#she didn't use those words she was far more poetic about it

[la-cocotte-de-paris]

NONONONONO I FOUND A QUOTE FROM EDWIGE'S MEMOIR AND NOW I'M IN TEARS AGAIN

#she really said happiness is a butterfly before lana del rey was even born #she didn't use those words she was far more poetic about it #that fuckin line made me cry so fuckin hard the first time i finished her book #she had NO RIGHT to make a girl in her early 20s from 21st century ireland cry that hard yet she DID and she SERVED #i was looking at that castle photo of me as a toddler and i had saved the quote like right before that in my gallery so #roacc

[multifandomwhore-003]

Forever —Drabble

Pairing: Lando Norris x female! reader

Summary: First time watching your boyfriend crash during a race? Rough.

Genre: angst, fluff.

Waring(s): Mentions of the Las Vegas crash.

Taglist: @ join taglist here

A/N: This is by far the most poetic work I've ever put out (I think), that being said. WHATEVER TF THIS IS, BLAME ON HIM, THIS MAN IS GORGEOUS

Gif credits to whom it belongs

REQUESTS ARE CLOSED

THIS IS NOT FREE USE, YOU CANNOT USE MY WORK

Even through ringing ears and a dazy view, he could clearly hear you, wondering then how it was even possible, he heard beyond the arguments and strong footsteps; the flare of your nose, the shakiness in your breath, the hamering in your heart, he swore he could feel it. And with that in mind, he sighed in relived, he could feel something after all, the last thing he remembered, the last thing he perceived was dread, flashing through the last few hours of his life, could those be his last?

Shaking, on the verge of tears all he could do beyond gathering the last remnants of strength in him, was think of his family, you right beside his parents, you.

Minutes passed before he realized he blinked forcefully, perhaps one of these times he'd actually lose consciousness, or worse, be gone for good. His usual dramatics and the painkillers were dancing around his brain, making it their playground. Against all of this, he tried to organize the sound with letters, letters into words, and words into speech. Speech, Could he speak right now?

He prepared himself for the task by trying to stand on his elbows.

"Mr. Norris, please lie down," the nurse guided his head back into the pillow.

"My girlfriend," his throat was hoarse strangely enough.

"She's right outside," the nurse's undertone confirmed his bare train of thought.

"I have to see her," he grabbed the woman's arm, he was pleading.

She whispered something under her breath, clearly giving in to the situation, "I'll let her in," she grinned.

He could recognize something now, your stance, firm in shape, trembling with every motion, you stepped in asking, no, demanding the nurse to close the door behind her, avoiding her gaze in plain coldness. You said nothing for the first few seconds, breathing deeply.

"I'm okay," he let out.

"I know, they've already explained everything to me," you covered your mouth.

His fingers reached for yours, longed for them, interlacing with one another, perfectly, like every time before tonight.

He took some awareness of his surroundings, as much as he could without pushing to the edge, how horrible of a might he had over his head, effective, but far too harsh, far too overwhelming.

"We're going home in a couple of hours, they just wanna make sure, you're going to be fine," you knew you were failing at reassuring him, he didn't need it, but you did.

"I gathered that, otherwise you would still be outside yelling at everyone you could,"

You chuckled, not proud of your actions, but finding them rather hysterical at the moment, "I'm sorry you had to hear that,"

"It was music to my ears," he joked.

"Having my screams flood this place?"

"Having you care so much about me,"

"Always," was all you could answer biting down a sniffle.

It was not so long ago when you quietly promised yourself to give him your heart, the one thing you'd never thought you'd offer, let alone to the guy the Russells so kindly invited to a tennis event, to the guy who over a few drinks and laughs without a sense of shame in the world asked you to dance messily, making of those videos something for the internet to cut and explore. He was so much more than that now, and even to put it into those words was the understatement of a lifetime.

He could say the same thing about his side of the story, to explore a rather rushed friendship before diving, completely submerging, was something he'd labeled as a blessing. To fill his hours by your side in talking, and talking until you had everything to learn from one another laid out and displayed in string lights. Neither of you looked for this, flowing like every bottle of champagne you saw him pop, like every shot of Tequila you drank during Mario-kart nights, like every tear of Rosé you spilled all over your couch in the middle of the night.

And to think that both the most infamous people of their career found in themselves something far more valuable than money, fame, even transcending. Comprehending during the first years of your adulthood what it all meant to allow yourself to be completely consumed with love. So unexpectedly both your reputation and his infinite rumors could all be proven wrong. Through the worst of the trials and tribulations of being committed, you still survived.

His head rested in all the calmness you made by moving heaven and earth to have, in the crook of your neck, never letting go of the sensation of his breath, his life. How funny was it to trust someone enough to keep you alive, physically, mentally emotionally; how funny that none of them could think of how to prove something as mysterious as love to be true, in themselves, in one another, in other people past the centuries, yet they believed in, that's what they invested their faith in.

Admitting you were never fools, but only to each other, you could almost touch each other's soul, finding it far more familiar than your own.

"I'm okay," he'd been repeating the same words like a prayer since the night before.

"I know," you gulped, letting go of a choked exhale.

He read you, "Trust me?"

"Forever," you reminded your thoughts, clearing them out with just one.

—If you can't trust yourself, trust him, forever—

"I'm okay," he tested the words against your sleepless frame.

"I belive you," you finally admitted in peace before giving you lips to his.

#lando norris x reader #lando norris #lando norris fanfic #lando norris one shot #lando norris imagine #lando norris fluff #lando norris angst #formula 1 #f1

[genericpuff]

The Extended Mishandling of LO's S3 Midseason Finale Premiere (Pt 2)

Alrighty, I promised a part two back in the first part of this analysis, but found myself busy with Rekindled and my day job, so I'm finally sitting down and finishing this up. If you haven't read that first part yet, please go check it out!

CAUTION: THERE BE FASTPASS SPOILERS AHEAD!

We left off with Hebe and Apollo roleplaying that one scene from The Lion King, albeit with a lot less sense or nuance. Literally all the "drama" so far feels purely manufactured for cheap plot progression and tension and it hardly feels authentic. But now we gotta talk about the second half of this episode, where we finally address the cliffhanger that the FP midseason finale episode left off on - Persephone causing winter.

And what better way to kick it off than with a completely off-base Persephone monologue?

Now, what's shown here is actually a flashback to the job interview scene from S1, when Persephone asked to see the snow in the Underworld. But it's written as if Persephone has some intimate relationship with snow as a whole, as if she's experienced more than this one time which... she hasn't. There was nothing "romantic" really about that scene following the job interview, she literally just wanted to go out and see something she hadn't seen before.

But that calls into question - why does Persephone constantly act like she has an intimate relationship with snow when it doesn't occur in the Mortal Realm? She even says in the honeymoon episode that it's hot all the time in the Mortal Realm, and the temperature only drops every now and then during rainy days... and she somehow makes this about Hades when it literally has nothing to do with him lmao Persephone monologues are some of the worst /r/im14andthisisdeep moments in the series because she's constantly using word salad to describe feelings we never saw or scenes that never happened.

And this scene is no different. She says that snow is something that's interwoven with her most 'treasured moments' but all the visuals have to show for is that one scene from S1 that, again, didn't even come across as a 'treasured moment', it was just her seeing the snow for the first time, there was nothing 'romantic' about it in a vacuum. All the moments from the series you could call ACTUALLY TREASURED milestones of Hades and Persephone's relationship - and Persephone's supposed "love" for the Underworld - are scenes where snow was completely absent (ex. the scene of Persephone and Hades talking about Sicily in Zeus and Hera's garden, Persephone and Hades spending the night in the cabin during the trial arc, etc.)

But then, to make it even more confusing, she goes on to describe her losing her powers and causing winter a "betrayal". As if the concept of winter owes her anything. As if Erebus owes her anything.

The allusion to Erebus itself in the visuals implies that she feels "betrayed" over this happening, as if it wasn't made ABUNDANTLY CLEAR TO HER that she would have to sacrifice something. She's gone SO LONG without knowing or caring about what she could have possibly given up, that by the time it finally revealed itself, she's acting all shocked Pikachu because there's finally something she can't just have. Everything that could make her seem imperfect has been washed away, from her SA trauma to those pesky green hands. Now we finally ARE seeing her affected by her own choices and she's basically waxing poetic about how sad it is that her actions have consequences.

That said, she does seem to have a moment of self-awareness here... but I can't be confident it will actually amount to anything seeing as how all the past attempts at 'growth' have been overshadowed by her vanity and ego.

This line is really confusing / weird in the way that it's written but I think she's trying to say that the source of the cold is from her, she can't pin it on any sort of 'big bad' like she could with Apollo and Kronos. It's just her.

And again, this could be a moment of realization for her that her actions are her own regardless of whatever she wants to pin it on-

But she rejects it instead. She's still not capable of acknowledging that her choices affect others, that her actions have consequences, that she's finally paying the price for something she knew had a cost.

If this were any other comic, I would accept her rejection of this, I would have confidence in knowing she may recognize it eventually. But this is LO and we're three seasons in, she's technically already gotten her happily ever after in the form of becoming Queen and married to her 'true love', so all of this feels like a very last-minute attempt to paint Persephone as this "struggling" character. But she's not "struggling", she's just finally experiencing karma catching up to her and as expected for a person like Persephone, she's already cracking under the pressure of realization that she can't have everything she wants.

Again, in any other comic, this would feel satisfying or endearing to see her fall on her own sword, but to me it just feels frustrating in the context of LO because we've spent five years seeing her get everything she wants with barely any real struggle that wasn't manufactured - with all of it painted as a GOOD THING - while still getting away with treating the people around her like shit.

And when I say she rejects this concept of having humility, I don't just mean through her monologuing, but also through her actions.

If I were to critique LO the same way I would an actual functional series, I would say that this should be the point of realization, the point where we see her crumble under the weight of her not being perfect, not being able to "fix" everything. It all stems back to her entitlement as a bratty main character, someone who can't fathom not being the main character or the "hero".

Because she's not the hero. Demeter is - or at least, she tries to be.

Again, it's hard to know if this is intentional or if this is yet another attempt to present Demeter as an "overbearing mom", but Persephone here looks and sounds like she's been reduced back to the state of a child crying for her mother in the face of her own failures. Despite now technically being a mother herself (through literal babynapping sigh) Persephone is still not a mature adult. Aging her up 10 years and giving her a husband and baby will not make her an actual functional independent adult who's capable of taking care of themselves or making the right decisions... unlike Demeter who is still, ultimately, more skilled than Persephone. She is an actual experienced and mature adult who's capable of rationalizing and decision making, and knowing when it's time to put aside your ego, walk away and let someone else who's far more qualified take care of things.

What Demeter has is something that one can only gain through true hardship, failing, learning from one's own mistakes, and experience, all of which Persephone does not have because she transitioned from a cage of her own imagination where hard work and responsibility was a virtue, into a gilded cage where true hard work can be passed onto someone else whose efforts she could take credit for while sitting on a throne and buying anything and everything she could ever want.

Despite everything Persephone and the narrative claims to have 'earned', she's still a child. The adults have to take over.

And like a child, she doesn't let them.

This is not an 'anime moment'. This is not a moment of redemption. This is immaturity and irresponsibility in its most visible form for Persephone - refusing to let go of her ego and shortcomings to "prove herself", even if it means making things worse.

And Hades enables it.

I want to make it clear there is a massive difference between not being controlling over someone, and actually enabling them.

This is not some small hill to die on. Persephone is literally causing winter, which could very well kill the Mortals. As we've seen in that prior Hebe scene from the first part of this essay, the snow is showing up in Olympus. This isn't something that's happening in the isolation of this single scene, this is happening everywhere and instead of taking the L, Persephone is trying to make things 'better' by simply 'trying harder' which is just not the solution here, Demeter knows this, but Hades is playing the "girlboss" version of a "good husband" by not even bothering to try and convince her to do otherwise. Hades above everyone else should be the one stepping in because he'd likely be the only one she'd actually listen to, but he's refusing to because he has to be the "good husband" who doesn't control the actions of his wife.

So he flat out enables her instead by not even bothering to try and reason with her, to help her see that what she's doing is not helping. Not even so much as a "Persephone, I know you want to help but it's clear something is wrong and if Demeter can figure out what to do to fix this, we should let her", just him saying to Demeter who wants to stop her that he can't stop her from trying... ignoring the fact that he should at least try.

And that's the difference between being controlling and being an enabler. He's not keeping her from doing something that benefits her and doesn't harm him or others. He's not micromanaging her decisions or trying to tell her she's not capable. Now, don't get me wrong, there are definitely things that make Hades a walking red flag especially when it comes to him being a groomer, but when it comes to directly controlling Persephone, most of the time she's doing things of her own accord convinced that it's "the right thing" (which is still just a side effect of the obvious grooming because I really doubt S1 Persephone would have done this shit lmao).

Here, he's not stepping in to even try to reason with her because "well I'd be a bad husband if I stepped in", completely ignoring the fact that it makes him a terrible person, period, to not at least try to calmly reason with his wife and explain to her that her 'help' is not going to help here. Just like when he rewarded her with sex for abusing a nymph in her own home, he's completely complacent to Persephone's actions and doesn't step in to try and help because, according to Wattpad and TikTok, a "good husband" is someone who looks the other way while his life partner does whatever she wants regardless of the consequences to herself and others. "Happy wife, happy life, who cares if the wife wants to be an actual piece of shit to people if it makes her happy".

And thus she makes things worse in her pursuit of "happiness", while Hades stands idly by, watching it all unfold as if he's just an innocent bystander who can absolve himself of any responsibility in this situation. As if she didn't become this way because she ate the pomegranate to be with him and a part of his world.

Now, there's one other sort-of-blatant smoking gun that I want to talk about that I haven't really seen anyone else mention since this episode went up. Granted, this might be me reading far too much into it, but hey, that's what this blog is for and I think it's something that absolutely needs to be mentioned.

Persephone goes on about how her powers aren't just gone, they've been replaced, all she can create is decay, and more specifically-

Now... think of the context of LO's narrative, what it's told us both literally and through subtext, intentional or not.

What does this sound like?

Hades lost his ability to produce children when he ate the pomegranate. He can no longer "create life".

And now, Persephone is finding herself in a similar situation, unable to "create life" the way she knows how. I'd like to think this isn't literal, but it really feels like there's a metaphorical implication here that Persephone losing her ability to create life is meant to be taken literally, that she not only can't create flowers and plant life anymore, but she's lost her fertility entirely. You can go even further back in this when it was established Persephone didn't eat six seeds, but nine, which originally felt like a weirdly random choice, but now seems intentional. I know some people have theorized that it has to do with her possibly being pregnant, but I don't think that's the case, I think it's the opposite - that the 9 months was a metaphor for the 9 months of childbearing that Persephone can no longer do.

And if that's the case... LO truly is no longer a "feminist" piece of work. It barely was before, but if the point of all this winds up being an attempt by Rachel to give Persephone a "flaw" by taking away her ability to bear children... that'll be a punch to the gut.

That said, if it does go somewhere, maybe the point will be Persephone learning she doesn't need to be able to reproduce to have value as a woman. But considering LO's track record with these sorts of plotlines, I can't be confident in the slightest that's where it'll end up. What I can be confident in is that Persephone will likely not stay this way. Like her green hands, she'll likely get her powers back, maybe after the resolution that she's still a real woman deserving of love even if she can't reproduce. I can't possibly know at this point where it's going, all I do know is that LO hasn't done a great job at resolving these sorts of deeper narratives so this just feels like another dart on the wall of bad ideas. Because it's, again, all being framed through Persephone being the "perfect woman", without there being any actual subtext throughout the narrative to imply that this may be a flawed ideology to have, it's just what Persephone has to be and it's sold in the narrative as a positive.

There's one term to describe this with that's rather consistent throughout LO when you peel back the layers of both the comic and Rachel's past work - white feminism. Despite LO's attempts to be "feminist", it's still ultimately being written through a heteronormative male gaze, that women are only "valuable" so long as they're youthful, that any goals or dreams a woman may have should be dropped as soon as they fall in love with a rich and powerful man, and that "other women" who don't fit into that mould of being rich, white, and heterocis are not worthy of love, empathy, or understanding. It's hard to trust that LO will actually challenge these norms when it's been practically enforcing them for five years.

But ultimately, that's a very loaded topic and right now, we don't know where this is going... I'm just not so sure I want to see it after all the missteps the series has pulled over the past half a decade. Like the miracle of childbirth, it's gonna take a miracle for LO to actually stick this landing.

Now, I'm assuming you read this line of dialogue, and you understood it. Yes? You positive? Okay, great. Why am I asking you this question as if you're an infant who doesn't understand what being "passed out" means? Well, you'll see what I mean in a minute.

Now, again, like with the whole "I can't bring life to anything anymore" thought process I just went through, I can't know exactly what they're trying to do here, but Demeter is fully in the right. I want to make that abundantly clear that Demeter was right the whole time and it's pretty telling that even a lot of the people reading the comic in good faith are pointing this out in the discussion circles they can actually access.

Now, in case anyone hasn't noticed, it's clear that Demeter herself is drawing upon the fertility magic of Gaia or Rachel is just alluding to Gaia for some reason. At first I thought it was supposed to be her form of "wrath" until I remembered that (unfortunately) Eris was the only reason for Persephone's wrath, so this is clearly meant to be some allusion to Gaia. Considering the fertility powers were passed down purely through Gaia and Ouranos, this means Demeter is a descendant of Gaia, which... calls into question Rachel's attempts to "remove the incest" from LO, but that's for another topic.

Either way, Demeter is fully in the right here. Hades is a fucking idiot - a useless lump - for not only enabling the shitty actions of his shitty wife, but for not taking even any amount of accountability for the fact that Persephone found out about the pomegranate through him.

"But Puff, she had to eat the pomegranate to beat Kronos!" Did she? Or was that purely manufactured for Rachel's sake because she just had to have an MCU Evil-Robot-Jeff-Bridges villain despite the fact that this FANTASY ROMANCE series didn't need one? The fact that it was written purely to 'force' Persephone into doing something she already wanted to do was completely redundant, it wasn't a 'sacrifice' she made, it was made pretty clear in Episode 165 that she wanted to eat the pomegranate as soon as she found out about it and while that decision is certainly her own, that does not absolve Hades of responsibility for not questioning his future wife's fascination with it or realizing that he unlocked the inner Pandora's Box of Persephone's mind.

And so, Demeter holds him responsible. As she should.

Okay, you read that, right? But remember that line I asked you about before? We should all know Demeter doesn't mean this literally. We have brains and we should all have a minimum amount of media literacy to understand that Hades was telling the truth when he literally said Persephone was "passed out".

We finish the episode on this panel, which I swear to christ I couldn't tell you in all of my own divine wisdom of the arts what in the world is going on in this panel. I'm literally looking at salad.

Is it Demeter and Persephone? Just some dying plants? I have no fucking clue, your guess is as good as mine.

But we're not done. Because we have one more glaring issue to talk about with this episode, and it comes in the form of an author's note that was inserted at the end of the episode. It is truly, despite EVERYTHING we've talked about in both parts of this analysis, the dumbest, most airheaded and egregiously pretentious thing I've seen in this entire episode.

Rachel quite literally put in a fucking disclaimer telling her audience what Hades already told us point blank in the comic - "Don't worry, audience members, Persephone is not literally dead, it's a metaphor for her spring powers being dead!"

I literally can't even express to you how pretentious and shitty this is of her to do. I can't tell if it's legitimately her thinking her writing is "too smart" for even her older audience members to grasp, or if she just wants to dispel the theories that people would want to make about this, or if she completely misconstrued the criticism about her writing not being "clear enough" and thinks that THIS is what people meant. Pardon my tone because I've kept it together relatively well throughout this post, but this is some 2009-era Fanfiction.net level of author's note bullshit.

If she thinks her writing is "too smart" for her audience to grasp, I'm sorry Rachel, but you're just wrong and this is incredibly shitty of you. You think the 14 year olds in your community aren't also reading other webtoons that have deeper writing than LO? I read Death Note when I was fucking 14 and I knew exactly the point of what the story was getting at by the time it was over, despite all the other stories I read at that age that completely flew over my head. And you think LO is somehow more complicated than Death Note, baby's first introduction to the grey areas of morality and justice?

If she's trying to dispel the theories... that actually holds some merit because not only is Rachel notoriously bad at not letting her fandom just talk about their theories without her swooping in to "um actually" them (even if it means killing the fun of theorizing), but the official FP page on FB was closed to new submissions in the hours following this episode and it since hasn't posted any new content. Is it because people aren't posting? Absolutely not. The mods are quite literally holding these posts hostage through the submission and approval system. People are legitimately trying to submit only for the mods to block it entirely from going through. If this is Rachel's attempts at trying to "protect herself" from the criticism this episode has surely earned, then all she's really doing is punishing her own fans who want to talk about it. It doesn't matter anymore that the discussion groups are finally back from 3-4 months of being shut down over the hiatus, they're still not being allowed to operate. The best there is now is the Discord and it's undoubtedly just as heavy moderated as the FB groups.

And as for the third possibility, this also feels like an attempt at Rachel trying to make her writing "more clear" without actually putting in the work of writing a good story. She's undoubtedly seen the criticisms towards LO as a whole that it doesn't express itself clearly, that it constantly flip flops on character motivations and information that has been established, and that any monologuing that's done implies things or events that we've never seen unfold on screen (case in point, the Persephone monologue from the start of this episode) but she seems to have either misconstrued or ignored the point of that criticism entirely by solving it with a quick and shitty author's note at the end explaining her intentions with a scene that was already clearly laid out to us. Instead of putting in the work to write a concise story to explain the things that are a bit more under-developed, she's slapping in a spoonfed explanation for scenes that literally don't need explaining and that ultimately cheapens the scenes that are TRYING to have impact, bringing them down to the same level of mediocrity as the scenes that never had the impact they intended to have to begin with. "You've killed the Goddess of Spring" was plenty clear after Hades said she was passed out, Rachel. Taking the time to explain it in a note at the end is just sad and it really goes to show what you think of your audience, especially when it comes to how you treat your fans in regards to community accessibility in the official discussion groups.

"The haters" didn't set this comic onto the path that it's on or ruin the fanbase experience, Rachel - you did.

#also i stg if she's just redoing the coma plotline from S2 #you can't just go to sleep and avoid the consequences of your actions persephone #wake tf up and take some goddamn accountability #lore olympus critical #lo critical #anti lore olympus

[incorrectbatfam]

When Bruce has ever gone too far in his controlling/paranoid mentally with any of the batfam, Alfred will calm yet sternly say "Bruce. Thomas. Wayne. you will stop now."

Alfred rarely has to do it as a stern glare usually stops Bruce in his tracks, but it is the fastest way to make Bruce pause and realise he has taken things too far.

"Bruce. Thomas. Wayne. You will stop now."

Bruce froze. Literally. His fingers stuck to the keyboard, creating a long string of E's.

Tim opened his mouth to say something before quietly retreating to change out of the sweaty costume. Damian's eyes flitted between them. Jason whistled under his breath. Dick, Cass, and Duke, like Bruce, stood paralyzed despite having no hand in this.

Alfred was angry.

That was an understatement, but no words could describe the fury radiating from him so the meager angry would have to suffice.

And Steph…

Before he could reach out and say something, she spun around and hopped on her bike, leaving a trail of smoke in her wake.

Alfred instructed the rest of them to clean up and get to bed. No one—not even the dog—objected.

He turned to Bruce.

"Fix this."

With that, it was just Bruce and the cave bats. He gazed at the spot Steph previously stood, the case file no longer mattering.

How was he supposed to fix this?

He pulled up the GPS tracker but stopped.

He put the tracker away and went to the lockers to get out of the heavy costume. The kevlar dropped to his feet and he immediately put it away so Alfred wouldn't have to. As he ran his hands through his hair, his eyes went to the row of Robin display cases. He walked over and gently rested his hand on the fourth one.

That's how it always seemed. Dick was old enough for the man-to-man talks. Jason could always be reached through a peace offering after an argument. Tim's persistence made him easier to reach and Damian's dedication spoke for itself.

But Stephanie…

Right now, his hand against the glass, was how it's always been. He watched her in action, he knew her strengths and shortcomings. And yet there was always this barrier between them that he could never circumvent. He was Batman, she was Spoiler. They were the same cape cut from two different cloths.

He cared about her. He respected her. He mourned her loss and celebrated her return. He trusted her, though after tonight he wasn't sure if it was mutual. She was a good fighter; a good hero.

He missed her.

Longing came in different colors. Some likened it to a hole in their chest that could never be filled. Others wished for what they never had.

Then there was this one. This kind of longing didn't fit into those neat, poetic boxes. It was a mess because what he wanted for her, what he wanted for himself, and what they both needed spilled like paint cups, the pigments muddling until he couldn't tell where the red ended and gray began. The instinct to try and separate them would only lead to swirling it around, making things even more indistinct.

And yet, it was that instinct which brought him in plainclothes to the roof of a hole-in-the-wall Burnside diner.

"What do you want?" Her words were flat and clipped as she picked at the waffles in a takeout box.

"I want to talk."

"Not my problem." She took another bite.

He gestured to a box, even though her back was turned toward him. "Can I sit here?"

"Don't care."

He sat down, keeping some distance. Steph eyed him.

"Why aren't you in costume?"

"I don't need to."

"Whatever you wanna say, just get it over with. You're ruining my appetite and I paid thirteen bucks for these."

Bruce took a shaky breath. "I want to say I'm sorry."

"Apology acknowledged."

He continued. "I should've trusted your new intel instead of thinking I had all the facts. I got so caught up in following the protocol and closing in on Black Mask that I didn't notice the danger his fallback plan put us in." He wanted to put a hand on her shoulder, but pulled back. "Because of you, Cass and Duke got out of there safe. So thank you."

"Sure, no problem," she drawled. "I would hate for Batman to lose any more sidekicks."

She stabbed her waffles harder.

"There's something else," he stated.

"Nice observation. You really are the World's Greatest Detective."

"How can I fix things?"

She shot up. "That's the problem. You try to take everything into your hands without letting anyone else make necessary changes. Every time I pitch an idea, I get shut down 'cause it doesn't follow your stupid bat-procedure. Like, I get it, I'm young and I'm not perfect, but it feels like you're treating me with kid gloves even though you're not my parent."

The last bit felt like a needle to the chest, but he brushed it off.

Steph kept going. "I don't know if it's a family thing, but I noticed you don't listen to me as much as the others. If my ideas are crap, tell me. Don't pretend you didn't hear me and move onto the next person."

Guilt pooled in his stomach. "I'm sorry, really," he said. "I didn't know I was doing that."

"Of course you didn't." She sat back down and put her chin in her hands. "I should've expected that. Batman doesn't need Spoiler."

"Hey now—"

"The bat existed before and kept going after I put on my mask. But if it makes you feel better, Spoiler doesn't need Batman either."

And she was right. The same cape from different cloths meant they could unstitch themselves from each other anytime they wished. Batman could save the city alone. That was true.

A couple cars passed, honking at each other despite ample room. The smell of garbage and cigarettes hung like an unfinished explanation—one he'd rather leave on the curb.

"Batman might not need Spoiler and Spoiler might not need Batman. But I want you to know that even if you never see me as a father, you'll still be my daughter."

He took off his jacket and draped it over her shoulders.

"We don't need to fix this right away. Whatever you want to do, I trust your judgment."

#bruce wayne #batman #stephanie brown #spoiler #alfred pennyworth #batfamily #batfam #batgirls #batkids #batsiblings #batman family #dc comics #dc fanfic #ficlet #writing #my writing #ask #anonymous #writing prompt #fanfic #tw angst #tw food mention

[twinkle-art]

hi mads! love your work! super duper normal about it and not insane at all! i wanted to ask what your azem is like in comparison to andromeda; how are they the same, how are they different, and how do those similarities and differences play into her fraught dynamic with emet-selch? thank you for your time and giving me so so so so much psychic damage!

thank you! that’s very high praise! i’d love to!

※perseus uses she/he- i used she in the last post for reading clarity and i’m gonna mostly use he here for the same reason

broadly speaking, my entire basis for perseus’ character is a very meta one. when i first thought her up, andromeda was supposed to be this sexy unflappable butch chad charismatic hero type and then she uh. really, really, really wasn’t that by the time msq was through with her. 

ergo, i thought it'd be fun to make perseus everything andromeda was supposed to be, name and all.

(side note: i first picked andromeda’s name in the character creator on a whim for the sound of it and could not have anticipated what she would become. kind of funny to name your wol Literally The Original Damsel In Fiction though. also you didn't ask but i Also didn't realize that Caecus didn't just mean "blind" but literally is "devoid of light". her garlean name is Damsel von Lightless. girl i'm so sorry.)

okay! similarities first though!

they both have a ravenous zest for life and a persistent good-naturedness that makes them easy to get along with when they let you in. they’re both big ol bleeding hearts who are intensely loyal and the first to throw themselves between danger and anyone in trouble. they’re both cagey about fully opening up, and prefer to fall back on a persona with strangers. they both give 100% to everything they do.

in a poetic sense, you could say the core essences of their souls are the same, beyond just the literal one.  

buuttttttt in practice they are like night and day. perseus’ exterior of an easygoing, almost frat bro-esque guy who doesn’t take anything too seriously may be just as much of an intentional construct as the stoic hero of few words façade that andromeda dons when she’s uncomfortable (that is, with literally everyone for the first three expacs) but it sits, far, far more naturally on him, blending seamlessly with his real self to the point where even he’s not sure where one begins and the other ends. 

where andromeda is deeply insecure, perseus is unwaveringly confident. where she’s easily swayed, he’s frustratingly stubborn. where her persona makes her come off as untouchable to a fault, his makes him effortlessly personable. where she latches on hard in all her relationships, offering her whole heart the second the threshold is breached, he can be flighty-bordering-on-avoidant around meaningfully vulnerable intimacy of any kind. 

and on that note: emet-selch hates andromeda for being, compared to his extremely rose-colored memory of perseus, a downgrade in every way. for better or worse, his azem was someone who would never, ever be cowed into submission, and he has a way of needling his way beneath andromeda’s carefully constructed exterior without even trying. she’s simply not as self-assured as perseus when it really matters, and so he resents every single inch he manages to take from her. he wants, more than anything, for her to fight back.

it’s worth nothing though, that emet-selch knows that perseus possessed a sensitive, complicated interiority beneath all that bravado. in fact, he wasn’t merely among the few privy to her “real” more complicated self, he was pretty uncontestedly the person she confided the most in, like, at all. like when i said the love was intense and practically familial i meant that shit. ironically, his abject refusal to accept andromeda as a worthy successor to someone he was incredibly close with causes him to flatten him in his memory, stripping him of the nuance he was rather special to be trusted with in the first place.

i'm not sure if he ever fully reckoned with that, to be honest. his final and only acknowledgement of andromeda was one of allowing her to stand on her own merits as her own person. even by then, i don't think he could stomach the idea of the two of them meaningfully being the same.

….also, it simply must be said that andromeda gets no bitches due to a brutal combo of terrible luck and self sabotage and perseus was drowning in pussy to the point where he was kind of a menace

#andromeda elo #ffxiv #thank you for all the andromeda questions today i'm genuinely touched anyone is interested in my baby <3 #i need to stop procrastinating now but i simply could not resist <3

[junebugwriter]

Transgender Dysphoria Blues

It was around 2005. In my dorms, I made a lot of different kinds of friends, and because it was the mid-2000s, we passed around CD's to show new music to each other. Back then, one of my friends introduced me to a band of theirs from their home state, a band called Against Me!. I said I enjoyed punk and emo stuff, and he said I'd like this band.

From the first moment, I heard the raw voice of the lead singer. This person was straining, yelling, screaming with melodic intensity and purpose, laser-focused on the rage, frustration, and despair that comes with young adulthood in the Bush era. They talked about love, and death, and how our future was sold out from under us. They sang

"Baby, I'm an anarchist and you're a spineless liberal We marched together for the eight-hour day and held hands in the streets of Seattle But when it came time to throw bricks through that Starbucks window You left me all alone, all alone..."

I was enthralled. I had never encountered anything like this music before. Well, that's not true. I'd heard punk before--older stuff, like the Clash, the Sex Pistols, the Ramones, stuff that spoke to a moment in time that seemed ancient to me but was only a couple of decades before--but not punk like this. Not punk that actually had some fucking teeth. Not punk that wasn't afraid to be proudly anarchistic, nakedly political, and darkly poetic in this way.

In 2007, I got the newer album, New Wave, and again, this was more of the stuff I loved. Sure, New Wave was a bit more polished, but it was still filled with all those rough emotions that spoke to a disaffected young "man" like me. There was something to the way the lead singer belted out those bars that really nailed something within me, something ineffable, intangible at the time. Something gestating quietly within my brain, a feeling that something wasn't quite right with me, but couldn't be named.

The final song on New Wave, "The Ocean," threw me for a loop. These lyrics... were different.

"And if I could have chosen, I would have been born a woman My mother once told me she would have named me Laura I'd grow up to be strong and beautiful like her...

There is an ocean in my soul Where the waters do not curve..."

At first, I thought this was simply poetic license, imagining a different life, imagining one in which they could be completely different, living a humble, domestic existence far from the drugs and rock and roll. One of simplicity, happiness, bliss. But... something gnawed at me. Why a woman? Why that name? Mysterious to my young brain.

I had not yet heard the word "transgender." I didn't have any context for it. But I knew the ocean in the soul, whose waters did not curve. I knew the depths that dwelled beneath. I knew that there was so much more to my being that even I couldn't quite understand.

Time passed. I graduated from undergrad, and had moved on to graduate school. In grad school, I had more education about LGBTQ+ issues, and had drawn closer to being in the "ally" camp of things, even in the Methodist church. I was drawn to the cause, yet couldn't quite understand why I identified with so many of the struggles they faced.

Near the end of it, a year before I graduated, news came out about the lead singer of Against Me!. She was transgender. Her name was Laura Jane Grace.

My mind raced. Wait, what? The singer with the raspy, raw, and to my mind, thoroughly masculine voice... was a woman now? I googled furiously. I had to learn more. I read every article about her. I drank deep of the news. I had to understand how this turn of events could be. Wait, someone can just... be a woman? And not know it? You can simply do that?

I watched some interviews with her. She seemed thoroughly natural in more feminine clothing. She smiled far more than I thought possible, knowing what she looked like before. She was... happy.

I was worried. What would happen to this band, now that their singer was different? Would her voice change? Would their songs change? I was nervous. But also... I was oddly excited. I knew what a trans person was. I knew that it was a thing you could be. But now, it suddenly became personal in a weird way. Because now I knew a trans person, if not personally, but through the art they made.

A couple years later, they came out with a new album. For whatever reason, I never took the time to listen to it. I had moved out to the country, and buying CDs was becoming passé, but I didn't know how else to buy music now, because I didn't want to bother buying songs through Apple. So... I never listened to it. Until recently.

Here's the title track of the album.

I no longer worried about the band. I knew that they were the same, just... actually wrestling with the thing that lurked within the ocean of Laura Jane Grace's soul.

With the kraken within the depths of my soul.

I was partly afraid of listening to the album. I was afraid of change. But I'm learning I'm more courageous than I thought I was. I'm learning to face the beast down in the depths, the dysphoria that stares back at me from the mirror each day. It has a name now. It has dimension, and weight, and yes, some days it is overwhelming and too much.

But I can fight it.

She wrestled with it in this album, highs and lows. Regrets, memories, eulogies for lost friends. All through the funhouse lens of gender dysphoria. And suddenly, all the rage, all the fury, came roaring back to the fore. The rage had an edge, and the edge cannot be dulled because it is an edge piercing all the way down to the spinal column. The cracks in the voice, the strain of the vocal cords, the tears and the joy and the endless, rocking waves of emotional turmoil... they can be viewed clearly now. They had a name.

It's a good album. I think every trans femme ought to listen to it, especially if you like punk. Because all the anarchist fury and anti-establishment wit is still there, just with a different set dressing, with a different lens, a different focus. If anything it's sharper. More raw. More powerful.

Happy Pride. This is the anthem of the month for me. I'm trans, and I'm going to help burn this world down build a better one in its ashes.

Thank you, Laura Jane, and Against Me!. You helped me understand the weapons in my hands better than any other band.

#transgender #lgbtq #lgbtqia+ #blog #music #punk rock #against me! #laura jane grace #transgender dysphoria #gender dysphoria #transgender dysphoria blues #Youtube #pride #trans pride #trans mtf #trans women #transfem

[nandsmi]

MY SILLY BRAIN (me) NEEDED TO WRITE ABOUT STEVE HARRINGTON GAINING A FATHER FIGURE BECAUSE *WELL* HIS SUCKS (mine too). So Hopper was the chosen one! My english is horrible, but my intentions are good.

★⭑✩ ⭑ ★ ⭑ ☆ ⭑★⭑☆⭑★⭑☆⭑★⭑☆⭑★

Hopper's parents divorced shortly before the end of high school, when he was sixteen. It was dramatic and involved a lot of screaming, like everything his parents did, but it brought a relief that Hopper did not even know he needed. So he didn't complain about crossing Hawkins every weekend to meet his mother and her new husband for a family dinner or about his new step-sister, Catherine, who was almost as horrible and snobbish as her fiance, Richard "Dick" Harrington.

They were the perfect couple, Hopper thought. One more arrogant and pompous than the other.

He did not think much about Cathy after his mother's death, months after he returned from Vietnam. He attended the wake side by side with his stepfather and, after crying like a child in the safety of his apartment, he burned the letter Catherine had sent from Paris, burned her condolences and excuses — she signed it as Catherine Harrington then. He burned it and fled. He ran away from Hawkins. From his ol' man, from his friends and from the pain he felt. He eventually found a career and new friends and started a family, all without thinking or remembering the existence of his step-sister, if he could still consider her as such.

And then he lost Sarah. Diane. Returning to Hawkins was a safe choice, poetic even. Let the remains of his new life rot along with those of his old one. Still, the Harringtons were just one of many families Hopper had to answer to as the Chief and he thought no more of them than he thought of anyone else, except the occasional curse when he driving through Loch Nora.

Like everyone else does.

So yeah, Catherine is the last person Hopper expects at his door on a Thursday afternoon. But there she is, standing on his porch. Dressed as if she were the First Lady while carrying in one hand a backpack that does not match with her heels while the other holds a boy next to her.

"James" She greets. Her expression says shes disgusted to be there. Hopper is not happy either. "This' Steve. Steven, this is your uncle, James"

"Hopper" he corrects involuntarily.

A lightly push. Steve, who looks no older than twelve, stumbles foward, mopping. He mutters a greeting, calls Hopper "sir" with just the right amount of annoyance that still sounds polite. Sighing, Catherine throws the backpack at Hoppers feet.

"I need a favor, James."

These words along with Steve' unhappy expression send a shiver down his spine.

"What?" He is confused. They haven't spoke to in a decade and even before that, Cathy barely thougth of him as a person. As someone from whom she would ask anything? Haha. "Wha- Catherine!"

"James. Jim" She sound displeased as if she can go to him demanding favors and Hopper has to jus accept. "Richard got a great opportunity! We need to attend this dinner in Chicago with some partners and shareholders, just for one night. Would take Steven with us, but..."

She makes a gesture. As fend off a fly. Does not complete her sentence either. Hopper would be impressed if he wasn't so furious.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?"

He doesn't wait for an answer. Grabs and drags Catherine to her fancy car, far enough from Steve, so the boy would not listen them. God, he looks tiny from certain distance, the way all children look. As Sara looked. Hopper needs another beer, needs them to leave.

"What the fuck?! It does... Shit, Cat! Its been years. YE-ARS! The last time, the last thing I heard from you and Harrington, God, I can not even remember and now... And now you, what? Want me to take of your son? A boy I've never seen? Hell! I did not know the kid existed until I got back to Hawkins!"

Hopper took a deep breath. Calmer, he says:

"I do not even know if I can still consider you my sister. What makes you think I would be a good "uncle"? Caring of any child?"

"You had one, did not you?"

Hopper is choked up.

"Did you know about Sara?"

Catherine grimaced as she rolled her eyes.

"Of course I knew about your daugther, my... I am so sorry for your loss. I can not imagine how horrible it must be. I-I wanted to go to the funeral, but I did not know if I would be welcome. I sent flowers."

Diane took care of it. Hopper couldn't bear to look at all the flowers, dishes and condolences gifts sent to their home. Catherine touched his hand.

"Listen Jim, I would not ask you this if I wasn't desperate. Richard thinks a 'sitter is a waste of money and I need to be with him. You are literally the only person I can count on in this town, James."

Fuck her. Fuck, fuck, fuck...

"You will pick him up tomorrow, right?"

★⭑✩ ⭑ ★ ⭑ ☆ ⭑★⭑☆⭑★⭑☆⭑★⭑☆⭑★

"You know she is not coming to pick me up tomorrow, don't you?"

The boy frightens Hopper. Since his mother left him more than an hour ago he has been silent. He sat on the couch and watched the news with the same enthusiasm as any other boy his age: none.

Hopper patted the kid, trying to give some comfort.

"I'm sure she will come, kiddo."

Steve laughed.

"Sure, sir, if you say."

#steve harrington #stranger things #jim hopper #hopper as steve's uncle #my english is bad but my intentions are good #steve harrington has bad parents #Mrs. Harrington is hopper's step sister

[bcbdrums]

what do you think of the English fan covers of papermoon and which version do you like the most if you do??

Yeah, I've listened to several.

I won't go into which ones I don't like and why, which...is most of them. Because I don't want to insult people's awesome efforts. But I'll say that generally the reasons I will end up disliking a cover are a collection of a few reasons: bad mixing; melody and/or rhythm departs too much from the original (I'll go into this more), translation that departs too much from the original.

That said, so far my favorite English cover is Caleb Hyles. And it's funny cuz I don't usually go for his stuff. But, it's a great mix, it sticks to the song overall, the translation does its best to use the actual translation where it can... Words such as "degraded" that you just wouldn't really see, for example. He kept in as much as made sense, I felt, and didn't poeticize it too much; he really tried to stay true.

And of course, his surprise switch to Japanese at the end was great.

Do YOU have a favorite cover??

And what I said about melody/rhythm departing too much... We have to remember, it's often the case that the songwriter wrote those specific notes/melody for a reason and so changing them can in fact change the entire feel of the song.

I'll give an example.... "Comet" from Steven Universe. Every single note and rhythm she wrote very precisely.

Some say I have no direction That I'm a light speed distraction But that's a knee-jerk reaction

On that last word, reaction, the melody drops an interval of a fourth and the drop there in combination with the lyrics is meant to show Greg's dejection. Also the initial word of the second and third lines there, the melody starts an octave below before rising. This adds to the anchoring feel of those lyrics, of negative things that have been spoken over him.

Still, this is the final frontier Everything is so clear To my destiny I steer

The initial melodic notes of the second and third line here stay in the same octave, making the melody sound more confident (ironically the same note though... makes you wonder if there's a subliminal doubting in Greg of his choices) but with that confidence added from the constancy of the initial melodic notes, each conclusion sounds more certain, more hopeful, even though the chordal structure is the same.

So, melody matters. Don't change it. (Like every single cover of Comet out there... I like none.)

I could go into the importance of the super-triplet rhythm of Comet but...this was supposed to be about Papermoon. 😅😅😅

Sorry sorry sorry, Comet is just like...one of the best songs ever written in terms of how the music represents a character... It's a modern Wagnerian approach and boy does it succeed.

#soul eater #papermoon #paper moon #black paper moon #tommy heavenly6 #comet #steven universe #rebecca sugar #tom scharpling #greg universe #caleb hyles #music cover #song cover #music analysis #wagner #richard wagner #opera

[napo-leo-art]

This is an unfinished and largely unedited fic I was writing about Levi's first time with Danny where (for some unknown reason) I decided to make a rule where I could only write it while drunk (idk if this was an exercise in seeing what came out when I was drunk or if it was ~*method writing*~ or what, but idk if I can finish it and I sure as hell cannot read it loool

Anyway Word Count: ~3300 words Rating: E Pairing: Herald/Levi (Sidestep) Warnings: I honestly have no idea, I didn't read it

"So..." Daniel swallows, finally aware that he's standing with a half-naked man on the verge of what might be a breakdown in his arms. "Do... do you want a drink or something?"

Levi wants to laugh. Levi wants a smoke, or a whole pack. He wants to tear Daniel's clothes off and take a bite of him, maybe sink down on his knees and see how far down his throat Daniel-Danny can go.

"Yes," He says in response. It comes out on an exhale, Levi's body kick starting him back to life with a little jolt. His foot sweeps forward and bumps into one of Daniel's, and only then does he realize he was checking for floating. No- Danny-Daniel's really that much taller even with both feet on the ground. Not as tall as Ortega. Neck probably doesn't hurt as much when he bends down to kiss Levi, which he's done more than once since they've got here, but it still makes Levi's stomach clench to think of how they must look together- the Golden Boy and the Has-Been, and at least his long legs keep Sidestep from looking too small in photos. Next to each other, though...

Maybe it would be better to put Danny on his knees. Or on his ass more likely, leaning back onto his hands, head tilted until that bright hair has fallen off of his face, and his face hidden between Levi's thighs...

"Levi?" Fuck, now that he's heard a hint of the accent, he can't let it go in his mind.

"Hm?" He asks, before he thinks about the fact that he's still clinging onto Danny, who has acquiescently kept his arms just as tight- not because he thinks Levi's too weak to hold himself together apparently, but because Danny *likes* it, and he's going to keep doing it as long as Levi actually lets him. Levi feels like he's flicking treats to a dog, which is a mean way to see Danny but god, isn't it accurate?

For a moment he's hit with a poetic thought: that the heat he's feeling is from basking in the warmth of feeling so *loved*.

He squashes that feeling back where it belongs, into the overflowing trashcan of his mind. Fuck, he's so drunk already that Danny might really just be holding him up with his arms.

He doesn't let Danny let him go, no- he holds those arms firmly in place and twists in their hold, turning back towards the kitchen counter and using Danny's glass for the both of them. His own glass lays abandoned on the floor where he *threw* it, and even that didn't scare Danny away. And that means that feeling bad about this really is meaningless, because Danny has already seen at least half of the nasty, ugly, *wrong* things about him, and he's not pulling those arms away or telling Levi to leave. Levi could push him off the deep end right now: '*I'm Retribution, I broke your leg, and I LIKED IT.*'

Instead he fills up Danny's glass, too full, more than is appropriate. But why the fuck do they make whiskey glasses so big if you're not supposed to fill them to the top? Why is Danny's hair so soft if not to grab it, why are his lips so plush if Levi's not supposed to kiss them?

When he spins back around to Danny with drink in hand, he's not sure if the drop in his gut is anxiety or lust. Really could be either. Both. Dr. What's Her Face has heard a little bit about his sex life or lack thereof because *he* brought it up, dumb asshole, and she says that he should take that twist in his gut as the fear it is but really, he hates fear but he's learned to like whatever *this* is.

Danny doesn't ask if Levi's okay, for which he's eternally grateful. Levi can only just *feel* the intention of the question buzzing at the front of Danny's mind.

"Pretty big glass you've got there," He says instead, still unsettled but now at least Levi isn't crying and *oh,* Levi's taking his jaw in his hand and so gently pushing the lip of the glass between Danny's plush ones, pouring a little more into his willing mouth. He's a little clumsy with it, little streams of the expensive stuff seeping past the corners of his mouth. Levi pulls the glass to the side and this time when he pulls Danny down, he licks the liquor from his face. It's so gross. Levi's just gross. He can still feel how he's exciting Danny, so it looks like it's working. He takes a swig from the glass and swallows with effort before his lips meet Danny's again, the smoky-oak flavor passing between them.

"I want *you,*" Levi says then, letting his voice dip into its huskiest tones. Smoking and boozing has fucked up his voice a little, but is that really so bad? He tries to immitate that throat rumble when he's John but he just *can't*, and it feels so good to have one goddamn thing that this body has over his puppet.

If he bothered to peek past the booze, he'd find that this body only makes him feel stupid when he tries to tease. But he'll let that thought lie where it fell, because he can *feel* the way Danny pushes his hips forward, seeking contact.

He can feel Danny's clothed cock bump his lower stomach. Fuck. *Fuck.*

"Oh, just that? I can give you that." Danny says with a grin. Correction, Levi's telepathy provides: he would love to give you that, *please.* He's even letting his hands trace the hemline of Levi's pants, a hint about what he wants before he even opens his mouth again. "May I?"

Normally Levi would refuse. He only knows his normal because the idea of this has plagued him for months, and in ten fantasies out of ten he was coaxing Danny not to float as he sunk his mouth down to Danny's base and took him all.

But tonight he's too busy marveling at the way his body is happily, enthusiastically responding to Danny's closeness and '*ah,*' Levi thinks, '*that's what it's supposed to feel like.*' He's so turned on already that he can feel the slick of his wetness coating the inside of his thighs. His legs shift together, trying to alleviate it, hoping for- god, why hide it? Hoping for Danny between them, whether it's his hand, his face, or his hips. Doesn't really matter.

"Go for it." Levi says, but he's still surprised when Danny yanks him up onto the counter before his trousers come off. Nope, not just trousers. Underwear too. The marble is freezing cold against his ass but hey, kitchen counters are the perfect place to eat. He's going to deny that sound later, the sound he makes when Danny coaxes his legs open. He'll edit it right out of the clip he's made of the noise *Danny* made, and he's not sure Danny knows he made it or that Levi heard it. He knows how to do *this,* he's just never done it with a man before, and that thought fills Levi with equal measures of jealousy and comfort up until Danny bends to kiss his thigh and everything, everything else goes away for just a little moment.

"This is my first," Levi gasps when Danny's thumb creeps over to slide along the line of a scar on his thigh, not because he wants to share it but because it feels *important*, and because Danny is apparently the sounding board for every stupid secret he's had. '*Why not talk about the threesome dream while you're at it?*' "...time."

"I better make it *really* good then," Danny laughs, not at Levi but just because he can't believe this is happening, his face heating further when Levi's hands find a good grip in his hair, which is just as soft as it looks. And Levi's hands feel it just as well as he sees it when Danny fully dips his head between his thighs and... *damn.*

His throat clamps automatically against his first moan, and every one after that is a little easier, caught behind the tight press of his lips. He grabs the glass of whiskey and takes a full gulp of it.

Danny's tongue traces up the slit between Levi's legs twice before it pushes a little further, before one hand slips off Levi's thigh to spread him open. His only sounds are gasps and sighs. His body tells a different story: tightened grips on Danny's hair, twitching muscles, a bottom lip clamped hard between his teeth.

"Fingers," He demands, because all this is already so much without having to ask nicely, and because even at home alone he wants it like this, fingers pressing up against his g-spot.

Danny obliges with just one at first, and that's enough. Levi sees more than senses what Danny wants: himself, legs wrapped tight around Danny's hips as he buries himself inside, every thrust deep...

It feels better to think of this all as what Levi wants. Being wanted is *hard*, being wanted feels *wrong*, and so in his own mind he imagines Danny pressed back against the sheets, Levi fucking down against his straddled hips.

"Oh fuck," Danny whimpers, finger still buried in Levi even as he butts his head against Levi's hip. Levi didn't mean to push the idea out, but it's already out there before he knows it. And he knows that it barely matters that Danny knows the origin of the thought, mostly seeing it as his own: '*Me pressed back against my sheets, Levi fucking down against my straddled hips.*'

He wants to throw the glass still in his grip. He wants a smoke. The most sane thing he wants is to touch Danny and to be touched back, and it would be easier to use his grip on Danny's hair to slide him back between his thighs, but he doesn't do that. He tilts Danny's head up oh so gently. It's mostly a strain on himself to bend his back so sharply when he leans down to kiss him again, tasting himself on Danny's lips and tongue. Daniel, lips parting to let Levi kiss him deeper, isn't passive the way Levi half-wishes he was. Another finger slips in, both curling up to push up at just the right angle.

Fuck.

He does his damnest to strangle that noise back where it belongs, behind his teeth where it won't do too much damage. But his lips and teeth are parted to slot as much of his mouth against Danny's as he can, and that's been going on *too long*, and so he parts them with a yank on that feather-soft hair just in time to make his punched-out whine harden into a rasp. Danny's thumb finds his clit faster than his half-lidded eyes can find contact with Levi's.

"How's that?" He asks with a grin that Levi hears as much as sees. Bastard. The bastard's other hand is tracing the scars on Levi's thigh with a reverence that doesn't feel soothing- which is fine really, Levi thinks he'd hate being patted and doted on like a twitchy stray cat, most of all *now* when what he wants is... exactly what Danny's giving him. *That look,* like...

"Is *that* why you keep looking at the scars?" Levi asks, breath hitching on a moan and then bursting back out with a breathless laugh. *Incredible.* "A kink?"

Danny doesn't have to answer, the flush on his cheeks does all the talking. But does anyway, "*yeah*", before he leans back down and wraps his lips around Levi's clit.

"Oh my-- *god*," Levi laughs again, bringing the glass up to his mouth and just butting the rim up against his lips. "I'm here telling- you my darkest... secrets... and you're getting... a stiffy over my scars. *Oh fuck,*" He gulps down another swallow of whiskey before he sinks down against the countertop, skin prickling with goosebumps as soon as the marble touches his skin.

"I think I finally get your sense of humor," Danny quips from between his legs, right before his tongue laps around his fingers, dipping into his entrance. Levi grunts, his whole core starting to tense, his thighs threatening to clamp around his poor victim's head. Danny's doing so good it feels like a challenge, and he doesn't plan to lose.

"Then you're... *probably* drunk enough... I don't want *either* of us sober... for my first time." Levi hisses, and he can just barely feel Danny's thoughts butting through the haze of his drunkenness, and he's got to cut that off *now*. "I showed you mine, when... are you gonna show me... yours? Scars. Body. *Come here.*"

Danny's lips are on his again, and his fingers have never stopped moving. Levi is trying and failing to plant his heels against the countertop so he can grind down on them.

He just *knows* none of those pinup shots are real. Photoshop or something. Not just the physique but the skin, not even the most premium doctors could erase everything Retribution did to Danny.

It's not the scars that are Levi's kink, exactly. He just like thinking that he's made his mark on this new territory, left something behind that'll stick even when this all goes to shit. He knows on a bone-deep level that it will, that there's an invisible timer ticking down at inconsistent, immeasurable speed.

Danny-Daniel has to pull his fingers out to undress, not looking even the slightest bit self-conscious. Levi wonders if it feels *good* to know he's so wanted, so want*able*, if Danny actually feels sexy under his scrutiny. The thought of eyes on him makes him feel pinned down like some etymological victim, or maybe like the butt of some joke. It's made worse by how bad he still wants this, like at any moment Danny will pull back and laugh at his enthusiastic desperation.

"Fuck you." He blurts with a little too much heat, one hand shooting up to grasp the curve of Danny's pec. "The pictures were real."

Except for the scars, but that registers more on the lizard hindbrain than on the more upfront desires burning up right out on the open. Thank *god* Danny isn't a telepath, because his mind is flooding with desires without proper outlet: bite, devour, fuck, make him beg, make him CRY

The buzz of too-bright thought bubbles up between them, and Levi knows it's Danny's thought before he even forms it into words and pictures- Levi doesn't need a cock to *fuck him* and use him the way he wants, he'd be a willing but mischievous little toy for Levi to gnaw on, to take what he wants. Just an illusion of true submission, but it works. He wants to make Levi come *so bad* that it snaps into Levi's mind stronger than Danny's base need to stick his cock in him. He'd happily let Levi ride his face for the rest of the night, as long as Danny could just see him blissed out at the end of it.

"*Fuck you,*" He repeats, and Danny laughs this time, though his face is heated. It contrasts so nicely with the pale hue his skin usually takes. This time Levi can see just how far that blush travels- it meets his jaw, then neck, collarbones and beyond. The fingers still splayed on Danny's chest just toe the blurred line of where his blush ends. The heat extends past that. Levi thinks he can feel his own sweat beading where their bodies are pressed together. "You think I won't? I've got no gripes about leaving you like this."

"Let me take you to the bedroom?" He offers rather than demands, bubbling up another flock of associated thoughts and feelings. Levi doesn't need to read them, because Danny happily says it. "My bed is a lot more comfortable. It's soft."

"I prefer firm." He doesn't, but he's a contrarian little ass even when he's not drunk. That means, though, that Danny just blinks down at him with this look of feigned innocence that makes Levi want to scream, or at least just bite him.

"Take me there," He orders a half-beat later, because he knows that Danny won't just fucking take him until he gets a straight answer for once. It doesn't matter if Danny's deciphered his code or not, Levi still needs to speak his language for him to work. Like saying the right cheat code or entering the right password. "*Now,*"

This time Danny moves him without sass, slipping back into the comfort of their dynamic. Not nearly as well-worn as Levi's dynamic with *Ortega*, where communication moves with a connection delivered through words spoken in the past. Danny has acclimated himself to Levi with a speed that betrays all of that pure observational skill; on Levi's end, it's mostly telepathy. He's not afraid to cheat, just a little ashamed to admit it.

Maybe it would be better not to think of Ortega, who still brings up a sharp and pleasant sting in his chest in some sort of psychosomatic response, or maybe some sort of learned pain- it'll hurt when the bad part happens, so might as well start the hurting now. Things like seeing Ortega with a million and one potential love interests and only turning to Levi with entirely platonic affection.

Not like Herald-Danny, who looks at Levi like he's worth fucking on clean sheets and a soft mattress, like he'd care if Levi dipped past nervous, neurotic, but enthusiastic participation and into a sort of dull-eyed acceptance-

No. He has to physically shake that thought away, body quaking enough that Danny shoots a puzzled look his way as he bends down to gather Levi up in his arms.

"Your counter is so fucking cold,"

"The bedroom's warmer," Danny assures with a coy smile, using the moment to warm Levi's back with his hands. "We can turn on the heater if it's that bad."

"Who the fuck," Levi spits with contempt, shoving his face against Danny's neck even as his skin prickles with latent discomfort, "Has a heater in Los Diablos? Get a white noise machine and just cope with eighty degree weather, you freak."

All of this shit- Danny carrying him in his arms, Danny kissing him, holding him, accepting him, *loving him*- it's declawing Levi bit by bit. The Levi of months ago could've broken the man's spirit, forced Danny to reject him, heard and *felt* how much it would hurt the little hero. Now he's not sure he could muster anything affective. He's tracing the tips of his short nails along the edges of all of Danny's scars, dismissing a halfhearted fantasy about tearing them back open with Retribution's clawed gauntlets. Instead he's catching Danny's skin between his teeth, too soft to deal real damage. He's finding the peaks and valleys of Danny's muscles with his fingertips, only pausing to rub a nipple under his roughened thumb.

--

Danny is floating them both to the bedroom, cracking an unashamed smile to greet the hard stare Levi tries- and fails- to give him.

'*I wish I were a telepath too.*'

"No, you don't."

'*If I were, I could know what you're thinking right now.*'

"You don't think you could ask?"

'*I don't think you would answer.*'

#writing tag #I am still behind on replies to things #tumblr has been stressing me out #fhr #levi song

[sunny-mercya]

Hey, Brother do you still believe in one another?

07. Love Letters

Heiji Hattori x Male Reader | Platonic! Shinichi Kudo x Brother Reader

Fandom -> Detective Conan/Case Closed

Masterlist | Previous / Next |

Warning -> Mention of explicit content

don't ask questions you don't wanna know 

learned my lesson way too long ago

bad, bad news one of us is gonna lose

Love letters were something flattering to get. They could be written in simplicity or in a poetic and romantic way—describing the feelings of one another, the beauty of the person and over all it was to express inner thoughts into a more deeply rooted way. 

It was something classic to do, though to give a verbally answer could sometimes bring heartbreak with it, especially when it's during the years of school.

Over the course of the last two months, it's already mid march, you had about three stacks of love letters saved. All of the envelopes unopened and without sender. The first few letters you had read, when you found them in your locker, though what has been written in them sounded so disturbing wrong—you had ripped them apart and threw them into the trash right away. 

Everyday you would have a new envelope in either your mailbox or in your locker at school. Shinichi once told you how everything could be a evidence, so you keep them stored in a box, somewhere in the basement. 

Reading about; how someone wanted to caress your naked body, marking it with bites till blood draws leaving kisses all over you. Making love with you over and over and over again—fucking you raw till your unconscious and into oblivion and even further afterwards. Stuffed and creamed with his Seed. Such a good little submissive househusbands you soon would be. Pretty boy naked and only in a apron, on your knees tending to his needs and begging for more and more, like the lovely slut you are for him. 

A unsettling feeling had started to grow in the pit of your stomach. You didn't want to know what else of perverting thoughts he had written about you. Unconsciously thinking about it, gives you a urge to vomit. 

Debating if you should call Heiji and tell him, wanting his reassurance that this was some sick joke and nothing more, but you didn't. Not wanting him to be worried or coming extra to Tokyo, something Heiji definitely would do, to try and find the anonymous culprit behind it. 

Calling Shinichi had been on your mind next, for a second, then you remember you couldn't do that either. Though for complete different reasons.

So far you had only told Sachiko about it and she had sworn secrecy.

~~~

Sachiko, despite having promised not to, was going to call Heiji anyways, telling him not only about those disgusting letters—she had kept about three of them as evidence, but also about the other unsettling things which were happening to you. 

The letters were one thing, could be ignored just fine. Small presents, which you would get every week on your doorsteps, consisting of Chocolate and gimmicks was something completely different though. You simply gave them away at school to almost every club, with the strong belief that the chocolate wasn't poisonous or the sort of. Sachiko hoped too, but than again what secret admire, to put it kindly, would poison the person they love? 

The everyday flower bouquet would get the same treatment. Given away to someone other.

And the Phone calls? The phone calls you would get were the worst. Sachiko had listened in to a few of the calls. Unknown caller ID and you either would get silence, heavy breathing or the words Darling baby. 

Three times you already had changed your number, still the creeped out call has continued. Deciding to get a second phone was the best option to not getting bothered anymore. As your old phone, long time battery dead, would probably still get incoming calls. Your newest current number would only been known by handful of people.

Sachiko could tell how much it unsettles you. It begun to stress you out little by little, adding to your sleepless nights and bringing more discomfort—regularly nightmares even.

To a point where paranoia had begun to set in.

~~~

Sachiko and you were about to exit the school gate, club activities had ended early today and Sachiko had the idea to get some Coffee. Stopping halfway when someone called out your name.

Sachiko squinted her eyes when the guy came near, he seemed familiar.......ah, that dude from the Disco! 

The question was, how does this Daiki guy knew to what school you would go? It's a private school and Tokyo is rather big, so the chance of lucky coincidentally meeting you here, are fucking nonexistent.

Sachiko grabbed your arm, holding onto it and did the most over friendly smile she could muster as a greeting. She didn't really listen to whatever he had to say.

Though these bullshit lies, were sure something. As if she would believe that his apparently little sister would go here. Sachiko heard way better lies before.

She couldn't say for sure what exactly it was, perhaps female intuition, that would made her so suspicious of him. Was it the way he spoke? Or how he gives you this sort of gaze, something Sachiko had seen already but she couldn't put a name to it right now. 

«[Name]~ lets us go already I don't wanna be late for my Coffee.» by now Sachiko was glaring at Daiki, his boyish smile wasn't gonna to fool her.

«I should go too, don't want my sister waiting. Ah here, this is for you.» Daiki pulled out a envelope.

You furrowed your brows, almost starting to frown at this.

«Now now, don't give me that look. Someone just gave it to me, asking me if I could be the deliver,» he chuckles. 

Taking the envelope from his hand, you thank him and said goodbye. 

Being now a bit away from the school grounds, Sachiko didn't felt the eerie aura anymore. 

you are my strange addiction 

you are my strange addiction 

#male reader #anime #x male reader #case closed #detective conan/case closed #detective conan #heiji x male reader #kudo shinichi #shinichi kudo #heiji hattori #hattori heiji #heiji hattori x male reader #xmalereader #male!reader

[giftedpink]

Why Shauna eat Jackie's ear?

I went way overboard on this I'm so sorry

Answer under the cut

Okay so the thing about this question is that there are multiple answers and IMO they are all equally plausible and valid. I don't think in the show they are ever going to explicitly state "Shauna did it for this reason", so it is purposely left open to audience interpretation. Now, some of the people who work on the show have given interviews and given what their answers are to this, so there are some explanations that we know they were thinking of when they wrote and shot the scene. And before you read all this, my own personal opinion is that all of what I'm about to say is part of why she did it.

I'll get into those in a bit, but first I want to start with the simplest and most surface level answer: she ate the ear because she is a pregnant starving teenager, and she was hungry.

Now, do I think this is the real answer? Not really, no. It's probably part of it, but a very very small part. However it is still part of the puzzle of the whole, and I would imagine if someone were ever to find out that Shauna did this, whether in the 90's or in the modern day, this would be what SHAUNA'S answer would be. Not that I think she believes it, but it's what she would tell other people, because its the easiest answer to explain away. I also think it's important to note that for some viewers, this will be the only answer. Not everyone consumes media with a very analytical and critical eye, which is fine! Enjoy your shows however makes you happy. But it does mean that in a situation like this, people who watch shows in that way probably won't bother looking past the surface level. My mother, for example, is someone I watch Yellowjackets with, but she uses TV as a way to turn her brain off, so I imagine for her it really is as simple as Shauna was starving.

Now for the freaks like me, who DO over analyze everything, there are a lot of layers underneath that hunger Shauna was feeling that we can dig into. I'll start with what's a little more textually supported and was spoken about by the showrunners, and then at the end I'll get into some of my own headcanons.

So, lets look at the word hunger. We've already discussed the literal meaning of Shauna's hunger and how it motivated things, but the other definition of the word hunger, the verb version, is applicable here as well. Shauna hungered for Jackie. They were best friends and had this very complicated and twisted friendship, a constant push and pull between desire and love and hate and sharpness. Teenaged girls have these deeply intense friendships that are just so, so complicated sometimes. To quote the showrunners "It’s about this very specific friendship that Jackie and Shauna had, where Shauna loves Jackie, but also was always in her shadow. She adored this friend of hers, but also in some ways, was always wanting to kind of destroy her — maybe that’s going a bridge too far? But I think that is very relatable to a lot of people who are in these intense friendships."

So Shauna loved her, but felt like she was second fiddle to her. To use an overly poetic simile, Jackie was like the sun to Shauna. She was warmth and light and goodness and everyone loved her, but she also cast a huge shadow. You could say Shauna was the moon but I think in reality she was the Earth. The Earth needs the Sun to survive, but at the same time its stuck forever in the Sun's orbit, and eventually the Sun is going to destroy itself and the Earth both. There was probably some jealously on Shauna's part, of wanting to be the sun for once. But that jealously was coming from her OWN view of Jackie, of seeing Jackie as this star popular girl and going "why can't I have that?". And I think Shauna didn't even understand herself in what WAY she wanted that. Did she want to be that or possess it for herself? Regardless, I think this next quote sums up where I'm going with this pretty well:

"And so the next step of that is consumption, right? I literally want to consume this person, because I love them so much — but I also want them no longer to exist in a way. I also want to keep them a part of me for my entire existence. We were playing with that kind of plasticity on a psychological and emotional level, and not just have it be about, 'Oh, I’m gonna eat the ear!'”

So, Shauna loved Jackie, and also she hated her. She wanted to preserve her forever but also wanted to destroy her. So she ate the ear. An act of preservation and destruction in one.

Now for some of my own musings on it. I think grief and guilt may have both played a large part in it. Straight up, people do irrational things when theyre grieving. They have bizarre responses to things when they've experience trauma, and all of these girls are traumatized. Shauna is well WELL down the path to being completely unhinged at this point, so an impulsive decision like this isn't that strange when you think about it. And the guilt part I think is 2 folds: 1, she feels guilty for causing Jackie's death in the first place, and 2, she feels guilty that she broke the ear.

She doesn't want anyone else to know that she's been moving the body around in there. She also doesn't want to feel like she's commiting MORE violence against Jackie. And she really doesn't want her illusion of the whole situation shattered. So when the ear breaks off, shes confronted very starkly with a dead body in front of her again, she realizes she harmed this body again, and she realizes if anyone else comes into the shed and sees it, theyll know she isn't just talking to the body. We see that she tries to reattach the ear and fails, so in my opinion I think part of her eating it was a knot of not wanting anyone else to find out about it, and also not being able to just GET RID OF a piece of Jackie. I mean she already killed her, now shes just supposed to throw away a literal chunk of her and not feel guilty about it? So it just ends up in her pocket.

She can't bury it because the ground is frozen, she can't toss it away because of the guilt, and she can't just leave it lying around. So she eats it. She consumes this part of Jackie so that it will always be hers, it will always be a part of her. Everywhere she goes, Jackie is now literally part of her. Shauna gets to have this ownership of Jackie through her consumption, while also preserving her forever in a very fucked up way.

Now the last piece of all of this for me is, of course, the homoerotic subtext of Jackie and Shauna's entire relationship. They were completely obsessed with each other. Jackie wanted to control Shauna's life to make sure she didn't leave her side. Shauna wanted to fuck Jackie's boyfriend because it was the closest she could be to Jackie. Both the closest she could be to BEING her and the closest she could be to her in this physical, intimate way that (I personally believe) they both wanted but had no way to articulate. And their desire for each other was buried inside of them, and complicated by all the other stuff going on in their lives, including just the horrors of being a teenaged girl, so it became this razor sharp thing that hurt both of them. They cut each other so, so deeply because they felt for each other so, so deeply. And then Shauna loses all of that, and it's her own fault, and she's also losing her mind, and now shes broken a piece of Jackie off and she just- she just needs to have this piece of Jackie for herself. To have it for just herself forever and to get to say "Jackie was MINE. She was mine and now I've proven it because this piece of her is now a piece of me". She loved her, and she lost her, but in this way she will never, ever lose her again.

And jesus fuck I really did write an essay, I am so sorry for completely going off when you were probably just looking for a meme answer like "nomnomnom" or something LMAO but thanks for giving me this opportunity to word vomit all over the place.

#yellowjackets #shauna shipman #jackie taylor #yellowjackets spoilers #this is literally an essay so #if u read this thanks i guess

[the-wardens-torch]

FFXIVwrite2021 - Grave

FFXIVwrite2023 - Prompt #21, entry #10

((Continuation of Off the Hook, Once Bitten, Clear, and Jerk in a VERY rare - at least for me - contiguous and continuous story.))

"And perhaps… if you learned more about it, you would cease to be so ill at ease with it."

His father was completely and utterly right. He'd also been considerate, of all things. The consideration part may well have been accidental, but perhaps it was worth giving him credit for. Fal rested his head on his hand, continuing to watch the dust motes drift through the weak shaft of sunlight coming in through the dirty window.

When he'd first seen his father stalking around at that party in Idyllshire, he'd been reminded of a hungering wolf. Not in the volatile, aggressive sense, but in the sense of a proud creature made desperate by circumstance. Right now he was only visible in shadowed silhouette, standing just on the opposite side of the patch of sunlight. He held a single book with his head bowed in contemplation.

"Since you are not the studious type, I suggest that if you wish to learn more about Bahamut… You should visit his grave." he said, silhouette not budging an ilm.

"His grave? But how could he have a…"

Fal went silent for a second as the answer dawned on him.

"You… mean Carteneau, don't you?"

If the great wyrm had met his end there and dissipated into aether there, it was as good as a grave. He put his hand over his mouth and stared down at the table before him. Uther had started talking again, but Fal's mind was far, far away. In the eyes of the great dragon as he had seen them that night in his dream.

The Coffin card and The Lily card.

Those two cards had stood out in Reo's reading for him after his harrowing dream. A symbol of death, and a symbol of respectful mourning that often went hand in hand - both things placed in graves. He couldn't recall everything she had said in her very sage interpretation, and there had certainly been more nuance to it, but she had also told him to trust his own interpretations of the symbols. His father has even used the word "grave," despite his aversion to descriptions that were more poetic than literal.

Stepping back into the light, Uther crossed his arms huffily and looked down at Fal, His dark green eyes seemed to glow balefully, as if he was aware Fal hadn't been listening.

"…Anyroad… The Carteneau plains were once a sort of no man's land, and many nations sought control over it. But to my knowledge, ever since the Omega Weapon was awakened and extracted from the Carteneau plains, there has been very little further political strife regarding the area. Its surfeit of aether is powerful, but renders the land utterly inhospitable. It might not be difficult for you to go there."

((can't keep writing, gotta play BG3 before bed because I didn't want to wait until after FFXIVwrite to start it. Oops.))

#ffxivwrite2023 #ffxivwrite #prompt 21 #grave

[masschase]

i’m really interested to see what Casey and Carlos relationship was like when he was alive. he’s such a fascinating character to think about purely because of how tragically his story ends and i wonder how that affected Casey too.

btw i hope you’re doing well :)

Phew sorry this took a while I dozed off at one point and all sorts 😅

Two SR characters ask meme

I occasionally worry about posting about these two because he's such a like... younger brother innocent bby type character for so many people including myself. But that's not how I wrote Casey and he's not particularly younger than her, maybe a year or so, so here goes.

Carlos was really the first person Casey had romantic feelings for (Shaundi was a little later during the sr2/3 gap). But she dealt with it about as well as you'd expect an awkward 16-year old who'd been thrown into the body of a 21-year old on a angst-filled power trip to react.

"Ugh, your aim's shit, let me help." (his aim was fine) "Hey, hey Carlos, betcha can't pick me up." (she was skinny *before* the coma, I think at this point a light breeze could pick her up) And the particularly egregious: *flirts in Spanish then asks what it means* (she's semi-fluent and worse, he knows that🤦🏼)

In terms of writing I wove this into her backstory fairly subtly because by the time we actually see her 5-13 years later I feel like she has got so used to her "love is dangerous" attitude that she doesn't really trace it back to Carlos. If anything she traces it back to Aisha's death, because she sees the way Johnny changes more than she sees any change in herself.

We see in chapter 7 her biggest fear is something she's not comfortable to admit. In chapter 10 we see that this fear is losing someone she cares about again. This could be about any one of the friends she's lost but the fact she says it in reference to protecting Matt suggests she lost someone she had feelings for. In chapter 15 she thinks about the fact she would comfort Johnny about Aisha and he would comfort her about Carlos, rather than just them grieving together, suggesting some sort of mirror between the two losses and that Carlos meant something different to Casey than Johnny.

In chapter 21 Matt asks her in 2021 if she's aromantic. Her thoughts on this are "She hadn't gone as far as falling in love, she’d never let herself get that close. But she’d had the feeling of starting to fall. Being just on the edge. Holding on by her fingertips and clawing herself right back. It was so terrifying that she avoided the precipice completely now.". This could mean Shaundi, and it does, but it also applies to Carlos, and he's the reason she classifies it as "terrifying". And although this is late on, it doesn't really spoil the plot, so; in chapter 32 when Johnny is (very accurately) calling Casey out on not being able to talk about her feelings, he asks her if she ever told Carlos how much she liked him.

She points out that is not cool rather than give an actual answer, but the answer is that no, she didn't. In fact the artwork I did of them together that I've not yet been able to fix enough for my liking... well I can describe it here actually.

Carlos is standing slightly behind long purple haired (main SR2 look) Casey, smiling and tapping/poking her on the shoulder while she turns her head and smiles back. Their faces are kind of close. A gradient starts around their shoulders that fades down to very dark grey where we see the words "I'll tell him tomorrow.". Then below the words, we see the barely visible black silhouette of their hands clasped together as per Red Asphalt.

Those words really sum up Casey's feelings around Carlos. Thing is though, it's not some really poetic or contrived thing where she thought it for the first time and that tomorrow was the day she had to mercy kill him. She thought it for a while. There were a lot of tomorrows. Yet still she didn't speak her mind, much as Johnny recognises 12 years later.

And because she likes to find meaning in all the shitty events she's witnessed in her life, her regret about that gives way to a belief that she may have actually made the right choice That's where her abandonment issues and fear of commitment tip over into a conscious choice to avoid relationships, into stuffing down those feelings deeper and deeper even as they grow stronger.

Obviously her highly "logical" views are complete bullshit when it comes to emotions. But if she didn't have those views, she wouldn't be her, and if they weren't bullshit, I wouldn't have a story. So at least that's something, right? 🙂

#i have so much more to say on the actual effects on her of everyones' deaths but that'll probably have to be another post entirely #in fact sorry if this is terrible it's 1am and i'm passing out any minute now #oh and thank you i'm doing ok :) #saints row #asks #sr boss: casey clark #carlos mendoza

[blueflyingturtleontheway]

It's way too late but who cares! Here is my analysis of the Polish translation of the first song from Encanto, Family Madrigal!

Just a headsup, this song is one of the "just good" ones, so dont expect any fireworks like with WDTAB (we'll save those emotions for What Else Can I Do because boy)

*I'll start by noting that I really like how in the og version they made "drawers" rhyme with "floors" and "doors" even though it shouldn't be possible

+ Then again, Mirabel's Polish VA balances it out by having more enthusiasm in her voice when she sings this part than her English predecessor had

+ I have to say I prefer "time for the show" over "let's go", and this is also a good example of when using a macaronism/slang term works really well

-"Here's the family" I know "my family" wouldn't fit but it just sounds weird x)

+ "We're all here thanks to her" I think sounds a little better, sweeter maybe than "She led us here so many years ago"

+ "It's better (for us) with each new day" > "every year"

+ And here I'm conflicted, because "I'll tell what I know from this story" just sounds better to me, like more in character? But it's kinda far from the original "There's just a lot you've simply got to know". Though at the end of it I think I like the dubbed version better

= "And it's okay" instead of "We're on our way" I know it was made to fit the sound of the original but it's a very interesting choice I'm not convinced about

= "This is my family Madrigal" instead of "I'm part of". For me Mirabel's constant assurances that she's part of the family were quite unnatural but I mean, I guess that was the point and part of her characterization/foreshadowing of her problems so

+ Coffe got diminuted into "kawka" <3

*I just wanted to make a note that if you can follow an og line with a dubbed line and it still sounds fine, then you know the translation is good

+ I'm not going to translate the whole line but I think the internal rhymes in the line "her recipes are remedies for real" work even better in Polish

+"It's not a dream, it's something fantastical, somthing magical/It's my family Madrigal" again we loose the foreshadowing but it sounds better

+Okay here are the fireworks I just love how the part about Felix and Agustin got transalted, just, the internal rhymes in "wój mój" and "za to tato" (the use of tato in Nominative is so informal <3) and it sounds even faster than in the original despite having the same if not less syllables it's just *mwah*

*I feel like I should say something about the use of "pocisnę" which is very slang, and "time sheet" (like you have in school) but I don't know what so here

-"Camilo changes (himself)" sadly we don't have a verb to shapeshift 😔

+"Antonio will find out his gift today" instead of "get", I like it, it implies they all already have it and the ceremony only like, outs it (And if you want to go the angsty route, this might've been what made Mirabel think she's talentless, the ceremony didn't out any gift cause she never had any)

-"She makes a flower carpet in seconds" no sass for Mira here

+ "Her brain and lion heart" lion heart <333

-"Look for me in the family Madrigal" I... absolutely don't understand this line

+ I like the use of the word biographical in the og line, but Polish one is more natural, kinda like she's no longer really singing a song, but just speaking normally and fitting into the melody and rhythm simply by the laws of musical

+ English: Julieta, better, arepa; Polish: Julietę, arepę, lepiej

+ Also the town chants "talk aabout yourself, Mirabel!" so again, more direct

-We lose the meta joke about Dolores hearing the chorus

+ Instead of just "what are you doing" abuela uses a stronger word (so not "robisz" but "wyczyniasz")

+ And finally I don't know why but just, Dolores' line is much more funny to me in Polish XD Maybe it's because of the archaic/poetic word order, maybe it's the delivery, but yeah

So generally, even though I've noted out many strong points, these are the kind that I only noticed now during this analysis, so I guess they've added a lot, but still in general it's just, equally good.

#my post #encanto #the family madrigal #family madrigal #polish dubbing #dubbing #translations #encanto song #translation analysis #languages #hm i should make a tag for those #since i dont plan to stop XD #yes that means you can expect the rest of the song this whenever! #and id sum this song with one polish idiom - #theres no frenzy ass doesnt fall off #edit: #blue's bafflegabs

[ferinehuntress]

💧 DROPLET , ❤️ RED HEART, 💀 SKULL — how has [Ketheric Thorm]'s death influenced your outlook on life, if anything? ((for dame aylin :y

◈　 ⇢  @necrophcge　 ⋯　 DEVELOPMENT QUESTIONS 💧 DROPLET — are you grieving something or someone? do you feel like you lost something or a part of yourself with it/them? / ❤️ RED HEART — what is/are your love language(s)? how do you use it/them to communicate your feelings about others? / 💀 SKULL — how has [name of person] 's death influenced your outlook on life, if anything?

Even as the dead king lays in ash and blood, his name continues to haunt her mind and many questioned her of him. Her fingers curled as she growled, a wolfish action that she did not care to hide. "Why must you wrought my mind so with the cursed man's name?" Aylin demanded the nameless one as she turned her head away from him and threw her wings outward, stretching them far and wide as they shimmered in the sun's rays. Those wings flittered once and then folded against her back. "He did not influence my outlook on life, any more than Mykrul has. I still believe in the good of people, and that most are searching for a path to live their life. Men like him should have no bearing or influence over the minds of others. All he caused me was a bitter hatred til I saw him dead. He deserves no more words from my mouth than what I spoke to him the day I killed him. He is a traitor, a betrayal, and the likes of the world she has never seen," Aylin snapped her lips in fevor rage before taking a breath.

"Enough of him," She demanded and waved her hands. Instead, she turned her thoughts to the next question, yet still more somber than the last. Her icy blue eyes turned to look at her hand, flexing the massive palm to see the rippled scars upon it, tracing up her arm. Cracked and glittering underneath the sun, a reminder of all the torture the Sharrans and Shar herself had wrecked upon her. "I...I do not know, how to speak of such thoughts," Aylin whispered, her voice sounding less angelic and more down to earth. She struggled, her brows pressed downward as she brushed her palm against her chest, tugging out her shirt, and shook her head. "Something is... amiss. Shattered glass where once solid stone stood. I feel it, at night. Tossing, turning, wrought in a battle of nightmares and terrors. Only when I wake up, does the loss torment me worse. Something... something is gone, and I don't know what it is, nor where it has gone. All I know, is I wake up crying, the breath gone from my lips as I mourn what used to be. I grieve myself, mortal. I grieve for what I used to be, and wonder if I shall ever be whole again. My dear Isobel provides me the strength I need, but even I find it difficult when those horrors haunt the edges of the mind,"

Aylin faded from her speech, for now, no longer talking. Her eyes stared into the distance as if piercing through the clouds and sky and looking into nothing but emptiness. Despite standing there, she didn't know what she was staring at, as if the world continued to move and yet she wasn't there. Briefly, it felt dreamlike as Aylin shook her head, trying to ground herself again. Isobel would always rub her wrist to her palm and so she reached down and started to press her thumb against her wrist, pushing upward to the center of her hand. Her mind silently listed things she saw around her before blinking and returning to reality.

"Tis the third question, that, I can answer," Aylin grinned as she gave a flap of her wings. "My moon lily, my lovely Isobel, I love to sing songs and speak with such poetic rhymes to her. Such words of affirmation, sweetly speaking with delightful memories of words I once read. Yet she is my living poem, my beautiful book open for me to read over and over. So perfect, tis she. But, I also love quality time. One of the first nights with my dear love was in the middle of a rose garden. Not only did we speak poems to each other, but she showed me all the night flowers that blossomed in the rays of the moon. It was such a beautiful time, and at times we would walk silently, and yet, I could not be more enamored by her time. tis hard, to claim one love language, when I like to grace my love with all of them. I will shower her with gifts, kiss her hand, help her dress, and aid her in any way possible. My heart yearns to always offer her what she needs," She finished off the questions with the last one, one that held my love in her heart then the heavy topics from the first ones. She hoped it satisfied the mortal, though she was more than willing to talk about the light of her life even more if they gave her a chance to.

#necrophcge #[ aylin answers ] — the nightsong will sing again . #[ aylin interactions ] — you will address me with due deference . #[ aylin default verse ] — her face lights the shadows .

[wbwoqlqxoxxms]

Yishun Revengers Episode 12 "CCCCCCB"

“Singapore is the heart of Britain's military base in Southeast Asia, an impregnable fortress! We will not lose to the Japanese! We will never surrender to the Ja-”

-The British shortly before getting bombed and surrendering to the Japanese

“Ah, wait. You're not one of those…” Little Whitey flew over to Luna's outstretched arm, ready to talk serious business.

Skorpius remained silent, although for possibly the first time it was silence that didn't feel like he was avoiding interrogation (like getting violently beaten up).

“What do you think, Little Whitey?” Luna said.

“Blah, forget about free rights anymore with these kinda guys, he's probably just gonna go on and on about how it's my divinely-given birthright and only purpose in life for existing to help him in his most holy and sacred mission about how-”

“Ok, can you shut up and get to the point?” Stefen shot him a look and not-so-discreetly rolled his eyes, obviously tired of how much talking everyone was doing today and therefore how much his brain had to process. Can’t blame him.

“I mean, I understand if just killing him rules out to be the better choice here. It’s just that-” Skorpius interjected. “I’d like to save as many innocent souls as possible in this crusade. That includes the ones no one ever cries for…”

Mendax smirked and folded his arms. “What’s wrong? Getting poetic?”

“Or, maybe something you didn’t tell us? Something important?” Fentanyl took the subtle hint and stepped forward to grab Skorpius by his hair again, positioning him for Sicarius, armed with her knife.

This time Skorpius did not resist, sitting there tiredly like a wise old man with three crazy beggars holding him hostage.

“Just get on with the plan already,” Ming groaned impatiently.

“You can talk if I kindly place my knife on your throat, right?” Sicarius glared over and passively-aggressively asked.

“...A Luminary Guardian requires a host to activate its power, but did you know that it can actually have more than one host?” Skorpius started the conversation, hooking Luna and Little Whitey in immediately with such a key attention grabber.

“Come…again?” Luna’s pets of Little Whitey decreased in speed and frequency, indicating clear importance she was interested in whatever Skorpius had to offer.

“The more hosts a Luminary Guardian has, the more power they are able to activate and channel. However, they still require the use of a primary host before they are able to possess any more hosts,”

“...Go on…”

“Possessing more than one host at a time isn’t as easy as you think it is, though. The Luminary Guardian is required to split itself into as many parts as its hosts, and each part can typically only hold up for a while. Many possessions are, as such, only temporary,”

“And that’s why, aside from a Luminary Guardian, I need the power of a Culpably-superpowered human too. Typically I would give these powers to any human if there wasn’t any around, but since we already happen to have one..” His words trailed off and he stared up at Sano, whose bloodshot eyes stared him dead and could truly make one shudder with appearances alone.

“You want me…to…” Sano’s voice had grown so deep and cold over the course of these 45 minutes worth of interrogation. He didn’t have an overnight puberty or growth spurt, did he?

“I want you to save him.”

“Continue with the plan,” Laju grunted almost animalistically already, smoke emitting from her frustration with the many conversational detours this group has taken.

“This is by far the most…traditional way of purifying a Culpable-the Luminary Guardian will possess me and activate its power, and the superpowered human will keep me supplied with a constant flow of energy while I fight off the Shadow’s Blade.”

“The…Shadow’s Blade?” August questioned.

“The will of the Culpable. The inherent, underlying, but nonetheless ever present will of the Culpable. The Shadow’s Blade is separate from the Culpable itself, though, make no mistake. “

“So what happens after you fight off the Shadow’s Blade?” Pertama asked.

“I purify it. At this step…I will require neither the Luminary Guardian nor the superpowered human. This is an independent step which I am able to achieve on my own.” Skorpius exhaled and sighed deeply again, leaving behind but a brief moment of silence of the crew’s contemplation.

“Yes, but..how can we trust you?” Sicarius removed the knife from its precarious position for a while to lick it threateningly, then returned it to where it rightfully belonged.

Skorpius, as usual, kept up his cryptic silence but fixed and let show his line of sight onto Little Whitey and Luna-the latter still as calm and uncaring as usual, much opposed to the former not doing a very good job at containing his bewilderment after the earlier info dump.

“Yes, you can trust him,” Little Whitey said after a while, much to the scepticism of literally everyone in the room.

“And how do we know that, Little Whitey?” Luna hissed non-threateningly over at the bird rested comfortably on her shoulder.

“I might be wrong, but since he did again prove he has knowledge of it, and only a Crusader would wear such a ridiculous mask-” Little Whitey sucked in a HUGE breath. Wait, can birds even do that?

“He’s an Astral Crusader. What’s crazier than the existence of seeds of negative energy running around worlds destroying and walking in the face of terror everywhere they go is, the existence of a group that actively seeks to ‘rescue’ Culpables and innocent people from the pain Culpables bring about…”

Stefen loudly sucked in the air around him in a frustrated manner and straightened his back, cleared his throat and prepare himself for the mental ordeal he was about to go through. “Go…on…” He whispered with a disconnected demeanour.

“In a quick introduction, Astral Crusaders have, quote unquote, “witnessed the calamity Culpables cause everyday, and have vowed to put an end to it-even if it costs them their lives. Well, it wouldn’t be surprising if they were just trying to kill all Culpables-I mean, everyone would love to kill a seed of negativity and banish it to the netherworld for good every once in a while and make the world a better place, now, right?

The crazy part is-that they think Culpables are victims of their own negativity and the killing they manifest too, and so the methods they use to ‘purify’ worlds afflicted tend very much to…save the Culpable too,”

He gasped in tiny, unnoticeable breaths after finishing such a long speech (long speech not for a human, but for a bird, ok), and turned to face Skorpius.

“Am I right?”

“Ah…you Luminary Guardians do know us the best,” He cocked his head to the side as an expression of amusement. One would imagine he could break out into a cute smile, if only there wasn’t the huge problem of a plastic covering masking his expressions that no one seems to question after the explanation anymore.

“So…do you trust me enough now?” He turned back to Sicarius (must have decided that she was the one most vicious here) and held up his restrains.

Sicarius unfolded her arms gradually and followed the trend of sucking in a breath, then exhaling. “I still don’t trust you…but that bird seems dead set on doing so, and I’d rather not anger it…”

“Welcome to the club.”