#now I have other monsters to face aka my final assignments

[souglias]

Remember To Throw Your Expired Milk [GINTOKI]

Just because an era has passed, doesn't mean everything from then is lost.

c/w: self-indulgent, may have some timeline inaccuracies, mentions of the Joui War, mentions of injuries and scars

Gintoki x gn!reader (reader is implied to be smaller than him for a small part)

word count: 4.7k words (I'm sorry guys)

note: This fic serves an outlet for me, so when I mean self-indulgent, I really mean it!! Please let me know if you think I missed any content warnings. Border is a cropped frame from the Gintama The Final movie :)

cross-posted on AO3 (accessible from my profile)!

All likes and reblogs are appreciated!

The morning before you leave for the Joui war is a chilly autumn, with the last leaves barely hanging onto their branches. The four of you were to leave together: You, Gintoki, Takasugi and Katsura.

This particular morning, it is just you and Gintoki in the abandoned house that Takasugi and Katsura also lived in. Both of them have gone out for a bit. You didn’t know for what, but the house feels a little empty without the two.

Gintoki is keenly aware of you standing behind him, your eyes burning holes into his hands that are tightening his headband. He is about to attach his sword but decides to drop his hands to his sides instead, shaking them.

With his back still facing you, he spits, "Go back to Edo tonight. You have no use on the battlefield."

The monotonous banter, usually akin to a relentless fly, stings this time. It takes only a moment for him to realise the possible weight of his words. Tentatively, he looks over his shoulder at you. 

Gintoki doesn't know if he is more than a friend to you, but he would carry all your burdens and sorrow if it meant you wouldn’t enter the battlefield with them. If he has to choose his life or yours, he will choose yours. He would do anything if it meant that you would tease him about his natural perm or jab him playfully at his sides again. 

So, when he meets your unwavering yet melancholic gaze, he breaks the eye contact that barely lasts. His feet become a little heavier each time he sees you with that face. The more he trudges forward, the more he has to lose.

"I'm not useless. You know I can fight. Didn’t know you had such a shit impression of me."

You can, and you fight well. 

“But you don’t need to fight. You should protect your ass when you can and live. You’ve always been a scared kid anyway. Oh, who was the one who used to be intimidated by me?”

You retort back, but there’s no bite in it. “Shut your ass trap. I’m not chickening out now. You sound like the one who’s scared now.”

Gintoki’s heart is trembling. He sees the grim reaper preparing for its shift to make rounds and he does not want to see you among a pile of corpses. 

He flicks your forehead, takes your headband anyway and wraps it around your head. You too, carry the same pent-up fury from the Kansei Purge as everyone else. You have your grievances to air in your way too. Hell, if you asked him not to fight, he would have called you an idiot and ignored you.

His arms hover around your head as he ties a knot securely at the back of your head. Your head is almost on his chest, and his mind wanders to how close you are to him. 

“It hurts.”

“Ah, sorry.” 

His hands move to loosen your headband, but you rest one hand on his forearm to stop him. You stare straight into his chest and your free hand fidgets with the side of your pant leg. Gintoki realises that you are thinking about so much more than the headband. 

If he could even be audacious, he thinks he knows what you are thinking of. 

He tries to think of something to say. For a split moment, he even considers a hug. Even though it’s not something he has ever been good with. But before he gets to do anything at all, Takasugi creeps up from behind him.

“I can’t believe you guys. Getting all touchy-feely before the fight?” 

Gintoki immediately steps back, creating some distance between the two of you. He hurls some insults at Takasugi and the two of them bicker. When Katsura returns, instead of breaking up the fight, he joins in their nonsensical argument that is not even about the two of you anymore.

You take in this scene and etch it in your mind. This is the perfect time to have time halt if it is ever possible.

The four of you set out when it was time. As you attach your sword to your side, Gintoki comes up to you with his faux nonchalance. His eyes wander everywhere for a bit, one of his hands rubs the back of his head and the other seems to be lost on what to do. "You already know this, but do me a favour and buy me some strawberry milk on your next trip to the convenience store again. Keep them in the fridge.” 

He pauses as he watches your face shift from confusion to understanding.

“It has to be the Azuri brand one! Don't you dare drink it."

Your hand resting on the handle of your sheathed sword tightens.

“Okay, you better fucking come for it.”

Gintoki catches you with that melancholic smile again. He bumps your arm gently with his fist. Noticing you walk with less of a drag in your feet, he assumes it is good enough.

(You are always so difficult for him.)

Sometime towards the end of the Joui war, when the bodies all start to pile up and the soldiers are all weary, he loses sight of you. His eyes can no longer find the silhouette he has become so familiar with and his ears cannot find the rhythm of your steps that he has memorised by heart. You do not return to base when night falls. 

The voices all say you’re dead and gone, but Gintoki tries to protect the flickering flame of hope in his heart as he continues to fight. You promised him a carton- no, cartons of strawberry milk. You are far from stupid to take a promise to the afterlife with you. 

But when the Joui war ends, he disappears, just like everyone else. Along with the dying fire in his heart that he wilfully thought he could protect. Hope is a heavy thing to carry after all that has happened. 

The Amanto, who had kept you in a dark room for what felt like weeks, releases you into a world you are no longer familiar with. You find out that it’s only been days and that you were originally to be executed the next day. 

The sky is cluttered with more spaceships and the sun feels a little more cruel than you knew it to be. You walk with no aim, looking back now and then, thinking that you hear familiar voices. It goes on till the sight of the convenience store you frequented with your friends slowly pulls you back to reality. The weight of your emotions kicks in when you hear the welcome chime of the store. Your wounds start to weep and your muscles burn as you limp towards the refrigerator of cooled drinks. 

With a throat full of screams you bite back, you place a few cartons of strawberry milk from the barren refrigerator of the convenience store into your arms. Large ones to keep in the fridge, small ones in the event he wants to bring it out. The counter staff asks you if you are okay while he packs your purchases, but you simply brush him off.

As you drag your unwilling feet into the town that spells a lonely journey into the future, the carton of strawberry milk treads too to its expiration date. 

(How naive of you, to think Edo would be the town you could call home with everyone you cared about and the one man you loved.)

-

You wander within the city after you receive treatment, searching for a sign of anyone you know. Eventually, you traverse out of Edo. 

Whenever someone mentions the Four Heavenly Kings, you find your spirit to be lifted, only to be let down without fail. It is a name that strangers use so freely and carelessly. The four you know are now only legends, reduced to mere tales. They are unreachable, even as someone who has grown with them. You start to think maybe they are dead. Maybe you have just been searching for a time that has ceased to exist.

(Besides, you may have escaped death when you were released, but you think a part of you died that day too.)

It’s a long time before you force yourself to get your shit together. When you return to Edo, you see wanted posters of Katsura everywhere, the corners already peeling. One, hangs on by a small strip of tape, at a lamp post outside a humble ramen shop on the outskirts. You get a job at this ramen shop, and you stare at Katsura’s mugshot as you work until the poster gets blown away one day. With your pay, you get by and live in a simple rented apartment nearby.

When you finally bump into Katsura himself, you think you’re seeing the distant light at the end of the winding tunnel. He manages to fill you in on a bit, but takes off soon due to his predicament. The bare, discreet conversation you have with him ends up doing the opposite of what you hoped, whiffing out the little hope you carried instead. Sakamoto is assumed to be in space, which makes you a little relieved knowing he’s living his dream. But, the fact that the whereabouts of Gintoki and Takasugi are still uncertain makes you feel you’re still at square one. 

Despite the time that has passed, you still see Gintoki in many things. The Shounen Jump on the shelves. Anyone with their permed hair, even if it’s clearly artificial. And especially those fucking cartons of strawberry milk you keep. They are an anchor to your past and their tarnished, rusted edges dig into your skin. You want to throw them out so bad, but you can never bring yourself to. You stay at square one with these rotting cartons for the passing seasons.

On a chilly winter afternoon with snow that’s taking its time to fall, you find Gintoki when you pass through Kabukicho. Walking past Snack Otose, you catch a glimpse of a head of silver in your peripheral vision. 

You don’t recall when this… Yorozuya Gin-Chan came to be above Snack Otose. But you always pass Kabukicho in a hurry. Maybe it has always been there.

An old lady talks to him at his door, blocking him from your view on the ground floor. But you wouldn’t mistake that natural wavy perm of silver, even though all you see are strands peeking out from the sides of the old lady.

When she walks off with a face of frustration, you withdraw into a nearby alley in a flurry. You take in the scene of Gintoki with his exasperated look. He scratches his head a little and sighs, before he goes back inside. You take it as your sign to leave.

(Gintoki sees you. And he isn’t ready to talk to you either. Not with the way your fists clench. He immediately guesses what you’re feeling, if you have not changed immensely into someone different. He shakes away the urge to approach you and convinces himself again that just knowing that you are alive and warm is enough. He is content.)

The snow does not stop even when night falls. When Gintoki returns home, he turns the television on and stretches out with his feet propped up on his work desk. The doorbell rings and he sits up. His heart throbs, in anticipation for a certain someone. He tames it. Expectation is a potential recipe for disappointment.

When he opens the door, he finds you carrying two plastic bags. Your hands are very tightly wrapped around the handles. You refuse to look up at him.

“What? Asshole crawled back up from their grave? Not happy with what you got?”

You enter the house wordlessly and he shuffles out of your path. You drop the bags on the coffee table, causing a loud thud to resound in the room.

“Hey hey, the landlady downstairs is going to complain. She already came up bitching about the rent earlier this afternoon-”

“I owe you something. Did you forget?”

You pull a small carton of strawberry milk out of the bag and set it on the table. It is worn from weather and time. You rip open the top of the carton and the straw gets yanked out of the plastic, soon finding itself in the opening. 

Shoving the carton into his chest, you gather the courage to look him in the eye. The carton starts to wrinkle even more from your tightening grip. You hold it tighter, as if it would stop your tears from welling.

He notices the expiry date printed on the carton, which was more than one and a half years ago. His hand wraps around yours and he doesn’t let you slip them out.

“I don’t forget what people owe me that easily. Even if I died, I would demand for the guardians of hell to arrange a delivery to get them from you.”

Your grip loosens a little when you notice the soft, subtle smile on his face. There’s a lump in your throat again and you take a few deep breaths to stop it. The sound of the television fills the silence between the two of you for a bit.

“A little less than a year ago, I crossed paths with Zura. He told me both of you disappeared and didn’t know where you were.”

The next few words almost escape him. It makes you feel small and helpless to say it, even though he was right in front of you. “I thought maybe you died.”

A stray tear streaks down your cheek. He gently pries the milk from your hands and sets it down on the table.

(He thought you died too. Sure, without realising it, he started to carry hope in his heart again. But it felt like the weight of the world sometimes, and he had to carry it by dragging it across the ground. The possibility of you being six feet under rang so loud in his mind.

It only became lighter when he bumped into Katsura for the first time a few days ago. It was when he heard about you from Katsura. Gintoki headed down and watched you work in the ramen shop from the other side of the road. He left without approaching you. He didn’t know what he was going to say to you. Besides, seeing him could reopen old wounds and he didn’t want to do that to you. And just maybe, he was a little bit of a coward when it comes to you.

But he guesses it is all futile. You found him after all.)

With his thumb, he brushes your cheek. You notice scars on his arm that you don’t ever recall him having.

“You worry too much. It takes a lot to kill me.”

“But it hurt, didn’t it?”

It did. Even now, the wounds on his soul throb a little. He thinks he’s underestimated how much he missed you. “They’re just scratches.”

You inch towards him and put your arms around him for a hug. He tenses up at your touch, but he manages to loosen up and pats your back gently until you stop crying.

“Did you cry like that when you found Zura?”

“No.”

A stray smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. “Don’t waste your tears on Zura.”

“So you’re saying it’s worth it to cry for you?”

Gintoki’s eyes dart off in another direction. “No. Don't cry for me again.”

The way his sentence seemingly hangs thickens the air between the two of you. He scoffs and sits down on the sofa. Refusing to make eye contact with you, he rubs the back of his head and frowns.

He is still the Gintoki you committed to your memory and love. Even as time passes, he still has the same habits. Even though his fashion sense has changed, you still see him adorn the same shades. You can still see the pureness of his soul even with the haze of time. Despite the tears, you find a hearty laugh rising up your throat. So you let it out. 

He freezes upon hearing your laugh and realises that he has not heard something so genuine from you for so long, even from before the two of you parted.

As he runs his fingers through his natural perm for the last time and stands up, he suggests, “Let’s go to the supermarket. We should get new cartons.”

You glance at the clock. “Sorry, maybe not today. It takes a while to get to the supermarket and I need to get back to my apartment too. I live on the outskirts.”

“I’ll send you back. I have a scooter now.”

“Wow, I assumed you couldn’t pay rent. Where did you get the money for that? Did you rob a bank? It’s well within the capabilities of the White Yaksha.”

His eyebrow twitches. “Quit yapping and move along. I bargained hard and relentlessly for a lower price.”

As both of you make your way to the scooter, you continue to make more snarky comments about how he got the scooter. When you see the scooter, you decide to make some more comments about the scooter, though you actually think it is a fine thing. He smacks you on the head, eliciting a giggle from you instead of what he thought would be a retort.

“Your home is so damned far away, you know,” Gintoki complains as he turns on the engine.

“You were the one who offered.”

Without much thought, you tease him as you sit behind him, “Then, where should I stay? With you?” 

You realise what you’ve asked and you’re about to make a comment to brush it off. But Gintoki plops a helmet on your head before you can do so, and starts the scooter. As he begins to drive off, you place your hands tentatively on his waist. He throws a glance over his shoulder at you. “Hold on tight and don’t let go.”

It doesn’t take long for you to get used to your hand on him and he can feel your tense hands slowly relax. With his eyes on the road in front of him, he’s not 100% sure, but he thinks you’re leaning in a little.

(The scooter doesn’t go as fast as those flashy sports cars the rich use to zoom around town. But you still get to the convenience store a lot quicker than you expected. It’s too fast, you feel like you will never have enough time with him. 

Even though he is right in front of you, the lost time makes the vast distance between the two of you so clear. It is one that you cannot cross now with your arms, even if you gathered the courage to wrap them wholly and tightly around him. The thought that he might disappear again will gnaw at you for a while.

That night, he pays for the strawberry milk. The two of you take the last two cartons of the Azuri brand he very much prefers. You take your time to sip on it during the ride, watching his wavy hair let loose in the wind and catch the lights of the slowly dwindling traffic around you.)

-

Gintoki gives you a face when he looks up from the grocery bag on the coffee table. His eyes fill with incredulity and his lips downturn dramatically. "What is this?"

You put up an air of innocence, teasing in a sing-song voice, "What's what?"

"THIS!"

He pulls out a carton of milk from the grocery bag with two fingers gripping it and waves it around hysterically.

"This is plain milk!"

"You're stating the obvious."

He drops the carton back into the grocery bag and yells out in exasperation, hands grasping at nothing in the air. You stifle a laugh.

"Still gives you the protein that you so absolutely love in your strawberry milk, doesn't it?"

He plops down on the sofa and crosses his arms. Eyebrow twitching, he begins a lecture.

"Listen [name]. Plain milk is not the same as strawberry milk. Strawberry milk is NOT just syrup or sugar getting added into milk."

You nod, pursing your lips so as not to let out a laugh at the bewildering he says and the ones he might say. 

His doctor highly recommended that he cut down on sugar. Based on your internet searches, strawberry-flavoured milk has more sugar than plain ones. And because you love your boyfriend so much, you decide to take it into your own hands to buy plain milk which would be much better for his health. Watching him become exasperated over it is just a huge cherry on top.

Sensing that you found his reasoning ridiculous, he whines and throws himself face down onto his sofa. You don’t bother to suppress your laughter when he starts kicking his feet. 

Out of nowhere, he jumps off the sofa and slides his wooden sword into his belt. “You did this on purpose, didn’t you? You offered to buy it because you planned this, right? Because the doctor said I had to reduce my sugar intake.”

How dare you, his beloved, commit such an act of betrayal to him! He adds a little shout in between his rambling. Then, adds, “Sugar is life, [name]! We have to go buy them now!”

He tugs at your arm and you refuse to budge. Initially, you reason that he can’t leave the house because Yorozuya’s opening hours aren’t over yet. As he tugs harder, you start to mock him for having such a sweet tooth, how he’s weak for being unable to go by without strawberry milk and how ungrateful he is for you. He retorts back saying you shouldn’t have backstabbed your boyfriend like that, and there’s nothing sinful with having a sweet tooth. In the end, he lifts you by your waist with his arm and out of the house into the spring evening. Conscious of the looks of onlookers, you smack him on his back harder and harder till he complains about how it hurts and puts you down.

Gintoki continues to lecture you about the strawberry milk as the two of you walk to the convenience store that opened months ago. In the five-minute walk, you let him go on about the difference and hum now and then as an indication that you are listening. At the same time, you imagine the pink cherry blossom buds overhead. You imagine the falling sakura blooms around him. A mental image of the blossoms in his silver hair surfaces.

When he finishes his sentence, you comment, “I think you could be a strawberry parfait too.”

“Huh?”

It’s now your turn to talk in this walk and Gintoki sees the vision you’re having. He’s about to make a dirty joke, but you jab him at his side before he can say it.

When the two of you enter the store, he runs straight to the refrigerator. You trail behind him, already finding his arms full of large and small Maiji milk cartons although it has only been one minute. 

It has become normal for Gintoki to take the Maiji brand carton without a second thought. You can no longer find the Azuri brand milk in Edo anymore, and possibly the whole of Japan. It took him a little getting used to and some whining to you, but he has come to enjoy it. 

When you watch him try to arrange and squeeze everything into the basket, you think maybe your plan to help him cut down on sugar has backfired. Mans simply trying to stock up at this point. You end up having to do some convincing in that narrow aisle, with some other shoppers, for this manchild to put a few back.

From the refrigerator to the cashier and back to Yorozuya, Gintoki keeps pouting. You poke his cheek with his free hand, but all you get is a “hmph”. He’s not going to give in so easily! It takes so much more than paying for his sweets and saying he looks like a strawberry parfait!!

You think about offering to pay for his parfait, but you tell yourself not to give in to him. You want him to live a long life and die of old age, not go out way before his time in agony because of sugar.

Gintoki plops down at the corner of the sofa when the two of you return to Yorozuya. He starts reading the latest copy of Shounen Jump with one leg crossed on the sofa, sipping loudly on his milk in an attempt to irritate you. You sit on the other corner with your drink and magazine you bought yourself earlier, and you prop your feet on top of his lap. He smacks your feet once, but he lets you be as he always does. On other days, he enjoys doing it to you too. 

Every now and then, you look up to see him engrossed in his manga. Sometimes when you blink, you still see images of the past versions of him with Katsura and Takasugi at his side.

You get up and give him a kiss on the cheek, before heading to the stairs outside. He’s a bit caught off guard, but you leave him to process it.

On the street downstairs, a few kids scramble around, presumably to head home. Your mind wanders to the three boys you grew up with. There are still days you think you wake from your nap in the classroom to the three boys duking it out in the dojo. But when your bleary vision in the morning clears and you notice that the ceiling above is different from the one at Shoka Sonjuku, reality settles. It’s just a ruckus made by some kids outside. You stare at the ceiling, remembering that Takasugi is at large with his new comrades. You remember that Zura now has his own faction, which both you and Gintoki reject his relentless invitations to. You remember that Shoyo-sensei is gone. 

You hear the sliding door open behind you and Gintoki leans on the part of the ledge beside you. 

“What’s up?”

“Nothing.”

Gintoki notices you running your finger back and forth on the grooved surface of the ledge. He places a kiss on your temple. A little hesitant at first, but he goes for it. He then shifts behind you slightly, resting his hand on top of yours. With his steady frame behind you, you lean back a little on him. 

(Gintoki wonders what Shoyo-sensei would think about the two of you. Hopefully, he approves, even though Shoyo had witnessed him disturbing you in class and outside of it. Hell, Shoyo even thought Gintoki was bullying you at one point and Gintoki had gone to lengths to prove otherwise. He would also argue that he was teasing you to get you to break out of your shell. Though in hindsight, maybe he had been a little mean about a few things.)

The wish to return to the bygone days still squeezes your heart with its agony. The days that Shoka Sonjuku was your home. Its invisible hands still try to grasp at the memories that are becoming ever-distant and drifting away in the stream of time. It is always the worst when you find resemblances that you find hard to ignore.

But everyone has found their place in this new era, including you. The night he dropped you off after reuniting, he asked you’ll come to Yorozuya again. You said you’d try, but no promises because it was far. Though, as you watched his receding figure ride back into the brightly lit town you once detested, you knew you would. 

You're glad you did. After all, you found a place with Gintoki. A place, in this still unfamiliar city, that you can finally bring yourself to call home again. 

If you've come this far, thank you so much for reading this self-indulgent, monster of a fic <3

#sakata gintoki x reader #gintoki x reader #sakata gintoki #gintoki imagines #gintama imagines #gintama x reader #gintama #souglia.s #my gintoki lovergirl era really hit this hard #this is my saddest era too esp bc of the songs I've been listening to while writing this #now I have other monsters to face aka my final assignments #still can't believe I spit out 4.7k worth of words for this man #I am very downbad for him #when I have the time watch me yap about the themes and shit and stuff I couldn't include

[bakudeku-recommendations]

BKDK Childhood Friends Recommendations (Pt. 3)

Note: Sorry for the long wiat, as you can see there are double the amount of fics in this one. This is the ;last planned part, but let me know if you want me to look for some more. There are some really disturbing fics here, so please read the descriptions and tags! Have fun reading!

Part 1 Part 2

1. Lemonhead by bkdkink

"I'll never outgrow you."   "We don't have much of a choice."

"Don't nourish me, then. Keep me small and withered so you can't ever say I was too much to bear. So I'll never outgrow you."

2. Childhood Kisses by Kaligraphy

There are things you do that are cute when you're a kid but kind of weird when you're older.

Kissing your childhood friend's injuries better is one of them.

3. I’ve always known you by Bitchitsbakugou

Kacchan and Deku are forced to take a ‘how well you know each other test’

4. As Long As You’re Next To Me by Bitchitsbakugou

Bakugou Katsuki and Midoriya Izuku have been best friends until middle school however, not everyone is privy to this information. When they are both excused from class together, the students of 1-A get curious.

5. For The First Time by Bitchitsbakugou

The one where the public realizes Deku and Groundzero were childhood friends through a game show.

6. fuck you and your shitty social constructs by TheSecondAssassin

Izuku throws knives at cotton targets all day and by the time he’s finally assigned a new mission to help bodyguard and train the hero course at UA, he’s all but ready.

7. I’m Friends with the Monster in my Closet by GIOpet (nkglasses)

Katsuki has a strange friend that gets stranger as time goes by.

8. If your touch could cure me by Yurusarenai (iwantcandy2), Yurusarenai

Soulmates AU where physical contact with your soulmate makes your quirk stronger. For Katsuki, this means every time he and Deku touch he feels invincible. For quirkless Deku, it means he doesn't even realize his soulmate is right beside him.

9. Kiss ≠ Sex by Altheas_Rose

"Deku and I have had sex before, no big deal."

"WHAT?!"

10. Desiring Ruin by towardthesun

“C’mon Bakubro,” Kiri beamed, throwing a casual arm around Katsuki’s shoulder, “Aren’t you at least a little bit curious about what a dream fulfilled would be like? It’s great!"

Katsuki would like to disagree.

OR Mina's friend who can show people their heart's deepest desires comes to visit, and Bakugou has no intentions of getting anywhere near her. He doesn't want to know what his heart wants, because he's sure that it won't be something that's achievable. But intentions mean nothing when Kaminari is involved.

11. The time class 1-A missed all the signs by oocephalus

When after a long tiring day at school class 1-A is faced with a long weekend and a friday night without plans, what shenanigans might they get up to and what happens when the alcohol makes Midoriya Izuku speak his mind.

or/ Bakugou and Midoriya are hopelessly obvious about their relationship and class 1-A miss everything.

12. All the times 1-A forgot BkDk grew up together and the one time it was abundantly clear by oocephalus

Bakugou and Midoriya grew up together, but seeing as they don't talk about it a lot the class often forgets,

what happens when they're reminded?

13. Pinky Promise by Dekusbkg (Smh_tessa)

Spiky blond hair, crimson eyes.. he’s seen him before. In a dream maybe? Or maybe it’s just because he resembles his aunt so much.. Yeah, that has to be it-

“K-Kacchan!”

He’s not sure where the name came from, or why he even said it. It was out before he could stop it, and now those ruby eyes are pinning him to his spot.

14. surprise reunions and childhood rekindling by ladyofsnails

Bakugou Katsuki and Midoriya Izuku haven't seen each other in five years. But when their friends suddenly bring them together and they finally meet again, it's like no time has passed at all.

AKA Katsuki and Izuku see each other again after a long time and immediately start acting like the crazy best friends they are, the Baku and Deku squads are very, very confused.

15. An Interesting Contradiction by schrijverr

When Midoriya was diagnosed as quirkless, Bakugo was certain his friend could become a hero by helping him and being “the man in the chair.” He and Midoriya stayed Kacchan and Zuku even when they go to different High Schools. At UA Bakugo mentions his friend multiple times and everyone builds a version of this mysterious friend, who seems slightly insane with the stuff Bakugo says about him. … Until they come face to face to him at the Provisional Hero License exam and he is the opposite of anything they thought.

AKA what if Bakugo stayed friends with Midoriya and he never got OFA (and I accidentally made Bakugo the main character)

16.Who's Katsuki Bakugou? by angst_queen12

Set in an alternate universe where Katsuki was severely abused by his mother, he developed DID. As the core, he can't remember any of his trauma and often believes his diagnosis is completely wrong. He spends most days in the inner world where it's safe and only fronts every few months to check in on his life.

Takashi is the host. Only Deku knows about the alters. But what happens when Aizawa begins to suspect something is wrong with his top student?

17. lovers to rivals to lovers? by Kassidey_01

Mina had the bright Idea for Class 3A to have a party. Everyone had agreed, even Bakugo. It started fine; they always do. It wasn't until Hagakure asked that traitorous question.

18. puzzle piece by whatismedoing

5 times class 1-a isn't sure if they should be jealous or weirded out by the two's "friendship" and the 1 time they came to accept that the two just simply fit together like each other's puzzle piece

19. His and her circumstances by Infinity_Sansa

Eijirou notices that Bakugou is acting strange. One night after the whole class meets to discuss about his weird behavior, he receives a call from the same Bakugou, asking for help...

20. Where the Wisterias Bloom by PuhTaehToh

Flowing green curly hair tied behind in a ponytail. The flutter of the pretty hanafuda earrings. The click of the sword being put back in its scabbard is heard as the demon’s head falls to the ground, slowly disintegrating into dust. Katsuki stared at the boy who was just cuddled in his arms four month ago. Izuku.

-or basically Katsuki is a supportive bf and goes to ua while Izuku is part of the demon slayer corps slaying demons before coming back to hug his caramel scented boyfriend.

-alternatively, Izuku is a pretty boy who’s identity is trying to be uncovered by Katsuki’s friend group.

#ao3 #ao3 link #ao3fic #bkdk #mha bkdk #childhood friends #childhood friends bkdk #cute #fanfic recommendation #reading fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic

[chernobog13]

HAPPY STAR TREK DAY!

(although if you live in Canada, “Star Trek” day was two days ago, because the show was broadcast there first)

Today marks the 55th anniversary of the Star Trek franchise.  Premiering on the NBC network at 8:30 pm, the country encountered most of the crew of the USS Enterprise for the first time in the episode The Man Trap.

Although it was the first episode broadcast, The Man Trap was actually the sixth episode produces.  However, it was a good choice as a premier because it  included most of the main cast as well as many of the elements that would become staples of the series.

First and foremost being the USS Enterprise, a ship unlike any other ever seen.

Ah, the old NCC-1701!  She is a thing of beauty!

The episode, of course, opens with the familiar voice over “Captain’s log,” which was a wonderful storytelling device for setting the narrative.  But even though we hear Captain Kirk’s voice first (although we don’t know his name yet), Spock is the first major character we see.  The log entry informs us that Spock has been left in charge onboard the Enterprise.

We also get our first glimpse of Lt. Uhura, seated at the navigator’s station.  It won’t be until a little later that we learn that she is the communications officer for the ship.  But this quick scene establishes that the Enterprise’s crew is very diverse (an alien and a Black female both on the bridge), which raised more than a few eyebrows back in 1966.

Next we get our first view of the transporter effect.  There is no explanation given as to what is happening, other than Kirk’s voiceover stating that he and Dr. McCoy are “beaming down” to the planet’s surface.  Star Trek, especially in the early days, decided the audience would be able to figure out what was happening.

Then we get out first look at Captain James Kirk and Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy.  The scene immediately establishes the friendship between the two, with Kirk’s gentle teasing of his ship’s doctor.  Also note, this is the shortest you’ll see Kirk’s hair in the entire series.  He’s got a proper military cut here; by the end of the third season he almost looks like a hippie.

There’s also a great bit later on, when Kirk and McCoy are speaking to each other on the ship via viewscreen.  McCoy tells Kirk he’s having trouble sleeping.  Kirk’s reply: “Try taking one of those red pills you gave me last week.  You’ll sleep!”

Throughout the episode we’ve seen Kirk as the tough, no-nonsense, by-the-book captain who commands the respect of the people he leads.  But these bits with McCoy show his humorous, human side that makes him a great character.  I truly miss first season Kirk, especially the first part of the season, because that’s my favorite version of him. 

Peppered throughout the episode are shots establishing many of the other characters  who will become regulars on the series.    Here we have Yeoman Janice Rand, who we learn is the captain’s yeoman and quite popular among the male crew members.

Unfortunately, Yeoman Rand only appeared in eight episodes spread across the first half of the season.  

Rand delivers the tray of food at the botany lab, where we meet Sulu for the first time.

Since this is the first time the audience see Lieutenant Sulu, it would be understandable if it was assumed that he was just a botanist.  Actually, Sulu had a few different positions in the first season (he was a physicist in the second pilot Where No man Has Gone Before, which would be broadcast 2 weeks after The Man Trap).

Surprisingly, Lieutenant Uhura seemed to get the most screen time of all the secondary characters. (not that I’m complaining; Nichelle Nichols is absolutely gorgeous!).  Earlier on the bridge she was flirting with Spock (with Spock subtly tugging on his shirt collar, indicating his discomfort), and then chastising him for his apparent lack of concern when he learned that a member of the landing party is dead.  Here she is being the queen that she is, teaching two other crew members proper turbolift etiquette: you let the person in the lift get out before you get in (same goes for elevators, just in case you didn’t know).

Two other recurring characters, Chief Engineer Montgomery “Scotty” Scott and Nurse Christine Chapel, are the only two not seen in this episode.  Scotty’s voice, though is heard on the communicator responding to Kirk from the transporter room. As for Nurse Chapel, she was not introduced until The Naked Time, which was the next episode (#7) produced, but the fourth to air.

One thing which I didn’t notice until I rewatched this episode just now (or maybe I did notice, but just forgot) is that Kirk is carrying a phaser almost the whole show, even while on the bridge.

Sharp-eyed viewers may also spot various crew members in older uniforms, like those worn in the two pilots, The Cage and Where No Man Has Gone Before.

Some people may call these continuity errors, or chalk it up to the wardrobe department recycling costumes for the extras.  But anyone who’s been in the military knows there’s always a transition period when new uniforms are introduced.  For example, my Basic Training class was the absolute last in the Army to be issued the old olive drab green fatigues.  The next class was issued the new woodland camouflage BDUs that became the standard for the next ten years.  I was given six months to purchase a full set of BDUs (you read that right: I had to buy them with my own money).  However, unless BDUs were specifically designated as the uniform of the day I was able to wear the o.d.green fatigues for another two years until they were phased out completely. I imagine these crew members are in a similar situation.

A few more Star Trek “firsts” from The Man Trap:

Kirk (or any crew member) using the communicator.  Kirk is on his communicator a lot this episode.

The Enterprise on red alert.

A gun - or, more correctly, phaser - battle.  Here we see Professor Crater armed with an “old style” phaser, but really just them same type that was used in the two pilots.

The very first phaser shot, as Professor Crater snipes at Kirk and Spock.

Kirk firing his phaser.  Don’t worry, it’s set on “stun.”

Professor Crater getting struck by phaser fire.  Don’t worry, it was set on “stun.”  He’s going to talk like he’s drunk for the next few minutes.

Kirk and Spock planetside, establishing that the two highest ranking officers will beam down alone to handle a dangerous situation.  It’s not like they have an entire Security Department on board the ship.

The very first meeting in the Briefing Room.

The crew at various stations on the bridge, although Uhura and Sulu are not at their usual posts, which just shows that this crew is highly competent and can handle multiple duties.  Oh, and two of them happen to be women, and tow are people of color.

Sulu chiming in on the meeting via viewscreen.

And then, because it was a science fiction television show in the 1960s, the network insisted there be a monster.  So we got the salt vampire, the shape-changing creature that had been killing all sorts of people by sucking the salt out of their bodies.  Not too scary by today’s standards, but I wouldn’t want to run into it in a dark alley.

The first time we get to see Kirk make that face as he screams in pain.

And the first time we see a dead monster/alien on the Enterprise.

The, finally, the what will become familiar denouement with everyone on the bridge as Kirk gives the order for the Enterprise to break orbit and proceed to its next assignment.  Notice that Sulu has finally managed to make it to the helmsman’s station.

Headed off into space for another adventure next week!

1966 was a great year.  It gave us Ultra Q. Ultraman, Ambassador Magma (aka The Space Giants), The New Adventures of Superman animated series, the Slurpee and, of course, Star Trek.

55 years later Star Trek is more popular than ever, with several new television series available, and another feature film in the works.  Here’s hoping for another 55 years of exploring the galaxy!

#Star Trek: The Original Series #Star Trek Day #USS Enterprise #NCC-1701 #Captain James T. Kirk #Mr. Spock #Dr. Bones McCoy #Lt. Sulu #Lt. Uhura #Yeoman Rand #Salt Vampire

[notyouraverageeldaryafan]

World Building part 1/5

The History of the Fae World

Hello and welcome to the first post dedicated to explaining how I would rewrite Eldarya! You can find the context to this post here. Before I begin here is your kind reminder that this is just my opinion and that it is subjective and that my version/AU is not better than the original or any other version for that matter, feel free to disagree and even tell me how wrong I am as long as you remain kind and polite. I will assume you are familiar with the game’s plot and so these posts will contain spoilers.

Let’s start with one of the core problems of this game, the world building. The game glosses over it, vaguely explaining it and seldom utilizes it in the plot. The team had a few good ideas, such as the war between the dragons and the aengels and it’s aftermath, but also they fail to take into account some of their decisions and their consequences. I am referring to the fact that the ritual was not completed and thus the food grown on Eldarya isn’t nutritional, it’s interesting in theory but the application is sloppy considering they have to constantly steal food from Earth but are unable to bring the main character back home. I will try to rewrite this origin story as well as a bit more of this world’s history, trying to make it as interesting but without it having so many consequences that are just making things less fun. (warning: this is unnecessarily long) 

The creation:

The birth of Christ was but a few centuries away: humanity was slowly learning how to write, faes were worshiped like gods and everyone lived in harmony. All was good and dandy until The Oracle (yes, the one in the Crystal) foretells a grim future. The Oracle was but a young witch back then, someone very similar to the Oracle of Delphi who could see into the future. She began to tell of a world where there’s only God who’s word is law and where fear of the unknown pushes humanity to persecute and abuse of faes (aka Christianity and unholy amount of persecution they led against witches and pagans). This of course was terrifying to the current leaders of the faes and, despite having some doubts, they still decided to act upon this prophecy. The Oracle offered the solution, the creation of a new world, an escape, so that, if things get out of control, the faes can just escape to this world and close the gates towards Earth guarantying their safety. 

All that was required was to complete a century long ritual, led by none other than the Oracle, where three of the mightiest faes species will have to sacrifice themselves in order to use the power within them to create this new world. These species symbolize what this new world should be like: the Dragons represent its power and might, the Phoenix, its immortality and fairness, the Aengels, its generosity and beauty. But there was a catch. The Oracle was using part of the power released by this sacrifice to become more powerful herself, unbeknownst to the others. Her Apprentice ended up discovering her secret and told the sacrificed about it. They decided to trap her during the last ritual inside of a giant crystal so that she may not use her new found powers against them in the future. And so they did, The Oracle found herself eaten by blue crystals where she stood and as she understood what was happening to her, she cursed this new world that she built: pieces of her Crystal will make faes go insane with greed and power, forcing them on killing sprees, that as much as they will try to keep the crystal in one piece, it will shatter, poisoning the inhabitants reminding them of her wrath. Dumbfounded, the remaining faes didn’t know what to do now, afraid of going in this new and now completed world, none wanting to go insane. The Apprentice stepped up, promising she knew how to appease her late master and thus control the intensity of this curse. 

Thus began something known as the First Wave, only a few thousand faes left for this new world they have created, to understand if it was truly dangerous, led by the Apprentice and much later by her reincarnations. Among these faes were the Original Three (the Dragons, Aengels and Phoenix) who each claimed one of the four main continents, the last one going to The Apprentice and her followers (you can find more details about the geography of this new world here [yet to be written]). At first, the Crystal was easy to control and the cases of Corrupted Faes were few and far between but it couldn’t last forever. (cf:The Fall of the Mightiest and The Return of The Oracle, found below) 

The War between the Dragons and the Aengels, also known as the Rise of the Mightiest:

The Ritual has left the Original Three weak and far less in numbers than they used to be. The Apprentice decided to give up the continent she was assigned, preferring to dedicate her life to dealing with the Oracle than to rule land. Both the Dragons and the Aengels wished to take this now ‘vacant’ continent for themselves. They were unable to compromise lands both wanting the land in its entirety. A war began between the two, The War of The Mighty Two. Meanwhile the Phoenix decided to remain true to their principals and remained neutral and fair, not taking part in this quarrel. They ended up regretting this much later. The war stretched for a couple of centuries until the Aengels disappeared completely from the face of this new world, declaring the Dragons victors and rulers of now three of the four main continents. Thus the Dragons began to change history, changing the name of the Aengels into Daemons and antagonizing them in history books. The Phoenix let them do so out of fear but also because they were afraid of losing their neutral stance. 

Special thanks to @partyinnevarra for helping me perfect this section and giving me the idea for the better reason behind the War between The Dragons and the Aengels, thanks again for your help <3

The Fall of the Mightiest and The Return of the Oracle:

In some sort of divine karma, the Dragons themselves suffered greatly. The Crystal, who had been quiet until then, awoke. The Oracle, who is theorized to have a conscious, waited until the new world was at its weakest to attack. The Dragons were the main victims of the First Corruption, going insane with power and destroying the world they promised to protect. The local faes were overwhelmed and called upon the faes that had remained on Earth to help them, mostly Dragons that have stayed behind. This was know as the Second Wave, starting around the fall of the roman empire and ending around the middle of the Dark Ages. The on-going fight with the Corrupted lasted less of a millennium and is to this day the longest cycle of Corruption to date. It is also good to know that back then, the faes weren’t sure how to fight these Corrupted, even more so that they used to be their saviors and were the strongest faes at the time. 

The easiest way to deal with the Corrupted was to kill them and take the piece of Crystal from their cadavers in order for it not to spread. It was the way that was prioritized for it was the most straight forward one (this technique is still used to this day). Another way is to trap the Corrupted in objects or caves or what-not, anything that can potentially contain something, but it required a lot of skill and maana and thus was deemed too costly (more on how that works here [yet to be written]) (this can also be an interesting villain for an episode, maybe a Dragon from the Dark-Ages trapped in ice or something else being freed by a villain or something) (this technique also explains the monster that could eat knowledge that was released by the main character in one of the episode). The last and perhaps the most efficient way of dealing with the Corrupted is through the Apprentice’s divine powers. The reincarnation of The Apprentice can extract the Crystal piece out of the Corrupted without harming them, this is called the Purification, but it is energy consuming and, well, there has only been 4 reincarnated at a time for thousands of Corrupted, so it is still considered the last viable option. (more information about how the Reincarnated work go here [yet to be written])

The First Corruption led to the almost complete extinction of the Dragons. On one side they were Corrupted and killed, on the other they fought against their brothers to extract the Crystal from them. The few Dragons left on Earth were hunted for sport by the likes of Arthur and his knights. A few unhatched eggs were saved and are kept by the Phoenix, in hopes that one day they will be able to save their species but there have been many debates surrounding the subject, mainly because of the fear that if the Dragons were to return, the Crystal might target them again. 

Aengels, Daemons and The Divine:

The Aengels were not all gone, a few escaped to Earth while the rest went into hiding. The ones on Earth quickly abused the then growing Christianism, becoming the known angels and demons. Despite that, they couldn’t hide from the witch hunts and the industrialization and either disappeared or returned to the fae world during the Final Wave. 

The Final Wave and The Second Corruption:

After the last of the Dragons disappeared, the First Corruption calmed down, the exact details aren’t clear, mostly because the faes that survived were few and traumatized. It took one full century for this new world to heal and for the faes on Earth to figure out that maybe, living in the fear of being Corrupted is better than dying at the hands of angry mods. Because, you guessed it, the Inquisition began followed by the witch hunts as well as the colonization of most of Earth which meant that even the places that were still considered “safe” (places that respected their legends and magical creatures, co-habiting, I’m thinking mostly of native tribes) started being invaded. Thus the last of the faes left Earth and joined the fae world, though a few remained but not enough to be worth being considered. The Second Corruption happened soon after the Final Wave and lasted less than two centuries. This time, everything was managed better, mostly because of the creation of the Guards (one of which the story takes place in), military bases meant to regulate the “bigger” Crystals and be able to predict the amount of Corruption, usually a Reincarnated accompanies the Guard members. 

The Third Corruption:

After a few centuries of moderate silence where the Corrupted were present but not the worst of threats, the Oracle awoke again. And it is at this moment the actual story starts. 

Nota bene:

This version of their history won’t be told to the heroine until much later in the game. At first, she will believe the story the Dragons have crafted, the version where Daemons are the villains and deserved what happened to them. The Oracle is also not seen as the villain for most of the game, mostly because the Oracle and the Crystal are seen as two different entities in the faes’ consciousness. The Oracle is seen as a helping hand, sometimes even worshipped as the goddess of this new world. The Apprentice and her reincarnations pushed forward this deification in an attempt to calm her late master’s wrath, maybe being seen as the goddess she always wanted to be would sooth her (spoilers: it doesn’t). All of this history being hidden would work greatly in the game’s over-arcing theme of lies vs. truths (it’s a theme that was present in the original material: just look at how many things the Guard hides from the protagonist even in A New Era where she is their savior). The fact that most of the faes population believed a lie ties in perfectly into the theme without making characters that the player is supposed to like and sometimes romance lie to the protagonist’s face (idk why for some reason beemoov keeps making their LIs lie to their main character, no one in 2021 finds that hot anymore, not that i think anyone ever found it hot in the first place, also you don’t need to have people lie to each other to create drama pls beemoov im sick of it) (sorry for the rant xD)

Wow!! I’m actually done... this was way to long, thank you so much for reading so far if you did. This is way too fun tho, wish I could do something more with this than just throw it in the void that is tumblr. Oh well. Next time, I’ll try to tackle the gameplay and the dreaded maana system.

Thanks again and have a good day!

#rewriting eldarya as not-really-an-average fan #eldarya #world building part 1/5 #order 1 #the history of the faes #man i forgot how hard is english

[lesbian-percy-weasley]

How To Make Your Crush Fall In Love With You In Three Easy Steps by Gay-Natasha-Saves-The-World on Ao3 (aka your Frankenstein references in Harry Potter fanfiction dealer)

Chapter 2: Make Yourself Desirable

Ship: Perciver

Content warning: Spoilers to the American satirical comedy But I’m A Cheerleader staring Natasha Lyonne and Clea Duvall in the first paragraphs. (It’s free on YouTube if you haven’t seen it)

Summary: Percy is starting to question his feelings about Oliver while Oliver tries everything in his power to prove to Percy he’s sort of an intellectual

A/N: Online school has totally messed with my sleep schedule so midnight fic release woohoo

“I swear film studies attract the worst type of people,” Penny sighed as she sat down at the library table with her friends. “This Tarantino fanboy was trying to talk to me about Pulp Fiction and then acted like I killed his dog when I said I didn’t like it. Cinema peaked with But I’m A Cheerleader and you can’t convince me otherwise.”

“Oh please, what’s so good about that movie?” Cedric complained. “Ummm, it’s gay, it’s a commentary about how gender roles are bullshit, it has a happy ending, and prince Zuko is in it,” Penny argued while she was opening her lunch.

“I would hardly call getting disowned by your family and being homeless a happy ending.”

“Did you not pay attention to the movie at all? First of all, they weren’t homeless; they were staying with Larry and Lloyd Morgan-Gordon. And second of all the last scene of the movie shows Megan’s parents in a support group for people with gay children so clearly they didn’t disown her.” Penny could deal with a lot of bullshit, but someone saying But I’m A Cheerleader was a bad movie was not one of them.

Percy however found this hilarious, but he was trying to hold in his laughter since they were in a library and his laugh was notoriously loud. Penny and Cedric were continuing to argue about the movie and Percy managed to gain composure. That’s when he noticed Oliver looking at him from next to a shelf.

He gave him a small friendly wave before he walked away of embarrassment. Strange. But Percy decided not to think a lot about it.

“Was that your boyfriend?” Penny teased Percy. “Don’t be ridiculous, it's just my friend from English.” He replied trying everything he could not make his face blush. “Oh, so he’s the person we have to thank for getting you to finally shut up about it.” Cedric laughed.

There was no hiding Percy’s blush now. “Oh wait, I get it. He’s not your boyfriend but you want him to be.” Penny exclaimed like this was a great revelation. “No!” Percy said a bit louder than he meant to, earning a harsh glare from Ms. Pince. “He’s just my friend. Besides, I doubt he’s gay, and even if he is, how would he know I’m gay.”

“Your computer screensaver is literally a picture of Oscar Wilde. It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out.” Cedric replied matter-of-factly. Percy couldn’t even muster a reply to that. Yes, Cedric was right but that still didn’t prove that he would have any chance of ever being with Oliver.

I mean just look at him. He’s a lanky, ginger nerd who was too shy to have more than 2 good friends and Oliver was a gorgeous and popular star sports player. Even if Oliver was gay, why would he want to be with him when he could be with any other boy in school?

Before he knew it, lunch ended and he had to go on with his day. But the thought of Oliver would be on his mind for the rest of the day.

Oliver was extremely tired after track practice. Besides the growing mountain of homework he had, he wanted to read the book for Percy. As much as he wanted to ignore it, if he did his grades would drop even lower and he would absolutely be kicked from the team. So the book could wait for now.

By the time he was done with his homework, he felt like he was about to pass out. But he HAD to read the book. It couldn’t be that hard to read, right? After all, he watched the movie with his parents a few years ago.

Oliver couldn’t even get past page 3 of Frankenstein before almost dozing. “I thought there was supposed to be a monster…” He mumbled to himself as he set the book down. He decided that he will try again tomorrow. If that didn’t work he would just SparkNotes it. It was almost 11 pm anyway.

For the next week, Oliver spent virtually every bit of the little free time he had reading Frankenstein. It was deceptively small for the amount of effort it took to read it. But late one night, he finally finished it.

The amount he took in was debatable but he understood enough to prove he read it. Just as he was thinking about messaging Percy about it, his phone beeped. He picked it up to see Percy had already messaged him.

ThatPercival: Do you still need help with the English homework?

Oliver.Would: Nah, I figured it out.

ThatPercival: Oh, okay.

Oliver.Would: I’ve been getting better at English this semester lol. I actually just finished reading Frankenstein.

ThatPercival: Really? What did you think about it?

Oliver.Would: I thought you were right about it being a better Jekyll and Hyde.

ThatPercival: Right? Mary Shelley did it first and better. I don’t know why we don’t read it instead.

Oliver.Would: If you got to pick the books we read in school people would actually pay more attention.

ThatPercival: I doubt they would pay any more attention to Pride and Prejudice or the Picture of Dorian Gray than they already do when they’re reading The Great Gatsby. But I would have more fun.

Oliver.Would: Touche. But at least we would be reading better books. You don’t even understand how boring English was before you came along.

ThatPercival: Speaking of English, what happened in the first semester that made Mr. Lupin have assigned seating? He never did that last year.

Oliver.Would: Oh yeah, Marcus Flint punched someone in the face over a seat.

ThatPercival: Asgjfhksdfkfdj What????

Oliver.Would: Yeah some kid sat in the seat he usually sat in, they argued about it for a few minutes and then he just punched him. He got suspended for a few weeks and Mr. Lupin had to change the rules. It was the only notable thing that happened in the first half of the year.

ThatPercival: That seems like a pretty severe reaction for someone sitting in your seat.

Oliver.Would: Yeah lol.

The conversation died after that and Percy felt quite sad about it. He would talk to Oliver all night if he could. It didn’t matter if he would see him in the morning. He’s found himself wanting to talk to Oliver about everything. Found a meme about the book they read in class? He would send it to Oliver. His siblings did something generally annoying? He would let off steam by talking to Oliver.

He still talked to Penny and Cedric about the random shit they always talked about, but he wanted to talk to Oliver way more. It just felt more, natural? Why would it feel more natural? He’s known Penny and Cedric since middle school and he’s known Oliver for like 3 months.

He put his phone on his bedside table and sighed heavily. All of this was just so confusing. He could read and understand some of the most advanced works in literature but his brain was a different story. Oliver made him feel an emotion he couldn’t describe.

His pondering was cut off by the ungodly noise his siblings were making seemingly right outside his door. They always seemed to do this at the worst times. It was 10:30 at night, what could they possibly be doing? Before he even got to the door, his mom was already telling them off.

Now he could return to trying to decode his feelings for Oliver. He couldn’t stop thinking about what Penny said a few weeks ago. Did he really want Oliver to be his boyfriend? Okay, maybe there was some truth in that. But there was still no way Oliver would want to be his boyfriend.

So what if he read a book he mentioned once? Maybe he was just trying to be friendly or expanding his literary horizons. That doesn’t mean he wants Percy to be his boyfriend. Why would he want to be his boyfriend? The two of them couldn’t have been more different.

But he shouldn’t waste time thinking about it. He had to sleep. He put his phone on the charger, turned his lights off, got into bed, and tried not to think about how madly in love with Oliver he was.

#harry potter #percy weasley #oliver wood #perciver #fanfiction #gay #percy weasley x oliver wood #muggle au #Highschool #classic literature brain rot #references to Frankenstein

[sparklyaxolotlstudent]

I got bored inspired today and decided to wite the Wackynette Story of “HawkMoth is” where Marinette does a presentation about why and how Lila is secretly Hawk Moth (Her assignment was to do tabloid news)

Also got inspired by @Rarity36 comic about the same thing, thank you!

semi salt, but not really.

-

Hawk Moth Is…

Or the Dangers of Assigning a Tabloid Report to Very Smart Students

The day started ordinary for the Class of Miss Bustier. Today lesson was on News and how they can be shared. To make the lesson a bit more fun, after they had covered all of them, the teacher had decided to assign each pair of student to investigate a current event and make a presentation in the style of said event. Lila immediately asked Alya to be her partner.

“Oh, we can dress up as journalists and make our presentation as something worth of a Newspaper!”

“But Miss Bustier” asked Marinette spoke up. “There are 15 of us, and the assignment is on pairs… one of us will be left on its own”

“Oh, don’t worry Marinette, I’m sure whoever that is can make a wonderful job on their own!” replied Lila with fake sweetness. Of course that with her claiming Alya, it was highly likely that Marinette would be left on her own. Marinette just glared at her. “Don’t get mad at me, I’m only joking!” Lila added with more fake sweetness. Alya giggled.

“I’ll be sure to make things fair. For starters, I’m making the pairs” she looked around the class, who groaned. “And I’m also assigning what kind of media will each do”

Miss Bustier took a small glass bowl from under her desk, along with a hat; both seemed to be filled with papers.

“Now, I’m going to take out your names from this bowl to make the pairs so everything is fair. No changes or substitutions are allowed, all pairs are final” she grabbed the hat. “And this hat has all the different media we saw, to make everything fair, it will be also random”

Marinette was one of the last chosen, and she was paired with Juleka, to work on a tabloid. Lila snickered, and Alya gave Marinette her condolences for having to work on “fake news”

At the end, only Adrien, Lila and Chloe were unpaired. Marinette felt a bit bad for hoping that Adrien would be on his own, but then a Christmas Miracle happened…

“Only three people…” Miss Bustier took one of the papers left “Adrien with” Marinette held her breath, as did the other two girls. “Huh… Markov? I don’t remember putting his name here…”

“No charges or substitutions allowed, all pairs are final” Markov played a recording of Miss Bustier. She just shrugged.

“Well, I did say that. Adrien, you’re with Markov. Lila and Chloe, you’re the last pair”

The two girls looked at each other, mouths agape. Even with Markov lacking a face, they could swear he was grinning at them.

“Good luck on your presentation” called Marinette to Lila and Chloe after the day was over.

Working with Juleka was a blast, even without taking in account that they also worked on her room, which meant Luka was present sometimes. They actually came to the realization that working on a tabloid would be easier than what their classmates had gotten, as it meant that they would only need to think on something current, and then lie their asses off in a sensationalistic way.

So of course they choose the most unbelievable thing they could, and went from there.

-

The day of the presentation came, with Chloe and Lila presenting something worth of a news show, and that was obviously made by professionals that Chloe’s dad paid. However, they forgot to cite their sources, so Miss Bustier had to take off some points of their grade.

“Marinette and Juleka are next, their theme is a tabloid”

The two girls stood up from their respective seats. Like Chloe and Lila before them, they were dressed in pantsuits that no doubt Marinette had designed, Juleka with her a dark purple that almost seemed black, with a textured fabric that looked like giant feathers, Marinette with a soft pink one that it took the others a double take to realize the blazer was simulating a skirt. Even Chloe seemed impressed.

“Yes, yes. Hello everyone, as you know, the Tabloid is a type of newspaper that is smaller, and covers more sensationalistic stories, celebrity gossip and such, most of their stories are dubious or outright fake.”

“They are famous in the states for reporting Bigfoot and UFOS, for example”

“So today, our news is the most unbelievable thing we could think of!”

Marinette pressed a button on her tablet, and the screen behind them appeared, it looked like the cover of a tabloid, with sensationalistic views talking about monster sightings, Andre the Ice cream man being secretly a spy, Luka being a vampire and other nonsense the girls could think of. The biggest font and the main news red “We discovered the identity of Hawk Moth!!!!”

“First of all, we want to thank Nathaniel for taking time of his own project to help us with the illustrations for ours”

“You’re welcome!” said the boy, who was also wearing a dark red suit, also designed by Marinette. Kim, his partner, was equally dressed, with his vest and pants being a weird shade of brown.

“Without further ado…”

“EXTRA, EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!” yelled both girl at the same time. Marinette pressed the tablet again, and the screen changed.

“Exclusive news, ladies and gentlemen! We have discovered the identity of Paris Number One Criminal! The one and only Hawk Moth!” Juleka said quickly in an excitable voice that everyone found uncharacteristically of her. Miss Bustier smiled, knowing that Marinette was being a good example for her.  Everyone gasped, forgetting it was tabloid news.

The next screen had a very cool illustration of someone transforming into Hawk Moth. Everyone immediately knew who it was meant to be.

“WHAT? Marinette!” Alya protested, surprising no one. Except maybe Lila. “That is slander! There is no way Lila is Hawk Moth!” she turned to their teacher. “Miss Bustier, you can’t possibly allow Marinette to continue!”

“Actually, it was my idea” said Juleka, much more meekly than before. Miss Bustier frowned and looked sternly at Alya.

“We are supposed to do a tabloid, so of course we are doing something bogus and ridiculous. Besides, Lila knows we are only joking” Marinette winked at the rest of the class, who all laughed making Lila furious

“They are right. Statistically speaking, tabloid news are very likely to be fake news, or greatly exaggerated ones.”

“Thank you Max” said Miss Bustier. “Girls, you may continue with your presentation”

“Thanks!” Marinette pressed another button, and it was Lila as Volpina. “As we all know, Lila was akumatized the first day she started class with us, and…”

“That proves she’s not Hawk Moth! She can’t be akumatized and be hawk moth at the same time!” Alya practically jumped out of her seat. Miss Bustier looked at her disappointed. Marinette looked at her, but ignored her comment.

“As we all know, the power of Volpina dealt with Illusions, and one of her illusions was, precisely, that of Hawk Moth appearing in plain sight”

“Now, you are wondering, why is that important?” several classmates nodded. “Because up to that point, we had only seen Hawk Moth’s head made of butterflies back on the Stone Heart incident, and we didn’t see the actual Hawk Moth until much later, on Heroes day” Marinette pressed a button, and an image of the head of Hawk Moth made of butterflies appeared, along with a blurry picture of hawk moth the day of Volpina, and another higher quality picture of Heroes Day, everything with their respective credits.

“So, I ask, how did Lila, AKA Volpina know how Hawk Moth looked, when no one else did?”

The class breaks in whispers. They seem to forget again that it is supposed to be fake news.

“But Hawk Moth is a guy! An adult man!”

“All the better to cover herself by pretending her alter ego to be of other gender and age. Something she can do as Volpina”

“And speaking of Volpina… do you know where she took that name from?” Most of the class shook their head. “Well, interesting fact! Adrien Abigail Agreste…”

“Please don’t use my middle name”

“Duly noted. Adrien Agreste brought a book from home the same day that Lila appeared…”

“Oh, and what did that book contained?”

“Excellent question Juleka! The book contained information on the Miraculous and their past holders, and it was actually the property of Adrien’s father, Mister Gabriel Abigail Agreste”

Adrien just head desked.

“And Lila grabbed the book for inspection. Adrien almost caught her, so she just threw the book on the thrash”

“That makes no sense, how would I know what it contained? Heck, how do you know?” Alya did notice that Lila had not denied that she had taken the book.

“My house is in front of the park. I saw you guys and thought I would approach and say hi.”

“Didn’t you say you were eavesdropping?”

“They were talking when I approached them, so technically, yeah.”

“Wait… you recovered the book from the thrash? You were the one to return it to my father?”

Marinette blushed a deep shade.

“What? You mean that part is real? Dupain-Cheng is the reason you returned to school?”

“Well, I’m not saying Lila did took my father’s book, but it disappeared after she showed interest in it”

“I can’t believe you’re accusing me of…”

“We’re not, this is a tabloid, remember?”

“And continuing, Lila going abroad after that…”

“AHA! If Lila wasn’t here, it means she couldn’t have attacked! Seh was too far away!” Alya again almost jumped from her seat.

“I would like to remind everyone that we all went to space thanks to an akuma”

“Swimming in space was the best”

“So, Lila going abroad and then returning coincides with the appearance of Mayura, which can only mean that she went to search for the Peacock Miraculous”

“Right and I’m Mayura too?”

“That’s info for another article”

Kim raised his hand.

“We’re not making another article”

Kim lowered his hand, disappointed.

“So, like we were saying, it’s highly suspicious that Lila joined the class with a 90% akumatization rate”

“Actually, it’s 87.5% akumatization rate if we count Miss Bustier”

“We counted the doubles”

“Ah”

“Why would someone join the Akuma Class, if not for gain intel about how to get more akumas”

“Not to mention the other teachers and students that have been akumatized too. Our school is a focal point for akumas… almost like the akumas came from inside the school!”

Everyone went quiet, looking at Lila with dread. Even if Marinette and Juleka were joking, they were raising very fair points. Lila seemed to be contemplating this.

“And we all have been akumatized at one time or another.” Juleka eyed Marinette. “Well, most of us. And some of us have witnessed other people becoming akumas. A common thread is that Hawk Moth knows exactly what the person wants due to his empathy powers. And Lila is a good friend who always knows what to say to make us feel better. Coincidence? Or an innate ability granted by her miraculous?!”

Lila was wide eyed looking at the two in the front. Everyone else was whispering again.

“Of course, one of the most common symptoms post akumatization is the loss of memory of what one does as an akuma. So it stands to reason that Lila might not know that she is, in fact, Hawk Moth, especially if she akumatizes herself each time so Hawk Moth takes over"

“Any questions?”

Literally everyone raised their hand. Even Miss Bustier and Markov, despite him not having hands.

“Great! That concludes our presentation.”

“Excellent job girls, you get full marks!”

Marinette and Juleka high fived each other, and went to take their respective seats. Everyone kept staring at Lila. Nathaniel slided away from Lila so much he actually fell from his seat, landing on his butt. Lila was staring at her feet, having a bit of an existential crisis

“Adrien and Markov, you’re next”

#miraculous ladybug #ml au #ml fic #ml oneshot #Hawk Moth is #Lila Rossi #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Juleka Couffaine #Wackynette

[thewincestgospel]

do you have any wincest fic rec in which sam and dean are actual fbi agents or something similar? even just the two of them being partners at some normal job, police-y or not. thanks ♡

Okay that gif is a little aggressive but you get what I mean.

FBI Agent Dean

Alternate World by EimiWinchester (Siyah_Kedi)   Sam casts a spell to take him to where Dean is whole and alive, and ends up in another world.     

Counting Bodies Like Sheep by  abeautifullie3 Sam D'Eboli is a mobster.  Special Agent Dean Winchester is assigned to take him down.  Dean's okay with that double entendre...until he isn't. A connection that won't be denied, and secrets revealed, Dean's objective may no longer be the same as the FBI's.      

FBI Agent Sam

Federal Temptations by Mrs_SimonTam_PHD  Dean Winchester is a career criminal who is caught by the FBI. The FBI calls in their best interrogator, Sam Wesson, to crack Dean, and Dean learns something about Sam.  

You Were Made For Me by blackrose_17 Sam Wesson has belonged to Dean Winchester since he first laid eyes on him and it doesn't matter that Sam is with the FBI sent to take him down, Sam is his. Sam just needs to remember that                

FBI Agent Jensen or Jared

Broken Angel by  moviegeek03 Senator Fred Lehne has been brutally attacking, raping, and murdering young men for over a decade, but always evades arrest thanks to his money and power. He has everyone fooled, except one team of detectives headed by Captain Jeffrey Dean Morgan and his protege Jensen Ackles. When things become worse, Morgan goes to FBI agents Misha Collins and Jim Beaver for help. They offer it in the form of Jared Padalecki, hotshot profiler who also happens to be Jensen's boyfriend. But there is more Jared...he also happens to be the only surviving victim of Lehne's..

Coming Home by sasha_dragon F.B.I. agent Jared Padalecki works in the L.A. Under cover Unit as a handler.   He has fallen in love with the under cover agent he looks after but has never met. Now Jared is engaged in a race against time and across L.A. To get to him before it’s too late. Can Agent Jensen Ackles hang on long enough, to finally meet Jared.

Shape of My Heart  by ashtraythief There are two things that make Jensen feel: killing people and thinking of the boy with the sunshine smile.

Police Officer Dean

Arachnophobia  by JuniperLemon   There's trouble going down in Sam's apartment. Unfortunately, this leads to a neighbor calling cops, Winchester and Novak.              

Impurity in the Night by CleverUsernameHere Officer Winchester is called to handle a noise disturbance. When he arrives he finds a high school party and gets more than he bargained for when he sees a familiar face  

Let's Get Frisky by ShadowBiscuit  What do you do when the city's hottest cop has his eyes on you and chases your fine ass down streets and alleys? When you can't help but want him to catch you and fulfill your dirtiest fantasies?Sam's solution to this problem is relatively easy: just be a flirtatious little brat and see where it gets you.      

Look the Other Way By: Candle Beck    Dean is a cop and Sam is his no-good brother.        

Mírë by  blackrose_17   Dean Winchester had an okay life as sheriff of Sioux Falls, sure his love life was a little slow but that was fine with him then everything changed the day Sam Wesson and his son Jack and friends moved into the empty Wesson Manor. Dean finds his world changed as he is drawn to the single father and his young son and his life is changed as his eyes opened to the fact magic is real and Sam is being hunted by someone who refuses to let him go. Dean will do whatever it takes to protect his new family.              

V I C E by awabubbles   Dean Winchester works in the human trafficking unit for the Vice Control Section of the Chicago PD. While undercover, Dean meets "Baby Boi" aka Sam, an underage prostitute with a strange fascination for the macabre. Sam has cast himself as Bonnie in a real life reenactment of the infamous outlaw duo, insisting that Dean is his Clyde. When Dean finally agrees, they run off to fulfill each other's deepest, darkest fantasies. For Sam, it's a dream come true; until Dean starts to spiral out of control.              

Police Officer Sam

  Blue on Blue  by  bingsboba  Sam Wesson, a young narc with intelligent eyes and a naïve spirit, meets Dean Smith, a man with a charming facade and a dangerous interior, in a drug bust mission turned into a failure. With no evidence to pin Dean to a crime, Sam is unable to move forward with his first loss in his job. Determined to have the biggest drug bust tied to his name, Sam goes after the con artist, but Dean turns out to be more than Sam can handle.   

Deeply Dangerous Dean  by ScorchedAngel   Dean is a quiet blood spatter analyst who keeps himself to himself and Sam is a detective on the hunt for the man who murdered his girlfriend Ruby. They've both been keeping secrets from each other and everyone else that have the potential to turn their world upside down.              

The Orange Hour  by  Deeranger     The Winchesters have gone undercover in a prison while working on a case: Dean as an inmate, Sam as a correctional officer. This way they will be able to gather information from both sides of the bars. A smart move, right? Or so they think. Because on a seemingly peaceful evening a riot breaks out, and the brothers are suddenly forced to question themselves - but most of all each other. What is real and what is not? And just how far are they willing to go to keep each other alive?

Perfect, Twisted, Bloody Family  by orphan_account   Dean has a great life. He’s got amazing boyfriend and a successful business, lots of friends, and a smart detective for a brother. They have awesome dinners at each other’s houses, poker nights, and a relationship most siblings would envy. Dean also has a deep, secret lust he’s been harboring for said little brother. That, and the occasional murder of a pimp or drug dealer, just to keep things interesting. C’est la vie.

Stop and Search   by JuniperLemon   Dean is trying to get out of town after a hunt when he is pulled over by Officer Wesson. Things go slightly unexpected when his hunting equipment is discovered. Unrelated wincest.  

Two Sides Of The Same Coin  by ShadowBiscuit   Sam Winchester, police detective.He's trying to find the notorious serial killer who has been leaving mutilated bodies all around the city. The police hasn't been this baffled since the time of Jack the Ripper. This mystery killer is just simply impossible to catch...But Sam isn't one to back down from a challenge. So he hunts the monster that preys on the innocent, however this time, he's not sure if he wants to win.Not when the "Righteous Man" might be his own flesh and blood, his big brother.                                                            

Police Officer  Jensen or Jared  

The Balance (Constantine Fic) by storyspinner70   Jensen Ackles spent his days coughing up his lungs and killing demons, hoping to earn his way into heaven. Jared knew his sister didn't kill herself, no matter what the Church had to say, and a hateful exorcist with a mission and a chip on his shoulder may not be his first choice for a guide, but Jensen was going to help him – if he didn't die first. Trips to hell, lung cancer, a conniving archangel, and even the devil himself weren't going to stop Jared from getting his sister back where she truly belonged.              

Creature Feature by Saone Something hungry is lurking in Lake Winchester.

Cuffs by TwoBoys2Love   Detective Ackles gets a new partner who may be a bit of a challenge. They have different views about everything. Ackles picks up some work on a new case that reveals his partner's secret and dredges up the past              

I'm A Broken Man With Addictive Tendencies  by robin_writes  In Jared’s mind they were a new brand of a tale as old as time; Romeo and Juliet. From two different worlds, destined to be kept apart, and both of them too fucked in the head to survive what they end up doing to each other.Jared is a cop who is a dom and Jensen is an underage prostitute. Jared tries to tuck away his 'dom personality' but you can't hide yourself from yourself.              

The Lion The Beast and The Beat by storyspinner70   It’s the typical story: boy goes through an ugly divorce, boy falls in love with the late night DJ that keeps him company on all his sleepless nights, boy saves DJ from his “number one fan”. The DJ is very grateful.

Mischief and Mayhem  by LoveThemWinchesters   Jared is a police officer.Jensen is his biker/bar owner husband of several years.Chaos ensues when something very important is lost.  

Out of Silence  by Annie46fic When hardened, but lonely cop, Jensen Ackles meets Jared Padalecki in his family’s diner, he doesn’t realize that his life is about to change drastically. Jared is a complete innocent, deaf, mute and unable to communicate, he needs a friend. Can Jensen be that man?

Pure like Blood by Ephermeralk   They have a deal. It’s two years (730 days, 17,520 hours) before Jared turns eighteen. And if, by some miracle, Jensen’s not in prison and Jared’s not another Joe Doe in the morgue, they’ll both leave Denver and start a new life. But, until then, Jared’s still got work and Jensen’s still a cop who’s hell bent on putting away the rest of Jared’s clients.          

Shades of Cool by tebtosca   Officer Ackles tries to keep the peace, but that Padalecki kid doesn't want to play nice.                            

Some Kind Of Hold On Me  by KatStark   Cop Jared comes home to his boyfriend, who has a special night in mind.      

Speaking Softly by femmefatales   Jared Padalecki, a 27-year-old police officer with a psychology degree gets assigned a special case. His job is to do one thing and one thing only-- Get Jensen Ackles, a seventeen year old boy who's been badly abused, to talk.                                

Stray by  storyspinner70   Officer Jared Padalecki is on his way home, but catches one last call that's near him. He has no idea exactly how eighteen year old werecat Jensen Ackles is going to change his life, but sometimes the best things in your life are things you never saw coming. 

Trust in me by Winmance It isn’t the innocence of the boy’s voice that was making such dirty sexual innuendos that made his blood run cold, it was the suggestive smirk he plastered onto his face while saying it. The way he leans too far forward on the chair, that it was impossible not to look obscene, and the large spread of his legs while he does so, almost inviting Jensen to look.When Jensen's best friend asks him to questionned the young prostitute he just came back with, Jensen has no idea that his life is about to change. Neither does Jared.                           

#ask and you shall receive #wincest #supernatural #j2 fics #dean winchester #Sam Winchester #dean/sam #jared/jensen #Jared Padalecki #Jensen Ackles #fbi #police #supernatural fan fiction #AO3 fic #livejournal fic #fanfiction.net #recs #fic list #Ask Me

[nerdygaymormon]

what do you think about the new handbook?

In January 2016 I received a calling that gave me access to the Church’s Handbooks and I was surprised at the amount of specific things in there on which I had never considered the Church having an official position. I imagine a lot of people are having that experience this week.

I’m glad the Church made the Handbook available to everyone, it’s a move towards transparency. Before this, people were being held to standards or facing processes that only their leaders could access.

I appreciate that in some areas there’s better framework and clarity, but am sad that it often came in the form of being more restrictive or not in line with modern science.

I’m going to outline the changes and add a few comments. ’ll put my opinion about all of this at the end, so if that’s what you want to see, scroll to the bottom.

————————————————————— 

Miscellaneous

The Handbook covers a lot of information, so I’m certain in the days and weeks ahead more new things will be discovered. But for now, here’s some assorted policies.

Sacrament

We’re supposed to take the Sacrament with our right hands

The wording that young men are encouraged, but not required, to wear a white shirt and tie is gone. All males who pass the Sacrament are asked to be clean and well groomed.

For a long time, which hand to use has been considered a personal choice, and some associated special meaning by using their right hand.

In February 2019, Elder Oaks saw some youth take the Sacrament with the left hand and he gave a short lecture that went viral telling these kids they were wrong, and now it’s official policy in the Handbook.

Dress Standards

The Relief Society Presidency is to teach dress standards to the sisters so their appearance and clothing show reverence and respect at Church and at the temple.

These are adult women!!! They can’t figure this out for themselves? It mentions ostentatious jewelry and casual clothes without any examples of what this means. I’m afraid some leaders will enforce their personal opinions, such as pants are verboten.

Also this section included a comment about ostentatious jewelry. What is that? Having 2 earrings in 1 ear?

—————————————————————

Discipline

Disciplinary councils have been renamed “Membership Councils”

People no longer are disfellowshipped or excommunicated. They have “formal membership restrictions” or “withdrawal of membership”

Does away with the unequal disciplinary structure for adult men vs adult women.

Before, men who were endowed had a disciplinary council at the stake level. Everyone else had a disciplinary council held by their bishopric.

Now anyone who is endowed and likely to have their Church membership withdrawn will have a stake membership council. Everyone else has a ward membership council for serious sins & actions

At the ward level, membership councils still function the same (the bishopric holds a council with the person whose membership is at risk).

At the stake level, the council now is similar to the way it works at the ward level (the stake presidency meets, without the high council also being involved).

The individual’s bishops can sit in on the council. The individual can also choose for the Elders Quorum or Relief Society President to sit in on the council.

Same-sex marriage is no longer apostasy

Apostasy has been removed from a list of reasons to hold a membership council. Instead it is on a case-by-case basis.

The stake president can place informal membership restrictions on the person and the stake president counsels with the Area Presidency (which are Seventy) about anything more than that, such as a membership council

The language is softer but the results are the same.

I like that men & women are treated equally in this new system. It always struck me wrong that most men in the church automatically had a council of 15 men and women had 3 men.

The reversal of the 2015 Policy of Exclusion finally made it to the Handbook. 

————————————————————— 

Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Same-Sex Attracted

Families & members should be sensitive, love and respectful of people who are gay, lesbian & bi

Sexual activity with someone of the same gender is on the same level as an unmarried sex.

Membership councils are optional in these cases, based on the leader’s discretion.

As long as an LGBTQ member is “striving” to live the law of chastity, they’re allowed to hold a calling and temple recommend

“Sexual cohabitation” used to be forbidden, now it’s “cohabitation”. So I guess gay people living together is a problem regardless of whether they have sex. I do know of a few couples who live together, but have given up sex in order to be temple worthy. I guess that’s no longer an option.

The mormonandgay website was done away with and some of the items moved to a new page titled “Same-Sex Attraction.”

Most of the links on this new page don’t work. I’m sure this will get fixed

Most of the “resources” from the old page aren’t on the new page.

The last 4 video stories of members from the former site are on the new site.

Credit for finally making this page available in languages other than English.

I wonder if it will still say it’s okay to identify using the terms gay, bi or lesbian.I know President Oaks prefers the phrase “same-sex attraction” and a lot of his influence is seen in the new Handbook changes. 

The best section of the previous site was a collection of 17 members who are gay, bi and lesbian (well, 2 of them are parents of gay kids). Hearing them tell their story in their own words was powerful. Most of them have asked for their video to be removed.

The only stories remaining are 2 people in a mixed-orientation marriage and 2 parents who have a gay son. Each of those 4 members now has multiple videos (Laurie, Laurie’s husband, Laurie’s bishop, Laurie’s friend). 

The experience of most LGB people in the Church is now absent from this page, which again confirms for me that this has been a site for leaders & family, not actual members who are bisexual, lesbian or gay.

—————————————————————

Transgender

Preferred names can be noted in your membership record and Church leaders are encouraged to use them.

People can also to ask others to use their chosen pronouns

Elective surgical or medical intervention (which I believe means hormone treatment) for the purpose of transitioning, and social transitioning will result in membership restrictions.

These restrictions include not getting to exercise the priesthood, receiving or using a temple recommend, and receiving some Church callings

Even if the hormone therapy is prescribed by a medical professional to ease gender dysphoria or reduce suicidal thoughts, membership restrictions will result

Transgender people who don’t transition can have Church callings & temple recommends

Gender is defined as “biological sex at birth.”

This is recorded on Church records and determines whether someone can receive the priesthood and how they experience the temple ordinances

Transgender people & their family are welcome to attend Sunday church meetings and social events

There is now a page for transgender people, just as there has been for LGB people

This whole section of the Handbook makes me sad because it reduces these members to being a mistake and they need to choose a side. Nevermind they were born this way and have complex lives, they need to look and act like a cishet member.

I’d love if the church leaders could show scriptural backing & the words of the Savior to justify their views on trans folks other than the Family Proclamation.

Credit to the Church for switching from “transsexual” to “transgender

While trans people are welcome to attend the 2nd hour of church, no guidance was given about if they can choose either Relief Society or Elders Quorum

It’s problematic to define gender being as your biological sex at birth. If gender is eternal, why is “at birth” needed? A doctor or nurse assigns a biological sex at birth by taking a look at the newborn’s external genitals. This is only 1 of 5 markers of gender. A doctor or a nurse is not God.

5 components of biological sex

external genitalia

inner reproductive anatomy

sex hormones

chromosomes

gonad differentiation (gonad secretions cause sex-specific patterns in many other tissues & the brain)

This section of the Handbook still speaks of gender as binary–you’re either male or female and trans. Genderfluid, nonbinary, or any acknowledgement of a spectrum doesn’t exist.

To say a trans person will face consequences for social transitioning is really troubling. What does “social transitioning” mean? Do pronouns count as “social transitioning?” Long or short hair? If people must dress according to gender stereotypes, then it seems like leadership is more concerned about the feelings of the 99 and not the health & well being of the 1.

Why is it only transgender members who have a ban on these surgeries? Lots of breast enhancements, reductions and mastectomies take place every month with not a whiff of interest by church leaders, but if it’s done to affirm one’s gender identity, then it’s forbidden, even if it’s life saving.

It did make me feel queasy to read that even if medical or surgical intervention is prescribed by medical professionals to deal with gender dysphoria or suicidal thoughts, too bad, we’re still going to punish you. What kind of monsters came up with this?

————————————————————— 

Intersex, aka People Whose Sex isn’t Clear at Birth

The Handbook says the incident rate of intersex is extremely rare

Questions about membership records, priesthood ordination and temple ordinances for youth or adults who were born with sexual ambiguity should be directed to the Office of the First Presidency.

This is the first I’ve seen Intersex given their own section in the Handbook.

While policies about LGBT people are listed as “moral issues”, the section on intersex people is under “medical and health policies.” That’s a good sign, it means that the medical profession determines what is best, not a church leader.

I appreciate that church takes this out of the hands of local leadership. It’s a complex issue that untrained people shouldn’t get to have say over.

The Church assumes that surgical & medical intervention is needed for this group of people. Unfortunately it implies the default is to do so in infancy or early childhood when current best practices would be delaying, if possible, until the individual can weigh in on their body & identity. 

The idea that intersex is rare, well that depends on what they consider rare.

The rate could be as high as 2% of the population or as low as 1 in 2000.

If we think of that in terms of Church congregations, it suddenly seems not so rare.

In North America, a ward must have 300 members. If 1%-2% are intersex, that’s a couple people in each congregation.

If we go with the lowest rate of 1 in 2000, consider that in the US & Canada a stake requires a minimum of 3000 members. So 1 or 2 members per stake would be intersex.

—————————————————————

I think these changes show that the Church is willing to include queer people up to a point. We can feel & be the person we believe ourselves to be as long as we don’t actually act in a way that affirms who we are.

We are to be loved, respected and welcomed, however these homophobic and transphobic policies remain in place. Love & respect is more than smiling & being nice to someone.

The policies of the Church regarding queer people is out of line with science. As science continues to advance and confirm that gender identities and sexual orientations are real and biological and not changeable by will, the tension for the Church on these topics will continue to grow.

“The only clear line I draw these days is this: when my religion tries to come between me and my neighbor, I will choose my neighbor. Jesus never commanded me to love my religion.” -Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor

Considering Jesus admonishes us again and again to love each other and that we are all alike to God, I can only guess that Jesus wept. Again.

#handbook #tumblrstake #queerstake

[kinetic-elaboration]

April 3: 2x13 Obsession

Okay, trying this again! My live-blog thoughts from watching Obsession last night. I didn’t remember this ep very well, and I was a little uncertain about it going in. But ultimately I think it was a really solid Kirk episode and a really solid triumvirate episode.

How many times as hard as rock is this mineral you’re looking for? Let’s be precise. (Aka how Spock flirts.)

I’m really into the sets and special effects today. This big rock that is obviously Styrofoam. The ominous cloud of smoke.

Set phasers to disrupter-b? I feel like he just made that up.

Oh no, three red shirts set out on their own! I feel like this one is pretty smart, though.

Leslie!!! RIP my favorite extra.

“Something that can’t possibly exist… but does anyway.” That’s it, that’s the show.

Well Kirk’s obsession is obvious right away. That’s good. We’re getting right to the point.

They have to meet up with another ship in order to transport perishable vaccines!! I know from first-hand experience that that is very important! Get it together Kirk. Admitting straight out, “I’m okay with some other people dying so I can further investigate the monster” is not a good look on him.

Also I feel like TOS often confuses “cure” and “vaccine” (as in Miri) but even if these are actually vaccines, they could still save lives urgently!

McCoy’s autopsy report: uh, just look at their faces??

The Yorktown, the Farragut… someone on the AOS team loved this episode apparently. (I remembered that the Farragut was Kirk’s first assignment but I did not remember the Yorktown.)

Interesting that the creature smells of honey because “rotting honey” was the smell that indicated the presence of Area X in the Southern Reach.

Some gratuitous touching.

When Garrovick Jr. first showed up, the shot was so ominous and dramatic that I legitimately thought that the creature was a shape-shifter and that was him lol.

Is this another episode where Kirk sees himself in a promising young man and then proceeds to judge him incredibly harshly as a way of judging his own past self? I think it might be!

Garrovick looks like he’s sitting in front of a green screen during this interrogation. Honestly, the colors in this episode are really going off in general! I can see how this would be fun to watch on a new color tv.

“Go to your room! You’re grounded!”

“Put it in your report, Spock!” I really wish we’d seen AOS Kirk do that. Like, fighting with reports and regulations is one of my favorite parts of TOS but we only saw AOS Spock use that as a weapon and it was made to show what a stick in the mud he was but like… they all do it! And AOS Kirk should have too.

And now a scene where Spock and McCoy gossip about Spock’s boyfriend.

I honestly love McCoy and Spock scenes. They have such a great rapport… the respect is not even grudging, it’s clearly there, but they make it more palatable to themselves by adding in some barbs and little digs at each other. But it’s still McCoy that Spock goes to when he needs advice or even, as he says here, just someone to bounce an idea off of, and McCoy is there to listen to him.

Oh, Spock definitely understands obsession.

Kirk’s quarters are looking very purple today.

Mccoy is trying to wax poetic and Kirk just wants him to get to the point.

Time to lie down in an Emo Fashion again.

Not to be nitpicky, but if the creature killed 200 people on the Farragut, and that was half the crew… wouldn’t the Farragut be a lot bigger than the Enterprise? I don’t think that’s right. Also, not to be even more nitpicky, but how did they finally get away from it? Did it get on their ship? If it killed all the people on the surface, could they not have just… stopped hanging out on the surface?

Anyway. McCoy is such a good best friend.

Garrovick was Kirk’s Pike.

Oh no, bringing in the big guns: the boyfriend. A blue shirt conspiracy.

Spock sounds like he’s in one of those HR training videos. Like, he’s attempting to sound conversational while still blatantly quoting from the Starfleet Handbook.

“Why are we delayin’ here?” Heavy Southern drawl.

They really are ganging up on him.

Intuition is a command prerogative.

I love how Bones says “We’re not ganging up on you” after a long scene where they gang up on him.

Oh no, the creature’s on the move! Just straight up floating through space. Cool cool cool.

Kirk’s so distracted by the creature that he’s not even looking at Spock’s ass.

Another bad day for Scotty.

I like Chapel but honestly, imagine Rand in this scene with Garrovick… I miss her.

Garrovick, what an idiot. Throwing shit and hitting switches across the room.

I legit don’t understand how the creature moves in space. Or what this has to do with gravity… which doesn’t exist in space.

Monster hunt, monster hunt!

Spock is agreeing with Kirk now, about the creature’s intelligence.

Whatever is going on with the vents in this ship, it seems like maybe they’re not the most well made.

“Let’s just nuke it.” That’s always a good idea.

Spock is trying so hard to make Kirk feel better. Even calling him “Jim”—which he used to do almost every episode and now rarely does anymore.

Lol, now he’s off to try the exact same thing with Garrovick. “If Jim won’t let me comfort him, perhaps this other irrational human will.”

“Garrovick, let me explain your own thoughts and feelings to you. I’m an expert on humans, you know. I’m around them all the time.”

“I know you want to be emo, but could you please just listen to me??” The absolute transparency with which he’s trying to be helpful.

Kindness actually isn’t an emotion… it’s a choice. Spock really will call anything a human emotion in order to avoid having to deal with it.

I'm sorry but he SNAPS THE KNOB OFF, goes "eh," throws it away, and then tries to stop the gas coming through the vent with his HANDS? How did Sarek raise this boy?

Garrovick is so Dramatic. A true Kirk protégé.

The creature tried to eat Spock and Spock didn’t taste so good.

"I'm asking for your military appraisal of the techniques used against the creature." Professor Kirk coming out.

Poor creature was lost, I guess. Just wants to go home.

And SPAWN. That word just gives me flashbacks tbqh…

Kirk and Spock having their usual ‘who will sacrifice himself first’ – off.

Realistically it should be neither the XO NOR the Captain but this is a tv show.

I do remember this part. Carrying that weird little device down to the planet. It is very aesthetically pleasing. I kind of want it for my apartment, to display as like a modern art sculpture. Minus the bomb

Mmm, a delicious snack for the creature. Yum. Got that gross green blood taste out of its mouth.

LMAO at Garrovick trying to be all heroic, knock Kirk out, and become the sacrifice. You thought!!

Spock and Scotty at the controls so you know how serious the transporter situation is.

McCoy versus the transporter again.

"It was my cross-circuiting to B that recovered them." Yes, Spock saved his space husband, he saved the day, and we should all acknowledge it.

Aw, that’s sweet, Kirk volunteering to reminisce with Garrovick about his father.

The end! I ended up enjoying it a lot overall. We gotta stop having episodes where Kirk is questioned or learns lessons though lol. I want my unabashedly heroic captain! Still no matter what he is always a hero in the end. And as I said, really great triumvirate ep with good individual characterizations, and scenes with each part of the triangle together.

If the Farragut incident was 11 years before this, and, as established in the last ep, Kirk is 34, that means he was 23 at the time. Pretty young to be a lieutenant imo. He was also a lieutenant at the time he was teaching Gary Mitchell at the Academy, which I’m going to personally headcanon, starting now, was right after Garrovick’s death. He returns to San Francisco, takes a year or a semester off to teach, and meets Gary.

Next up is Wolf in the Fold, a rare Scotty-centric episode.

#the year 2021 #2021: star trek #2021: fandom thoughts #star trek tos

[trensu]

Episode 12: The One where Everyone Goes to Evil Summer School and Has a Bad Time

And we’re off to a bad start bc we’re at Evil Summer School and WC is monologuing like the world’s shittiest villain

His flunkies take everyone’s swords and wwx whispers “lan zhan” after watching lwj hand over his sword (LIKE, THE ONE THING HE HAS LEFT OF HIS HOME *SOBS*)

Lwj ignores him tho

And then keeps ignoring him

Be easy on him, folks, he’s overcoming some trauma

We get more useless wc monologuing

But we’ll ignore him and focus instead on how wwx keeps throwing worried little glances at lwj

(hey remember how last episode i told you all about lwj’s capture and subsequent injury even tho it wasn’t wangxian moment?? IT PAYS OFF IN THIS EPISODE WITH MULTIPLE WANGXIAN MOMENTS)

(also, just fyi at this point wwx still doesn’t know what all went down at the cloud recesses or that lwj is injured; i mean yeah, wc bragged to him about it but what, we’re gonna take him at his word? Heck no)

Wc assigns the class homework - Memorizing Wen Clan Rules

So we see wwx being all studious

He and jc are dragging the wen clan for their hypocrisy and then wwx has an Epiphany

Wwx: hey, the Wen clan is so petty, they wouldn’t have just settled for LWJ attending Evil Summer School; they would’ve taken way more hostages I mean disciples!! SOMETHING BAD MUST’VE HAPPENED

And he leaps up with every intention of tracking down LWJ but some wen flunkies are guarding the door so that ends up being a no-go

But wwx is not deterred! No sir, he is coming up with a plan to finally get LWJ’s attention 

We’re back in class at Evil Summer School and wc is all i’m gonna pick ppl to recite the rules bc i’m a douchebag

And ofc he picks lwj, wwx, and jzx

Lwj: Can’t do it. Not today.

Jzx: Yeah, no, that’s Beneath me

Wwx: oh oh pick me!! I can do it!! *raises hand excitedly*

Omg wwx he already picked you, you don’t have to do that

Wc: okay, but if you get it wrong I will Punish you bc i’m an asshole that way

Cue wwx’s Classic Look of Disgust (guys, guys, i just love this expression on his face SO MUCH, i couldn’t even tell you why)

But that look quickly morphs into his Signature Mischievous Grin 

Which he aims at lwj, so ofc it looks SUPER FLIRTY ahhhhh

Lwj continues to ignore him

AGAIN I ASK, how the HELL does he keep doing that??! If i had wwx smile like that at me, he’d have my FULL UNDIVIDED ATTENTION FOREVER

Okay, here’s where a good moment becomes a GREAT moment

Wwx goes up all cocky and starts THEATRICALLY doing STRETCHES even tho all he’s doing is RECITING LINES, OMG, WWX

Wc: GET ON WITH IT

Wwx: right, right, i got this. Okay, listen carefully~!

Wwx: *STARTS RECITING LAN CLAN RULES*

THAT’S MY BOY!!! LOOK AT MY BOY GO! HOLY SHIT, THE AUDACITY. WHAT A BI-CON, I LOVE IT!!

Now lwj FINALLY looks at him!!

And it only took 14min and wwx reciting his clan’s rules to FINALLY GET A REACTION

Wc: HOW DARE YOU RECITE LAN CLAN RULES IN QISHAN

Wwx: oh dear, oh gosh, how foolish of me! I am SO sorry i got them all mixed up!!

And then he literally pats himself on the back with a pleased little smirk

And that’s how jzx, lwj, and wwx end up in Evil Detention carrying manure to the vegetable fields

Lwj is just pouring the manure out of the buckets

Wwx: lan zhan, you want me to find you a scooper?

Lwj: *ignores him*

Jzx: *unwillingly bears witness to this and rolls his eyes*

(don’t even, jzx, you het disaster)

Wwx: hey lan zhan, how come your clan has a silencing spell but not a spell that blocks out gross smells?

Lwj: *picks up empty buckets and leaves, CONTINUING TO IGNORE WWX FOR SOME INEXPLICABLE REASON*

Here wwx just sloppily dumps out his buckets and chases after him

As they walk over to wherever they need to go to refill their buckets, wwx starts asking lwj Plot Questions and generally worrying about him

Which could’ve become a sweet moment

Except that wc shows up to ruin the moment with his, you know, general existence

So obviously wwx has to go and insult wc to his face, right? HE WAS TRYING TO HAVE QUALITY TIME WITH HIS SOULMATE, GODDAMNIT

Wc tries to whip wwx but wwx catches it like a BADASS and is all “don’t try me”

But then wc gets his flunkies to tie up wwx!! (i’m telling you guys, this clan really seems to have a thing for tying/chaining people up)

Lwj sees that his soulmate is defenseless and is like, can’t have that happening and goes to defend him!!

Ugghhh but that ASSHOLE WEN CHAO GOES AND HITS LWJ ON HIS INJURED LEG WHICH SENDS LWJ TUMBLING INTO THE GROUND

Wwx: HEY, leave him alone! I was the one insulting you!!

DO YOU SEE THAT GUYS?? THEY ALWAYS DEFEND EACH OTHER!!

And actually this starts up a general pattern for them: lwj always defends wwx physically and wwx always defends lwj verbally

IT’S SO BEAUTIFUL. THEY COVER EACH OTHER’S WEAK SPOTS WITHOUT EVEN REALIZING IT!! 

(lwj isn’t all that good with words as you know, and wwx has this talent of making everyone around him want to punch him in the face, his beautiful beautiful face)

Wc goes to whip wwx again, but LWJ gets up on his feet in an instant (even with the leg wound!!) and catches the whip ONE-HANDED AND YANKS IT OUT OF WC’S GRASP

LIKE, DON’T FUCKING TOUCH MY SOULMATE YOU SLIMY BASTARD

Obvs he didn’t say that, but you can see it in his eyes that that’s exactly what he was thinking, word-for-word. Trust me on this.

The wen flunkies release wwx who drops to the ground and lwj immediately grabs him by the arm

He doesn’t try to lift him up and he’s not actually holding him up

So why the arm-grabbing?

I’LL TELL YOU WHY

BC HE WANTS TO BE NEAR WWX, THAT’S WHY

And let me remind you that this is the same lwj who’s all “i don’t touch people” back in episode 5: the One with Angry bb!LWJ

Yeah, that rule doesn’t apply to wwx anymore BC SOULMATES

Although in all fairness, who wouldn’t grab onto wwx given half a chance?

Okay now wc monologues some more 

Wwx: wc, stop babbling 

(omg wwx, stop baiting him)

Wc: TAKE HIM TO THE DUNGEON

Lwj: *BOLTS UPRIGHT ON HIS INJURED LEG AND BLOCKS THEIR WAY*

Srsly, injured leg!! And it doesn’t even slow him down when it comes to protecting wwx!! And he stretches out his arm so his pretty white sleeves mostly cover wwx from view

Wc: don’t worry, the dungeon’s big enough for two (wc you slimy bastard, you’re ruining everyone’s sex dungeon fantasies)

Wwx: *pushes away lwj’s arm* nah, just take me. The dungeon’s bound to be cooler than being out on these sunny fields anyway lol

And now we have this terrible moment where we see wwx be well and truly terrified for the first time in the show

He’s thrown into the dungeon WHILE CHAINED UP and there’s this HUGE MUTANT DOG MONSTER

Poor wwx visibly pales and breaks out into a cold sweat while wen chao mocks him (I HATE HIM SO MUCH)

Okay, i’d like to take a moment here to fully acknowledge that this dog monster thing is, like, really horrible effects-wise. We all know this. But we’re gonna pretend for sake of the Emotional Trauma it causes our darling wwx that it’s actually a big scary thing, okay?

Anyway

WEN NING TO THE RESCUE - knocks out the dog with strategically placed needles and provides wwx Medicine Pouch and Medicine Bottle 

he’s like, i stole medicine for you bc we’re bffs and i’d die for you (which he does eventually lololol I’M SORRY THAT WAS AWFUL)

I’m sure you’re all hey trensu, this isn’t a wangxian moment you said this was a wangxian guide, what the heck

BUT IT IS A WANGXIAN MOMENT and also it sets us up for ANOTHER wangxian moment later on in the show!

It’s a wangxian moment now bc wen ning provides the info wwx has been trying to get this whole time, aka what the heck is up with lwj and the cloud recesses?

Wwx looks utterly DEVASTATED when wn tells him lwj’s home was burned

And when he tells wwx about the wens breaking lwj’s leg?

FUCKING FURIOUS

HE’S SO ANGRY THAT THEY HURT HIS LAN ZHAN

HE PUNCHES THE STONE FLOOR OF HIS CELL WITH AN ALREADY BLOODIED UP HAND

THAT’S HOW ANGRY HE IS

See? Totally a wangxian moment

Oh, and then we see him take like, only one (1) medicine piece from Medicine Bottle and then slips the it and the Medicine Pouch into his robes

Wwx: i’ll save this for lan zhan

I’LL SAVE THIS FOR LAN ZHAN, HE SAYS

HE’S INJURED AND CHAINED UP AND HE’S SAVING THE MAJORITY OF THE MEDICINE FOR LAN ZHAN

BC HE LOVES HIM

AHHHHHH

Okay now we’re back in class (and wtf, wwx has to attend class even after all that??)

Wwx is still looking all wrung-out and bloodied

We see lwj look at wwx all concerned!

Plot stuff happens

More plot stuff

Now we get set up for our last wangxian moment of the episode!!

Wen Flunkie: hey boss, there’s this monster in this mountain that probably someone should get rid off

Wc: oh cool, good thing i’ve got all these hostages i mean cannon fodder I MEAN visiting disciples with me. Let’s do it!

TIME FOR A FIELD TRIP (OF EVIL)!!!

Wen chao is on a horse with his girlfriend while everyone else is walking bc wc is the WORST PERSON

Then oh no, lwj is visibly limping as they go on!!

And wwx looks over and sees lwj limping

~THEIR SONG~ STARTS GENTLY PLAYING IN THE BACKGROUND AHH AHHHHH

IDK IF YOU GUYS NOTICED YET BUT THAT’S OUR CUE THAT SOME GOOD WANGXIANTICS IS COMING UP

Wwx does not hesitate even a minute to go help him!! BC THAT’S WHAT SOULMATES DO

But JC ofc holds him back (what the heck jc), and he’s all leave him alone, you’ve helped him enough already

And wwx is like, HE JUST LOST HIS HOME, JC!! AND HIS LEG IS BROKEN. WHAT IF HE LOSES HIS LEG??

JC: it’s not like he’ll let you close enough to carry him anyway!!

Wwx: well that’s his choice BUT I STILL GOTTA OFFER BC I LOVE HIM, HE NEEDS TO KNOW IT’S AN OPTION!!

JC: we can’t stick our noses in his business!

Wwx: well SOMEBODY has to help him!!

And he flounces off to go to lwj

Wwx: lan zhan, how’s your leg?

Lwj: it’s fine

He says, y’know, like a liar.

Wwx: hey, we’re friends, you can be honest with me!! Are you sure your leg is okay??

Lwj: it’s fine

GOD DAMN IT LWJ, HE’S TRYING TO HELP YOU

Wwx: don’t pretend it’s fine all the time!! I can carry you~! 

OMG HE SAYS THIS WITH THE SWEETEST, MOST SINCERE SMILE, GUYS

HE WANTS TO HELP LWJ SO BAD

HE WANTS LWJ TO LET HIM CLOSE!! 

BECAUSE HE LOVES HIM, AHHHHH

And with that sweet, sincere smile, the episode ends

On a high note!!

Lovely, lovely, it was lovely, i want to stare at that smile forever

Return to Masterpost

#WangXiantics #wangxian #the untamed

[mittensmorgul]

FYI everyone, there... is just too much meta to this episode.

This is chuck actively manipulating the ENTIRE story and slapdashing elements from pretty much the ENTIRE history of the show together until he hits on a combination of events and themes that “works” to get the ending he wants.

It’s horrifying, and manic, and BRILLIANT on the part of *our* writers, but Chuck-As-Author... is desperate, and his entire story is falling down around him. He’s been pushed to “write an ending,” instead of just being able to fly off to create another universe to bother, because he CAN’T fly off or create another universe.

He’s stuck here, going through every failed draft he’s ever written, because he can’t let go of the “one brother kills the other” ending he thinks is the best ending to his story. This is why every since draft he’d ever written before was doomed to fail. The one “successful” draft? The one where Sam and Dean chose to save each other. Over and over again.

(well, with a LOT of help along the way from Cas.)

This episode started out looking exactly like an inversion of 1.02, Wendigo. Friends camping in the woods, two doomed to die at the hands of a pair of brother werewolves who’d sworn off eating humans, after one of the brothers decided he was a monster and would never stop hunting humans or being a monster. And this pinged... SO many other episodes.

The entire werewolf plot sounded so much like Cain in 10.14 when he told Dean he would never stop killing, when Dean was begging to know if he even COULD stop, before executing him. And also, Cain in 9.11 when he asked Dean why he’d saved his own brother instead of killing him. Because this had been Chuck’s recurring story, over and over again. Kill the sibling (ostensibly to save them from monstrousness), kill the lover (while trying to save them from monstrousness), live in misery forever.

CHARMING!

But then we had Lilith show up, as a MASSIVE inversion of the entire plot of 4.18. All of that was Chuck’s story, too. This entire episode not only stood all of 4.18 on its head, it gave Lilith license to critique Chuck’s entire body of work. And even HER critique was scathing.

SHE WAS A PLOT DEVICE. She couldn’t act outside of the lines that Chuck had written for her, though she could hate those lines, and actively say so. Regardless of if this was OG Lilith or Chuck having “remade” her to serve this function within this episode, she still was able to comment on the metanarrative of the entire episode.

My head is spinning, in the best possible way.

There were callbacks to s5 and Lucifer-possessed Sam killing Dean (with FIRE this time! which also felt like a direct callback to s6 and s7 and Sam’s Halluciferations), to s9 and s10 with MoC Dean killing Sam (with the first blade this time!).

Then there was the melting of the Equalizer gun, as if that would actually solve any of Chuck’s problems. He’s already been shot, you know? The damage has been done. Granted, Sam and Dean don’t have it as a last resort weapon anymore, but would either of them WANT to use it, knowing full well how it works? One of them would’ve still had to die to fire it at Chuck. And the whole POINT of all of this is that NEITHER of them should have to die for Chuck’s dumbass, nonsensical story.

Which Lilith critiques REPEATEDLY.

Hold that thought for a second. The melting of the Equalizer looked an AWFUL lot like Dagon melting the Colt. Flashback to 12.19 for that one. Chuck doesn’t want them to have too much power. It makes things too easy for them, and gives them a way to keep saving each other instead of one of them killing the other. Okay, back to where we were.

I mean, even going back to 4.18, I’ve written A LOT about this episode, and specifically about how in hindsight from a post s11 universe it all looks like a test of Chuck’s Personal Emergency Broadcasting Network. Like Chuck wanted to see just how much power and control he had over the story, by specifically engineering this outlandish sequence of events from writing himself into the story as a “prophet” to the ridiculous “Dean seeing stars and having cartoon bandaids on his face.” He wanted to test his own power to manipulate events to his own liking.

But here’s the kicker... Lilith has come back into the story in s15 despite all logic, despite all ability to predict her arrival, WITH THE EXACT SAME STUPID PRETENCE. This time it was to “seduce Dean,” when last time it was to seduce Sam.

AND YET! BOTH TIMES SHE COMPLETELY FAILED TO DO THAT.

Dean brought Chuck to the assignation at gunpoint to draw down the Archangel protecting him to drive Lilith off. Prophecy the First averted. This time, Dean... just had to be himself. Not the kind of person who would take advantage of a terrified and wounded recent college grad. I mean, if Lilith’s “performance” was really Chuck’s attempt at “seduction” it tells us SO MUCH about who Chuck THINKS Dean is, versus who Dean actually is, you know? And this is exactly why Chuck’s story has failed over and over again.

Chuck... has no idea what the fuck he’s writing.

And it’s fucking glorious.

And now? Sam and Dean are 100% aware of the fact.

Of course, Dean’s despondent over the fact. He just wanted to be free. He wanted to think his life was finally his own. But it hadn’t been, all this time he’s still be under Chuck’s thumb. And now he’s so broken he doesn’t know if it’s even possible to win against Chuck, with all his terrible storytelling directly influencing their lives in perpetuity. How do you win against God? How do you win your way free of his terrible story? When every time you think you’ve won, he just keeps writing a new, worse scenario for you?

(and honestly, even when they DO die, he just brings them back and makes them start again! there’s no escape! It could go on forever!)

I wonder what terrible thing he’ll write into their lives next week!

Oh, wait, one of the witches in the promo for 15.06 was the actress who played Sera Siege in 4.18, aka Chuck’s agent! Aka the woman who grilled Sam and Dean about facts from the books and gave them Chuck’s address! Whose name was a conglomeration of Sera Gamble and Julie Siege-- two writers of Supernatural!

So Chuck really is the monster at the end of this book, and Dabb’s final act will be dismantling his entire reign of terror over the lives of Team Free Will.

I... am entirely here for this ride.

#spn s15 spoilers #spn 15.05

[polizwrites]

WIP Wednesday 16 Sep 2020

Chapter 15 of It All Started With) A Night at the Nat (aka WinterIron/WinterHawk/WinterIronHawk Supernatural AU with werewolf!Bucky and fae!Tony & Clint) is paused for the moment  - I've done nothing (other than working out the grand finale WinterIronHawk smut  in my head) The way things are going, I doubt I'll get it done before the end of the month, as other more time- restricted projects are bouncing around in my brain.  Current Last Line: n/a

Part 1 of the @starkbucksbingo   Multiverse Shenanigans square  Quantum Leap-ish fic is still  sitting at 940  words with maybe another 200-400 to finish it off.  I'm combining it with an adopted TSB flash fill - Meeting Alternate Universe Counterparts  to give myself a deadline.  FYI: I will definitely need some help with the various 'verses I am planning on having them visit on subsequent parts:  (Avengers Academy,  Avengers Assemble, Earth 616, Marvel 1872, Noir  Marvel) -- so if you have expertise in any of these and are willing to help with plot ideas, please let me know! Current Last Line:  “So, why’d you bring me here?”

I'm shooting to get another blackout for the September @tonystarkbingo Flash bingo #023 card - the tricky part is going to be finding the time to write it all!  

War Machine square - done.

Friday square - as mentioned above, this is being replaced with Meeting Alternate Universe Counterparts

Epilogue square:  Combining  it with my @starkbucksbingo square  Kill List/Hit List which I'm also using for my Winter's Snowflakes fanart fic challenge (several Discorders are writing a fic based on the same pic).  After a successful mission  (Dec 16, 1991) - the Soldier is given the assignment to bring the Stark heir to Hydra any way he can. If it runs into multiple chapters (as it's likely to do, given that it's me writing this) - I might throw a Whumptober prompt or two into the mix. This is coming along nicely at 830 words. Current Last Line: “What are you,  my—“ Tony cut himself off mid-sentence, his face crumpling. 

Touch square:  Started working on a sequel  from Tri (Tri) Again with  Tony and Eddie|Venom getting up to some more smutty shenanigans.  It's currently at 841 words and they're just now getting around to talking about the smut stuff. Current Last Line: But now, well ... V’s the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Insomnia square:  Combining with my @buckybarnesbingo Insomnia square and another @rebelmeg Sleepy/Cozy prompt: "Carry me to bed?"   It's a new pairing for me: WinterPepperony - (technically established Pepperony with Pepper angling to get Bucky into the mix).  It's pretty much finished at 760 words and will probably be published on Friday.   Current Last Line: He grinned and swept her up in his arms. “Whatever you say, boss-lady.” 

Decision at Sundown (IronHusbands Western AU with mistaken identity smut) is still languishing at the moment. I know the basics of where Chapter 3 will go (Rhodey meeting Tony at Miss Carol’s and mistaking him for an employee), but haven’t gotten any words down on paper yet. I could really use an encouraging nudge on this one, BTW….

Eventually, I’m going to take look at all the published WIPs I have out there and figure out which ones I still have a spark for and which ones to call it quits on. :^/

On other creative fronts, I’m working on a Batman figure for the fourth of my  7-figure commission and I've signed up for  @marveltrumpshate - so stay tuned for your chance to bid early and often!    You can also always check out Stuffed With Character over on Facebook for a list of my designs and photos. They’re mostly Marvel and monsters, but I have some Star Wars & Disney figures as well. Plus I love to take custom design requests!  (The holidays are on the way... hint hint)

Feel free to send me asks regarding any of these projects (or any other WIPs I’ve got out there) – they really help feed the Muse and keep me motivated!

#writing stuff #WIP Update #WIP Wednesday #winterhawk #winteriron #starkbucks #StarkSymbrock #winterpepperony #IronHusbands #Shameless Self Promo

[we-with-the-lgbtqfanfiction]

Gn!dragon!demon!reader x Damien (Monster prom)

Alright. Well since no one has requested something yet I'll make another self indulgent story I guess. --- You were a new student at spooky high. You walked into class like a badass, kicking the door and walk in. The teacher was telling the students about the new student aka you. You look at the teacher and say "I heard you talking about me, well I'm here now so let me introduce myself." Damien looks up from what he was doing. He looked at you face intensely enough for you to notice him. You where surprise to see him again. Damien lavey your childhood friend you haven't seen him in a while, well it's only been like a year or two but it's felt like much longer. You've missed him but you had to go overseas, you wanted to become stronger since your family is part of the Lavey's guards. --- *flashback* Damien's fathers know how much you cared for their son so they ask your parents if it would be alright once You get older to be Damien's personal guard. My parents accepted right away since dragon demons always stay loyal to the ones they served and the Kings saved my parents lives so that was a plus because of the kings I got to have them alive so I also swore my loyalty to them and they're son even tho I was a bit young to be a guard I know once I grow older I would do anything to protect them. *present time* You cough. "My name is (y/n) (l/n) and I'm a dragon demon." You say as you spread you wings out. "I'm a part of the lavey guards. I've finish my training and will now be a student here. I'm Damien's personal guard so I'll ask one of you to change seats with me." You see a girl get up. And walk to your assigned seat without a word. You also hear people commenting on how cool your wings are. You smirk and thank them. Since they didn't think you could hear them one turns away from your gaze and blushes and the other one says "you're welcome dude!" You then walk up to Damien's desk and lean on it. "I've missed you" you say softly for only him to hear. He turns away with a small tint of pink and "whatever, nerd." That's an old one, you thought. "it's been a while since you've called me that" you laugh out. "Dumbass" you hear him mutter. Man you've missed him. "Haven't heard that in a while either. It seems like you've missed me too." You say then chuckle. "Of course I've f*cking missed you. Why wouldn't I.." He grumbled again sounding frustrated. "You know.." "I wanted to tell you before I left for training but never got the time.. The day I left I asked you to see me off but you didn't.. I always wondered why..." You say. Then you hear Damien in a rough sad toned voice "I didn't want to see you go. If I was there I'd have done anything to keep you from leaving. But I know how important it was to you so I decided it would be for the best if I didn't go. Instead I tried to get my mind off it did some arson you now how rade arson is! Tho it would have been awesome if you were there you breath motherf**king fire!" You chuckled he always got so enthusiastic about arson but as a dragon demon you were also very much a fan of fire since you are a fire breather after all. "Hey, Damien?" "Hmm?" You hear him hum out he was still talking about arson so he wasn't fully paying attention to you. You coughed. "Damien I need your full attention please this is important." Once you see you got his attention you continue what you were saying. "Alright. So as I was saying.. I wanted to tell you before but I guess now is as good a time as any... I wanted to tell you that I've fallen in love with you.. I've known I've liked you for a very long time now. If you don't like me back that ok.. I just wanted you to at least know of my feelings..." Huh. You finally said it! You felt nerveus and yet relief after you said your feelings. Damien looked shocked for a minute then shouts "f*ck yeah!" Then you feel his lips on yours. The hole class looks at you both once they heard Damien shout. Everyone had different reactions. The funniest thing you hear was someone shouting "Get a room!" After you and Damien finished the kiss you chuckle. "Maybe we will" you say half jokingly as you laugh. You grab Damien and put him on your shoulder. "Hey!" You hear him say. "Where you taking me and why am I on your shoulder! He asks slightly annoyed. You let out a soft laugh and say teasingly. "I'm getting us a 'room'." --- Alright! This was fun to write! Well I hope you all liked it my lovely readers! Please make sure to request something and leave a comment. 💙 have a lovely morning/evening/afternoon/night everyone! Love you all💕

#damien lavey x reader #gender neutral reader #gn!reader #reader x character #dragon demon reader #demon reader #demon!reader

[zackfiar-a]

FRIENDSHIP ENDED WITH SHINRA NOW AVALANCHE IS MY NEW BEST FRIEND

it took me 10 hours to write all this. i did change up canon quite a bit, but it’s generally the same in some places. i dont blame u guys if u want to skim it LOL 

i rewrote zacks canon from when he joined soldier then a little bit after the Infamous Shinra Showdown PLEASE read this !!!!

i will be applying THIS canon to my portrayal for now on esp the part where he lives but knowing my dumbass, ill be forgetting pieces of canon information i meant to add before ill be adding this to his about shortly once i wake up with a better thought process

if u have any questions pls feel free to ask !!!

being a naive kid at 13 and hearing the glorifying the heroic stories of shinra and SOLDIER, zack makes leave for midgar while writing a note to his parents not to worry about him, he’s aiming for greater things; far more than what gongaga can give him. his dream is to be the wrong idea of what being a hero means, which is wanting to be loved by many and being admired simply for the fame. sephiroth could do it, so why couldn’t he? anything is better than the boring life that gongaga gave him. 

at 15, he makes it into SOLDIER as a 3rd class with the sheer force of determination and the passion of not giving up, which is what his higher ups find lacking in the military chain. being young and impressionable, shinra puts into their head of the glory they give. SOLDIER and the military is what the people look up to for protection while some think of SOLDIER as just dogs. this doesn’t deter zack, genuinely thinking that shinra is doing well for midgar. during this time he gets injected with a dose of mako, which is what they give all members of SOLDIER. this enhances their abilities and strength at the cost of body degradation and the risk of dying earlier than everyone else. zack questions this: giving up literal life for power? well, shinra wouldn’t lie to him! right? if this is price of being a hero for the people, then it has to be worth it while completely clueless of the manipulation of propaganda and ideology that shinra has shoved in his face and forced to intake.

when he turns 16, he’s promoted to SOLDIER 2nd class and befriends kunsel, who helps him give more of the inside scoop of shinra. he’s one of the first real friends zack has made, even exchanging e-mails to communicate outside of missions and SOLDIER. all the while, he is put under the tutelage of angeal. he can sense the hesitance in his mentor for training an actual kid while zack thinks being in SOLDIER is all fun and games. zack hasn’t even seen the horror of the underbelly of the beast, only fighting the surface of the war and just blindly following orders (anyone who dares stand against shinra is a bad guy and aligns themselves with wutai). fortunately, zack doesn’t fully believe that. regardless, angeal teaches him what it means to be SOLDIER, something along the lines of having SOLDIER honor. he doesn’t get what angeal means by that with furrowed brows as he continues to drill that into zacks mind, ontop of zack admittance of the reason why he joined SOLDIER in the first place aka becoming a hero for shinra and the people of midgar. angeal doesn’t even try to alter that dream knowing very well that’s not something he should be aiming for, deciding to let zack figure it out for himself.

if you want to be a hero, you need to have dreams and honor. how many times zack has heard that, he would be a rich man. eventually he takes it to heart, looking up to angeal because of how wise and strong he is.

when he’s 17, angeal nominates for him to be a 1st class while being sent out to a mission in wutai. lazard says this will stop the war, but in actuality it’s used as a false sense of justice of using SOLDIER to set up another reactor in its place. zack is unaware of this, thinking of serving as justice against wutai, using this as a place and opportunity to prove himself. in the end, lazard uses zack’s tenacity and naive enthusiasm to show he could prove himself to overtake fort tamblin. ontop of that, while navigating lazard to safety, angeal is gone and is approached by sephiroth that angeal has possibly betrayed and abandoned SOLDIER. 

no! angeal wouldn’t do that! that’s not the angeal i know! he tries to tell himself that. it’s now where he begins to doubt in shinra and question their motives. he’s so enraptured at the loss of his mentor, he’s stuck inside of his mind on why angeal would leave? he has honor, right? it’s not honorable to leave that what you’re loyal to. having infatuation and admiration for sephiroth, he quickly loses the shine. maybe it’s disappointment, maybe it’s the loss of his mentor. shinra had glorified the 1st class members on all forms of media, but in reality, they weren’t all that special. he takes this time to talking about the SOLDIERS (some that don’t really care for him), about shinra and why they’ve joined it while trying to see if anyone knows anything about behind the scenes. he confides in kunsel, who does give some information on former 1st class genesis and all the 3rd and 2nd classes he took with him.

going with tseng to banora, he immediately feels a sense of dread. it’s strangely quiet, especially when when he comes across angeal’s mother. while he explains to her he doesn’t know where he is, he is determined to bring him back no matter what, not knowing the meaning of his own words. finding out that genesis buried his adopted parents, tseng and zack make their way to the apple factory on the outskirts of town. tseng tells him that sephiroth was originally assigned to this mission but pushed this on zack, for selfish reasons, he thinks. he doesn’t know whether to be angry or relieved because he feels like he can convince angeal to return to shinra but angry because how cowardly can you be? when he finds out that the planes are going to bomb banora, he rushes to try and help gillian escape only to think that angeal had killed her. he feels enraged, punching him, yelling at him about honor and the fact that was his own mother. the respect for him was rapidly being lost, feeling immensely disappointed when angeal leaves without explaining himself. he comes to greatly hate genesis and seriously distrust shinra.

coming back to hq, he is promoted to SOLDIER 1st class. lazard thinks zack would be happy about his promotion, but is only met with a sad face. i don’t deserve to be SOLDIER 1st class. i don’t want it. which, this is what he wanted in the beginning, but with everything that’s happened, he feels like can’t. being unable to convince angeal, the loss of a village and the death of gillian, he feels like he’s going backward from his goal of being a hero. it doesn’t help that he’s a 1st class by default from the lack of leadership. lazard doesnt listen and hearing that genesis copies have attacked midgar. doing so, he meets cissnei. finding out that she can handle herself, he immediately hits on her but is shortly sent on a mission with sephiroth to sector 5 reactor. they look for hollander, instead they find papers for project g. seeming that sephiroth is interested in the details of the experiments, zack is appalled that genesis is a result of a failed experiment and the fact that hollander experimenting on others. is this why he took a bunch of 3rd and 2nd class SOLDIERS with him? to use them to help himself?

finally finding hollander and genesis, he chases hollander through the mako reactor to eventually come across angeal. there’s a momentary relief of seeing him again, however is quickly flooded by reddening anger. angeal tells him, because he is also a monster, he only dreams of 2 things: world domination and revenge. zack is thrown aback at the declaration, resisting the temptation to punch him again. you’re not a monster. monsters don’t have honor. they’re scared. they’re selfish, so they fight and punish the weak. you’re not like that, angeal! and then he remembers what cissnei said about wings that symbolize freedom. angels aren’t monsters. angeal after gets into a fighting position and demands that zack defend himself. hurt at the notion that he would attack him, he’s momentarily stunned. before he can get into a fighting stance or defend himself from the blow, he falls below into sector 5.

he wakes up in a church with aerith hovering over him, briefly thinking it’s his mother when he’s convinced that she’s an angel that has come to greet him in heaven. there’s a funny feeling of meeting her, but he brushes it aside and asks her for one date as a thank you for saving him. he notices the flowers, suggesting that she should sell them to make midgar happy with the motto midgar full of flowers, wallet full of money. on a little detour, zack and aerith chat while she explains she’s afraid of the sky and SOLDIER. they fight and they like it, she explains. however, zack explains that he’s a part of SOLDIER and maybe that it was a mistake that he joined in the first place. not all of them enjoy fighting for the fun of it. that some of them joined because of a childhood fantasy and it’s not at all what it’s cracked up to be. SOLDIERS motives and goals were vastly different from his own and he doesn’t know if he wants to continue to align himself with shinra. he apologies that he shouldn’t have put that all on her since they just met. though he reassures her that since his eyes are the color of the sky, there’s nothing to be scared of. he decides to take her out to see the real sky one, to reassure her that it won’t swallow her. his stay is cut short when he’s called that genesis has attacked midgar and that he should hurry back.

when aerith takes him back to the sector 5 gate, zack decides to buy aerith a pink bow as a gift for their one - day anniversary of meeting. before he leaves, he helps a guy name the bar that would later be named 7th heaven. 

he makes it back to shinra hq and is ordered to go protect hojo, for hollander is probably using this as a way to kill him. finding hojo, he seems less than troubled and more annoyed about hollander. he says that SOLDIER should do their jobs as brutes and do less thinking to protect geniuses like him, which angers zack a little bit. he never really did trust him, seeming to enjoy it too much when hojo injected him mako upon first entering SOLDIER. people aren’t made to throw their lives away for someone who seems them as less than human and shows no compassion. regardless, he does his job, fighting the bahamut fury. he swore he saw angeal during the fight; genesis is gone. 

months later, he’s sent to modeoheim with a couple of shinra infantryman and tseng. on the way there, the helicopter crashes and he meets cloud while the infantryman can’t quite keep up. he learns that cloud is from nibelheim and they instantly bond as being “country boys”. eventually they find a mako excavation facility, which zack takes the initiative to infiltrate while tseng and the others continue to modeoheim. he finds a bickering genesis and hollander, which he immediately aims to fight and kill him. even though he has no personal connection to genesis, he knows that he was close friends with angeal and sephiroth, and he feels like it’s his duty to finally end him. albeit hesitant, he charges forward and wins the fight with genesis while he continues to run after hollander. in the bathhouse, he finds tseng and cloud tired and beaten as they had fought angeal. they warn him to be careful. doing so, he runs into angeal and hollander. 

with his sword shaking in his hand, he decides that he has to bring angeal down and stop this cycle. that as long as he’s alive then genesis will be as well. he finds out that angeal is a result of project gillian and that said gillain actually killed herself in her home. he feels so bad, so disgusting that he had accused angeal slaying his own mother. those thoughts aren’t with him for long, but he sees him combining with all of this copies to become angeal penance. this is it, this where he is where he’s going to have to slay his mentor, the man that he’s looked up to and found as a role model. angeal, his friend that he had confided so much of his secrets in, dead by his blade. it’s like the battle was over in an instant, because now angeal was on the ground, blood pouring out of his wounds whilst slowly degrading. while zack sustained injuries of his own, the most noticeable one was the x on his cheek, with blood slowly running down his neck. it doesn’t take long for him to realize that his whole intent was to kill him, while angeal still had some semblance of honor left. it wasn’t fair, he shouldn’t have to be the one to do it.

angeal weakly hands him his buster sword and tells him to remember dreams, that zack should aim to be a true member of SOLDIER and protect his honor.

when he dies, he takes a deep breath and presses the buster sword to his forehead much like angeal did before he went on missions. sorry, angeal. i can’t do that. i can’t be the SOLDIER you want me to be. my dreams… what does it even mean to be a hero? what honor do i have left as SOLDIER? as long as i stay here, i have none. i will continue to live with what’s left.

later he confides in aerith, traumatized over angeal’s death. he doesn’t want to be in SOLDIER anymore, not what’s going on behind the scenes. unfortunately, while being under the contract of shinra, he’s forced to stay in and serve as a SOLDIER 1st class.

at 18, he’s one of the few SOLDIER 1st class left, the other one being sephiroth. when interacting with a brigade of shinra troops, he tells them that if they want to be a SOLDIER, they must have dreams and honor. while the troops have said to find his speech admiring and they they look up to him with his cool, new look! it’s any rare time that he gives a somber look. don’t believe what shinra says. think for yourself. he doesn’t want to promote and encourage more people to join SOLDIER. deny them as much man power as he possibly can, even if it gets him in trouble with the higher ups. as long as he’s here, he’s under the thumb of shinra.

as a “congratulatory break”, he’s sent to costa del sol to rest and relax. except the fact that he was opposite of that. cissnei was here with him, and any other time he wouldn’t mind, but he knew why she was also on “break” with him. though he’s warned that genesis copies have been spotted, and he has no choice but to fight. a soon to be vacation was over with, when he’s also informed that hojo broke out of prison with the suspicions of lazard, who was said to have disappeared prior before. he rushes to midgar to help stop the genesis copies with the stolen tech of shinra. when he found hollander, it was too late and he escaped. lo’ and behold sephiroth has finally arrived and tells zack that his mission was deemed a failure. he’s just tired of all of this, more concerned about the towns people that caught up in the mess than hollander. at this point, he was too deep that he has no choice for hollander to seek justice for what he’s done. needless to say, he doesn’t care much about seeing sephiroth, but hearing him say he forgives him of his misdeeds relaxes him. with sephiroth’s permission to go back to midgar to see aerith, he heads off there immediately. 

when he arrives at the church, he spots an angeal copy with aerith. at first assuming the worst, he aims to kill it but aerith says not to. instead, the copy protects aerith instead from an uninvited monster. zack doesn’t trust it, but leaves it in the church’s beams anyways to watch over her. he tells aerith that he’s going to be gone for a long time, and he won’t know when he’ll be coming back. so she suggests that zack makes the flower wagon he promised her long ago. when he gets the pieces together, he’s disappointed that aerith doesn’t like it but uses it anyways. he’s with her for several hours, selling flowers, but when he sees aerith being lenient with the price, he tells her not to settle for less. make your stand and not sell it for 1 lousy gil. the flowers deserve to be 10 gil a piece, at least. when a costumer comes across aerith and zack selling flowers, he tells them that it’s their dream to make midgar full of flowers. unfortunately, it isn’t a bit later that he gets a called away on his last mission. before he leaves, he tells aerith that aerith should do something for zack every time he comes to visit her, like wearing pink. he thinks pink is a really endearing color on her. he finds tseng hiding behind a piece of playground equipment, and even though he doesn’t fully trust the turks, he’s really the only one he can trust to take care of aerith, not exactly understanding tseng’s role in the first place.

when zack gets back, he finds cloud, who’s trying to round everyone up for the next mission. zack is elated and excited that finally another mission with him. he finally meets with sephiroth, accompanied by cloud and several other unnamed shinra infantryman, and sephiroth tells them they’re leaving for nibelheim. their goals there were to inspect the incoming monsters infiltrating the town and a malfunctioning reactor. although zack is surprised that cloud has his helmet on, he has his suspicions, he asks why. cloud doen’t give a direct answer, so he brushes it off, not wanting to push the issue. hearing that sephiroth doesn’t have family, he perks up when he hears him mention jenova’s name. jenova… jenova… isn’t that the cells they were using for the monsters? genesis mentioned something about that, didn’t he?

when they go check out the reactor, tifa is there and offers them around nibelheim as a tour guide, even taking pictures in the process. the reactor is now fixed, but among the pods they find monsters soaked in mako. zack is disgusted and feels bad to the people who were affected by this. what were the lads words they said to their family? what were they doing when they got kidnapped? climbing the stairs, he finds the biggest pod with jenova and he can’t help but stare at the plaque. jenova… wait, that’s sephiroth’s mother! before he can think about it more, sephiroth starts to speak. you average SOLDIER members are mako - infused humans. you’re enhanced, but you’re still human. …but then what are these things? their mako levels are exponentially higher than yours. when sephiroth explains that they are monsters spawned by mako energy and that hojo created them, it didn’t take long for zack to connect the dots. he didn’t want it to be true, but it wasn’t a coincidence that the three best friends weren’t human at all, just experimental pawns made by the scientists of shinra. zack approaches him, and tries to be careful on the subject. he didn’t want it to be true. you said “average” member. what about you? that should’ve been an instance where he kept his mouth shut.

this whole thing was no coincidence. seeing sephiroth suddenly grip his head and ask himself if he’s an abomination, that he’s not like the others. zack can’t help but wonder what’s wrong and console him or to be shoved away. makes it no better that genesis came to confirm that’s the case, blowing zack away; that sephiroth is not human because he was created from jenova, or the remains of those failed experiments. finally, when genesis leaves after sephiroth, zack rushes after him to see zack be blasted by a monster and helped by tifa. it makes sense that sephiroth possibly the strongest monster out of angeal and genesis. when he helps tifa and cloud back to the inn, he goes to check up on sephiroth, who is in the basement of the shinra basement. in a mistake of one room, he comes across a seemingly sleeping man in a coffin. oh, creepy. finding sephiroth, he is immediately shunned away with him burying his face in the books. it was his fault this happened anyways, that he had to ask why sephiroth thought he was different from the other SOLDIERS, even angeal and genesis. he was going to try again, because he wasn’t going to have sephiroth betray them too. except sephiroth continued to ignore him and even threatened him to leave. there was a terrible feeling in his gut, but there was nothing he could do, so he left to go check on cloud back at the inn.

cloud was fine, but he wanted to talk to him about tifa and the fact that he was hiding his face the whole time he was in nibelheim. it was a personal issue it seemed, but cloud said if only he was in SOLDIER, then he would be strong enough to protect tifa and others. except, zack wasn’t on board. SOLDIER is a den of monsters. don’t go inside. everything shinra has told you about it is a lie. how great it is… how it produces the best heroes in the world; they don’t settle the peace, they’re just glorified monsters. they don’t care about what happens to the people, as long as it funds their goals in the end. cloud seemed confused, wanting to know more about what he was talking about. zack has the experience of being in SOLDIER in his belt, he just wants to prevent people from being in the same situations he’s been in many times. you know, i asked myself what it meant to be SOLDIER. when i first joined, i thought i was proud to be a part of shinra. everyone talked about how great being in shinra was, but no one knows what lies in the dark. only i know the truth. cloud, do me a favor: don’t ever look in SOLDIER’s direction, before you get turned into a monster, too. 

cloud is still confused, but agrees with him regardless because he was someone who looked greatly up to zack, and it must be serious if he’s saying stuff like this too. though he couldn’t help but ask if zack was considered a monster also. zack doesn’t answer for a long moment, even considering. … i might be. all monsters are infused with mako energy afterall. wouldn’t it make sense if i were one? cloud doesn’t know how to answer it, so he nods towards the buster sword, telling zack that’s never seen him use it. zack picks up angeal’s sword and thinks. this is a symbol of my dreams and honor. it was a symbol of angeal’s burden of SOLDIER honor, not his own. no, it’s not. it’s symbol of my freedom, when i finally leave SOLDIER for good. when i make up all the wrongs it’s done to the innocent people of midgar. this is a symbol for… my own honor. this is proof that i am alive and that i exist. who gives a damn about SOLDIER anyways? no, he wasn’t a monster and never will be one. he’s a kind, and cares for others. do monsters do that? he smiles at cloud and sets down the blade. he thanks him while going straight to sleep. cloud doesn’t even have a say in what for.

a week passes. zack hasn’t seen sephiroth in town and every time he visits him, he is shoved away and ignored. it doesn’t even look like he’s been sleeping. it’s his horror when he wakes up to the increased heat in october and the smell of smoke that he finds out nibelheim is on fire. going to confront sephiroth, he sees tifa curled up, cursing shinra and SOLDIER. he meets him in the reactor where he’s talking to jenova, which he fights him not soon afterwards. just like genesis and angeal, monsters from experiments. sephiroth is no longer the man he had once trusted and admired, so he must either kill him or try and talk him out his hazed trance of god superiority. which is pathetic to think about, because if he couldn’t convince angeal, what makes him think he can talk to sephiroth? zack is striked down, too weak to fight on, so seeing cloud approach, he begs for him to finish sephiroth off. for what he’s seen, it looks like killed him. that victory is short lived when he becomes unconscious. 

for the next 4 years, his dreams died as fast as he desired them. he vaguely remembers such unjust experiments done to him; pumping in so much mako and the power of jenova cells it feels like the flesh is melting off his bones and his heart pounds heavily in his chest. zack doesn’t even realize it’s been 4 years, maybe several days max when he sees angeal’s image in his sleep. he tries to scream for him, but nothing comes out. he bangs on the glass, but there’s no sound. the next few seconds flash by, and now he’s on the ground in some lab. where was he? that didn’t matter. he’s free now, and he’s see cloud in a pod that was next to his own. from then on, it was his duty to take care of cloud until he woke up. it didn’t matter if he didn’t wake up for 3 months, he was still going to be by his side. it’s the least he could do, he owes him so much for getting cloud involved in this mess. 

when he’s finally able to change his clothes, he realizes upon closer inspection that cloud is suffering from severe mako poisoning. he’s seen it in several SOLDIER members who were addicted to it, like they were in such a catatonic state it took them a day to several to get over it. he can’t imagine the intake he has taken, but zack was fine, already being infused with it previously. 

he takes cloud to the coast of a beach that wasn’t far from nibelheim, but by the time he got there, it was night time. he didn’t mind, he needed a break anyways and they had to wait it out until morning because of all the shinra patrols. which, has hasn’t figured out why there were so many to begin with. he’s approached by cissnei, but she wasn’t here for a friendly conversation, her weapon drawn. she asks if he’s the runaway specimen, which gives zack the idea that while he got his wish of no longer being a SOLDIER, he is now seen nothing as an experiment gone wrong. that’s not quite what he had mind, but also finding out that being gone for 4 years makes sense, being presumed dead when he was captured. how was he supposed to function in this world now when it’s moved on and you’re left behind? it was cissnei’s orders to capture him alive, but zack would be dead than rather to be back in shinra’s hands. seeing her able to actually put up a fight, zack escapes to meet back up with cloud. cissnei comes back, but offers him her peace, and a vehicle for them to runaway in. he thanks cissnei, and cloud and zack attempt to back to midgar, while trying to run from shinra.

another year passes, he sees genesis on the road, which he’s been told that zack’s “gift of the goddess”. becoming captured, a genesis clone eats some of his hair to help stop his degradation, except the cells had adapted to zack’s body, having already intaken mako in the past. the clone transforms into a monster, which zack has to fight to pass. he does, becoming more frustrated and angry until he reaches gongaga. he decides to make a pit stop, but cissnei finds him, telling that his hometown is such an obvious place for shinra to find zack. except he spots a white wing and a flash of angeal’s face. 

he leaves cissnei and goes to chase the figure, finding out it’s lazard who had become an angeal copy. once wanting revenge and filled with anger, absorbing angeal’s cells caused him to have a strong will and the desire to help out zack. he’s degrading, and it shows by the withered feathers. unexpectedly, he asks what zack’s dreams were. this time, he takes serious consideration. no longer someone of shinra or SOLDIER, he’s free to do whatever he pleases, however now that’s very sure in his goal, he tells lazard that he wants to a hero. this time, not for fame or to see how great people are. if he can save one person, then he can be a hero. if he can help at least one person, then that’s good enough for him. he doesn’t care about fame, or the glory that comes with a praised name. that’s boring and not for him at all. lazard laughs and tells him exactly what he had said before when he first asked those years ago: unattainable dreams are the best kind.

genesis and hollander find them, which hollander now has become a genesis clone. genesis informs him that cloud is the last bearer of pure s - cells. upon them trying to take it, zack officially kills hollander at last, which he leaves cloud with a wounded lazard. zack finally gets the hint with the constant banora apples he always holds that genesis works from banora. he asks a dying lazard to look after cloud as he goes to finish off a further degrading genesis. he chases him underground and finds and finishes him. after all this time, he can’t feel the harbor of anger and hatred he once had towards genesis, but now only pity and sadness. all this for a shred of immortality, just because he was afraid of dying. however, he can’t forgive all those people he’s captured and extracted for any hopes to stop his degradation process as a failed experiment. he leaves genesis down in the banora underground where the lifestream goes through.

coming back to the surface, he sees lazard dead with the angeal copy that had protected aerith in her church. zack rests with cloud when the last angeal copy to dies, thanking it for protecting aerith this whole time while he was away. with his new found motivation, zack hitches with cloud on the back of a truck on the way to midgar. zack tells him that he wants to become a mercenary, any job that’s dangerous or boring, as long as it has pay. he also informs cloud that he’ll join him too, because they’re friends, right? he also has “conversations” with a continued catatonic cloud about how he can’t wait for him to meet aerith. zack thinks the two of them will get along perfectly, like they’re two peas in a pod. also recalling how cloud had issues with talk about tifa, he hopes that cloud gets that resolved because he’s sure tifa misses him a lot and wants him to come home (which, it’s unfortunately no longer nibelheim). zack continues to talk to cloud about nonsense, even silly stories about being in SOLDIER. he says once that kunsel had e - mail’d him like crazy when he mysteriously found that he was still alive. it’s like he’s too ashamed to face him now. 

he spots a shinra road block, which zack thanks the driver and sets cloud to the side, telling him he’ll be right back. he’s convinced that he will die here but he will continue to fight for his freedom as long as he was associated with SOLDIER in any time frame. that’s fine with him. approaching him, he gives a sigh and a shake of his head. then pressing the blade to his forehead, he speaks to himself. whatever happens, protect your dreams…  and your honor. fight for your freedom and your right to exist! come and get it! before charging at the army in his wake. 

it feels like the battle went on for hours, being targeted at several different directions. the weight of the buster sword was becoming too heavy, his arms feeling like lead and legs feeling like jello. dodge a bullet there, block a punch there. even several summons later, it like his body was running on auto - drive. he’s lost vision in one eye, but he can still fight. the pain is numbed by the adrenaline running through his body and how his lungs are struggling for air with every swing he takes. was he really going to die here? his first mistake was believing in shinra’s ideals and goals, and continuing to follow them, what kind of idiot was him? quickly went down from being a respectable, admirable leadership to someone who’s the lowest of the low. shinra won’t keep midgar safe. everyone is pawns, they’re all expendable. they don’t care about its people, they will sacrifice as many as they can. what’s their end goal? he doesn’t know. he just wants to right all the wrongs he’s done, all the ignorant stuff he’s said. it’s all over. he owes the people.

i’m sorry. i’m sorry.

it’s almost a hour later, his back is laid against the bloodied ground with a cloudy sky above him with the hilt of the blade loosely being held in his hand. did he… make it? his heart rate is slow but as long as he can still move. was cloud okay? that was his main concern. cloud… his voice is quiet, rasp as he struggles to sit up. blood is pouring down his face and neck, a rib was cracked, but that was the last thing on his mind. cloud, we did it. there’s a very weak smile on his face, his left eye is non - functional, and he’s using his buster sword as a crutch. a rather pathetic sight. did you see that? he finds cloud resting exactly where he rested him. good, he’s so relieved. he struggles to pick cloud up, but with his arm held across his shoulders, he’s wincing and in so much pain, but they had to keep moving. we’re almost there. then he can see aerith again, the freedom of the sky of his victory well won.

however, he collapses upon half way making it to midgar, unconscious from blood loss, but when he wakes up, he’s at the slums sector 7 train station. he looks at his side and see cloud still knocked out. he’s safe. he’s spotted by tifa, who regonizes cloud and brings them back to the apartments. zack is treated by a doctor, with 2 cracked ribs and a loss of his left eye, which is covered up with a bandaged eye patch. cloud is still catatonic, however slowly regaining consciousness, as he is showing more body function than he has in the past year. while recovering, zack is introduced to avalanche, who’s goal was to fight against shinra and their greedy destruction of the planet. zack decides to still work as a mercenary while aiding avalanche, to take back what they’ve killed and caused chaos with. he decides to take tifa to the side and apologize for what happened in nibelheim and her dad, even feeling solely responsible. 

when zack is able to fight, he takes up the job to help bomb a reactor, albeit hesitant, and helping up around  the sector 7 slums with the neighborhood watch, even going to the sector 5 slums and reuniting with aerith. even after all this, he still maintains a positive face, joking with the lack of a brain cell.

however, bombing the reactor has tied him with shinra once again, instead of being a SOLDIER 1st class, he’s an escaped fugitive; a betrayer of shinra. the events after this is still to be determined.

#m. #my eyes hurt ............. ill be back later after taking a nap or something

[migstheruler]

PLaystation 5 Event

initially great, despite the horrible pre-orders ordeal.

On Sept. 16, 2020, Sony pulled back the curtain on another slew of details regarding the PS5.

1.       The PlayStation 5 releases on November 12th, 2020 in Japan, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and the United States (why these states, only Sony knows even though I think it’s because of their distinct market in each of these countries).

2.       The PlayStation 5 releases everywhere else on November 19, 2020.

3.       The PlayStation 5 launches at $399.99 for the digital edition and $499.99 for the disc-based edition.

*IF backward compatibility with the PS4 is important to you, I’d recommend the disc-based PS5. Sony execs have confirmed 99% of PS4 games are compatible with their new Flagship console.

   The event also gave us a look into some new games coming to the PS5 for launch as well as games we can expect during the first year of the PlayStation 5’s life cycle. Honestly tho, I think some of those games indicating they were launching during 2021 is a lie. You mean to tell me you’re going to launch Horizon, God of War 2, Final Fantasy 16 all in one year…..really… If these games were dique going to launch in 2021, you would think they would have had at least a working demo or something, instead of a teaser trailer with the games logo…but I digress, I’ll touch on this later.

 Below are a few games showed that caught my eye and I just had to write about them.

Overall, Sony’s PS5 presentation was a good one, with all the information we as consumers were asking for since June and 10/10 would watch again (I’ve seen the presentation 4 times already (twice to write this piece 😊)).  

The presentations started with a trailer showing a slew of different games coming to the PlayStation five system, most games we covered in https://migstheruler.com/post/620830163010240512/ps5-reveal-event but just when you thought this was another trailer, boom!!!

Final Fantasy 16

A nice mix of old and new: as if the folks from Final Fantasy 11 and 12 made a 15 esque type game.

Shiva the ice goddess is back, and looking deadlier than ever throwing out chilly ice crystals sure to cause anyone level seven frostbite

Who´s a good boy? This little pup looks ready to be pet and given treats.

 It looks like our trusty steeds the Chocobos are back, hopefully, they are more useful this time around )I’m looking at you final fantasy seven episode one)

Marlboros are looking as menacing as ever.

 Final Fantasy 16 was pretty unexpected to be honest, especially given final fantasy seven episodes one releasing a few months ago. However, it’s a nice surprise to see Square Soft jk Square Enix working on a new Final Fantasy game, especially one that likes to expand upon the action RPG elements (Think kingdom hearts series or final fantasy 15 and even 7).  Aesthetically, this is giving me hardcore fantasy elements with realism thrown in there.

Either way, what a great way to start off the presentation.

  Spiderman Miles Morales:

Next up, Sony gives us a seven-minute look into Spiderman Miles Morales, which expands upon 2018’s PS4 Spiderman. Sony has said this is not a direct sequel but instead a look to further expand upon the world through the eyes of Miles Morales. The graphics and presentation of this game are sure to entice any spiderman man. The lighting coupled with Mile’s powers makes this game a visual PS5 treat.

 Last time we saw Miles, he had just shown Peter Parker he too had powers to which Peter Parker joined him upon the ceiling, it was a bonding moment the two spider-men would have. Fast forward maybe a year (I’m not sure how much time has passed since the last spiderman game) we are thrusted into the shoes of Miles Morales.

  “Mom I’m home” Can we take a moment to appreciate my man’s line up here, dam that shit looks crispy.

Walking through Harlem, music playing, and folks dancing Salsa in the street. I’m not going to lie, this made me cheese from ear to ear.

This is what I expect to encounter when I have to mediate between clients ready to rip each other apart in a gory fashion (above).  

 Okay, knowing how strong spiderman is, I fully expect the dude’s Jaw to be broken after this power punch.

I forgot to mention (above) Miles can turn Invisible and has access to electric powers (below) sure to spruce up and affect the way Miles plays. I can only imagine a focus less on gadgets and more of an emphasis on Miles’ powers.

Although I know this game stars a new spiderman aka Miles Morales, the developers sure are making sure we know  we’re not playing with Peter Parker anymore.

“Insert obligatory spiderman being pulled from different directions trope here” I’m not even going to front; this image is pretty cool.

Lastly, how dope is this launch title? It is one of the first games I plan to beat on my PS5.

-          I do want to say one thing regarding this title. I think it’s pretty great from a representation perspective to see a Black and Puerto Rican spiderman. Representation matters. I’m not Puerto Rican but am Latino and I do appreciate the flags littered throughout the trailer, folks dancing salsa and overall, Miles Morales as a character.

One gripe I have with this game unfortunately is Sony’s anti-consumer stance regarding those that purchased 2018’s Spiderman. Folks that purchase the Deluxe Spiderman Miles Morales edition for $79.99 get both Spiderman Miles Morales and a supped-up version of 2018’s spiderman for the PS5, yet Sony hasn’t extended an olive branch to those of us that supported their 2018 game (even making it one of their best sellers). IF you want to play Spiderman Miles Morales, you can cop it for a cool $49.99 which is dope but doesn’t include any type of upgrade for those of us with the PS4 version of spiderman. Honestly, as someone that doesn’t plan on playing the game again but it’s pretty anti-consumer to not even offer some type of benefit to those PS4 supporters. Here’s to hoping they offer some type of upgrade via a patch to the PS4 spiderman.

·       Turns out the game will run natively better on the PS5 given the consoles superior power but for a truly next gen 2018 Spiderman experience, you gotta pay those $69.99 duckats.  

   Looks Like we’re going back to Hogwarts and I’m not talking about Fantastic Beasts or Harry Potter. We received our first look (aside from the leak that was released last year). In Hogwarts Legacy, we go back to the late 1800s to visit the Wizards of the Waverly place (I think I said this right, I’ve only seen the Harry Potter movies once all the way through). Either way, it looks like they managed to capture the magic of Hogwatz. The walls of Hogwarts look alive, books flying all over the place and magic spewing from cauldrons of unknown potions.

 Our journey begins going back to Hogwarts with a cool looking Owl to boot.    

 The sorting hat is back babi, it seems like this is a create your own character adventure, where we as the player will get to customize our very own character, sure to get into whatever wizardly fun is to be found.  Team Slytherin all day!! JK, I’m team Gryffindor babi. But really tho, I have no idea what school I’d be assigned too.

  In both of these pictures, its quite remarkable the little details you see; the more you look, the more you see. Did you see the candles above, or the candlelight below

Looks like our boys are cooking up work in the kitchen aka cauldron. I’d also like to bring attention to the lighting, truly impressive.  Time to eat some delicious grub with my fellow wizards!! (Below)

 Looks like we’ll be facing a litany of different monsters and foes. I know with my Avada Kedavra, I’ll be blasting fools like the one below away.

 Dam son, we fighting Dragons out here too, sheesh.

Looks like combat will be a big portion of gameplay as the video showed of a created character fighting some pretty large beasts.

Looks like we’ll be playing quidditch in this game, and I honestly can’t wait.

I sure do hope we’re able to feed these little cuties and pet them.

Looks like this game is open world, as the characters are seen flying on Griffins across the vista. They draw distances in this game are spectacular.

Hogwarts Legacy launches in 2021.

 *JK Rowling has no involvement with this game and that’s a good thing given her recent problematic statements.

  Demon Souls

Full disclosure, I bought demon souls for the PS3 back in the day but unfortunately, did not stick with the game. It was fun and I would proceed to play other From Software and souls genre games in the future such as Sekiro, Bloodborne and Nioh to name a few. But here we have Bluepoint games remaking the PS3 Cult Classic and precursor to the Souls Genre. I for one am super excited to jump back in and try my hand again at Demon Souls.

 This place here is the game’s main hub that allows you to access other portions of the world map. IT’s nice to see it in all it’s HD Glory.

Our Player is borne anew: Rise from your grave!!! JK, this isn’t a Sega title.

The environments look super luscious and literal indistinguishable from concept art. The leaves, lighting, and armor are truly a beautiful sight to see.  (Below) 

Nothing like chilling by a bonfire, although if you’re new to the genre, every time you heal at these bon fires, all the enemies you spent tirelessly fighting repopulate.

Call me crazy but in the original, players from other games could leave each other messages written in blood, as a way to help each other out. It looks like this concept is making a comeback this time around.  

 Dragons are so hot right now…. (insert Zoolander Gif here)

If you have ever played a souls game, you know this is something you can expect to see even in your dreams. I remember going to bed thinking how an enemy boss had beaten me 13-times in a row, only to go to bed thinking and imaging different strategies on how I could kill the foe standing between me and the game's progress.

The gameplay looks faster than the original but the difficult elements remain prevalent. The player is seen mowing down enemies which seems a bit off given the extreme difficulty of the PS3 game. But this could be Bluepoint addressing the sometimes-outrageous difficulty by making it more appealing to casuals.

Launch Title!!!!

 God of War Ragnarök:

Last time we saw our heroes, Kratos and Atreus were shacked up in their home when they receive a visit from a mysterious visitor brandishing what looks like Mjolnir on his waist.  The game ended in a great cliff hanger and is sure to improve on the many aspects the PS4 game

Get the fuck out of here. Sony decided to drop a nuclear ton warhead on us with the teaser trailer of God of War Ragnarok, a sequel to the PS4’s God of War.  Although they did not show any game play, they did manage to build the hype with the screen below:  

And then to top off the trailer the list the following with a supposed 2021 release date which I think is highly unlikely but, we will see. Either way, “we must prepare”.

   Sadly, when the presentation ended, pre-orders went live . We were told by Sony that we would have ample time to prepare to pre-order, nothing but the contrary occured. I was one of the unlucky folks who failed to obtain his PS5 preorder despite having the funds to do so. Here’s to hoping I’m able to secure a pre-order prior to the Nov 12 launch. I did manage to get a PS5 camera which is a must for me since I like to stream games online, it’s really quite addicting. Check out my channel at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiazQqSufhmIGo2a7odLOpQ?view_as=subscriber.

I do want to say one thing, I am very fortunate to have the things i’ve accumulated over the years. I know there are people in the world that lack even basic necessities. If you’re reading this, please donate to  cause/fund or organization you beleive in. I know my life’s work is to improve the living conditions of everyone regardless of their creed and that keeps me plenty busy.  

  All images used in this piece were obtained from the source below: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG0G44G6RI8

Credit: IGN 

#ps5 #ps5 release #ps5 reveal #demonsouls #god of war ragnarok #spiderman mile morales #hogwarts legacy #final fantasy 16 #final fantasy xvi

[chaneltae]

Mångata pt.1 | kth

Pairing: Taehyung x reader Genre: College!AU, fluff Warnings: none Words: 2,8k Part: 1

↳ When faced with his final art project for college Taehyung considers himself royally fucked if it weren’t for class mate Yoongi to come up with a rescuing idea. Struggling herself, Y/N can’t help but accept to work together with the just introduced strawberry enthusiast. And it’s just for this one assignment anyway, what could possibly go wrong? ⋆ aka your local broke college students + strangers to lovers trope

“Okay, that’s it. I quit.” Taehyung groans into his hands, covering his face. All this time he knew exactly how important this moment is going to be, but he never expected to be so utterly confused and helpless once he was confronted with it. The final project. The last piece of art to determine his grade, his degree. If he even gets one. At this point right now, he feels like rather giving up than spending another six months trying to figure out a final… something to present at the grand exhibition. Ten minutes ago, he was motivated, ready to tackle this last mission, excited to pack out whatever medium required and start working on his most important piece so far. But that already seems to have been an eternity ago, his mind long gone into the depths of a feeling equivalent to watching paint dry. Glancing around the lecture hall it seems he isn’t the only one questioning the choice of his major at this given moment. As if anyone had a realistic chance of actually escaping this. The topic couldn’t have been worse. Human. What’s that supposed to mean? 

“Human? What’s that supposed to mean?” Next to him a disheveled mop of hair lets out a snorting giggle. A weird sound Taehyung notes, as if it’s supposed to sound unbothered but it sounds more like anxiety laughing. “Whatever it is, our professor definitely is not.” The raspy voice states, clearly not having it. “She really wants us to suffer, huh? Even forcing us to work together with a person… a human.” another undefined sound of displeasure leaving his lips. “I would say it couldn’t get worse, but we have complete freedom regarding nearly everything and there is honestly nothing more constricting than freedom in this situation.” A sharp voice cuts them off of any further conversation. Faced to the blackboard the professor continues her monolog, scribbling down the time schedule everyone is expected to follow suit. The last number mentally already saved as funeral date in Taehyung’s head. “I repeat once again, the overall topic of your project is ‘Human’. Interpret that however you want, you have no restrictions in terms of media, but keep in mind the size of our gallery is limited, and so is your designated space in it.” A few grunts erupt around the boys’ seats, everyone knowing very well that calling the gallery limited is a huge understatement. As if anyone of them would come around with a giant truck loaded with massive pieces for the exhibition when they are still unable to even have the grasp of an idea. Even the sculptors wouldn’t. “Regarding the person we are supposed to work with. Any restrictions?” Taehyung hears his seat neighbor ask, eyes fixed to the front of the room. An evil smirk gracing his professor’s lips, he can almost feel everyone’s heart in the room dropping in to their pants. “Good question Mr. Min. Yes, there are restrictions. You are, of course, not allowed to work with anyone in your class. Your final project is supposed to reflect your own work and inspirations and not end up being a group project. You’re not particularly searching for a partner, I want you to take a person and add them as a human aspect to your work. Again, interpret that as you wish.” The silent grimaces of confusion paint the rows of students as the professor leaves with the promise of an email with more detailed information and a threatful reminder of the set schedule. With a sigh of defeat Taehyung turns his body towards the smaller man next to him “Hyung, what now?” Finally looking up, the other stares right into his eyes, dead serious “We’re fucked.”

 The door opens, the annoying bells chiming at the disturbance. Your cue to put on a smile and look like selling beverages to sleep deprived students at this ungodly hour is the one thing to bring you joy and mental strength. Despite the fact that you are anything but joyful at this given moment. You were just about to start your generic greeting when you spot ashy grey hair sticking out of a blue beanie, catlike eyes gazing through them in a warm hello. “Oh Yoongs, you’re early! How was class? Did I predict your topic right?” you wiggle your eyebrows in expectation, hands already working on the coffee machine as you grab his favorite mug. It was a production mistake, the city skyline somehow printed on the ceramic twice, leaving it unable to sell, so you kept it as your own. Even though it ended up being Yoongi’s favorite once he started to visit you between his classes and you couldn’t bring yourself to deny him that when he looked like a proud puppy holding it in his hands. You get an annoyed scuff as an answer as he peels himself out of his scarf and jacket “I wish. That would have been better.” Surprised you can’t hold back a slight chuckle, answering once the machine in front of you stopped loudly grinding coffee beans. “That would have been better? What could possibly be a topic worse than ‘Developing a prototype to translate text and speech to sign language with bilingual subtitles: a framework’?” “Developing a what?” a third voice suddenly stutters half laughing, obviously taken aback by your statement. Bewildered you turn around to take in the sight of another man standing in the café, one corner of his mouth rising slightly at your expression. Having him next to Yoongi is nearly amusing, while the older is dressed in ripped skinny jeans and his favorite Kendrick hoodie, muffled up in huge scarfs and beanies during the biting winter air (“no I’m not going to wear ‘unripped’ jeans, I’m not a monster”), the taller looks quite the opposite. A dark red flower shirt decorates his broad chest, tucked into wide-legged, black pants which hug his unnecessarily long legs, unfair, in a way that make it look like he is too expensive for clothes. His fluffy black hair frames an unreadable face on one side, while the other half is tucked behind his ear, barely long enough to stay there in place. “Oh Y/N, this is Taehyung. We’re both in arts class with Professor Power Point but he’s one of those motivated kiddos who chose a double major, consider yourself warned.” Yoongi mindlessly gestures his hand through the air, as if that would give the introduction more substance. “Taehyung, this is Y/N. The only reason I actually attend morning classes.” With that he plops down on the armchair, apparently done with his excellent characterization. Confused, Taehyung’s eyes skim from the older to you behind the counter, waiting for further annotation. “What he’s trying to say is that I’m his flat mate and have to drag him out of bed and provide him with free coffee when I’m on shift.” You laugh at his confused façade falling with realization as you turn your attention back to the roaring machine. “Well then double major Taehyung, who I have been warned of, what drink can I get you? Full offense, you don’t look like someone who would drink the same hell-brew like Yoongs does.” The last bit of awkwardness falling off of him Taehyung steps to the counter, taking a quick look at the menu only to end up pouting “Do you have anything with strawberries?” Cute.

A few minutes and tired customers later you join the two boys gathered around the tiny table in the rather hidden corner of the shop, Yoongi’s favorite spot to no one’s surprise. With a grin you place the pastel pink drink in front of a curious Taehyung “Here is your ‘Very Berry Gurt’, hope you like it.” Cautiously he wraps his lips around the straw, obviously suspicious, as you let yourself slouch down on a nearby chair “It used to be the favorite drink of our Yoongurt here.” “Yah, don’t call me that!” the small male retorts at your stupid nickname, swatting his hand in your direction with the weak attempt of hitting you. Bursting out in giggles you can’t stop yourself but continue “He was berry passionate about it, you know.” Yoongi groans out in annoyance, his head falling into his palms, wishing he could morph with the chair as a deep, breathy laughter fills the room. Pleased you take in the sight of Taehyung’s boxy grin as he tries his best not to choke on said drink. “Since when did you plan to set up this joke?” the grey-haired asks while gently hitting the youngers back, judging look on his face. Shrugging your shoulders nonchalantly you sip at your own drink “The second I saw the name.” “How come I never met you before Y/N? Even though I have the feeling I saw you around somewhere.” Taehyung asks once he is able to breath properly again, carefully placing his drink back on the table. Keeping a safe distance in regards of his own health. “My classes are practically on the other end of campus if you are at the arts building, so I’m sure we never ran in to each other there.” You try to think of a possible scenario but nothing comes to mind, knowing for sure Yoongi most definitely didn’t invite him over to your shared flat. That you would remember. Tilting his head to the side his somewhat puppy-like but also fascinatingly intense eyes scan your face, searching for an answer in your contours. Yoongi shifts in his armchair, pulling his knees up to wrap his arms around them, looking more huggable than anything else. “Maybe you recognize her from the photos.” He states, leaving Taehyung even more confused than before. “You remember my last years’ final project? Part of it is still hanging in the gallery if I’m not mistaken.” Slowly nodding the younger seems to vaguely remember what the older is referencing, his mind wrapping around the information. “There were a few pictures with Y/N in them.” “Oh yeah right, I helped you with that project!” you chirm in, remembering the small favor to save him from an existential photographer crisis. Taehyung’s eyes widen, finally envisioning the pieces in his head. You didn’t really think much of being in the background of a few photos if it prevents your best friend from going insane over a potential failed class. But now that you are faced with the situation of someone actually paying enough attention to take in your features, let alone being able to somewhat remember you, leaves a weird taste behind. You can’t help but wonder if there are more people who looked at those pictures, looked at your face, able to recognize it in a crowd. A familiar face but nothing behind it. A familiar stranger. The shrill notification sound of different phones interrupts the moment, the two males starting to frantically fish around in their pockets as if their life depends on it. “Oh god, it’s Professor Power Point with her details mail.” Yoongi states once he found the device before scanning through the text on his screen. Taehyung falls just as silent with a concentrated expression on his face, brows slightly furrowed and his tongue quickly poking out to wet his lips. Somehow it reminds you of Yoshi’s little ‘mlem’ sound. Adorable. Not long after starting to read a desperate rampart of ‘no’s, slowly increasing in volume, leaves Yoongis lips as he continues scrolling. You just raise your brow in question, waiting for him to elucidate his distress. However, all he does is start to whine, gripping his phone as if he would try to strangle it, wishing for it to be something else “What did I ever do to deserve this?”. “In all probability, something terrible.” He shots you a disappointed, judging look at your remark, not even worthy of an eyeroll. “You’re not helping Y/N.” Shifting in your chair you plant yourself in a position that says ‘you can tell me everything’ as Taehyung chimes in, apparently done with reading “What is it, hyung?”. With a sigh the older tugs his phone into the armchair gap and turns to you “Okay, let me summarize quickly so you can understand, Y/N. Our project theme is ‘human’. Yes, I know, stupid, please don’t say anything. Thank you.” You nod slowly, no intention of adding anything. “And our delightful professor had the audacity to force us to work with a partner. A human, hah. But we are not allowed to work with people from our class, even if they have a different major. Which means I can’t work with Taehyung here since he’s in fine arts and photography. So, my brilliant thought was to ask you again, since y’know, you saved my ass with the last project and of all people you should know the best what to do with the topic ‘human’.” At that Taehyung sends you a questioning look but doesn’t dare to interrupt the older as you keep nodding. “However, we are also not allowed to work with people we paired up with before. Aka, I can’t ask you either. Aka, I’m lost.” That said Yoongi looks at both of you with a face that resembles the smiling upside-down emoji horrifyingly accurate. For a few seconds no one is quite sure what to say, staring into their beverages as if the liquid would give them the needed advice. Helpless you turn to the tall male sitting next to you “Do you have any plans on how to find a partner yourself, Taehyung?” A pained smile crosses his features as he ruffles through the hair at the back of his head, fluffy strains floating through his ring accessorized fingers. “I’m was also going to ask my flat mates, but I’m not sure what they’ll say. Especially since I have no concept or idea whatsoever… they might be too busy with their own stuff.” He trails off, obviously unsure about his own words, a wave of anxiousness hitting at the realization this might be harder than initially anticipated. Given the lack of ideas everyone returns to stare at the table in front of them. The drinks still far from illuminating. “Hm, it makes sense to work with someone from my classes though, even if it’s not me. But on the other hand, it also might be a little too literal to pair up with a social major, don’t you think?” you attempt to reason, trying to think of a person who would be willing to accept such a challenge when everyone is busy themselves surviving their own classes. Eyes hovering over Yoongi’s hoodie you suddenly get an idea “I could ask Namjoon from Legal! You know each other, right?” “Legal?” Taehyung asks, even if not the person involved, he can’t hold back his curiosity. “Legal and ethic issues in social work.” You mechanically respond before turning back to Yoongi “He has more business focused classes, but still shares the social ones with me. It’s worth a try.” Relieved you note that his face seems at least a little less anxious at the mention of his former music school acquaintance. Carefully he takes a sip of his hell brew coffee, still hesitant but eventually agreeing to your idea. Interrupted by the aggressive bells announcing a new customer you get up to move back to work with the promise to ask Namjoon in behalf of Yoongi, hopefully saving him once again.

-

“Jimin, please! I’ll even do your laundry for the next month.” Taehyung almost begs into the phone he’s holding on to for dear life. After he left the café with Yoongi, parting their ways, he couldn’t help but dial his best friend’s number in an instant. The fear of having to search for someone who isn’t one of his two flat mates creeping up his spine, now that realization finally hit. The problem of the concept itself long forgotten, all he can think of is persuading the male on the other end of the line to help him out. However, the soft voice coming through the speakers only fuels Taehyung’s desperation “I’m so sorry Tae, but I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep. You know how busy Hobi hyung and I are with the studio and we don’t want to agree on helping you, when we might end up having to bail out.” He can hear the sincerity in the others voice, knowing very well they only mean good and want the best for him. But still – “Well, shit.”

#bangtanarmynet #networkbangtan #bts fanfiction #bts fanfic #bts x reader #bts fluff #taehyung x reader #bts series #kim taehyung #mangata #chanel;series #[this is my first fic guys please talk to me; shoot me an ask; every kind of feedback is needed ♥] #[is this worth continuing? ;;]