#this is what happens when I work on perspective

[five-rivers]

Cracked Clay Cup Chapter 17

@greatbigolhampuckjustforme

Danny reappeared in the entryway of Clockwork’s house in a swirl of blue.  He met Clockwork’s eyes for just a moment and saw the muted concern in them.  

He couldn’t stand it.  

He darted to the side and made for the stairs.  

“Daniel–” said Clockwork, behind him, but he ignored him.  

He reached his bedroom and dove under the covers of the bed, wrapping himself up in the quilt, because he missed grabbing the sheet underneath it.  He pressed the nearest pillow into his face and tried to stop crying.  

“Daniel,” repeated Clockwork softly from near the doorway.  Danny hadn’t closed the door.  

Danny shook his head.  Whatever Clockwork wanted right now, Danny just couldn’t–

The edge of the bed sank down as Clockwork sat on it.  He put a hand on Danny’s shoulder.  “It will be alright, Daniel.  You are safe here.”

“You know– You know what they did.”

“I do.”

“How could you just let me– How could you let me go there?”

Clockwork sighed.  “I am bound by the limits of the role I have taken on.  I could not tell you.”

Typical.  Danny rubbed angrily at his eyes.  “How did I get away?  Do you know?”

“I know,” said Clockwork.  He didn’t say anything else.  

“But you can’t tell me, is that it?”

“If I were to tell you,” said Clockwork, carefully, “I would be removed from my current role and replaced by someone… less able.  The Observants are ever eager to exert control.”

Danny sniffled.  Clockwork’s explanation was reasonable, from a certain perspective.  It still hurt.  

“Why did they do it?” asked Danny.  “They said they wanted to understand, but they–  Who could do that if they wanted to understand?”

“I cannot say that I understand their motives,” said Clockwork.  “I certainly couldn’t imagine acting like that.”  He began rubbing a small circle into Danny’s back.  “But you need never see them again, if that is your wish.”

A sob caught in Danny’s throat, and before he knew what he was doing, he had twisted around to throw himself into Clockwork’s arms.  Clockwork received him with a remarkable amount of grace.  

“I don’t know why–  I don’t– Why I’m acting like this, I barely know them, knew them, it shouldn’t feel like–”  He didn’t know how to describe it.  “I don’t know why.”

“The why of it does not matter so much as the fact that you do feel that way,”  said Clockwork, continuing to pat Danny’s back.  

“It matters to me.”

“Ah, I see,” said Clockwork, soothingly.  “I’m sorry.  Of course it matters to you.  Of course.”

“I’m sorry,” said Danny.  

“No, no,” said Clockwork, “it’s quite alright.”

“I’m crying on you.”

“It’s fine,” said Clockwork.  “Tears wash out.”

“I don’t know why.”

“You learned about something very upsetting.  This is natural.”

“I don’t remember it.”

“It still happened, and is responsible for your present circumstances.  It’s alright to cry.  I will be here.”

.

“I made oatmeal today,” said Clockwork, putting a steaming bowl down in front of Danny.  “I thought that something simple would be best, after last night.”

Danny grunted and picked up a spoon to stir the oatmeal.  It wasn’t as simple as all that, really.  Clockwork had put raisins and cinnamon sugar in it.  It probably tasted just as good as all the other food Clockwork had made for him.  

“I’m supposed to choose now,” said Danny, listlessly. 

“This is the stage of the trial where you choose, but you need not do so immediately.  I cannot advise you on how to choose, or how to weigh your options, but it would not be out of the question for you to contemplate the matter for several days.”

“Right,” said Danny.  He scrubbed at his face.  Even after he’d sent Clockwork away, he’d cried on and off all night.  His skin around his eyes felt grainy and salty.  “What happens, when I choose?  Do you just teleport me back and the doors start working again?  And I, um, get my memory back?”

“That is a portion of it,” said Clockwork.  He sat down at the table across from Danny.  “First, however, the power involved in the ritual that is the trial would coalesce into a bond between you and your chosen guardian.  This would include the power involved in altering your form, so you would shortly thereafter regain your original appearance.”

“I kind of like the ears and tail, though.”  He ran his hands over his ears reflexively.  “They’re fluffy.”

Clockwork smiled.  “There are ways you can either regain or retain them.  Once that has occurred, the Observants will come to return your memories, and, finally, you will be escorted to your guardian.”

“Huh,” said Danny.  He poked at the oatmeal some more.  

“You should eat,” said Clockwork, gently.  

Danny sighed, and did his best.  

.

“I should make a list,” said Danny, having given up on breakfast.

“Of what?” asked Clockwork.  

“Names,” said Danny.  “Of people.  Choices.”

“You already have one of those,” Clockwork pointed out.  “In the folder.”

“Oh.  Yeah.  Where did that get to, anyway?”

Clockwork slid it across the table, along with a pencil.  

“Thanks,” said Danny.  He flipped the folder open.  “I guess I can start by crossing off the people I’m definitely not going to choose.”

“That seems like a logical way to proceed,” agreed Clockwork.  

“So.  Not the Observants, obviously.”

He looked up at Clockwork out of the corner of his eye.  He could swear he’d seen him smirk at that pronouncement.  Just a little.  

“And not Skulker, Ember, and Technus,” he continued, moving down to the next entry he could safely cross out.  “And not, and not, um.  Not Jack and Maddie.  Those’re– those are the ones I can’t, who won’t, um.  Yeah.”  He looked at the rest of the list.  “Vlad is okay, but he lied to me a bunch, and I don’t really get why we were enemies, so when I get my memory back, I might hate him again, so not him.  Jazz…”

Danny licked his lips and tapped the eraser of the pencil against the table.  He liked Jazz.  And she was his sister.  Given everything else, he could sort of understand why she was lying, but…  No.  Vlad had a point, saying that he shouldn’t choose her.

“Not Jazz,” said Danny, finally.  “I don’t want to do that to her.  Which leaves Pandora and Frostbite.”

“A difficult decision indeed.”

“Yeah,” said Danny.  He sighed.  Either one of them would be good.  Different.  Very different.  The culture shock would be hard.  Ancient Greece and the Far Frozen were both very different from what he was used to.  But Frostbite and Pandora would take care of him, and that’s what really mattered, in the end.  

But he had to wonder if there wasn’t another option.  

“Clockwork, you knew me before, didn’t you?”

“I cannot tell you that.”

“Right.  But Jazz knew you, which sort of implies that I knew you.  So.  You knew me.”  Danny bit his lower lip, thinking.  “You, um.  Why didn’t you join in?  As a guardian, I mean.  Why didn’t you, um.  Apply?  Is that the right term?”

“It’s as good as any.”  Clockwork leaned back in his chair.  “There are still limits on what I can tell you.”

“Yeah, but tell me what you can tell me.”

“If I were to adopt a child,” said Clockwork.  “Any child, not necessarily you; you understand that I cannot speak of such specifics.”

“Right,” said Danny.  

“But, if I were to try to adopt a child, the Observants would be very cross with me.”

“Why?”

“Because my responsibilities to such a child would supercede my oaths and duties to them.  They would not appreciate the loss of control, and would do everything in their power to prevent it.”

“Like, by making you be a neutral party.  Taking you out of the running.”

“Yes,” said Clockwork.  “That would be something they might do.”

Danny fidgeted with the edge of the paper folder.  “If you– Did you–  Would you have applied?  If you could?  You know, hypothetically.”

“Yes,” said Clockwork, simply.

Danny took a deep breath and rubbed his hands on his thighs.  “Then…  Then, if I…  I can choose anyone, can’t I?  Anyone I want, right?”

“Correct,” said Clockwork.  “That is the base rule upon which this whole trial is based.”

“So… what happens if I do?  If I, um, if I choose you?”

“That would be a nonstandard ending to the trial,” said Clockwork.  “It would not end as smoothly, perhaps, as it normally would.  The pathways that the power involved would travel upon may be confused.  You may not regain your original form.  The Observants would certainly withhold your memories.”

“And that would be… bad,” said Danny.  “That would be…”  He shook himself all over.  “I, um.  I don’t think…”  He faltered, looking down at his hands.  “That wouldn’t be much of a loss.  Really.”

“Fifteen years of memories is not insignificant,” said Clockwork, a note of warning in his voice.  “This is not a decision to make lightly.  It will affect your entire life.  There may even be other side effects that I have not listed.  Things that even I cannot foresee.”

“I don’t think I want to remember.  Not if it means remember what…”  He swallowed, with difficulty.  If what had been written in that binder had actually happened, he didn’t want to remember it.  “I’ve been thinking about this decision for months, right?  Every moment I remember.  I’m not making it lightly.  I know how important it is.”

Clockwork inclined his head towards Danny, acknowledging the point.  

“Pandora and Frostbite are great, but…”  Danny took a deep breath.  “But it’s you.  I choose you.”  He braced himself preparing for rejection.  A sort of tension built inside his chest until the feeling scraped the edge of pain.  

Then Clockwork was next to him and reached out to him, putting one hand on his shoulder and the other on his cheek.  “Oh, Daniel,” he said.  

The tension abruptly collapsed, and Danny let himself fall forward, into Clockwork’s arms.  Clockwork carded a gloved hand through Danny’s hair, ruffling his ears.  

“It’s okay, right?  It’s okay for me to choose you.”

“Of course it is,” said Clockwork.  “Of course.  I cannot tell you how glad I am.”

“But you can tell me other things, though, right?  You’re not neutral anymore.”

“Quite right,” said Clockwork, and Danny could hear a smile in his voice.  “I have so many things to tell you.”

“What kind of things?” asked Danny, settling his head against Clockwork’s collarbone.  Or whatever ghosts had instead of collarbones.  

“All sorts,” said Clockwork.  He chuckled.  “You’ll be able to see my actual lair.”

“Is it purple, too?”

“You’ll see.”

#danny phantom #phic phight #phic

[txttletale]

(Other than the really weird bit about "Male presenting Doctor") what were your thoughts about the specials?

pretty mixed bag, pretty messy, but good overall. i think they were very obviously a nostalgia trip for people around my age lol and it worked! i loved seeing tennant and tate back onscreen together, their chemistry hasn't aged a bit, and honestly just watching doctor who that wasn't written by chris chibnall was a breath of fresh air. they weren't boring, like seasons 11 and 12 were, and they didn't go too far off the other end into nonsense like flux did. characters want things again! the show can let itself just be silly! i was literally cheering out loud when donna and the doctor were just saying random scifi gobbledegook at each other for like a solid several minutes during the star beast.

the structure of the specials kind of baffles me. i love wild blue yonder--i think it's definitively the best of the specials as a standalone, it's absolutely fantastic, creepy and atmospheric and bringing things around to RTD's strength, which is well-written characters interacting with each other and letting good actors just act. but at the same time i dont understand why it exists? it feels like...idk. imagine if you watched the star wars original trilogy but instead of the empire strikes back the middle film was just a feature length film about luke and han surviving on an ice planet with no reference to anything that happens in the last film except the two characters' relationship. and then the next film was still return of the jedi, unchanged. it felt like that

i liked all the weird campy silliness of the star beast and the giggle, and they were both very fun! neil patrick harris gave a fantastic performance, there are a lot of very memorable sequences from the giggle, but it's very very all over the place. so many threads get kind of picked up and go nowhere. the toymaker's haunted house dimension goes nowhere. RTD's eyerolling social media commetnary goes nowhere (thank god tbh but yknow im illustrating something here). even the toymaker kind of goes nowhere, after ncuti gatwa shows up he's bascially an afterthought who loses by dropping a ball. obvious parallels to david tennant's first episode with that ball scene could be made, but just... aren't. it feels like load-bearing sectikons of the plot and themes were cut out to make room for a backdoor pilot for the stupid fucking UNIT spinoff

oh and it goes without saying i fucking hate all the UNIT wank in the star beast and the giggle. i hope space nine eleven 2 happens to their stupid fucking avengers tower i cannot stand kate stewart who is constantly a murderous bonehead (in the giggle alone she gets two pepole killed by not listening to the doctor and assuming that this teleporting godlike entity could be restrainted by Two Guys) who is both in and out of universe just a boring nepo baby with no merit of her own

um. i still dont know what happened with the regeneration. i think the implication is that when david tennant dies hell time travel back to become ncuti gatwa inside himself--at least the rehab dialogue seems to make that implication. but it's not really explained or explored? baffling. i do think that fourteen getting to settle down and live a peaceful life with his friends is cute.

oh yeah and the ask said other than that but goddd there was some good stuff in the star beast and honestly with the state of the UK media i will take any perspective on trans people that includes baseline human erespect but some of those lines made me cringe so bad. anyway overall i am cautiously optimistic for the future of the show--oh ncuti was fucking great did i mention that i instantly bnought him as the doctor he owned the scene, the moment he was there it was clear he was the protagonist, and i liked the church on ruby road well enough too--i am cautiously optimistic but i worry that a big UNIT-shaped tumor will devour huge chunks of it and it'll be annoying. also russel t davies is like 60 and i just dont want to hear what he has to say about twitter so im not looking forward to dot and bubble

#ask #doctor who

[vigilskeep]

i have never thought of the bg3 paths as railroaded before but oh my god... i see your vision. i think that, for all that can be picked apart in the writing of dragon age, the worldbuilding in that series is so so interested in complicating all factions that you can envision a character who /makes sense/ while bouncing through various ideologies. and the sort of fantasy writing in (most of) the forgotten realms doesn't really allow for that.

dao is particularly the light of my life because the origins mechanic is specifically intended to let you create a character who has a distinctive perspective on the world that’s grounded in the worldbuilding. one of my favourite aspects of this is several origins having completely different codex entries on their own culture as opposed to those an outsider would get. it’s really good! it’s also a reasonably grounded world (while obviously silly) because, like, the basic fundamental premise of thedas, from which they ikea flatpack built almost every feature, is “how would people react to magical and fantastical diversity? the same way they react to human diversity.” you’re meant to feel like, aside from i guess the darkspawn, people are normal and have real motivations. sure it has to fulfil certain roles in a story, and dragon age was manufactured too quickly and purposefully for everything to land feeling authentic, but evil in dragon age should feel recognisable. and in most of the origins they give you a chance to do something that is bad, but also totally makes sense, because of the context of your character belonging to this world where these things happen

in dnd/the forgotten realms it’s a bit different because capital e Evil exists, so there are people and deities and devils (and, to open another can of worms, races) whose entire goal is to Do Evil. it’s also harder to produce grounded evil because in a world where i’m being given basically no context and just told to make whatever i want, i don’t have an inch of the kind of social information i get from for example a dao origin: what my character has been taught to believe they should do to survive, who they are willing to sacrifice, whatever. bg3 also happens to have a main plot goal that is, at least for the first part of the game, broadly selfish (“i am sick, and i need a cure”) which works really well for getting a bunch of people with vastly differing moral standards to band together for the same goal, and not so good for any kind of “greater good” type blurred morality, so that’s out too

however much the worldbuilding factors into this, bg3 specifically went for quite a clear distinction between the good path and the capital e Evil Path, and i find it pretty hard to vary up the good path. when i say railroaded i mean you either do the specific thing that gets you a quest down the line or not. i was really disappointed actually in my playthrough where i totally fucked up in the druids’ grove and caused a fight to break out, because it immediately instakilled tons of characters i knew i would need down the line. the few it spared needed some of the dead ones to stay alive in later quests, so it’s like... oh. that’s just... over. for both factions. bg3 arguably lets you do basically anything you want but they are able to do that because if you fuck around it just breaks the entire quest line from coming up again, which means playing a character who fucks up is not even really going to get me consequences it’s just going to cut content from the game. does that make sense? and then the Evil Path is just straight up evil, like... there’s no way for me to complicate and empathise, here, especially playing a blank canvas character whose motivations i would have to make up from nothing, and who faces basically no consequences for not doing this. the only neutral/cowardly/self-interested option in act 1 is to do neither path, which gets me the least content because i literally don’t get to play the fucking game

i don’t know, i’m not saying it’s necessarily bad just that it’s hard for me, personally, and how i like to create characters. especially when you have my constant restart disease and you have to do this all over again a dozen times just for a handful of different dialogue. does any of that make sense

[rukafais]

i think it's probably that we got the laios/toshiro argument scene in the anime and now people are rewatching it with fresh eyes and rethinking their initial knee jerk reactions to it, but imo there's a lot of overcorrection happening towards the perspective that laios was the one in the wrong or something? which seems silly to me because like you said, the point is that they both made mistakes and had trouble communicating with each other and that's what led to that argument getting so intense. there's nuance to it that i think people are still ignoring, just from the other side now

Legit. I figured it was an anime thing but boy it's getting...fucking weird.

Yeah, I'm seeing a lot of BUT ACTUALLY LAIOS WAS WORSE AND ALSO IT WAS A MICROAGGRESSION AND HE'S BEING RACIST and its like - Laios is right to be mad that Toshiro didn't say a damn thing and expected him to magically turn into a mind reader and figure it out or expect him to miraculously attune to Toshiro's style of communication. - Toshiro is right to be mad that Laios accidentally bulldozed him repeatedly and considered him a friend when Toshiro was trying to communicate very hard (by the standards he was raised with) that he didn't want it. - They clearly worked it out after they fought and cleared the air with each other, Toshiro was able to speak his feelings and Laios was able to understand him better - They were also super keyed up because something fucked up and stressful had just happened which made everything more intense so the response is baffling, like, why are we slapfighting about who's worse that was not the point of that scene at all

#rukamemes

[cfr749]

Initial Thoughts on Chenford in 6x07

All right... I'm feeling... a lot at the moment, so just sharing my initial reactions before seeing anyone else's. I'm sure my feelings will evolve. Also this turned into a GD essay and I'm sorry.

The Good

Grey acknowledging that Lucy was going through a lot ABOVE & BEYOND the break up. I just wish he'd mentioned the shooting, too. Lucy deserves to be more than her relationship with Tim and I need to actually see that in the future.

Lucy laying out 2 key things in her conversation with Grey - how easily Tim walked away and that he had no right to make that decision for her

Prior to the last scene (see The Ugly below), I thought Tim's interactions with the therapist were reasonably well done; if only therapy was that easy in real life lol

"You've always got a home with me" - I loved this final scene between Lucy and Tamara. I don't really have feelings either way about Tamara at this point, and this still hit me right in the heart.

Smitty's poll made me laugh, but also another solid indicator that these writers / producers do in fact really enjoy laughing at the expense of the fandom and shippers (which, whatever, I don't care that they do, I'd prob do the same; but it does irk me when people act like these writers should be worshipped because of all the things they "give" us)

The Tim

"I'm not depressed. I broke up with her."

"I was her TO." Not her friend, cuz god knows Tim has yet to deal with the fact that he started banging his former Rookie I suppose.

I dunno whether to put this in The Good or The Bad at this point; it depends on where they take it, so instead Tim gets a section all about why he's a dick.

To be clear, I do not like that Tim is a dick. But I actually do kind of like that it is very clear TO THE AUDIENCE that Tim is being kind of a dick. Do I still think people will bend over backwards to defend him? Of course they will.

From my perspective, I love Tim, I understand that he thinks he's doing the right thing, and has lots and lots of trauma. I've never seen Tim as a character that magically healed at some point between Seasons 1 & 5 (please see his storyline with his dad, his ongoing issues with UC work and unwillingness to confront or deal with them, his feelings about therapy historically, his inability to dump Ashley, etc. etc.). He's never been perfect and he doesn't need to be.

All of those things are true. None of those things give him a free pass to be kind of a dick. He still has to take accountability for how he treated Lucy (which, to be clear, was like sh*t).

The Bad

Lucy being petty AF with the invites to Tamara's dinner - let her be ANGRY, but give me villain Lucy over this dumb sh*t.

Lucy having no one other than Grey to talk to.

Others acting like Lucy is actually kind of pathetic (why do these writers love sh*tting on her so much? girl could not be down and kicked any harder at this point) -- Celina / Nolan and the double dumping crap, Lucy thinking Grey paid actors and him telling her she was out of her damn mind

The last interaction between Lucy and Tim. I am so angry for her. I needed to see that from her, but instead it felt kind of like her being dumped / a kicked puppy all over again. We got it, thanks. What's next? Lucy being incredibly happy with the hottest man on earth? I'm here for it tbh. Lucy plotting Tim's murder? Also here for it at this point. LOL.

The Ugly

I could not hate the implication of that final scene with Tim and the therapist and the door shutting more. There was ZERO reason they couldn't have had him show up during the day, and it actually disgusts me that they are pushing this line again, but especially with Tim. I am literally NEVER this dramatic, but in this case I really hope they did that to just get a reaction, because if anything were to actually happen between Tim and the therapist, I'd be 100% done with this ship and show as would a whole lot of the audience (I think). If I kept watching, it would only be to see Lucy be absurdly happy without Tim.

Well, what'd I miss? What did y'all think?

#chenford #the rookie #the rookie spoilers #see lana ramble #no one tell the writers that women can have storylines that are not about BABIES

[jheselbraum]

It's 2024 and some of y'all are still whining about Katara being "mean" to Zuko after he joined the party like he didn't directly betray her trust and almost caused her to waste the spirit water on him instead of saving it for Aang which-- while definitely not intentional on Zuko's part since 1) Zuko didn't know that Azula was going to shoot Aang with lightning and 2) He didn't offer or expect the spirit water to be able to heal his scar-- from Katara's perspective the last time she trusted Zuko the Avatar cycle almost fucking ended. Of fucking course it's going to take her the longest to trust him again, she's right! She was the first person to trust him, and he burned that bridge!

Everyone's field trips with Zuko make the most sense for both how they happen and when they happen. Toph trusts Zuko the quickest because she can literally tell when people are lying and is also good friends with Iroh, who's like, the number one "Zuko's not evil he's just in turmoil" guy. Aang trusts Zuko next because he's a fucking air nomad pacifist who is culturally predisposed to the virtue of forgiveness. Sokka trusts Zuko after an intense and prolonged mission to rescue some POWs because Sokka is a warrior at heart and while he like Toph sees the strategic value in Aang having a firebending teacher (eventually), he needs to know how Zuko behaves while on their side before he can trust him. Like-- the change in dynamic between the air temple, when Sokka and Zuko aren't on mission and Zuko is kind of the one "in charge," he has the information Sokka wants but Zuko is the one who hesitates to give it freely and Zuko is the one who dictates how Sokka leaves the temple for the boiling rock, to when they actually get there and Zuko follows Sokka's lead and Sokka is the one calling the shots and coming up with the plans really emphasizes how Zuko works in team setting when it counts.

And Katara's field trip with Zuko has to be her revenge quest, and how Zuko acts during that quest really tells us a lot about what Zuko wants personally from that field trip which is the same thing that he wanted from the others-- jack shit.

Zuko asks Sokka about his mother's death because he wants to better understand where Katara's coming from, and from where I'm standing it's pretty obvious that he only realizes "hey hang on my years at the Fire Nation School For Little Princes might come in handy actually" and tells Katara what he now knows about the raid and who did it.

And throughout the entire episode Zuko is 110% on board with whatever Katara wants to do with that information. If she'd said at the tent "Thanks but the only revenge I want is helping Aang defeat the firelord and ending the war" then he would've just been like "ok"

Zuko makes no judgement call on Katara's use of bloodbending and he makes no judgement call on Katara's decision to spare Yon Ra and every move he makes in that episode is Zuko saying "You're right, I fucked up, and I understand where you're coming from" every move he makes is in support of Katara, she is the one in control in the situation and I think that's why Zuko brushes off Aang's call to pacifism earlier in the episode, because pacifism isn't what Katara wants in that moment.

Like that whole sequence comes from such a genuine place of caring and support from Zuko for Katara and I think the interpretation that Katara is just being Mean to Zuko for No Good Reason really cheapens one of the best episodes in the series as well as the episodes leading up to it.

#atla #the southern raiders #zuko #katara #look man the team they sent to go take on fucking AZULA was zuko and katara #it's 2024 give my girl her fucking dues

[cloudyskiiees]

ok i cant control myself here’s me infodumping about my stardew valley x tdi fic idea:

-first few chapters are all noah’s perspective. he lives in a small run down town called stardew valley, working at the library with their shitty museum attached. he has a couple old books of his on display, but nothing more. rumors of a new farmer coming to town arise, he doesn’t think much of it.

-until he sees the farmer after he’s moved there. he’s pretty, sure, but he’s… weird.

-the farmer waits around like he knows where people are gonna be at a certain time. he’s scarily good at collecting new gems and minerals for the museum, he’s even better at fighting in the mines, where most people don’t dare to go.

-he knows what everyone likes without even asking.

-this all gets annoying because noah hasn’t learned anything about the farmer, other than his name. alejandro.

-he can’t shake the feeling something is wrong with the new farmer.

-so he starts being a bit meaner. refusing gifts he loves, even if it almost seems to pain him to do so. he’s gotten to the point he can outright refuse to let alejandro donate to the museum! it brings him satisfaction to see the looked on the farmers face, but he can’t deny something inside him feels horribly wrong whenever he… acts out.

-eventually we get an alejandro pov. and the entirety of “stardew valley” is a video game. none of the characters we’ve been following or learning about are real, not even the farmer noah knows. he’s simply a made up character.

-alejandro is pissseddd because something is wrong with his newest save! he had made a brand new one to attempt and speed run it, having the summer off from college and finally being miles and miles away from his family breathing down his neck.

-so what is this characters deal all the sudden?

-the new dialogue noah says, he can’t find it anywhere online. he didn’t know characters could refuse gifts they loved, or even in general!

-when the librarian refuses to let him donate his recent finds to the museum, he makes it his mission to figure out how this is happening.

-he gets his local tech “friend” Sierra to take a look and observe the game, hoping she can figure out what’s wrong. he doesn’t exactly like the girl but…. she’s really smart when it comes to certain things. especially her favorite video game.

-noah continues to question the other townsfolk, but starts realizing that… they all kind of act the same. have the same responses. routines.

-he realizes he does too.

-izzy is the only other self aware character inside of the game, noah nearly strangled her when she told him she’s known for a long time.

rest of the story is sierra and alejandro realizing the characters are becoming self aware, and being like WTFFFF especially since they all start having distinct reactions and dialogues once sierra takes over alejandro’s farmer for a bit, seeing as they act very different.

this story would likely not have a super happy ending since ya know, most of the characters aren’t real. but i love fucking around with grey idea things like knowing ur trapped inside a game forever, but also loving the people and life you have in there! as well as ofc the eventual angst involved once feelings become a thing noah has for alejandro, seeing as he knows he’s real, and the farmer he plays as will never actually be him.

#total drama #alenoah #tdi alenoah #tdi fanfic #total drama island #this is definitely angstier than i anticipated #is there anyway for it to like end happily???? #idk but i like the concept! #it can definitely be messed with too but these are my first thoughts LOLOL

[bestworstcase]

Thanks for your response ala Ruby & Yang, great stuff!

Idle aside, but do you have any thoughts on Yang's role as the sort of black sheep of the family by dint of Raven associations?

Cos like, Tai overtly favors Ruby, projects Raven onto Yang, resents Raven being rough up and is bad enough about reminders of her Yang feels she has to apologize for his negative reactions. Let alone his... Everything else.

Then there's Qrow who doesn't seem to interact with Yang over much at all and one of if not their most major interaction. Involves him straight up saying he thinks she's either a liar hurting people for fun or "crazy".

I recall someone I was chatting with wondering: Imagine doing everything you can to keep your family from breaking apart & being compared to the woman who left you when you were a baby?

Cos I do wonder how Yang feels about all that given she seems to downplay and or try to work around her family's issues when she can. Let alone what it says about the adults in the room.

smth i think about a lot is the way yang’s narrative about her childhood shifts between v2 to v5

’cause in v2 it’s: “it was tough. ruby was really torn up, my dad kind of shut down. it wasn’t long before i learned why…” all to provide context for this anecdote about putting ruby in a wagon and running away to find her mother. and then her conclusion is “my stubbornness should have gotten us killed that night.”

and while there is a degree here of yang framing the story to emphasize the point she wants blake to understand, it’s also very obvious in her delivery that the emotional reality of this memory for yang is “the time my stupidity and stubbornness almost got me and ruby eaten by grimm”—when she was [checks notes] like five, six years old, and regularly left at home unsupervised.

but in v5, it’s: “my mom left me. ruby’s mom left too. tai was always busy with school, and ruby couldn’t even talk yet; i had to pick up the pieces. i had to pick up the pieces. alone.”

aside from the telling slip (tai, not dad)—yang centers her own feelings and the harm this situation did to her this time. which is something she’s always felt but i don’t think she could have brought herself to say it out loud to anyone during the beacon arc, because it was pressed down under the guilt on display in burning the candle, the feeling of having been inadequate and too stubborn and too selfish and and and–

coughs quietly. “my stubbornness should have gotten us killed that night.” / “you were predictable. and… stubborn. and maybe a little boneheaded.” yang’s narrative about the wagon incident—which happened when she was five or six!—pinning the blame on the thing tai imagines to be her fatal flaw is…probably not coincidental. yang in v4 after a year of being loved by her team and supported by mentors like glynda / oobleck / port has the perspective to know that tai doesn’t know what he’s talking about; but as a small child who’d just had a terrifying near-death experience with her baby sister… 😶

it definitely had a big impact on the way yang sees herself

BUT i do read qrow's talk with yang in 3.8 pretty differently ->

because the context is: yang saw mercury attack her and struck back in self defense, then had like a dozen synthetic soldiers point guns in her face, then looked up and saw the replay footage of herself walking over to shoot a boy who was just kneeling on the ground. and some of the most powerful authority figures in the world are pushing this narrative that stress and adrenaline "clouded her judgment."

like this would make anyone doubt their sanity. bc holy shit.

yang, though...a couple weeks ago, yang after being knocked unconscious woke up and blearily saw someone she thought was her mother walk away from her and disappear in a flash of red light. she hasn't mentioned it to anyone, because it's just so bizarre—yang doesn't know about raven's semblance yet—she must have just been seeing things. right?

aside from raven (who isn't here) and yang (who believes she hallucinated), the only other person who knows that yang saw her mom on the train is qrow, because raven told him about it. he also knows that:

tai insisted on not telling yang ANYTHING about her mother, and qrow respected that up until now; so yang doesn't know about raven's semblance and can't make sense of what she saw.

salem's infiltrators are the same people who attacked amber, and qrow didn't get a good look at them because they seemingly vanished into thin air—pretty damn good chance that one of them has a semblance that manipulates what you see.

ozpin wants #2 kept secret, so yang has some very powerful people actively trying to convince her that she's crazy. ironwood is straight up gaslighting her.

qrow also—based on the first thing he says, which is "why'd you do it?"—seems to consider it a possibility that it is what it looked like but yang did have a good reason, and i actually do not think that is an outrageous thing for qrow specifically to think. because qrow was emotionally abused as a child, and he knows yang, and in the event that yang really did suddenly turn around and punch a guy who was kneeling on the ground, why would she do it?

glances at shay d. mann. well. maybe this kid has been harassing her? maybe he said something horrible or threatening to her and in the heat of the moment she just snapped? maybe "he attacked me, i saw him attack me" isn't really a lie per se, she's just scared that "he's been picking on me ever since he got here and he made a disgusting remark and i just couldn't take it anymore" won't be taken seriously? as in, he did attack her—verbally/emotionally.

it's probably worth asking, at least!

so, qrow leads with "why'd you do it?" in case there is some invisible reason justifying the apparent action. yang says "you know why." qrow goes okay, well, i only know what i saw, so you're either lying (i.e., yang had a reason she now isn't telling) or crazy (i.e., yang saw something different from reality that was very real to her).

she says "i'm not lying." qrow believes her: "crazy, got it."

at this point, he knows the most probable explanation is that one of salem's infiltrators fucked with her head. the inner circle's gaslighting doesn't sit right with him; he's not going to buck ozpin by telling her the truth outright, but he wants to make sure yang knows she isn't losing her mind. he also has all the info needed to guess that yang is actually really really scared that she might be crazy.

which is why he kicks off the wall and begins to pace around. the language he uses sounds dismissive, but his tone is mild and his body language implies "let's talk about it, let's figure this out."

leading to:

YANG: Who knows? Maybe I am. QROW: And here I thought your dark-haired friend was the emo one. YANG: I saw my mom. …I- I was in a lot of trouble, took a pretty hard hit. But when I came to, the person attacking me was gone, and I thought I saw… her. Her sword. Like the one in you and dad’s old picture. QROW: You’re not crazy, Yang. That was your mom, alright. Let me guess—she didn’t say a word, did she? YANG: How did you know that? QROW: I don't see my sister very often, but she does try to keep in touch... whenever it suits her. YANG: Wait—you mean you talk to her? That was real!? QROW: Yeah, she found me. Had a tip from my most recent assignment and wanted me to give you a message.

it's really telling that yang responds to him this way. 'cause we've seen how yang acts when she feels dismissed or belittled:

TAI: Well, "normal" is what you make of it. YANG: What is that supposed to mean? Do you want me to just pretend like nothing happened? I lost a part of me. A piece of me is gone. And it's never coming back. TAI: You're right. It's not coming back. But that doesn't have to stop you from becoming who you wanna be. You're Yang Xiao Long, my sunny little dragon. You can do whatever you put your mind to. So whenever you're ready to stop moping, and get back out there? I'll be there for you. YANG: I– I...

she freezes and shuts down! her teachers have to come to her rescue!—but when qrow goes "crazy, got it" and suggests she's being "emo," yang blurts out her big secret. i saw my mom. to me that suggests a level of trust and understanding that isn't there with tai: qrow says stuff like "okay, so you're crazy" and "here i thought your friend was the emo one" but what he means is "hey, i know something's really bugging you, tell me about it," and yang picks up what he's putting down.

it's akin to how ruby goes "did you miss me? DID YOU MISS ME??" and qrow's like "nope" and they both laugh. or the back-and-forth ribbing between him and the girls in 3.4. there's this layer of mild ironic meanness in the way qrow converses with his nieces that all of them are fluent in, and in this scene he's using that mode to signal that "crazy" is not off-limits, that it's okay to talk about openly.

crucially, there's a code-switch in the middle of the conversation: as soon as yang gets real and says "i saw my mom," qrow reflects that seriousness back to her. you're not crazy, that was your mom, she found me afterward and told me about it. it was real. you're okay. qrow's ability to do that—to shift into a more serious mode when irony isn't appropriate—is why yang can have this rapport with him that she doesn't have with tai, because tai isn't... being ironic when he says mean or dismissive things to her.

anyway, qrow passes on raven's terrible message and then kind of annotates it: "raven's got an interesting way of looking at the world that i don't particularly agree with, and she's dangerous." (which is a very diplomatic way of saying he thinks raven is full of shit. lol.) but then he connects this whole conversation about raven back to what happened after the match: "you're a tough egg, kiddo. don't let this tournament thing getcha down. you had a slip-up; sometimes bad things just happen."

implicitly: yang isn't crazy. what she saw on the train was real, a product of raven's personality and her semblance. sometimes bad things just happen. qrow believes that yang had the experience she says she did when she punched mercury. he doesn't know why she had that experience—yang doesn't either!—but he knows she isn't just "crazy." sometimes things that seem crazy are actually real.

remember what he tells the girls in 3.4? "you may be acting like huntresses, but you're not thinking like one." same thing here. he's telling yang, hey, you're not crazy, you know what you saw, but you don't know what or who caused you to see it. "you cut off the head of the king taijitu, but now the second head's calling the shots."

hint, hint.

it's subtler than the hints qrow drops for ruby in 3.12, but very much in the same vein, and yang is plenty smart enough to figure it out. she might... not have? in the couple of hours between this conversation and everything going to straight to hell, but if they'd had literally just one more day, just long enough for the wheels turning in yang's head to click together with what ruby heard from velvet about coco hallucinating during her and yatsu's 2v2 against emerald and mercury, she would've had it.

more... generally, i've never gotten the sense that qrow projects raven's flaws onto yang in the way that tai does; qrow is definitely a lot closer with ruby than yang, but i think that has less to do with favoritism on qrow's part than it does ruby thinking he's like the COOLEST uncle ever and wanting to use a scythe like he does.

'cause like, qrow isn't their parent, he doesn't live with them, he's not responsible for raising these kids like their dad is, so while he obviously did contribute to fucking them both up because: alcoholic, ultimately there just isn't the same degree of betrayal or emotional abandonment; he's not their dad. both times yang talks in detail about her childhood, it's "my mom left, ruby's mom left, tai wasn't really around, ruby couldn't even talk, i was alone"—she doesn't mention qrow. there isn't that deep hurt, that feeling that qrow is someone who left.

when he isn't drunk, yang seems to feel pretty okay around him, and qrow likewise treats her... honestly a lot better than tai does:

he stops by their dorm in v3 to hang out with both his nieces; yang is fully in sister mode—cheers for ruby to beat him until ruby loses, immediately shoves her out of the way like "my turn!! >:D"—and qrow ribs them both, takes ribbing from both of them in good humor, tells both of them "you two are gonna go far."

qrow nicknames to show affection; ruby is "pipsqueak," yang gets "firecracker."

we only see qrow's goodbye to ruby, but in 5.4 yang indicates that qrow came to talk to her before he left, too. she also has complete trust that he's keeping the promise he made to look after ruby.

yang, as noted, opens up to him about seeing her mom; she's also shocked that he's still in contact with raven and indignant that he didn't tell her sooner, but—unlike with tai—she doesn't seem surprised that qrow is willing to talk about raven in general.

which tracks with what tai says in 4.11: "despite asking him numerous times not to, i know qrow told you where you're mother's been at these days"—meaning, this was a point of contention between him and qrow. behind the scenes, while tai refused to discuss raven at all, qrow was going okay well, let me tell her then, she deserves to know. and then ultimately he just bit the bullet and told her behind tai's back. i wouldn't be surprised if it turned out qrow had been straight with yang that her dad wanted to be the one to tell her the important stuff, and he wanted to be respectful of that, but raven wasn't an off-limits topic.

general contrast between yang-tai and yang-qrow dynamics; for example both of them say almost verbatim "you've got a long way to go before you're ready for the real world" (3.4/4.4). from tai it's belittling, he's insulting her; from qrow, it's meant to encourage, it's "remember you're still new to this, you'll make mistakes, just keep learning, keep trying." (rwby does stuff like this all the time, refracting an idea in different directions to highlight contrasts between characters; ozpin's advice to ruby vs port's advice to weiss is another example.)

a lot of qrow's resentment toward raven is centered on her abandonment of yang: "did you know yang lost her arm? [...] rhetorical question, i know you know. it's just obnoxious that you'd bring up family and then carry on like your own daughter doesn't exist. [raven: "i saved her."] once. because that was your rule, right? real mom of the year material, sis." like he is PISSED on yang's behalf that raven won't even try.

my impression is that qrow—although a) often away on long missions in far away places and b) an alcoholic who sometimes got blind drunk and became a burden yang and ruby needed to take care of—when he did manage to be there, made a serious effort to connect with both of them. he ended up being closer to ruby bc she wanted to learn scythe-wielding, but i do think qrow would've trained yang too (or instead) if the girls had different combat interests.

and while his relationship with ruby has a mentorish aspect, i don't get the sense either of the girls see him as a parental figure: he wasn't part of their household, he traveled a lot, his alcoholism in combination with tai's neglect eroded the adult-child boundaries because they had to be responsible for him as often as the reverse. he's a friend who also happens to be related to them. and that's especially true for yang, because he wasn't her teacher.

(i know it's a... pretty common headcanon / fanon that qrow lived with them, but i really don't think that's supported by the text? whenever ruby or yang look back on their childhoods, the family unit is always them + tai, and qrow isolates himself out of fear that his semblance will injure those he cares about. plus ozpin sending him all over the place as the one member of team strq still active. it makes way more sense to think he lived alone, and visited when he had the chance. which is the main reason i'm WAY softer on him than on tai, 'cause qrow wasn't in a caretaker/parent role; at most he was an occasional babysitter. so while his incidents of turning up drunk on the doorstep contributed to the harm... it's like, it would absolutely have been better for them if qrow were sober, but that wouldn't have changed anything about their home life. they'd just have somewhat easier relationships with qrow.)

TO WRAP THIS BACK AROUND TO THE QUESTION, tai is unfairly judgmental and harsh with yang bc he projects his idea of her mom onto her; yang also has a better relationship with her mom's brother than she does with her dad. how do these two dynamics interact? how does yang feel about hearing from tai that she's too branwen, so to speak, while also getting along better with the branwen side of her family? how might that fuel her desire to find raven?

if her uncle treats her better than tai does, then... maybe her mom would too, if only yang could reach her?—obviously it's not rational, but like. i don't think five year old yang put her baby sister in a wagon and ran away to find her mom because she thought she would ask "why did you leave me?" and then get her answer and go home. as yang grew older and developed a more realistic perspective it shifted to "i just need to know why she left" and she projects that backward onto herself as a child, but at the time what she wanted, what she was looking for, was someone who would take care of them.

#never-ending heap of yang thoughts

[vodika-vibes]

Cowboy Casanova

Summary: When you decided to move to the middle of nowhere to get some perspective in your life, you expect to be bored out of your mind. You definitely don’t expect Bacara.

Pairing: Commander Bacara x F!Reader

Word Count: 4123

Warnings: Smut, dom/sub dynamics, biting, hints of a breeding kink

Tagging: @trixie2023 @n0vqni @dukeoftheblackstar @kimiheartblade @mire-draws-things

A/N: This started out at one thing, turned into another, which turned into a third thing, and anyway it's now what it was supposed to be so I had to change the name, which makes me sad. The Original name was Save A Horse, Ride A Cowboy. Anyway! I hope you like my sin. Also, this is a western au because...I don't have a reason other than Bacara with a cowboy hat. I'm sorry. Anyway, no requests got done today because of this. Note, this isn't edited - so if you see any errors, no you didn't.

“You’re staring,”

“Am not.” You reply absently as you drag your gaze across Bacara’s bare chest, your eyes lingering first on his dog tags and then on the nipple piercings that he got when he lost a bet.

He chuckles, low and deep, “You’re still staring.”

“If you don’t want to be stared at, then you should put on a shirt.” You counter, unrepentant.

Bacara arches a brow and flings a rag at your face, making you sputter and scrunch up your nose, “You wouldn’t say that if I was staring at you.”

“Of course not. Double standards are a thing after all.”

He rolls his eyes and walks over to you, leaning into your personal space as he picks up his rag again, a smug smirk crossing his face when your gaze drops to his chest and then his waist, before snapping back to his face, “See something you like, city mouse?”

Your face heats, but you keep your gaze locked with his, “Just worried that your pants are going to fall down since they’re hanging so low.”

“Fashion choice,” Bacara replies with a shrug, as he walks away from you and back over to the machine he’s trying to make work, “Besides, it’s hot as balls out here, and I hate the feel of my shirt sticking to my skin.”

Well, he’s not wrong about that.

Bacara leans back into the engine block and reaches in, “Why don’t you just pay someone to come and fix it?” You ask.

“You have the money for some repair man from the city to drive out here and fix this? Cause I sure as hell don’t.”

“You own, like, a dozen cows.”

“There are three dozen of them, actually.”

“That’s not the point that you think it is.”

He laughs and pulls back, “Yeah, yeah. I know. Come here, I need a small hand.”

“I don’t fix things, Bacara.” You warn, though you do hop off the bale of hay that you’ve been sitting on and walk over to him.

“You need to learn, city mouse. What happens if something breaks in your home?”

“Uh, I’ll call you.”

“What if I’m not available?”

“Why wouldn’t you be available?”

“Believe it or not, I don’t exist to come running at your beck and call.” Bacara replies dryly.

“What? Wow! Really?” You marvel sarcastically, and then you yelp when he pinches your side. “Rude!”

“Alright, Little Miss Sass, I need you to reach into there and feel around for any loose wires.” Bacara explains as he presses his chest against your back and points where he needs your help.

“Wires? I’m not going to get electrocuted, am I?” You ask as you try, really, really hard to not get distracted at the feel of him pressed against you.

He shoots you a look, “Of course not. It’s totally safe.”

“Fiiine.” You sigh out as you reach into the opening and feel around blindly, “Um...okay, I found a wire.”

“Excellent work,” His voice is low against your ear, and you can’t help but shiver. Embarrassingly, he notices and a quiet chuckle falls from him, “I need you to follow the wire and tell me if it’s connected on both ends.”

You ignore him, as best as you can, and feel around for a moment, “I...think so? It doesn’t feel loose at least.”

“Damn, I was hoping you’d say the opposite. Alright, pretty girl. You’re done. This is now, officially, someone elses problem.”

You pull your hand out and make a face at the oil on your fingers, “I thought you didn’t want to pay-”

“I don’t, which is why I’ll have Neyo come and fix it.”

“Ripping off your own brothers, shame-”

“What are brothers for if not a little unpaid labor every now and then?” Bacara asks rhetorically, “Come on, you can come inside and get that stuff off your hand.” He picks his hat up off his work table, and pauses before setting it on his head.

He shoots you a small smirk, and drops his hat on your head, it immediately tilts over your eyes, and you use the back of your hand to tilt the rim back so you can look at him, “Well, how do I look?” You ask with a small grin.

Bacara lazily drags his gaze across your body, his smirk growing, “Hot as hell,” He drawls.

Your face heats again. Still, you’re not able to stop the delight from sliding across your face, “Well, thank you~”

He stares at you for a moment longer, and then motions for you to follow him. It’s kind of unnecessary, you could navigate Bacara’s ranch blindfolded and drunk, but you do appreciate being able to walk with him.

After you get yourself cleaned up, which takes a lot longer than you anticipated since the oil just did not want to come off your hands, you meander from the guest bedroom, down the hall, and into the kitchen.

He’s still not wearing a shirt, and you’re beginning to think that he’s walking around like that intentionally. “Did you manage to get the oil off?” Bacara asks as he turns to face you.

“Yeah, eventually. The bottle of special soap was empty, so I had to make some more real quick.” You shrug easily as you sink into one of the chairs at the kitchen table. You don’t mind, you normally make it for him anyway.

Your parents would be so proud. Thousands of credits spent on a fancy Chem degree...and you use it mixing oil removing soap.

“Sorry about that, I should have checked earlier.”

“Don’t worry about it.” You fold your legs under you, and your attention lands on something interesting on the table.

Now. Bacara is a rancher, there’s always new and interesting things laying around his house that he needs to explain to you. Over the year that you’ve been friends with him, you’ve learned a lot about ranching and about the things that he needs to do his job well.

This, however, is new.

“Bacara?” You sound slightly bemused as you reach across the table and hook a finger under, surprisingly silky, maroon rope, “What’s this for?” You ask as you turn your gaze to him.

Unless your eyes are deceiving you, there’s a hint of a blush on his face.

“It’s a joke gift. From Cody.” Bacara replies as he walks over to the table and picks up the rope, only to hesitate for a moment, “Although-” he murmurs quietly, as if to himself, as he pulls some of the rope out and lays it across your wrist, “It would look amazing wrapped around your wrists.”

You tilt your head and your mouth is slightly dry, you’re pretty sure that his comment was meant to be an inside thought, not an outside one, but it’s not like you can unring that bell.

“I think it’d look better wrapped around yours.” You blurt, and his gaze snaps to meet yours, “The color would look amazing against your skin tone.” You add, sheepishly.

He stares at you, and you stare right back at him.

And just as you’re about to apologize, Bacara smirks.

“Alright.”

You blink at him, “Alright?”

“Alright. Lets see what you’re capable of.”

You blink at him again. And then a third time as his words process, “Wait! Really?”

“Really. Unless you think you can’t handle it.”

“I can handle it,” You shoot back, “The question is can you?”

He folds his arms across his broad chest, “Let’s make this a little more fun-”

“-more fun then you getting tied up?”

His grin is predatory and sharp, “I don’t beg. Ever. For anyone.” He advances on you, “However, if you can make me beg in say...an hour, you win this little challenge and I’ll do whatever you want for a week.”

“You already do whatever I want, Bacara.” You point out.

“Unimportant.” He replies, “But when you lose-”

“-if. If I lose-”

His gaze locks with yours and his grin becomes even more predatory, “When you lose,” Bacara repeats, “I get two hours to make you beg for me, and when I win you’ll do whatever I want for a week.”

“Hold on now! How come you get two hours and I only get one?” You demand.

“Because I’m going to spend the first hour with my face buried in your pussy, that’s why.”

Your entire thought process screeches to a halt as your train of thought derails. “...oh.”

“So what do you say, city mouse? Do we have a deal?”

And, really, there’s only one thing you can say to that, “Deal.”

Bacara advances on you again, essentially crowding you, as he walks you through his home and into his bedroom. His eyes a glittering with arousal, but he doesn’t touch you, as much as you can tell that he wants to.

He kicks the bedroom door shut and turns on the lamp so there’s some light in the room, and then he folds his arms and waits.

You gaze at him thoughtfully, a small smile on your lips, “You’re wearing too much. Strip.”

His gaze is hot as it lingers on your face, “Yes ma’am,”

You consider watching him strip for a moment, but instead turn to the bed and start setting up the rope, while pulling out your phone to look up safe ways to tie him up.

“Alright,” You murmur to yourself as you make sure the ropes are secure around the bed frame, and you climb off the bed to focus your attention on him, “Pick a position that’s comfortable for you, Bacara.” You say as you carefully don’t take your eyes off his face.

“Not even gonna steal a peek, kitten?” Bacara asks, as he moves passed you and settles on the bed, with his back pressed against the headboard.

“I lady doesn’t peek, Bacara,” You sniff.

“Oh? Do they tie up their friends.”

“I can leave you know.”

He laughs and grabs your wrist to tug you onto the bed, you tumble against him, your hands settling on his shoulders, as he reaches around you to settle his hand on the back of your neck, “I want you to look, kitten. After all, I need to know if I meet your approval.” You have to shift to get more comfortable, eventually straddling his thigh so you’re not twisted uncomfortably.

You roll your eyes, but slowly drag your gaze down his chest, a nearly silent sigh of delight falling from you when you see that he’s still wearing his dog tags. Bacara chuckles lowly, and you hurriedly continue your visual perusal of the man beneath you.

He’s solid, your Bacara. Oh sure, he has a belly, but you’re pretty sure that he’s solid muscle, like the professional weight lifters you used to know in college. Big, beefy, and could lift you with one arm if he was so inclined.

Absently you trail your fingers down his chest, teasingly skirting around the nipple piercings, and down his stomach, and then your gaze lands on his cock.

Already erect and with precum leaking from the head.

He’s gorgeous.

But that’s not what catches your attention. No. What catches your attention is the golden piercings.

You blink at the piercings dumbly for a moment. “Holy shit Bacara.” You blurt, “Why didn’t you say that you had cock piercings?”

“Not really something that comes up in polite conversations,” He counters with a grin.

“But...If I had know then my-” You cut yourself off before you finish the thought, and you snap your gaze to his face, “Never mind.”

“Oh no, you definitely need to finish that thought, kitten.” Bacara practically purrs, “Come on, your what?”

“Nope. Not going there.” You shift your weight slightly, and reach down to grab his wrist, but Bacara doesn’t let you move it. “Really?”

He smirks, “Tell me, and I’ll let you tie me up.”

“Don’t you automatically lose if you don’t let me even try?” You try to bargain.

His smirk widens, “No, because I saw that look on your face. You want my face in your pussy.”

Damn him for being right.

“Fine,” You drag the word out, “I might have fantasized about you before. Maybe.”

He smirks smugly, “Knew it. Alright, you may continue.”

“I’m pretty sure that I’m supposed to be the one in control right now.” You counter, even as you bring his hand to the headboard and carefully loop the rope around his wrist.

Bacara hums and his still free hand comes up to caress your hip, “Oh, kitten. I need you to understand that I’m letting you do this. But I need you to know that I’m the one in control here, not you.”

Your fingers slip on the rope, “I’m going to pretend that you didn’t say that for the sake of the challenge.” You finally say once you finish with your knot, “How’s that? Too tight?”

Bacara tugs at the rope experimentally, “Good enough.” He finally says, as he lifts his other hand to the headboard.

You’re a lot faster this time, now that you know what you’re doing, and you sit back on your heels as you look at him. “I was right,” You finally say as you climb off of him so you’re able to peel your own clothes off.

“Bout what?” Bacara asks as he watches you strip with hungry eyes.

“That color does look amazing against your skin.”

He hums his understanding, tilting his head so he’s able to watch you push your shorts and panties down your legs. “I can just about guarantee that it’s going to look much better against yours.”

You set your clothes on a chair and climb on the end of the bed, settling yourself between his feet.

Bacara looks completely relaxed, and you’re beginning to accept that he was right, he is the one in control here, as much as it might seem like you are. “Just gonna sit there and stare at me, kitten?” He drawls.

“I’m thinking.”

“Do you need some direction?” He offers, “Because I can do that.”

“I’m not giving up yet, Bacara.” You counter as you slide up so that you’re better able to reach him, your fingers feather light as you glide them across his thigh.

His muscle twitches under your touch, “Yet, huh.” Bacara says with a small smirk, “Good to know.”

Finally fed up with his comments, you surge up and crash your lips against his. Your hands wander across his chest, lightly flicking his piercings, as you trail your tongue across his lower lip.

You’re almost surprised when he takes control of the kiss.

Almost.

He catches your lower lip between his teeth, and nips you roughly enough that a squeak falls from you. Bacara then soothes the sore spot with a lazy swipe of his tongue, and the moment you part your lips for him, his tongue slides against your own.

He maps out your mouth with a single minded intensity that leaves you moaning, and encourages you to straddle him again. When you break the kiss, you’re slightly breathless, and his gaze is dark as is slides across your face.

“You should give up, kitten.” Bacara purrs.

You shake your head, “I can still win.”

He laughs, “You’re already straddling me, and we haven’t done much more than kissing.”

“That-”

“I’ll make you feel so good, kitten.” He purrs as he tugs his wrist once, causing the knot to unravel. He presses his hand against the small of your back, and pulls you closer, and you shiver when you feel his hard erection pressed against you.

Unthinkingly, you grind against him, the head of his cock pressing deliciously against your clit and a moan fall from your lips as you do so.

His arm hooks tightly around your waist, and he pulls you closer so that he’s able to trail his lips against your throat, “Say you give up, kitten. And I’ll give you exactly what you need.”

Your lips turn down into a small pout.

“We can try this again later,” He promises, very temptingly, “After you’ve had some time to prepare properly.”

You peer at him, and then release a heavy sigh, and reach up to untie his other hand, “This isn’t me giving up.”

“Of course not.” Bacara agrees, suspiciously easily, “But, it is you forfeiting, which means it’s my turn.”

You squeak as he flips you so that you’re under him, smoothly using one hand to pin your hand over your head and tying them together and to the headboard.

Bemused, you tug on the ropes, but there’s no give whatsoever, “How-”

“Practice. I’ll teach you properly for next time.”

“...this game was designed for me to lose from the get go, wasn’t it.”

He grins and leans over you, his lips hovering just over yours, “Good girl, I knew you’d figure it out eventually.”

“You’re a dick.”

“Not gonna deny that.” He replies before he kisses you deeply, but quickly.

And then he’s moving down your body, biting marks into the soft skin of your neck and throat, across your collar, and down your chest. You squirm and writhe under his attention, biting your lower lip to keep yourself quiet.

He takes a quick moment to lavish your nipples with attention, before he’s moving again. At this, you’re unable to keep yourself from gasping out his name, and you feel his lips curl up into a smile against your breast.

Bacara litters your stomach and sides with possessive marks and then he leaves a trail of bite marks from your hip to your thighs. By this point, you’re a moaning mess, you don’t care if this means that he wins, you just don’t want him to stop.

And only then, when he’s sure that you’re covered in his marks, and when you’re whining for him, does he spread your legs to make room for himself between your thighs.

“Look at you,” Bacara praises lightly as he drags a single finger between your folds, a pleased smirk crossing his face as your hips twitch towards him, “You’re already wet. Do you have a biting kink, kitten?”

Your face burns at his words, and you stubbornly press your lips together to not say anything.

Bacara clicks his tongue, and his hand lands, heavily, on your outer thigh. It surprises you more than it hurts you, and you blink at him wide eyed, “I asked you a question.”

You know what he wants to hear. Even though you’re so horny that you almost can’t stand it. Even though his large, calloused finger is circling your clit in a way that is kind of driving you insane. You still know what he wants to hear.

What he’s expecting to hear.

Your tongue darts out to wet your dry lips, and you plaster on your most innocent expression, “Did you?” You ask, slightly breathlessly as you clench around nothing from his teasing, “I wasn’t listening.”

Bacara stops. His fingers stop moving, and his hand, which was caressing your thigh and the red mark blooming there, stops moving as well. He searches your face for something, and then a slow smirk crosses his lips.

“Safe word or color?”

Your heart racing with excitement, you breath out, “Color.”

He hums, “What color are you?”

“Green.” You blurt, “Very green.”

For a moment, there’s a glimmer of something warm and soft on his handsome face, before it’s gone. “So, it sounds like you are able to listen.”

“When I want to.”

“Then it sounds like I just need to teach you that you need to listen to me, doesn’t it?”

You feel a thrill of delight, “If you ever said anything worth listening to-” You words get cut off with a ragged moan as he suddenly thrusts a finger into your pussy and curls it, almost instinctively finding the spot deep inside you that makes you see stars.

“I’m going to tell you how this is going to go,” Bacara says, a hint of promise in his voice, “I’m going to give you as many orgasms as I want, you are only allowed to cum when I allow it.” He eases his finger out of your pussy, and licks it clean with an appreciative hum, “And, if you don’t obey me, I’ll have to punish you.”

“Punish?” You ask.

He just smirks, “Do you understand? Answer verbally.”

“I understand,”

“Good girl,” He gives himself a couple of lazy strokes as he examines your splayed out body appreciatively. “I did say that I was going to bury my face in your pussy, didn’t I.” He muses, loud enough that you’re able to hear him, “But I don’t think you’ve earned that.”

That pulls an unhappy noise from your lips, and he chuckles, “Only good girls get to have their pussy eaten, and you haven’t been a good girl.” He releases your legs, letting them fall back to the bed, before he reaches up to check the ropes one more time, and then flips you, making sure that the ropes didn’t twist in such a way to hurt you. “There we go,” Bacara murmurs as he smooths his hand over your ass and then squeezes roughly

You squirm under him, but settle when you feel his hand press against your lower back. He quickly eases a pillow under your hips and adjusts your legs so that you’re spread wide for him.

He doesn’t touch you for a moment, though you can feel his heavy gaze dragging against you body. Just as you start to squirm, a little self conscious about being so exposed, his hands are on you again.

His hands are calloused and heavy on your body, and you’re sure you’re going to have bruises from his hands covering your body, but you can’t seem to bring yourself to care as his hands press into you.

And then you don’t care about anything as the blunt head of his cock presses against you. Slowly he eases inch after inch inside you, and you’re squirming and whining before he’s even halfway sheathed.

The piercing feels amazing inside you, and you find yourself clenching around him.

Bacara groans and bites down on the back of your neck, “No cumming, kitten.” He warns as he slowly pushes the rest of the way in. As soon as he’s bottomed out, he presses a light kiss to the mark on the back of your neck.

He doesn’t move for a moment, and then he slowly eases out, until only the head of his cock is inside you. Bacara waits a beat, until you squirm to try and get him to move again, and then he thrusts in hard and fast.

He keeps the rapid pace, his breath hot against your ear, his hand fisted in your hair to keep your head down.

The sensations of his hand in your hair, and low groans in your ear, adding to the amazing feeling of his piercings dragging against your walls and the delicious stretch of his cock, are too much to handle.

And try as you might, you’re not able to keep yourself from cumming with a cry of his name.

You feel him laugh, “That’s punishment 1, kitten.”

“Not my fault-” You gasp, “Feels too good.”

“Oh? What’s that? Harder you said?” Bacara asks, as he adjusts himself slightly, before he leans in and catches your earlobe between his teeth. Before he does exactly as he warned, thrusting hard enough that you release a noise that is something between a moan and a sob of sheer pleasure.

“Good girl,” Bacara purrs, “You’re taking me so well.” He smooths his hand up your spine, “Such a willing little thing,” He coos in your ear, “I’m going to ruin you, kitten.” He catches your lips in a deep kiss, his tongue sliding against yours.

“Please,” You whisper, “Please ruin me.”

For half a moment, Bacara’s hips stutter, and he releases a deep groan. “Oh, princess. Gladly.” He pulls out completely, pulling a disapproving whine from your lips and then he flips you back onto your back, before he thrusts back into you hard and fast. “I’m going to stuff you full of my cum, princess.” He promises, “Over and over and over, until I’m good and done.”

“Cara-” You whine his name as you arch against him as best as you can.

“So, be my good girl and take all of me,” He orders as he leans in and catches your lips in a passionate kiss, “Be my good girl, and I’ll ruin you.” He promises, his gaze dark.

And, really, how can you do anything other than obey him after that promise.

#star wars #tcw #star wars au #commander bacara x reader #bacara x reader #star wars fanfiction #x reader fanfiction #f!reader fic #18+ fic #nsft

[warcorrespondence]

You've probably seen that post that goes around, you know the one: It's all fun and games in hbowar until you want to see two women have a conversation.

Well, @mercurygray/mercurygray set out to fix that. The Darkening Sky is full of women having conversations about real things.

fandom: band of brothers

pairing: Dick Winters/OC

mature, 220612 words

This epic asks the question: what would it be like if women went to war with Easy Company? No, but really though?

There are a lot of OCs, and a personal challenge I have with reading OCs is that I already love the canon characters. So for me, OCs have more work to do in fanfic than they do in novels, because they have to shoulder aside my blorbos. (This is me - there are a lot of OC writers and readers in this fandom and bravo to you all! I’m simply explaining a barrier I have). 

But fairly quickly, they established themselves, and over not too long a time, I grew to love them.

The main relationship is between Joan Warren, niece of General Pershing and society gal of Nixon’s ilk, and Dick Winters - she’s flirtier than he is, and more outspoken, but just as driven and in essence just as private. It takes them A WHILE to get going, because it would - these are two serious people with serious things to do, and they take love seriously too.

And all right, I’m just going to put it out there - was it a challenge, as a card-carrying winnix girlie, to hop on board that train? 

…not really? 

It helps that Nix ships it (which, like everything here, is shown and not told, and with delightful subtlety). It helps that Joan is awesome, a fully-fleshed out character with flaws and frustrations, narrative drive as well as personal drive. It helps that this is just another world where the Nix-Dick friendship didn’t develop that way, from Toccoa onward. There is no "We'll go to Chicago, I’ll take you there." It’s not what happens. 

(This fic also doesn't straightwash - there's not a ton of focus on m/m or f/f relationships, but they're there).

But Joan and Dick, much as I love to read about them, are not the only focus of the story. POV shifts all the time, sometimes to Shifty, sometimes to minor characters like Aldbourne residents or land girls, and we get an idea of what the war is like for them, as well as their perspective on Easy Company in all its camaraderie and complexity. 

It probably goes without saying that in a fandom full of heavily researched fics, Merc’s stands out as being the most meticulous. She knows her shit, and I knew that going in. But there’s a difference between throwing in facts and details for the sake of it, and doing it to further the experience of the reader. I felt like I learned things, but never like I was being taken to school - when I learned something it was because I was gaining context about a beloved character or understanding more about how the world would work for women in these circumstances. And they don't all have the same experience! Life for Lieutenant Joan Warren, reluctant media darling, is very different than it is for Sergeants Billie Mitchell or Marj Gordon (just to name a couple of my favorites).

These women never stop being women, and being treated that way, for better or worse (often worse). And there's something heartbreakingly frustrating but also beautiful about that.

Marj’s new haircut looked good on her - Doris wasn’t proud of a whole lot, these days, but any time she caught sight of Marj with her helmet off she had to smile. I did that. And she looks damn good. Marj’s honey-colored pageboy was starting to get a little long at the edges, but only enough to make Doris regret not bringing her scissors so she could do everyone else’s. Her fellow sergeant looked…free, without the hair, released from some burden of responsibility to look like she belonged somewhere else and might well be there soon. Why didn’t we do that earlier? Doris wondered to herself. It’s a war, not a beauty pageant. We’re not winning awards.  Because we’re still women, and we still want beauty. Because it’s hard to change something like that.  Because we all want to go right back to the way it was when this is over - even if we know we can’t. The way it was. The phrase made Doris want to laugh. They weren’t those women and men any more, the kids who’d arrived at Toccoa, and it was foolish to think they might be. Look at any of them, bruised and scarred - look at Marj! And even if they hadn’t changed, the people at home would have. (Look at Marj, again - and fuck Allen, while they were looking.)

#band of brothers #nikkirecs #200-250k #dick/oc

[aaronontherun]

Okay, there are two things about the ending of GO S2 that I cannot get out of my head after finishing the rewatch:

1. Gabriel's descent to earth

2. Aziraphale's reaction to the offer of Metatrash

(The rest under the cut)

The thing about Gabriel's descent to earth is that when he comes down to earth, he has not been fired yet. He decides to come down.

What's interesting about this is that in the last few minutes of the last episode Gabriel says his original plan was to leave heaven to go to hell, to join Beelzebub.

The quote goes:

Beelzebub: "Silly, silly angel. Why?"

Gabriel: "I was coming to you, but I... I forgot."

So... he had not been fired yet (because he left heaven before Michael and the lot could get a hold of him again). And he had originally planned to go to Beelzebub ("oh, you're sending me to hell, aren't you?" -> he was kind of counting on that). But after hearing he will lose his memory and go down to earth, he decides to ditch that plan and make himself forget all of it to go to earth (where he did not really intend to go in the first place) to give a box to Aziraphale that says "I am in the fly", that he knows will make him remember.

Why?

My working theory is that since he was the highest ranking angel, he knew about the plans of heaven. He knew about the second attempt at Armageddon of course and he did not want that to happen, because of his love for Beelzebub and the war that would break out. But I reckon he also already knew about the Second Coming.

And by wiping his own memories, he deleted that knowledge for all of heavens associates. But by storing it in the fly and transporting that to earth instead of hell, he brought it to the safest place he knew.

"The Second Coming will be a fearful, mournful time for the wicked, but it will be a day of peace for the righteous."

I don't know if I am reading something into it here, but to me it also sounds like a clue. The only other pair that kind of unites the powers of heaven and hell like Gabriel and Beelzebub is Aziraphale and Crowley. And we know that connection to be quite a strong one (as seen by the "teeny tiny miracle" that ended up sounding every god damn alarm bell in heaven). Crowley is a fallen angel and does not particularly care for heaven or hell and Aziraphale is still an angel and also does not conform with everything that heaven does. And Gabriel knows that.

BUT as far as we know, neither Aziraphale nor Crowley have had contact with the fly or the memories. For now we only know Gabriel kept his memories out of heaven by going to Aziraphale and that he probably knew more than he let on.

The question is, does the fly still exist or did it get destroyed when it went into Gabriels eye?

Also, given the CLUE that takes up almost half an episode - the part of the song that we don't really get to hear is this:

"Everyday seems a little longer,

Every way, love's a little stronger"

Everything we have seen points to an ending where you don't have to choose a side. Where there is no need to categorize into black and white, but to just accept shades of grey. Which is obstructed by heaven (the big corporate agenda, that needs people to think in black and white) and hell (which holds the outcasts that could not keep up with the agenda, but still cling onto it in their own competitive way).

Okay and this is the perfect transition to Aziraphales reaction to the Metatrons offer.

Because after years (or millennia in Aziraphale's case) of being oppressed and silenced and having to be careful around everything he says, I think Metatrons offer to put him in charge of heaven is in Aziraphale's eyes the only perspective of ever getting out of his misery while still doing good.

He *could* have given up heaven and fallen like Crowley, joining him that way, but instead he takes the route of trying to take Crowley with him to the very top of heaven.

Which, in my eyes, is a very very clear sign of the abusive relationship he has with heaven.

I don't think he realises that he is still just a pawn in a big chess game, also and especially as archangel of heaven.

As both Beelzebub and Gabriel said: "As if we make the rules..."

That is not how it works.

(I also find it very interesting, that the voice of god (basically the manager of heaven) asks if anyone ever "asks for death" (I mean, come on) whereas god, talking to Job, is genuinely fascinated by him and his goodness.)

I don't know if I can put this thought process into proper words, but I feel like the problem is that Aziraphale is still clinging to the whole concept of "doing good" and preserving his own status in the organisation. I don't think he is going up there to "change it from the inside" with a wicked plan in mind. When the Metatron made the offer, he told him that he would be "such a good leader, kind and honest", "be able to make a difference, be put in charge of everything". Which is exactly how they get you. He did not tell him he would be in charge of the second coming right off the bat. He lured him with being able to make everything better for everyone (which is all Aziraphale really wants) while keeping and continuing to receive approval from above (which Aziraphale is so afraid of losing).

Which is also what he tells Crowley about. The trust he is being given, the opportunity to make a change, the opportunity for Crowley to regain validation from heaven.

And only when he has accepted the offer, the Metatron specifies the details of the deal and that "doing good for everybody" means initialising the Second Coming, that has already been well planned (and that is everything Aziraphale never wanted to be a part of, but he won't disappoint them by saying no now).

"We could have been us" feels so powerful in that context, because I feel like what it really meant was "we could have been us without the approval of anyone". Without the need to justify their actions, think about right or wrong in the sense that heaven or hell would have categorized them. The freedom to work as a team, as the shades of grey they naturally are, containing both "good" and "evil" in a way that they balance each other, not desperately trying to put one of them out. (Also worth noting here, that throughout the seasons Aziraphale *has* done "evil", but only if he could somehow twist it to be "good" (see the episode with Wee Morag, right?), which showcases the pointlessness of categorizing again).

"I forgive you" from Aziraphale is such a heartbreaking line here, too. Because it is not him speaking, really. It is him already speaking in place of the organisation he is going to work for. "I forgive you for not regaining approval. I still love you."

"Don't bother", Crowley says and his whole posture drops. "For me it was never about that."

#good omens #aziraphale #crowley #ineffable husbands #aziracrow #good omens meta #good omens fan theories #metatrash #good omens gabriel #good omens 2 #good omens s2

[curatorofvibes]

Lilith in the 2nd House

Artwork by Blake Kathryn

Lilith in the 2nd / Second House natal. Don’t let astrology limit you, you can be who you dream you are!

Lilith in the 2nd House Natives can either love the idea of material possessions (2nd house being “the house of possessions”) or loathe the idea of material possessions. When it comes to material possessions, they can use their sexuality or in general do whatever act necessary as a way to gain their desires. Natives may have been rejected and struggled with financial stability and/or their self-worth. This battle with stability and security could’ve stemmed from an authority figure taking things from them and holding them back from attaining those things. As a result of this, they become very protective of their finances. They mostly care about ownership, whether that is people or things. However, natives can also be the most sensual of beings once they trust you or.. “own you” and let you in. When they do let you in, the sex feels very personal. They’ll make sure it’s an unforgettable experience for you because of how intimate, sensual, and all-consuming the sex can be with them, but you’ll only see this side of them if they let you in. If they don’t let you in, they’re able to quickly detach from the connection and leave you stunned wondering what just happened. Something that kept coming up is how fascinating, magnetic, and sexy the voices of these natives tend to be. I wanted to make sure I added that in because who doesn’t love a good voice? One major thing I learned from research is that these natives can feel unworthy and have low self-esteem. As a result of this, I wanted to boost the Lilith in the 2nd House natives up with this playlist and make them feel good and let them know you are worthy (Worth It). You’re amazing and I wish you a smooth self-love journey and hope you get to that point in life where you do love yourself unconditionally for who you are and never settle. With that being said, I hope that I was able to successfully show love to these natives and through this playlist and post I hope that I’ve provided at least a glimpse into what Lilith in the Second House might feel like. ~ ♡CuratorofVibes♡

Playlist Description:

To start off, I would like to preface by stating that this playlist and description of this astrological placement is from the perspective of a native with this placement utilizing seduction and manipulation as a way to feel worthy and gain a sense of security in life, mostly through material objects and a reliance on love from others.

The playlist starts off talking about material things and using sex and seduction as a way to gain those things in life. I used the track “Pyramids” by Frank Ocean to paint a picture of the Lilith in 2nd House native feelings in a sense. For example he mentions “What good is a jewel that ain't still precious?” and “You feel like God inside that gold”. Then the second part of the song goes into working at the Pyramid. At this point, the Lilith in 2nd House native is all about the money. Nothing is no longer free from them, they make you feel good (physically, emotionally, etc.), but now you have to pay for it. The lines that I relate to that are, “The way you say my name makes me feel like I'm that —, but I'm still unemployed” and, “But your love ain't free no more”. These natives tend to be skilled at successfully dangling temptation in front of you and making everyone think that they have a chance with them, when chances are they never did from the start.

The theme of the second part of “Pyramids” continues on with the next few songs of this playlist. Not only does it continue on with that theme, but it also emphasizes the Lilith in 2nd House native’s obsession with money and material things. They want to keep those things with them for life to feel secure and they’re willing to do whatever immoral or moral act it takes to get those things because it makes them feel worthy.

“what it means to be a girl” by EMELINE, kind of introduces the Lilith in 2nd House native. Essentially, I used the song as a description of the native presenting themselves in an overtly sexual manner while faking their happiness and feelings of security to please their objects of desire.

With the song “SAD GIRLZ LUV MONEY Remix” by Amaarae, Kali Uchis, Moliy, the playlist goes into a sort of party girl vibe where the Lilith in 2nd House native is portrayed as the life of the party. This can also be their version of feeling worthy by being surrounded by so many people relying on them to be the source of fun. ”I don’t wanna stop, I’m dancing dancing”. Into “Maraschino Love” by EZI as the perspective of the person experiencing the Lilith in 2nd House native, especially with the lyrics, “Your lips a sugar rush, Like candy on my tongue. Once I got a taste I couldn’t stop” and “Wanted every drop, Give me all you got. I’ll sip you out the bottle! You're so sweet like cherry pop? Was like "oh my God", My new favorite drug, You go down like liquid velvet”. This continues on with the next song, “Candy” by Doja Cat with the lyrics, “She's just like candy, she's so sweet, but you know that it ain't real cherry” and, “Sugar coated, lies unfolded, you still lick the wrapper. It's addictive, you know this, but you still lick the wrapper”.

The song, “Nate Growing Up” by Labrinth is the transition back into the theme of the second part of “Pyramids”. “ESCORT” by Chase Atlantic tells a story of leading a lonely life where your body is your source of material security and people use it, but there’s never any real connections made. This person craves a new life of security and comfort without feeling used in the end. The song also slightly touches on daddy issues, which is something I read these natives can have during my research.

The playlist now goes into the sensuality themes that the 2nd House can bring because after all, this is the house of Taurus which is ruled by Venus and deals with sensuality, love, and intimacy. For this, I started with the song “Sexhibition” by Miss.Janet Jackson. This part of the playlist talks about how the Lilith in 2nd House native can make you feel free and as if you’re the only one in the world. They make YOU feel worthy and in more ways than one can give you...“Good Comfort”.

For Lilith in 2nd House natives it’s all about self-worth. I now use the track, “SWEET / I THOUGHT YOU WANTED TO DANCE” by Tyler, The Creator, Brent Faiyaz, Fana Hues to transition into the self-worth portion of the playlist. I feel like this song perfectly described the line (from what in my opinion is a great description of Lilith in the 2nd House, or maybe I just really love lilmajorshawty’s writing lol), “they can wear plenty of silly pretend tones, and soothe anyone into a manipulative tactic and make it seem like it was all a misunderstanding”. It starts off as the native being the sweetest person ever and then to “I THOUGHT”, as in I thought this was what you wanted? Now there’s a misunderstanding!

Lastly, this playlist goes into loving being you and feeling secure in yourself as a Lilith in the 2nd House native because while this placement deals with material aspects, money, and what you’re worth, a big part of that worth is your self-worth.

(...)

(Spoil me rotten.)

(“The money is the motive.”)

(“Mi have good comfort.” )

(I might let you in, but you'll have to stick around to find out.)

(You’ll lose yourself to me as I take you on the ride of your life.)

("Put ribbons in my curls then carry around a knife with my diamonds.")

(“She's just like candy, she's so sweet. But you know that it ain't real cherry.”)

(I am so damn worth it.)

(Never Settle.)

(“To know your heart is a brave thing.”)

(⚸)

I would also like to state that I'm not an astrologer, I created this post because of the playlist that I made in relation to this astrological placement and simply wanted to share it with whoever it finds its way to.

NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT STEAL MY WORK. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO REPOST, PLEASE GIVE CREDIT.

#astrology #astrology playlist #lilith #spotify #2nd house #playlist #second house #lilith in the 2nd house #lilith in 2nd #lilith in 2nd house #natal chart #birth chart #astrology notes #astro observations #astrology placements #astro notes #astrology observations #lilith in the houses #curatorofvibes

[ctrl-alt-tahu]

Counting Turaga

So... open question to the Bionicle fandom: how many Turaga are there? Or, perhaps, putting it better: how many Turaga are there supposed to be?

Without really thinking about it, I have two not-quite-compatible mental images, which we'll call "Plenty of Turaga" and "Turaga are Rather Rare."

Plenty of Turaga comes from the original years of the saga: there are six of them, one per village, as many as the Toa. There's a footnote on BioSector01, on the Turaga page, that Greg said there were more Turaga than Toa left at the end of the story (so, "more than 58" as the page put it).

On the other hand, the rest of the saga really has me imagining fairly scarce Turaga: there's never more than one mentioned in Metru Nui, Jovan seems to have been a Turaga alone. The norm seems to be: one Turaga, one village. Metru Nui, in particular, seems to highlight this contrast: there were 11 Toa Mangai, but there's only one Turaga.

Thinking about this, I suppose that it's partly just attrition: the same thing happening to the Turaga that happened to the Toa by the end of the MU. And not every Toa is going to survive to be a Turaga.

But...

What if it's by design? What if there aren't SUPPOSED to be that many Turaga? A village may need a team of defenders, but does it really need more than one sage leader in the same way? When the Great Beings made the first Turaga, how many Toa did they expect to transform?

What really has me thinking that the ratio of Turaga to Toa probably isn't supposed to be 1-to-1 is Destiny. If it really is the case (I've grumbled about this before) that only certain Matoran are destined to become Toa, why would it be the case that all Toa are destined to be Turaga? Doesn't it make more sense for only certain Toa to be destined to be Turaga?

(Sidebar: destiny in Bionicle is basically whatever you want it to be--it's as malleable as time travel in Doctor Who, but I don't think it matters for this argument if destiny means "programmed from the very beginning," "an ever-changing, ever-adapting plan of Mata Nui to meet the circumstances," or something else. At least as long as you don't stray too far toward the edges...)

I find that I actually really like the idea that Turaga might be rarer than Toa and only the destiny for a few of them, larger because it really makes the Toa Metru take center stage: if the norm is that only a few Toa become Turaga and then an ENTIRE TEAM becomes Turaga, that means they are special, right?

From a meta perspective, of course the Metru as special: they're the archetypes of Turaga for any fan who followed along from 2001. Having it turn out that they're actually a massive reversal of what is normal makes their personal destinies fit really well with the reveal that the island paradise of Mata Nui is not actually where they belong: fans imagine Mata Nui (and plentiful Turaga) as the default for Matoran, because we entered the story there, but an island paradise (and a whole Toa team becoming Turaga) is not what was normal in the MU.

I also like it because it lets you have fun with the "who really is the destined team of Toa" story, where Mata Nui is putting forward the Toa Metru and Teridax is nudging forward the Mask Matoran. If the Mask Matoran couldn't become Toa, then what was the point of that? Lhikan would give them stones, it wouldn't work, he'd take them back, and he'd try again (right?). On the other hand, if they were able to become Toa, what's the advantage to Teridax in picking those six rather than the other six?

My proposed answer: Teridax has no idea. He can just read the signs that Mata Nui wants the Metru, so being the contradictory bad guy that he is, he figures a different set of Toa has got to be slightly worse. After all, Teridax has picked off a lot of great Toa already--the new Toa will need to be superb to do what the Mangai couldn't, and if the new Toa aren't quite what Mata Nui wants...

But what Mata Nui really wants isn't warriors; it's wisdom. The Metru do important and valiant things as Toa, but the single greatest thing they do is sacrifice their power for the Matoran, and that was an act of wisdom. When Mata Nui picked them, he wasn't only picking Toa who could save them once in battle, but Toa who could save them again in transforming, Turaga who could lead them.

I think this takes a little bit of the sting out of the end of LoMN (not necessarily a good thing--bittersweetness and loss is a huge part of Bionicle--but I think we do want our faves to be happy and significant). If being a Turaga is special and rare, then there's a eucatastrophic miracle in all six of them becoming Turaga at the end: a miracle that speaks of hope in a dark hour.

Maybe it would also explain why they founded six villages on Mata Nui: one village for each Turaga.

#Bionicle #Turaga #Toa #Toa Metru #Mata Nui #Metru Nui #Teridax

[wolfydoesstuff]

I've got a lot to say about Dark, not gonna lie.

This whole thing is based on my interpretation of AvA, by the way! Everything is just what I, a random person on the internet, thinks about a little red stick figure.

Note: I'll be using he/him for Dark and they/them for Chosen. (In normal conversation, both would be he/they or he/they/it in Dark's case, but it's easier on my brain to stick with one set per character.)

The thing about Dark is that he's very un-fleshed out. And that's almost "fine," if he was a one-off antagonist in AvA 5, maybe I could let it slide, but here we are.

Like, sure, we got The Flashback, but that was all from Chosen's perspective. Dark is there when he's relevant, but no more than that. He's been shown as nothing but "raahhhhh stab stab murder destroy" in most of The Showdown when I feel like AvA 3 and The Flashback established him as being more than that.

He was completely chill before being programmed (something I'm going to revisit), was able to work with what was in front of him, and had actually interesting interactions with other characters for being as early in the series as it was.

Later, The Flashback gave us a little bit more, with him being actually proud of making the ViraBot and also seeming to expect Chosen to be as well. Also Chosen and Dark high-fiving. That was just cute.

And then we got The Showdown. Don't get me wrong, I love the episode so much, but I feel like they took the previously established Dark and picked what they wanted to use and just forgot about it, turning him into a crazed murderer with no real transition to that from just wanting to do shit with Chosen. Then he slaughtered RYGB in cold blood and was blasted into a cliff.

Now a lot of people are saying how they don't think he'll ever come back and honestly, if that's what ends up happening, that'd just be sad.

Because Dark has so much goddamn potential.

He's already got interesting things that can be revisited and expanded upon more. After his (possibly temporary) writing off, I still had unanswered questions about him and his character.

We don't really know how much his programming affects him and his 'normal' life. Does being with Chosen and not doing anything to destroy them like his programming says he should? Are there any other things that come with being programs? Other pros and cons? We've got no fuckin' clue!

How does Dark feel about things in general? Life mindset, reactions to things going wrong outside of just murder, hell, even just an actual personality. Things that, for the most part, require a living, breathing Dark, whether to actually make sense or just not be as awkward.

And I've heard the arguments that not all the villains should have redemption arcs and Dark being dead is a reminder that there's other options, and I wholeheartedly agree.

I think that Dark could be brought back and be expanded upon while still being an antagonist. We can get to know him as a person, feel with him more.

And then it'll happen.

It'll seem like things are going well, he's going to turn around, but he doesn't. (This could also be a great opportunity to bring back to programming aspect.) And so, for one reason or another, Dark ends up actually dead, and people actually care for reasons other than its affect on Chosen.

And I feel like it's fitting.

The one who murders in cold blood for whatever reason is killed off at the end right as he tries to be different. (Or doesn't and just ends up being more sympathetic than we first thought.)

And that, my dear reader, is how to make the audience hurt and actually grieve a character, if only for the moments that they're dying.

Anyway, that turned from a rant-ish thing to what I'd do with a character, but I hope this whole thing made sense and you all have a good day.

Bye >:3

#ava dark lord #ava chosen #animator vs animation #idk man #just some thoughts #AvA 3 #AvA 5 #alan becker

[rrosiepetals]

don't know if you do ask but got curious what some of your favorite things about Marlon and also maybe your favorite pics of him in game

AAAA love this ask, thank you so much anon!!! I love Marlon and I will take any opportunity there is to gush about him!

Marlon is devoted, he’s got a good heart and wears it right on his sleeve. Take one good look at him and you see someone who’s (trying) to keep it all together. He was genuinely so passionate when talking about how well fortified Ericson’s had become. It was endearing seeing how much he boasted to Clementine about running the place and how he and all the other kids had worked so hard over the years to protect the school. 

He is a tragic character, and although only appearing in one episode, you can sense there is more to him than meets the eye. He is someone who has been weighed down by responsibility and by the world he was forced to grow up in. These kids had been sheltered, most of their lives had been spent surviving at the school. The teachers and other staff they'd looked up to… the ones that were entrusted to take care of them had abandoned them, leaving them for dead. As a result, they had no adult figure to look up to and seek guidance from.

Who could they lean on now?

This is where Marlon comes in; I like how despite his feelings of sorrow and betrayal, he decided to step up and take action, even though he was just as scared and confused as the other kids. It highlights just how much he cares for his friends; he doesn’t want to see them suffer and live in fear. It's a scary world out there; practically anywhere they go, it could mean death. However, as determined as ever, Marlon strives to make the best of their situation, and they work together to make Ericson the home that they never truly had before the apocalypse. The fondness in Louis' voice when he talks about him is really heartwarming and goes to show how dedicated he was when playing into the leader role.

Marlon is a person who will do anything in his position to protect his friend's safety. As the self-proclaimed leader of the abandoned boarding school, he goes to great lengths to ensure that everyone is well fed and has a good night’s sleep. When he speaks with Clementine, you can see the desperation in his eyes; shouldering so much responsibility alone for so many years is hard. Despite his doubts that cloud him, he attempts to make it work with the limited resources they have.

The situation involving the twins is extremely heartbreaking from both perspectives. Some people paint Marlon as this “heartless villain” who will just willingly hand over his friends like it’s nothing. I want to pose some questions. Do you think he wanted to hand them over? Did you think he hasn’t gone days upon days without sleeping? Wrecked with the guilt of his decision? Spending hours trying to come up with some sort of rescue plan to get them back? It doesn’t erase the fact that he knew these kids… he grew up with them in this fucked up world. He’s literally still a kid himself! What was he to do in a situation where all he had was a gun practically pointed at him by adults who could easily overpower them? Perhaps he could’ve handed himself over, however what would happen then? They’d just come back anyways and take the rest of the kids without a second thought.

At the end of the day, he wanted to be a good leader and good friend to everyone at the school. He kept all his worries and stress to himself so that the spirits of the school weren't weighed down because of him. He was so insistent that everyone abided by the safe zone rule so much to avoid any conflicts that could disrupt the peace they made for themselves. Thus, these built up emotions/worries caused his eventual downfall and he died thinking that all his friends potentially hated him for what he did. Watching those hurt and dejected looks on their faces when being confronted.. especially the look of sadness from his best friend. It hurt more than anything. I love how they handled Marlon, even if I wished he and many others had more screen time to truly shine, the amount of impact they had is worth it. Also many love towards his va Ray Chase, he put in his all with that performance!!!! 👏

A bit of a side note as well: Marlon had broken his own rule regarding the safe zone as he managed to save Clementine and AJ outside the train station. Why was he out there in the first place? I believe that he was actually planning to scout the Delta from afar, finding any weak spots necessary before making a solid rescue plan to get Sophie and Minnie back. No one else was with Marlon at the time as far as we know, only him and Rosie when he refers to "when we found you." I could be wrong but that’s what I’d like to think.

As far as picture wise go I have a few of them! Mainly love the ones where he’s smiling!!!

#twdg #twdg marlon #twdg s4 #twdg ask #sorry for the long post!!! #i actually hate this guy #💞💞💞💞

[canonkiller]

do you consider your self made?

#my art #self portrait of sorts #been musing a lot on disability recently and how being relatively freshly unable to do Most Things has changed my perspective on things #for a long time growing up i was fixated on the idea of being An Impact On The World yknow? mainly the next Big Writer #(and that it would be sooo impressive that everyone would make my books bestsellers when i was only 12 because it was That Good) #and i mean. obviously that didnt work out as originally planned because i was 12 and learning. but I've felt a lot like #I've kind of built my sense of self on those big achievements. even if they were only big to me. and a lot of them #are now out of reach or very difficult to reach. and it's been a lot to. recontextualize #to take what ive been told my whole life and ignore it in favor of just being being enough. #things will happen as they happen. i havent earned anything by suffering but it hasnt ended the world either #im here doing what i Can do for as long as I'm able to do it. and thats all i need to be for now #just making sure that i Do do the things i can do rather than assume i can do them later #anyways. love you #cw: #top nudity #artistic nudity #the dreaded ambiguously presenting nipple #if you put any pro weight loss eating disorder shit on here ill kill you btw #my body is sexy because im in it and im still alive. not because its struggling to stay that way #lindwormposting