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lyneira · 11 months

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♡ sorry, they're already taken ♡

-> someone confesses to you, his dear lover, in front of him, how would he react?

lyneira's 1.2k milestone event

Watches from afar

Cater, Jack, Silver, Neige, Jamil, Kalim, Che'nya

He trusts that you'll turn them down and he knows that you know how to handle the situation, so he doesn't see the need to step in. They're just expressing their feelings and there isn't any real harm done from it, after all. It would also be a funny story to recall later in the future.

Though, don't be fooled by this calm nature of his. If they dare try to touch you or make any physical advances towards you, he will be on the perpetrator in an instant and will ensure that they regret it.

Confronts IMMEDIATELY

Epel, Floyd, Leona, Ace, Riddle, Sebek

When he sees them confessing to you, he'd scoff, absolutely astounded. Has he not made it clear enough to everyone that you two were together? He's always had his arm around you, always talked about you, and was almost always by your side, so to say that he was shocked that a person had the audacity to confess to you even after all that was an understatement. So he'll confront them immediately, telling them to back off since you two are already together. And if they don't, he won't hesitate to get physical

Don't worry though, if you tell him to calm down, he'll listen to you. As long as they understand that you're already taken- by him specifically- he'll be able to cool his jets.

After they leave, he'll huff while grabbing you and hugging you protectively, muttering to himself that he should make it more clear to others that you two are together. Maybe he'll find more ways of doing so, whether it's giving you one of his belongings to wear, or giving you love bites in places for everyone to see 😏 he'll find a way so that something like this doesn't happen again, as much as he can help it

Finds it 'funny'

Malleus, Jade, Rollo, Azul, Lilia, Rook, Vil

He'd be amused by the situation. (Not a funny "haha" type of "amused", but a rather one of intrigue and surprise) Look, he understands why they hold adoration for you. He understands it himself all too well, so he can't find himself blaming them. At the same time, just because he understands doesn't mean he's willing to let you go or share you. It seems that it must be reiterated that you're his and he's yours.

He'll be "kind" enough to let them finish their confession before standing his ground by approaching you, pulling you close to him by the waist and giving an ever so subtle threatening smile to the confessor, "I understand your sentiments towards my lover, truly...and we would appreciate if you'd take your leave now"

Basically, he'd act possessive asf in this situation, just like in the previous category, except with a different and less explosive demeanor

Awkwardly steps in

Ruggie, Idia, Deuce, Trey

He'll step in if he sees that you're feeling awkward about the situation (otherwise he'll let you handle it if he sees you have no problem dealing with it)

But tbh he'd definitely feel just as awkward in attempting to explain it to the confessor. It could be a possible misunderstanding or that they didn't know that you were already taken, so he'll set things right, albeit sheepishly.

It's not until the confessor underestimates him and tells you to ditch him does a surge of confidence suddenly flow within him and he'll become more forward and direct in proving that they won't be able go break you two up.

He might be awkward in certain situations, but when it comes to defending you and the love that you two share, he won't hesitate to fiercely protect it.

a/n: tbh I felt "meh" about this one, but just wanted to have something out there and check if my posts are finally showing up again in the tags aaaa

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fanfic-lover-girl · 1 month

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Personal Appeal of Dramione

Since reading comprehension among some HP fans is lacking, let me reiterate with some disclaimers:

I do not ship Dramione.

I do not like Dramione, especially as it is portrayed in fanworks.

I do not think Hermione should be with Draco because I dislike Romione. Unfortunately, Romione is the best ship for Hermione...Ron could have done better though.

If anyone makes any comments about the previous points, it is proof they did not read my post properly. Sick and tired of pro Romione people asking how I can ship Hermione with her bully when I merely bring up anti-Dramione arguments I observed.

Anyway, I keep seeing some common arguments for people's disdain for Dramione. I agree wholeheartedly with most of them. The Ron bashing in Dramione fics is 100% out of control and I find it laughable that someone will say Ron is toxic but then say Draco is better. I love Draco but I live in reality (plus I would never pair my baby with a girl like Hermione). Maybe Draco has the POTENTIAL to be better in a well-crafted AU but the canon as it stands does not support this. I have commented that even the enemy part of the enemies-to-lovers ship for Dramione is boring and lacklustre compared to Drarry. Despite all of this, a part of me does find Dramione as an appealing concept and I think some Dramione antis are deliberately being obtuse when wondering why Dramione is popular. I want to write my own response to some sentiments I have seen:

If you want an enemies-to-lovers ship, Romione is right there.

I hardly consider Romione an enemies to lovers ship. Can you even consider them enemies at the start? Ron didn't like Hermione because her personality rubbed him the wrong way. He made a few deriding comments about her that led to her crying. Hermione acted naggy and intellectually superior and maybe she saw Ron as a bit of a delinquent? YAWN! What enemies! Technically they fit the definition of the ship trope but in the tamest way possible. As far as I am concerned, the emphasis was more on their friendship (they are friends for basically most of the series) and their initial dislike was a minor hiccup. They were 'enemies' for like 5 chapters in one book and the switch from enemies to friends was lightning quick - like one sentence quick.

But from that moment on, Hermione Granger became their friend.

I think Romione is better suited as friends to lovers but that's just my take. Just look at Sukka from ATLA. Sokka and Suki started off on a rough note but you would not call them enemies to lovers. Most of Romione's 'enemy' moments boil down to Ron and Hermione being teenagers and going through normal, hormonal teenage drama.

Compare this to Dramione. Draco scorns Hermione's very being and Hermione dislikes him before even having dialogue with him. They are on opposing sides from the beginning: opposing houses, opposing sides of the war, opposing values and ideologies etc. And it would have been interesting to see how that disgust and conflicting worldviews could have morphed into respect and love.

Draco already has a redeeming love interest. You don't need Dramione when you have Drastoria.

Drastoria is a decent ship but I don't like it for a few reasons. First of all, Astoria is a character I know almost nothing about. If I want to know about her, I have to search Google. She and Draco have hardly any interesting history shown. She's basically a NPC - a blank slate. Maybe Cursed Child fans would like Drastoria more.

Secondly, while it is admirable that Draco married a sickly, blood-traitor girl who might not have been able to give him heirs, at the end of the day she is still a pureblood. She's still a relatively safe option. Marrying a muggleborne person like Hermione would make a way more concrete redemption/atonement story. Hermione challenges Draco's worldview more than Astoria ever could.

On Hermione's end, maybe being with Draco could challenge some misconceptions she has about pureblood culture or something. Maybe being with Draco could even challenge how she views her femininity when we consider how pureblood women don't tend to be career-driven in canon, except fanatics like Bellatrix who are childless and have unhappy marriages. Also, I think Hermione's flaw of being vindictive and aggressive could have been challenged more in Dramione. I despise how JKR lets Hermione get away with murder in Romione. Even when Hermione is wrong, it ends up being Ron's fault. Disgusting!

Draco and Hermione would never touch each other in canon.

That's so true...that's why fanfiction and fanon exist. To explore creative possibilities. It's always a bit amusing when I see canon shippers of ships like Kataang, Hinny and Romione complain about the lack of fan content. Like dude, you have canon as your content. Of course, fanon couples will have a tendency to have more fan works due to the lack of canon material.

While many Dramione fics are annoying and totally OOC, there are some concepts that can honor canon that I find intriguing:

Draco and Hermione are forced to be together. This way they have to find a way to reconcile whatever bad feelings they have so they are not miserable for eternity.

Draco and Hermione meet as kids. This allows their personality and impressions of each other to slightly change before canon starts.

Draco and Hermione meet again as grown adults. Maybe Romione and Drastoria did not work out for non bashing reasons and they form a tentative acquaintance as mature adults which blooms into something more.

Draco begins his redemption/awakening arc prior to starting Hogwarts. I like fics where Draco begins questioning his parents' beliefs due to some external factor (like his Aunt Andromeda). That way Draco starts Hogwarts with a lot of his awful bigotry gone. Not all of it but even a small portion of it, making Dramione more feasible.

Draco was Hermione's bully.

It's called enemies to lovers for a reason...you know because the people were enemies. Duh. I will argue that Draco's actions towards Hermione are not as devastating as most people think and are totally redeemable. I will die on that hill (not really lol). All of Draco's biggest offences against her are verbal in nature and he arguably harrassed her the least in the trio. If JKR showed Hermione being impacted by Draco's slurs, I would 100% feel differently. However, Hermione treats Draco like an annoying fly - Draco does not hurt her in any meaningful way to totally dismiss Dramione as a ship in my view.

Draco and Hermione are happy in their canon ships

I love when my fav character ends up in a happy, loving relationship. I hate that Draco lost his wife which is one minor reason I dislike Drastoria. But that's besides the point.

Part of the reason why I dislike the teen ships Romione and Hinny is that they don't really matter much in the narrative. If you take them out, nothing changes, especially Hinny.

For example, there's nothing profound or grand about Ron marrying Hermione. The Weasleys are pro-muggle (...at least in spirit...) so who cares about Romione getting together? I sure don't. The most profound thing about Romione is that Harmione did not happen with Harry and Hermione being the male and female leads. However, Romione still occurs within the friend circle. Same with Hinny. They are safe pairings that don't challenge the status quo. Safe pairings are cozy but most tend to be uninteresting.

On the other hand, Dramione offers the potential for a richer narrative. It could symbolize the potential for change in traditional pureblood families - the start of an era of unity. Between Slytherin and Gryffindor, purebloods and mugglebornes. Because JKR ended HP with the chasm still wide open. Nothing changed except who was on top. Draco is the face of the younger Slytherin generation and is the scion of two prestigious pureblood houses. His ending the story being romantically involved with Hermione would have been amazing to see. Instead of seeing everyone still stuck in their own corners in the epilogue. How disappointing. JKR even ruined Harry's moving speech to Albus with that line about choosing Gryffindor if being in Slytherin bothered him so much. But JKR seems to love the status quo, so what else is to be expected?

Characters being happy in their relationships is great but I also like seeing how a relationship contributes to the themes of a story. Dramione could have offered more to the HP narrative than Romione, and maybe Drastoria, in my view.

These are my opinions. I truly don't care about Hermione so that's a big reason why I can't stand Dramione. But I do see the potential of the ship if written well.

#dramione #dramione critical #dramione fandom critical #draco malfoy #hermione granger #anti drastoria #anti romione #anti ron weasley bashing #harry potter series #ron weasley deserved better #anti jkr #had to get this off my chest #hermione granger critical #pro draco malfoy

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feysandfeels · 3 years

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I gathered you read the chapter... how are we feeling, any thoughts you might want to share?

There I was, writing on my journal after a decent day at work when this fucking bomb exploded quite literally on my lap. But fear not I am here and we shall discuss until we can make fucking sense of it. Should I even warn you of the length of this post, or are we all on the same “Luisa can’t synthesise for shit” boat now?

I. Azriel

I will start by saying that this does not make me hate Azriel or stop caring for him and wanting what’s best for him. I still do very much love him. This however does not mean I applaud or get behind how he expressed himself during this specially chapter. For me it was quite disturbing to see how he saw Elain merely as a sexual partner and thought that that translated into love. If he had made the distinction between being physically attracted to her and being in love with her, then I don’t think we would all be feeling like we are. Because it is fair to be sexually attracted to someone but not necessarily in love with them.

From what we saw I think we can gather that Azriel knows Mor is not into him and in his grief from all those years being in love he wants something immediate and there. On top of that he sees his brothers settled and feels like he is owed from the cauldron, so of course he starts seeing Elain as the perfect “solution” to his pain. Now, of course Elain (and no one for that matter) should be seen a solution to anything really. Much less he should jump on that boat and already think of her as his. Az, my sweet, possessiveness is not love.

When I first read the chapter something stood out for me, he said he’s envious of his brothers and the emotional stability they both have, the fact that they were both chosen by the ones they love. We know Az loved Mor with all his heart and although she loves him too, it was not corresponded on the same energy since she is well bisexual homoromantic. He, so far, does not feel chosen in that same sense, which only feeds his insecurity of being unworthy.

In his envy he oversimplified things, he saw what both Rhys and Cassian now have and did the simple most stupid math ever: he went Rhys+Feyre = love, Cass+Nesta = love... hummm then If I’m single and Elain is single then it must mean Az+ Elain = love. (Sugar I love you but that is dumb as fuck). This has the same energy of when you are in high school and you let your friends convince you that you are actually into someone when you are really not, but then you buy into it and start believing in it yourself. In this case he was the one who created that push and convinced himself that it was the right thing.

I think so far we can gather a few things of the place Az is at right now: he is feeling extremely lonely, extremely envious and extremely sad. I do not think this excuses his behavior at fucking all, but at least we know where he is coming from. He is clearly mistaking sexual attraction and possessiveness as love. But I do think it all stems from this turbulent place he is at emotionally, not because he is a bad person.

I do not thing he is a bad person for thinking of Elain as he does, because I truly think this is a set up for the growth he will experience. Is it a good look? honey no. But is it a realistic one? I dare say it is. As I said when I read this I got full on high school bull shit vibes, I thought “ohh I’ve seen this film before and I have lived it”. He is being immature and there is no denying. Which was only confirmed with him regifting that necklace... sugar... that was a dick move, very fucking dickish move -specially since it was alluded that they might have feelings for each other–. My man needs to do some emotional growth because yikes.

II. The Narrative

Now, I have said before that for me, Sarah’s strength lies not so much on her world building or the originality of her works (which is not to say that her worlds suck or her narratives are not interesting and offer something new), but it lies more on her characters. To me she has always excelled at creating characters that do exemplify the range of humanity in its good, its bad, and all that’s in between. Even you can look at stuff that your fave did and go “yeah not cool at fucking all”. At least I know I can and I adore almost every character in this series. I love characters not because they are perfect but because I can either relate to them or because they allow me to understand and experience points of view that are alien to my own experience. Sarah has never made characters black and white. Your faves will make mistakes. Feyre has, Rhysand has, Cassian has, Nesta has, Elain has, Lucien has, Mor has and Az has.

What make her books interesting from this perspective is that she says “characters development does not equal character growth”. Take Chaol for example –if you haven’t read ToG do yourself a favor and read it– his character arc is one of the most interesting and best fulfilled ones in that series because we saw him at his lowest, when we couldn’t empathize exactly and he was being an ass, and then we saw him question his problematic behavior and move past it. Character development means just that: that the character move from point a to point b. It doesn’t mean he will be better by the end, but it means movement. Character growth does mean he will hopefully get to a place where they are “good”.

I think she knows exactly what she is doing with Az and with this teaser. Need I remind you of the chaos the bonus chapter in ACOFAS left this fandom in for a solid two years. This got our emotions high and got us one way or another expecting to see where this will all lead. I don’t think any of us were expecting this chapter when it was announced that Az would get a pov.

III. Conclusion

To conclude I just want to reiterate that I don’t support how he’s is behaving. I think I am accepting how he is behaving. Acceptance however does not meant that I am behind it, it means that I accept it and I am willing to stick around to see him grow out of this and realize why this is all so wrong (because well you know I can’t actively engage with him since he is... you know... fictional). I have had moments like this with some of my closest friends irl with whom we’ve had talks about previous behavior and have had the “be fucking better” talk, which is something that Rhys essentially said (GOD BLESS YOU BOO), and is also a sentiment most of us shared, even Feyre, when Rhys forced Mor to face both of her abusers and then didn’t consult her when selling Velaris off to her dad. And to me that is part of what friendship means, it means being there through the growth.

Everyone has their own limits of what they can understand of a character/person. If this is your own then it’s fine, no harm no foul. If this is what makes you jump ship from Elriel (that’s their ship name right?) then hey all good, I’m sorry for your loss.

I am not an Azriel hater, nor I think I will ever be. At least not from the information I have right now. I do still love him and as I have said before I want to see him happy and with a healthy amount of self confidence (and no Azriel saying you could easily kill Lucien is not the healthy self confidence I am talking about). So if anything I am interested in the arc his character will face, we just caught him at a moral low –which to me still has a solid chance of growth–.

I hope this offer some light or whatever. And remember take it easy, it’s okay to feel things deeply but don’t quit in the middle of the war, we still have his book coming up and I am 100% that will enlighten us more.

ANYWAYS, LONG LIVE ELUCIEN BITCHES.

#jesus fuck that was a long one #Azriel #ACOSF spoilers #A Court of Silver Flames #A Court of Silver Flames Spoilers #Sarah J Maas #ACOTAR #ACOMAF #ACOWAR #ACOFAS #ACOSF #Elain Archeron #Inner Circle #Feysandfeelsasks

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aotopmha · 3 years

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Your thought's about mikasa's ending? I have seen people upset that she got the worst ending out of everyone even though she made the biggest sacrifice.

This made me think: which character do I think got the worst ending?

And I think it's 100% Historia. At least some hint of Ymir would've been nice. It's good in the sense that having a baby didn't somehow drop her position as queen, but that's about it.

Falco and Gabi get no thoughts whatsoever, but I think they at least got to reflect sufficiently beforehand and sort of end the main portions of their arcs then.

Second in row are Pieck and Annie who get to be the cynical balances to Armin. I'm particularly happy with this because they didn't leave off on a having babies note. None of the potential relationships are rushed to and pushed in your face 3 years later.

You can make some connections, but that is not the focus and that's really rare for shounen.

For example, I see Armin and Annie being championed around, but their interaction is a pretty neutral one. It doesn't confirm anything. The problem with the endings of these two (and this will become a trend) is that they are character-specific in very general ways. It's a very general ending.

A portion of the side cast is like this, namely Gabi, Falco, Annie, Pieck, Jean and Reiner. They have elements of their arcs, but the only one among them getting a sort of full-blown scene for only themselves is Reiner.

I think this is fine for Connie. Him getting his mom back is the best closure he can get after what he has gone through and it sort implies he can now get the emotional closure for becoming a soldier.

Pieck never had much of an arc to begin with, so her final moment being another "exactly right" moment is good, but it is very basic.

Annie's character arc is shown by her simply being there and taking action. The aim of it was for her to learn take action in the face of a cruel world. I see people complaining she's on the ship and not somewhere peaceful, but I think that would actually be much worse.

Equally, Jean's arc is shown by him simply being there. But there is the hint of him trying to look good for someone.

I think the biggest problem people seem to have with is Reiner and because of the Historia joke, that's all that gets attention.

But I think out of these four his is the strongest because his goal all the way back was to become a hero because his mom pushed him into it. For his mom to throw this expectation away is a very good way to end it for him.

The problem with all of these is that they aren't necessarily specific moments just focusing on their inidividual growth. But you also can't do that in 40-50 pages when there is other stuff to also cover.

The endings I strictly do think are solid are Levi's, Eren's, Armin's and Mikasa's.

I saw a post talking about how 95% of Eren's character was thrown out for the finale and I just don't think this is true.

I understand the complaining about the exaggerated outburst about Mikasa, but just go back to the Trost arc and the first chapters:

- Eren is no longer looking for revenge.

- He clearly cared about Armin and Mikasa since the start. So few people mention Grisha's words about him controlling this power to save them in the context to this final chapter. He did it. He gave them a new chance at life by the end.

- The story started with Eren swearing to eradicate the Titans and it ends with him essentially doing so. It's partially because of OG Ymir, but he is a big part of it.

- The most important part to me is that the genocide is condemned. Directly and subtextually.

- The entire point of this is that the consequences are single-minded and selfish. The story never set up Eren to be this selfless hero OR some blind monster who just wants destruction. He's motivated by what he personally cares for the most.

His ending is completely fine to me.

I think Armin's and Levi's endings are the best, with Armin's edging out Levi because Armin actually has a substantial character arc.

Armin's ending is a callback to the situation in chapter 11.

People hate Armin just because he supposedly killed Bert and "replaced" Erwin (because of the young coming after the old trope), but Levi straight-up says that he can't replace Erwin. Erwin's death is not painted as a positive thing. It's, again, a selfish decision.

But I love his arc. All he can do is the best with the circumstances he has been given and the talents he has. Him convincing the Marleyans through diplomacy is the best ending to his arc I think you can get.

He doesn't have to be coaxed into action. He acts with confidence all the way through. I think it's really good. There is so much talk about Armin worship, but I really think his journey and his principles aren't bad ones to emphasize.

Levi gets the closure for his friends at the Survey Corps. His is one of the more simpler character endings and his character is one of simpler ones. There is no need to look back at any context here. He killed Zeke and that's it.

Finally, there is the character you asked about, Mikasa. I like her ending. She is mourning Eren, but she still has the good memories of him and her friends are coming to visit her soon. I think the final sentiment is that while she lost Eren, she is not alone and will live on for them and in Eren's memory. I think as a big finale maybe everyone arriving at the tree to visit her would've been more emotionally potent and "definite", but I like it.

My biggest issue with the ending is actually how some of the characters were handled. I think all of the characters could've gotten at least a small scene all to themselves to show their growth and emotional state like Eren, Mikasa, Armin, Levi and to a smaller extent, Reiner did. Eren obviously got the most focus because he kind of caused a global genocide.

I very much think a lot of the issues people prescribe to this ending come from a lack of reading comprehension and selective reading. I really do feel like it. Obviously interpreting something is very subjective and maybe for some it's just a matter of conveyance or *how* things are written. I can understand where this comes from, too. But I just don't agree with a lot of the claims made I see.

Armin doesn't thank Eren for the genocide. He thanks him for willing to do it for them and says what he did was a mistake.

Eren isn't just doing all of this for Mikasa. He's also motivated by ending the Titan curse (for them to be free of it) and saving everyone else. This is meant to be selfish and single-minded.

OG Ymir "loved" King Fritz because she got approval from him for everything she did and eventually she wanted to be free from this awful relationship.

And I really do not think this is some 300 IQ reading strats, personally (I've seen people say you have to look at the tiniest details to make sense of it, but I feel like you really don't, just read everything they say and put it in context [together] with the previous 138 chapters. I can even explain how I do this if anyone is interested).

If anyone is interested, I can also explain why people might find the prose confusing and stilted.

I think the characters literally tell you what they are thinking. This is the case with stuff like Evangelion's ending, too.

I think it's the prose of those final two episodes and the series in general that also causes Eva to be labelled as confusing.

What I do think can happen is that the anime can expand on some of the stuff. Maybe add a few lines in for everyone to make their arcs clearer.

But at the same time some of those closures were in the earlier story, like the convo between Jean and Connie in 138 or Jean's daydream of a good life after everything is over or Reiner's confrontation and conversations with all of the characters during this entire arc. Everyone already has had some form of closure at least.

But some of it could be reiterated to get a smoother end to everything, I guess. I think it takes some people out of the story that some of the endings didn't feel as smooth as they could've been or didn't have as much of a neat bow attached to them as they could've had.

Thank you for the ask!

#Attack on Titan #Shingeki no Kyojin #Mikasa #Mikasa Ackermann #AoT 139 #SnK 139 #AoT #SnK #Asks

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dodgergilmore · 4 years

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YAS give me more jess/rory analysis PLEASE ❤

I ended up expanding on my season 3 thoughts in another post, so I’ll just ramble on about something different if we’re all good with that!

Let’s discuss how “You could do more.” is, in some ways, the thesis of the whole Rory and Jess dynamic.

When Rory is not amused by his magic trick during one of their very first interactions (what a sentence lmao), it shows that she isn’t going to put up with the facade he puts on in Stars Hollow. She doesn’t shy away from speaking her mind and pushes him to take responsibility for his actions:

“All [Luke] does is stick up for you, and all you do is make his life harder. I guess that's what you have to do when you're trying to be Holden Caulfield, but I think it stinks. (...) Funny, I never pegged you as clueless, my mistake.”

Again, Rory points out the act Jess puts on but this also shows how she isn’t going to just passively allow him to act in such ways because she doesn’t see him as the nuisance/lost cause that much of the town sees him as. Instead, she holds him to a higher standard because she knows he isn’t clueless.

After a well-intentioned suggestion on Rory’s part, we see her at odds with the expectations placed on her by the town as she becomes “the poster girl for censorship” and she can openly discuss this with Jess as someone who would understand where she’s coming from, because he is one person who is not charmed by Stars Hollow’s small town antics. Her future isn’t bound to this place, so when Jess questions what Rory and Dean talk about, saying that ‘he doesn’t seem like her kind of guy’ it adds another layer to that conversation; let’s be real, Jess is not coming from a place of entirely pure intentions but after season 1, Dean is basically the town’s golden boy (despite previously being the new kid in town) and thus is the embodiment of one of the two worlds Rory is caught between throughout the series: Stars Hollow. But right from the Pilot, we know that Rory is set to “do more” than Stars Hollow. That whole sidestory in 2x12 and its relation to Rory could be an analysis of its own, which I don’t think I am equipped to offer at this time...

By 2x13, Rory is pushing against and growing frustrated with Lorelai’s view of Jess. Rory recognises that Jess should not need a tutor, after trying to explain his margin-writing to Lorelai in the previous episode, and it’s clear that Rory believes in Jess in a way that he himself does not at this point. He meets her words of encouragement and “you could do more” with cynicism but Rory remains unconvinced. Schooling should not be a measure of success – and by season 6 it ends up being beside the point anyway – but it is interesting that Jess’ reasoning for not going to college has nothing to do with himself and everything to do with what others have to say about him.

And why aren’t you going to college? (...)

Ask my mother, she could give you a couple reasons. Oh, and I’m sure Principal Mertin can chime in with a few good ones. In fact, ask your mother. She doesn’t know me all that well but I’m sure she could improvise a few things.

Do not give me that whole ‘I’m so misunderstood, Kurt Cobainy’ thing. You are way stronger than that and I don’t even wanna hear it.

That whole conversation in the car really is The Goods. The paths they have planned for themselves could not be more different but still, they offer each other the same unwavering support and encouragement.

I wont go into detail because I think I’ve already addressed this in my previous posts today but “you could do more” comes into play even during their relationship in that Jess, as we know, does not generate the most positive views from the people of Stars Hollow, perhaps believing that Rory could do more, so to speak, than him. If nothing else, the town definitely thinks so.

Jess shows support for Rory’s Harvard-and then-Yale dreams, which is one of many reasons his reappearance in 6x08 works so well. He assumes she graduated early before considering she wasn’t in school; when Rory keeps commenting on how her circumstances are “all temporary” Jess is visibly... I don’t know that I’d say concerned at this point but he is definitely taken aback.

I know it's good. Jess, you've got such a great brain. I knew that if you could just sit down and stop shaking it around, you could do something like this. I knew it. I knew it.

I know you did. (...) So, I just basically wanted to show you that. Uh, tell you... tell you that I couldn't have done it without you.

Obviously Jess is confirming her “you could do more” sentiments when he explicitly credits the role she played in helping him find success for himself. In doing so, this reassures Rory that she was right about something after feeling the defeat of Mitchum’s words for however many months by this point, and also reminds her of the ambitions she once had for herself.

Neither of them do or say these sort things for “I want to be with you” reasons but for “I want good things for you” reasons. It doesn’t come from a romantic place – they sincerely want the other to succeed, even if that means being apart. Even after everything that happened, Rory is saying “I hope you're good. I want you to be good.” in that 3x22 phone call, and then this in 6x08:

You know that section toward the front, the staff recommendations? I'm gonna grab a copy of your book and put it in that section, and then I'm going to write my own little recommendation on a card and attach it so people see it and buy it.

Please, that’s just cute :(

Of course it ends up ending in absolute MESS but she goes all the way to Philadelphia to see his open house. Imagine if she hadn’t checked the mail that day lmao

I just got the flier, and I don't know. I just wanted to see your place, but then this...

In AYITL, Jess hears Rory out as she divulges the state her life is in then reassures her that she’s in a rut that she is fully capable of getting out of. “Where is this coming from? What inspired you?” indeed. The implications, y’know??

Now I’m going to circle back to what I said about Dean representing Stars Hollow for a moment here. Logan very overtly represents the world of wealth and like I said, Rory is between these two worlds. Rory is a balance of the world of her grandparents and her mother; what’s interesting about Jess is that he doesn’t belong to either world, really. He can exist in the world of Stars Hollow because of his familial connections and history there and that brings us some little moments that are not at all deep, but I absolutely love anyway:

Can't wait to hear how you bagged the job.

It was the usual thing; I submitted my resume, plus samples of my work, I was thoroughly vetted, there were several lengthy interviews, plus complex negotiations over salary, benefits, parking–

You asked Taylor.

Pretty much.

And then when he asks Rory over the phone to fill him in on the ‘showbiz spat’ in 3x14. Stars Hollow has an important role in Rory’s life, and Jess is able to understand that world in a way that Logan simply can’t – if I recall, he is actually quite endeared by the town when he makes his first official visit there in season 7.

Season 5 makes Dean’s place in Rory’s life very clear, first with “What am I doing here, Rory? I don't belong here. Not anymore.” in 5x08 and then in 5x18, when Dean is used as a direct parallel to Luke:

They want more than this. Don’t you see that? And all you are is this. (...) This town, it’s all you are, and it’s not enough. She’s going to get bored, and you can’t take her anywhere. You’re here forever.

It’s... kind of an odd comparison to make in that Lorelai is quite happy with her Stars Hollow life and hasn’t indicated that she wants “more” than this. For Rory, though, it does reiterate that she wants more than Stars Hollow can offer her. I’ve discussed this before but the world of wealth and Logan, while initially intriguing to Rory, loses its shine during season 6 and she ultimately rejects it in that she doesn’t want to be bound by it. It offers temporary thrills and escapism, but she ends up having to enter the real world.

In Summer, Rory talks about looking at places in Queens so that might be the best, most recent indicator of where Rory wants to be in terms of geography. Just like Rory, Jess isn’t bound to any particular world – bouncing around from place-to-place in the original series, not unlike Rory in the revival – and together... they can do more. And that is that on soulmate-ism!

All in all, they hold each other to high standards not because they idealise one another or put each other on pedestals but because they genuinely believe in each other’s capabilities. They actively push each other to do more and important to note is that they hear each other in these moments; maybe not always immediately but they get there eventually because by the end, it’s clear they have a certain respect and fondness for each other. I like that they don’t passively roll along with whatever the other chooses to do, which may be the very reason some people don’t like them. As much as their dynamic evolves with time, there are just some things that remain a constant...

#ask #somekindofhelicoptervalentine #literati #~you could do more #barely even mention them but i'll tag anyway:#anti dean #anti logan

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noxexistant · 5 years

Text

gamquick; “(but first) let me take a selfie”

fandom; marvel 616, all-new x-factor (2014)

pairing; remy lebeau/pietro maximoff

word count; 1.9k

rating; g

notes; this is my first time writing 616 and my first time posting a fic to tumblr in god knows how long,, please be nice. anyway, this is Dumb and Self-Indulgent, and i love gamquick So Much, and i think about canon insta baddie pietro every single goddamn day of my life

ao3 mirror

———

“Are you taking a selfie?” Remy asks, somewhat incredulously.

Pietro hums an affirmation, short and sharp in such a manner that manages to somehow convey the complex sentiment of, ‘Well, obviously, you imbecile.’

Granted, Pietro does look the kind of way that warrants a selfie. His outfit and general aesthetic choices tend to pendulate between the extremes of ‘godly’ and ‘unspeakable’, but his current outfit is definitely the former. It’s a linen suit in a summery shade of periwinkle - and Remy hates that he not only knows those terms but also managed to string them together, but he manages to soothe the knock to whatever ridiculous attachment to traditional ‘manliness’ he’s still coddling with the observation that his boyfriend looks fucking incredible. The suit is fitted perfectly, tapered to his narrow waist, and Remy waits for the next sound of a camera shutter to lean over and grab Pietro’s ass through the delightfully tight, light fabric of the slim-fit trousers.

He likes to imagine that the camera managed to capture Pietro’s face perfectly, but it’s more than likely that the photo turned into a blurred mess because Pietro is turning to swat at Remy before he’s even really had a chance to appreciate the ass grab, which is very unfortunate, because Pietro’s ass is the best.

“Go and pester someone else,” Pietro snips, landing a fairly solid playful backhand to the apple of Remy’s cheek - only playful in that it doesn’t actually shatter Remy’s whole face - as he pretends to still be invested in his sleek smartphone. “Lorna’s in the other room. Why don’t you go and tell her that her green dress is an adventurous choice? Very capricious of her.”

Despite his stinging cheek, Remy laughs easily and falls into Pietro, arms winding around his waist from behind as he glances down at his phone screen, catching sight of the camera app still open and just a glimpse of the previews of previous selfies.

“Don’ upset the lady,” he admonishes, leaning close to his lover’s ear and looking up to meet his eyes through their reflection in the full-length mirror before them. “‘S’not nice to tease your sister, cheri.”

Unsurprisingly, Pietro rolls his eyes.

“If she didn’t want my teasing, she should’ve at least gone with a better shade. The seafoam dress was nicer, but she insisted it reminded her of one of Father’s outfits. God forbid. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the man outside of red and purple.”

Remy can’t say he’s all too familiar with Erik Lehnsherr’s wardrobe.

“‘S’this the latest in you guys’ elaborate familial judgement, then?” he asks, “Fashion?”

He raises an eyebrow, going for an unimpressed look, but his face breaks into a smile when Pietro does The Thing - meets Remy’s eyes in the reflection and lets his own become open and warm for just a moment.

“Believe me,” he says airily, “I’ve been judging my father’s fashion choices for as long as I’ve known him.”

Remy tilts his head in consideration, still smiling.

“Must be those bad genetics that influenced that cargo shorts look a couple weeks ago, then.”

His smile widens when Pietro’s expression becomes once again deeply serious, eyes narrowing.

“How many times must I reiterate that not all tan shorts are cargo shorts? The definition of ‘cargo shorts’ comes from the pockets—“

“—Okay, okay, so no extra pockets,” Remy concedes, releasing Pietro’s waist for only a moment to splay his hands in surrender, “But they were ugly. Luna thought so, too.”

Pietro makes a face that Remy struggles not to classify as a pout.

“Luna hasn’t been educated in proper fashion-practicality balance yet.”

“Ah, right, right. An’ that one suit you like t’wear when we go out to fancy joints - the one with no pockets so I have to hold your phone and wallet all night - that’s fashion-practicality balance?”

There’s a twinkle in Pietro’s eyes as he meets Remy’s gaze again, despite the flatness of his tone.

“You’re fashion-practicality balance.”

The gasp Remy lets out is wounded, apparently convincing enough - despite his huge, stupid grin - that Lucifer comes trotting over to investigate.

“I’m a glorified seasonal accessory,” he weeps. Despite the fact that they’ve spent several seasons together. Many, in fact. And Remy apparently hasn’t gone out of fashion.

Unfortunately, Pietro is too busy giving Lucifer and an approaching Figaro stern looks to respond, shifting his feet as they get closer to nuzzle around his shins. “I swear, if either of you get your claws anywhere near this suit—“

“—They won’t. An’ if they do, ‘s’only ‘cause they love you.”

“I don’t care. They’re menaces. Where’s Oliver?”

“Still asleep on your side of the bed, if I had to guess. ‘S’his favourite place. ‘Cause he loves you. Same as me. You’re their stepdad. Step-cat-dad.”

“How many times must I tell you to stop calling them your children?”

“They’re my babies.”

The sigh Pietro lets out is long-suffering and entirely affectionate. It makes Remy want to smile so hard his face really does shatter, especially as Pietro’s face once again softens as Figaro looks up at him and meows sweetly.

“I love you, y’know?” Remy says, letting his jaw rest against Pietro’s shoulder to speak right against the rapid pulse in his neck. It’s for the intimacy, yes, but it’s also mostly just so he can feel the shudder that runs through his love.

“You may have mentioned it in passing,” Pietro says, the same unimpressed tone, but it stings just a little in the way that it always does, because he doesn’t know. Remy could say it a thousand times over, in English and French and every language that Pietro has expressed similar sentiments in and then taken the time to patiently teach Remy to echo the pronunciation. He never manages to make the words sound quite as pretty as Pietro does, but Pietro always smiles at him when he gets the words right, smiles like they really mean everything, even though he can never quite believe them.

“God. I love you so much. Mon trésor. Mon colibri. Mon bibou.”

That last one, as he knew it would, earns him something that’s almost a laugh, a dusting of pink appearing across the apples of Pietro’s cheeks.

“Stop getting sappy,” he says. “If you adore me, then maybe you’ll brush your hair and finally get a shirt on. We do have places to be.”

“Only place I have any interes’ in bein’ is by your side.”

Pietro retches, but Remy manages to see how he smiles even as he laughs against Pietro’s neck, arms looping tighter around his waist to hold him close.

“If you were anyone else, that woulda worked,” he says, as put-out as he can pretend to be. “You got your standards all backwards, mon ami.”

“Clearly. I should’ve gone for a man who knows how to dress himself in a timely manner.”

“Now, I know we got real different definition of what ‘timely’ means.”

“Right now, I’d say it means that the task should be completed at some point before we’re expected to arrive.”

Remy shrugs easily. “Never heard’a bein’ fashionably late, cheri? An’ who are you to talk? You’ve been admirin’ yourself in the mirror for the whole time I was in the bathroom.”

“Failing to give yourself a decent shave.”

“I like havin’ stubble!”

Pietro levels him with another unimpressed look, but it once again softens as he reaches backwards to trace his thumb across Remy’s jaw. Remy smiles and leans forward just enough to kiss his fingertips, just a gentle peck against each one while he appreciates that Pietro’s staying still for once, until Pietro’s holding his jaw again and turning half around in his arms, enough to finally press their lips together. It’s slow and soft, washed warm by the midday sunlight from the bedroom windows, and Remy treasures it for as long as he dares before he peeks his eyes open a little to look at their reflection, make sure he clicks the volume off and gets the angle right.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, when they finally pull back just an inch. “That one looks the best.”

Pietro looks up at him, brows creased in confusion, until Remy holds up the phone he’d easily taken straight from his lover’s hands minutes ago. Pietro scowls, snatching it back in a blur, but whatever ire he holds is immediately forgotten in the face of the photograph on the screen - the two of them, pressed close and kissing, Pietro’s hand against Remy’s neck and one of Remy’s holding Pietro’s waist while the other holds up the phone. It’s not got the best composition - Remy isn’t exactly well-practiced when it comes to taking selfies whilst fully distracted by kissing his boyfriend, but the warm glow of sunlight across them, Pietro’s pretty outfit and artfully messy hair contrasted with Remy’s sleep-rumpled form dressed in nothing but a pair of ugly pyjamas trousers, gives the whole photo a vibe that he treasures. It’s them, solid proof that this is something real, and, judging by that soft look in Pietro’s blue eyes again, he agrees.

“You’re ridiculous,” he says, then mumbles something in a language Remy doesn’t recognise at a speed he could never hope to even comprehend - Pietro’s regular speed. By now, though, Remy’s gotten used to that being Pietro’s equivalent of an ‘I love you’ or something similar, and it makes him grin like an idiot, leaning forwards to press a kiss to that sensitive spot beneath Pietro’s ear.

“Only with you, cheri,” he says, directing a wink at Pietro in the mirror and enjoying the eye roll he gets in response. “Hey, don’ be rude. Just got you our future holiday card photo, didn’t I? Your sisters are gonna love it.”

“I suppose Lorna’s already seen you in most states of undress, but I’d rather not share the sight with Wanda.”

Remy chuckles, hooking his chin over Pietro’s shoulder. “‘S’pose you were takin’ the photos for her anyway, huh?”

“For Wanda?” Pietro asks, then shakes his head casually. “No. They were for my Instagram.”

…“Your what?”

Lorna comes in to chew them out for being late before Remy can get an explanation. He gets dressed about as fast as he ever has whilst Pietro makes entirely unhelpful comments and enjoys his misery, but then his boyfriend brushes his hair and picks a cologne out for him, all intimate and domestic even if it’s made slightly less picturesque by Lorna’s growing frustration.

They all spend the day beneath the warm sun, drinking expensive alcohol and drifting from gazebo to gazebo across a perfectly-kept lawn as they schmooze and chat and act all casually heroic, and Remy almost entirely forgets about the whole Instagram thing.

At least until they’re home and he and Pietro are curled up in bed together, and Pietro drops his phone on Remy’s chest.

Remy picks it up to see Instagram open on a post on what must be Pietro’s account - a collection of photos taken over the course of the day, candid photos of the team and a couple of Pietro’s selfies and, finally, last in the set, the picture of the two of them. There’s no caption, but there are—

“How many likes?!”

#gamquick #quickbit #pietro maximoff #remy lebeau #all new x factor #my fics #i don’t think we’re ever told whether pietro succeeds in his quest to become an instagram star but i think we all know he did #the internet loves arrogant pretty boys with unnatural hair colours and lean muscle #also is this dumb? yes. is my characterisation off? unquestionably. but we’re all just here to have fun and this was very fun to write

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presumenothing · 5 years

Text

on haibara in the dog lovers kidnapping case: a throughly unscientific review

aka @deductionfreak slapped me with the hatchet so now i’m legally obliged to write the essay. bearing in mind that i’ve never written meta before and that it’s also 1am but now or never so leggo

(for reference, this is file 290-292/ep 233-234)

((also: am reading the raws, so salt this for my probably-flawed comprehension))

[morning eta: mangadex link in case anyone would like to read along]

zeroth of all, context for the case: this directly follows the bus hijacking, about 10+ days later in-universe per conan’s dialogue

ALRIGHT SO can i say first of all that i like how this case starts, bc the mental image of haibara and agasa dropping off the kids (conan included) before going to park is just plain hilarious. have a nice day at school crimefighting y’all

not so fun: haibara half-hiding behind agasa and looking warily around, and that’s before arthur (the dog, not the author) barks not-nicely at them. which at least lets us learn that they both pet a doberman just this morning!! pls tell me this is at least a semi-regular occurrence bc yes it should be.

unfortunately that’s the last of the warm fuzzies we get for a while bc haibara herself proceeds to give one of her chilly monologues. you know the kind. in fact she does it three times this chapter and all aloud within the others’ earshot, which is unusually many? even for her? but we’ll get to that later (probably, i’m not writing an outline for this or anything). anyway, line 1, regarding arthur:

“an odd one out, a dangerous person… in my case… to the contrary, it might actually not be an error…” (仲間外れの危険人物…私の場合…案外勘違いじゃないかもしれないわね…)

which is a similar sentiment to what she expressed in the previous case, i.e. the bus hijacking, that she’s dangerous and Does Not Belong. but just as important is her subsequent action when conan reacts – she brushes it off like she’s joking and absolutely refuses to engage. (uncoincidentally this combination of commenting about a lack of belonging then deflecting happens almost identically in higo’s intro case.)

somewhat ironically neither her nor conan seem to notice that the db have in fact realised and are plotting away, though their attempts to interest her in picking a gift only begets line 2, this time about doyle (still not the author):

“because if i, like marie, were to vanish with the dew on the guillotine… just like her beloved dog tisby, you too would chase after me and throw yourself into the river seine, wouldn’t you?” (だって私がマリーのように断頭台の露と消えたら…彼女の愛犬だったティスビーみたいに、私の後を追ってセーヌ河に身を投げてくれそうじゃない?)

this time she doesn’t even wait for conan to react before deflecting right off.

both these lines basically neon-light sign that she’s still stuck in the mentality aka cloudy-with-a-chance-of-death fear from that bus hijacking – that she ought to disappear so as not to endanger the rest, and no one should rather miss her. and agasa’s description of her behaviour since essentially confirms it: not wanting to leave the house, not eating properly, apparently not even sleeping well. yes i am in fact crying inside

in return we learn that conan had in fact called to say that the bus passengers’ background checks cleared (probably why he was surprised that she’s still wound up now). also, he’s in fact taking her dire predictions of “the org will murder everyone around me/you if they find out” at least somewhat seriously. unfortunately haibara does not hear this part.

finally after doyle disappears (and haibara does actually participate actively in the following search, which i bet a virtual dollar is more interest in anything than she’s shown for the past ~2 weeks) we get line 3 after conan suggests that doyle might’ve hidden somewhere in fright:

“that’s true… to live afraid in hiding, with the terror that you may be found eventually, there’s nothing quite as harsh…” (そうね…いつかは見つかるかもしれない恐怖に怯えて隠れ住むぐらい、辛いことないもの…)

pleasant thoughts indeed. but interestingly, this time when conan reacts and tells her to cut it out, she actually engages to respond. third time’s the charm? or more likely because he asks if she’s sulking only about the possibility of assassination nbd which probably suggests to her that he’s not being as serious about this as she thinks he should be. this is reflected in her calling him “an optimist without any plans” before reiterating the danger they face if she’d been found out – without knowing that conan had said almost the exact same thing very seriously to agasa literally just hours earlier.

but of course! she wouldn’t! because conan responds by cheerfully reassuring her that she definitely Has Not Been Discovered. sometime later (aka in the jodie & heiji case) she will learn via overhearing that conan’s hiding org-related things because of his promise that she needn’t worry, but at this point she takes him at face value and responds with perfectly comprehensible incredulity: “how can you say something like that!?”

and his response (which she’s shown to be briefly surprised by) starts to negate that idea of him being a zero-plan optimist, because he has in fact considered and dismissed the possibility of someone from the bus having targeted her.

…by detecting a lack of killing intent with his detective-y senses.

alright, so maybe he’s only half an optimist with even less of a plan. reassuring.

(two notes here:

one, conan’s answer here is absolutely inconsistent with his earlier words to agasa, where he reasoned more logically that (a) any Org agents that might’ve been coincidentally on that bus shouldn’t have noticed Haibara’s presence, and (b) it’s been 10 days they would’ve murdered us all long ago otherwise. which points to him not being as certain of things as he claims to be here, but that shouldn’t really be a surprise to the readers.

two, if it’s not already obvious, haibara’s evaluation of conan at this point is not as accurate as she assumes it to be – a revolutionary concept that we later revisit via her thoughts in the post-bloody valentine murder-by-vcr case.)

anyway, they proceed to brush things off with some collective salt, and haibara stalks off declaring that she’s 100% done with detectives it’s almost 2am, i’m allowed to paraphrase??

after which case resolution happens, etc etc, followed by what is inarguably among the top 10 Best Haibara Panels ever, but tl;dr –

the three lines collectively show that the fear and doubts/thoughts of escape raised by the bus hijacking didn’t miraculously end just because conan physically saved her and told her not to run (her accepting that doesn’t really happen until the higo intro case but that’s a whole ‘nother post which i am def not writing), but the subsequent conversation starts her re-evaluation of both conan himself and the idea that… well… you don’t have to be blindly optimistic to be optimistic? or at least not end-of-the-world pessimistic?

which – and this is important – still does not solve everything: if nothing else the ever-lurking possibility of pursuit still remains in her mind as of the subsequent case (aka genta’s barbershop adventure) and arguably only gets partially resolved during the later cases as brought up above.

and on a last note: how Good™️ is it that what finally breaks her doom&gloom mood is reaching out to reassure arthur that nobody is mad at him anymore? at which point the db reveals their topsekrit plans to cheer her up because they’re good children who deserve many good doggos, and i should sleep before this degenerates any further into drivel? responses welcome, i’ll figure out what to tag this in the morning. presume out

#detective conan #haibara ai #tiny science saltchild #detco meta

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shiikadai-archive · 7 years

Text

here it comes (the unavoidable sun) | voltron

i realized i would never write this bc i’m a Lazy Fool so i thought i’d just post my somewhat in-depth outline of shiro and allura throwing themselves back into the tournament so that they can rescue matt bc he’s obviously still there DUH (also i’ve conveniently chosen to assume shiro comes back bc, to reiterate, obviously he does DUH)

after ages and ages of searching for Matt, the squad (read: Pidge) discovers that he’s still stuck cycling through the tournament

since only the winner of the tournament is allowed to dictate the terms of their imprisonment, Matt has essentially been stuck in limbo

Shiro reasons that, as the previous Champion, he has a shot at winning the tournament and renegotiating the terms of Matt’s imprisonment if he wins again

Allura, however, refuses to let one of her Paladins go on such a dangerous mission unsupervised and insists that she tag along

Shiro and Allura land on one of Galra’s satellite moons in a small pod

Allura disguises herself using her shapeshifting abilities

Shiro grows a beard ?

Allura masquerades as a dealer wanting to get in on some cash and negotiates with another dealer to sneak Shiro and another contender (read: herself) into the games

a subtle and sentimental moment follows where Shiro assures the princess that they’ll make it through this before the two are separated and taken to their holding cells

there are two objectives at play here:

Shiro’s primary objective is to make it through the tournament so that they can negotiate Matt’s terms

Allura’s primary objective is to find Matt and garner as much information about the Galra’s plans for the future while they’re here, as well as somehow survive the tournament

finding Matt is relatively so much easier now that they’re in the tournament, but his head is a little lost and he’s having trouble remembering how he got here and where he was before

Shiro not only has to focus on the tournament but on jogging Matt’s memory because it is absolutely not an option that he brings back an amnesiac brother home to Pidge

the fights are definitely harder this time; there’s a new overseer in control and he’s much better at calculating which prisoners to pit against each other so as to keep a constant flow of competitors but to not let anything get too out of hand

Allura comes back beaten near bloody from one of her fights and Shiro is almost tempted to yell at her but he sees this fierce look in her eye and she wipes the blood from her lip real easy

and the thoughts in his mind fracture for a moment, because he thinks of how he nearly lost her to Haggar when they broke the source of the quintessence

she’s in reach of his arms this time but he’s still unable to do more than look on and hope for the best and watch her fight like hell to grow stronger than she already is

sometimes they pass each other while their respective groups of cell mates are on water or bathroom breaks and there’s this look that they have for each other

even while they’re murmuring quietly to each other about how things are progressing, Shiro’s fingers brush over her knuckles and there’s a catch in her breath and he asks if she’s okay and she just whispers “yes” while refusing to look him in the eye

it’s a few weeks before the semifinals of the tournament roll around and Allura has been eliminated by this time but she is still made to watch the matches and every time she sees Shiro she can’t help but cringe

because here’s the thing - he’s so used to the pain, to every blow to his shoulder or abdomen or jaw, that he hardly reacts and just pummels back at his opponent with equal force

and Allura thinks of how someone so gentle with her can condition himself to be so hard given a particular situation

her eyes lock with his as he comes out of his match, the winner and the first contender for the championship title, and the smile he sends her way makes shivers run down her spine

of course, you’re probably wondering where Matt fits into all of this

it’s surprisingly a combined effort that helps jog his memory a little at a time; Shiro and Allura will stand on either side of him on water breaks and just talk about Pidge as if it’s any other day and Matt will remember some tidbit from his childhood and his heart will lift and for the first time, he’ll feel like he can actually make it through the day

in fact, the day before Shiro’s final match, Matt says that if Pidge has made herself into someone new for the sake of getting back to him, that he’d like to show her he’s tried to change to get back to her, too

his hair has grown long by this time, but Shiro uses the heat from his Galra tech arm to shave off Matt’s hair from the sides and cut it a little short and shorn a Jewish prayer into one side of his head

and then, it’s the final day of the tournament; Shiro wins, as expected (and desperately hoped) by Matt and Allura, and all seems good as he files into the overseer’s office until a paper is held in front of his face and all it is is his reflection staring back at him

Shiro doesn’t even realize until too late that he’s being injected with the serum and it’s a splitsecond before everything goes Galra purple but he sees Allura’s face, and the scar on her left eyebrow or under her jaw and the short, jagged cut to her hair, and the cracked skin of her lips, and then he has to close his eyes

he comes out to the crowd with the overseer holding his hand aloft and announcing that the Champion has returned, and Allura is down in the prisoners’ box wondering what the hell is going on

but then the overseer is calling for a challenger to battle the recrowned Champion and Allura has to find out where the hell they are in all this so she tugs her hand from Matt’s - he holds on for so, so long, and it pains her to let go but she has to, if they’re going to get out of this - and marches up to one of the guards at the gate and says that she’s the one going into that arena

the guards, of course, are amused that some girl who got beat up in the first few round is daring to challenge the Champion, but they call the overseer anyway

and of course, in the overseer’s eyes, this makes for the perfect bloodbath, so he gives the okay and Allura steps into the ring and starts running through how best she can communicate with Shiro while still making their fight look good

but then she’s fighting him and she barely has a chance to talk before he twists her arm so hard and Allura sees stars, feels the pain rocket up her spine as she tries to catch air

her head twists in an effort to meet Shiro’s eyes but all she sees is black, and then the overseer hanging above them in the box with a disgusting smile on his face and it all sort of sucker punches her at once

Allura blacks out from another hit and before she knows it she’s waking up in the cell, Matt’s hand on her arm and his questions running past her mind as she fits all of the pieces together

there’s so much anger and anguish filling her up and Allura just clutches at her hair and screams for a second before tucking her head into her knees and breathing heavily for several long minutes

it takes her a few days, but she regains her composure and formulates a plan and the first part of that plan is to disguise herself and get Matt out because not only is it what Shiro would want, but after being here for so long, it is what Matt deserves

so she gives him the instructions that Pidge had given her for sending the signal and waiting for Keith to pick them up while Lance provided cover, and it takes a while for her to convince him to go, but she tells him that Pidge needs him more than she does, and that’s something he can agree on, so he goes

and then, finally, it somehow comes to the point that Allura hadn’t been expected to anticipate but did anyway, because she is a princess and a leader and this is what she does, is foresee and plan accordingly so she can get things done

every waking minute in the holding cell is spent utilizing any opportunity to strengthen herself or train so she can throw herself into the tournament again

she makes small talk with the other cell mates and works herself into a position where she can practice on others and collect information all the while without giving herself away

and when the tournament begins again, Allura doesn’t spare herself any time to watch Shiro the way she used to when he battles, with concern or agitation; the look in her eye is always calculating and observant of angles and trajectories and weights

she’s building herself into a mirror of Shiro, or at least she’s trying to, and every battle that she goes into she comes back out from bloody but not beaten, because she’s stronger each time she shows her face in the arena - she has to be

and somehow the weeks go by and she doesn’t know how she’s lasted this long without smile-cringeing at Lance’s jokes or fussing over how best to get along with Keith now that he’s part Galra or trying to talk to Hunk about Altean food or recounting memories of her father with Coran or trying to learn more about Pidge’s likes and dislikes or seeing Shiro genuinely smile, but it hurts, it hurts, it hurts

the semifinals of the tournament come along and it’s a miracle but she makes it, kicking and screaming because she has to get to Shiro before he loses himself to them, and as she’s walking out she notices there’s a small patch of hair missing from her forehead, but for some reason she doesn’t even care

the day of the final round her hands hardly shake and she runs her fingers through what hair she has left, brushes her thumb over the scars that mar her skin on every possible surface

his eyes are black when she looks into them before the battle but as soon as the siren sounds Allura is screaming and she’s yelling at him about how Keith is probably dying to see him and Pidge is worried sick and Lance can’t handle being without someone to look up to or to have guide him and Hunk just needs everyone to be okay or his anxiety will skyrocket

there’s no sign that he’s listening but she claws at him, doesn’t think twice about resting her eyes on the scarred bridge of his nose or the nice shear to his undercut or what used to be a hard but gentle jaw

everything at this point is about clawing past the black and into the soul, and there’s a moment near the end where she thinks it’s all over, because it’s Shiro, and really, how can she face off against him?

but when she throws her arms his way for one last punch, her wrist slips into his hand and their eyes meet and it’s so quiet for a second, she swears the world stops

and it’s ages and ages, but a fleck of gray comes back into his pupils, and then another, and another, and pretty soon Allura of Altea is staring at Takashi Shirogane, and her eyes are welling with tears upon tears

he whispers to her to kick his ass and drag him through the dirt because he deserves it for being so optimistic and letting himself get caught, and she throws him down to the ground, and Shiro’s face is as composed as ever but she can tell that on the inside, he’s just laughing and laughing

they’re a lot better about dealing with the overseer now, and because Allura is feeling a little bolder with each day that passes, she doesn’t hesitate to reveal herself to the overseer and promptly threaten him if he speaks a word about their deal or who they are

she and Shiro sneak out the way they came in, make it to the dropsite, and send the signal, and while she has come to appreciate Keith, Allura is so happy that it’s Hunk who comes to get her and Coran who covers

she dissolves in Hunk’s arms and starts to cry, and when Shiro asks from within Coran’s arms if she’s okay, she can’t bear to respond it’s all overwhelming her so much

they get back to the castle and the others are ecstatic, Pidge rushes for the infirmary and with Matt’s help - she’s so happy to see him, she’s been lively enough as it is but with her brother around it’s like she’s a walking lighbulb - washes the blood off of Shiro and Allura and properly sutures and bandages any of their open wounds

it’s a long time before they’re alone together, but Shiro is lying in his infirmary bed and he can’t sleep and he asks her, “How did you do it?”

Allura smiles, gets up from her infirmary bed and walks over and talks it through - the strenuous training, the detailed observation, and the continuous struggle

he’s so proud of her he can’t help but hold up a hand to cup her face, and it nearly takes the breath out of him when she leans into the touch

in fact, his voice is so hoarse that when he finally says “Princess” it sounds like a plea, and Allura just opens her eyes and says, “Allura”

“What?”

“You called me ‘Allura’ when you were worried about me”

“I’m not worried about you right now”

“Of course not, but you were worried about me, at least once”

Shiro nearly cries from the thought, but he pinches his nose and keeps it in, tucks his forehead against hers and wraps his arms around her waist before pulling them back down to the bed together

and neither of them has to say anything but Allura closes her eyes and smiles soft, tucks her head into the crook of his neck and doesn’t startle when his lips meet the patch of skin where no hair lies anymore

it’s well past midnight in a galaxy a dozen light years away and it’s been who knows how long since they were home, but they are, and home is her body tucked under his arm while she closes her eyes and drifts off to sleep

Shiro thinks to himself, “I love her”

and for the first time in a long time, his eyes close, too

#takashi shirogane #allura of altea #shallura #vld #voltron #voltron: legendary defender #*hc

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