wantonlywindswept

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No Man Left Behind / Something Worth Dying For

REQUESTS / BLOG EVENT

Request from @razzbberry - Palette #1 - Alpha-17, Cody - Death of the Cynic in Me

Notes and close-ups beneath the cut!

Notes: I think Seventeen would, both subconsciously and consciously, keep his cynicism as long as possible. It’s how he thinks the world works, but it’s also a survival tool. It’d be a very, very slow death.

It’s put to the test with Cody — not because Cody is special among his fellow clones, but because he’s one of the first that bothers to fight Seventeen on his own terms. The argument is always the same. Cody wants to talk about what he hopes to be, someday, after he is a soldier. Seventeen thinks he’s stupid to think that’s possible, or that he’d be capable. Cody knows it, and he, might not be. Seventeen thinks it’s even more stupid, in that case; what a waste of energy.

It develops. When they’re older, and in the thick of war, one day Cody risks his life for the chance to save a brother that was going to die anyway. Seventeen yells at him for fifteen minutes once he’s conscious about luck and stupidity and the trouble it’s causing Seventeen and the false hope it’s engendering in others. Cody says he can disagree all he likes, but he doesn’t give a fig, respectfully. Seventeen thinks Cody can go try to get blown up again, if he thinks so.

There’s no point fighting for a better tomorrow; they’re bought and paid for to fight for something else, FOR someone else. Seventeen is prepared for being fodder, as a result. He’s prepared for unfairness and the bleak life that they’re living. Instead he watches as Cody defeats odds time and time again, somehow managing to balance being an exceptional military leader with a secondary war to live for something more, running himself ragged and — inexplicably — gaining ground. Each of those little victories are a little death for Seventeen’s cynicism; a chipping away. A little seed of Cody’s brand of hope takes root, awkward and begrudging, fond and tentative.

Then Order 66 happens. Cody’s efforts for a better life are in vain, and Cody himself-

Cody may never know that Seventeen was right abut just how helpless they were. Now he only knows that Seventeen is a traitor, apparently, because Seventeen — for once in his life — was the lucky one and his chip malfunctioned.

And Seventeen could say ‘I told you so’. He could rest, vindicated and resigned, in the fact that every dream Cody built up and everything he thought was worth dying for is pointless, now — as he always suspected it would be.

But it isn’t fair, even by Seventeen’s standards.

“What are you doing,” Rex will rasp, caught in a strange role reversal as Seventeen paints an armor set with Cody’s golden colors. “He’s not coming back, Seventeen. He can’t. It’s pointless to keep going after him, you need to stop.”

“No,” Seventeen will answer, unbothered, “I don’t think I will.”

“We can’t — we can’t keep hoping,” Rex says, because he means he will probably have a breakdown if he imagines there is even a pitiful possibility he could save his brothers and then have to turn away from that scrappy chance for the greater good and Rebellion, and all that. “We’ve got to move on.”

“Go on.” Seventeen will invite sincerely, one brow raised because he knows Rex better than that.

“Do you want him to shoot you?” Rex will finally yell, all knotted up at the thought of losing Seventeen too, even though it’s funny because Seventeen was never kind to Rex.

“He can try,” Seventeen will say, touching up the last of the paint. He will stand, wiping his fingers, and pick up his pack. “See you when we get back, then.”

Alt version:

#tcw #tcw fanart #alpha 17 #commander cody #so pretty #Q

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Curious about something

#just two #a plain CBJ one and a CSKA zherdev #should've gotten a sergei one back when i was more into hockey #my interest wanes but my continued love of sergei fedorov is very real #no idea what team i would do for him tho #Q

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No see results option, I'm forcing you to perceive yourself. rb for more results pls

#i don't interact with many people offline so #Q

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do you know where "no beta we die like x" comes from and how it is used?

The term "beta" in this context is short for "beta reader" - a person who reads a fic while it's still in the editing stage and helps the writer get it ready to post. Some betas check grammar. Some check canon compliance. Some are sensitivity readers. There are lots of things that betas can do.

So functionally, saying "no beta" means that the writer didn't get this checked by a second person before they posted it. It's a warning that there might be errors or typos etc. It's mostly used when an author has written something quickly and is posting without doing a lot of (or any) edits first.

As for where it comes from? It all started with a bumper sticker.

This image was an internet meme at one point, and it got meme'd on in the form of "no ___ we ___ like men"

Here on tumblr, one of the versions that got really popular was from now-deleted user @grec1a who created this version:

From there, it migrated to AO3 as the "no beta we die like men" tag, and very often the word men is replaced by the name of a character who dies in canon.

#huh did not know that #Q

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#keyboard forever #dunno how some of you peeps can write fic on your phone #even just texting i feel so slow communicating vs like discord or smth #Q

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#cats #what an adorable goblin #Q

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The war is over and Palp is finally dead

#tcw #tcw fanart #commander fox #commander cody #dawww yes more fox loving and being loved by his batch #Q

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lmaooo

#AHAHAHAHA #someone near us has (had?? lawls) a cybertruck #and when they tell you they look even uglier in person than in photos #boy they are not kidding #Q

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It's Fox! ✨ He has wings! ✨

more winged au

#tcw #tcw fanart #commander fox #oooh #...hmm #fic ideas #Q

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#ASDLKFJ I WAS ALSO LIKE #'damn the elves got slutty' #Q

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This is what peak performance looks like.

#fish #water yam #Q

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Plushie thief!!

(via)

#cats #lmao #Q

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I kill you

#cats #and this is why we have a small plastic dog carrier #though these days we just put miles on a leash and bring him in that way #he'll still cry but he gets to sit on a lap in the car and doesn't claw his nails bloody #chillest cat in existence until you bring out the carrier #miles vorkosicat #Q

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What we have in mind for now are black dragons, with low density silver glitter, silver enamel, so that the pride flag pops)

#2/2 #don't let 1 win give us fluffy ace dragon #ace problems

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KARMA IS REAL HE HAD CIDER TODAY

Apples are so fucked up you can get two from the same pile ans one tastes more like an apple than anything youve ever eaten and the other tastes like water poisoned by pharaohs

#there were two bottles and reader i bought both of them

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#lmao #Q

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The RoosterTeeth site will be deleted May 15th 😔 do yourselves a favor and start archiving EVERYTHING you can now. RageQuit, RvB, X-Ray & Vav, the Minecraft Let's Plays, RWBY, etc. RT is warning us as nicely as they can that there's a p good chance we won't be able to access ANYTHING by next year, including the YouTube channel. Download!

#to do #Q