#you’re all authorised btw

[pizzacrustdisposal]

⚠️Prior authorisation required to continue⚠️

omg hiiiiii ily >w< 💖💖💙🧡🖤🩵💘💚💖🩷💜❤️💕💖💘💛💞🩷💖🖤💞💜

#pizzacrustdisposal #you’re all authorised btw

[potteresque-ire]

Commentary ~ Little Red Little Green Episode 18, “Fruits & Found Family”

Link to original post in Chinese, posted 2021/05/23. Link to official English translation.

(Disclaimer / Notes + Commentary under the cut!) (TW: possible eating disorder)

Disclaimer / Notes:

While the posts by Little Red Little Green (LRLG) are among my most favourite candies, I’d like to remind everyone that they are fake rumours, and should be read and enjoyed as such. ie, all CPN below!

The English translation linked above is the only one authorised by the Fake Rumour House; therefore, please treat all content below as a very casual, very *unofficial* convo between fellow turtle friends! ❤️💛💚

With Chinese being a highly region-specific language, my reactions to it is necessarily filtered through my background, which is, admittedly, somewhat removed from Gg’s, Dd’s and LRLG’s. However, it is not uncommon for even c-turtles (and several times, LRLG themselves) to be lost with what they read / heard due to regional differences ~ which reflects the reality of communicating in the Sinosphere. In fact, the regionality of the dialects used by different “characters” in LRLG’s dialogues is among the most critical elements that make these posts so authentic-sounding, and so difficult to replicate. A fun activity of following LRLG is to watch c-turtles patch their regional knowledge together, from local slangs to food choices, to make sense of what’s going on. 

Okay, with that all said *phew* ... onto the commentary! “p. X” refers to the panel number in the official English translation (there are 7 total in the Twitter post). 

p1. “Fairy”

Likely referring to the similarity between Gg’s current role for 玉骨遥 (The Longest Promise) and LWJ. Dd was praising Gg for being “fairy-like”; Chinese “fairies” (仙) have a certain style especially in visual media, similar to ... LWJ’s ~ otherworldly, white robes that billow in the wind, peaceful to the point of distant, scholarly, delicate. In between the lines, Gg likely said he was simply playing LWJ (hence, the ”act another me” in the translation), which Dd protested... and said Gg was simply playing himself. Whether that means DD IS NOT LWJ!!!!! 😡😡😡 or something else, we’ll know what we get to watch the show!

p1-p2. “Heat”

Yes about the Chang’e 嫦娥 reference!! Despite Houyi 后羿 shooting down 9/10 suns and saving the day, his wife is, indeed, more famous (and therefore the star, the more powerful one), because she’s frequently featured in Mid-Autumn festival art, along with her pet rabbit 玉兔 (”Jade Rabbit”),:

(Chang’e with her bunny, traditional Chinese painting. Source.)

Below is Gg’s rendition of Chang’e / Jade Bunny pair ~ Chang’e being the superman in the drawing while Jade Bunny is crouching on the planet!! 

Guess of the missing convo from Gg’s side: Gg had wanted to bring something to Hengdian (where the filming of The Longest Promise was taking place) to cool himself down, and Dd had said it wasn’t necessarily. Hence Dd’s “My bad my bad” and the promise to send that something to Gg.

The loveliest line in this segment for me—and for many c-turtles— is the one about white hair. Turning grey a common, but very old-fashioned way of expressing worry and poor Dd, who hasn’t even turned 24, is claiming he was turning white because he got so worried every time Gg complained about the heat (Aww). 

Turning grey with worry isn’t limited to romantic situations — it may happen to doting parents with wayward children, for example, or to ancient patriots over their crumbling kingdom. However, it’s also one of the more (very!) dramatic ways to communicate tragic love in Chinese fiction before Western influence allows “love”, as a term / word / character, to be used explicitly in writing romance. 

Here’s a little example, a little diversion that may be of interest. Those who are familiar with the Wuxia classic Return of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶 by Jin Yong 金庸, whether it’s the book or its numerous visual adaptations, may remember how the hero, Yang Guo 楊過, went white at his temples overnight after his Shifu and lover, Xiao Long Nv (小龍女), didn’t show up at the cliff at the end of his 16-year wait for her.  

Set photo from a TV adaption of Return of the Condor Heroes, 1995. Turtles may find the actress playing the perenially white-wearing, calm-to-the point-of-aloof Xiao Long Nv, Carmen Li 李若彤, familiar ~ she also played Lan Yi in The Untamed. 

The 16-year wait, the invitation to Carmen to play Lan Zhan’s ancestor (when the two shared similarities in aesthetics and personality), were two of the three references from Return of the Condor Heroes I picked up from The Untamed (the last one was more specific—WWX mentioned Yang Guo’s master 獨孤求敗). This tribute is unconfirmed, but MXTX did say before that Jin Yong’s works were her inspiration. I also read a (small) discussion on whether LWJ’s hair carried a few pieces of white in the final episode, or if the lighter strands in it were a trick of the sunlight. (Here’s a screenshot of the approximate place to look!!) 

While I lean towards the latter (the sunlight), turning white with worry, with love, is a tradition in Chinese storytelling. Here’s a little something I’ve noticed too, on this note ~ both in the actual interviews and in these fake rumours, Dd’s word choices, the way he conveys emotions are sometimes surprisingly traditional. It can be because of his background (which would require a study of how Luo Yang people and Koreans talk); it can be because the traditional way of talking allows for fewer words to be said, fewer things to have to be explicitly explained (example: LWJ), but the effect is that Dd has supplied the most romantic lines in LRLG’s posts because of that ~ romantic because it harks back to the rhythm, the themes of old poetry, of ancient stories that, as were true everywhere in the world, were about love. 

Okay, back to the rumour (and hoping Dd won’t look like Bad Wig Yang Guo in a few more summers!) ....

The line after the one about white hair ... the way I understand the original Chinese sentence is “Heat is The Reason”: ie, anything Dd wants Gg to do and Gg disagrees, Gg would use heat as The Reason (R) to not do it. This anything may be eating, for example, which also has a strong possibility as conventional Chinese wisdom says that heat causes people to lose appetite. Dd’s worry would therefore be: Gg refusing to eat because he claims it’s too hot to do so.

“Corny joke” ~ the Chinese for this is, literally, “cold 冷 joke 笑話”, which becomes a pun as the gzry (team members)’s joke was about the (cold) winter and black hair. So... Dd threw a corny joke to combat a corny joke :D .

p3. “Apple”

The first half I also had to rely on c-turtles to help me interpret what it meant! Regional dialects aside, LRLG has captured dls’s very quick wit, the way his ideas freely hop from one concept to the next and this hopping carries traditional + popular cultural references that I know only a fraction of, not being a local after all. 

I’ve read an additional interpretation of this segment: “big fruit” 大果兒 (as in dls: “Those are all big fruits, all big fruits”) is a Northern Chinese, traditional slang for women—dls might have connected that with the previous line in the convo about being Guowang, as explained in the translation, and “big and juicy” + “touch to feel” being suggestive phrases. Then, given the rare usage of the big fruit = women slang, dls expressed surprise that Dd understood what he meant, went on to say he expected Gg to know it (implying Gg could’ve taught Dd the meaning) ... 

Which led to the entertaining part of this segment. Dd was like “You guys (= Gg + dls) talked?” Dls appeared to have thought of the scenario customarily inviting this question (scenario: someone on the verge of catching their spouse cheating) and began playacting that scenario, started to stammer ... as if he had just been got caught trying to chat up someone’s spouse  ~  ”I-I-I....how to say it ...”. Dd caught on dls’s playacting and went along, continued with the “accusation”: “You’re stammering”. Dls then noted that Dd’s accusation was scary and Dd smiled, ending the playact ~ so, ah, readers, never mess with Dd’s spouse!! Dd gets scary!! 

(BTW: ”nijia na kouzi” 你家那口子 was explained in the translation for a reason ~ It’s a warm, friendly term for a dear friend’s spouse. 😊)

p4. Lychees

Lychees. Has everyone tried them? It’s important not to over-eat them though...

In which the “Feeding Gg” saga continues! This segment is one of those that are wonderful for fic writers who wish to capture Gg and Dd in words. Gg, like many brought up in traditional families, has trouble saying “no” outright, which is often considered rude. As such, he resorted to delay tactics, something he had also done with the fried noodles in The Makeup Room BTS. 

In the BTS, his delay tactics had been to argue that Dd hadn’t eaten his box of noodles and therefore, he couldn’t start (~2:35 mark)—as proper manners indeed dictated. In this dialogue, his delay tactics was to say he’d eat the lychees later, that the lychees would make him too full for the proper meal (rice). 

A cute thing about this convo is that rather than pouting and grumbling his only being LWJ’s replacement (as he had hilariously done in the BTS), Dd had, apparently over the last three years, become an expert on countering such delay tactics. He peeled the lychees, which not only removed a major obstacle for eating, but also set a timer as peeled lychees get dry quickly (and Gg, despite being a picky eater, didn’t seem to like to waste food). He said the fruit could make appetiser. He got the help of their team members, who assured Gg that two lychees would be all right.

Gg’s response to the assurance... takes a little time to explain. 

The original Chinese line for “Great, great, you’re so awesome” was 絕了絕了你們絕了。 “絕了”, a popular phrase used by Chinese netizens, was repeated three times.

絕, literally, means the extreme, the absolute, the end. 絕了 means pretty much the same ~ a thing that is 絕了 is standing en pointe at the edge of the cliff that is The Absolute End of a spectrum. It is the Ultimate. It can't be surpassed. It’s unbeatable. 

絕了 is usually used in a positive sense, as in the English translation, with the positive being implied. If I say the LWJ photo above is 絕了, for example, I don’t need to specify that the extreme in 絕 stands on the good end. It’s understood given the audience of this post are mostly turtles (HELLO *waves*). We’re all heart-eyes here. We agree, without saying, that this photo is The Top, The Pinnacle; it can’t be better. 絕了 is higher praise than Excellent; it’s so good that there are no adjectives for it. Its own presence defines How Good It Is. 

But 絕了 doesn’t have to be positive. If my audience is Su She ... he’s likely to take the same “This LWJ photo is 絕了” to mean the Mariana Trench kind of Absolute—the bottom of the bottom, the Unbeatable, Adjective-Defying Worst. 

絕了 allows for that understanding too.

In this scenario, I interpret Gg’s 絕了 as taking the meaning of both extremes (which make it a fantastic phrase choice!): that Gg thought Dd and the team members were being both the Absolute Best (for thinking of Gg, caring for him) AND the Absolute Worst (for going against his wish to not eat!) Gg’s 絕了 also signals defeat; if Dd and his team members were The Absolute ... Whatever, then poor Gg had no choice but to yield to their wishes. I can already imagine his “I can’t believe I lose this way” Look (see: every rock-paper-scissors he lost, which was ... pretty much all of them), mixed with, perhaps, a healthy amount of bunny tooth warning (how dare Dd et al banded up against him)...

Those bunny teeth had to be taken care of, right? And so Dd went on to say lychees being good omen that ensure things would go smoothly for the eater... targeting Gg’s being a, as c-turtles call it, 小迷信 (literally, “Little Superstitious”, a young + adorable + superstitious person). Dd said that to help Gg justify the choice to eat, to make Gg feel better about his defeat. 

(Of note: I had actually never heard of lychees being associated with good luck before, and a quick search online also didn’t yield any result. This could be a relatively rare association Google failed to catch ... or something Dd made up on the fly to make Gg happy.) 

(Lychees have, however, been associated with romance. If Emperor’s Smile 天子笑 was The Love Drink in The Untamed, then what is Concubine’s Smile 妃子笑? Answer: it’s the RL name of a type of lychees, lychees being the fruit very much adored by Yang Yuhuan 楊玉環, the consort of the Emperor Xuanzong (685-762 BCE) of the Tang Dynasty and one of the four most beautiful woman in Chinese history. Since lychees had only been grown in southern China, the emperor had had the fruit couriered, in express mode involving many horses, to the palace up north to please his favourite wife. Lychees had become a symbol of love from that historical tale.)

Did Gg get Dd’s message then, the love and care packaged in those peeled, sweet fruit awaiting his bite? Yes, but not without a little more fight! “Eat eat eat, (I’ll eat) until you go bankrupt” is a literal translation of his final line. Tonally, I can see the following as being an alternative translation: 

“Fine fine fine. I’ll eat, it’s not like I can bankrupt you by eating anyway!”

If it sounded a little sulky, that’s because it did ... a little sulky AND fiery. As expected from our favourite Chongqing Big Pepper 😂😂😂 (Poor Gg).

Dd smiled at that, needless to say. He won!!! He got Gg to eat!! The world shall rejoice!! 

p5. “Showtime”

There’s a show coming up for Dd (the YH concert maybe?), and Gg offered suggestions. 

The sweet point of this segment is about half-way down the conversation, in the piece of paper 📄 Gg gave to Dd (after “This is for you.”). Dd took the paper, noted the many words on it, and started saying 我把我整個靈魂, translated as “I bring my entire soul”.

c-Turtles have, based on these words, hypothesised that Dd was about to read out a quote that Gg had written on the paper, with the list of items Gg thought Dd should take, before Gg stopped him with a call of his name (“WYB”). The quote was included on the translation (”I give you my entire soul...only, a little good, love you.”) I have also talked about the same quote, in more detail, here.

I’m equally stumped on the final line of this segment. (Sorry!!)

p6. “Found Family”

It’s a heartwarming segment. While LRLG had previously noted that the TTXS bros had communicated with Gg, this segment made clear that they care for him like they do for Dd ~ as family.

* dls mailed Gg a lot of fruit for sharing with the film crew. “Family member needs to be impressive” is a rough translation, but this line does defy simple translation because 排面 a highly cultural concept that has much to do with the equally complex, Chinese concept of face (which this article explains... somewhat adequately). The message to take home is that dls cared enough about Gg that he wanted to make sure Gg wouldn’t lose face in front of the film crew; that, by having enough gifts (fruits) for everyone, Gg wouldn’t be viewed as cheap or inadequate or stingy, or whatever adjective that wouldn’t befit his top idol status. Because dls saw Gg as a member of his family. 

* The prescription from hg had been mentioned in a previous LRLG rumour. 方子 is a Chinese medicine prescription, which, unlike Western formulations, is individualised both to the discomfort / ailment and to the “body constitution” of the person who'll take it, the latter deciding the kind of ailments the person is susceptible to, and which ingredients are expected to be more effective. Chinese medicine also places a strong emphasises on long-term conditioning, whether it’s for recovery from a certain condition or for general good health. A good 方子 is therefore a far more complex and personal thing than, say, a scribble of “paracetamol” / “acetaminophen” on a piece of paper. :D

* fg’s gift for Gg (xx) is something for the waist. A brace support, maybe? For example?

My favourite line in this segment is when hg asked what will Gg and Dd do when they reach hg’s age. Given that the last two items (the prescription and xx) were health-related, I interpreted it as hg worrying about Gg and Dd’s health when they grow old... with all the health problems they already have. It’s the kind of thing a worried parent say to their children ~ my mom has said the same thing to me as well. 😢

p6. “The Cat Paw”

Not quite sure what’s happening here ... not sure what the cat paw is. (Sorry!!) But that é in the translation is Dd’s signature laugh (collection here), which is written as 鵝 (”Goose”) in Chinese 😂.

p7. “The Cat Toy”

Dd appeared to be shopping for a cat’s toy (something that can “hook the cat” in the translation, such that the cat can entertain itself and not rely on human companionship as much). Gg had already bought the toy though and sounded quite proud of it, told Dd to return the toy. The implied cat was, of course, Nut (堅果 Jianguo)... which had been repeatedly referred to in LRLG’s posts as Gg’s daughter.

p7. “Cool vs Cute”

Gg is often viewed as cute, and Dd as cool. Did Dd dislike Gg taking cute pictures for public consumption? Were they scheming an exchange of image? :D

And that’s it for this issue! Ooh, this took unexpectedly long ... I apologise for the ridiculous delay between the original post and this commentary! 

(I wrote half of it, then RL struck and I forgot about it.) (I’m hopeless.) (I need a 方子 for poor memory!!)

#pie eats candies #pie metas #yizhan #bjyx #LRLG

[cowboy-anon]

hey...saw the apple ask thing...here’s some EXTREME forms of torture that could easily be pulled off in a house. or, anywhere, really. (definitely much much MUCH worse than run of the mill punishment.)

anyway, here’s my list in no peculiar order!

the rack sounds pretty whumpy

The victim’s ankles would be strapped to one end of this device, and his wrists to another. A mechanism was then cranked during the interrogation process, stretching the victim’s limbs. Bones and ligaments made startling sounds as the victim’s joints were dislocated until he either confessed or was torn apart. [source- the archive]

oh, but heretic's fork too

Used to elicit confessions during the Spanish Inquisition, the heretic’s fork was even engraved with the Latin abiuro (“I recant”). Bi-pronged on both ends, the simple device was wedged painfully between the breastbone and the throat. The victim was unable to talk or fall asleep, and delirium usually led to a confession. [source-the archive]

cant forget ling chi!

Ling chi, also known as "slow slicing" or "death by a thousand cuts" was a method of torturous execution practiced in China. The condemned was tied to a post and bits of skin and limbs were gradually removed one by one, usually culminating in a final cut to the heart or decapitation. It was used as early as the 10th century, and continued for nearly a thousand years. Luckily it was banned in 1905. [source-britannica]

yowch! boiling sounds pretty bad

Nowadays, boiling alive is a fate reserved for shellfish. But centuries ago it was a common method of execution from East Asia to England. The condemned was stripped and then placed in a vat or pot of boiling liquid, usually water, oil, or tar. Or, for a more gruesome experience, the offender could be placed in cool liquid and then heated to boiling. Records from the reign of Henry VIII show that some people were boiled for up to two hours before they finally died. [source-britannica]

strappado is classic, but definitely still worth mentioning

Strappado is an uncomfortable form of torture that, unlike many of the others on this list, doesn’t necessarily end in death. In strappado, the guilty party is strung up by the wrists, behind the head. The awkward angle is pretty much guaranteed to cause an agonizing dislocation of the shoulders, but if it doesn’t weights may be added. Thought to have originated in medieval times during the Inquisition, strappado has been used into the 21st century. [source-britannica]

and the cold cell, which fits it’s name nicely

The CIA is authorised to use about 6 interrogation/torture techniques on prisoners, and one of them is the cold cell. The cold cell is where a prisoner is put in front of an air conditioner for hours, months or sometimes even years, in order to torture them to retrieve information. [source- mensxp]

another quite painful one, the german chair makes me feel quite queasy

The method is known by several different names, including the German Chair, the Flying Carpet, or simply the Tyre. When a person is captured they are often tied to a metal chair. Their arms and legs are then secured and the chair is tipped backwards and towards the ground. This causes severe stress to the detainee's back, neck and spine, and often causes permanent damages to the body. [source-swordandscale]

pretty commonly known, but waterboarding is still painful

Waterboarding is a simple yet effective form of water torture. Here the victim is tied to a table with their legs elevated and a cloth covering their face. Water is then poured over the cloth for up to a 60 seconds at a time with the person only being allowed to breathe for a few seconds in between. The torture causes suffocation and a sense of drowning. [source- wicked horror]

i’ve seen a lot of similar things within whump, but here’s white room torture

A form of emotional and psychological torture, white torture might be one of the worst. The victim is placed into a room that is completely white. They are clothed in white, meals are white rice on white paper plates, and they are forbidden to speak. Sensory deprivation soon makes a person start to hallucinate and eventually may drive them mad. [source-wicked torture]

dunking could easily be preformed in a bathtub, still quite terrifying

The method most often depicted as used to torture suspected witches, dunking is exactly what you would expect: the victim is submerged in water and then removed before drowning. This might not seem so bad but remember, you have no control over when you’re taken out of the water! You could be close to running out of breath or even on the verge of drowning before the torturer lets you back out! [source-kriii]

have fun with this info! i hope this was educational. certainly made me loose my appetite for the next few hours. :]

(oh, and i quoted these directly from the sources btw! the summaries aren’t mine, and i don’t claim them!)

Anon, these are all absolutely wonderful--and so informative! The salesman would definitely try a few of these out on Apple, particularly the heretics fork. Just looked it up. Dastardly! And then imagine that paired with another punishment, and he's unable to scream lest he put pressure on the forks prongs? So many possibilities!! Thank you so much for all your research!

BTW, sorry you lost your appetite. Hopefully it returned! Remember, if anything ever makes you squeamish (in a bad way), feel free to opt out! Worst case scenario, throw me the link or site and article name and I'll gladly take it from there. :)

Thank you so much again!! <3

#thank you for the ask! #and all the wonderful information holy cow! #this is more well researched than some of my essays real talk #anyway i really appreciate you!!! <3 #maybe inspo for later #i tag knowing full well i'm DEFINITELY coming back to this #y'all are so smart i can't even #anywho #water torture #white room torture #torture tw #just like lots of torture lol #death tw #whump #whump idea #whump ideas

[skye-huntress]

RWBY V8 Episode 12 “Creation” Reactions

I don’t even know why I’m surprised. If there is one thing that Ironwood is consistent at it’s his incompetency. All his plans are full of holes and blindspots so of course like all of his other plans his plot to threaten Penny into complying would fall apart as fast as he put it in motion due to factors he is too stupid to consider, you know like the fact that members of his own military have enough of the integrity he lacks.

I’m not surprised by the kill on sight order. When RNBWPM set off the alarms in the military compound, Ironwood authorised lethal force against them

Vine seemed to be reflecting on their choices and was perhaps starting to realise they have been on the wrong side of this conflict all along but too little too late

Emerald playing a Penny double is something we all called, but I didn’t expect Winter to be in on the whole plan. Smart of her to coordinate with her sister in order to neutralise Ironwood

“You did the right thing.” “I have. Feels weird.” But you’re smiling so I guess its the good kind of weird, or it’s the euphoria from pulling off such a great con on a massive douche

With both JNPR and Winter ambushing Jimmy, they certainly took no chances with him, which again, smart

Meanwhile, one of the things I’ve hoped for and predicted was Marrow using Stay on Harriet! I mean, it was all three remaining “Ace” Ops, so it’s not personally targeted at her but I’ll take it

Also, BTW, I think I covered this last reaction but Marrow... Great of you for having enough integrity to understand what Jimmy was doing was very wrong, but try to think through your response to things before you got yourself in trouble, or shot. Good thing Winter managed to keep her head and knew they’d need an actual plan and help

So their plan was to use the staff to solve their other problems with the evacuations and Penny. And with the gravity dust Atlas has they have a brief window but it is as I suspected. You can’t have the staff as such an important part of the show and not use it so Atlas was always going to fall, but it hasn’t yet. This of course is going to cause all sort of problems later but more on that later

Quite the hole Oscar left. I love seeing Ruby use the new application of her semblance, it opens up so many possibilities.

I didn’t quite catch Creation Jinn’s name so I’ll call him Blue until I look it up later. May I just say, I love Blue throwing shade at the idea of a floating city. When you think about it, the then Kingdom of Mantle would have probably been better off keeping their feet on the ground.

Before we continue, I’m just going to say something so people are clear why I stand on this, Penny is, always was, and always will be a real girl/woman. As a transgender woman myself, I know better than most that the parts we are made of do not necessarily define who we are. Whether she is made of flesh or metal, human or faunus, Penny is Penny

It feels a bit like cheating, doesn’t it, like they bent the laws of the universe a bit, but hey, desperate times. I can’t pretend to understand it and I don’t even think Jinn could explain it in a way I could but the results are what matter. Besides, bending rules to save the day is very much a Team RWBY thing

I admit it was unnerving watching Penny’s old body die, the way it reached out like even though it was soulless it still had something of her left like memories of what it had lost. Not to mention a clear visual of what almost happened

So throughout this show, Penny has given and received a lot of great hugs, but never thought much about how she feels them. In hindsight, not exactly something I would want to dwell on since it wouldn’t change unless the tech in her body change, or so I thought. She is just so precious how she is now not only showing her affection but enjoying the physical act of doing so. I want to see more cuddly Penny going forward, for the rest of the show. Because Penny is not going anywhere.

Also, when of the first things I noticed about Penny was that she had a blush!

So begins the Fall of Atlas. And as Jaune begins his broadcast, it goes down. That’s probably not a good sign and the fact they weren’t able to fully explain the situation will likely cause problems further down. But also why? The likely culprits would be Watts and Cinder, and the goal would be to sow confusion as well as make it difficult to communicate via scrolls

Ah, Jacques is still around, somehow. You know, it occurs to me that with the entire Kingdom being reduced to rubble, so goes most of the SDC’s assets. While it’s not entirely clear where he’ll end up, yet, he will have still lost everything he had built up and I find that very satisfying. As for Weiss, her home is her family, that’s all she needs and more than Jacques ever had

So now the critical part, getting everyone out of Solitas before the inevitable. Already, the confusion and hesitancy going around is going to slow things down, and every second is going to count. Then there’s the pocket realm Blue created, where if you fall off, well, I’m guessing there is nothing that will ever break your fall and once the Staff is used again, that whole realm and probably everything still in it may cease to exist

Then there’s the final destination. Before the events of the show, Vacuo would have been considered the least ideal place for a whole Kingdom of refugees to go, and the last Kingdom for Atlesians to go to for help given how their ancestors played no small role in its exploitation and decline. But Vacuo is the only Kingdom Salem has yet to attack and the only one not dealing with any direct fallout. Still, resources are scarce enough in what is basically a wasteland and accomodating such a sudden influx of refugees is going to be impossible. Not even touching on the political shitshow it’s going to be

Now, the outstanding issues. It’s like some kind of cruel joke, Ironwood initially stopped the Mantle evacuations because he thought that was how Cinder got in. This time she actually has planted herself among the refugees. Neo and Watts, too, no doubt. The advantage is theirs and their targets are Ruby, an exposed staff, and Penny who is both unarmed aside from her magic and not quite as durable as she used to be. Three villains, three targets

Then, there’s Salem. Not only are they racing against the Fall, they’re also racing against her resurrection which could happen any moment. And the only way to stop her and her Grimm from following is to close the “doors” which might require creating something else. But who would make that call, and when. I suppose if they manage to keep hold of the staff, the most logical thing to create would be a “temporary” shelter for the refugees. Considering anything Blue creates is temporary, it can be as sturdy as they want

We still somehow have two episodes to go and so much that can and will go wrong. I don’t like it!

Final note, I want to hug Penny, too!

#rwby #rwby8 #rwby8 spoilers

[mottlemoth]

If you’re not too overloaded yet - “great. perfect. nice. fuck this.” And I hope the biscuit cake did not disappoint :)

Apologies… our best laid plans for this evening will have to be changed. M[Received 17:09]

great. perfect. nice.[Sent 17:14]

fuck this.[Sent 17:15]

Excuse me? M[Received 17:17]

you’re cancelling on me… right?[Sent 17:27]

Something has arisen. Unavoidable. All I’m requesting is an amendment. M[Received 17:31]

Am I to take it from the lack of response that you are angry? M[Received 17:43]

you know what, myc? I don’t even know what to say to you right now…[Sent 17:46]

oh no… wait…[Sent 17:46]

here it comes…[Sent 17:46]

you are a PRICK.[Sent 17:47]

you are just a PRICK. And its all you are. [Sent 17:47]

you don’t even realise why I wanted to meet up tonight, do you? You don’t even remember why TONIGHT might matter to me[Sent 17:48]

of course you don’t[Sent 17:49]

because… as we’ve now established… you are a prick.[Sent 17:49]

why did I even dream you might remember its my stupid birthday and try to be there[Sent 17:50]

its not like we’ve been together for 6 months, right?[Sent 17:51]

6 months of you cancelling on me and postponing and “amendments” (btw I know you mean “move it to some time in 3 weeks”)… 6 months of you making me last priority when I always bloody put you first[Sent 17:52]

jesus christ, why do I even fucking bother…[Sent 17:52]

literally all I wanted was to have dinner with you[Sent 17:53]

just have you to myself [Sent 17:53]

for ONCE, spend some time together[Sent 17:53]

you know what? forget it[Sent 17:54]

this is over.[Sent 17:54]

Greg smashed the final ‘send’, locked his phone and hurled it at the pillows of his bed. It resounded off the headboard with a clunk. He didn’t check to see if the screen had smashed. He didn’t care.

He’d turned down drinks with Scotland Yard for this. He’d said no to a takeaway with John and Sherlock. He’d said no to all his family, no to all his friends, no to everyone in the whole bloody world… just so he’d get to see that face by candlelight, for once, for his birthday.

Fuck this. This is how I’ll remember my fiftieth.

Sitting alone in his flat, grieving. Drinking. There were two bottles of wine on the coffee table - a gift from his division. Greg made immediate plans to drink both of them before midnight. He was going to drink them so fast he barely tasted them.

As he headed through to the kitchen for a corkscrew, too angry yet to break into tears, there came a knock at the door of his flat.

One of the neighbours, Greg thought. They’d been dropping by all day - cards, well wishes.

Maybe it was someone who’d want to come in. Greg knew most of the other flats well, and right now he’d give anything not to spend his fiftieth alone. He hoped it was someone who liked drinking red wine very quickly.

He unlocked his front door as he arranged his face into some semblance of happy greeting. He jerked the door open.

Standing outside on the landing was Mycroft.

Greg’s face fell.

He then realised Mycroft was standing beside a suitcase. He was dressed in comfortable clothing - a cotton shirt and knitted argyle tank-top, casual chinos, weekend glasses - and he was holding two airline tickets.

“Rome,” he said, as Greg’s brain reeled. “Eight nights. Your superintendent has authorised your leave - I cleared it with him six weeks ago - and Sergeant Donovan has said she’s happy to cover everything in your absence. You have half an hour to pack, then our flight will be leaving from Heathrow.”

Greg gaped noiselessly for a moment, still holding the door.

He swallowed.

“Has your… phone been on silent for a while?” he checked.

Mycroft’s brow creased. This was not the reaction he’d expected. 

“Yes…” he said, slowly. “Why?”

Greg swallowed again. “Can I borrow it a second?”

#mystrade #mycroft holmes #greg lestrade