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#or maybe more accurately A was willing to take more on faith for love of B
seth-shitposts · 3 months
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I just want to say that I love the name for your newest au "Sense of Faith, Self & Valor" because those are qualities that are all visible differently in each character and yet also something that they desperately want to embody more of, Kallus with being Faithful and full of Valor yet having no true sense of self, Tua with Faith & Self but having no Valor, and He with Self and Valor but having to Faith because of how far he has fallen from what He used to be.
Friend, friend, MUN, when I tell you I had to break out into a sprint because of this in my inbox-
THANK YOU.
Much thanks to @mystical-salamander for helping us in naming this au because I was very much kicking myself in the ass for not having changed the label of Defectors AU early on when I realized 1- I was indeed going to add and expand upon the au more and 2-the og concept was definitely changing. Because this au is much more accurately defectors than the other one, but it's too far developed for me to detach it now. It's not getting a name change until the story is finished and I start posting the first chapter.
Salamander helped us with a large chunk of the name, and after the conversation I felt it was still missing one more crucial piece, so I added it.
And your reading about it is very correct.
Kallus has such a lack of Self, that his senses of Faith and Valor were increased to cover that but ultimately led to him allowing himself to make a line of the worst mistakes he can't take back or repair. He dedicated himself so much and so intensely that he allowed himself to be comfortable in blind faith.
Tua knows herself well and is very self aware. Her dedicating her faith and self was how she covered her lack of valor, but she couldn't hide that when things got intense, and in so, her faith wavered. Her sense of self didn't and that was how she ends up still continuing with faith, but her lack of valor still haunts her.
And for Him, he knows large portions of his self, and his valor is even greater. But his faith continuously has not been whole. His faith had wavered and weakened frequently in the jedi order, and he left at something after the Trials of Ahsoka Tano. He was always willing to step forth his valor for his sense of self, but his lack of faith still limits him. To the point now that it affects his self.
I'm very much looking forward to this au. I'm having it start around the time Kallus's loyalty to the empire has disintegrated, which in this au is maybe a few weeks or so after Bahryn, and a few more weeks before he starts trials to pick up the Fulcrum role&code name.
I very much look forward to not shutting the fuck up about this. I will drop more information after I've posted the first concept dump on ao3. In the meantime, I will answer any questions about this au. I'll be bouncing between this in our other WIPs&AUs frequently. Atm, this is just the one demanding our attention and getting our mental&emotional stability through working two jobs.
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attadale · 11 months
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Spiritually burnt out reader + sweet caring John :( <3
Spoiler for the chosen2, fem!reader, worried John, maybe not canonically accurate (??), def should count my writing as a warning💀, english is not my first language, not proofread!!
Note: It is hard (specially as we start to believe and live for Christ) to not have at least one burn out when we (for example) feel like we cannot accomplish God's commandments; making us feel like a dissapointment to him. When he is more than faithful and willing to forgive us ♡
Your flesh is completely dried out in these terms; your spirit willing to fight contrary to a body where you remain, in which you live everyday, with it's great and not so great feelings.
Your spirit so burnt out it manifests through the low energy John watches you walk with, the one you speak with and it's an endless worry to watch your eyebags turn your eyes so dull. To not be able to hug this broken spirit you carry; the load is such that it looks heavy on your back even though this is beyond physical.
The worry threads through his hands when he puts them over your pale skin. He prays with you, unable to not keep eyes open when he is aware yours are closing sadly. You look so softly tired; but actually too tired. Your faith remains in a string and he reminds himself to strengthen it before it's too late. Because it's a scary thought that somehow brings him hope. Because it does mean hope.
You have faith.
“I chopped too many slices,” you look up at him, eyes droopy and heavy. Putting a stop to the previous task.
“It's ok, love, I would eat them all if it's you who cooked.”
You laugh at his loveliness. John would eat food made ashes if it's you who cooked them. If it meant something to his lovely wife; even though you always cleared up how bad your cooking might be.
“John, I never cook. I don't know how to,” you admit childishly, actually lamenting not knowing how to.
He picks up on your dissapointing tone just as soon as he wraps his arm around you, pulling you closer by the hip. It is pleasurable; to know John supports your body, as much as your mind, and your mind as much as your spirit, your center.
You lean even more into him, subconsciously seeking his warmth. You feel how you can't sink further and disappear in him as desperately as you want to. Your head is buried on his chest, and he melts, cheek comically pressing against the crown of your head.
Both of you stay like this for a while. He swings you back and forth and recalls the times you did so. A very sudden heaviness on his heart as he acknowledged how many times you held him like this; when James was gone; Sometimes John wouldn't shower, he wouldn't eat, wouldn't move.
You inhale and exhale exhaustingly, the puff of breath warming John's heart, resting in the depths of his chest. And in the silence comes up the presence of a third among the household; among you and John.
Your breaths take away all recordable sound, and your spirit takes in all non tangible presence. He is here, I am here, this is healing, you think to yourself. You get lost between John and His warmth. Then your mind races back to what you call reason, awakening in a peace that is aware of the issues you need to address, but is faithful; He is faithful.
John is muttering words you then comprehend as praying. Your hands find purchase on his shoulders with your body still trapped in the hug, some circles soothed over the fabric of his tunic with your palms, faintly massaging the skin underneath it.
John smiles relieved, eyes lovely as you state “amen” after the prayer ends.
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nekropsii · 2 years
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Cronus’s relentless, rapidly-changing attention-seeking behaviors, which manifest even in changes of identity, occurring ever since his childhood speak to some kind of deep-seated mental health issues.
Content Warning: Long, Discussion of Abuse, Toxic Behavior, Identity Issues, and Hemoloyalty.
On one hand, you have to acknowledge he feels extremely entitled to this attention, and does genuinely feel he deserves it purely for existing, but also the way he goes about trying to acquire this attention he so desperately craves is very… Well, concerning. It’s unhealthy for him, and downright toxic for others.
It’s interesting, a lot of the time when I see people try and tackle Cronus, they fail to realize that wanting attention isn’t that abnormal of a trait. Wanting attention is very human, and there are certain situations where feeling somewhat entitled to it is pretty warranted. The reason he’s shitty isn’t really because he wants attention and feels entitled to it, it’s more like… the supposed reason of why he feels so entitled to it in the first place is really shitty, and the way he goes about it is even worse. It’s completely steeped in a disgusting level of Hemoloyalty- because he’s Royalty by Blood Color, he feels himself to be inherently superior to others. His interactions with other people- and the ways he treats the concept of their attention and affections- are incredibly dehumanizing in a way most people can’t fathom replicating.
He’s like a spoiled child who couldn’t get the toy he wanted, and each rejection is like him getting told “No” for the first time. The way he acts extends far past a desperate desire to be Loved. It’d be far more accurate to say he has a desperate desire to be Worshipped. Really, I don’t at all think finding someone willing to have a Romantic and/or Sexual Relationship with him would fix him, or make him a better person. That… Just doesn’t make sense, considering his pattern of behavior. I don’t think he understands that Respect and Relationships aren’t just his for the taking- they’re a constant equal Give and Take. What he’s after isn’t a 50/50 Effort, because I don’t think he’s ever understood that he needs to put effort in to get what he wants in the real world. He doesn’t want Love, he kind of just wants someone to worship the ground he walks on purely because he exists.
The ways he goes about attempting to acquire what he wants are really unhealthy for everyone involved, including him, and they do not help his case. If he can’t get it immediately by virtue of existing, he tries to take it by force. If that doesn’t work, he tries to win pity points in order to make them feel bad enough for him that they’ll maybe, possibly, go out with him. If that doesn’t work, try the force option again. Rinse and Repeat.
This whole “rapidly shifting from identity to identity, to hobby to hobby, to behavior to behavior, to aggression and harassment” thing is genuinely not a normal trait. He seems deeply, hopelessly out of touch with how people and social situations work. He’s out of touch, and the more he’s in denial of this, the more he’s destroying everyone’s faith in him as a person. I don’t think he even cares about people’s faith in him anymore- or, at least, he tries not to. He’s long since completely given up on ever even trying to be a good person.
Maybe his refusal to change comes from that disordered thought that All Attention Is Good Attention. Maybe it comes from the fact that he’s afraid of Introspection and Reexamination of The Self. Maybe it comes from an idea that he’s already done so much harm that there’s no point to changing now. Maybe it’s a mix, and maybe it’s none.
At the end of the day, Cronus is a jaded, socially inept, deeply troubled, deeply entitled person with a menagerie of unhealthy and toxic traits and behaviors. He’s a coward who’s lethally afraid of consequences, and he’s a coward for hurting everyone around him in the first place. He’s spoiled to the point of hopelessness, and he views his peers as objects with feelings to be bought. And it’s important to remember, while he is a pitiful, pathetic person, pity should not bleed into affection. And if it does, you fell for the trap.
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mmmthornton · 1 year
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Abbott Elementary D&D Episode WHEN baby?
What can I say, I'm a simple lesbian. I see a show with a great group dynamic and I gotta think about what they'd be like at the tabletop.
Plus, I'm...responsibly imbibing and putting off work so HERE WE GO!
youtube
Jacob becomes determined to start some kind of gaming club at the school, but he hadn't actually DM'd before so he asks the other teachers if he can do a "practice run" first and bribes them with takeout and beer to let him run a game for them in the gym in the evenings. Surprisingly Barbara has come around to it NOT being a tool of the devil thanks to her and her husband watching Stranger Things together ("If it can help those kids beat a demon and learn to appreciate family in the god-forsaken 1980s, it can't be all bad"). Melissa says she could learn a new game since its no fun card sharking the same five people at her local bar, and Gregory is pretending really really hard that he's not EXTREMELY excited about this because he's always wanted to play but never did as a kid. Ava laughs until she cries when Jacob first asks if she wants to join then flips when Gregory will be there..."and when those craft beers go right through his skinny hipster body" she wants to be there to see his "wild" side. Janine knows nothing about the game but is excited about a new extracurricular activity and thinks its a great way to bond with the kids, and Mr. Johnson wasn't invited but shows up with Coke and a Costco-sized bag of Smartpop because he KNOWS whats up.
Barbara : Definitely a Cleric. She is willing to physically fight Jacob though if she has to "choose a god" from the pantheon, so to keep the peace AND the immersive experience they agree Not To Go Into It but its enough that her healing and spells are faith-endowed. Early on though, she gets some REALLY good rolls to hit when they're surrounded by enemies and she becomes more of a "warcaster" in addition to healing. Lots of buffs and she gets into the idea of a powerful warrior who gives holy blessings with her presence. Probably should've chosen Paladin from the getgo with how she ends up playing, but she makes Cleric work for her.
Melissa : Definitely a Rogue. Okay, I promise all my thoughts aren't basic but also listen to me. The whole concept of the rogue network is SO up her alley. She almost seems like she's not even playing a character at first, but then JACOB surprises her with his NPCs and the two of them roleplay thieves cant as a sort of south philly slang. I think Jacob would be an AMAZing DM so he's ready to meet her where she is (not really invested at first, kind of skeptical on the whole thing), and draw her in by accurately using terminology and making the world feel gritty, lived-in, and familiar - and Melissa LOVEs it. She starts to really get into the fiction of this fantasy world and take the threat/plot hook seriously. Gets yelled at by the support for jumping into fights and going unconscious because she's not a tank class; maybe multiclasses into Barbarian or at least takes a feat or two so she's not going down every fight.
Gregory : The archetypal wizard; old, beard, pointy hat, the whole deal. I hear you thinking "Why not human fighter?" but no. Gregory will not do human fighter, he's been waiting to play D&D for like twenty years and hes researched EVERY aspect of every class. Could be a minmaxer, but moreso is just WAY overthinking the choice so finally Jacob just gives him a premade, high-fantasy, Gandalf-ass wizard named something like Geoffrey Jankins or whatever. Gregory spends a lot of time making his : [ face, worried that he's already destroyed his chance of "having fun in a tabletop game with work friends" because he's THAT kind of person. Once he relaxes, he starts to feel a lot more kinship with his wizard character; he's got a backstory in the premade sheet where he's trying to find a spellbook that was stolen from him that contained years of his hard work and research. Over the course of the game Jankins kind of works with the others the same way Gregory did as he warmed up to them as a substitute, and in the end has the Real Emotional Moment in-game as he realizes what his work was keeping him away from (the relationships with the others in the group being his found family). No one leaves that game with a dry eye.
Ava : Elf Bard, College of Swords. She refused to make a character when Jacob mentioned it involved adding numbers because she's too hot for math, so she got another premade that he knew she'd enjoy. She's actually pretty stoked on the idea of a Creative and Powerful Artist who's dripping with charisma enough that she actually gets the ins and outs of the spell rules really well and is very generous with her Bardic Inspirations ("even to Gregory's old-head-ass"). She does however seem to only use Cutting Words on her own team, specifically Janine ("Jacob! How could you let her use that spell?" "In my defense I didn't think she'd even read the spell sheet!"). I say College of Swords because the worst thing about being a bard is having to share the spotlight with someone else, so she decides she wants to be the hero AND the sexy song vixen who makes the ballad about it.
Janine : Some kind of Genasi or fey druid. She wants to connect with the nature in the world and tries to channel a kind of Pan-from-mythology-meets-Steve-Irwin-depicted-by-Simone-Biles character. Her character motivation is she wants to write a guidebook of the animals - both common and magical - that they come across but keeps absolutely failing her rolls. She rolls a one and slaps a Mystical Enchanted Forest Deer in the face, launching a fight that the party is NOT prepared for. IS very good in a fight; she'll transform into an owlbear and headbutt an enemy away if one of the other party members are in trouble. Only remembers how to use like, three spells total and doesn't tell Jacob that she has no clue how things like spell slots or materials work so she just doesn't track it / makes up a number when asked how much she has. Jacob catches on pretty quickly, but side eyes into the camera to let us know he's deliberately letting it slide because she keeps rolling badly and could use the break.
Mr. Johnson : Makes his own dwarf warlock who's ABSOLUTELY minmaxed to hell. The overall playstyle of the group though is more laid back, but he's after a harder core play experience and only drops in sometimes if he hears there's a boss fight. Can do things from the book that are completely legal but have Jacob looking up obscure status effects and rules to try to keep up. Would probably make a good DM, but says he's more of a Warhammer guy.
Jacob : Obviously the DM, but I imagine that once the kids get into the game one of them might want to take a turn DM'ing. Jacob, gleaming with pride, would be happy to pass the DM screen to the "younger, brighter, woker generation". He joins the party as a ranger ("...which in the fifth edition classic is not the most capable class however with updates and features can be utilized in very specific cases for role-play and battlefi-" "For f*cks sake Jacob just take a shortbow proficiency and lets get on with it"), and spends most of the time that they're playing being extremely proud of his student....until the kid catches him on a technicality on his animal companion range.
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creacherkeeper · 1 year
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happy sleepover saturday!! who's your fav character in arthurian legend? what's your favorite movie that makes no goddamn sense?
oh this one is Targeted
okay so first my fave and then my fave obscure/underappreciated character
fave is of course my boy gawain. i want to put him in a jar and shake him up until he cries. like. my man is so interesting. all the people close to him agree that he's super noble and kind and goodhearted and just. but also he has a sense of humor!! and even more interesting than that is he's willing to throw himself under the bus for the betterment of others
in sir gawain and the green knight, when the green knight comes to challenge someone in a duel to the death, gawain makes a big show about how he's Clearly the most suited one there and how it would be silly to challenge anyone else and no one could really take on the green knight except for him. he makes himself look like a completely pompous asshole. but also that spares literally everyone else from having to rise to the challenge of facing a very terrifying and clearly magical foe. everyone gets off scott free by saying "ugh big headed gawain showing off again, lets all watch him get his ass kicked" while they can secretly be relieved none of them had to step in, or WORSE say no to the challenge and make king arthur and his court look weak. by making himself look like a dick (something everyone there knows he isnt) he lets everyone save face while also protecting them from almost certain death and he does it SO well that the green knight is none the wiser. like. big brain moves only from my boy gawain
in a COMPLETELY different tone he's such a fucking horse girl and in one of the stories (i cant remember which one. yvain maybe???) gringolet his horse gets stolen and the man just like lies on the ground crying about it. he loves his horse so much!!!! and its so funny!!!! he's so strong and brave and his horse gets stolen and its full toddler hours from noble knight gawain. the other knights are like my man you gotta pull yourself together and gawain is like *snot and tears* MY BEST FRIEND GRINGOLET
now my favorite obscure/underappreciated character from the arthurian canon is moriaen. i dont blame people for not knowing him because his story is very rare and hard to find but more people should!! he's the only knight of the round table who's canonically black and he's really fascinating
its very clear in the text that, while there's some stuff thats obviously MMMM,,, today, it was the author at the times attempt to be really progressive and accepting. moriaen has very dark skin and a lot of the characters in the story have never met a black man before and are originally very scared of him. however in his story moriaen comes to be known as the MOST christian and noble of all the knights of the round table (in a time where christian = good and moral) and the people who were originally afraid of him are so impressed by his good heartedness, morality, and strength, that they come to value and praise him. also his father, who is a white knight of the round table, actually ends up going back to [unspecified country in northern africa] to pursue justice for his mother's kingdom. like its very elementary social justice kind of stuff today but for the medieval period this was RADICAL and its really really cool to me
on the topic, for the movie question, everyone should watch king arthur legend of the sword (2017) because like. is it good. no. does the story make any sense. no. is it historically accurate or faithful to the canon. god not even a little. does it fuck severely for no goddamn reason and go so fucking hard at every opportunity? GOD. YES. its genuinely a piece of ART and i mean that in the most derogatory and highly affectionate way possible. it makes no goddamn sense but its SUCH a good time everyone should watch it
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writer-on-time · 3 years
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yes it is 3am yes it is day 1 of nano and yes I am obsessed with characters who are not in my nano wip. what's it to you anyway???
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writingwithcolor · 3 years
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Do small hints of a character’s Jewishness work, or do more harm than good?
@oatily asked:
I’m writing a HP fanfic and the mc has a Jewish friend. He’s really politically active, the one who radicalizes mc on stuff like the oppression of werewolves, the slave labor of house elves etc. Generally really smart passionate guy. I grew up atheist and pretty much completely outside of religion. I think I would need to take multiple college courses to fully understand any religion, but I still want to provide good rep. I’ve read a lot of Shira’s blog, but are there any subtle ways to include his faith without having an in depth understanding of the religion? Or should I just not mention his faith at all if I do not completely understanding the details of Judaism? I’m willing to put in the time to research ,and I already have quite a bit, but I think it would take me years and many classes before I felt proficient in my understanding. I guess my question is: Is it enough to put in small hints like the character eats kosher and goes home for Jewish holidays or does only mentioning these surface level things do more harm than good?
WWC NOTE: this question was answered to fill a gap in coding questions around Jewish characters, and it just so happened to be about HP fic. We at WWC, including specifically the Jewish team, do not condone the TERF-ness (or racism, anti-semitism, transphobia, or fatphobia) of JKR. We hope that the principles we used to answer this post will be useful for writers of other fandoms and for original fiction as well.
Mentioning surface level things is fine if they’re the right surface level things.
For example, someone who “goes home for Chanukah” is clearly only going home because that’s when the Christian-rooted school calendar says there’s a holiday, but if someone went home for new year’s (Rosh Hashanah) or Yom Kippur in the fall, or for their family’s Passover seder in the spring, that would feel accurate.
One way you could make sure that your surface level mentions are the right details to add rather than subtract verisimilitude, is to trade beta-readings with a Jewish friend and ask specifically for suggestions of places in the story where the little mentions would make sense. For example, if they’re in a history class and the teacher is talking about a particular time in history when we weren’t allowed in England, the kid might chuckle aside to his friend “my ancestors weren’t even allowed here that year.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_England
(Or less depressing, “oh hey, that’s the same year my folks came here from Russia/Germany/whatever”)
Kids in that series are also sometimes around the right age to become b’nei mitzvah, or to have had that just happen, so “and now on top of all these spells I have to learn my Torah portion?” or to mention some amusing incident that happened at his bar mitzvah reception if it was a couple of years ago, that’s another way to throw in a casual reference. If the kid is magic-born maybe the kiddush cup or fancy pen or whatever that his parents gave him for his bar mitzvah has magic properties. Come to think of it, going home over the weekend for his little sister’s bat mitzvah would be another good thing to work in, speaking of that age.
--Shira
How does the character's faith shape his passion for social justice?
Hello 😊 I love the sound of your activist Jewish character and the fact that the character’s existence actually addresses some of the problems with the source material.
The word you’re looking for is Tikkun Olam, an important Jewish middah (value) that translates to ‘healing the world’. One way to include the character’s faith in the story is to lean into how it shapes his passion for social justice:
· Does he have a particular rabbi or other spiritual leader who is his Tikkun Olam inspo? For example, my brother is Orthodox and vegan, and he loves to quote Rav Kook, a 19th/20thC rabbi and advocate for environmental justice and animal rights, as they exist in Jewish thought.
· Does he have a chavruta (Torah study buddy) and is he learning something that supports his views on discrimination?
· Were his ancestors activists at key moments in Jewish or world history?
As for other aspects of Jewish identity, there is actually already a fanfic about this, so I would recommend starting there. Again, not sharing this in support of JKR’s views – see below – but the fandom belongs to the fans, not the author.
- Shoshi
What does the character do on Saturdays?
I think the key to a lot of other questions about this character is going to be, “What does he do on Saturdays?” That is to say, what denomination is this kid from and how observant is he personally? This may only directly come into play if you’re specifically writing a scene stated to occur on a Saturday, but it’ll inform what mentions of Jewishness even make sense for his character. So let’s think through Jewish life at Hogwarts for a moment:
Denomination:
Are there enough Jewish students that they have a weekly visiting rabbi holding services on campus? Do Jewish students go off-campus to services at Temple Beth Anakim or Congregation Adath Kesem (Reform and Orthodox respectively) in Hogsmeade (I just made them up)? If so, an Orthodox or Masorti group of kids might go to Hogsmeade before dinner Friday and not come back until Saturday night, and thus be missing from action that took place in between, while a Reform group might only be away from Hoqwarts for an hour and a half Friday evening. Or he might choose not to go at all, either because he’s from a secular or non-observant family, or because he’s not comfortable in services for reasons of his own, or because the plot needs him around, in which case maybe pretending to be sick to get out of going to services without raising attention could give him some rounded characterization.
Observance:
As ever a quick reminder that denominational affiliation and personal observance are related but not 1-1 correlated. A character who regularly attends Orthodox or Masorti services might not personally have a problem writing, using money, or doing other activities that observant Jews typically avoid on Shabbat, or they might do them but have Feelings about it, or they might scrupulously avoid them. A character who regularly attends Reform services may not have an inner conflict about doing these things on Shabbat, but they might be sick and tired of being judged by more observant Jews about it--or they might be more personally observant and have to defend that practice around other Reform students.
Now, I’m not saying you have to include a detailed examination of your character’s inner feelings around their Shabbat observance in order to have them pop into the plot, say “Hi, house elves should have rights, see ya later,” but knowing the answer to this will help you come up with what does fit in your plot as far as what’s actually Jewish about your Jewish character.
You offered some beginning thoughts about this, but here are some additional quick questions about Jewish life at Hogwarts:
Does your character keep kosher? Where does kosher food at Hogwarts come from? Does the castle kitchen have a separate kitchen where specially-trained house elves prepare meals for the Jewish students? Is it apparated in from outside? Is it the same, better, or worse than the non-kosher alternatives? If he doesn’t keep kosher, does he have feelings about it? Does he joke about kashrut while eating a cheeseburger (have house elves heard of cheeseburgers?) or does he eat his black bean burger on a separate plate while wishing it tasted as good as your main character’s cheeseburger smells?
Shira mentioned b’nai mitzvah; If your story takes place in year 1, 2, or 3, your Jewish character is not only learning the difference between leviOsa and levioSA, they’re also learning how to decode and pronounce a not-insignificant portion of Hebrew scripture, as well as chant it according to a pre-medieval system of musical notation. Who are they studying with, and when do they practice? If they’re older, then did your main character come to their Jewish friend’s bar mitzvah? Why or why not?
Shoshi mentioned continuing Jewish education and connection: aside from the technical study, how does your character study Jewish history and culture, that he can draw on it to power his progressive politics? A chavruta would be another Jewish student they meet with specifically to study Jewish text, while a Jewish professor might be a role model or may be teaching them extra subjects on the side.
Ultimately, though, what hints you drop that reveal your character’s Jewishness are going to get easier to figure out when you can be confident answering what does your character do on Saturdays.
- Meir
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vickyvicarious · 3 years
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Just as I was about to go to sleep last night, I got a brain flash that went basically "something something flashback episode thiefsome themes???" so now in the light of day let's re-examine. This still isn't anything too polished, but... I think there's some interesting stuff to be found here.
Putting it under a tag so it doesn't clog up peoples' dashes too much, but the gist is that their roles actually represent their relationships/desires at each respective point in canon quite well, and it's giving me some thoughts about what a possible flashback with Hardison/Eliot would look like.
In the van Gogh Job, we get flashback Parker/Hardison. Obviously it wasn't them and the names are different and all but I'm just gonna call them f!Hardison and f!Parker because it's easier.
f!Hardison is brave, clever, determined, and deeply in love
f!Parker is loyal, comfortable, just as deeply in love, but terrified
Their flashback story is a cautionary tale as much as it is a romance. F!Hardison shares so many traits with Hardison himself, and f!Parker is a clear representation of current Parker. They make no bones about it, the parallels are extremely obvious and are even what makes the guy start telling Parker his story in the first place. Parker loves Hardison but she has found a place to belong in the team (flashback town/roller rink) and is afraid of what will happen if she disturbs that status quo by getting into a relationship with him. She's too scared of losing him (flashback to her racist dad/his buddies killing or hurting him, modern to the possibility of death mostly) to take the step to actually be with him, even though they both know she wants to. I love that there isn't any hint of her doubting his feelings or that he will remain devoted in either flashback or modern; the focus is entirely on her own fears for him and how she would handle that, not ever of him in any way.
Regardless of the timeframe, it's clear that (f!)Hardison loves her and will respect what she is willing to give him, even if that means leaving her. In the flashback, f!Parker still loves him and saves his painting in his honor for the rest of her life, remaining loyal to him despite never seeing him again. None of the emotion is in question at all, and it's clear that if she is willing to give it, her faith in him will be completely justified.
The episode basically just acts out Parker's fears (puppet-style?) and demonstrates to her that even though she would be fine if she doesn't take the leap - she'll be so much happier if she does. There's no guarantee of a happy ending, but Hardison is still himself and that means that before that ending comes at the very least, she will be happy. (Much like Sophie's beautiful speech to her.) Parker was already beginning to ease into a relationship with him, and this episode doesn't exactly drive her to jump in headfirst, but it's clear when we watch her reaction to the story what she will choose. She's going to build up her courage, but she's going to take the risk.
.
Now, given how transparent that episode is on their pairing, I kind of wondered what would happen if I look at the one that pairs Parker/Eliot's flashback selves: the D.B. Cooper Job.
f!Parker is understanding, supportive, loyal, and gives him a place to belong
f!Eliot starts out doing something bad for the sake of someone he loves, is drawn to her, and later feels wracked by guilt and seeks redemption by helping others
The focus in this one obviously isn't on the romance. It isn't even on either of these characters, so much as it is on Nate and his flashback self. But the parallels between modern and f!Eliot are still pretty apparent, if a bit watered down in that f!Eliot has no intentions to hurt anyone and in fact takes pains not to do so.
But as far as pairings go, I think what they do between these two is pretty interesting. Their flashback characters are drawn to one another, feel a kind of understanding and recognition that they can't quite explain. It's why f!Parker stops him before he jumps and never gives him up, it's why f!Eliot trusts her in the first place and why he shows up at her door after it is all over. I think this is a really nice parallel to the way Eliot and Parker understand one another and have this connection that is different from the rest of the team.
The other thing I like a lot is that in this episode, f!Parker is the steady support. She represents the home f!Eliot longs to have, even if she isn't the one who eventually offers him the chance to help others and make his own redemptive efforts. In fact, him working with f!Nate starts out for selfish reasons and only later evolves into a place where he feels he belongs. That's another obvious parallel to the Eliot we know, but the Parker in this episode is a little less immediately recognizable. Sure, she's an incredibly loyal person and will obviously not care overmuch about crime or whatever but mostly it's harder to see her as much in that role.
But I think she serves much the same role here as f!Hardison in the other episode. Though modern Eliot isn't hearing this story and making any resolutions based on it, the casting still represents their relationship. Parker is growing steadily into the position of leader/mastermind, and at this point she and Hardison are openly together. She is someone who understands Eliot on a very deep level, and she is coming to be the person who is his rock. While I'm not discounting Hardison's importance at all, Parker more closely fits the role of the person who encouraged him to take the job in this flashback. She's the one who, only three episodes later in Rundown, verbalizes a promise to change together. She (and also Hardison) represent the home Eliot craves to have, the belonging and support necessary for him to grow and to do good in the world. What's more, f!Parker is accurate in representing her side of things as someone who wants that for him. She wants to invite him in, wants to support him even if it's from a bit more of a distance at first (pre-relationship) but would absolutely welcome him inside as soon as he shows up at her door (once he's ready, she will bring him into the thiefsome).
And Rundown shows us that in action, again only three episodes later. Not in the sense of canon thiefsome, but Parker and Hardison are absolutely supporting Eliot leaving his darker past behind, changing with them for the better - and not just getting away with his own hands clean, but doing the extra work to help others (going after the guy who tried to hire him instead of just leaving town; again when they realize how serious the situation is but stay to fix it). The episode even ends with Eliot literally throwing away the crutch that would allow him to walk on his own, and pull them both in to support him instead. He's in the middle, he's deciding to join them even if he could get by alone, it's all representative for them welcoming him into the relationship too. (I headcanon something went down between them here but it isn't all cleared up relationship-wise until the Toy Job, but either way the themes are there!)
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So with this in mind... The flashback with Hardison/Parker focused on Parker and her fears/decision to enter into a relationship with Hardison. Similarly, the flashback with Eliot/Parker focuses more on him and his desire to join the relationship. For both of them, the episode represents a shift in their relationship with one another, something not entirely unknown before, but a step that is challenging for them personally. Still, this step leads to greater happiness and growth.
All that in mind... what would a Hardison/Eliot episode look like, if we got it in Redemption? I'm getting into slight spoiler territory here, so leave now if you haven't seen the first few episodes.
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Okay, so since we've had more focus on Parker, and on Eliot, this episode would focus most on Hardison. It makes sense as well for his role in the new series, because while Parker and Eliot are a little more stable, Hardison is the one entering a challenging new period of his life that is difficult but helping him grow.
I don't have any kind of full plot figured out, but here are some things I think we might see:
f!Eliot is supportive, confident, and believes deeply in him
f!Hardison is bold, struggles with self-doubt, and upends his own life in order to change the world for the better
I think Eliot's role in this flashback would be smaller, but he'd love f!Hardison deeply and the focus would not be on their relationship developing, but on the challenges it would face as f!Hardison embarks on... whatever it is. It has to be something f!Eliot knows he cannot do, and maybe even something that might mean the end of their relationship (though much like the van gogh job, the love between them is never in question).
I've seen people mentioning a Stonewall flashback episode for these two before, and that's possible. But another thing we could see is f!Hardison working against racist laws or something. Whatever the case, he needs to be doing something that benefits many, many other people, and it needs to put him at personal risk. I'm not entirely sure on what would be holding Eliot back from helping in the same way - it may just be as simple as f!Hardison gives amazing speeches and inspires so many people, while f!Eliot just doesn't have that skill. Maybe he is sick. Maybe, their relationship does end up attracting violence, and he gets hurt (doesn't even have to be their romantic relationship, if we're going a race angle and setting this episode further back, it could just be an open friendship with their romance kept secret. the themes would still be there). Whatever the case, f!Hardison has to leave Eliot behind.
And yeah, this has already happened in canon. We're already here. But if we wanted this episode to happen, I think it would be possible for the themes to still be relevant and the challenge to still be there for Hardison's character, if something brings him back to the team. If something goes down and he isn't there, and it terrifies him that he wasn't there, and he has trouble leaving again even though his work isn't done. Or if he organizes something on his end of the world that goes horribly wrong somehow. Sometimes it's not the first step that's hardest, it's keeping on even after the first big challenge. No road is free of bumps, after all, so Hardison might well think he's fine at first but start having doubts even after things have been going well for a while.
That is where you can bring this episode into play. That's where you start - f!Hardison is already getting involved in activism of some kind, but his own fame brings about negative consequences or something unrelated happens, and it scares him and makes him consider giving his work up. The episode can be bittersweet, with them never reuniting, or it can have a happier ending where he returns and f!Eliot is still waiting for him. But it's important for Eliot to represent a home that Hardison is already comfortable in, and one he has to leave in order to help others (however temporary the leaving is). And we need to see him away from the team, thriving and growing and improving so many peoples' lives in ways that never would have happened without him - both in the flashback, and in the modern part of the episode. In fact, Hardison doesn't even need to actually be physically with the team at all in the modern part of the episode. It can be more like the Broken Wing job, where we get hints at what they are doing but the focus is entirely on him and his struggle.
Of course, I have no idea how this would tie in to a modern heist. But maybe the format could be changed up, if we focus more on Hardison outside of the team. I'm sure there's some way this could be worked. And I think it would do really well in completing the trio of thiefsome episodes, and giving equal emphasis on all three of them in each one.
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eisforeidolon · 2 years
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The thing is, you could maybe sell me a John & Mary story if it was taking place in one of Chuck’s other draft universes.  The whole retro 70s vibe could be fun, getting back to the basics of hunting everyday monsters is a definite plus, and there’s legitimate opportunity for John & Mary to have organically fallen in love and hunted together without retcons and other handwavy bullshit if it’s a different universe - while having the Winchester name they clearly want to try to capitalize on the draw of. 
I just don’t see how it works in the show’s main universe, though.  At all. 
Even if we go with the prevailing theory that John will be mindwiped at the end, and decide to charitably agree it’s no more absurd than several things main-SPN expected us to accept?  And we’re willing to just overlook that cupid saying John & Mary hated each other’s guts before they were forced together?  And all the sense it doesn’t make for Dean to know enough about them to narrate, however that’s even supposed to work?  Even if we also give them the benefit of the doubt that a lot of times the promo blurbs are not terribly accurate representations of what a story actually turns out to be, especially dismissing that “saving the world through lurve” nonsense as cringe-y hyperbole?  Even if you set ALL of that aside?  They’re still setting themselves up for constantly trying to tiptoe through a 15 years long minefield of potential retcons working in the main universe.  From as big as what the major players like Chuck/angels/demons know and are up to, to as small as whether a monster they use any particular week was one that Sam & Dean were/weren’t able to find in their references and if the details match.  Just... it sounds like a logistical nightmare that the main-SPN show itself was desperately struggling with (and losing) by the end and IDGI as a choice.  Which doesn’t even touch on my lack of faith in Robbie Thompson to write a female character who isn’t an egregious Mary Sue, even as a main character rather than a usurper.
Like, okay, John is one of Jensen’s favorite characters outside his own and what he was most interested in revisiting considering the later seasons’ treatment of him.  That’s fine in and of itself.  However, fully understanding all the details and considerations that go into building a story that will work from the bones up is an entirely different skill than acting out and/or changing the nuances of a story someone else has written the foundation of for you.  Even before you add the complications of doing so in a universe where the future is already set in stone.  What they’ve given us so far does not make me confident that anybody behind this idea actually has that skill. 
Although I do have to say that my non-fandom friend who I told about the prequel said she’d totally watch it despite my WTFing, so who knows what the casual GA would do.
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stylishanachronism · 3 years
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Classic Aedyran and/or Dyrwoodan love story archetypes (and which gods they do and/or REALLY REALLY DO NOT invoke or involve)?
This went extremely sideways and also has no internally consistent organization, but that’s why it’s a series of bullet points and not an essay.
So Aedyrans are pretty obviously into three things: duty, tragedy, and Drama. Like on the surface it’s all austere dutiful piousness but go like, an inch below that and the dramatics just start pouring out.
-I’m not saying Aloth isn’t like, legit anxious about the very real trouble he’s about to be or currently in, I’m just saying a solid chunk of that is rooted in a culture that takes ancestor worship to really weird places, among other things, and literally none of it is as big a problem as literally anybody is making it out to be.
—the appearance of not even wrongdoing but just.... not enough virtue signaling is *just as bad* as actual wrongdoing. (They blackmail that one kid with his mom’s probably-fictional indiscretions? To the point where it kills him even.) Like ‘I saw Goody Proctor vent’ is actually the name of the game here.(1)
That being said, and given soap operas have not been invented, we’ve probably got three major schools of art:
-high brow morality plays in which either our poor ill fated couple, torn apart by (unscrupulous relatives? That hussy down the street? A wild misunderstanding involving a stolen baby who was swapped for another stolen baby? Somebody’s being tempted away from true love here, to whatever end) fate, dutifully come back to each other and are deliriously respectably happy together, or fall into despair and die over their bad choices. Think extra-overwrought Victorian ‘modernists’(which I heartily don’t recommend.), crossed with the soapiest tellanovellas you can imagine (which if you’re into that style of drama, I do)
-fantasy Shakespeare, where all the dick jokes are so old nobody recognizes them any more, possibly with a moral stapled to the end
-eyebrow raising, too much for today’s delicate stomachs, fucking wild shit presented as ‘educational’, with worse shit underground(2), because the veneer is more important than the reality of the thing.
But the major tropes you’re going to see like.... overall, not just in theater, are probably more community based? Like, you fall in love with your neighbor’s kid, she falls in love with you, so you both go to your mothers and they’ll determine whether it’s a good match or not, you technically don’t really get a say in the matter.(3) There’s also probably a lot of superstition involved? Like, if the omens are bad you’re not getting married, but if they’re just okay you may have to wait six months.
-also there’s a lot of hideously complex contract work over who’s marrying into what, among other things.
—divorce isn’t an option! Better hope your relatives pick wisely!
—- more accurately divorce is even more hideously complex and expensive, so unless your spouse is actively trying to kill you it’s probably not worth it, and even then you’d probably have serious second thoughts.
In terms of like, the Ideal Romantic Partner (not necessarily romantic partner, but given you’ve got to be married if you want to(socially acceptably) have sex or have kids, because Aedyrans are wild), you’re probably looking at someone dutiful, who will put their own comfort second to keeping their word, cultured but not smug about it, efficient but thorough, graceful and always perfectly composed no matter what happens, soft spoken without being servile, and the whole package should come across as effortless.
We’re attempting to ignore all the work I’ve done re: shitty Protestants, so we’ve canonically got nobody actually in charge of marriage anywhere, so probably you’re praying to Woedica (to keep your contract) and Hylea (if you need this marriage to be fruitful), and maybe even Ondra (to ensure everybody remains faithful, because Aedyrans are Dramatic, and the fucking moon bedroom is a thing)
As for the Dyrwodans:
Less repression + more inversion ceremonies mean they’re way less dramatic in general, but obviously that means they’re still Really Dramatic, given they’re into swearing eternal feuds over literally nothing every other day. They place a much stronger importance on soul lineages than blood lineages, but whether you take that into consideration re: romance probably depends on what current feuds your family and/or community is currently embroiled in, and how serious they are. And if you have the cash/local cipher to get said lineage traced.
-Theater tropes are going to tend towards the comedic (think 27 dresses, or some other friendshippy romcom) and bawdy, and also fantasy Shakespeare, now with added dick jokes, because the existing ones are still too old to be recognizable, and probably some of the less overwrought Aedyran and Vailian plays, maybe. Also the whole theater plot, because that is a thing, even if they’ve had to bury it both deeper and shallower than Aedyr.
As a general thing, marriage is still mostly a practical thing, and while your families are definitely involved, they’ve generally got much less of a say in it. Outside of high society weddings, which are obviously more alliances than anything else, there’s generally not a contract so to speak; because children belong to their mothers, and nobody much cares where she got them unless she’s already married, when and if she does get married, it’s socially expected that her new spouse will join her household, and splitting up a household is so socially unacceptable murder is a neater, less fraught solution than divorce(4).
Your Ideal Romantic Partner (who probably is romantic, unless you need an extra pair of hands all the time that badly) is clever without being supercilious, with an easy disposition and a good sense of humor, willing to take life as it comes, but also to defend what they’ve got to their last breath, generous and community minded, but still independent enough not to need looking after, forthright but not unkind, and you should be able to tell how hard they work for whatever it is they want.
As for gods: pre everything, you’re probably looking to Abydon, to build your disparate members into a household, and Eothas, to make that household into a home. Post everything, it’s just Abydon, maybe Magran to ask that whatever trials you face make you stronger together. I don’t know, there isn’t a really good option there re: canon.
1: the Readcerans somehow take this even further but in an even weirder direction, this shit is wild, babes, but we’re not talking about them today
2: I’ve got a specific horrible irl example in mind but we’ll go with the theater quest in PoE, turned up to 11, because that lot hasn’t had nearly as much time to get established as Aedyran equivalents have.
3: congrats this is why Aloth is so hard to romance I guess. Nobody has approached his mother about him/he hasn’t asked his mother to approach anyone. Also I have extensive thoughts on the vagaries of social class re: marriage, so like, who exactly does the approaching is probably equally complex!
4: look I didn’t put that quest in there, what the fuck else am I intended to think? ....I mean Obsidian definitely definitely didn’t expect me to come up with polyamory gone wrong but like I’m not reaching when I say that’s the conclusion I came to. Hooray for weddings?
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wolftraps · 3 years
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For the reverb inspiration thing honestly I'd kinda like more Ethan stuff? Mostly because it'd be fun to see someone adjusting to the future institute and that sort of flavor of outsider POV intrigues me. Plus I also just... Love Naomi a lot...
As happens with literally everything I write, this ended up longer than intended. So here’s Ethan’s first week at the Blackwood Institute. Poor guy. His boss is a creepy moron. Warning for a brief mention of self-harm and eye trauma right at the start here, but pretty much everything is canon-typical. This is also on AO3.
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Being an Assistant Archivist at the Blackwood Institute is… well, it’s nerve-wracking honestly. There’s no formal training, and this seems to be largely because there’s been only one other person to have held the position in… ever, as far as Ethan can tell. And that had been over fifteen years ago and lasted a grand total of nine months before Chloe Halloway, age 29, had a “crisis of faith” and tendered her resignation by pouring bleach directly into her eyes.
“If you’re going to reconsider your position here,” Jon said matter-of-factly, after telling Ethan this, “I highly suggest you do so prior to signing a permanent contract.”
Which was really unnecessarily creepy, sure, but creepy is sort of why Ethan is here in the first place, so not that surprising. The least Miss Halloway could have done, in his opinion, was leave some kind of manual or something behind. A guide. Notes. Ethan would probably be willing to kill a man for a “To-Do list” at this point.
Technically Ethan has his own office, but the room is dusty and cluttered and doesn’t actually have a desk or chair yet, so he set up in the main Archive area, where there are three ancient desks, three slightly less ancient desk chairs, a small table, and inexplicably, a wardrobe and a worn armchair. Finding the least uncomfortable configuration of furniture made him feel a bit like Goldilocks, despite the desks and corresponding chairs being virtually identical. He figured that was what had been meant by “make yourself comfortable.” Jon didn’t say any different.
Between orientation (signing papers, sitting through general training, another tour, getting his picture taken with an actual polaroid camera, etc) and “settling in,” it hadn’t mattered the first day that Jon didn’t give him any direction. And when Ethan got in on the second day, Jon had already been in the middle of taking a statement, so Ethan had busied himself going through the desk he’d taken. And then another desk. And then the other desk.
At the end of that task, he had various office supplies, a good dozen unfiled statements, five tape recorders, sixteen unlabeled tapes, five labeled tapes that didn’t match any of the unfiled statements, a small notebook with a few unfinished poems, a bag of what might have once been gummy worms, a nearly empty bottle of vodka, two very faded polaroids of a younger Jon and Martin with a woman identified on the back as Sasha, and a large, large stack of poorly drawn and seemingly conflicting maps. Also a lingering feeling that he would never be able to fully get the cobwebs off his arms.
He wasn’t sure what to do with any of it.
Well, except for the gummy worms and vodka, which he promptly disposed of.
Most of the rest ended up on top of one of the unused desks. And by the time that was done, it was nearly time to leave. As far as Ethan could tell, Jon hadn’t come out of his office once. Though, apparently the statement-giver had left at some point without Ethan noticing, so he couldn’t actually be sure. He does have a tendency to block everything else out when he’s focused on a task.
When he came in on the third day, the desk he’d placed everything on was clear and Jon wasn’t in his office. In absence of anything else to do, Ethan started looking through the database. From reading (and supposing any of what he heard on The Observer Chronicles was accurate), he thought he understood a couple of the categories. Others seemed a bit too… arbitrary. Most entries appeared to have corresponding files regarding any follow-up done, but very few had actual digital copies of the statements themselves. And only the discredited statements had audio files.
Jon didn’t return until well after lunch time, and when he did he seemed almost surprised to see Ethan there.
“You should take an early day,” Jon told him, before Ethan managed to formulate any of his questions. “Daisy’s brought me a statement. Probably best it doesn’t see you in case we decide to let it go.”
And then he went into his office. Ethan had no idea who Daisy was or how a statement was supposed to see him— or what it would do to him if it did— but it didn’t look like he was going to get any answers now, and it probably wasn’t a good idea to risk it. So he was left with nothing but to do as Jon suggested.
“You’re home early,” Naomi says when he walks in to find his mum sitting on the couch.
“So are you,” Ethan replies, and he didn’t even do all that much today, but he feels exhausted none-the-less.
“I had an appointment,” she reminds him. Right. He knew that. He’d just… forgotten. But he knows she hadn’t really expected him to remember. “Nothing to report. So? What has you home already?”
“Jon told me to go home. Someone named Daisy brought him a statement, and he thought it was better I wasn’t there. Why? I have no idea.”
“Well, it’s early yet, and they deal with some pretty dangerous things there,” she reasons. “The Jon I knew tried to look out for people. Can’t say I’m not glad if it’s still the same.”
“Sure, but…” Ethan stands there, fiddling with the strap of his bag, staring at the coffee table as he tries to find the words. Naomi waits, but he’s not sure what to say.
“Why don’t you go put your bag down,” she says eventually. “Think it over a bit, then come sit with me. I’ll get you some tea and wake up Beaker.”
True to her word, when Ethan gets back in more comfortable clothes, there’s a cup of tea waiting on the table, just barely steaming, and a squirming, growling ball of orange fluff in his mum’s lap. The moment he sits and Naomi lets go, the cat is in his lap, squeaking her indignation. Her brush is already set on the couch beside him.
“Thanks,” he says, and his mum just nods.
“So?” she prompts.
Ethan sighs. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Ethan, you’ve only been there three days. Not even three days. Everyone feels lost when they start a new job. It happened literally every time you started a new year in school, if you’ll recall.” He keeps brushing Beaker, but he can see his mum smiling in his peripheral vision and he rolls his eyes.
“No, yeah, I know that. I mean I literally have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing. There’s been no training. No instructions. I don’t- I cleaned out desks and I looked through the database and I read some old statements, and I keep waiting for Jon to say something. Tell me what I’m supposed to do. Explain anything.” Beaker squeaks again, nipping at his arm as he absently tugs a bit too hard at a knot of fur. “Sorry. Sorry.”
“I’m going to be honest,” Naomi says, huffing slightly the same way she does every time the tube runs late, even though she expects it. “That’s far, far more common than you’d think.”
“That makes no sense, though! How are people supposed to do their jobs if no one explains how to do the job?”
“Well… I think a lot of people try to pretend and copy the people around them. It’s usually better to just ask, though. People can get so used to doing something that they honestly forget that other people don’t know how, and Jon’s been doing this for a very long time. What did he say when you asked?”
On the table, Ethan’s tea is going cold. If he leans over to get it, though, Beaker will probably yell at him and run away, and brushing her really is helping him relax. But his mouth feels so dry, and it might be worth it.
“Ethan,” his mum says in that tone. That one she always got right before Caleb tried to lie to her. “You did ask Jon, right?”
There’s another knot in Beaker’s fur, but he takes more care with this one and she just keeps purring. He rocks. His mouth is still so dry.
Naomi sighs, setting her own cup down and passing Ethan his, handle out. It’d be alright today, he thinks, if their hands touched when he took it from her, but she’s always careful anyway. He takes a sip. The tea is good, as always, though he can’t help thinking of his interview with Martin. There’d been a cup waiting for him in Martin’s office. His favorite kind, perfectly made. He’d meant to ask Martin how he knew, but then he just… hadn’t.
“You didn’t. Ethan, you… Okay. Okay. Why not?” his mum asks.
“I don’t know! He’s always… in his office and- and busy or— I don’t know. He makes me a little… nervous or something.”
“Intimidated.”
“Maybe?”
“I can understand that,” she says. “The first time I technically met Jon, I was terrified of him. The first… many times. Even after I actually met him and got to talk to him, I kept having to remind myself that he didn’t want to hurt me. If he’s still like I remember him, and I’m willing to bet he is, then I don’t think leaving you to figure things out yourself or not talking to you is intentional. He’s really a very… very awkward man.” She’s staring at the wall, but doesn’t seem to be looking at anything, and after a moment she laughs a little. “Promise me you’ll at least try to talk to him Monday?”
Ethan promises, of course.
Jon doesn’t even seem to understand the words at first, when Ethan asks him what an assistant here does. For a few seconds, there’s no expression, and then Jon’s brow furrows and he looks down at the papers on his desk like he might read the answer there.
“I— Hmm,” he says. “F-file? Organize? I— What did they— I never actually was one, so… It occurs to me that I am very lucky I chose to include Sasha after all. You might ask her? Or- or Martin. They actually did the assisting once upon a time, so…” Jon shrugs, or Ethan thinks he does. There’s a cat draped across his shoulders, so they don’t actually move much. And then Ethan stands there, and Jon sits, and neither of them say anything, and if Ethan’s mum is right, it’s because neither of them is quite sure what to say.
Ethan leaves.
Martin was nice during his interview. Encouraging and friendly and patient when it took some time for Ethan to decide what to say. It was a far, far easier interview than he’d feared. And Martin had said Ethan could come to him if he had any questions. Despite that, Martin makes Ethan even more nervous than Jon. It’s always worse disappointing friendly people.
So instead, Ethan makes his way to the Library, because that’s where Sasha works, if he’s remembering right. Once he’s there, though, he has no idea where to look, and it occurs to him that there may be more than one Sasha. The one he’d seen when he interviewed was young; maybe a couple years older than him. But the one in the pictures he found in the Archives would surely be Jon’s age at least. There’s no one who looks like either of them that he can see.
“Excuse me,” he says to someone who is probably a librarian, since he’s sitting at a desk with a plaque that says the date and ‘You’d have been out of here days ago if you’d just asked for help.’ The man doesn’t look up from his book. “I’m looking for Sasha?”
“Upstairs,” the guy says. The library is only one floor, though. It’s the first time he’s been in it, but Ethan made note of all Mara’s warnings.
“I’d like to speak to Sasha,” he says, firmer. The guy doesn’t look up and doesn’t look up and doesn’t… and then something changes and he stiffens and slowly looks up at Ethan, and he seems almost… nervous.
The man coughs. “O-oh. You’re- you’re from the Archives.”
“Yes,” Ethan agrees. “I need to talk to Sasha?”
“Right. Sure. Um, I’ll get— uh, Kelly- Kelly will help you.” The man nods toward something over Ethan’s shoulder. When he turns there’s someone already there, a bit too close, and Ethan didn’t know teeth could be that white.
“Hi!” They smile and smile. “I’m Michael. You can call me Kelly. I’m here to help. This way please!” Literally turning on their heel, they walk away with a gait more like a bounce than a walk, and Ethan follows. Right up until they hop onto the first step.
“I—” he says. Even before they turn their head, he can somehow see their smile. Human necks almost definitely aren’t supposed to turn that far. He almost forgets what he meant to say.
“Yes?”
“I— I was told the library is only one storey.”
They smile and smile. “That’s right.”
“But… the stairs?” he asks.
“What stairs?” Their head tilts, like a curious dog, still looking over their shoulder. And human necks definitely aren’t supposed to turn like that.
Ethan looks down at the stair Kelly is perched on, and they look down as well. There is no acknowledgement of the stairs.
“Come on!” They smile. “Best to take the first step at a bit of a jump!”
And they keep going up the stairs, so Ethan takes a breath and hops onto the first step.
Except it isn’t a step. It’s… a rug maybe? It doesn’t stop looking like stairs, but the whole thing is level, and he nearly trips more than a couple times expecting his foot to hit the floor before it does. When they reach the end, he looks back. Back and down. Down at the library, one storey below.
At the end of a short hallway, there is a yellow door; one that Ethan is sure he’s seen before, except somewhere else. Kelly bounces up to it and knocks, and looks back at him and smiles and smiles, and then the door creaks open.
The person who emerges is definitely the young woman he saw when he came for his interview, but she’s also almost definitely the woman in the photograph from decades ago.
“Hi, Sasha!” Kelly smiles. “This one wants to talk to you!”
“Oh? Oh!” Sasha also smiles, and there’s a ringing in Ethan’s ear when she talks, but it seems like a fairly normal smile. At least, comparatively. “You’re the new Archival Assistant!”
“Uh, A- Assistant Archivist, actually.” It probably doesn’t matter. People are always telling him things like this don’t matter, and he shouldn’t bother correcting them. For some reason, though, it really feels like this does.
Sasha, at least, looks a bit surprised. “Really? Huh. That’s fascinating.”
Ethan is at least 75% sure she isn’t being sarcastic. “Is it?”
The hallway couldn’t have been more than five meters, but her laugh echoes down it. “It is! Thank you, Kelly. I’ll be sure Ethan makes his way back alright.”
It’s a clear dismissal, but Kelly doesn’t move. They keep looking at Sasha and they smile and smile and smile until eventually Sasha rolls her eyes and scoffs.
“Please,” she says. “I couldn’t lose one of Jon’s if I wanted to. He’ll be back in the Archives as soon as we’re done talking.”
Kelly smiles. “Okay!” they say cheerily, as if there’d never been any tension at all. “Nice to meet you, Ethan!” and then they’re gone.
“They’re a good kid,” Sasha says. “Well, then. Please, step into my office.” She closes the yellow door behind her and opens a different one beside it, that Ethan is also sure hadn’t been there a moment before. It’s a normal enough door, though. Looks a lot like Jon’s, actually. Sasha waves him through, and if he didn’t know better, Ethan would be sure he was back in the Archives.
In fact, he’s pretty sure that’s the same couch that’s currently sitting in Jon’s office and the same armchair he’d moved into his own “office” the other day; though both look in significantly better shape here.
“Have a seat,” Sasha says, dropping onto the couch— or draping herself across it rather— and eliciting a grumbling meow from an almost opalescent white cat that flicks its tail when she goes to pet it and jumps into Ethan’s lap the moment he settles into the chair. At first touch its fur feels like marble, but then he pets it and it feels like plush. He can’t hear the purr, but the rumble makes his fingers tingle.
“So, Ethan. What can I help you with?” Sasha asks.
“Well. My job… I hope.”
She sits up and sounds delighted when she says, “Oh, did you find a statement about me already? You’ve only been here a couple weeks, haven’t you?”
“Four… days?” It’s not a question. Ethan knows this is his fourth day. Knows. Yet for some reason he starts second guessing himself. It has only been four days… right? Yes. Yes, four days.
After the “stairs,” he doesn’t bother asking why there would be statements about her.
Sasha thinks for a moment and then waves his comment away. “Close enough. Time is fake. So… which one is it?”
“I didn’t— find a statement. I’m just trying to figure out what I’m supposed to be doing. Jon told me to ask you because you’ve actually done the job before.”
If she keeps laughing like that, he’s going to end up with a headache. The ringing is terrible.
“I’m sorry,” she laughs. “I wish I could think you were joking, but I know you’re not. I love Jon. He’s such a disaster. You know he knows basically everything?” Ethan does not know that. A lot, definitely. More than anyone logically should or could, sure. But everything?
“That… sounds improbable.” Buried in the cat’s equally improbable fur, Ethan’s fingers start going numb.
“He does. He knows almost everything and then always forgets that he knows anything. It’s hilarious,” Sasha says with a grin. “Alright. We used to do a lot of research, but that was back when we were cleaning up Gertrude’s mess and all the work the actual Research department did somehow got lost on its way down the stairs. The real ones. And Jon only knew most things rather than basically everything…”
She tells him she did research and reorganized possibly the worst archiving system in the world. She tells him she took statement-givers’ information and caught flies to feed the spiders in the corners. She tells him she killed worms and mapped underground tunnels and scanned in old letters and typed up written statements and managed “monster relations” and blew up mannequins and recorded false statements and hacked government networks and provided alibis and stole old books from museums and sang to the recorders so they wouldn’t start eating people’s fingers and updated the database and appeased disgruntled “youtubers” and collected obituaries and plotted her boss’s death.
Ethan is sure some of these things aren’t true, but he just walked up a flight of not-stairs, so he honestly couldn’t begin to guess which. He’s also not sure how many of them are relevant.
“Mostly, though,” Sasha concludes, “you take care of Jon.”
He does try to ask about the categories, and a couple of the titles she gives them make some kind of sense, but she also says category 06 is “me”, 09 is poker, 10 is geese, and 15 is millennials, so he decides to take those with a grain of salt as well.
When they finally leave her office, the door opens into the front lobby.
“There we are! Back safe and sane, just like I promised. I know I said I’d get you back to the Archives, but I’m not actually allowed to open doors down there anymore. And it’s only… Oops.” The lobby is quiet and the windows are dark. It’s definitely well into evening, though Ethan suspects midnight has come and gone. His watch starts buzzing with missed messages. “Well, I’m sure it’s at least the same day or Jon would’ve yelled at me by now. I could give you a shortcut home?”
The yellow door is back, and beyond it is a long hallway.
“I think I’d better take the long way,” he says.
Sasha nods. “That’s fair.”
If Ethan could actually figure out how to message HR, he would just message them. Even if it took them a day to get back to him, he’d still be better off than he has been so far. Unfortunately, he can’t find any sort of contact information for them at all. So the morning of his fifth day, he goes to the front desk and meets Priya No-Last-Name-As-Is-Tradition, who handles “reception, admin, and whatever Martin needs.”
He doesn’t ask, but she informs him Martin will be in a meeting all morning anyway. That’s fine. She’s more than happy to walk him up to HR and introduce him to a woman named Hope.
Hope startles when she sees them, and her fingers freeze on her keyboard, but there is definitely some kind of movement in her lap, barely visible over the edge of the desk. Then she smiles and turns to face them and Ethan does not comment on the fact that he can see two long, black limbs trying to shove some sort of yarn project into the drawer of a filing cabinet behind her. Priya nods at a job well done and leaves him there.
“How can I help you?” Hope asks. There’s something not quite right about her smile, but Ethan doesn’t comment on that either.
Instead, he says, “Do you have any sort of job description or scope of duties for the Assistant Archivist position?”
Hope blinks.
“The what?” she asks.
“The Assistant Archivist position.”
She blinks again. Her smile is gone, and he’s honestly glad for it. “Assistant… Archivist.”
“Yes.”
“That’s a thing?”
“I would hope so? I was just hired as one, so…”
She blinks again, then shakes her head. “Right. Sorry. Of course. I just… Honestly, I was sort of under the impression no one could work down there but the Archivist.”
Given that apparently only one other person has in longer than Ethan’s been alive, he doesn’t exactly blame her. Still, he’s pretty sure it’s her job to know these things, and he’d really like an answer.
“I understand,” he says, “but I do work down there. So…”
“Right. Yes. Assistant Archivist, you said? Just a moment.” She turns back to her display, taps a few keys, and then starts scrolling. And scrolling. And scrolling. All the while singing “Assistant Archivist Archivist Assistant Assist Assist the Archivist” under her breath.
Three minutes later, Ethan is still waiting.
“Are you… sure that’s your position title?” she asks finally, and Ethan turns around and heads back to the Archives.
While he hopes he never has to do most of the things Sasha listed as her duties, there are a couple Ethan thinks he can probably manage. He has no idea what, if anything, might need to be done with the statements that already have case numbers, but there’s a shelf of boxes near the Archive entrance labeled “Me Next!” that Jon had said were unprocessed. Maybe he won’t be able to fit them all into the proper categories, but there have to be some that are obviously false, and it seems as good a way as any to get more familiar with the database.
Halfway through the day, he switches to listening to some of the old audio files to figure out the format. It doesn’t seem too complicated. Probably he can record a couple test statements, get a feel for it.
Twenty minutes later, he gives up searching and asks Jon where to find their recording software. Jon frowns and tells him he’s better off finding a free one online, so Ethan reaches out to IT instead.
Ten minutes after that, he gets a message from Cass Walters telling him to check his apps again and that he’ll “know it when [he] see[s] it.” So he does.
Halfway through the list there’s an icon with a stylized cassette tape. It’s labeled “IM TELLING YOU IT FUCKING WORKS JON”, and Ethan figures that’s probably it. Thankfully it’s fairly intuitive, and it might end up being a total waste of his time, but by the end of the day he has three halfway decent recordings and feels like he accomplished something, at least.
-
On his sixth day, one week after starting, Ethan comes in just in time to hear someone say, “Are you kidding me?!” really quite loudly in Jon’s office.
It doesn’t sound like the sort of conversation he wants to disturb, so he goes to his desk and gets set up as quietly as he can and meets the cat’s judging stare head-on while eavesdropping. She blinks and rubs up against his leg, and he can’t help but think it was some kind of test. Apparently he passed.
“You know everything, Jon,” the same person says, and Ethan is at least 80% sure it’s Martin.
“Not ev—”
“Everything,” Martin repeats. “How can you possibly not know what your own assistant is supposed to be doing?”
“I can’t know things that don’t exist, Martin. Chloe always wanted to figure everything out herself and made things up as she went along. It may as well be a new position. So, I don’t know.” There’s a moment of silence.
“Jon,” Martin says.
“… Yes, Martin.”
“Love,” Martin says.
Jon sighs. “Yes, Martin. I realize—”
“That might be the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“Yes, Martin. I get it.”
“He’s an Assistant Archivist! Tell him what you need assistance archiving!”
“I’ll take care of it,” Jon says. If either of them say anything in the few minutes after that, though, it’s too quiet for Ethan to hear.
“Alright,” Martin says, like they’ve come to some kind of agreement despite the silence. “I love you.”
“Yes, Martin,” Jon says, the same tired way he’d said it before, though there’s a slight laugh at the end now. “I know.”
Martin is smiling when he comes out of Jon’s office. Instead of leaving the Archives, he walks up to Ethan’s desk and sets a mug of barely steaming tea down upon it.
“It should be just right now,” Martin says, like he’d known exactly when Ethan was going to arrive— despite him being half an hour early— and purposely made the tea so it would have cooled to the perfect temperature the moment he walked in. It is, of course, made perfectly as well. “I should have warned you a bit more about Jon. He’s a bit of a moron sometimes, but he means well. The next time you ask a question and he says he doesn’t know or tries to send you to someone else, just ask again, a bit slower. Usually the critical thinking capabilities will catch on then. Come see me whenever you’re free on Friday. I’d like to hear how you’re doing, once you actually get into the work.” And then he’s gone before Ethan can say a word.
In the doorway of his office, Jon clears his throat.
“I’ve been— reliably informed that I owe you an apology,” he says, and Ethan really would rather he didn’t. Apologies are almost always terrible, no matter which side you’re on. They’re awkward and often pointless. It’s not like he’s hurt or anything. Jon feeling bad isn’t going to do anything but make Ethan uncomfortable. “I sho—”
“Okay,” Ethan says. “Can we just skip to you training me?”
“… Yes. Yes, we can,” Jon says, possibly as relieved as Ethan to move on. He looks less tense, at least. “We usually wait until the end of probation to explain the fears, but that won’t exactly work here, so we’ll get to that in a moment. You’ve already started recording, so I suppose the first thing to know is that true statements won’t record digitally. The audio always ends up corrupted. I don’t think I’ll have you start recording any real statements quite yet, but once you do, you’ll have to use the— the tape…” He trails off, staring down at the small stack of statements Ethan recorded yesterday.
When Jon shows no sign of continuing, Ethan tentatively prompts, “The— tape recorders?”
“You’ve already started recording,” Jon says again.
“Yes?”
He pulls out the statement at the bottom of the stack and holds it out to Ethan, shaking it slightly. “You recorded this statement.”
“Yes? It was the last one I did before I went home last night.”
“Play it for me.” So Ethan does. Three minutes in, staring at the paper in his hand, Jon tells him to stop. “That’s not… Set up a new recording. I’m going to start reading this, and after two minutes, I want you to take this from me and stop the recording.” So Ethan does that too.
It had felt a bit… odd, when Ethan read the statement yesterday. Like the air got thicker, almost. But he’d also been very tired, and while a lot of things are weird at the Institute, that doesn’t mean everything is. It’s different when Jon starts reading. Not so much the air getting thicker as pressing down on them, and Ethan feels very uncomfortably like someone is making direct eye contact with him. It’s creepy. He almost misses the two minute mark.
The second he pulls the paper from Jon’s hands, the feeling lifts. Somehow, he isn’t surprised that playback of Jon’s reading comes out with a terrible screech and a whole lot of broken, garbled nonsense.
Jon looks between Ethan, the paper, and the display again and again.
“Jon?” Ethan asks.
“That’s not fair,” Jon replies. Then, with a sigh, “I guess I have more work for you than I thought.”
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violetwolfraven · 4 years
Text
Then I See You Again
33 w/ sprace— requested by @livininmyhead
You’re in the hospital and I’m pleading with you not to leave me and to please just wake up.
Rad. *cracks knuckles* Angst time. I’m gonna write this in a modern AU. Also, don’t fret about this now, but for future reference, to request fics, please, send me asks. Commenting your requests makes it harder for me. I will fill them, anyway, but please use asks in the future.
Tw: Injuries, I guess?
...
Spot was thanking God that Race’s foster mom was so chill, and he didn’t even believe in God.
He had been planning on sneaking into the hospital room if he had to, but Medda just signed him in as a visitor completely legally, meaning he didn’t have to scale two stories worth of brick to even get to the window. He was definitely grateful for that.
Since the second Spot met him, Race had never once been still. He was always in motion in some way, running dance choreography, moving through the five ballet positions under his desk, fidgeting with a pencil or pen or the hem of his shirt...
He was still, now.
It was a stupid mistake. It wasn’t even a mistake caused by human error. It was caused by insufficient funding to the drama club and lighting equipment that needed upgrading and it might cost Race his life.
Spot was going to kill those morons who didn’t give the club the money they needed.
He was sure he could get away with it. Sure, it would take planning, but Hotshot, Bart, Rafaela, and all his shifty friends on the stage crew would help him and confirm his alibi.
Spot forced himself to take a deep breath. Murder wasn’t the answer this time. Not unless Race actually died, and... and he wasn’t going to die. Race was not going to die.
He was not going to die.
A portion of the stage’s lighting had fallen on him in the middle of rehearsal, but it would take more than that to take out Anthony ‘Racetrack’ Higgins.
Even knowing that, believing that, Spot had never been afraid the way he was today.
Spot had looked down from the catwalk to see what could possibly make Jack Kelly scream like that and seen... seen...
Race, pinned under a huge chunk of metal, moving a little but clearly hurt and scared.
In hindsight, the next scream might have been Spot. He wasn’t sure. But suddenly, Kath had 911 on the phone and everyone else was trying to lift the fallen lighting equipment off Race but Spot was frozen.
Everyone else was trying to save Race, but Spot couldn’t move. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t even breathe.
When someone finally shouted his name, Spot didn’t know who it was. All he knew was that he was running down and grabbing Race by his shoulders so he could pull him out while the others lifted the set piece and then he was holding his boyfriend’s hand and his head in his lap and trying so hard to keep his voice calm for him as Race was choking on broken sobs and crying it hurts, Spottie, it hurts, help, please, Jack, Crutchie, Romeo, Spot, help, it hurts—
And everyone thought he was going to pass out, but he didn’t. He just kept drifting somewhere in between, sobbing in pain and keeping a death grip on Spot’s hand but not making much sense or really responding when anyone tried to talk to him.
“Most things just are what they are and not what we wish they could be. But then I see you again and a new world starts spinning.”
Spot had ignored everyone’s shock as he started singing quietly, trying to keep his boyfriend calm, trying to distract him, just... anything to make him more comfortable, knowing how much Race loved musical theatre and the songs that came with it.
“Filled with light, filled with you, and the crazy belief that tomorrow is something worth winning. Keeping faith with a new beginning.”
It was a song he’d heard Katherine singing more than once. Some song he didn’t recognize, maybe from some obscure musical or one Kath was writing herself. He didn’t know. He had to sing it an octave lower, but he sang it anyway, and Race untensed a bit, getting quiet and calmer, at least.
“Most things just are what they are, so why not give in and let go? And then I see you again and I know...”
Then the paramedics got there and Race was taken away from him and even though Spot really should have felt good about that, because Race needed a doctor and the paramedics would get him there, it only made him more panicked and he didn’t register that Jack Kelly was hugging him until he realized he was crying, and what the hell, Spot Conlon doesn’t cry, especially not in front of people.
He felt a little better, now, but also worse.
Because Race had a broken leg and several broken ribs, a few of which had damaged internal organs while breaking. Even if he recovered, it would take months of physical therapy to get back to where he was before this happened.
He was going to recover. Spot had to believe he was going to recover. But...
He knew how much Race loved acting. How much he loved dancing and singing. He wouldn’t be able to do any of it for a long time, now.
He couldn’t even start down that long road to recovery until he woke up, damn it.
“Taken out by lightin’ equipment?” he whispered, “Nope. No. No, Racer, you’re not allowed to leave me like this. If you’re dyin’ before your time, or even gettin’ stuck in a coma, at least make it by somethin’ interestin’. Certainly not by some stupid accident that ain’t even anyone’s fault. Race, come on, wake up.”
Race didn’t respond, and he didn’t wake up.
“Asshole. Are ya tryin’ to get me to sing again?”
Race made a pained noise in his sleep and Spot froze.
Judging by the amount of meds the doctors had him on, it wasn’t physical pain. More likely, a nightmare. Spot grabbed his boyfriend’s hand, wishing he could pull him out of it.
“I never said this out loud. But sometimes I just, I get scared. And then I see you again, and it’s like I’m protected.”
Race settled, but Spot kept singing. Because everything he was singing was actually fairly accurate, and... being sappy sometimes was okay, maybe.
It was true that Race had a way of calming him down, whether it was fear he was feeling, anger, or whatever. Race made Spot quiet.
“Seems unreal, you don’t know. Seeing me in your eyes is a prize I ain’t never expected. Makes me feel... what’s the word? Connected.”
Spot had definitely never expected to find someone like Race, who saw his flaws, his rough edges, and cared anyway. Someone who convinced his friends to give Spot a chance. In turn, Spot introduced Race to his crew friends, which meant they both had more people supporting them.
“Most things they are what they are, so why not just pick up and go? And then I see you again, and I know...”
Spot had never been able to admit when he really cared about people. Even friends were just allies, no strings attached, no real caring.
Until Race. Race who blew past all of Spot’s walls and found a way to matter to him so much that he couldn’t deny it. That he felt comfortable starting to let other people in as more than just allies, one by one.
“Up this high, if you try, you could almost believe that our problems are small. Almost believe they’re not problems at all.”
Race was breathing evenly now, his face calm. Spot would never get used to the thought that someone like this, someone who looked like an angel and sure as hell had saved Spot like one, wanted to be with him, some broken kid from Brooklyn.
Well, Race was a little broken, too, but he still managed to mend some of Spot’s fractures and make him feel like nothing was wrong even when everything was.
Spot really wanted to help with the fractures Race had, but... he didn’t really know how. He was still willing to try, though.
“What if we stay really still, and don’t even look at the ground? Not a soul for miles around. We are at the beginning.
How to start, got no clue...
But I know when I’m up here, it’s not about losing or winning. Would you care if the Earth stopped spinning?”
Spot wouldn’t care if the world ended if Race could just be okay, if he could just wake up and heal and smile the way he did when he was actually happy, when he wasn’t performing for anyone and was feeling genuine, unbridled joy.
A truly happy Racetrack Higgins was rarer that it should be, but when you actually got to see it... his smile was like starlight on a clear night, like a sky so blue it’s almost purple, like the warmest kind of sunshine that made everything else just... drop away for a second.
“Not much is certain down there. One thing’s for sure even so. I admit I don’t know when, or how time will pass ‘til then. But I will see you again, this I know.”
That last line felt like a promise. A vow that no matter how long it took, he’d wait for Race to wake up. And no matter how frustrated he got or how much he took out that frustration on Spot while recovering, Spot would stick by him, anyway.
He loved Race enough to stay, no matter what, even when he wasn’t okay, but he really, really wanted him to be okay.
“Please, please, wake up, Racer,” Spot whispered, “Don’t leave me like this. Race, I love you too much lose you like this. Please wake up. Please.”
Amazingly, by some stroke of luck or fate or theatre kid magic, after only a few seconds, Race groaned quietly and opened his eyes.
“Hey,” he said softly, and Spot wanted to laugh at the cliche of it all, but he didn’t.
“Hey. How you feelin’?”
“Better, seein’ you.”
At that, Spot couldn’t help but roll his eyes.
“Where’s my family?” Race asked.
“They went to go get some coffee so’s we could have some time alone. I can go find—“
“No,” Race interrupted, “Stay. Please.”
Spot nodded, “Of course. If ya want me to.”
Race was silent for a few seconds, and Spot wasn’t sure if it was because he was preparing to say something difficult or because the pain meds were making him slow.
“How bad is it?”
“You should probably hear it from—“
“No. My mom and brothers’ll try to make it seem better than it is. I know you won’t lie to me, Spot, so tell me. How bad is it?”
Spot took a deep breath, knowing how much Race was trusting him, here, to tell him the truth exactly as it was. He squeezed his hand gently.
“Your right leg is broken in two places,” he said, carefully keeping his voice level, “You’ve got several cracked ribs and some internal damage from where they broke against organs. It’s bad. It might take surgery, and even if it doesn’t, it’ll be months of physical therapy and a lot of drugs to manage the pain.”
Race inhaled shakily, looking hard out the window.
“Hey,” Spot said, “Hey. Yeah, it’s bad, but—“
“Who’s gonna take my role in the musical?”
“That’s what you’re worried about?”
“No, you idiot,” Race chided, “It’s just easier to focus on that cause if I don’t, I have to focus on...”
“Yeah, okay,” Spot said, hoping to interrupt whatever thoughts got Race close to tears, “Okay. Um... we don’t got official understudies, but... I think Jojo could get your part down within a couple weeks. He’s in most of your scenes as ensemble already. He probably knows all your lines.”
Race nodded, “They’ll have to switch around some dance choreography, but... oh, shit. Shit. I’m dance captain. Who will—“
“Tommy Boy. He can nail down more turns than you, anyway.”
“Ya really think Tommy Boy’s a better dancer than me?”
Spot shook his head quickly, “No, no, I—“
“Relax. I’m messin’ with ya. You’re right. Tommy’s better’n me at turns. I’m better at everything else, but... but you’ll all do alright with him leadin’.”
Spot chuckled, “Only you could joke around at a time like this. Jesus, Anthony.”
“Hmm. Anthony? You must be mad at me if you’re callin’ me Anthony. Well, whatever I did to piss you off, I’m sorry.”
Spot scoffed, “Whatever you did? You didn’t do anything. And I wasn’t angry, Racer. I was scared.”
“Scared?”
They both knew how often Spot actually said that he was scared, even if he was.
“I was terrified,” he admitted, “I thought I was gonna lose you.”
“To some fallin’ lightin’ equipment? It takes more’n that to do me in.”
It took Race a couple seconds to realize how serious he was really being.
“I’m sorry I scared ya, but Spottie, you ain’t gonna lose me.”
“Ya can’t be sure of that,” Spot muttered, “This time a stupid accident almost killed you. What about next time?”
“That ain’t gonna happen, Spot,” Race insisted, “Never. I promise.”
“You shouldn’t make promises ya ain’t sure you can keep.”
Race squeezed his hand, smiling softly, “You’re right. I shouldn’t.”
Spot sighed. Not being able to think of the right thing to say, he settled for kissing the back of his boyfriend’s hand.
“I can’t promise forever,” Race admitted, “But I can promise right now that as long as you want me, you have me. And I’ll do my damn best not to leave you as long as you try not to leave me.”
“If you think you’re gettin’ rid of me before it’s my time to go, you’re crazy, Racer.”
“Well, I am probably crazy.”
Spot rolled his eyes, “My idiot.”
Race smiled sleepily, “Damn right.”
...
In case anyone was wondering, the song is Then I See You Again, a deleted song that was once the jatherine duet instead of Something To Believe In. Personally, I think it would have been a great sprace duet instead. (:
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Note
Hey, it’s me again! ^_^ I hope I don’t bother you too much with my requests, but your posts are so cool I just can’t help it. Upon completing Yakuza 4 I’ve had a lot of thoughts and feels about Daigo and how his character was handled across the series. To be honest, at first I didn’t like him much, because he seemed pretty bland (and his screen time leaves much to be desired), but soon enough he’s really grown on me. What is your opinion on him if you don’t mind me asking?
I definitely do not mind requests! Meta is my bread and butter c: I’ve just been busy for a few days, sorry ^^; And... my opinions on Daigo are not going to be as mindblowing or exciting as my opinions on Kiryu, I’ll be real ^^; And there’s a big advantage in Kiryu being the protag, All of the content is about him ^^; I do love Daigo, I think he’s a super interesting character, but his tragedy is just what you pointed out, he’s underutilized. And he isn’t set up very well to have the position he holds. 
But, so saying, let’s get into my essay on Daigo ^^; 
So, we meet Daigo properly in game 2. There’s little side stories with baby Daigo in Zero which helps build Daigo’s and Kiryu’s relationship and set up for what would later happen, but we don’t really know him until game 2. And game 2 is a LOT about Daigo and his arc and what he’s meant to be! There’s a tumblr text post meme somewhere with a pic of Daigo depressed in his little puffy white coat that says “And I’ll probably become the next chairman of the Tojo Clan. Things like that just happens to guys like me.” and that is totally accurate! Like, it’s a funny thing to complain about, but that’s obviously the struggle Daigo’s having, understanding from a young age that it was obviously his destiny to succeed Sohei, the only problem is uh... well... Kiryu. 
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Dojima Sohei never became chairman of the Tojo Clan. And that’s really wild thinking back to Zero and how powerful he was, he was all but a shoo in for chairman. But then, uh... Kiryu. Kiryu happened. Kiryu, and Majima I should say, are the reason Sera becomes chairman, not Sohei. Forever upsetting the wheels of fate. Given where we see Sohei next, I can’t imagine that he ever really recovered from that upset ^^; And I’m SURE it made him bitter towards Kiryu the rest of his life. And considering, again, where we see him next, I think the canon supports this ^^; 
So what becomes of Daigo’s destiny then? His father had victory snatched away, destiny denied, and everything he had slowly crumbles over time, leaving his son with less and less to inherit, but still with the ideology that he should take this over. That’s an awkward position to be in. 
And then Sera dies. Ooh, golly, I wonder who the next chairman’s gonna- it’s Kiryu. Of course it’s fucking Kiryu, how could it not be? It OBVIOUSLY should be Kiryu. He’s the strongest, the bravest, and who inspires the most loyalty. It doesn’t matter that Kiryu’s never been in leadership before, he TURNS people. Kiryu could get anyone on his side through sheer force of personality, which is hilarious to say about a guy with maybe 3 facial expressions. But tell me I’m wrong. I cannot count the number of part-time antagonists who turned on a dime because Kiryu beat their ass. And anyone who can do that can rule the world. Kiryu was absolutely the best pick for chairman and I will fight the world on this.
(Abbreviated for length, this is a LONG post)
But... then Kiryu makes the stupidest decision of his entire fucking life and renounces the chairmanship. And he has his reasons, feeling unworthy, traumatized from the events of Kiwami 1, unsure if he even wants to stay in the yakuza or if there’s maybe something else he wants to do with his life... he’s going through a lot of intense self-reflection and self-doubt and, I hate to harp on it, but fucking trauma. His brother blew himself up in front of him in a bid for redemption after all but telling Kiryu that all of his mistakes are Kiryu’s fault. Yeah, no, I’m sure Kiryu’s doing FINE with that. So, like, I can see why Kiryu said no, but it was still... fucking nuts. And it irrevocably changed the trajectory of everyone in this universe. Which Kiwami 2 goes out of its way to explore. Kiryu’s leaving? Majima fucking retires, Terada’s suspect, there aren’t any old, loyal hands left to lead the families, and we see how vulnerable the Tojo clan is on every side because Kiryu just up and fucked off. 
(I have A LOT of feelings about Kiryu being chairman and someday I will have the strength to write the AU we all deserve where Kiryu stays as chairman)
So... the wheel of fate turns and oh yeah remember Daigo? Dojima Sohei’s son Daigo? The kid who’s been raised his whole life to take over the clan only to be denied at every turn? How’s he doing? Not great! It turns out, not great! Kiryu, his father figure, killed his ACTUAL father, but didn’t really, took the blame for some other weird guy, leaving Daigo with one badass mother and very little direction in life. Daigo’s been brought up thinking he’ll take over a great kingdom but all that’s left now is a broken wreck about to be demolished and picked apart by scavengers. Great, yeah, just what any kid wants to inherit. And he wasn’t trained to fix this, it’s kinda shitty to saddle him with destiny and then not train him for the thing that actually has to be done and then do it anyway. It’s real shitty actually. And not many people help Daigo. 
Daigo couldn’t have taken the chairmanship directly from Sera, he was still just a teenager then. But it probably would have been nice if Kiryu checked in with him even fucking once since getting out of jail. But no, we never explain on screen to Daigo what happened as far as I can remember. Which, I feel, is a pretty fucking big oversight. How the fuck is Daigo supposed to trust you Kiryu? Or we’re supposed to believe he just figured it out off screen and holds no grudges? Like, I’m sure knowing Kiryu didn’t kill Sohei helps, but he couldn’t fucking tell you that himself? He couldn’t trust you with that information or that conversation? Fuck this. Very understandably, Daigo has his own crisis of faith about the yakuza, very much in parallel to Kiryu’s. Why the fuck SHOULD he go to bat for a crumbling organization that has only proven itself to be a dog chasing its own tail, willing to devour itself at the slightest provocation? It took his father, both his fathers, and he didn’t really get either of them back. Why the fuck should he try to fix that? 
And to its credit, Kiwami 2 does a decent job of articulating Daigo’s motivations there. I could have done with even more, but I think they do him credit in showing him as disenfranchised and lost. And I think it’s refreshing to see someone have to confront the consequences of what’s happened since Kiryu left. Because the games don’t do a good job of showing that this is Kiryu’s direct fault. They never like to make Kiryu’s decisions have consequence, which is poor use of a protag. Rightly or wrongly, their decisions ALWAYS have consequence, or they’re not the protag. You can’t have it both ways. If this person is going to matter then, guess what, their consequences matter. Kiryu turned away. Rightly or wrongly, he did that. Daigo will never get that opportunity. Child of destiny. Not only was he bred and raised for this, he doesn’t know how to do anything else either. He doesn’t have other options the way Kiryu does. And we’re in a terrible vacuum of power. Terada’s namely in charge, but no one’s loyal to him. Even if he wasn’t deliberately fostering this, the Tojo Clan can’t survive without faith in their leader. Daigo, by fact of being his fathers’ son, can bind what’s left. And he has to because Kiryu won’t. Which is... really shitty. So either Daigo does this, or we all hang. And we never quite articulate that this is on Kiryu’s say so. Kiryu could still take over now and fix it he just... won’t.
And on top of this already comfortably stressful situation... we set Daigo up to come into a stable situation of power, where his transition would be smooth. We didn’t give him the tools to know how to salvage. He’s not practiced negotiating with hostile entities or even just people who will resent him because he’s young. And he’s lost a lot of faith, without even charisma and willpower on his side, this is a massively uphill battle. If he doesn’t believe, who else will believe him? Daigo knows this. And we watch that struggle go on, all while Kiryu just cheerleads. He hasn’t decided yet if he’s gonna stay in the yakuza either and he’s lowkey depressed after Kiwami 1. Lowkey he’s just suffering depression and can’t do as much as he normally would. Not an excuse, but I think an important way to read how tired and reluctant he is. Some therapy would really fucking help. 
Anyway, we manage to get through Kiwami 2 and install Daigo as chairman, at which point Kiryu fucks off for good. Now, he kinda/sorta leaves some supports for Daigo, in Majima specifically, but also in Kashiwagi and I wanna believe in Daigo’s mom too. She was so cool and then we just... never talked about her again ^^; Laaaame *sigh* So, I guess, Kiryu did try to fulfill his remaining responsibilities as Daigo’s living father, but mostly it was just an excuse for him to leave and not feel guilty. Mostly it was him foisting off his duties onto someone else. He didn’t stay to teach Daigo everything he knew about the people Daigo would have to control. He didn’t teach Daigo and Majima how to talk to each other, a thing which REPEATEDLY comes back to bite us in the ass. He’s not there for Daigo to ask advice and help. Kiryu is full of confidence for Daigo, he’s not TRYING to make him fail, but Kiryu’s so caught up in his own need to leave, he neglects to people who need him. 
And Daigo, to his everlasting credit, does his best to get by without Kiryu’s help. As much as possible, he never calls to ask Kiryu for help. And he does grow into a quite competent chairman! He does successfully rehabilitate the Tojo Clan, he makes them profitable again, he insists on respect and people don’t run amok under him. He does it, he salvages a dying organization. And he may not even really believe in it, but he has such a sense of responsibility, he does it anyway. He knows there’s no one else. He knows if he goes to Kiryu and says I don’t want this, Kiryu won’t help him. Kiryu didn’t mean for it to happen this way, he didn’t mean to be selfish and put others in a bad position. But he wasn’t there to listen. And I think Kiryu eventually comes to rue that. 
The very unfortunate thing about Kiryu is... he is a dragon. Even though he is kind and generous and not greedy in a conventional sense, he is greedy. As much as Kiryu is a powerhouse because come hell or high water, he does what he thinks is right... this also makes him extremely selfish. He can be blind to other people’s needs and refused to be tied down. Again, for the best of reasons, because he’s trying to raise a family, because this environment is triggering for him, but he just hauls off and does things instead of talking to anyone which... makes him impossible to have a working relationship with. He has to learn to talk and to listen and that he can’t make all of the decisions by himself. The great irony being, Kiryu never wants to, but he doesn’t know how to ask for help. He’s so used to have everything put on him, he doesn’t realize it doesn’t have to be that way... but anyway, I’m getting caught up ^^; The point is, he thinks because he ditched the Tojo Clan they no longer care about him. Which is... naive at best. Of course people still care about you dumbass. Which makes Kiryu a massive vulnerability to the Tojo. In 3 and 4, Daigo makes stupid calls trying to protect Kiryu and trying to protect his interests. And because Kiryu hasn’t left open an avenue for them to talk, Daigo has to make these decisions on his own with bad information and he does his fucking best. But... he doesn’t know how to make the best of what he has, not like Kiryu would, and he fucks up sometimes. 
I really, really love game 4 for that reason. Daigo’s fuck up is SO understandable, SO reasonable. It sounded like a good idea, it sounded like peace and harmony. And he was left without a leg to stand on before he knew it. In many ways, it wasn’t his fault. Kiryu himself says as much. And I may never forgive the end of 4 for letting Kiryu REALIZE he defaulted on his responsibilities but then, instead of changing his behavior in any way, he fucks off back to Okinawa. God... *siiiigh* ANYWAY. 
And this struggle, this lack of communication, but unstated loyalty, comes full circle in game 5. When Daigo is literally drowning, literally knows he’s going to fail this time and there’s nothing he can do, and even when he’s with Kiryu, he can’t bring himself to ask for help. He knows Kiryu won’t or can’t. Instead he asks for absolution. He tries to tell his dad he’s just been doing his best and... he’s sorry for the terrible things that are about to happen. How gutting that Daigo can only see himself as a failure because... he’s not Kiryu. No one’s Kiryu. Even Kiryu refuses to be Kiryu. But Daigo knows if he was just Kiryu, things would be better. He’s not a legend. He’s not a god. He’s not all-powerful or crazy or impossible. He’s just a guy, doing his best because he had to. Because there was no one else. And some days Daigo does great, but a lot of days, he doesn’t measure up. And that eats at Daigo like mold. Kiryu would NEVER look at Daigo this way. Heck, most people at that point would never compare them. It’s in Daigo’s head, but it still hurts. He’s still, even now, looking up to Kiryu and he’ll just... never quite get there. 
This is the only good thing I will ever say about game 6, and it was still 2 or 3 games too late, but Kiryu finally acknowledging Daigo as his son was good. Kiryu saying he was proud and saying he was grateful was good. Again, several games late, but... it still mattered. It still mattered that, in the end, Kiryu recognized his legacy in Daigo. That he understood so much of what Daigo did and does and is and was is for him. That mattered. 
Daigo is a great chairman who takes care of his clan. But he was robbed of his relationship with his father. The games never work on the relationships that exist, strong relationships, for reasons I will never understand. Games 3, 4, and 5 would have been SO much more interesting if we had just like Kiryu talk to his fucking friends. Two would have been SO much easier if Kiryu had just been fucking chairman like he was fucking supposed to be and the transition of power to Daigo came later and smoother, with Kiryu helping to make it. Daigo tries his hardest every day and he’s an incredible negotiator and savior after all the shit he’s had to pull the Tojo Clan through, kicking and screaming and fighting to tear itself apart every damn day. The generation above him is all legends, Majima and Saejima and Kiryu. Daigo isn’t one of them. But he’s better because he was here and because he tries and because he succeeds. We need Daigo. We deserve him. 
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juliandev0rak · 3 years
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First Love 🍓💘
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Nine: First loves – before any of the M6 did your OC have any crushes/relationships that stood out to them? What happened to them? 
echoes of the past event
@arcana-echoes​
Stella Rosa, she/ her
Center City, Vesuvia 
10 years before the events of The Arcana, Stella is 18
Words: 2339
Warnings: “Someone has to leave first. This is a very old story. There is no other version of this story.” -Richard Siken 
i used the lovely @leila-of-ravens​ city of Umbra as a minor location in this fic! 
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The first time she sees Lune is at the market. Stella’s Zia Alessa had asked her to go buy more bread, so she had dragged herself out of bed at the crack of dawn to make sure she got there early enough to get it fresh. The early morning market is usually much less busy, so it’s no wonder that this particular girl sticks out so much. 
Stella is busy weaving through stalls of vendors, trying not to step on the long hem of her dress which was probably a bit impractical to wear to the market. She spots her across the aisle, perusing a jewelry stand. The girl is beautiful, dark hair cascading down her back, blue eyes catching in the early morning light. Stella stops walking for a moment, transfixed as she stares. The girl looks up and meets her eyes and Stella immediately pretends to be interested in the scarves at the stall next to her. 
When she looks up again the girl is gone, so she continues on her path to the baker’s. She arrives just in time to see the same girl from earlier purchasing a loaf of bread. The girl notices and gives Stella a smile, she smiles back in response and goes to order her bread. When she turns around the girl is still standing in the same spot looking at her. Stella doesn’t quite know what to do so she takes her bread and murmurs “Good morning” to the girl as she walks past. 
The girl laughs lightly under her breath and says it back, Stella notices that she has a thick accent of some kind. Before she can embarrass herself more by staring at this pretty girl she leaves the market, headed for home with her bread in tow.  She thinks about the girl all day, the fleeting glimpse she’d gotten of her perfect face, the sweet tone of her voice, the accent she can’t quite place. 
The second time she sees her is at the shop later that week. Stella is bored watching the counter while her aunt gives a customer a reading in the back room when the shop door opens with a slight tinkling noise. She looks up to find the girl from the market walking in and immediately straightens up from her stool and smooths her hair down. 
“Hello!” She says, unable to suppress a smile at the sight of the pretty girl once again in her vicinity. 
“Hello.” The girl greets back, an answering smile on her face. Today she’s dressed in a light blue dress which accentuates her eyes and Stella tries not to blush as she’s caught staring, again. 
“Is there anything I can help you find?” Stella asks, hoping whatever it is will take a while to locate so she’ll get a chance to talk to this girl.
“Well, I was hoping to get a reading, you see. I heard from people in town that you predict the future?” The girl says, Stella is pretty sure her accent is Umbran, though she might be mistaken. 
“Oh, sure! My aunt does most of the readings, she’s with a customer right now but she should be with you shortly.” Stella responds, “I can show you around the shop while you wait?” 
“Actually, I was hoping that you would do the reading.” The girl smiles, tilting her head slightly as she regards Stella. 
“Oh, well I’m still in training actually, my readings aren’t as accurate as my aunt’s.” Stella tries not to get flustered as the girl takes a step closer to the counter.
“I am willing to take a chance on you.” She grins, “You seem like a powerful magician.”
“Do I?” Stella laughs, wondering what would make the girl think that.
“Well you dress like one.” The girl gestures to Stellas dark wine colored velvet dress and cloak. She joins in Stella’s laughter and leans closer to look at her. “Something in your eyes perhaps...”
Stella’s Zia Alessa emerges from the back room then, laughing with the customer as they exit. 
“You’re on the right path, dear, trust yourself!” She says as she waves them out of the door. She turns to Stella and the girl with a bemused expression, quirking an eyebrow up in question. “May we help you?” 
“Yes, I was hoping to get a reading.” The girl explains politely, tearing her eyes away from Stella’s. 
“Of course dear! Right this way.” Alessa gestures towards the back room.
“Actually Zia, she wants me to do it.” Stella explains, hoping her aunt will agree.
“Oh, well that’s fine of course! Just be warned that Stella is a bit new at this, if you’re not satisfied I’d be happy to do another reading afterwards.” Alessa smiles. 
“Wow Zia, thanks for your faith in my abilities.” Stella says, voice laced with sarcasm. Her aunt laughs and waves her on towards the door. 
“You’ll be fine, cara. Just remember what I’ve taught you.” Alessa pats her shoulder and heads towards the other corner of the shop to tidy potion ingredients. 
“Well, uh right this way then!” Stella says, trying to be confident as she ushers the girl into the reading room.
“Your name is Stella?” The girl asks as she takes a seat in the chair Stella pulls out for her.
“Yes, what’s your name?” Stella says, “It’s uh, it’s for the reading of course. I need to know your name for the reading.”
“My name is Lune.” She replies, and Stella grins.
‘What a pretty name!” Stella exclaims, trying to distract herself by reaching for her aunt’s tarot deck.
“It means ‘moon’ in Umbran.” Lune smiles, “That’s where I’m from.” 
“I’ve never been to Umbra, but I’d like to travel someday.” Stella responds, “My name means ‘star’ in Venterrean, that’s where I’m from, Venterre.” 
“A beautiful name for a beautiful girl.” Lune says, “Well, Stella, let’s see what the stars have in store for me.” 
“I’ll do a three card spread, representing your past, present, and future.” Stella explains as she sets the three cards down, blushing for the thousandth time in the last five minutes. She’s done plenty of readings for customers before, but never one she’s wanted to impress so much. She tries to remember her Zia’s teachings and quiets her thoughts, trying to focus on the voices of the arcana.
“The Tower.” Stella says, flipping over the first card. “Your past was marked by chaos and constant change, you didn’t have much stability.”
“That does seem accurate to my past, my family has moved many times before, my parents don’t like to stay in one place. It makes it hard to get to know anyone.” Lune comments, her expression pensive and a bit sad as she meets Stella’s eyes. “I hope we stay in Vesuvia for a while.” 
“The Star.” Stella turns over the second card, she looks up to see Lune smiling at her and ducks her head to hide another sudden blush. “Uh, in the present you are feeling a sense of hope and renewal, like anything is possible.” 
“You didn’t cheat and put that one in there, did you étoile?” Lune grins, a glint of mischief in her eyes.
“Why, were you hoping I did?” Stella returns the smirk, using the cards as an excuse to lean closer over the table. 
“Hmmm... perhaps I was.” Lune leans closer too, her head nearly touching Stella’s. “Well, what does my future hold for me?”
“Let’s see,” Stella turns over the final card, “Oh, Death.” 
“Well that doesn’t seem very promising.” Lune laughs, not seeming startled in the least.
“Well Death doesn’t represent a physical death, it’s more of a sign that something is ending or changing. Death asks you to allow those changes rather than fighting against them, it’ll be better for you in the end.” Stella explains, keeping her eyes on Lune while she talks. Lune nods and sits silently for the moment, absorbing the information.
“Well, if my present is marked by The Star, our meeting seems destined.” Lune says, picking up the card to inspect it more closely. 
“Do you have any questions?” Stella asks, trying to come up with a way to prolong this moment.
“Yes. When do you get out of work?” She grins, reaching out to place The Star card in Stella’s open hand.
“Whenever really, my aunt is very nice that way.” Stella shivers as Lune lets her hand linger in hers. 
“Well then, Stella, shall we go out and explore the present?” Lune asks, her eyes trained to Stella’s. 
“Like, on a date?” Stella replies, instantly cursing her forwardness. Lune might’ve just been being polite. She’d thought Lune was flirting at times, but maybe she hadn’t been? Had she misread the signs?
“If you would like it to be.” Lune stands up, still holding Stella’s hand in hers. 
“Very much.” Stella smiles and allows Lune to pull her out of the backroom.
Stella spends the evening showing Lune around the city, Lune’s warm hand never leaves hers. They visit all of her favorite places and grab dinner from one of the stalls in the shopping district. The night ends at a park near the Temple District where they set up a picnic. Stella transforms her cloak into a blanket, much to Lune’s astonishment and delight, and they sit for hours as they talk about their lives, where they’ve been and where they want to go.
“It’s a full moon tonight.” Stella notices as they’re packing up to leave. 
“Oh, it’s lovely isn’t it.” Lune says, staring wistfully up at the moon, “It’s so bright.” 
“It’s not half as lovely as you.” Stella flirts, a smile on her face as she looks at how beautiful Lune is in the moonlight. Lune takes a step closer until the two of them are face to face and Stella’s breath catches in her throat.
“I know we’ve only known each other for a little while but may I,” Luna says, reaching a hand up to gently tuck a strand of Stella’s hair behind her ear, “That is- can I-” she leans closer, nose to nose with Stella.
“Yes.” Stella sighs, “Please.” closing the centimeter of distance between them with a kiss.
The next few months are wonderful. Lune comes to visit Stella at the shop every day and their relationship continues to grow. They go on dates around the city, gondola rides and trips to the theater. Soon enough Lune and Stella become as inseparable as the moon and stars. After only a month of dating Stella tells Lune that she loves her, and Lune returns the sentiment. Things are moving fast, but they’re young and in love, enjoying the present just as the cards had told them to do.
All too soon, things change. Lune comes to the shop in tears one afternoon, her father had announced that the family is moving again, back to Umbra where her father’s business is located. They’re leaving in a week.
The girls are heartbroken, just when things had seemed so right everything went wrong. Stella swears they’ll make it work, they can send letters and travel to see each other, but Lune isn’t so sure.
“We’re so young, Stella. I don’t want to hold you back from all that your life has to offer.” Lune cries, “Umbra is so far away, and I won’t be able to see you. You deserve better than that.”
“We love each other!” Stella argues through her tears, “I’ll wait for you, until we can be together again.” 
“I don’t want you to have to wait for me, ma chérie.” Lune sighs sadly, “Maybe it’s best if we both try to move on with our lives.”
“I don’t want to move on,” Stella says angrily, “I want you.” 
“I know, but we can’t. I have to leave and you can’t come with me.” Lune frowns, “And it wouldn’t be fair to either of us to keep holding on.” 
“Stay here, in Vesuvia.” Stella pleads, “You could live at the shop!” 
“I wish I could stay, but I want to go to school and there’s no university in Vesuvia.” Lune shakes her head slowly, “It just makes sense for me to leave with my family.” 
“Are you breaking up with me then?” Stella asks bluntly, angrily wiping away tears. Lune pulls her into a hug and they stay like that for a few minutes, both crying and comforting each other. Stella knew the answer before she asked, but it still hurts to hear it.
“Yes, I think so.” 
The last time Stella sees Lune is at the docks. She’s gone to say goodbye, even though she’d considered staying home out of anger. She knows she’ll regret not seeing Lune one last time. 
“I’ll write to you,” Lune says, holding Stella’s hands in hers, “I want to know what you’re getting up to.” Stella simply nods in response, it’ll be a while before she feels ok enough to write to her. 
“You’ll be ok, I know it.” Lune leans in to press a kiss to Stella’s forehead. “You’re going to do amazing things someday.” 
Stella watches as she boards the boat, she stays until it’s disappeared beyond the horizon line. Lune waved as the boat departed but she couldn’t bring herself to wave back. She thinks bitterly of the reading she’d done all those months ago that had predicted this very outcome- change has come and the only options are to accept it or to let it pull her under.
Many years later Stella finds an old love letter under her bed in the shop, it’s signed from someone named “Lune” but she can’t remember who that is. She’s nearly brought to tears anyways, old hurt she doesn’t remember the cause for brought to the surface. The words of the letter are sweet, written in silvery ink with random phrases in Umbran throughout. Whoever wrote the letter must have loved her a lot, she thinks, it’s a pity she doesn’t know who wrote it anymore.
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