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theoldsports · 5 months

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married.

Coriolanus Snow x reader | 5.5k words

alcohol makes consent messy, substance abuse, manipulation, arranged marriage, public humiliation, two-way abusive relationship <3

Coriolanus may well replace Lupin as my favorite guy to write for. he’s fucked up. i can’t fix him, but i could certainly make him worse.

As quietly as possible, [Y/N] closed the door to Coriolanus’s lavish new apartment behind her. She didn’t particularly want him to know that she had left the apartment in the first place. There were always too many questions.

[Y/N] had recently moved in with Coriolanus since their engagement. Her parents had arranged their marriage with his grandmother, affectionately called the Grandma’am not long before she passed. Coriolanus was about the most desirable bachelor in the Capitol. Not only was he an excessively handsome twenty-three year old, but he was also growing increasingly wealthy and had recently received his first assignment as a Gamemaker working on creating a new arena structure for the Hunger Games. Everyone who was anyone in polite society knew of Coriolanus Snow.

And [Y/N] hated him with everything she had. She had to see his defiant smirk in school every day for years since they were twelve or so. She hid from him every chance she got at home. [Y/N] slept in another room away from him. The only advantage of their marriage were the politics and name recognition for the both of them.

“I didn’t realize you were going out.” Coriolanus said flatly, snapping [Y/N] from her thoughts. She hadn’t even realized he had been in the apartment’s common area. He was sitting calmly in an putrid-looking armchair, alarmingly still.

[Y/N] gasped and clutched her chest in surprise. “Is there a problem with my leaving?” She said quickly.

“No problem.”

[Y/N] looked at him curiously. “Okay.” She said and moved passed him to her bedroom.

After a moment of pause, Coriolanus appeared in her doorway. He leaned against her doorframe with a hand in his pocket. “Where were you, by the way?” He asked plainly.

“I don’t see how that’s your business.”

“It was beginning to get late. Our engagement party’s in two hours. I cannot very well attend an engagement event without my fiancée. So. Where were you?”

“Dry cleaner’s.”

Coriolanus let out a scoff. [Y/N] could see him get hot under the collar. “You expect me to believe you were—Where’s the laundry?” Coriolanus questioned.

[Y/N] reached into her coat pocket for the stub of her laundry receipt. “Dropping off, not picking up. You’re on Lucky Flickerman’s next week. Dropping off my dress ahead of time. Anything left you would like to accuse me of?” [Y/N] sighed, leaned against her desk chair.

“Do not speak to me like that,” Coriolanus begun, sighing. It was obvious that he felt undue humiliation from her response. “It’s childish and unbecoming.”

“So is your being a hypocrite.” [Y/N] snapped back instantly.

The pair fought daily. Never had Snow laid a hand on her, but it wouldn’t be surprising if he did one day. [Y/N] didn’t recall any particular fights he had been involved in at the Academy, but it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen.

“Stop acting like a child!” Coriolanus repeated. “Are we not allowed one remotely pleasant moment together? You know I don’t want this just as much as you, but here we are. Can’t we be civil?”

“I am capable of civility, yes. You, on the other hand…”

“You’re disgusting. You don’t know how to listen. It blows me away. I asked you a simple question that a married couple should ask the other when one is gone. Now you’re screaming at me like a little girl. Grow up.”

“Grow up? You wanna talk about childish; you’re selfish, demanding, and cold. I’m scared to death of you. You make me feel like a toy, not a person, Coriolanus. I was always pretty fucking certain children had toys, not grownups.”

“Good gracious… Fine! Be that way. Cause a fucking scene!” Coriolanus screamed. His temper flared. He got that look in his eye that only men can get when they lose something they wanted. “My coat and tie are black. I’m assuming you’re not intending to clash or something, so just letting you know. Y’know. Communication. The polite thing to do.” He reported and stormed out of her room to his own. Her door slammed so hard behind him that she feared in may splinter off its hinges. What must the neighbors think of them?

[Y/N] resisted the urge to shout for Coriolanus to drop dead.

She was left to ready herself alone. As she pulled out her dress (that wouldn’t look foul against Coriolanus’s coat and tie) from the closet, she caught a glimpse of the engagement ring on her finger. White gold with a moderately sized ruby set in the middle. She was told both the gold and the stone were real, but she had her doubts to some extent. She found it was difficult to believe anything Coriolanus said. The ring made it clear that Coriolanus didn’t truly know [Y/N] because she had always worn silver jewelry. She felt isolated from all her prior jewelry pieces as now, none of them matched.

Then, [Y/N] stepped into her dress. A flowing black ballgown with a full petticoat and a glittery exterior over the fine satin it was made from. She couldn’t quite complete the buttons running up the dress’s back. She sat down at a small vanity Coriolanus had purchased her to do her hair and makeup. She assumed he would be hard pressed by the fact she couldn’t button the back of her own ballgown; that she was incapable or needy.

After dragging kohl and shadows over her eyelids, among other things, she set out to find the correct pair of shoes to match the dress.

The problem with dressing to match Coriolanus is that he was excessively tall. This meant every dress had to be accompanied by the tallest heels one could find. [Y/N]’s ankles ached just thinking about a night in shoes like that again. With her makeup done and her dress unbuttoned down the back, [Y/N] set out to find the red heels Coriolanus had purchased for her. She sat unceremoniously on the floor with her large skirt fluffed out around her to dig in her closet for the shoes.

Coriolanus was fastening his white gold and ruby cufflinks that matched [Y/N]’s engagement ring when he knocked at her door.

“Yes, what?” She shouted from the floor.

Coriolanus pulled the door open without asking if she was decent. “I was going to ask if you were ready, but I can see that you aren’t.” He sighed. Coriolanus never apologized after a fight, instead he tried to placate in whatever way possible. He was incapable of an apology, [Y/N] thought. Whether it was buying her something, taking her out, helping her find something she had lost, that’s what he would do to ease his own guilt. If he could feel guilt.

[Y/N] sighed as well. She was unwilling to engage in verbal sparring with him now. She lowered her head in a visual show of defeat. “I can’t find my other shoe,” She said weakly. “The red ones you got me.”

“The red heels?” He asked quietly. Coriolanus perceived she was not much in the mood for his attitude, and felt his residual anger cool off several degrees.

[Y/N] nodded hopelessly. She didn’t want to go to the engagement party. She didn’t want to be marrying Coriolanus under terms such as these. [Y/N] felt like property and everything hurt.

“Let me look,” Coriolanus said. What he meant to say was ‘I’m sorry for everything,’ but what he said was: “I’ll help you look. Don’t wrinkle your dress, alright?”

[Y/N] stood up awkwardly, holding the falling bodice of her dress up. She felt uncomfortable being so vulnerable in front of him like this. “Sorry, I couldn’t button the back.” She said. With her free hand, she reached around the back of the dress in an attempt to close it.

“Don’t apologize. I’ll get it. Turn,” Coriolanus commanded plainly. [Y/N] did as he said. He notched the buttons down her back with ease. “You should’ve called for help. I didn’t realize you were struggling.” He said. He patted her shoulder to signify he was done with the back of her dress. Coriolanus moved in front of her closet and bent down to find the missing left red shoe.

It was silent for a moment. “Of course you weren’t aware I was struggling.”

Coriolanus offered no reply. He understood what she meant.

“Aha!” He said after a few moments, holding up a matching set of shoes. Coriolanus placed them on the floor in front of her so she could step into them. He offered [Y/N] a hand for stability as she did so.

“Thank you,” she said. “Hey, Coriolanus?”

“Hm?”

“Are you nervous?”

“No,” he replied, standing up from the carpeted floor. “Are you?” Coriolanus’s blue eyes were piercingly inquisitive. Eyes that didn’t want to know you, but to consume you.

“Yes.”

“Really? Why?” Coriolanus asked. It didn’t feel rude or hot-tempered. It was merely a plain question. It made [Y/N] feel safe to answer, even though she remained guarded.

“I’m presenting myself as the soon-to-be wife of the most important thirty-under-thirty in the Capitol in an arranged marriage. And you hate me. You have hated me since we were children. My life is over, Coriolanus. This is for you and for my family’s honor, evidently. What do I have left?”

“You think I hate you?” Coriolanus asked, bending his neck to look at [Y/N]. “I don’t hate you.” [Y/N] wasn’t sure how truthful the statement was.

“Well, at least, you don’t like me.”

Curiously, Coriolanus placed a hand on her neck and dragged his thumb across [Y/N]’s jawline. “That’s such shit, [Y/N]. I didn’t realize you thought that of me. That you… Felt that way at all,” he started carefully. “Rather, and this sounds silly, I enjoy arguing with you. I sort of thought you did as well. You’re ruthless, I admire that,” He smirked and paused for a breath. “I do like you. Believe it, or not. I’ll just have to figure out a way to show you better,” Coriolanus’ hand slid from [Y/N]’s throat, down her side and back to eventually rest at her waist. She blinked up at him, surprised at the luxury of such unexpected contact from him. “Your life is not over. You wanna work, work. You want to not work, stay home. Please, allow me to do what I can for you. I can open doors. Whatever you want, name it. Things, opportunity,” [Y/N] nodded at the word ‘opportunity.’ “You’re meant to be my wife and I’m… really, I’m one of the best resources there is around here. Let me use that advantage. Had I known sooner, I wouldn’t have wasted all that time and money buying you things you hate.” He attempted a casual joke, holding her too close to him.

They were closer physically than they had ever been. Due to their proximity, [Y/N] had to rest her hands on Coriolanus’ chest as she stared up at him. She didn’t know what to say, so she nodded and straightened the red rose at his lapel. “You just might get yourself that unified front with me if you bring home your work…”

“You’re interested in Gamemaking? Since when?”

[Y/N] rolled her eyes. “We’re going to be late. We can speak about this later.”

“By all means.” Coriolanus leaned down awkwardly and kissed her. Maybe it was out of duty, maybe out of desire. Neither of them knew. They had shared the occasional peck on the lips for social reasons before, but this felt a bit different. It was charged somehow. A promise.

When they separated, [Y/N] stared at Coriolanus. He was all eyes - blue, blue, blue. He blinked at her. She blinked back. “Come on, we’ll be late to our own party.”

—

The whole ride to the event venue, Coriolanus had kept his hand on [Y/N]’s thigh. This was an unusual gesture. Normally, he didn’t chance touching her, even by accident. It was an unspoken agreement to keep their distance.

“I’m gonna be sick.” [Y/N] groaned into her palm as she exited the vehicle, led by Coriolanus toward the door of the event hall. The building had been destroyed when they were children in the war and had been recently restored to its former glory.

“Same thing as earlier, or did you decide I’m the worst person on earth?”

“Same as before. Haven’t decided about the second thing. My parents are going to be here too. You remember them?”

“Yes. I’ve met them… Twice, I believe—”

“Tread carefully.” [Y/N] said, offering no additional support.

Coriolanus nodded in solemn understanding. His eyebrows knitted together, knowing one more nasty, exhausting troublespot would be in his way tonight. He hated social gatherings as much as [Y/N]. With all the gentleness he could muster, Coriolanus took her hand. “Heading inside… Unified front?”

“If I must.” [Y/N] said.

With that, the night took off. Bright flashing cameras reflected off the black and white marble of the building, and applause rang off the large, cavernous walls. Everyone was shaking their hands, greeting and congratulating them, and stopping them for overly pictures at every turn. For a moment, [Y/N] truly believed that everything in her life was perfect, because everyone around her seemed to assume that it was. It made the pill of her future easier to swallow.

Coriolanus led her around the room with ease. He introduced her to many individuals whose names she would not remember tomorrow. She was beginning to develop a stunning routine of artifice with him as Coriolanus puppeted her around the room. Each interaction functioned with a greeting from Coriolanus to the stranger, he would remove his arm from [Y/N]’s waist and drag it down her arm into her hand in order for her to showcase her striking gown. Then he would say “isn’t my fiancée beautiful?” or “isn’t she just divine?” or “what a lucky man am I?” [Y/N] would chuckle and compliment him back with “my Coriolanus, ever the charmer!” or “isn’t he just divine?” or “what a lucky woman am I?” accordingly. They would smile sickeningly and pretend they were in love, he would lean in and kiss [Y/N] on the cheek, and she laugh warmly at his ‘spontaneity’ and place a hand on his chest, or straighten his tie.

After that, they would move on to greet the next poor sucker and repeat the process.

Eventually, [Y/N] dragged Coriolanus off to the side so she could relax her artificial grin. “Sorry, I need a moment. My face hurts. And that last man and his wife, was that his wife? They stunk. They smelled so foul it is unreal.”

Coriolanus smirked. “Those were my next door neighbors growing up. Vile. They’re very heavy morphling users, if you couldn’t tell with the glazed over look and twitchy eyebrow.” Coriolanus mocked.

[Y/N] laughed, hard. “Oh, you’re terrible!” She jeered. “Damn, what I wouldn’t give for morphling tonight…”

“Don’t tell me you’re a junkie, now.” Coriolanus pressed.

“Junkie is such a strong word…”

“Well, since I can’t get you high out of your mind at the moment, best I can offer is posca. I can grab you a glass and you can hide from the onslaught for a moment.” Coriolanus offered.

“Please. A particularly stiff glass if you can swing it. Or whiskey!” [Y/N] said. She watched Coriolanus turn to leave for the bar. [Y/N] tucked herself in a corner behind a noble Corinthian column for a moment of peace. A few people came and went that she greeted with that 1000-watt fake smile of hers, but she was mostly left unbothered. [Y/N] caught sight of a clock and realized Coriolanus had been gone for several minutes longer than he should have. She excused herself from talking to some old woman that claimed to be some distant great aunt or something of Coriolanus’ and set off to locate him and her posca.

Cutting through the crowd, [Y/N] spotted tall Coriolanus over most everyone’s heads, holding two glasses of posca, and speaking to her parents.

Fuck.

Her parents.

[Y/N] rushed sharply towards Coriolanus. She stopped short of approaching. She wanted to listen in for a moment to what they might be saying. [Y/N] knew her parents were of the socially treacherous sort. She turned her back to them and stood, pretending she didn’t know they were there.

“…Hasn’t given you too much trouble.” She heard her mother laugh.

Coriolanus laughed uncomfortably back. “Ha, not too much, no,” He said. “She’s quite fiery, for lack of a better word, though. Tough. She’s a tough woman.”

“You’re a strong young man, Coriolanus. I’m sure you’ll find a way to put her in her place. You can’t have her compromise your image and all that, you know. She can just be so destructive.” Her father said.

[Y/N] felt her heart sink. The positive interactions she had with Coriolanus were slipping out of her mind by the second in overhearing the conversation.

“Ah, yes sir,” Coriolanus said. “We’ve got a whole lifetime for—“

[Y/N] turned around and stomped over to Coriolanus. “There you are!” She said, returning that winning smile to her lips. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you, dear,” [Y/N] the pet name coming from her mouth made her nauseous. She grasped Coriolanus’ arm firmly. “And you got me a drink? You really are a dear, aren’t you?” She smiled and turned to her parents. Coriolanus felt tense beside her; she could feel it in the muscles in his arm.

Both her mother and father embraced her lovingly. “Oh, [Y/N], you look beautiful as ever.” Her mother said.

“Thank you,” [Y/N] said flatly, not returning the compliment. “If you’ll excuse us, there was someone else I wanted Coriolanus to meet. We’ll be back around soon. Love you!” She muttered, pulling Coriolanus away from her parents.

“Give me that.” She said, as soon as they were out of earshot, taking the glass of posca from Coriolanus.

“They’re…” he started in reference to her parents.

“Dreadful. I know,” [Y/N] heart felt broken. She didn’t even have a chance with Coriolanus without their humiliating influence. She didn’t want to dive into rationalizing his overheard conversation. So she just morosely stared down at the floor.

“They’re cruel to you,” he remarked as [Y/N] drank. “They told me I should work on breaking your spirit.”

[Y/N] took a long drink from her glass. “Are you going to? Break my spirit, I mean.”

“Haven’t decided,” Coriolanus replied. “Is tonight terrible so far for you?”

“Absolutely and unendingly.”

“Shame, since it’s supposed to be for us,” Coriolanus frowned. “Here’s what we’ll do. Drink up and we’ll dance. You told me you liked to dance once. Still true?”

“Uh, yes. You remember that?” The truth was that Coriolanus forgot very little.

“Too much talking, not enough drinking.” He replied, reaching out to tip the stem of her posca glass up, forcing the drink towards her lips.

“You’re a dick.” [Y/N] snapped. Her voice echoed from the round glass at her mouth.

“Never heard that one before.” Coriolanus said sarcastically.

A total of five empty posca glasses were settled on a cocktail table between them after about forty-five minutes of chatter and drinking. Coriolanus seemed looser than before, but focused as ever. The third glass, and the last half of Coriolanus’ second, had sent [Y/N] over the edge into drunkness, however.

“Dance with me now?” [Y/N] slurred slightly.

Coriolanus held his hand out as an affirmative response. She took it and he led her towards the dance floor. “FYI, I’m going to lead. You’re falling apart.” He leaned in to whisper teasingly as they approached the shiny wooden floor.

“If you’re shit at this, I reserve the right to take over as lead.”

“You have zero faith in me,” Coriolanus said, grabbing her too firmly in a waltz hold. She placed her hand on his broad shoulder. “Don’t think, just follow. I’ve got you.” He said, staring at her. Blue, blue, blue eyes, completely unreadable. Coriolanus sloppily led her around the dance floor, keeping the spins to a minimum. Sober, he was probably a fairly decent dancer. [Y/N] was reflexively a fine dancer as well, but a bit sloppier than normal. The thing that was actually holding back her dancing abilities, were the damn red heels. Her feet ached and she didn’t think she would be able to keep up with much more than a waltz in them.

The next song began after only half the length she had expected from a waltz, [Y/N]. It was a brisk foxtrot; all reliant on footwork. As Coriolanus led her into the first sidestep, [Y/N] kicked off her heels without missing a step. She harshly kicked them aside, sliding them to the edge of the dance floor. [Y/N] found she felt tiny now in front of Coriolanus. His smirk doubled at the sight as well. “Better?”

“Much. How about you shrink six inches next time so I don’t have to grow six inches. Seems fair to me.”

Coriolanus laughed cordially. His laugh turned into a sigh when he noticed [Y/N]’s lack of reply. “Are you angry with me?” He was aware that she usually was angry with him, he was asking specifically she to the conversation with her parents.

“Yes, why?”

“Because you’re being extremely rude.” Coriolanus said sharply.

“And?”

“No reason, just making conversation.”

Coriolanus couldn’t figure out what [Y/N] was looking at over his shoulder, but he didn’t care enough to ask. “Wanna make it up to me?” [Y/N] asked. “Posca wasn’t enough.”

“I’ll consider it. The terms?” He replied, spinning her through a tempo change.

“I want to make my parents hurt. I don’t live under their roof anymore. She’s been staring at me since I took my shoes off. See? I’m embarrassing her. And you know how big you owe me.”

This gave Coriolanus pause. Really, he didn’t owe her anything worth a damn. She was as bad to him as he was to her. “Why?”

“You said you could grant me opportunity. Grant me the opportunity of making her feel a fool for making me marry you, Coriolanus. I’m drunk. This offer is only going to work right now.”

“What’s in it for me?”

“Blowjob.”

“I have an idea,” Coriolanus said immediately. [Y/N] grinned. His job was having wicked, awful ideas, so it was nice when he delivered. “Do you trust me?”

“No.”

“By the end of tonight, you will,” Coriolanus grimaced. He rotated the pair of them on the dance floor so [Y/N]’s back was to them and he could keep eyes on her parents. “I’m going to touch you.” He whispered in her ear when the music shifted to something more akin to a rumba.

“What?”

In seconds, [Y/N] felt Coriolanus’ nose slide from where he had whispered in her ear and down her neck to above her pulse point. He planted one kiss to her throat. Coriolanus waited before kissing her again to make sure she didn’t throw him halfway across the event hall in rage first. After that, he felt he had the go-ahead to work more forcefully. Coriolanus sensually kissed hard up and down the right side of [Y/N]’s throat, while both of them tried to keep their fuzzy brains clear enough to keep dancing. He kept kissing and sucking at her neck until she let out a nice loud sound of pleasure. That was when he pulled away. He was happy to see a nice purple bruise starting to form on her exposed neck.

“How was that?” He asked dryly, trying to hold off a pending erection.

“You’re out of your mind. Do it again.”

“I’m pretty sure my boss is here, [Y/N]. That was… great, but unless there’s—“

“We got lectured our entire growing up at the Academy to make sure we were to be winners by any means necessary, Coriolanus. Push the envelope. It’s our night. We can do whatever we want. Let’s make it count, at least. With all these cameras here? You keep this up, and your face will be on every periodical in Panem.”

“Yeah, for terrible reasons!”

“Any press is good press and you know that. ‘TROUBLE IN THE ARENA?: GAMEMAKER’S FIANCÉE BREAKS DOWN AT PARTY,’” she said, showing a fictional headline example. “Below it, a nice picture of me crying and you dusting me off like a dutiful husband. Have your way with me and eventually I’ll snap and cry and accuse you of something you didn’t do, then you can ‘put me in place,’ so to speak. Control the fucking news cycle til everyone knows your name.”

[Y/N] could tell that Coriolanus had in fact agreed to gamble with his image when his hand slid down her back and grabbed her ass. His mouth ducked back into her neck as well, biting harder than [Y/N] expected. [Y/N] let out a painfully loud moan without meaning to.

“You want a show, let’s give ‘em a show.” He muttered against her skin. Coriolanus pulled his hips flush against his. The fabric of her ballgown being the only meaningful barrier between them. After a few moments, they had given up any chance at a rumba. Coriolanus stood over her, kissing her bruisingly hard anywhere we could reach.

“Coriolanus,” [Y/N] muttered. She gripped his shoulder tightly to steady herself. “Fuck, that feels good.”

Coriolanus took his hand out of the one that was clutching hers and slid it up to grab her face harshly between thumb and forefinger. “Can you shut up for a minute? I’ve let you run your mouth all day. It’s getting annoying,” He said, the mask of kindness slipping from his eyes. “You have had a complaint about everything. I put up with it, too. It’s getting… really,” Coriolanus’ hand gripped her ass harder over the ballgown. “Fucking annoying. You’re already making me do all this because I’m a dick. Stop being a brat. Please keep your mouth closed until I want it open, okay?”

He was holding her face so tightly that she couldn’t even nod. That’s when she saw the cameras start flashing, as Coriolanus gripped her by the face like a spoiled child and rubbed her ass in front of everyone she knew. “Yes.” She tried to mumble, but it came out squished.

“Great, then, we’re clear. Don’t think, just follow.” Coriolanus leaned forward and kissed her blazingly. That’s around the time [Y/N] could hear her mother in hysterics stomping to the bathroom. She sighed with relief, but also burned with humiliation. It felt like Coriolanus was practically trying to fuck her with her clothes on.

[Y/N] couldn’t believe this. This wasn’t brutally argumentative Snow, this wasn’t pseudo-gentle Snow. Who was this? What the fuck was he doing? Why did it feel good? [Y/N] felt a shiver tingle down her spine as he kissed her. Aggressively, she kissed back in an attempt at delivering that ruthlessness Coriolanus said he prized. He squashed that quickly and leaned her back, almost knocking her off her feet. She pulled back breathlessly.

[Y/N]’s eyes were darting around the room, watching everyone watching her. She was the show tonight. For the first time in her life, someone had made her the real center of attention that she always craved to me. Coriolanus granted her opportunity. It fucking worked. Her gaze shot back to Coriolanus, looking down at her possessively. He was mouthing something to her, but her intoxicated brain couldn’t signal her eyes to focus enough to piece together his words.

“What?” She whispered, leaning away from him.

More clearly this time, Coriolanus mouthed. “Hit. Me,” He leaned in close to her ear and whispered. “I told you. I’m leading; I have an idea.”

[Y/N] started to shake her head ‘no’ at her insane exhibitionist fiancé, but she remembered she was the one that had asked for a show. Without asking why, [Y/N] feigned disgust and stepped away from Coriolanus. She raised her hand and sharply slapped him across the face. This elicited gasps of shock from their guests. She could see a red mark beginning to develop on Coriolanus’ fair cheek.

Violence like this is what people in the Districts did. This was not what well-bred, promising youth from the Capitol did. The chatter in the room grew in the form of prying hushed whispers. The band stopped playing. This was not how beautiful young girls behaved at their engagement parties. [Y/N]’s stomach dropped. She looked angrily between her vile hand and the mark on Coriolanus’ face. Both of their expressions showed that she had hit him harder than they expected.

“How many men, [Y/N]?” Coriolanus asked, forcefully.

“What?” [Y/N] asked, shocked. She had no idea what he was talking about.

“How many men have had you behind my back?”

It was a fucking act. No truth to it at all. He wanted a rise out of her and so did the cameras. This was exactly what she had asked him, she didn’t realize how seriously he would take her.

[Y/N] sighed. She understood her role and she was going to play it perfectly. “One. Only one, I swear. None since you caught us in bed.” Lie. “Stop. We’re…” she glanced around, playing ashamed of the cameras. “We’re in public, Coriolanus. Please. Don’t cause a scene.” She said, parroting what he had said to her that morning.

That line did the trick. She saw the vein in his forehead pop out. “Don’t cause a scene? You struck me!” Coriolanus roared. “That’s unfair, and you know it.” The ghost of a smirk played on his lips while he clutched his face.

“You wouldn’t hear reason! The accusations you made of me, Coriolanus. You—You—“

Coriolanus surged forward and grabbed her by her forearms. “Accusations that are warranted. I don’t know how you expect me to trust you after something like that! Do you think I’m made of stone?”

“Yes!” [Y/N] yelled truthfully.

Coriolanus paused. “[Y/N], I hurt just as much as you do. You’re drunk. You’re not thinking straight,” He placated. “I just can’t stand to see how these men look at you like that, knowing you would trade me for them in a heartbeat.” He brought the tempo of their fight down with his false melancholy.

“Coriolanus…” [Y/N] said tentatively. “I wouldn’t… Not now. We’ve put that behind us. I-I’m yours and—“

“I made this whole night about you. I…” Coriolanus swallowed dramatically. “I love you.” Lie? “I love you, I spend all night trying to show you that I don’t want anyone but you. I try to make you feel special so you won’t stray again. And you, you hit me… I can’t do anything right enough for you.” He turned his face away, feigning hiding tears and released her arms.

Without the stabilizing touch of Coriolanus, [Y/N] was starting to feel uncertain on her feet from the alcohol. Far from gracefully, [Y/N] sank to the floor, her skirt fanning out around her as it had when she was searching for her shoe earlier that evening. From the drink, the tension and the state of her shambling life, [Y/N] let out an unexpected sob. Coriolanus turned his head in genuine surprise at the sound. “I’m sorry, my love,” she started through sniffles. “I’m sorry. Forgive me,” She looked up at him as her mascara began to drip down her cheeks. “Please forgive me. You have every right to leave, but please, Coriolanus, you’re all I have left.” That part was true. It was all gone. Her childhood home, the security of her parents, university and the Academy were behind her, taxing relationships with friends she had outgrown. Coriolanus was all that remained. [Y/N] cried harder. “I made a mistake.” She howled.

Coriolanus was impressed, to say the least. Cautiously, he knelt down in front of [Y/N]. He would remember this image of her for his whole life. With her mascara running, her stockings ripped, her shoes long missing, the top of her extravagant dress sliding too low for public consumption, she was divine, truthfully. That was her. That was how he would always want to remember her. “Darling?” He said quietly.

Now, the bastard was left open to play the dutiful savior, just as she had teased earlier.

[Y/N] started to twist the engagement ring off of her finger, theatrically. Coriolanus took her obvious bait and took her hand to stop her. He slid the ruby ring back down her finger calmly. “Darling, I’m not going anywhere. You’re drunk. You just need a little help, right? You mustn’t drink so much. It breaks my heart to see you like this,” Coriolanus squeezed her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing it softly. “You need me. I’m not going anywhere. What kind of husband would that make me if I did?”

She nodded. “Thank you,” she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “You’re a good man, Coriolanus,” LIE. “You’re too good to me.”

“Come on,” Coriolanus rose from the floor and extended a hand to her. “Let’s get you home, huh?” He said condescendingly.

[Y/N] took his hand carefully. He pulled her up and she stumbled to her feet. Coriolanus wrapped an arm tightly around her waist and pulled her closer. He glanced around in surprise to address the crowd that had gathered in front of them. “I’m sorry for everything you just had to see. Please be kind to my fiancée; she’s had a lot to drink. Posca, right?” Coriolanus darkly attempted a somber joke. “I should’ve kept a closer eye on her. We’ll be getting home. Thank you all for coming out to celebrate us tonight.” Sorry to call it a night with so much night left.” He said softly.

Coriolanus led her to the edge of the dance floor where he had spotted her shoes. He grabbed the red shoes from the floor and carried them dangling from his free hand as he walked her to the door and down the stairs to the sidewalk. [Y/N] had a vague memory of Coriolanus summoning their driver via the valet at the door. She was too busy noticing how her stockings caught on the sidewalk with every step.

“Darling?” Coriolanus whispered, leaning down to whisper to her. “You were brilliant.”

“Really?” She sniffled hesitantly. “Because I’m fairly certain that everyone in that room hates me.”

“Any press is good press.” Coriolanus reminded her with a gentle kiss to the forehead.

“For you, maybe. I made a mistake asking for that…” she kicked at a stray stone on the sidewalk. “I am probably the biggest villain in Panem right now.” [Y/N] said, shaking her head a little with a sad laugh.

“Not a villain,” Coriolanus scoffed. “A star.”

PART II HERE

TAGLIST:

@badwicht @stelleduarte @cinnamongirl127 @prettyppetty @soulessien @bejeweledreverie @jjstyles @ndycrls @arminsarlerts @catlover420sstuff @chmpgneprblem @co1dmountains @watermelonharry @ohantonia @miscellaneousmoonchild @lille999 @pumkinnxsmut @nananarwhal @taykorsyogurt

sorry - some of them would not process and actually tag! i tried!!!!! non functional tags indicated with strikethru

#coriolanus snow x reader #coriolanus snow #the hunger games #hunger games #coriolanus snow imagine #coriolanus snow x you #coryo snow

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ladymelisande · 9 months

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The reaction to this season could be summarised as:

Fandom decides to be deliberately obtuse about how stories and three-act-story structure works.

Guys, even YouTube videos explain how stories work, will tell you this magical phase:

The couples often break up in the second act.

Remember the homework Neil sent about watching P&P? Okay, think very hard and remember... What happened in the second act of that story?

It's not queerbaiting, you are just allergic to conflict, honestly.

I literally work teaching children and yet I think the kids are less obtuse about things than this fandom. And if I am talking to you are it's because I am repeating, many times, that you need to cool off and think before you go for your pitchforks to the writers for obeying basic rules of storytelling.

PS, but also warning because I'm tired of seeing the same thing: No offence, but I am the literal last person someone can come with the excuse of “We are behaving like appalling arseholes because we have been oh so burned before [insert tragic backstory]”. I don't give a shit how “burned” you were and how much you “suffered”. Back in the times of Sherlock or Doctor Who fandoms, I wasn't the kind of kid to side with the fandom acting like fucking shits because something in the didn't go the way they wanted. I was on the side that got harassed by the so called 'victims' because I said this behaviour was shit. So, honestly, spare me your tragic backstory about the Sherlock or DW or whatever “burned”. I am not gonna side with you because I never did. Period.

#good omens spoilers #good omens #last post about this I swear #I need to finish watching but the STUPIDITY is trying my nerves

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thehighladywrites · 4 months

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— “it’ll be our little secret, professor”

☀︎ - pairing: eris vanserra x reader

☀︎ - summary: you hook up with this delicious older man for one fun night to forget your scummy ex, what do you do when the same man turns out to be your new professor?

☀︎ - warnings: smut, oral (m.receiving), hint of degradation, taboo relationships, student x professor, both are obviously old enough, i just want him so bad GOD

☀︎ - amara’s note: this is going to be a series where i’ll post text threads with prof eris, headcanons, just different things. I’m planning this series to be about 10 chapters, but I literally have no structure, I just write. also i hope you like this as much as I do. and if you see any mistakes, no you don’t

In the corner of the club, everything felt a bit fuzzy. The air was thick with a mix of excitement and different scents. Dim lights created a soft atmosphere, and the distant sounds of the crowd and music blended together. It was like time slowed down, and you were in your own world, just soaking in the low-key vibe of the club corner.

The earlier shots hit you, and now you're in a blissful, relaxed state. All you could focus on were the hands exploring your body, lips locking with yours, and captivating scent surrounding you.

In the heat of the night, you ended up kissing a stranger without a second thought. The risk of being alone with someone unfamiliar did register – you just didn't care. Discovering your boyfriend's cheating after a difficult three-year relationship, marked by numerous breakups and makeups, left you feeling free from a toxic situation.

Now, free from those shackles, you embraced the chance to breathe and have some carefree fun. You had gone out with your friends, planning to originally get black out drunk but you suppose there’s better ways to cope.

Coming up with the idea of harmless fun, you and Elain came up with new identities for everyone to play out. Providing a random name, you spun a fat lie of being an up-and-coming writer, in the middle of writing your latest novel. Falsely claiming to be older, you described a beautiful house situated on the outskirts of Prythian that you owned. It was all part of a lighthearted game, with no harm intended since you believed you'd never cross paths with the guy again. It was ridiculously easy to bag the man since he didn’t tell you anything about himself, only nodding when you talked about yourself.

The attractive stranger had dark copper hair, captivating amber eyes, and stood several inches taller than you. His eyes glistened in mirth mixed with hunger. His muscular build caught your attention, and you found yourself grabbing onto his strong arms.

If his looks didn't captivate you, his mouth certainly did. His wicked tongue unleashed clever comebacks and tantalizing dirty talk that sent shivers down your spine.

The best part? He was older, more mature, more confident and much more good-looking – just so much more than your ex. Comparisons might be wrong, but if you had to choose, the man in front of you was a no-brainer.

Because he wasn't some guy; he was a man who acted like a man, who spoke like a man and touched you like a real fucking man.

The man had been touching and kissing you for what felt like an eternity. You greedily wanted more from him. You didn't want to regret not taking the chance, and almost as if he could sense it, he invited you back to his place.

You nodded, excusing yourself to let your friends know about leaving. Approaching them, you shared your decision to go with him, and Gwyn, Nesta, Em and Elain cheered you on. However, Feyre, always the protective friend, expressed her concern.

“Go get some, but I swear I’ll hunt him down if anything happens, got it? And have your location on.”

Her words, while somewhat playful, held a genuine undertone of worry.

You nodded and promised her you’d be safe before hurriedly made your way outside to the handsome man.

“Still want to come with me, sweet thing?” he asked curiously, making sure it was still something you wanted.

“Mm, yeah, still wanna go. Unless you've changed your mind?” Stepping forward, you grabbed the man's tie, pulling it gently as you looked up at him with half-lidded eyes. A playful glint clouded your gaze as you cocked your head to the side, oozing confidence.

He smirked down at you with a wicked glint, clearly showing his mind was nowhere near changed. The man stepped forward, rubbing his clothed cock against your dress, making you feel his hard on through his pants

“Does it feel like I’ve changed my mind?”

The chemistry you had was unmatched, he was so clever and witty and you wanted to know more about him as he led you to his car, a sleek, black one, indicating money.

You’d blame your forwardness on the alcohol tomorrow when you remembered how you just blurted out the question.

“Hey, you rich or something?” you giggled.

The man opened up the backseat door for you and through the side of his eye gave you an amused smirk.

“Or something.” he teased.

You rolled your eyes, grinning, as you hopped into the backseat, enjoying the warmth of his hands securing your seatbelt and closing the door.

But hold on, the backseat?

Weren't you supposed to sit upfront with him? Before you could ask, he opened the other backseat door and slid in beside you.

Maintaining eye contact, he grinned at your confusion and said, “Alden, please take us home.” A faint "yes sir" was heard, and the car started moving. Shocked, you realized he had a driver – clearly, he was quite wealthy.

You scanned the spacious car, realizing there was more than enough room for the fun activities on your mind. With a screen separating you from the driver, you unbuckled your seatbelt and moved closer, straddling his lap.

His hands instinctively found your hips, guiding your movements over him. Lips on your neck, he left dark marks as your hands ventured lower, reaching his cock, which elicited a groan from him. Your eyes widened as you felt the size of him. The man simply flashed you a subtle smile and raised his eyebrows.

You unbuckled his belt, maintaining eye contact as you carefully watched his face show pleasure as you put your hand down his pants and stroked him. You gave him a few lazy strokes, eventually shuffling off his lap and kneeling infront of him, ready to put your mouth to use.

Time became irrelevant and all that was heard were the sinful, obscene noises mixed with his hisses of pleasure as you sloppily bobbed your head up and down, swirling your tounge around the head, running your finger over the slit.

“Fuck yeah, that’s it. Could use this slutty little mouth forever.” he rasped, hips bucking as his hands went to your hair, slightly pulling on it as you let out a muffled whimper.

Pre cum and spit dripped down your chin, slowly making it’s way to your chest and floor as you pushed your head down further and further, feeling satisfied at his sounds of pleasure.

Once, twice, you grip on the shaft and slap the tip on your tongue before sucking on the sensitive head.

With a quick twitch of his cock, he cums, experiencing euphoria in his buzzed state. He gasps and moans pitifully as his lips twitch between his teeth and his hips buck into your mouth against his better judgement. You pump your hand at the base of his cock where you are unable to fit, swallowing as much of the hot, sticky ropes that coat your mouth as you can. As he pours into you, the walls of your pussy clench around nothing, so badly wishing your were sitting on the cock that was currently on your tongue.

His cum was everywhere - your hair, your face, your tits. He slumped against the seat and moved his eyes down back to you, catching you licking of the sticky residue of your fingers.

Before either of you have a chance to say something, the car slows down to a halt signaling that you’re probably at his place. He tucks himself into his pants and doesn’t buckle them before he opens the door and grabs you, throwing you over his shoulder as you laugh. Your mind forgets about the fact that you’re covered in his cum and just blanks when you take a look at his so called house, a mansion or a fucking estate is more like it.

The lengthy driveway opened up to a stunning front yard adorned with red and orange-leaved trees, an unusual scene for the end of summer. A well-lit, ornate fountain with three tiers stood proudly infront of the house, enhancing the beauty of the surroundings. The massive Victorian mansion, with its beautiful windows and overgrown vines stunned you.

He set you down and held your hand as he led you into his room, and it overmet your expectations. Instead of a dark, edgy space, it was spacious with earthy tones and bathed in soft ambient lighting. The room exuded comfort, making you wish to stay longer. His bed, adorned with a large fluffy comforter and a million pillows, looked inviting.

Various trinkets and figurines adorned the room, but what captured your attention was a massive bookcase showcasing your favorite books. Intrigued, you dropped his hand and made your way over. Your eyes widened at seeing a book from your wishlist, yet to be released. Confused, you asked how he had it, and he explained that Sellyn Drake was an old family friend and had gifted it to him.

You decided to tease him about the book, saying, “You know, I've heard great many things about this book. How about you tell me what it's about? I heard it had some... exciting scenes.”

His eyes met yours, and with a subtle smile, he stepped closer and closer, “How about I show you instead?” The air seemed to thicken with a hint of tension, leaving you curious and captivated by the possibilities that lingered in his suggestion.

——

Your legs trembled as you hastily stood up, determined to make your exit. Having been fucked stupid all night, dawn was approaching, and the new semester was starting tomorrow, leaving you with a load of preparations. You located your dress, bag, and heels, putting the clothes on carefully. Quietly, you ordered a cab to avoid startling the man still asleep. Before leaving, your eyes lingered on his bookshelf. Tiptoeing closer, you took the book you'd eyed the night before and read the teaser on the back. Glancing between him and the book, grabbed it, and silently left his room and house.

——

Feyre, Elain, Nesta, Gwyn and Em, your friends and roomates, practically pulled you across campus to grab your schedule and check out the new students filling the cafeteria. The buzz of excited chatter and the aroma of coffee and sweet pastries filled the air as you scanned the room. After a few moments, you parted ways, each heading to your respective classrooms, the anticipation of a new semester buzzing in the atmosphere.

You wandered through the literature building, searching for classroom LE4, the place where Advanced Literature with Professor Beron awaited. Memories of your first year with him being an absolute ass lingered, so you hoped he'd calmed down over the summer, giving everyone a fucking break.

You finally entered the huge lecture hall and climbed the stairs, opting for a seat at the back, hoping to fly under the radar in case Professor Beron was in a bad mood.

A few rows down, you spotted your ex, Ilias, with a new girl on his lap. His sleazy smile and wandering hands were more icky than anything ever. Reflecting on why you ever went back to him so many times, you turned around, focused on bringing out your notebook and computer from your bag. As the doors opened, the click-clack of quality shoes echoed through the hall, accompanied by girly giggles and voices creating a murmur in the background.

A jolt of surprise froze you, and your heart seemed to pause for a moment as his voice unexpectedly filled the room. All your previous movement ceased, and a sudden hush fell over the surroundings, creating an atmosphere charged with unexpected tension. The shock of hearing someone you hoped thought to see again made time momentarily stand still.

“Hello. I'm Professor Eris, and I'll be taking over this class. My father used to teach it but has passed away, so I'll be filling his shoes. I anticipate a productive year together. If you doubt your ability to keep up with the rapid pace of this advanced class, I suggest you leave now and spare yourself, as well as me, the trouble.”

Panicking, your eyes scanned the room for any possible escape route. There was just no fucking way you could be in this class when your professor had fucked you against his bookshelf, or when you had his dick shoved down your throat. Sinking in your seat, you desperately opened your computer, using it as a shield, praying he wouldn't notice you. The need to escape intensified, but the fear of drawing attention kept you frozen in your seat.

As dread crept in, he pulled out an attendance list. The sinking feeling deepened as he insisted everyone state why they chose the course. Hiding behind your computer, you debated revealing your presence or attempting to stay under the radar.

"Ilias Smith?"

"Emma Wilson?"

"Jess Lennox?"

"Amanda Gomez?"

Each one confidently declared "here" and delved into passionate remarks about Hemingway, Austen, Kerouac, all the authors that made them choose this course or whatever. Your hands started sweating as Professor Eris called your name. When you hesitated, he repeated it louder, his gaze scanning until it locked onto you.

Anticipating an intense reaction, all you saw was a slight narrowing of his eyes.

“Well? Are you here, Y/N L/N?”

You mumbled a faint "yeah," and when he asked why you were there, your words fumbled, “Uh, I suppose because I like books. A huge fan. Yes.”

Your classmates chuckled at your less-than-impressive answers, and you sunk back into your chair, just observing for the rest of the lecture. A few rows ahead, a group of girls giggled, thinking they were discreet as they whispered about Professor Eris. Their discussions about their fantasies sparked a tiny irritation within you.

Like who the hell gossips about someone, so crudely in broad daylight and during a lecture, especially when it's about a professor? It wasn't jealousy, no, no definitely not.

You just found it… super unsettling.

——

After two suffocating hours, you hastily packed your bag, eager to escape. But just as you were about to disappear, your name echoed in the room.

“Miss L/N, do you mind staying behind? There seems to be a problem with your email,” Professor Eris announced, leaning against his desk with his massive arms crossed. He bid the remaining students goodbye and waited until they all left before locking the doors.

The moment those doors clicked shut, the atmosphere in the room shifted dramatically. The tension became so thick you could practically cut it with a knife.

He turned back around and approached you, merely a few inches away, face a mix of amusement and curiosity.

“Hello there, little liar. I certainly didn’t expect to see you here.”

Your cheeks heated and nervousness filled you at the memory of the depraved moments you'd shared, causing your gaze to involuntarily drop to his chest and wander downward, reliving those sensations.

However any nervousness vanished as you remembered that he was the one who came to your university. If anyone should’ve been surprised it should’ve been you. A mischievous smile played on your lips as you toyed with the idea of making his year more challenging. Testing how good of a man he really was became a tempting game.

After all, a man like him wouldn't indulge a student, right?

This could turn into a fun little project to spice up an otherwise dull year.

Lifting your chin up, you looked him square in the eyes as your lips twitched in anticipation.

“I could say the same, Professor Eris. You definitely don’t seem like the lecturer type.”

His eyes narrowed at you, jaw clenching as his intense gaze bore into yours. The intensity made you shift a little, almost causing you to lose some of your confidence.

“Do you think you're funny? I believe you understand the situation here. You lied and now you're here of all places. As my student. Well, this is an unexpected twist. One of us will have to quit and report this,” he stated, injecting a hint of playfulness into his serious tone.

Wait, quit? No, you really didn't want him to leave. This could turn into such a nice little distraction, and there was no way you were losing it now. The thought of him leaving added a layer of urgency to the situation, making you quickly reassess the potential consequences.

“Come on, professor. It doesn't have to be like this. I won't tell anyone. And who says we have to stay away from each other? I mean, what the dean doesn't know won't hurt him, right?” you suggested, a sly smile playing on your lips as you flirted with the idea of bending the rules.

Eris looked you up and down before throwing his head back and letting out a hearty laugh. Your brows furrowed as you twisted your lips, wondering if he was laughing at you. Was he not taking you seriously? Despite the uncertainty, the desire to keep playing this game with him intensified.

Eris seemed to notice your mood turning sour and promptly clamped his lips shut.

“I promise, sweet thing, I'm not laughing at you. I’m just amazed at your boldness.” he assured you with a more serious tone, attempting to dispel any misunderstanding.

“Promise?”

He stepped forward, “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

You both knew that under no circumstances should you be doing this. If anyone caught you, there would be hell to pay. Expulsion and blacklisting from any other Ivy League universities for you, and definitely prison or some sort of pesky law thingy for him.

Yet the mere thought of engaging in something so wrong and secretive made your stomach flip, a mix of thrill and anxiety churning within you.

Looking up through your lashes, you blushed, a deep crimson hue spreading across your cheeks as you once again grabbed his tie and pulled him closer.

“I promise I won't tell anyone, professor. It'll be our little secret,”you whispered, the words laden with a taboo excitement that sent a shiver down your spine.

A wicked gleam flashed in Eris's eyes, and a subtle smirk tugged at the corners of his lips.

“Well then, miss L/N,”he whispered, his voice low and conspiratorial. “Let's see just how well we can keep our little secret.”

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ventique18 · 5 months

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~ Malleus and his self-expression in the Japanese language ~

Just a few random things that Malleus enthusiasts might find interesting...

As we're probably aware of by now, the English version is not exactly a 1-1 translation of the Japanese version. This is unavoidable, as a lot of culture nuances just can't be faithfully expressed without having to explain them in detail like this. One of those is Malleus' way of talking. He's often presented in English as talking as if he woke up straight from the Victorian era; and while that's also true in Japanese as he talks somewhat formally, there's something about his self-expression that wasn't carried over in the English version: in that he speaks in a masculine way.

In Japanese, there are typically three ways that a person can express themselves through speech: feminine, gender-neutral, and masculine. There's also varying degrees of these three depending on "bluntness" or "softness"-- and when you think mega blunt, you can imagine Leona's way of speaking that's actually accurate to how he physically acts. The thing is, Malleus also practically talks like that; just removing some pronouns and particles that would come off as rude.

Basically, he talks in an assertive, masculine way while actively avoiding mansplaining superiority to his conversation partners, which Leona and a few others tend to do.

Another interesting thing to point out is what some of you might have noticed in the audio: his preference of using "Boku" as a personal pronoun. Boku is one of the pronouns used by masculine people. While "Ore", which Leona uses, is more masculine, it's not Malleus' preference as it comes off as a lot more aggressive while Boku is more polite. This is why Ore is also frequently used by most men (people can swap pronouns depending on the situation!) when they're in casual situations; because it gives off a message that they do not appreciate being submissive among peers. If you've noticed, Ace, angry Deuce, and most of the third years use Ore as their pronoun.

The last mentioned point is important, because you might question why doesn't Malleus use Ore as his pronoun when he's literally higher ranking/more important than anyone else in the school? Because it's more formal than Ore, and this is just my personal conjecture, but it gives off a mighty message that he doesn't even need words or pronouns to assert how naturally dominant he is.

But if he likes being formal that much, why doesn't he just use the very formal pronoun "Watashi", like the headmage Crowley? Because, going back to the very first point, Boku suggests masculinity while Watashi does not. He also actually doesn't structure his sentence in an overly formal way like the headmage because doing so would omit the air of masculinity which he rather prefers.

So yeah, that's just an interesting topic I thought some would be curious about. The first time I heard him, I also didn't expect he'd express himself in an assertive way because of the beautiful elegance he always carries with him. Actually, this makes me appreciate Twst more; because it doesn't really conform to societal norms--that yes, a man can wear makeup and heels and it's not anyone's business how he decides to express himself.

Some other non-Malleus notes: this topic is incredibly nuanced and vast. There's no hard rule for this and it really depends on the individual to mix and match depending on how they want to express themselves. For example, Furina as the Hydro Archon is feminine but uses Boku as her pronoun as a message that she is not to be looked down on by men. This is interesting to me, as rather than associating pronouns to gender like in English, Japanese pronouns can carry other messages depending on the person's intent. That's why we prefer to call it masculinity or femininity, as it really is more of a self-expression rather than gender identity. There are actually other more self-expression patterns outside masculine-feminine-neutral!

#twisted wonderland #ventique rambles #malleus draconia

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ominoose · 2 months

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𝐎𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐫 𝐈𝐬𝐚𝐚𝐜 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫'𝐬 𝐀𝐬 𝐓𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐬

Characters: Steven Grant, Nathan Bateman, Llewyn Davis, Jake Lockley, Blue Jones Summary: Oscar Characters characters teaching subjects at school. Warnings: None WC: 1.7k

𝗦𝘁𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝗚𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘁 - 𝗛𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆

His natural passion and accidental ability to hyper-fixate on things means he can teach all the required topics with ridiculous detail, but we all know which subject he dominates best.

The vast majority of the students adore him. Mr Grant’s lessons are always fun, he lets the class make posters (that include all nine members of the Ennead), do Kahoot quizzes, create live re-enactments of historical events. Even when he’s just talking off a power point, his voice, mannerisms and tendency to act things out has the children engrossed and giggling.

The classroom walls are absolutely littered with posters, some bought and some done by students. There's inspiring quotes, positivity kittens and Egyptian puns.

Not only is he a good teacher, but a good mentor. Being autistic himself, he notices any neurodivergent or “othered” kids and makes it a point to find what they’re passionate about and working it into their curriculum. If someones struggling he’ll arrange one-on-one time, asking them what they’re strengths are not just to help figure out how to work with them, but to remind them they have strengths.

While most students do love him, the few troublemakers know he’s not the strictest and thus will absolutely take the piss. Feigning ignorance and struggles as an excuse to why they missed a deadline or didn’t do the homework. Steven, the optimist he is, is always happy to give second, third and fourth chances. It does take that long for him to realise they’re not genuine, and yet he’ll still try, convincing himself that he’ll be able to turn them straight with the magic of friendship.

𝗡𝗮𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝗕𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗻 - 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗦𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲

It would be like finding a needle in a haystack trying to find a single student in the many years Nathan had been teaching that didn’t, at least at one point, absolutely despise him. Mr Bateman was far from the friendliest, lax teacher to his students, bordering on a bit of an asshole really. He had an absolute zero tolerance policy for time wasting, messing around and not giving 100%. All students were expected to keep up, get the work done on time and spend time studying and completing exercises at home. If you didn’t do that, you weren’t trying hard enough.

The common conception of a hard-ass wasn’t ill fitting, but it wasn’t without reason. Mr Bateman was a hard-ass because he wanted his students to grasp every opportunity at their disposal and stretch their potential. Some people were born smarter, some learned quicker from a young age but every single person could better themselves regardless of whether they started at Level 10 or Level 0.

It also shouldn’t be said that he wanted students that simply obeyed. It was a story passed down to students about the time a student, in a fit of frustration and defiance to the teacher that always pushed them, completely disregarded the set code structure and wrote their own entirely new one that completed the aim function. While everyone would expect them to be given weeks worth of detention and a reaming, but Mr Bateman simply smiled, said well done and moved on with the lesson. Apparently the kid managed to get a full paid scholarship into top university, but that was just hearsay. Rumour has it his middle name is Hamlet too, snickering students will whisper.

Besides his rigid teaching style, not much is known about him. The classroom is minimalist, only a coffee flask and a pot of three black ballpoints sit on his desk. The walls are sparse beyond a handful of posters about common coding knowledge.

𝗟𝗹𝗲𝘄𝘆𝗻 𝗗𝗮𝘃𝗶𝘀 - 𝗠𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗰

The beginning of every new school year followed the same routine. Kids would hear their music teacher was a published artist, get insanely excited, go to class then realise published was not synonymous with success and wither with disappointment. Mr Davis gave up caring years ago, at least he finally had a steady gig, albeit at the cost of his soul.

Classes were average. Sometimes students were treated to his natural singing voice, something that always sparked smiles and attention from the kids, but usually lessons were Llewyn bearing through kids bashing piano keys and drum pads as he wandered around and did his best to tutor them through it.

To kids that were required to take the class, it was alright. Mr Davis wasn’t a hard ass, although it did drain his soul to see kids blind to the brilliance and potential of music. His homework mostly consisted of practicing at home or listening to different genres. To kids that genuinely enjoyed music, it was bliss. Mr Davis was no dream mentor for sure, he was quite stubborn about what he thought “good music” sounded like, but when he sat with someone he could share the passion with, the kid would feel like an equal.

The classroom was always open to kids that wanted time to practice, he knew what an escape music could be, and would never hesitate to sit and work out a song or even add his guitar to whatever a student was playing.

The room was a riot on a good day. All sorts of instruments littered and surrounded the desks, posters of musicians and notes and the different types of brass instruments lined the walls and there was always something playing in the background. A basket of fruit and cereal bars was always sat fully stocked next to the door, with a “Help Yourself” sign stuck to it. No one knew why, and no one ever thought to question it.

𝗝𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗟𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗹𝗲𝘆 - 𝗦𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘀𝗵

Spanish was always a full class, no matter what year or whether the students actually cared about Spanish. Students either swooned over him or wanted to be his friend. Mr Lockley knew, although had no clue why, but who cares as long as he was able to spread some Spanish around. The point is, Mr Lockley had no enemies at school.

Like a typical Spanish teacher, the register was taken in Spanish, if you wanted to ask to go to the toilet it had to be Spanish and if you wanted to pass notes in class they had better be in Spanish. He wasn’t the most forgiving, the man expected homework to be in on time and god help you if it was google translate. Mr Lockley would call you out, make you re-do it in his class at lunch or give detention to repeat offenders.

If students had been doing reasonably well he’d bring in some traditional Latin American foods for students to try, turn on a Spanish movie or even treat them to a little story about his past. Remember the Chef in Ratatouille that killed a guy with one thumb? That's the type of nonsense he talked about, albeit a bit more kid friendly. Most of the stories were embellished tales of him saving a grannies purse from being stolen, but some students always wondered about that hardened, broody looking teacher.

Mr Lockley prefers to keep his help to class time, long past learning his lesson about the very obvious students that came to him giggling and blushing behind their hands. On a rare occasion however, he will accept a student that comes knocking, overly apologetic and pleading for just a little help on their assignment, especially if the student is a quiet one. His lunch is set aside and he gestures for the student to take a seat before going over it with them, helping them with pronunciation, never shaming them or getting annoyed if they make a basic mistake. At the end he’ll even teach them how to say shit in Spanish, if they can keep it a little secret.

The classroom has posters of different Latin American countries, verbs and nouns, the different gendered terms. His desk was a little cluttered, a ‘Mejor Profesor’ mug, papers half marked and some drawings done by students hung nearby.

𝗕𝗹𝘂𝗲 𝗝𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘀 - 𝗖𝗵𝗲𝗺𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆

No one's favourite teacher but everyone knew him and had something to say. If a student had him later in the day they’d need to pray the morning classes were well behaved or pray they knew someone in said classes that could give a heads up on his moods. It didn’t matter either way, you could walk in one him sucking on his lower lip and glaring the entire class down and walk away with him smiling and patting backs. It was every student for themselves in that class. The only consistency was the white lab coat he wore.

There were obvious favourites, usually people who found a good balance of kissing his ass but not too overtly, asking for help while still expressing basic knowledge. If you asked too many questions, he would openly sigh or ignore you for someone else. If you gave an answer he thought was stupid, he wouldn’t hide the hands raking over his face in annoyance. If you were quiet and kept to yourself, you’d skirt by okay until one day in the middle of a lesson he calls your name with a faux chirp, predatory smile and ask a question. Answer correctly and you can rest assured he'll (probably) leave you alone for the next few lessons, answer wrong and enjoy doing exam questions as practice.

Detention for even a hint of a Breaking Bad reference. Openly hated a student named Jessie. Weirdly, students notice it's not the chemistry part that annoys him, it's the inaccurate portrayal of drug transactions and the costs. No one has dared ask why he knows so much about that.

Mr Jones’ door is usually locked at lunch and after class, he'll blatantly ignore any student that knocks and continue eating. On the stray chance a rare student manages to find him outside the class and has the balls to stop him, with his trademark sigh he'll begrudgingly set up a day and time to help them. It'll be a one-on-one session filled with eyerolls and being talked down to, but you'll get lots of extra knowledge and he'll even throw some of his old textbooks at you for free. Weirdly, he won't bother you in class anymore, just giving you a little smile out the corner of his eye.

The classroom has old periodic table posters from the teacher that retired years before him, and classroom rules about remembering to wear goggles or you'll go blind. The only thing on his desk besides several piles of paper is teacher mugs with variations of chemistry puns he pretends to hate.

#steven grant #nathan bateman #llewyn davis #jake lockley #blue jones #omiwrites

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lurkingshan · 3 months

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Dead Friend Forever is a Marvel of Mystery Writing

I haven’t been watching Dead Friend Forever live, because I am not always that into the slasher genre and I figured I would wait to hear whether it holds up before jumping in. I admit, I was a bit dubious about a drama sustaining a slasher narrative for 12 entire weeks and didn’t want to spend time on something that might be too shallow to sustain and would end up falling apart. I basically told bestie @wen-kexing-apologist to vet it for me and holler if I needed to start paying attention. And a few weeks ago, they started poking me with increasing intensity, along with a few other friends, because the writing was holding up better than they could believe. I started asking questions, and once @ginnymoonbeam mentioned that Sammon was the writer, it all started to click and I dove into a binge to catch up.

And they were right! This show is excellent, and its strength is sourced in an incredibly strong script from a writer who knows how to construct a longform mystery. Because it turns out, that’s what this show actually is. How do you sustain a slasher for 12 weeks? By embedding a deeper mystery within the slasher framework and pacing your story so that the entire middle delivers a backstory narrative that is even more compelling than the current events. This show is expertly structured to grab your attention and then get you deeply emotionally invested in the coming bloodbath, which is crucial for a slasher to feel like it has any stakes. Let me also note that the excellent writing here is supported by extremely smart direction and editing and some standout performances from young actors. I am going to focus on the writing here because that’s what I do, but it should be said that this whole production is all around excellent.

So let’s talk about why the writing in Dead Friend Forever works so well! Great drama mysteries should support two kinds of engagement from the viewer:

no thoughts head empty engagement from the people who just want to be pulled along for the ride and be constantly surprised

red string board theory engagement for the people who enjoy finding clues and trying to solve the mystery in advance.

It’s actually really fucking hard to thread this needle as a writer, because it requires seeding strong enough clues that attentive viewers could reasonably guess some of the big reveals, but not giving away so much that you are unable to surprise them. A reveal in a good mystery should have you saying “oh my god WHAT” and “of course, that makes perfect sense” at the same time. And the best mysteries support the viewer being able to go back and rewatch, find new meaning they missed the first time, and realize every single thing that happened adds up. A tight mystery has no loose ends and no false steps; it never lies to the viewer, it only works to draw your attention where it wants it at any given point in the story.

Dead Friend Forever does this masterfully with several of its reveals, but I will highlight the biggest example: the reveal of Phee and Non’s relationship in episode 7. In the first four episodes of the show, the story lets us in on a few crucial facts: Phee is newer to this friend group (along with Tan and White), he was not present for whatever went down with Non three years ago, he has some kind of fucked up not!friends with benefits relationship with Jin that involves lots of sexual tension and dick biting, and he seems interested in figuring out what the hell happened once all these dudes start acting crazy about the videos. The string board theorists had enough to go on there to reasonably guess that he was intentionally trying to uncover the truth—but not why—and the no thoughts head empty crowd could just vibe, enjoying his scenes with Jin and wondering how exactly he ended up hooking up with him and getting involved with this group of people he doesn’t even seem to like.

Once we get to the backstory and see Non’s narrative, additional clues emerge, like the existence of both an older brother and a mysterious sweetheart that is only saved as [heart emoji] in Non’s phone. No thoughts head empty is over here going huh I wonder who they’re gonna be and hey when are the rest of the characters going to show up; string board theorists now have two clear options for how Phee could tie in to Non’s story and why he might care enough to investigate, but no one knows for sure. So when the show ended episode 6 with Phee running into Non’s room and began episode 7 with The Most Effective Five Minute BL Of All Time, everything clicked into place. No thoughts head empty got to experience a very pleasant shock moment, the string board theorists got to feel satisfied that they figured out at least part of the reveal, everyone got to enjoy an unexpected shot of romance in the middle of this stressful narrative, and there were still parts of Phee’s motives and involvement with this group that we didn’t understand and would require additional reveals. That is great mystery writing in a nutshell.

And it’s not only the mystery construction that makes the writing here so smart. It’s also the way Sammon is weaving in tons of social commentary, embedding Thai cultural and religious values, incorporating complicated crimes with lots of players in the mix that somehow don’t get confusing, and drawing complex and nuanced characters whose choices and behavior you understand even if you find them abhorrent. It’s not easy to make a viewer both despise a character and still care what happens to them; when you write a story about despicable people you run the risk of inspiring apathy in the audience, which is a death knell for a mystery. We have to be invested for this story to work. We have to feel deep empathy for Non to the point that we fully support axe murdering his bullies, but we also have to be interested enough in the bullies and why they behave the way they do to watch 12 weeks of them running around being awful to each other and harming everyone in their paths. And Non, too, gets to have real complexity. He is not a perfect little Mary Sue who never does anything wrong. He makes big impulsive mistakes, and seeks attention and affection from the wrong people, and lies to the ones he loves, and doesn’t always ask for help when he needs it. He is a flawed human being and that’s so important, because he is the center of this story and we need him to feel real.

In conclusion: holy shit. I tip my hat to you, Dr. Sammon, and I am very excited to be on this ride for the final four episodes.

#dead friend forever #dff the series #thai bl #shan shouts into the void

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astrologicalsstuff · 1 year

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Some more

Astrology observations

Scorpio risings causing drama without even meaning to

Capricorns are the hottest placement sun and rising

Everyone says it’s probably Leo or libra or Taurus but Capricorns have this I’m hot and it doesn’t matter energy. Like those placements know they’re hot. They got the bone structure and legs

Everyone thinks it’s Scorpio but I would NOT WANT TO MAKE AN AQUARIUS ANGRY. These people can be calculated and smart. They don’t feel in the same way other people do typically so they can really whip out some unwarranted shit.

Aries moons going 0 to 100 in half a second.

Virgo aries combos especially Virgo sun aries moon or Virgo rising aries… acting first thinking later and regretting everything:((( these can be some very… stimulated people.

Cancer Leo Taurus in the big three loyal and selfless with a dash of manipulation

Leo Venus will like you and still make you chase for a year you’d better be ready to chase!

Venus in the second know their self worth.

Mercury in Pisces/Sagittarius or in the 9th or 12th house how’s that ADD/ADHD??

Cancer stellium/ Virgo stellium with those stomach problems.

Where your 6th house ruler sits is how your health shows up. 6th house ruler in the third might need glasses or have hand problems. 6th ruler in the 12th might have mental health problems. 6th ruler in the 5th watch your heart.

Aquarius moons are so chill if your not tryna have a relationship with them and humble too. Like they won’t start shit.

Neptune in fire houses (1 5 & 9) have the reputation of being mysterious but isn’t as mysterious as everyone thinks, they don’t really know themselves either lol.

Further, neptune in the first just doesn’t see themselves the way you see them

Neptune in the 5th probably have identity issues, people like them better on drugs. Struggle to see themselves the way others see them causing misinterpretations

Neptune in the 9th people don’t see the spirits on your side lol. Maybe people don’t see that you can see through them

Saturns not all bad, in houses where you must acquire (earth houses 2 6 10)

Moon in the ascendant will have children especially with planets in the 5th.

Capricorn or Saturn in the 5th may have a hard time conceiving or having children

Uranus in the 5th… just make sure you wrap it cause get ready for those unexpected pregnancies. Also what’s up with those one night stands??

Neptune in the 11th most likely means friends at a distance or friendships where you do a lot of drugs and alcohol. Friends Can be artists as well. Best case I think these people are celebrities and connect with masses online.

Mars in Leo are HORNY and loud about it

Pluto in the third can cut people with their words

Moon in the 10th makes people comfortable around you yet a distance between you and other people?

Neptune in the 10th where’s your dad lol?

12th house ruler in the 10th everyone talks about you behind your back so much gossip

Virgo men lowk like it when you call them out🫢🫢

Pisces moons can’t stop lying huh? Like you don’t even know why your doing it

Virgo rising s are so hot. Like subtle beauty look good without makeup.

Virgo sun women’s personality is basically just whatever copies and compliments their best friend…

Fire sign moons are soo DRAMATIC

Moon in first = heart in sleeve

Thanks for reading let me know what you think please don’t copy my information!

#astrology #astro observations #astro placements #synastry #astro chart #astroblr #venus #8th house #5th house #placidus #saturn #cancer #capricorn

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maxwellatoms · 5 months

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Do you think the new division of Cartoon Network Studios will end up exploiting and abusing AI to make new cartoons of their old properties?

I wouldn't put it past any studio to do this.

We're at the end of The Animation Industry As We Know It, so studios are going to do anything and everything they can to stay alive.

The way I see it is:

AI "art" isn't actually art. Art is created by humans to express ideas and emotions. Writing prompts allows a computer to interpret human ideas and emotions by taking other examples of those things and recombining them.

Just because something isn't art doesn't mean that humans can't understand it or find it beautiful. We passed a really fun prompt generation milestone about a year ago where everything looked like it was made by a Dadaist or someone on heavy psychedelics. Now we're at the Uncanny Valley stage. Soon, you won't be able to tell the difference.

It's not just drawings and paintings that are effected, but writing and film. It's every part of the entertainment industry. And the genie is out of the bottle. I've seen people saying that prompt-based image generators have "democratized" art. And I see where they're coming from. In ten years, I can easily see a future where anyone can sit down at their desk, have a short conversation with their computer, and have a ready-to-watch, custom movie with flawless special effects, passable story, and a solid three act structure. You want to replace Harrison Ford in Star Wars with your little brother and have Chewbacca make only fart sounds, and then they fly to Narnia and fistfight Batman? Done.

But, sadly, long before we reach that ten year mark, the bots will get hold of this stuff and absolutely lay waste to existing art industries. Sure, as a prompter I guess you can be proud of the hours or days you put into crafting your prompts, but you know what's better than a human at crafting prompts? Bots. Imagine bots cranking out hundreds of thousands of full-length feature films per minute. The noise level will squash almost any organic artist or AI prompter out of existence.

AI images trivialize real art. The whole point of a studio is to provide the money, labor, and space to create these big, complicated art projects. But if there are no big, complicated art projects, no creatives leading the charge, and no employees to pay... what the fuck do we need studios for? We won't, but their sheer wealth and power will leave them forcing themselves on us for the rest of our lives.

The near future will see studios clamp down on the tech in order to keep it in their own hands. Disney does tons of proprietary tech stuff, so I'm sure they're ahead of the game. Other studios will continue to seek mergers until they can merge with a content distribution platform. I've heard rumors of Comcast wanting to buy out either WB or Nick. That's the sort of thing I'm talking about. The only winners of this game will be the two or three super-huge distribution platforms who can filter out enough of the spam (which they themselves are likely perpetuating) to provide a reasonable entertainment experience.

400,000 channels and nothing's on.

I do think that money will eventually make the "you can't copyright AI stuff" thing go away. There's also the attrition of "Oh, whoops! We accidentally put an AI actor in there and no one noticed for five years, so now it's cool."

One way or another, it's gonna be a wild ride. As the canary in the coal mine, I hope we can all get some UBI before I'm forced to move into the sewers and go full C.H.U.D.

#maxwell atoms #ai generated #prompters #c.h.u.d.

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r--kt · 12 days

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Where actually was this betrayal line for Obito that Kakashi had crossed?

about the whole "anyone got Kakashi, but not Obito" thing that @komihoyinsblog said. I remembered where the culmination of this theme was. no, like, this whole topic is real!

let's talk about the scene after when Jubito was defeated. here I will analyse kkobkk relationships and Obito's arc specifically.

contents | context · meaning of the scene · where's a mistake and where's a betrayal

CH. 655

Context

during the battle with the shinobi alliance, Obito came face to face with a deeply repressed desire for another life, which he did not realize due to his position as the only one who can fulfill the tsukuyomi plan. the battle itself as well as the conversation with Naruto reminds Obito of the aspirations and values dear to him that he had to sacrifice. all this has noticeably hit Obito and now he is disarmed and stripped of his armor, which is metaphorically reflected in his half-naked body (and cuz fans love men's boobs).

CH. 652. god, look how happy he is, I'm sobbing. love the way he never regrets about his scars, they're with him even in his imagination, that's a reminder of his core values.

structurally, in Obito's arc, this scene is the Collapse point and the end of the second act. here, the previous methods (the tsukuyomi plan) have shown their inconsistency, and the goal (peace for everyone and for him, too) has not been achieved, and he must find a new way to achieve this goal. at the beginning of the scene, he is confused, defeated and not ready to face the consequences.

why isn't he ready? he's lying there, seemingly resigned. yeah, not exactly. here, he accepted the impending death, and it's even not bad to die by Kakashi's hand to some extent. another question is, is he ready to talk to him, is he ready to accept the defeat and find the strength to continue the journey?

Meaning of the scene

once again, it is important that the battle with the alliance and the conversation with Naruto influenced Obito, but did not convince him. it was Kakashi who did it.

in fact, this conversation with Kakashi is a crucial reason for Obito to return to his ideals. before that, he was in doubt (the second act is a reflection of the character, as if hesitating from one side to the other), and after that he takes the side of the alliance. what did Kakashi say that made Obito come back?

three questions Obito is asking.

how can you be sure that Naruto won't fail on his way, unlike me? [pic 2, above]

why are you so attached to Naruto, what's the difference between him and me? [pic below]

why are you willing to help him (and not me)? [pic below]

they don't talk about different paths here. Kakashi emphasizes that Obito's path is not exactly wrong, so that's not the deal. it's about Obito and Naruto as people, and, more, about Kakashi's opinion on Obito.

finding out why he is not the one whose path Kakashi is ready to defend is essential for Obito. he wants to understand why Naruto (aka Obito's previous self, too) is closer to him, why Kakashi does not support the actual one for whom he grieved so much. why, even recognizing the possible correctness of tsukuyomi, Kakashi refuses to support Obito in this, prefers to go the same way. and also look at how damn emotional he is at this moment, his feelings go from anger to anxiety in a couple of frames. that's what happened when the central conflict "I'm never good enough to be loved" is raised.

Obito's questions are a subconscious appeal to Kakashi — "why don't you choose me? I could make you happy. what's wrong with me again?!" he thinks that the reason Kakashi doesn't take his side is not because of the correctness of his path, but because of Obito himself. subconsciously, he thinks that it's because of Kakashi's personal dislike of this "new" Obito, and he is very afraid of this might be true. just look at his face at the bottom of the page, he's really worried about hearing Kakashi's answer. oh, and it's actually the same meaning as "I thought, maybe you could love me like you used to, even though I'm different" [ Jinx's quote from Arcane, yes, I like to compare these two sometimes ].

what Kakashi says in this situation means "let me help you." Kakashi said he would be ready to help Obito if he let him in, if he allowed him. this is literally the only condition (which is important to mention here) under which Obito did not pass, because of his desire to reject Kakashi's help, believing that he must put his life on tsukuyomi plan and cut off all ties. but this does not mean that he wanted Kakashi to cut off this tie in return.

Obito was an individualist, and he only scoffed or got angry at Kakashi's offer to help/sympathize. now they're in a situation when Obito finally hear that Kakashi said "you've made mistakes, but that's okay. I can be with you, if you need me to, and I'm okay with you continuing your life and reaching peace. I accept you and I believe in you." and I want you to appreciate that this is the tipping point of Obito's arc.

so, that's why Obito changes his way of acting. Kakashi shows that he accepts Obito the way he is, and thus significantly reduces Obito's need to prove his worth through his own hardships and overcoming difficulties. yes, Kakashi had already said similar things before, and it didn't work, but here this line is resolved precisely because of this deep conversation they had.

Where's a mistake and where's a betrayal

oh, maybe Rin's death was a thing Obito considered a betrayal from Kakashi's part? everything's much less trivial. would he offer to help Kakashi if he thought he was a traitor? and well, he offered.

CH. 630

no, look at his face on the bottom right, why would you say that with such a gentle face to someone you consider a traitor? what is it, a genuine smile? so something happened besides that.

the betrayal was that Kakashi preferred his other ties to the connection with Obito. here, betrayal is not about killing Rin, and not about breaking a promise — all these are mistakes that Obito is able to forgive.

all the moments when Obito says something like "you had the opportunity to kill me, but you didn't do it", "you can't deal with me because of guilt?", "still blaming yourself for the broken promises?" - all this is an attempt to increase his own value, to show the importance of Obito for Kakashi. and it's also a projection. Obito says, "you had so many opportunities to kill me, but you..." although he does the same. like, why would he leave Kakashi alive after the kamui battle? intentionally inflict a non-fatal wound on him and leave him in a dimension that only he and Obito have access to? "I don't care if he's alive or dead," but at every opportunity he chose the option "alive", even if it's less profitable for him. my baby loves to deceive himself so much.

all this time, Obito believed that he was striving for their common dream, and therefore the condemnation from Kakashi (there should be a couple more frames from the manga) feels like the most painful blow for him, especially when Kakashi says that Rin would not want it either. before that, Obito had compared himself and Kakashi a couple of times, put them on an equal footing, and after being rejected by him, that's where Obito feels really lonely.

the point of no return was precisely the fact that Kakashi shows with his own words that he does not accept the current Obito and everything he's been striving for years. all this, taken together, he considered a betrayal, as if he's not enough, as if he fucked everything up again.

therefore, their conflict is resolved by the acceptance of one person by another, this is in fact exactly what Obito's heart wanted — to hear that he could be accepted after all that had happened. the same thing happened after his death, when he finally met Rin, by the way.

hope the text is not that messy. oh, and! that kkob video I've made with mitski's song. this fits the topic so well. love these guys

#obito uchiha #kakashi hatake #naruto shippuden #naruto #kakaobi #obikaka #team minato #kakashi #obito

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violetasteracademic · 22 days

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I know this has been said a million times in a million ways, but I humbly request an audience to September Virgo out for a hot minute and share my dissertation on why the "Three Brothers and Three Sisters is *lazy writing*" take is by far the WORST.

If you found me through my Lucien Vanserra's Hero's Journey breakdown (I'll link that at the end) then you already know I am an absolute nerd about book structure. I do not beef with the other ships and genuinely love and am interested in every character in these shipwars. But I get a little hot when I see this take!

The reason being is that 3 and 3 is not "lazy writing." Lazy writing is:

⚫ Conveniently de-escalating all current stakes and conflicts established in the service of a romantic pairing.

⚫ Poorly pacing a book because now we have to explain why a character was thinking about offering another character 1 ticket to ride his face, but now he quickly wants someone else instead that many people offline don't even know about. Structure wise- (we are talking three act structure here, again I have broken that down in the link I'll post below) this means that by the end of Act One, the act in which the lead of our story has been presented with all of the information and their story has been laid out, they are now crossing into Act Two with clarity and set up, (side note-the first act is typically resolved within the first 20% of the book (or less!) we must resolve an existing romance with one character that has not even gotten its opportunity to be told in depth (i.e. Feyre and Tamlin). And reasonably introduce a new romance. As well as the introduction of new plotlines to accommodate the new romance. It's just... it's a plot and pacing nightmare. I'm getting the sweats even thinking about it.

⚫ Ignoring years worth of details and foreshadowing in an act of fan service because the fandom decided they don't like your character, even if you, as the author, very much do.

⚫ Introducing a brand new plot in the middle of a smorgasbord of unresolved plotlines so a newly introduced side character who has already had a complete arc in service of another main character can now become the next main character, leapfrogging over the remaining main characters who have been around since book one with active storylines in development.

Three and three is not "lazy writing." Three is simply a motif. A motif is an artistic/literary device. Three sisters. Three brothers. Three mountains. Three stars on the night court insignia, ect.

Writing is: Structure. Line level prose. Obstacles. Stakes. Character arcs.

I will absolutely allow the criticism that it is cheesy or corny. That is an opinion, and you are totally allowed to have it. We can respectfully disagree on that and it's no skin off my back.

However, Elriel (as well as Vassien) have the elements that *good* writing is comprised of. Characters with steadily increasing arcs. Obstacles at every turn. Incredibly high stakes. And in my opinion (though of course everyone is allowed their own opinion on this!) some downright BREATHTAKING one liners and line level prose in their interactions from ACOMAF all the way to the bonus chapter.

Please, I beg of you, understand that just because you do not like something does not make it lazy or poorly executed. Art is subjective, and when we use our taste to make objective assertions about things we don't prefer, art suffers.

For more on book structure and the possibilities of Lucien and Vassa's absolutely beautiful potential, hop on over here:

Thank you for your time 😂

#elriel #elriel endgame #pro elriel #azriel x elain #elain x azriel #elriel supremacy

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ladyluscinia · 6 months

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Ok, I think I might be exiting the "are you fucking kidding me?" period and ready to make a real argument, so lets talk about Three Act Structure!

Is OFMD S2 just the "Darkest Hour"?

A very common explanation I've been seeing for some of the... controversial... aspects of S2 is that it's meant to be that way. That the middle act is where the protagonists hit their lowest point. Where we get the big failure point. Where everything looks kind of shit.

S2 is supposedly just that point. It's The Empire Strikes Back. People have been making that comparison since before the first episodes even dropped, telling everyone to expect something that could be disappointing or unsatisfying - it's just a matter of needing to wait for S3 to pull it all together.

It's not a baseless framework to consider the show through - I'm pretty sure David Jenkins has mentioned it in interviews (or at least mentioned he planned for three acts / seasons) so it's certainly worth asking how he's doing at the 2/3rd mark.

So - quick summary of Three Act Structure:

Act 1 introduces our characters and world. It includes the inciting incident of the story and the first plot point, where a) the protagonist loses the ability to return to their normal life, and b) the story raises whatever dramatic question will drive the entire plot. Act 2 is rising action and usually most of the story. The protagonist tries to fix things and fucks them up worse, in the process learning new skills and character developing to overcome their flaws. Act 3 is the protagonist taking one more shot, but this time they are ready. We get the climax of the story, the dramatic question gets an answer, and then the story closes.

If you want examples, the Star Wars Original Trilogy is a very popular template. And, hell, he said it was a pirate story... the main Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy also does a solid job with their three acts.

Let's compare. (Spoiler: I'm not impressed 🤨)

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First thing I need to establish... Wait. Two things. First is that Three Act Structure is flexible, so we can't really analyze success or failure by pulling up a list of necessary plot beats that should have been hit in X order. Second is that if you tell me you are writing a romance with a Three Act Structure - where "the relationship is the story" - the first thing I'm going to do is ask you how you are adapting it. Because while there's not necessarily anything preventing you from applying this to a character driven plot, most people are familiar with it as plot structure for externally driven conflict.

Unless there's a reason the status of the main relationship is intrinsically tied up in the current status of the war against the evil empire, a standard Three Act Structure is going to entail either an antagonistic force that absolutely wants your main couple apart being the main relationship obstacle OR the romance aspect being a subplot to the protagonist's narrative adventure. None of those sound like how the show has been described.

So how is OFMD adapting it?

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Act 1

(Can't figure out how well Act 2 is doing if we don't start at setup.)

Right out the gate, OFMD breaks one of the main "rules" for a story where the Acts are delivered in three parts. Namely the one where the first Act is treated as an acceptable standalone story, with it's own satisfying yet open ended conclusion.

In Star Wars, A New Hope ends with the princess rescued, Luke finding the Force, Han finding his loyalty, and the Death Star destroyed. The Empire isn't defeated, the antagonists still live... the story is not over, but this one movie doesn't feel unfinished.

Similarly, Curse of the Black Pearl gives Jack his ship back, Elizabeth and Will get together, and Norrington has the English Navy let them all off the hook and give Jack and the pirates one day's head start.

OFMD's final beat of S1 being Kraken Arc starting is not that, even if Stede returning to sea is still a pretty hopeful note. Now... I don't necessarily think this was a bad call. At least, not if the story is the relationship. It's easy to close on a happy ending and then fuck it up next movie if the conflict is external and coming for them. Not so much if you're driving the story with your protagonists' flaws, in part because it should be really obvious at the end of setup that your main characters need development and can't run off together right now. I actually like that they were risk-takers and let S1 look at the situation clearly vs doing a fragile happy end, because it takes into account the difference between a character-driven and plot-driven narrative.

I think OFMD's Act 1 actually ends at maybe the Act of Grace? Well, there through the kiss on the beach, counting as our "first plot point" before everything goes wrong, basically.

At that point, they have setup the story and characters. We've been introduced to Edward and Stede's current issues. Signing the Act of Grace does make the intertwined arcs between them real - it's no longer a situation that either one of them could just walk away from like it was in 1x07 - and we narrow in on the (alleged) driving question of the show:

It's not about "Will Stede become a great pirate?" or "Will we develop a better kind of piracy for the crew?" - the show is the relationship and the big question is "What is Stede and Edward's happy ending?"

Act 1 ends on their first solution, being together and making each other happy and admitting it's more than just friendship. Act 2 starts, appropriately, by saying both of them are currently too flawed for that to go anywhere but crashing and burning.

Now... looking back, what does Act 1 do well vs poorly?

I think it's really strong on giving us the foundation for BlackBonnet's characters and flaws. We aren't surprised Stede goes home or Edward goes Kraken (or at least... we weren't supposed to be surprised. There are still a lot of holdouts blaming Izzy for interrupting Edward's "healing" despite how at this point in the story it doesn't make sense for Edward to have the skills to heal... but I digress). The relationship question is compelling at the end of S1, the cliffhanger hooks, and the fandom explosion of fics did not come from nowhere - the audience was invested.

I also think Act 1 does a great job of settling us in the universe. We understand the rules it abides by, from how gay pirates are just a fact of life to how there's no important organs on the left side of the body. Stede has a muppety force field. Rowboats have homing devices, and port is always as close as you want it to be. Scurvy is a joke. The overblown violence of pirate life is mostly a joke, but we are going to take the violence of childhood trauma seriously.

Lucius's fake-out death, while technically part of Act 2, works well because Act 1 did a good job of priming everyone to go "obviously this show wouldn't kill a crew member for shock value, and we're 100% supposed to suspend disbelief about how he could have survived getting flung into the sea in the middle of the night." And we do. And we get rewarded for it.

Regarding antagonists - a big focus of any setup - the show is deliberately weak. The one with the most screentime is Izzy, and he's purposefully ineffective at separating our main couple. Every antagonist is keyed to a particular character, and they function mostly to inform us of that character's flaws and development requirements. The Badmintons tell us about Stede's repression and feelings of inadequacy, and Izzy tells us about Edward's directionless discontent and tendency to avoid his problems. Effectively - the show is taking the stance this will be a character driven narrative where Stede and Edward's flaws are the source of problems and development the solution. No person or empire (or social homophobia) is separating them...

...which leads me to something not present - there nothing really about the struggle of piracy against the Empire. Looking at Curse of the Black Pearl... we see piracy is in danger. The Black Pearl itself is described as the last great pirate threat the British Navy needs to conquer. Hangings are omnipresent - Jack is sentenced to die by one almost as soon as he's introduced to the story, when his only act so far had been to wander around and save Elizabeth from drowning. OFMD tries to invoke this kind of struggle in 2x08, but there's no foundation. Our Navy antagonists are Stede's childhood bullies, and so focused on Stede the crew isn't even in danger when they get caught. The Republic of Pirates is getting jokes about being gentrified, not besieged.

Even the capture of Blackbeard by the Navy is treated as a feather in Wellington's cap but not a huge symbolic blow against piracy... because we just do not have that grand struggle woven into Act 1. You only know the "Golden Age of Piracy" is ending if you google it, or have watched a bunch of pirate shows.

Overall, a solid Act 1, well adapted to the kind of story they've said they were looking to tell - a romance in the (silly-fied) age of piracy, instead of a pirate adventure with a romantic subplot.

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Now, Sidebar - Where is the story going?

The thing about the dramatic question - in OFMD's case: "What is Stede and Edward's happy ending?" - is that a) there's normally more than one question bundled up in that one + sideplots, and b) while you aren't supposed to have the answer yet, you can usually guess what needs to happen to give you the answer.

Back to our examples... Luke's driving question is "Will the Empire be defeated?" Simple. Straightforward. Also: "Will Luke become a Jedi?" The eventual climax of our story from there is pretty obvious... the story is over when Luke wins the war for the Rebellion in a Jedi way. That's the goal that they are working toward.

Pirates of the Caribbean is a bit more complicated. We're juggling more characters and have a less defined heroic journey, but there are driving questions like "Is Jack Sparrow a good man?" and "Is Will Turner a pirate / what does that mean?" and even "Will the British Navy defeat piracy?" They get basic answers in Curse of the Black Pearl, and far more defined ones in At World's End. Still, this is another plot-driven narrative. They've laid the foundations for the Pirates vs Empire struggle, and when that final battle turns into the trilogy climax then you know what's happening.

OFMD is not doing a plot-driven narrative. To judge how they are doing at their goals, we have to ask what they think a happy ending entails in a character sense.

Clearly it's not the classic romantic sideplot, where the climax is the first kiss / acknowledgement of feelings. They've teased a wedding in Word of God comments a lot, so that's probably our better endpoint. Specifically, though, a wedding where both of our protagonists aren't ready to flee from the altar (big ask) and where they've both grown enough that their flaws / mutual tendencies to run away from life problems won't tank the relationship.

In Stede's case it's still massive feelings of inadequacy and being too repressed to talk about his problems. Also he ran away from his family to chase a lifelong dream of being a pirate - "Is Stede going to find fulfillment in being a pirate captain, or will the real answer be love?" Edward meanwhile expresses a desire to quit piracy and retire Blackbeard, but we also find out he's struggling with massive self-loathing and guilt from killing his father - "Is retiring what Edward wants to do, or is he just running away?"

If they are going to get to a satisfying wedding beat at the climax of their story, what character beats do we need to hit in advance?

Off the top of my head - both characters need to self-realize their flaws (a pretty necessary demand of anyone who runs away from problems). They are set up to balance each other well, but also to miscommunicate easily. They have to tell each other about or verbally acknowledge that self-realization so it can be resolved. Stede has to decide how much being a pirate means to him. Edward has to decide if he's retiring and what he wants to do. They both need to show something to do with getting past their childhood traumas given all the flashbacks. Through all this, they also need to hit the normal romance beats that convince the audience they are romantically attracted to each other and like... want to get married.

Oh, and this is more of a genre-specific sideplot, but once they demonstrate a behavior that hurts the people who work for them, they need to then demonstrate later how it won't happen again. Proof of growth, which is kind of important in a comedy where a lot of the humor is based in them being massively self-centered assholes. Stede doesn't earn his acceptance in the community until he kicks Calico Jack off the ship, making up for causing the situation with Nigel in the first episode. A workplace comedy can get a lot of material from the boss as the worker's antagonist, but if you want the bosses to stay sympathetic you have got to throw them some opportunities to earn it.

All that sounds like a lot, but like - the relationship is the story, right? If we spend so much time on establishing flaws big enough to drive a story, we also have to spend time on fixing them. Which is where the turning point hits.

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Act 2: How it Starts

This is where the full story reality-checks your protagonist. Glad you saved your boyfriend and embraced new love in Act 1, but his repressed guilt means he's about to completely ghost you, and your own abandonment issues and self-loathing are about to make his dick move into everyone else's problem.

Again, it's a non-conventional choice OFMD has this start at the very end of S1 rather than with a sudden dark turn in the S2 premiere, but it's still pretty clearly that point in the Three Act Structure.

In Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back opens with a timeskip to our Rebellion getting absolutely crushed and hiding on a miserable frozen planet. The Empire finds them as the plot is kicking off and they have to desperately flee. They get separated. Han and Leia try to go to an ally for help and end up in Vader's clutches. It's a sharp turn from the victorious note that A New Hope ended on.

Pirates of the Caribbean's Act 2 starts dark. Dead Man's Chest opens with our happy couple Will and Elizabeth getting arrested on their wedding day for the "happy end" escape of the last movie. Jack has not been having success since reclaiming his ship, and we'll soon find out he's being hunted by dark forces. As for the general state of piracy, we get a horrifying prison where pirates are being eaten alive by crows, and a new Lord Beckett making the dying state of piracy even more textual. "Jack Sparrow is a dying breed... The world is shrinking."

The key here is making a point that our heroes aren't ready. This is the struggles part - things they try? Fail. The odds do not look to be in their favor.

Now, OFMD apparently decided to go all-in on flaw exploration, especially with Edward. The first 3 episodes of S2 are brutally efficient in outlining Edward's backslide. In S1 you could see he had issues with guilt and feeling like a bad person. S2 devolves that into a destructive, suicidal spiral where Edward forces his crew into three months of consecutive raids, repeats his shocking act of cruelty with Izzy's toe offscreen (more than once!), escalates it with his leg, and finally they state directly that Edward hates himself for killing his dad so much that he fears he's fundamentally unlovable and better off dead.

Stede's struggles are subtler, but most definitely still there. He's deliberately turning a blind eye to tales of Edward's rampage, half from simply being too self-centered to care about the harms Edward causes others, and half from being unable to face or fathom that he had the ability to hurt Edward that much. Upon reunion he wants to put the whole thing behind them, not addressing why he left in the first place. Very "love magically fixes everything" of him, except Stede is no golden merman.

Interestingly, here, BlackBonnet's relationship dysfunction has very clearly been having a negative impact on the surrounding characters we care about. Make sense, since it's the driving force of the story, but that also adds a lot more relationships we need to make right. Like... Edward is the villain to his crew. The show focuses on their trauma and poisoned relationships with him. And then draws our attention even more to Stede taking his side to overrule their objections to him.

For a story where the conflict and required resolutions are primarily character based, and the setup had already given the main couple a good amount to work with, dedicating a lot of S2 to adding more ground to cover was... a choice. Potentially very compelling on the character end, certainly challenging on the writing end... but not a complete break with the structure.

Bold, but not damning.

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Act 2: How it Ends

Now it is true that Act 2 tends to end on a loss. Luke is defeated by Vader and loses his hand, and Han has been sent away in carbonite. Jack Sparrow for all his efforts cannot escape his fate, and he and the Pearl are dragged to the locker.

But the loss is not the point. The loss is incidental to the point.

Act 2 is about struggles and failure, but it's also about lessons learned. There's a change that occurs, and our cast - defeated but not broken - enters the final act with the essential skills, motivation, knowledge, etc. that they lacked in the beginning.

Luke Skywalker could not have defeated the Empire in Return of the Jedi until he'd learned the truth about his father and resisted the Dark Side in The Empire Strikes Back. (Ok, confession, I'm using Star Wars as an example because literally everyone is doing so, but frankly it's a better example of formulaic Three Act Structure repeating within each movie because on a trilogy level - relevant to this comparison - it is a super basic hero's journey in a very recognized outfit and as such the Act 2 relevance is also... super basic "the hero tries to fight the antagonist too early" beat where he learns humility. Not really a lot going on. So, for the better example...)

Dead Man's Chest has a downer ending with the closing moment of the survivors regaining hope and a plan against an enemy now on the verge of total victory - a classic Act 2. But in that first loss against Davy Jones we get Will's personal motivation and oath to stab the heart, Jack finally overcoming not knowing what he wanted and returning to save them from the Kraken (being a good man), Elizabeth betraying Jack (being a pirate), Barbossa's return, and Norrington's choice to bargain for his prior life back. The mission to retrieve Jack from the World's End is the final movie's plot, but things are already on track to turn the tables back around as we enter the finale.

Now, relevant sidenote - one major difference between Three Act Structure within a single work vs across three parts is that Act 2 continues into Part 3, and only tips over into Act 3 about midway through. This is because obviously your final movie or season cannot just be the climax. That's why both movie examples start with a rescue mission. They have to still be missing something so they can get the plot of their third part accelerating while they go get whatever that something is.

But if you wait until the 3rd movie / season to get the development going at all - you're fucked.

Jack's decision in the climax of At World's End to make Elizabeth into the Pirate King goes back to the development we saw in the Pearl vs Kraken fight in Dead Man's Chest. So does Elizabeth's leadership arc. Will's whole arc about becoming Captain of the Dutchman gets built upon in the third movie, but it starts in the second. Not just as an idle thought - he's actively pursuing it. Already consciously weighing saving his father vs getting back to Elizabeth as soon as he makes the oath. Everyone is moving forward in Act 2. Their remaining development might stumble for drama, or they might be a bit reluctant, but I know that they know better than to let it stick, because they already faced their true crisis points.

I'm not sure we can say the same about OFMD.

S2 does a good job of adding problems, yeah, but there's not really any movement on fixing them. Our main couple stagnates in some ways, and regresses in others.

Stede opened Act 2 by running away in the middle of the night back to his wife without telling Edward anything. We know he did it because of feeling guilty and his core childhood trauma of his dad calling him a weak and inadequate failure. Now in S1 he actually speedruns a realization of his shitty behavior with Mary, but what about S2? Well...

He continues to not talk to Edward about... pretty much anything. My guy practiced love confessions galore but Edward only finds out about going back to his wife via Anne, and it gets brushed aside with a love confession. He seems to think Edward wants him to be a dashing pirate, or maybe he just thinks he should be a dashing pirate. Idk, it doesn't get examined. Regarding his captaincy, they give him an episode plot about Izzy teaching him to respect the crew's beliefs, but this is sideplot to a larger arc of him completely overruling their traumas and concerns (and shushing their objections) to keep his boyfriend on the ship so. That.

Stede kills a man for reasons related to his issues, shoves that down inside and has sex with Edward instead of acknowledging any bad feelings. At least this time Edward was there and knows it happened? Neither Chauncey's death nor his dad have been mentioned to anyone. He gets a day of piracy fame that goes to his head, gets dumped, and ends on a complete beat down by Zheng where he learns... idk. Being a boor is bad? He's still wildly callous to her in the finale, and spends the whole time seeking validation of his pirate skills. He reunites with Edward, kisses, and quotes Han Solo.

Where S1 ended on a great fuckery, his S2 naval uniform plan after they regroup is ill defined except to call it a suicide mission - and we don't get to see what it would have been because it devolves into a very straightforward fight and flee. And gets Izzy killed. Quick cut funeral (no acknowledgement of his S2 bonding with Izzy), quick cut to wedding (foreshadowing), quick cut to... innkeeper retirement? Unclear when or even if BlackBonnet discussed Stede's whole driving dream to be a pirate and live a life at sea, but I guess that got a big priority downgrade. Despite the fact he was literally looking to Zheng for pirate-based compliments in the post-funeral scene.

I guess he's borderline-delusionally dogged in his pursuit of love now - so unlikely to bolt again - but he's also got at least a decade of experience mentally checking out in a state of repression when he's unhappy. And he's stopped being as supportive and caring toward the crew in that dogged pursuit, while arguably demonstrating a loss in leadership skills, so, um, good thing someone else is in charge?

And if Stede is a mess, Edward's arc is so much worse.

As established, they devote the Kraken to making Edward worse. He literally wants to kill himself and destroy everyone around him in the process because Stede left, and this is fixed by... Stede coming back. That's it. The crew tries to murder him and then exiles him from the ship (and Izzy takes the lead on both, indicating exactly how isolated Edward has become), but it's resolved in half a day by Stede just forcing them to put up with his boyfriend again. Like they think he murdered Buttons and still have to move him back in???

The show consistently depicts Kraken Era as a transgression against the crew, but they also avoid showing Edward acting with genuine contrition. He admits he historically doesn't apologize for anything, and then mostly still doesn't. It's a joke that he's approaching probation as a performance (CEO apology), and then the only person he genuinely talks to is Fang - the one guy cool with him - and the only person who gets a basic "sorry" is Izzy - the guy he really needs to be talking to. Edward's primary trauma is guilt, but apparently he only feels it abstractly after all that? He's only concerned with fixing things with Stede, despite Stede being about the only person around who hurt him instead of the reverse.

Speaking of primary traumas, Edward hating himself doesn't really go anywhere after the beat of self-realization. Apparently Stede still loving him is enough of a bandaid to end the suicide chasing, but he doesn't like. Acknowledge that. Edward is maybe sorta trying to go slow so he doesn't hang all his self-worth on Stede again (you can speculate), but they a) absolutely fail to go slow, and b) he doesn't make any attempt to develop himself or another support structure. Just basically... "let's be friends a bit before hooking back up." And then we get the whiplash that is Blackbeard and/or retirement.

Kraken Era is Blackbeard but way worse, like no one who has known Blackbeard has ever seen him. In the Gravy Basket Edward claims he might like being an innkeeper, before destroying his own fantasy by having the spectre of Hornigold confront him over killing his dad. The BlackBonnet to Anne & Mary parallel says running away to China / retiring makes you want to kill each other - burn it all down and go back to piracy. Stede rightfully points out prior retirement plans were whims. Edward gets sick of the penance sack after a day and puts his leathers back on to go try "poison into positivity". But also claims to be an innkeeper (look - two whole mentions!) when trying not to send children to be pirates after teaching them important knife skills.

Killing Ned Low is a serious, bad thing that prompts ill-advised sex and then going hardcore into retirement mode - leathers overboard, talk about mermaid fantasy, get retirement blessings from Izzy, end up dumping Stede for a fishing job instead of talking about how he's enjoying piracy. The fishing job, however, is also a bad thing and a stupid decision because Edward is a lazy freeloader fantasizing about being a better person. We have an uncomfortable, extended scene of "Pop-Pop" weirdly echoing his abusive dad and then sending Edward to go do what he's good at - disassociate, brutally murder two guys, fish up the leathers, rise as the Kraken from the sea. He continues with comically efficient murder but also he's reading Stede's love letters and seeking to reunite with him so... wait, is this a good thing? Post makeout / mass slaughter he's trading compliments on his kills with Zheng so. Yeah. Looks like it. Murder is fine.

Wait, no, skip ahead and Izzy is dying and Edward suddenly cares a whole lot as Izzy makes his death scene about freeing Edward from Blackbeard. Now being a pirate was "encouraging the darkness" because Izzy - a guy who had little to no influence over Edward's behavior - just couldn't let Blackbeard go. Murder is bad again, and he is freed. Minus the little detail that the murder he explicitly hates himself over was not related to Blackbeard or piracy whatsoever, so presumably haunts "just Ed" still. Anyway he's retiring to run an inn with Stede now, as the "loving family" Izzy comforted him with in his dying moments sails away from the couple that can best be described as the antagonists of their S2 arc. Also Edward implicitly wants to get married. It's been 3 days since making out was "too fast". He's still wearing the leathers.

So most of the way through Act 2 and Edward's barely on speaking terms with anyone but Stede, who he has once again hung his entire life on really fast? Crushing guilt leads to self-hatred leads to mass murder and suicide, but only if he's upset so just avoid that. He's still regularly idealizing Stede as a non-fucked up golden mermaid person (that maybe he personally ruined a bit) because he barely knows the guy. His only progress on his future is "pirate" crossed out / rewritten / crossed out again a few times, "fisherman" crossed out, and "innkeeper ?"

Just.

Where is the forward movement?

It's not just that the inn will undoubtedly fall apart - it's that the inn will fall apart for the near-exact same reasons that China was going to at the beginning of Act 2, and I can't point to anything they've learned in the time since that will help them. I guess Stede realized he loved Edward enough to chase after him, but that was in S1! They should be further than this by now. You can't cram another crisis backslide, all the Act 2 development, and the full Act 3 climax into one season. Certainly not without it feeling like the characters magically fix themselves.

If they just fail and keep blindly stumbling into the same issues because they don't change their behavior, then Act 2 doesn't work. You're just repeating the turning point between Act 1 & Act 2 on a loop.

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Where Did They Fuck Up?

Actually... lets start on what they did right.

The one consistent aspect of S2 that I praised and still think was done well in a vacuum (despite being mostly left out of the finale) was the crew's union-building arc.

With only 8 episodes and more to do in them than S1, side characters were going to get pinched even if the main plot was absolutely flawless. That was unavoidable. With budget cuts / scheduling issues, we regularly have crew members simply vanish offscreen outside of one scene, meaning cohesive arcs for your faves was not likely. Not to say they couldn't have done better - my benefit of the doubt for the TealOranges breakup and Oluwande x Zheng dried up about when I realized he was literally just her Stede stand-in for the parallel - but something like Jim's revenge plot from S1 was realistically not on the table without, like, turning half the crew into seagulls to afford it.

The union building works around this constraint really well. They turn "the crew" into the side arc, and then weave Izzy's beats in so that they aren't just about Izzy. The breakup boat crew working together to comfort each other and protect him turns them into a unit, and Stede's crew taking it upon themselves to address the trauma vibes while the captains aren't in the way solidifies it across all our side characters. The crew goes to war with Stede's cursed coat and wins, they Calypso their boss to throw a party, and they capitalize on a chance to make bank with an efficiency Stede could only dream of.

We don't get specific arcs, but Frenchie, Jim, and Oluwande are defaulted to as leaders in just about every situation, and Roach is constantly shown sharing his inventions with different characters. Individuals can dip in and out without feeling like the sideplots stutter. Any sense of community in S2 is coming from this arc - even if there are cracks at the points where it joins to other storylines (Stede and Edward, Zheng, etc.)

So why does it work? Well, because it's a workplace comedy, and you can tell they are familiar with working on those. They know where the beats are. They know where to find the humor. They know how to build off of S1 because they made sure the bones were already there - an eclectic group of individuals that start as just coworkers, but bond over time in the face of their struggle against an inept boss who they grow to care for and support while maintaining an increasingly friendly antagonism because, you know, inept boss.

OFMD does its best work in S2 when it's being true to its original concept... and its worst work when it seemingly loses confidence in its own premise.

"The show is the relationship," right? It's a romance set in a workplace comedy. The setup of Act 1 was all about creating a character-driven narrative. So given that... where the hell are we getting the dying of piracy and a war against the English Navy?

That's not a character-driven romcom backdrop, it's an action-adventure plot from Pirates of the Caribbean or Black Sails. It's plot-driven, creating an antagonistic force that results in your characters' problems. Once the story is about the fight against the Empire, the dramatic question becomes the same as those adventure stories - "Will the British Navy defeat piracy, and will our protagonists come out the other side of the battle?"

Forget the wedding. The wedding is no longer the climax of the story, its back to the happy ending flash our romantic subplot gets after winning this fight.

Except, of course, trying to pivot your story to a contradictory dramatic question near the end of Act 2 can be nothing short of a disaster, because either you were writing the wrong story until now, or you've completely lost the plot of the real one. I shouldn't even be trying to figure out if they are doing this, because it should be so obvious that they wouldn't.

And yet.

What do the Zheng and Ricky plots add to the story if not this? Neither of these characters have anything emotionally to contribute to Stede and Edward - they truly are plot elements. It's a hard break from the S1 antagonist model, but it also takes up a lot of valuable screentime. This was considered important, but still Zheng's personality and motivation only gets explored so far as it's an Edward-Stede-Izzy parallel with Oluwande and Auntie, and they only need the parallel for Izzy's genre-jumping death scene. Which follows a thematically out-of-left-field speech about how piracy is about belonging to something good (workable) and how Ricky could never destroy their spirits (um...?). And then David Jenkins is pointing to it and saying things about "the symbolic death of piracy" and speculating S3 might be about the crew getting "payback"??? An idea floated by Zheng right before our temporary retirement, btw.

Fuck, the final episode of S2 didn't have time for our main couple to talk to each other because it was so busy dealing with the mass explosion of Zheng's fleet and Ricky's victory gloat. We get lethal violence associated with traumatic flashbacks until they need to cut down enemy mooks like it's nothing, at which point we get jokes with Zheng. The Republic of Pirates is destroyed outright, and it feels like they only did it because they got insecure about their "pirate story" not having the right kind of stakes. Don't even get me started on killing a major character because "Piracy’s a dangerous occupation, and some characters should die," as if suspending disbelief on this aspect makes the story somehow lesser, instead of just being a fairly standard genre convention in comedy. Nobody complains about Kermit the Frog having an improbably good survival record.

Did someone tell them that the heroes have to lose a battle near the end of Act 2, so they scrambled to give them one?

Just... compare the wholly plot-driven struggle in 2x08 to Stede and Edward's character-focused storylines in 1x10 and tell me how 2x08 is providing anything nearly as valuable to the story. Because I can't fucking find it.

At best they wasted a bunch of time on a poorly integrated adventure plot as, like, Zheng's backstory or something, and just fucked it up horribly by trying to "step up" the kind of plot they did for Jim. In which case the whole thing will be awkwardly dropped but damage is done. Otherwise, they actually thought they could just casually add a subplot like this because they've done something wildly stupid like think "pirate" is a genre on the same level as "workplace comedy" and can just trample in-universe coherency while you draw on other media to shore up their unsupported beats.

Bringing us to the most infuriating bit...

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"...end the second season in a kinder spot."

If this was the goal, the entire season was written to work actively against it in way that is baffling and incompetent.

The really ironic thing is that the reason that the Act 2 part typically gets a downer ending is because of the evil empire that OFMD did not have to deal with until they pointlessly added it. A plot-driven story has an antagonistic force - a villain - that the heroes need to defeat. Something external working against them. The story ends when they beat the thing, and it's not much of a climax if they do most of the defeating before you get there. Ergo, they have to be outmatched up to the climax. Ergo, the second part cannot end on them feeling pretty comfortable and confident going into the third.

The same rules do not apply in the same way to a character-driven arc.

We already established Edward and Stede declaring their love is not the end of the story. Nor, necessarily, is both of them confidently entering a relationship. Even once they've developed a bunch they will have to show that development by running into the kinds of problems that would have broken them up before and resolving them better.

David Jenkins keeps talking about this idea that S2 is getting a hopeful open ending and S3 will get into potential problems, and like... I don't see any reason why they couldn't have done that successfully. They didn't, but they could've.

If S2 grew them enough as characters and then had them agree to try again in the last minute of the finale, they absolutely could have had a kind and hopeful ending where you were confident they could do it. And then a potential S3 can show that. It's a bit rockier than they were counting on, but they have learned enough lessons to not break up. And then the overall plot can build to proposal (start of Act 3) and wedding (the romantic climax). It doesn't have to be a blow out fight to be emotionally cathartic.

(Hell, the main rockier bit that they overcome in the S3 Act 2 portions could be marriage baggage. I'm sure they both have some. It would work.)

In the same way focusing on our character's long term flaws and character-driven conflict makes an Act 1 "happy ending" more difficult, I suspect it makes an Act 2 "happy ending" easier.

Instead they wrote an Act 2 that failed to convincingly start development and got confused on its direction, and then presented a rushed finale ending in a copy of the predictable disaster from S1 as though it's a good thing. They yanked the story at least temporarily into an awkward place where a romcom is trying to sell me on a bunch of serious drama / adventure beats that it has not put the work into, and inviting comparisons to better versions of those same beats in other, more suited media that make it look worse. The need to portray everyone as reaching happy closure overrules sitting with a major character death and using it for any narrative significance, while still letting it overshadow those happy endings because a romcom just sloppily killed a major character with a wound they've literally looked into the camera and said was harmless.

If I'm being entirely honest, Dead Man's Chest ends effectively at Jack Sparrow's funeral and then cuts to the British Navy obtaining a weapon of mass destruction, and it still feels kinder and more hopeful just because I leave with more faith the characters are actively capable of and working toward solving their problems.

OFMD S2, in contrast, has half-convinced me our main couple would live in a mutually obsessed, miscommunication-ridden horror story until they die.

---

Additional Reading

Normally I link stuff like this in the post, but that requires more excitement than I'm feeling right now. Here's my alternative:

Where I thought they were going with Edward - really outlines the mountain of character development they still have unaddressed

Where I thought they were going with Izzy - touches on a lot of themes that might be dead in the water & also context that's still probably relevant to why Izzy got a lot of focus in S2

My scattershot 2x08 reactions

An ask where I sketched out the bones of this argument, and another where I was mostly venting about the fandom response

This one, this other one, and this last one (read the link in op's post too) about genre shifts and failure to pull them off

The trauma goes in the box but it never opens back up - the whole point of Act 2 is that they needed to start opening shit like that - and also they focus so much on needed character growth and so little on following through

They can't even carry through on character growth that we got last season???

Why Izzy's death feels like Bury Your Gays ran smack into shitty writing

EDIT: Oh and this post is REALLY good for outlining the lack of change in way less words than I did

#our flag means death #ofmd #ofmd s2 #ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd meta #three act structure #character arcs #blackbonnet #genre #blackbeard ofmd #stede bonnet ofmd #my meta #ladyluscinia #ofmd critical

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doublekanble · 2 months

Text

deer (after the car crashed)

Alastor/reader (gnc)

romantic

word count: 4.7k

Or, a confession, (somewhat) note: not nesnecessarily connected, but IS written in the spirit of deer (iahl). someone said p2 where he confessed and i thought 'he would've never, he would do every romantic thing in the book and cry over your dead body but he will never ask you out. reader got hurt, non-descriptive as i am but a silly guy, very possibly wrong description of a little medical things.

The gramophone in the corner of your room play a tune that he himself isn’t exactly fond of, but didn’t exactly hate. It’s been your favorite ever since you spent more than a month of your wages to win an “online” bidding war for the limited release. As he hum along, he held onto your jaw, fingers sharp and all claws doing its best to not leave so much a scratch on your chin. Just as gently, he let the tip of a thermometer sits on your tongue, and close your mouth.

Finished, but not leaning back, he take a second to look at you, almost a sneer on his face at your state, he trust that by the time you wake up, you can still remember the faces of whoever it is that harmed you. Even if you can’t, he mused, he’ll help you. Hopefully you know how to recognize bones structure. He turn back to the book he left half-way through and pick up where he left off, a book you tried to read several times. Would you let him spoil the ending, he wonder. Reaching for his neat whiskey as he scanned the line printed on yellowed paper, he down it in one go.

(somewhat, Alastor let the thought fester, he also became a culprit. Having time after time parading you by his side, thinking that he can always shelter you)

You’ve always been good at giving books recommendations, despite finishing only a handful of them. You’re also a delight to be around, much more than anyone in the hotel can ever afford to be. Always finding himself around you, adding seconds to minutes to hours, and then when he would check the time, you both would’ve already missed dinner, talking about nothing all the while.

(he would laugh, and you would chuckle, and he offers you meat, and you'd denied. You don’t feel like eating that day, you’d say. That’s how he started checking up on you, even though eating is nothing more than a passing hobby down here in Hell)

Needless to say, you’re his favorite, worming into his heart in such a short amount of time. It’s even much more redundant to even bother insinuating that he might do everything he can just to keep you safe. Having taken enough time to think about the unfamiliar emotions you stirred in his heart, he decided that it’s welcomed to stay for as long as he wants it to. As such, Alastor acquainted himself with the need to make sure you’ll never have to worry about a single missing strand of hair on your head. Always more of a caretaker, he finds it utterly adorable how your nonchalant demeanor always falters under his relentless care. Never the heart to deny it, but never fully accepting it either.

And it should’ve stayed that way, with you blubbering about and tripping over your own words while acting like nothing is wrong, and him hovering over you, grinning as he brush off whatever you gotten onto your clothes that day. But it couldn’t possibly stay that way when you’re lying on your bed wrapped up and unresponsive, unable to even give him an excuse as to why you stumbled back through the front door after what supposed to be a quick errand trip, scaring poor Charlie to death with ugly, gnarling gashes in the shape of long running lines down your arms and several red holes staining your shirt, one logged deeply in your left inner thigh. You would promptly pass out the moment she rush to your side and stays that way for three days and two horrible, grueling night.

He wasn’t even there, staying in his radio tower for the day. Assuming that you’ll come to him if you needed something, he let his shadows rest at the corner of his eyes. Only when Husk burst into the room -furs all frazzled and sweaty- that he knows. When he came down to you, you’re out like a light for at least three hours already, Angel sitting on your bed with two bullet in a red cup sitting at his side. His pink and white gloves stained red, it trembles as he drop yet another one into the cup, then slowly goes back to gently reaching in for another one.

“Can’t afford to work fast, been some months since I hafta pull anything out on my own. Heh.” He laughs to soothe himself, shuddering under his breath. Saying that, Angel makes it clear he doesn’t trust anyone else to do this. The sheets that Nifty changed for you already turning red, the one at the foot of the bed brown. The unfortunate downside to natural healing is that you tend to bleed for a long time until you're stable enough for your meat to reconnect.

(the bottom of his shoes would later step on that same brown, mixing another red into it. He was -and still is- torn open at the thought)

Alastor likes to play up the lie that he doesn’t understand fear or anxiety, pretend that he have never been at the feet of anyone else other than himself. And he would go through the duration of your relationship letting you see him as such. He’s someone you can rely on; someone you can trust with everything you have without the lingering fear that he’ll pull it from under you one day. But you always been individualistic to a degree, it was never a problem before.

(you dislike not knowing where to go and what to say, so you never do anything or say anything that might ruin the perception people have of you. You seems so close off like that, he said. You’re not, you insisted, you’d let anyone you love in as long as they ask)

Briefly, as he seated back onto the armchair now sitting right by your bedside, thermometer back in hand, he ponders about how he must’ve looked to the others when he first step into the room. You yourself are often entertained by the macabre sight of his much more unpleasant form, calling it endearing at times. But the others are much less appreciative of it. They don’t come in that often, anyway, only Nifty and Angel does. It’s not that they don’t care about you, it’s simply that he deemed them completely and utterly useless.

(he wonders when you woke up, will you let him back in, already knows how it'll play out)

Vaggie busied herself with taking care of Charlie, who can’t look at you without bursting into tears. Her weeping heart normally is entertaining to see in action, but an on-edge and scared Charlie is a messy Charlie, and she nearly pour hot water on you and Angel Dust - who hurriedly covered you up with his lanky frame. He appreciate the spider demon extended effort in keeping you safe, having only left to pick out a disc to put back into the gramophone himself.

Through gnashing teeth and a too-wide smile, Alastor asked Vaggie to keep check on her dear partner. And they haven’t been seen near your room since. Promised by Angel to come by and give updates whenever he can.

Nifty’s appearance would be much more erratic. At first, it’s to take away things that Angel stops using, cleaning it up and putting it back to its spot. Then after that, bringing with her tea and biscuits Pentious made and practically begged her to bring to you that would, in turn, sit on the bedside table until her next visit to change the sheets and duvet again. He can tell she’s a bit more bothered by the fact that you’re still bleeding onto the sheets than you being unconscious. She did ask him when you’ll be awake. He doesn’t know.

(he can’t fathom the idea of you pushing him away. but the taste of dirty copper stains the roof of his mouth for the days you wasted away on your bed)

And Angel, much more agitated than anyone else, much more competent than everyone else, grumbles about how hard it is to change your bandages with Alastor hovering over his shoulders. After the 3rd time, he figured the demon would never stop, so he let him keep watch.

Alastor would’ve done it himself, not trusting the spider (or anyone else for that matter) with touching you now that his part in clearing your wounds is done, if not for how his eyes lingers on your right hand, your dominant hand. The one with the tear in the web between your pointer and middle finger, running down by at least 3 centimeters, sewn shut with skills Alastor almost wishes he have. He hates that he fully understood why Angel would be staring down at you with such a miserable expression.

When you’re bleeding finally stable enough so that you don’t need the bandages change as much anymore, Angel would come by with a thermometer, placing it in his hand and asked him to keep check on you and change your bandages if needed while he himself went off to make up for the work he “missed out on”. His phone now finally back in his hand after the constant ringing in the 7th hour nearly cracked Alastor’s patient, left behind with Fat Nuggets.

(Husk would come by one time, on the fourth hour of your rest. Alastor would leave for one. When he came back, Angel doesn’t have the heart to questioned why he reeks, simply chiding him to try and go change)

Holding it in his hand and turning it over, he look at the readings and think you would’ve thanked God for your wounds not being infected, or at least enough to give you a fever. Angel did well. He thinks about how downright disgusting the wounds looked on you despite seeing so much worse in his time. It won’t scar you, but it’ll take more than a week for you to even hold a pen, let alone moving it without any pain. At least it’ll heal. He would’ve killed God if he could.

Returning to his (your) book, he felt a pit forming in his stomach, you’re easy to read, he’ll know what to do once you talk again. Alastor pretends he doesn’t feel fear, but it certainly is much more unpleasant when it’s about someone else. He expected you to wake up soon, if it’s not tomorrow, he doesn’t know how he can hold it back, taste of copper still stuck to his teeth.

It took you five days and five night for you to start opening up your eyes. Six and a half for you to rasped out a weak apology for making him worried, being hand-fed as much water and porridge as possible in between the short sentence before you immediately fell back onto your pillow and sleep for the rest of the day. Angel Dust who was there at the time slipped away to pass out the good news to the rest of the hotel residents.

Despite so, nobody enters the room more than once for rest of the night. In their stead, hand-made paper flowers and get-well-soon cards stays with you on your bedside table. He knows they’re making something else in the main lobby, and it’s absolutely hilarious to him that they think you’ll be able to walk anytime soon to see it yourself. One time, Pentious tail bump the garbage can on his way out, Alastor can feel his terrified gaze, but choosing not to pay the fool any mind. Your right hand in his left, he sit with a glass of whiskey on the rock instead, armchair now sitting next to your bed and facing the bundle of gifts.

(Husk would come in twice before the dawn came to give him two more drink and to give you a lousy card, clearly been made by Charlie in his stead. He waited for Alastor’s permission before placing it on top of the pile with all the others)

At early dawn, he held himself back as you stir awake. Your hand wrapped in his, giving him a squeeze so weak he barely able to feel it. but he felt it nonetheless, and in spite of his wearing sanity, he simply returns the gesture and lifted your hand up to his thinning grin.

“Good morning darling, you gave us quite the scare there. I hope you’re finally awake enough to know where you are?”

Still with that charming tone, but so much smaller and quiet in the room. He waited for your reaction to see how far off you are from consciousness, when the corner of your lip stretches just a bit, he smile with a bit more heart, but it still border on exhaustive. Turning the words sitting on his tongue, back and forth after the relief finally settled, he wonders if it's worth it.

Placing the half-finished whiskeys on your bedside table and accidentally draws your eyes to all of the get-well gift. Not too awake yet, you look back at him with a blank expression and his rotted heart jumps in his chest.

“Ah, those.” he heave a sigh, “They’re from the lots here. You’ve missed a group exercises or two dear.” He leans over you, mindful to not pull your arm with him. Even so, your eyes squinted just a bit, it breaks him more than he’d ever want to admit. “I’d suggest you get used to it though. It’ll be quite some time before you can leave the room.” Borderline on warning you, yet tone still playful, he watches as you breathe and turn your head towards the ceiling, eyes off him.

“…I figured…” You’re so pitiful like this ,he thought as he poured a cup of water for you with one hand, not minding the cards and flowers that fell off in the meantime, they can wait until he’s done with this.

You made a miserable attempt at sitting to take the cup on your own for all of a second before you drop back down with a quiet “oofm”, the bed barely creaks while you seethed and writhed, cursing under your breath, hand finally leaving his to set itself on the soft surface. It’s shaking, your entire body, that is. Briefly, you try to open your right hand, and you stop. Separately, he cursed you and your wretched independence.

“Hurt?”

“I'm surprised I'm still alive…”

“It’s no wonder,” Alastor carefully lifted your head up, bringing the cup to your lips and let you take slow sip as he starts, tone just a tad bit too grating, “you did come crawling back to the hotel with 5 bullet in your torso and more than a few scratches that our fellow spider friend almost can’t handle! Really! I’d be glad to still be breathing if I were you.”

His words almost too fast for someone who just woke up from a week-long coma to get and he knows. But Alastor have been sitting in an armchair that felt one size too small for him for seven days constantly going through your two records and 3 books and reliving the moment he sees you on your bed with your eyes closed shut like a corpse in a casket. So even as he lay your head down and put the cup away, gesture loving and gentle, he still can’t help but to sneer at you.

“It’s almost like you’re trying to die again. You know that if you really wanted to, I would’ve gladly assisted you with leaving this side of the living world. Or the dead! No need for scraping scraps off the road.” He tries to play it off as a joke, laughing a bit to himself. But he knows you know. At the sounds of your beloved song being drown out by his growing static, he tries to keep his composure still. “What was it that got you stumbling through the door like a kicked pup on the road, by the by? Did you got caught in the storm drain picking up daisies? A run-in with a past nemesis? Please, do feel free to share, dear. You were so eager to run off on your own with that little errand of yours without a word to me after all.”

It's something that he compels you to do early on when he started taking you out with him. Simply inform him when you planned to leave the hotel alone, especially if it was to some much fouler part of the Pride Ring. Let alone the trail of dried blood that Husk traced after was irritatingly far from the hotel. You didn’t just stumble into the hotel on your last leg, you dragged yourself back to him one coin from your death bed.

It's been seven days, and the taste of copper still lingers. Alastor is not a patient man, but he likes to think he tried his best to be, especially with you. But the more you stay silent without even facing him, the more he can feel his self-restraints pulling at the seams, so close to breaking.

“That’s not funny, Alastor.”

Without time to even mourn the façade he plays up for you that long since crumbled to dust, Alastor hovers over you, fingers digs and tears at the sheet. It’s a habit grown bad, the way he defaults to less-than-vague threatening gestures and mocking words the moment he feels too vulnerable, something you picked up on naturally and never bothered poking him with. But the more he lingers by your side, the more he’s aware that he simply cannot just do that to you, someone who can freely walk off from him. And with his growing need to keep you by his side, you would more likely be hurt by him than anyone else in all of Hell.

“It never was supposed to be, dear. Now, do I have to pry it out of you or do you want to tell me why?”

For seven days and six nights have he been thinking. If he learns to keep you somewhere no one else can see you, Alastor would’ve never found you on the stained bed with bullets decorating your innards.

(this anger should’ve never been directed towards you, but somewhere deep in his wretched, rotted heart, he thought that you should’ve stayed away in the first place, he begged that you yell at him so he can finally leave you alone)

And Alastor would’ve gone on, would’ve said something even more nasty to pull some kind of reaction out of you, but you, with your eyes looking out what part of the window that the curtain haven’t covered up and a voice so small he can hold in one hand. Almost like you’re sorry.

“They say it’s because I know you.”

And he let himself fall by the foot of your bed.

It’s a snicker at first, then a chuckle, then he start to laugh. And he keeps laughing as his claws pulls at the sheets and left marks just as ugly as it was on your arms. Claws as sharp as the one that have dug itself into you, now tearing lines into your duvet and sheets and bedding and open up scars. But your warmth grows apparent as your trembling fingers held onto his claws. And despairingly, he held onto you.

Even though he already know, even though he was frantically getting into your face and forcing you to confirmed what he learned by the middle of the fifth hour. Alastor still feel a horrible sense of defeat washes over him as he held tightly onto your right hand, the information’s utterly revolting, coming directly from you.

And even knowing that he’s hurting you, he still refuses to let go as your bandages slowly bleeds red. Promises to himself that if you let go, he will. And when your other hand reaches over, your breathing’s heavy, he prayed you’d pry his hands off yours. And when you didn’t. It takes everything he have to not lock you away forever and never letting you out.

“I don’t want to bother you so much. It wasn’t even supposed to be that far of a trip, but I panicked and didn't realized they were leading me from the hotel…” you paused, wanting to go on but wasn’t sure how to soothe him while the implication kills him. Just what sort of godly deeds did he ever do throughout his life and death to have you by his side? And just what sort of unearthly karma is placed upon you for you to be stuck by his?

You know this happened because of your ties to him, but there’s not a lick of anger from your end as you give him the time and privacy he barely granted you to collect himself. And as time pass on without a word from both side, you start to drift off, still beyond tired even after the long rest. But he can feel your hands still holding onto his. Oh, what a pair, you and him. An idiot that refuses to leave and a dog that can’t let go. The last song plays before he needs to reset the needle as he gather the strength to clear his throat and break the silence.

“I’m sorry dear, I-,” He rasped out, voice strained and unsteady, having laughed himself raw, it sounded as if he’s the one that just came back from the death. “I know you won’t be gone for long, but I simply just-“ neither the gun or bullets he held in his hand at that time are made with Angelic metals, they would beg and cry out to him. The bastards couldn’t have afforded enough to spare you any. But it doesn’t do well to quench the pain in his heart, neither would it let the wound on your body heal any faster.

He laugh a light and airy laugh, unable to tell you what you already know. “I must beg for your forgiveness mon cher. It seems I simply can’t handle the idea of being parted from you for too long anymore.”

(like mocking, beloved, but shouldn’t have never been his, you shouldn’t have gotten stuck with a rotting corpse of a deer chained to a tree, but he doesn’t want to let you go just yet, so you’re his)

“That was genuinely shitty of you.” Right to the point. Despite you letting him hanging onto you so desperately, despite holding onto him so kindly, you never bothered to mince your word, more than exasperated, almost like you’re scolding a child. “I know you said that because you’re upset too. But if you were anyone else, I would’ve actually just, kick you out.”

Dragging himself up, careful to keep your wounds from flaring up with any more pain than it already had, he sits right next to you, bringing himself closer to your face and placing your right hand into his lap, almost like croaking, the static in his voice comes in and out. “I know, dear. Whatever it is I can do to make amends. I will.” He will leave if you asked him to, if only Alastor is anything else but a selfish dog, he will never let you know.

“I don’t want you to fix anything, Al. Just-“ he relaxed his grip, hearing you called him like that again, in such a voice, something blooms inside him again, he mourned your fate. “try to not do that again, yeah? It feels like shit waking up after all of that and then getting yell at.”

Chuckling humorlessly, of course you would ask for something so simple. He lie down next to you, storing the little mundane sight of your much more relaxed face so close to his off into the back of his head. “Of course, my dear. I vowed with all of my heart, or- whatever’s left of it.” Something like this will never, ever happened again. Not as long as he’s still breathing. And you, too eager to place the unfortunate incident behind you, but too worn out to laugh along, you simply smiles and close your eyes, face flushes red.

“Whatever you say, fucking dork…”

“Oh, such ghastly insults! How will I ever survive?” he turns over and lie on his stomach, hand holding up his head while leaning over you, play with your unkempt hair like a maiden in love. “And right after I spent my days keeping over you! What a heartbreaker you truly are, darling. I wonder what dear old Charlie would say to such a foul mouth?”

Your mouth open for a bit, then screwed itself shut, words failed to form as you try to hold in a giggle at his antics. Despite your gramophone still playing the same set of songs since last week, his heart finally get to rest when the atmosphere in your room grows much brighter. For your sake, he let you find your footing while brushing bangs into your face. Your breathing is still heavy, tinged with pain and what else that will surely follow you for the next gruesome month, but at least you’re laughing.

And then, as if on loose tongue, you stop him dead in his track. “Why do you call me that?”

Alastor froze, the claws dancing on your forehead moved to held onto the side of it, nearly nicked you in the process. He forced you to face him.

“Do enlighten me darling. What do I call you?”

“Like that.”

He raised an eyebrow.

(you’re silly, but not clueless. He knows you’re smarter than this. But then again, he doesn’t know if you know he’s yours just yet)

“ Y’know… like-“ impossibly, affectionately, you’re much redder than he’d ever seen you, now stumbling over your words, “like…darling?”

“Yes, dear~?” without missing a beat, he replied.

“You b-! Argh…”

(he could get used to this)

You nearly sat up, then immediately quiet down and seethe at him through your teeth. He laugh in returns and pat your cheek affectionately. “You ought to be more careful dearest~! At this rate, you’ll be here for-“

“Stop that!” your roar, something akin to a small kit, voice barely able to stay steady enough to comprehend. “You know what I’m trying to say! I don’t get it!”

He smiles, hand going back to messing with your hair. “I do not get what you’re trying to implied,” baring his teeth while you gritted yours, “sweetheart~”

(a rotting piece of meat, sitting next to a flowerbed, what a sight you two made)

It’s endearing how hard you try to act upset, with your smiles barely differentiate from a grimace and eyes that refused to look at him. “They’re pet name, Al.” he lift your chin towards him, kicking his feet in the air. “It’s personal, isn’t it? You don’t call anyone else that either…” you’re finally starting to gawk the distance between you and everyone else from his eyes. Better late than never, as his mother always told him.

“Correct! You’re such a charming little thing, trust me, but it’s honestly rather demoralizing waiting for you to pick up on it dear! I thought it would’ve taken much quicker, let alone it took until you climbed out of Hades gate to realized.”

“Pick up on what??”

“What do you think?”

"...That you...see me as a pet???"

(he hope you won’t pick up on the smell)

He knows you enough to know you will never let yourself say it out loud until he does. But Alastor is nothing but a patient man. Grin stretching across his face, he pecks your forehead and lifted himself off the bed as you can do nothing else but to loudly protested him. He sings to you as he open the door, “I’ll be seeing you in a bit mon chéri, so do feel free to rest a bit more. We shouldn’t keep the others hanging over this good news!”

“I swear to GOD I will kill you with my bare hands Alastor!”

“Ooh how exciting! I’ll be waiting for that day then. If you can get out of bed by the next month that is!”

Your yelling cut off the moment he’s gone from sight, you’re surely processing it all now. What an exciting thought.

Alastor would’ve rather you two have this conversation under any other scenario, but really, you don’t get to be too picky. He prance off as midday approached, planning on showing you the bones he kept in a box on top of his fireplace later on.

(he hope you’ll learn to live with the contorting shadow that’ll be walking along with you from now on. He might be a dead corpse dragging itself along, but as long as you would let him. You’ll be right by his side)

#alastor x reader #hazbin alastor x reader #hazbin hotel x reader #hazbin x reader #x reader #hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel oneshot #hazbin hotel imagine #hazbin hotel alastor #cut a work call short so i can finished this actually #splatoon dlc drop tomorrow so i have no time #wrote 3.5k in a day...

112 notes · View notes

kfaem · 17 days

Text

Love and Deepspace; when their S/O is a kpop idol

notes: brrr new fandom lets go. also yes i went MIA but hey im not like dead

the boys when MC is an idol :) this is self indulgent. im a zayne girlie but i got carried away with raf lol. im tired so this is unedited, poorly written, no structure, and kinda just rambling

Rafayel:

here me out

he was a fan for the longest time, creating multiple pieces based off of you and your likeness

you and your members go to one of his exhibitions and when you make eye contact he's immediately in love more than he was before

kinda in a weird way

but when you approach him first he's in shock and doesnt know what to do

after the initial talking period and when the relationship starts he acts like his normal self

attends every concert and fan meeting

spends hundreds of dollars on your albums, collecting your photocards and solo posters

brags about being your boyfriend on sns and your manager tries to get him to stop

thomas is so embarrassed everytime your manager reaches out and begs him to calm down cause its a bad image

doesnt care about the reporters, is willing to fight with elites over you and your reputation

he's a simp but is also kinda mean sometimes lol

is jealous when you go live and refuse to respond to him to at least an hour and makes his presence known in your chat

i find the image of the matching outfits, couples goals posts on sns, and articles where he names you his muse to just be so <3333

Xavier

You guys bumped into each other at a convenience store, both reaching for the same bag of chips

both flustered with red cheeks, you let him have it and apologized

awkward

so, so very awkward

both of you are stuck in a awkward, silent encounter and neither of you want to say anything

one of your members comes over to see whats taking you so long and realizes that you're in a standoff with a cute blond and decides to play cupid

it worked

you two end up becoming good friends, and then eventually some sort of situationship

he doesnt want to damage your career and acknowledges that you both dont have time to spend with each other

but still acts as a loving boyfriend, buying your albums, concert tickets, merch, birthday specials etc.

then when you guys go on a snack run, a reporter recognizes you and within the week you're caught up in dating rumours

deciding that you guys couldnt avoid the truth, the situationship turned into a real relationship

doesnt really make a big deal out of your relationship or your popularity. would rather spend your guys' spare time reading together, watching movies, eating good food and relaxing

the media eventually forgets but the fans dont

they love every piece of media that ever gets showed, glimpses of xavier in mirrors, reflections on water, glasses, windows. mentions of a lover in interviews when asked what inspired you

just a loving boyfriend who tries to give you a sense of normalcy outside of the flashing lights

Zayne

Childhood friends

he hates your career and how much soul it has taken from you, but also acknowledges that you love what you do and are willing to risk your health and privacy

zayne is the king of situationship lmao

dates all the time, dinners at small restaurants hiding in booths in the far corners since you both like to be alone, together

your members genuinely dont understand how hes "not your boyfriend"

has lingered on music video shoots, using his title as your personal doctor to not raise any eyebrows

doesnt go out of his way to buy your albums but... if hes at a corner store and sees it, he'll buy it. or two. or three.

keeps one of your photocards and a normal picture of you in his wallet, grayson found it on the floor in his office once after it fell out of his wallet and he could never live it down

the entire hospital staff knows but wouldnt say anything for fear of their life

always sending messages no matter what side of the world youre on. Please remember to eat, drink water, and rest as much as you can. Too much strain on your body can cause long-term side effects.

buys tickets to your concerts, trying to hold back his smile as you glow on the stage while performing in front of your many fans

yeah he gets jealous

wont say it

and you can barely tell

but the chill that fills the room when another idol hugs you and is being overly touchy is so very much obvious and has people rushing to do something else

a reporter approaches him and tries to ask about your dating life. he shuts them up with a glare. the reporter doesnt even dare publishing that article.

your fans have a basic idea of what zayne is to you, but they respect you enough to not make a scene of it.

then one of your members gets drunk on a live and asks about your boyfriend and it comes unravelled

you post a picture with him, captioned with a heart, and its never brought up again

has brought your fans food and drinks whenever they set up cafe events for support

he appreciates everything that your fans do for you and has asked them to take care of you when hes not around

your relationship is never actually made official but yall live together when you arent required to be at the dorms and own like two cats so idk

still the caregiver that we love

#love and deepspace #love and deepspace zayne #love and deepspace rafayel #love and deepspace xavier #lads rafayel #lads zayne #lads xavier #loveanddeepspace

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septembercfawkes · 8 months

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The 12% Rule of Story Structure

Proper structure helps you deliver your story to the audience in a satisfying and familiar way. You wouldn't want to end up with the climactic peak hitting only ~36% into the story. That would make the story feel awkward and the remaining ~64% boring. (Talk about a dissatisfied audience.)

Contrary to what some believe, to me structure is all about organizing and/or timing. When stripped of all the details, beat sheets, and fill-in-the-blanks, it's a matter of organizing your content and timing the delivery of it.

This is one of the reasons you can find successful stories that don't seem to fit your favorite beat sheet. Even though that particular story may not be like others in its details, it can still deliver the content in a satisfying way if it organizes and times it properly.

Today's post is more about the timing.

And I call it the 12% Rule--or perhaps better said, the 12% Rule of Thumb (because even here there are variations, however atypical they may be).

The idea is, at the most basic level, most all successful stories will have a significant turning point every ~12%. A major turn near the end of every quarter, with a medium turn between those.

First, let me acknowledge that some writers hate using percentages, because they feel too calculated, too formulaic. But in all honesty, percentages are the best and quickest way to convey when something should typically happen in a book, so I use them (though I too used to hate them as a beginner.) And this article is obviously using them today.

Second, let's talk about what I mean by "turning point," in case you are new around here.

A turning point is an action or revelation that turns the direction of the story. It turns the trajectory of the story. The plot was heading toward one destination on a metaphorical "railroad," but a track switched, and now it's heading toward a new destination. (That's the analogy I like to use, anyway.)

The climax is the biggest turning point of the story, and notice that in basic structure, it quite literally, visually, turns the story into the falling action.

But not only should your story have a climactic turning point--ideally there should be turning points in each act and each scene. The difference is that, the smaller the structural unit, the smaller the turn.

Another notable turn in the story as a whole, is the inciting incident, which essentially disrupts "normal" life and kicks off the main plot. Sometimes in basic structure, the inciting incident will be drawn so that it too will visually turn the story into the rising action. While the climax is a big turning point, I consider the inciting incident to be a medium-sized turning point. But I'll talk more about inciting incidents in more detail, in an upcoming post.

If this is your first time learning about turning points, you've probably actually heard them called by a different name. They are also known as plot turns and plot points. Three different names that mean the same thing.

So, there should be multiple turning points (or plot turns or plot points) in a story--moments that actually change the direction, the trajectory, the plot is going. Something shakes up what's currently happening in a big enough way, that the consequences of it lead to a new or altered course. The story is on track for a new outcome. These turning points almost always shift the protagonist's overarching goal or their plan to get the overarching goal (or both). And sometimes, on occasion, they simply add a new goal to the current one.

Now, this is just a rule of thumb, but most successful stories will have some sort of turning point, a plot "shake-up," every ~12%. Let's go through how this typically looks. (And if you know about 7 Point Story Structure, or some other structural approaches, this may all look familiar to you.)

~1%--Hook:

Open the story with a hook to grab the audience. (This isn't necessarily always a turning point, but it's an important moment I felt I should include.)

~12%--Medium-sized Turning Point (Inciting Incident(?)):

It's common for the inciting incident to hit at the ~12% mark. This is halfway through Act I. However, this isn't always the case. The inciting incident can be as early as the first chapter (where it may double as the hook), and as late as near the end of Act I.

For example, the inciting incident of Harry Potter, when the Hogwarts letter arrives, hits near ~12%. But the inciting incident of The Hunger Games, when Prim's name gets called, happens in the first chapter.

So the inciting incident can hit in different places, but there is still often a turn at ~12%, whether that is the inciting incident or something else.

Commonly, if it's not the inciting incident of the main plotline, it will be the inciting incident of a secondary plotline, like a relationship plotline.

What's nice about looking at things this way, is you can have the inciting incident of one plotline be the hook, and the inciting incident of another hit the 12% mark. I could have the inciting incident of the relationship plotline be the hook, and the inciting incident of the external plotline hit at 12%. And I could have the inciting incident of another plotline hit later.

But I digress a little. Because it may not even be an inciting incident.

It's just the idea that there is a medium-sized turn-- a "shake-up" or "change up" ~12% in, that alters the story in some medium-sized way.

~25%--Big Turning Point (Plot Point 1):

Plot Point 1 is the big turning point of Act I. You can even view it as the climactic moment of Act I. It's what the beginning has been building toward. So while Harry gets the letters ~12% in, Hagrid tells him he's a wizard and has been invited to Hogwarts about ~25% in. It's what Act I has been building toward. It's a big turn, and how Harry responds changes the trajectory of the story. He was living an ordinary life with the Dursleys (more or less), and now he's going to go with Hagrid to the Wizarding World.

That's a big change.

That's a big turn.

Plot Point 1 is usually the moment when the protagonist chooses to engage in the main plot in a defining way. It's also known as "Crossing the Threshold" (Hero's Journey) and "Break into Two" (Save the Cat!)

But the most important thing to remember, is that this is a big turn.

~37%--Medium-sized Turning Point (Pinch Point 1):

~37% into the story, there is often another medium-sized shake-up. This is commonly known as Pinch Point 1. A pinch point is a moment where the antagonistic force applies painful pressure to the protagonist. I already did a big post going over the details of Pinch Point 1, so I won't repeat everything. And this could definitely get complicated, because the protagonist isn't always present (which I think can make some of what I'm saying in this article arguable), but I'm trying to stay somewhat basic.

Now admittedly, occasionally, I see stories where I don't see an obvious pinch point here. But there is still some sort of medium-sized turning point. Something comes along and shifts the direction of the story a bit, enough to alter the goal, plan, or course, somewhat.

It often bumps the story on a clearer trajectory to hit the next big turn, the midpoint.

~50%--Big Turning Point (Midpoint):

Halfway through, there is another significant turning point, called the midpoint. Again, it changes the direction of the story in a significant way, often by revealing information to the protagonist about the antagonistic force. This typically leads the protagonist to become more proactive in the "fight." This changes his or her goal or plan in a powerful way that affects the third quarter of the story.

For example, in Interstellar, the midpoint happens when Cooper learns that Plan A is a ruse. He responds by changing his current plans. This alters the story for the next quarter. In Star Wars IV, this is when Alderaan is "missing" and the Millennium Falcon gets pulled in by the tractor beam, before Luke learns Leia is on the ship. He decides to find her. This alters the direction of the story for the next quarter.

~62% Medium-sized Turning Point (Pinch Point 2):

~62% into the story, there is often another medium-sized shake-up. This is commonly known as Pinch Point 2. It's another noteworthy pinch point, but it's worse than Pinch Point 1. It's at least another medium-sized turning point that alters the direction of the story somewhat.

It often bumps the story on a clearer trajectory to hit the next big turn, Plot Point 2.

~75% Big Turning Point (Plot Point 2):

Plot Point 2 is the next major turning point, and you can view it as the climax of the third quarter, or even the climax of the whole second act (the middle). This is (almost) always a major moment, and usually the second biggest "peak" of the story. It will usually be a key confrontation between the protagonist and antagonistic forces. It most commonly ends in a costly failure, but it can also end with a costly victory (sometimes called a "hollow victory").

In Hamilton, this is when Burr implies he could use the info about Hamilton's affair against him, so in response, Hamilton writes the Reynolds Pamphlet, revealing his affair to the public. This is a major moment that alters the course for the next quarter or so of the story.

This is also called "The Ordeal" (Hero's Journey) and "All is Lost" (Save the Cat!).

~ 87% Medium-sized Turning Point:

~12% later, and guess what? There is usually another key turning point--another medium-sized turning point. I feel like this can show up a few different ways, but generally speaking, it's the turn that takes the protagonist into the climax of the story. It's the turn that leads the protagonist toward the final confrontation with the antagonist.

It often bumps the story on a clearer trajectory to hit the next big turn, the climactic turning point.

~ 89 - 100% Big Turning Point (Climactic Turning Point):

This one is a little tricky with the percentages, because obviously 100% is the end of the story, and nearly all stories have a denouement, which means the big turn will come before 100%.

But the final big turn is the climactic turning point. This is where the protagonist or antagonist defeats the other and the main conflict is resolved, which turns the story into the falling action.

This is Harry defeating Voldemort.

Katniss winning the Game.

Luke destroying the Death Star.

Hamilton and his duel with Burr.

I think you are probably most familiar with this turn 😉

Remember that I'm simplifying and briefly covering all these things. These are the basics of timing key turns. And it's the basics that provide the foundation for everything else. So, include a notable turn about every 12% in your novel, and it will serve your story's structure well (even if it varies from more detailed story structure approaches).

#writing tips #writing tips and tricks #writeblr #writing help #writing advice #writing tip #writer #writing #fanfic #writing reference

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