#All the ways it could be interpreted with and without context

[spaghetticat3899]

“You’re so Curly-coded :3”

The internet either wants me dead, violated, or loves me, there is no in-between. Either a compliment or insult depending on how you interpret the character, either way you’re exploding.

[priceysalt]

PATRICIA ANN LUPONE GET MEDIA TRAINING NEOW

[musical-chick-13]

I'm the LAST person to suggest that you have to preface every single comment you make about a character/fictional relationship/etc. you like with a reminder that you Know™ it's pRoBLeMaTiC, but I DO question what the point of acting genuinely for real like there were no problems is.

[slimyenemy]

if you want to talk to me online in this context you're not allowed to cheat on me that's my boundary

[screambirdscreaming]

Something that peeves me whenever I see another post going around with some variation on "autistic people take things literally which means we are the only people who communicate Clearly and Directly" is that - for any given statement, there is not one singular, agreed on, universal Literal Interpretation. If there was, none of this would be a problem!

The nature of language is that there's always some degree of interpretability. Words have several different meanings, often overlapping, and there's nuance of context, cultural references, and so on.

Faced with a statement, most people will quickly come up with an interpretation that to them makes the most sense. But if you asked a roomful of people to explain in detail their interpretations, everyone's would probably be a little different, even for a pretty simple statement. Regardless of whether those people are autistic! Everyone conceptualizes the world a little differently, and everyone has a unique personal history of all the language they've encountered, and these things effect our interpretations.

In order for communication to be workable, given this slosh in interpretability, there's another couple of processes that go on. As conversation goes on, people reassess if their initial interpretation matches up with additional context. If it doesn't, they revise it, or ask clarifying questions. And on the flipside of this process, the other person in conversation is tracking if your reactions make sense with *their* understanding of what they're trying to convey to you, and offering context or rephrasing things if it seems you're out of alignment.

These processes are social skillsets that are, like most social skillsets, not ever directly articulated or explained. Many people are bad at one or both. Sometimes you encounter someone who is really, notably good at it - the vaunted "good listener", who puts in the effort to really understand what you're trying to say, or that really excellent teacher who engages with you back and forth until you really get it. But a lot of the time, it's a sort of passive social friction - people just not getting each other.

Sometimes, you encounter someone whose brain works so much like yours that talking to them feels almost effortless - you just get each other. But that's a pretty rare occurrence for anyone. More often, as you get to know someone, you start to understand the shape of the way they interpret things and learn to account for it, so over time it's easier to make sense to each other.

It's honestly not uncommon in society for people to aggregate in groups of people who interpret things similarly, and who are thus easier to talk to, rather than actually building the skills of communicating across interpretation gaps. Particularly egregious are those groups of men who talk about Women as an incomprehensible monolith, but it turns up to a greater or lesser degree on a lot of levels.

I suspect this is the root of a lot of parenting problems - people who have never built this communication skillset, and relied on choosing friends who make sense to them without a lot of effort, and who are then totally unprepared to interact with a child who interprets things in ways they don't expect.

Obviously I can't speak to The Universal Typical Experience, not least because it doesn't exist. But in general I would posit that:

Most people, give or take a few assholes, are not trying to say things that are confusing. Most people think they are communicating clearly, because the first interpretation *they* would come up with on hearing one of their own sentences is the correct interpretation.

Many people are not very good at accounting for different ways people could interpret things they're saying. However, it is normal and polite social behavior to be somewhat flexible about this and forgiving of misunderstandings. If people are being shitty to you about not understanding them, they are assholes. And I wouldn't assume that the rest of the communication they have with everyone else they know goes totally smoothly for them.

I suspect there is a bit of an unfortunate feedback loop, where people have bad experiences when someone gets mad at them for not getting something, and learn to hide when they're confused. Which then leads to larger, more complicated misunderstandings, which other different people get upset at them about, because those people think they should have asked for clarification in the first place.

Truly you can't win with everyone. No one can win with everyone. There is no monolith of "neurotypical communication" which resolves all these contradictions - all those people you're lumping in together under "neurotypical" have just as much trouble with each other.

[kiitzuna]

so..... kriselle. right guys?

⚠ DELTARUNE CHAPTER 3+4 SPOILERS ⚠

tw// csa mention

to preface, this is just my own reading. you are free to interpret the weird route and its contents how you wish. you are not required to take my reading as the end all be all.

horror has always had somewhat of an inherent sexual (and queer) undertone to it but it doesnt mean that you cant write it without it- i love horror that blends real life psychology and human experience with the otherworldly because there is SO MUCH you can do with it and it gets scary because most of the time it feels like something that could actually happen under the right circumstances… although when youre including a supernatural element (such as the player) the circumstances change and you need to recategorize and take more care to understand certain actions while still being conscious so that you are not just writing something torture porn-esque. this is an otherworldly entity (the player) taking the place of the human (kris) and acting within human bounds (kris cannot shapeshift or anything like that, we're limited to what their human body is capable of) to perpetuate the horror.

in context of the couch scene this is the moment that kris can no longer hide the existence of the other entity inside them from noelle. the secret is entirely out in the open and noelle knows that there is something unbelievably wrong with kris. i dont think noelle understands that it's us, the player, doing this to her because she doesn't know its a game but she absolutely knows that whoever it is is not kris. we are forcing noelle to confont that it was all real, it wasn't a dream, and it finally snaps her when we put the thorn (i.e. thornring) back on her finger. we've pushed noelle to her limit, 'used up' all of who noelle originally was and forcibly turned her into another vessel for our actions.

the loss of innocence is a common trope explored in horror, but i personally feel like this is moreso focused on the loss of autonomy than the loss of innocence. ch2 is noelle murdering monsters en masse and probably being berdly's cause of death. that innocence is already gone, but innocence can take on various forms and meanings which can alter the way we perceive certain situations as more one thing than the other. the thorn is representative of our control over noelle, we force kris to pierce it back through her hand during the couch scene which cements our authority over her. i understand why people could interpret the scene as being mainly the loss of innocence, with the rose wilting it could be read like an allegory for deflowering, but i believe that the scene is moreso focused on us removing her limitations. we've overflowed the pot on the stove and now she's stronger than ever. even not on the weird route, noelle exhibits behaviours of wanting to strangle berdly and take control of her life for once, whether joking or not. she was already really fascinated by her own power in ch2, finding out that yes actually she isnt powerless and she can take things for herself, as long as she listens to kris- hence her saying 'Thank you.' towards the end of the route.

what makes weird route kriselle so interesting is that kris doesnt want this. when noelle is close to kris and she begins to trigger the downfall of events, kris is trying to cover her mouth desperately to stop her. kris wants nothing more than to keep noelle from experiencing everything all over again. it's not just kris abusing noelle torture compilation. with not only closet scene where kris is trying to hit us with the hockey stick but also the bathroom scene we see just how fucking ANGRY kris is at us- literally beating the shit out of the soul…. both in a 'why would you ever make me do this?' way but also in a 'you broke her' way.

we've taken these childhood friends with such a strong connection and forced them to rip themselves to shreds. we've broken them to their core. i don't think noelle is capable of saving kris, i don't think she wants to anymore. in the few moments she had left between the start and the end of the couch scene, she's lost that will.

noelle's now broken, she's lost herself because we took her autonomy. just like kris. a cage. a vessel. we've given her the power to take whatever she wants, we've removed her limitations, we've made her stronger.

as long as she listens to us.

------------------------------ start of edit ------------------------------

with that being said, @enuratled made some good points and connections in their reblog of my post and i want to elaborate on/include them in the main post due to wanting to ensure that im not coming off as discrediting or attempting to disprove the loss of innocence reading while explaining more of my position.

"...it's not necessarily that i disagree but I think loss of autonomy is loss of consent, loss of ability to consent and I think that's very much what the rose deflowered imagery is pointing us towards."

the loss of autonomy is the loss of consent which in turn can also mean the loss of innocence. all of these tropes and concepts are intertwined and you can't really fully separate them, although the loss of autonomy/consent/innocence doesn't always indicate a sexual connotation. my reading chooses to focus more on the psychological rather than the sexual, so i guess its just my piece of the puzzle when it comes to dissecting this. there is clearly a reading here that involves a sexual undertone because of the defloration and understandably so- this is something that happens in real life and depending on your background or perceptions may be the first thing your mind jumps to when you see this scene play out.

"it uses the same dialogue, noelle begging herself to move but being unable to, it has the rose being deflowered, it has kris forcing the ring onto her hand, it happens in her fucking bedroom! her most private space! the place where she's supposed to be the safest! she asked them to come in! in this case, the imagery of sexual assault is being used to convey the inability to consent."

a good point on the reading of csa. this makes the reading more prominent and ties it back into autonomy and consent.

"...a lot of good readings of the weird route comes hand in hand with discussions about comphet, and how dangerous it is to force these very gendered roles onto kids (or teens) who explicitly don't conform, or want to conform to these things. snowgrave, as much as it is about autonomy, power and player control, can also be read about gender and sexuality, especially with how it utilises this imagery of marriage."

ive read the hellspawnmotel analysis many times over and its one of my favourites, i think the concept is really solid and you echo the same sentiments with that here. there is clearly a strong theme of identity/gender/sexuality beneath the surface of deltarune and especially with weird route kriselle.

I understand that [c]sa is a very taboo topic, and it's not necessarily in-line with the usual host of 'dark' themes we expect to see in games like this, but that doesn't mean the narrative can't utilise the commentary that comes with it, or the imagery used for it. again, I don't think it has to be read as sexual assault, but I don't think that's an unfair or unearned reading.

i agree, it being taboo doesnt mean that the reading isn't or can't be there. i am not attempting to say 'you cant see it like this!' or 'youre wrong and im right!' because everyone is entitled to their own perceptions of a scene, especially when it is not explicitly stated or shown in the text. personally (just me, you dont need to feel the same), i feel it's just too heavy to be thrust onto us if that is the intended context with no warning. maybe thats the intention, to drop it on us with no warning like it would happen in real life, but i honestly can't see that being how it was originally intended.

i think where this scene creates so much clashing of readings is again that you cannot really separate loss of autonomy from loss of consent and loss of innocence from either. these tropes can be interpreted in different ways- sexually, psychologically, physically, etc. its up to you to decide how you want to read it. the reading of csa has a lot of evidence for it and a strong argument. i dont think its wrong, but im personally not sure that should be our main takeaway.

my main reason for why i emphasize the focus on the loss of autonomy in the way i have is that a lot of people have decided to take the reading of csa as what happens explicitly, treating this scene as if you've genuinely done this to noelle.

if this is to be taken literally like how a good chunk of the fandom is treating it unfortunately, we're the ones who are doing this to noelle and kris. these actions are our own. they're our choices. this isn't kris, its us, the player. i do not want to be responsible for the sa of noelle, i wouldnt want to play a game where im forced to commit csa. it doesn't feel right. i don't think toby would put that into deltarune directly. you can read it as csa being what happens after the screen cuts to black if you want to, but honestly thinking about the implication that i as the player forced kris to rape or deflower noelle makes me want to curl up, puke blood, and die.

i dont think anyone wants to be burdened with that. thank you to @enuratled for allowing me to use parts of their reblog in my edit, and i hope this adds a bit more context to the entire post and where i come from! everyone can read it in their own way, and i do not wish to discredit anyone by suggesting a different reading of the scene. please consider reading their additions to my post in their reblog to see everything they said, as i believe it does hold a lot of merit.

------------------------------ end of edit ------------------------------

UPDATE: rose was patched out. i feel kind of vindicated but my feelings are honestly mixed....... you can still interpret the scene how you want but i think it's pretty clear toby didn't intend for the graphic to be taken that way. sucks we had to lose the rose because of that but it's for the best considering.... theres a lot of ways that the fandom was taking the csa allegory too far and blending it with other ones which snowballed into a whole new thing and i kinda dont want to go through a year of kris misgendering and "toby fox put child rape in his game". (even though he didnt. its an allegory. one that i dont personally wish to focus on but others can at their own will.) which i think is kinda reasonable

UPDATE 2: THE VISUAL WAS CHANGED AGAIN! this time i feel like it lines up with my analysis even more and really conveys how visceral and painful it is

the way that it both shatters out from her heart to indicate we've broken noelle and extends out like blood vessels... this is us turning noelle into another vessel for our actions....

shatter effect - we've broken noelle

extending out like blood vessels - tied to the heart/SOUL and 'vessel' can be a play on vessel/cage like how we're turning noelle into a vessel

the extensions having small sharp protrusions - rose stems have thorns

idk man i think the scene is perfect

this visual is so insane i love it

[kaurwreck]

Paradoxes Nothing in the world is as soft, as weak, as water; nothing else can wear away the hard, the strong, and remain unaltered. Soft overcomes hard, weak overcomes strong. Everybody knows it, nobody uses the knowledge. So the wise say: By bearing common defilements you become a sacrificer at the altar of earth; by bearing common evils you become a lord of the world. Right words sound wrong. [Ch. 78 of Tao Te Ching, ascribed to Lao Tzu; English version by Ursual K. Le Guin]

I'm water like how raging rivers are water, so I also find solace and praxis in Ch. 63 (excerpted from the same English version as above):

Consider Beginnings Do without doing. Act without action. Savor the flavorless. Treat the small as large, the few as many. Meet injury with the power of goodness. Study the hard while it's easy. Do big things while they're small. The hardest jobs in the world start out easy, the great affairs of the world start small. So the wise soul, by never dealing with great things, gets great things done. Now, since taking things too lightly makes them worthless, and taking things too easy makes them hard, the wise soul, by treating the easy as hard, doesn't find anything hard.

I'd recommend the entire Tao Te Ching, actually, for self cultivating mettle, but if nothing else, the above is presently, as ever, salient.

If you'd like something more literally applicable, however —

Living With Change When the government's dull and confused, the people are placid. When the government's sharp and keen, the people are discontented. Alas! misery lies under happiness, and happiness sits on misery, alas! Who knows where it will end? Nothing is certain. The normal changes into the monstrous, the fortunate into the unfortunate, and our bewilderment goes on and on. And so the wise shape without cutting, square without sawing, true without forcing. They are the light that does not shine.

(In other words, according to Ursula K. Le Guin's footnote to the above Ch. 58, Taoists gain their ends without the use of means.)

I won't promise it'll be okay, regardless of what happens over the next few days, but I can promise the outcome is navigable.

[sundrop-writes]

BRAINWASHED

Virgin!Stiles Stilinski x Fem!Reader

Everything’s clean - except for my thoughts. (Thinking about me getting you off.)

Can’t stop thinking you got me B R A I N W A S H E D .

Summary:

Stiles likes you. He really, really, really likes you. It's bordering on obsession, but he likes to believe that he has it under control.

So when you accidentally leave a pair of your panties in his presence, ripe for the taking, and they're in his backpack faster than he can blink - he realizes that he might not have it as under control as he would like to think. But he can't find it to be too much of a problem when he has those panties wrapped around his cock.

Virgin!Stiles Stilinski x Best Friend!Fem!Reader. Pining!Stiles/One Sided Fantasies. Panty Stealing. Smut/PWP.

Word Count: 8,000

Teen Wolf Masterlist | AO3 Link

Full list of warnings and author's notes below the cut.

Warnings: the reader uses she/her pronouns and is described as having a vagina; Stiles and the reader have been best friends since childhood and they are in high school now (they are both the same age) (for argument's sake, they are both 18, but the horny parts were motivated by the hotness of a 20-something actor so idc what age you interpret the characters as); the reader's looks are mostly undescribed and left neutral in terms of race, hair texture/colour, height, etc. however the reader is implied to be fat/plus sized; mentions of the reader wearing dresses and tights (things that the other characters on the show would typically wear); mentions of the reader having a cat - I did not give the cat a name so you can imagine it's the same as your cat's name/what you would want your cat to be called if you had one; use of Y/N and L/N (as in Last Name); brief mention that the reader would like wearing bikinis; the reader calls Stiles 'good boy' in non-sexual contexts and it turns him on; mentions of Stiles looking up the reader's skirt when she doesn't know it; some slight dubious consent because Stiles steals the reader's underwear without her consent and uses them in a sexual act (his masturbation); masturbation (Stiles touching himself); this is a one-sided/pining fic - all the sexual acts take place inside Stiles's mind as sexual fantasies while he masturbates; the reader character is described in these sexual acts as they play out in his mind, so that's why she is included heavily in the warnings; Stiles is submissive (even in his own fantasies) and he fantasies about the reader being dominant toward him; Stiles becoming aroused by the idea of the reader not shaving her pussy; technically there is edging - because Stiles edges himself to make his fantasies last longer; panty sniffing (though the panties Stiles took are freshly launder and not used ones); scent kink/sweat kink - Stiles likes the way you smell, including your sweat; kinks and sexual acts mentioned only in Stiles's fantasies (taking place only in his mind in this fic): car sex (in the back of the Jeep (typical, I know)), fingering (reader receiving), degradation kink (Stiles receiving - he likes the idea of the reader insulting him and being mean to him); pussy eating (Stiles fantasizes in depth about this); Reader makes a joke about spanking Stiles and Stiles has a small fantasy about being spanked by her; I think that's finally it.

A/N: Title for the fic comes from the song Brainwashed by Waterparks. Warning - Stiles might be a bit OOC in this because I wrote it before I started re-watching Teen Wolf again (and before I started watching Season 1 for the first time, because previously I had only seen 3B and beyond). In this, I have said that he's flunking classes and he's not really great with studying, while in the show, he's really smart and bookish and really well studied - but it could just be chalked up to the fact that he has a huge crush on the Reader that is distracting him from studying. So, interpret it how you want. I hope that you enjoy it, and please read through to my end notes to find out about a potential sequel to the fic!!

...

Stiles was hopeless. 

That was the only way to describe his current state of being. Completely, utterly hopeless. 

He was a complete and total loser, hopelessly in love with his best friend. And he was getting more stupidly caught up in that crush every single day. And of course, he didn’t even have the courage to admit his feelings for you so that it could be awkwardly out in the open. So that the two of you could get the rejection part over with, at least. 

Basically - his feelings for you were slowly ruining his life. 

Stiles had been in love with you for as long as he could remember. Well, maybe not that long. 

See, you, him, and Scott had all been friends since the beginning of kindergarten, and naturally, Stiles always liked you as a person. He always thought of you as a good friend, even if he gravitated toward Scott more.  

But he distinctly remembered the first moment when he had started to develop a crush on you. It was a very special memory to him - the day when you shifted in his eyes from annoying, slightly nagging friend to a beautiful, fierce woman. 

It was the day when the three of you were out on Halloween night during the third grade - and that was around the time people started whispering about crushes in school, when people would have playground girlfriends and boyfriends that they broke up with every other week. That night, a group of eighth grade bullies began chasing the three of you, trying to take your candy. 

Without hesitation, you picked up the largest rock in sight and threw it at one of them, causing a large cut across his forehead - and you loudly told them to ‘fuck off’ (the first time Stiles had ever heard such a word when it wasn’t coming from his dad). They had run away, somehow terrified of a girl a foot shorter than them. 

That night, you had become his hero. 

And since then, you had been the only object of his affections. 

Of course, over the years, Stiles had plenty of opportunities to tell you about his feelings for you. He just… always felt too cowardly to do so. 

In seventh grade, he had come very close to asking you out to the winter dance - only to have Scott beat him to the punch. When he pulled Scott aside to ask him about it, Scott confessed to him that he also had a crush on you. This resulted in their first ever fistfight. The first ever true rift in their otherwise close, brotherly friendship. 

The boys didn’t speak to each other for days. Which, naturally, annoyed the hell out of you. Especially because, of course, neither of them told you why they were fighting, not wanting you to know that you were the source of the rift in their friendship. And to you, this only made the fight seem more stupid and immature. 

So finally, when you demanded it, they called a truce. They agreed that they didn’t want to lose their friendship or lose you. They didn’t want to make you choose between them when it wouldn’t make any of you happy. 

So Stiles proposed that the three of you should go to the dance as friends, which you loved, and they both got you a corsage, one for each wrist - and the three of you still laughed at the pictures of you holding each of their arms. 

Eventually, Scott grew out of his crush on you and moved onto other girls, and he loved that he got to keep you as a close best friend, someone he could go to for dating advice if needed. Scott kept trying to convince Stiles to simply ‘man up’ and tell you about his feelings, but Stiles kept that same sentiment they had concluded upon years ago. Telling you about his feelings would only ruin the friendship. Not just between you, but between the entire group - it would fuck up the pack. 

Though it felt like the more he tried to ignore his feelings for you, the more they festered like a tumor. While Scott was able to mature past his crush on you, Stiles only grew more intense, and more insane when it came to his ‘crush’ on you. 

Over the years, his crush on you had grown from something sweet and childish into something much more. When puberty truly took over and lust was added into the mix, he now had to deal with the fact that you had grown into a gorgeous woman. He could barely control his arousal when looking at you, hearing your voice, smelling you, talking to you, thinking about you - even simply being in your presence made something in his mind melt. And it was growing much worse with each passing day. There wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t wake up with a raging boner fueled by sexual dreams of you. 

And naturally, he would say that not telling you about his feelings for you was ultimately the best thing for him. He would steadfastly refuse to admit that him being distracted by all these fantasies of you was slowly eroding your friendship from the inside out. Slowly, bit by bit, his worst fears were coming true - your friendship was being ruined by his crush anyway. 

But he tried to ignore that. Even if you were the most gorgeous, perfect being ever put on the planet, he tried his hardest to simply enjoy the platonic version of you. He tried to act like he wasn’t stupidly, head over heels in love with you. 

He tried not to act like it. 

But on nights like this, it was just so hard. 

Tonight, the two of you were studying for an upcoming English mid-term that would be worth a decent portion of your final grade. 

Logically, Stiles knew that he should have locked himself in his room and forced himself to study independently. Or he should have taken up Scott on his offer to study with him and Allison. 

But no, he just had to ask you for your ‘help’. 

And you pitied him and said yes, because he was doing poorly in the class. The only reason for that being because it was one of the classes that he shared with you, and he spent all of his damn time staring at you across the room during it. He had tried to tell himself that he really would study tonight, that he would really take advantage of your intelligence here and now to get his shit together in order to up his grade. 

But no. That was just one of many daily lies that he told himself. Since the moment he had set foot in your bedroom that afternoon (and it was dark out now, well into the evening) - he hadn’t been able to focus on anything but you. 

Sure, sometimes that worked to his benefit. Hearing you recite Shakespeare, the words coming off your sweet lips - it did force him to focus on the material at hand for at least a short period of time. But it wasn’t like he was actually retaining any of it. He was just thinking about how gorgeous your voice sounded and how amazing you would be in an adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. One where he played Romeo, of course - and he would get to use someone else’s well-crafted words to romance you, finally getting to kiss you for the first time. 

Again - he was hopeless. 

Currently, Stiles was laying diagonally on your bed, sitting among a mess of books - the English textbooks, the assigned novels, the published copies of the play, along with binders of your notes and other notebooks, stray papers. He couldn’t pay attention to the notes he was supposed to be writing, not for a moment, not if his life depended on it. Not when you looked this stunningly beautiful while busy writing your own notes. 

With the soft lighting from your bedside lamp brushing across your skin, making that skin look even softer, you were a goddess-like vision sitting on the bed across from him. You were wearing the simple dress that you had worn to school earlier that day, your modest tights since shed off in the name of ‘comfort’ (and so that your cat wouldn’t rip holes in them while crawling across your lap, you had remarked to Stiles). When you had stood at your hamper and peeled them off your legs, Stiles had a hard time not letting the drool spill out across his chin. 

Your thighs were gorgeous. Thick, wide, spread out like a buffet for his eyes to feast on every single time you sat down. From his angle, laying down the way he was, he was up close and personal with the dimpling cellulite and stretchmarks you had there. The hem of your dress had ridden up when you had adjusted your position to get comfortable, and he felt absolutely spoiled by how much more of your thighs were revealed to him. 

A few times throughout the evening, he had to physically clench his fingers, tight, to remind himself not to reach out and touch. To remind himself that he wasn’t allowed to touch. The last thing he wanted to do was to creep you out by randomly reaching out and touching your thigh. But he wanted so badly to touch. 

How many times had he imagined what those thighs would look like bouncing and jiggling while you rode his cock? How many times had he imagined those thighs clamped around his head while he licked your pussy? (Far too many times for the good of his own sanity.) 

Not to mention the concentration spread across your face - you were so fucking hot when you showed off your intelligence. Hell everything about you was hot - your sweetness, your laughter, your sarcasm, even your bitchy side. But your bookish side had to be one of Stiles’s favorites. 

The way you would nibble your own lip when thinking, the way your brows furrowed slightly in thought. Everything about you - from the bra strap sticking out of the neckline of your dress to the chipped edge of your nail polish where you had chewed on it - you were a fucking vision. And Stiles couldn’t take his eyes off you, no matter how hard he tried. 

It was a wonder that you didn’t notice Stiles staring at you - not as often as he did it. 

Stiles felt strangely caught when you put down your pen and looked up from your notebook, then. He quickly scrambled to grab his own pencil and start writing something, to look busy. But of course, he just looked like more of an idiot when the eraser end began scraping across the page in nonsense patterns. 

“Stiles,” You scolded him with a sigh, a way he was used to hearing his name come off your lips. “Have you gotten anything done? I told you to copy down at least half my notes-” 

Of course. You pegged his blank page as simple laziness, rather than his brain slowly melting out through his ears due to his inability to think about anything but you (especially when he was in the same room as you). At least he hadn’t been caught staring at you in that creepy way yet. 

You snatched up his notebook to check his work, and his heart dropped - if you looked too carefully, then he would be caught. In the back of that notebook, there were about three pages of his name and yours in hearts, and a few times he had practiced writing his signature as ‘Mr Stiles L/N’. (He was a feminist, and he liked the idea of starting a new tradition.) There was even a drawing he had made designing your theoretical wedding cake, including a cake topper where he was Superman and you were riding on his back while he was flying. 

“Y/N, uh-” 

He quickly snatched the notebook back, causing a glare from you while he sighed in defeat. 

“Fine.” He shrugged, knowing that he had to admit to a smaller crime in order to cover up the larger one. It was something that he did with his father all too often. “I didn’t get anything done. I was slacking off. You caught me.” 

“Stiles!” You scolded him again, reaching out to gently smack his shoulder. “If you keep this shit up, you’re never gonna graduate!” 

Sadly, you were probably right. His crush on you was absolutely going to ruin him. 

“Well, you could just let me copy off you,” He replied, giving you a wide grin that let you know he was mostly kidding. 

You rolled your eyes in reply, and soon your gaze caught sight of the clock on your nightstand. 

“Well, it seems like you have wasted enough of my time for tonight.” You scoffed sarcastically. 

Stiles knew that you had intended this to be a joke - but he couldn’t help the twinge of pain the words caused in his gut. The idea that he was truly just a waste of time in your life. He pressed his lips tightly together to suppress a frown and didn’t say anything more, and then you continued. 

“It’s almost your curfew anyway.” You pointed out, gesturing toward the clock. You were right. Stiles hadn’t even noticed how late it was getting - too busy enjoying his time with you. “We’ll pack it up for the night - but you should meet me at the library tomorrow morning, early, so we can go over everything again before the exam.” 

Of course, you were still invested in the idea of him getting a good grade, even if that seemed unlikely to happen. 

“You’re gonna make me get up early?” He whined, hating the idea of missing out on even ten extra minutes of sleep. 

“Yes.” You stressed. “I want you there at seven o’clock. Sharp.” 

Your ultra serious voice ordering him around was undeniably a turn-on for him. No matter what sexual fantasies Stiles cooked up about you in his mind, he could never picture himself having full control over you. In fact, most of the time, he found himself covered in cum at the idea of you having complete control over him. And it was likely because this was how most of your friendship went - you told him what to do, and he did it. And that was a huge part of why he fell for you in the first place. 

When he didn’t verbally confirm the time, too caught up in his infatuation yet again, you let out a gentle growl of frustration. 

“Stiles!” You called out his name. “You have to be there at seven. So you can’t get out of bed at seven - you have to set your alarm for like six-thirty, got it? Don’t make me come over there and get your ass out of bed like last time.” 

This thought caused Stiles’s stomach to clench. 

The last time you had come to his house to wake him up for school (because he had agreed to help you with some bakesale project and you were pissed off that he wasn’t there early to help you set up tables and whatnot) - you had charged into his house in a fury. You had your own key, of course, and his dad wasn’t there to busy you with conversation or pleasantries. 

And you charged right up the stairs and nearly caught him with a hand around his cock, jerking off to a picture of you in a bikini from the summer before. And he had rushed to shove the picture in his nightstand and cocoon himself in the comforter to hide his body just as you made it to the top of the stairs, shouting at him for being late. Luckily, he had gotten away with the lie that he had slept in, rather than revealing the truth that he had been distracted because he had woken up with morning wood after having a heated dream about you. 

When Stiles didn’t respond yet again, you grabbed a smaller decorative pillow from behind you and lightly hit him with it for emphasis, causing him to burst into laughter. 

“Promise me you’ll be on time!” You said, smacking him with the pillow again. 

“Yes, yes! I promise!” He finally agreed, his face becoming pink from laughter. 

You dropped the pillow then, and leaned down, causing his eyes to inadvertently go straight to your cleavage while you gave him a gentle, friendly kiss on the forehead. 

“Good boy.” You responded, praising him for agreeing to your terms. Obviously, it was another joke. 

But these praising words combined with your lips even slightly brushing against his skin, along with your tits dangling so close to his face, had his cock swelling to hardness nearly instantly. He grabbed the pillow then, trying to look subtle as he put it over his crotch, desperately trying to hide the very obvious bulge that had popped up at the front of his jeans within seconds. 

He was lucky when you shifted your attention away from him, now busy with cleaning off the bed, gathering your textbooks in a pile and moving to put them on your desk in the corner. You being distracted gave him a few moments to try and mentally will his dick down, which worked slightly. Only slightly. 

“You could help me, you know.” You mocked him lightly - distracting him from his thoughts of baseball, trying to will the blood out of his cock. 

He looked up and saw you standing there with his backpack, putting away his textbooks and notebooks now. He had been so dumbly distracted by his own dick that he hadn’t noticed you taking the kind initiative to clean up his things for him too. 

“Right, sorry.” He jumped into action and did so, taking things from your hands and shoving them into his bag with haste. 

“You don’t have to rush out, I just need the bed cleared off so I can pick out my clothes for tomorrow.” You told him. 

“Wait - you actually pick out your clothes in advance?” He asked, thinking that this was entirely adorable, and explained why you were always so well dressed. 

(And it explained why you were always so punctual in the mornings while Stiles was usually a mess - running around his house still half-asleep, shoving his head into a shirt that he had sniffed to see if it was clean, shoving things frantically into his bag in order to get out the door five minutes late.) 

“Well you know not all of us are okay with just throwing on last week’s mustard stained tee shirt,” You said, playfully pointing to a mustard stain that he had on his shirt from lunch. 

He rolled his eyes in return, trying to ignore the slight twist of embarrassment that wanted to swell up inside of him at the comment. 

There had been a point where he used to make a very pointed effort to impress you. Back when his crush on you had first gotten serious - likely around the beginning of high school. He used to get up early every single morning, spending a lot of time being intensely picky about the clothes he wore. He drowned himself in cologne (until you had complained about it), he wore certain colors just because you mentioned liking them. But none of it seemed to garner any more of your attention than usual. 

And so, he resigned himself to be the loser best friend who would always just float at the corners of your life, drowning in his secret affection for you until some better, hotter guy came along and swept you off your feet one day. 

He was just glad that day hadn’t come yet. 

Stiles was hesitant to leave - he wasn’t done being around you for the day yet, too emotionally attached. But he guessed that he would need to get some decent sleep before waking up at the asscrack of dawn in order to see more of you the next morning. (Even if it would include the horrors of studying at the library.) 

“So - I’ll see you tomorrow morning?” He posed, ready to take his leave as he swung his backpack over his shoulder. 

“Ooh, wait one second.” You said, eagerness twinging through your voice. 

His heart pounded hard in his chest for a moment, wondering if this could be the moment he had been waiting so long for - would you stop him there, grab him by the shoulders and kiss him hard, and then tell him that you had been feeling the exact same way as he had for all these years? 

“Which one?” You asked, spinning around from your closet to face him, holding up two dresses on hangers. 

Oh. You were asking for his opinion about what you should wear to school the next day. 

“The blue one.” Stiles said, motioning towards it. “That shade of blue looks beautiful on you - it compliments your skin tone well, and it makes you shine. But ya know, you look gorgeous in everything. You could wear a paper bag to school and everyone would still be jealous of how amazing you look.” 

He rambled on for a moment too long, and realized that his genuine fondness for you - something straying too far into romantic territory - was slipping out. 

“But - uh, yeah. I’ll see you later.” He quickly added on, now eager to leave before you could make any further comments. 

Then he dashed out of your room and down the stairs, getting out the front door so fast that he practically left a poof of cartoon dust behind him. 

He got into the Jeep and tossed his bag into the passenger’s seat - which, he hadn’t realized was not even zipped up. (A habit you often scolded him for - going around with his bag unzipped.) Papers and books spilled across the seat and underneath it, and he let out a loud growl of frustration. 

“Idiot!” He screamed, scolding himself as he leaned down, trying to clean everything up. “Idiot, idiot, idiot!” 

Partially, he was feeling so idiotic because he had just been so vulnerable with you and you probably thought he was weird for it. Actually, that was mostly why. 

As he was picking up his things, he realized that - yup, he was missing his English textbook. He had forgotten it in your room. He heaved out a sigh and collapsed back against his seat. He could leave without it - but then he would get an earful from you in the morning about how he was ‘forgetful’ and ‘irresponsible’. Ugh. 

He got out of the Jeep again and shuffled his way back into your house - your mom was working late, so there was nobody there to question him running out of the house at top speed and then appearing back so soon. All he got was a curious chirp and a head tilt from your cat, who was sitting on the top of the stairs. 

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Stiles remarked to the animal, stopping for a moment to pet him. “I’m pathetic. But you can’t rat me out, okay? I know she thinks highly of your opinion and I need you to put in a good word for me. Got it?” 

The cat purred and pushed his face into Stiles’s hand, so he assumed that was a positive affirmation that he would root for Stiles - or at the very least, keep his secret. 

Stiles linger for a moment to scratch the cat’s furry cheek, and then he stepped over the cat and made his way back toward your room. He passed the closed bathroom door and heard the shower running, and he almost cheered. If you were in the shower, then you wouldn’t notice him slipping back in to grab his book, so you couldn’t scold him for being a forgetful idiot. 

He went into your room, and the second he made it through the mouth of your open bedroom, his eyes locked onto your bed like a hot target. Your clothes for the following day were spread out so neatly, and right there, on top of the blue dress he had suggested - there was a pair of lacy purple panties that were something right out of one of his fantasies. 

Stiles had thought about your underwear before - many times. Too many times to count. 

He had even caught small, passing glimpses of your underwear before - when you had worn dresses without tights and bent over in front of him. But he had only seen enough of it to determine the color, not to know if it was lacy or silk or cotton. And even that was enough to send him into a tailspin that had him rushing to the bathroom to relieve his aching cock. 

In the back of his mind - or truly, the forefront of his mind whenever he jerked off to thoughts of you - he always wondered what kind of underwear you wore. What kind of decorative wrapping your pretty pussy would come in if he ever got the other-worldly privilege of getting his hands up your skirt. 

Would they be simple, practical cotton underwear? Would they be cute? Would they be sinfully sexy? Would they be those underwear with the days of the week written across the front? 

But seeing this now - seeing the tangible evidence in front of him that you actually planned to wear purple lacy lingerie to school - it was something that had all sense draining from his mind as blood rushed to his cock once again. He barely had time to think about it - and he didn’t think about it. Because then, they were in his hands, in his pocket, and he was back in the Jeep, hiding his stolen goods in his bag and hastily zipping it up so he could slam his foot on the gas and race home. 

He didn’t even have a chance to think about the fact that he left without the textbook that he had gone back into your room looking for. He didn’t have the attention span to notice that said textbook was in a stack along with your own - almost as if purposefully kept there like an excuse to lure him back into your room, rather than clumsily forgotten by him. 

… 

When Stiles got into his room, he slammed his bedroom door shut behind him, now entirely frantic, and thankful that his father was working a late shift again. He sat down on the edge of his bed, his hands shaking with anticipation as he unzipped his bag and pulled out the thing he had so hastily snagged. 

His mind was warring with so many sensations. Guilt for taking the panties, paranoia that he would get caught, shame that he even had the urge to take them in the first place - but all of that was easily toppled over and forgotten in the name of lust. Overwhelming lust and arousal that he felt for you. Greed and joy at knowing that he had something so private of yours in his hands now - something so secret that he shouldn’t have. A perfect little piece of you. 

His little secret piece of you. 

He still couldn’t believe that this was the kind of underwear you wore on a daily basis. 

Just imagining that this was what you wore to school - thinking about the fact that this was what you were wearing under your clothes during your everyday interactions with him: it drove him wild. 

He easily pictured this pretty lace sticking to your cunt when you were wet, the lavender colored material getting slick and slightly darker, soaked through and visibly sticky when you spread your legs for him to see. He wondered if your pussy would be shaved or not - but you didn’t have a boyfriend, so currently, you didn’t have anybody to shave for. 

He remembered a conversation from a few weeks ago where Scott had wondered if he should shave his pubes for Allison and you had remarked that ‘putting a razor near your junk’ was ‘ill-advised and stupid’ - so you probably didn’t even like shaving your pussy on principle. 

This immediately put a picture in his mind of your pussy being covered in soft hair that matched the shade on your head - maybe a bit darker. It would clump together with your juices and become soaked when you got wet. The little hairs would probably stick out cutely from the sides of the bikini cut underwear, peeking at him. 

Your pussy would be the prettiest thing he had ever seen, he knew that for certain. 

Stiles imagined getting you in the backseat of the Jeep one night after a game. 

He would still be covered in sweat from his efforts, worn out from trying his best. Sure, he wasn’t the best player, but you wanted to ‘reward’ him for his efforts on the winning side, even if he hadn’t directly contributed to the win. 

So as soon as the game was over, before he even had time to change out of his pads or shower, you hauled him to the parking lot and shoved him into the car. His gear was only half-off, ditched hastily by your feet, and you were in his lap - a perfect prize after all the hard work he had done, sitting astride his already sore thigh muscles while you kissed him - hard. Your mouth greedily sucked the oxygen out of his lungs while you shoved your tongue past his lips, painting his tongue with your sweet spit - and fuck, it felt like he was made for this. 

He got sucked so deep into the fantasy - it felt so damn real. 

He imagined having his hands splayed out against your beautiful, plump ass, gripping you tightly, noting wanting you to separate from him for even a section. While you held on tightly to his face, sealing him into the kiss until his lips were sore. And you would only pull back to look into his eyes with glossy desperation and utter out: 

“Please, Stiles. I need you. I need you to touch my pussy.” 

And what else could he do but obey? 

So he would lift up your skirt - a particularly short skirt that you had worn with nothing else but a pair of knee-high socks. Something that you knew he loved to see you cheer for him on the sidelines while wearing. Even though it was a chilly night, you couldn’t feel too cold when you saw him glancing at you every single chance he got. Of course, those distracted stares had gotten him screamed at by Coach more than once. But he loved the way your skirt would flutter up in the nighttime breeze, teasing him. The way the fucking beautiful thick fat of your thighs would jiggle whenever you would jump around in order to cheer him on. 

He was a man of simple, divine tastes. 

So - he would lift up that perfect skirt to find those purple lacy panties underneath; to find the perfection of your wet cunt waiting for him, growing slicker by the second, more needy for him. You were humping yourself against his athletic cup, which his hard cock was practically dying inside of, bursting to get out of the hard shell of plastic to touch you. But he ignored his own needs for a few minutes longer in favor of yours. Reaching forward, sliding his fingers along the wet spot at the front of your panties, absolutely indulging in the beautiful gasp you let out when his touch grazed across your swollen clit through the fabric. 

“Stiles, please.” 

He could almost hear it - it was so fucking clear inside his mind. The way your voice would be so pitched with desperation, so perfectly needy curled around his name. He wanted so badly to hear it in real life. 

And he would push those panties to the side, pushing his fingers inside of your hot, wet cunt-

Back in the real world, Stiles’s cock gave a needy pulse, leaking into his boxers. 

He heaved out a sigh, his cock practically vibrating with blood. He had driven home the whole time trying to ignore that boner, but he simply couldn’t do that anymore. He just had to give in. 

He hesitantly put your panties aside - already feeling a strange sense of attachment to them - and reached to his nightstand, grabbing the bottle of lube that he had in the drawer. Shamefully, it was already half empty, mostly due to the fantasies that he had about you. He undid his pants and had them around his ankles in record time, and whipped off his shirt for good measure, knowing that he was quite a ‘splasher’ and not wanting to get cum on it to pair with that ugly mustard stain. 

He lubed up his cock more than a healthy amount, knowing that it would contribute to the fantasy of you being so wet around him. It was a distant fantasy that he would never actually get to achieve, but hell - a man can dream. Then he began to slowly pump his cock in hand, wanting to milk it and truly enjoy it, and he let his mind get back to work. 

He thought back to your place. A place he was comfortable, spent a lot of time at hanging out with you. 

He imagined that early that night when he had forgotten his book, rather than you being in the shower, he went back to your room and found that you had been getting ready for bed. You were rubbing sweet-smelling lotion on your arms, pulling back the covers, wearing nothing but a pair of cute little socks, a tiny camisole - where he could very visibly see that you weren’t wearing a bra, with the natural teardrop shape of your breasts bared to the eye, your nipples poking through the fabric - and those purple lace panties. 

When he would appear in the doorway, you would gawk at him and ask: 

“Stiles? What are you doing? Did you… forget something?” 

But you would be positioned half leaning over the bed, taking back the covers so it would be comfortable for you to sleep - and your ass would be unintentionally on full display. Your sweet pussy lips peeking at him from behind, the roundness of your ass so fucking inviting, daring him to leave bite marks across the beautifully fat flesh. 

And after a few moments of him staring so brazenly, saying nothing, simply drinking in the gorgeous sight of your body bent over, wearing so little clothing, wearing those perfect little lace panties-

(Stiles sped up his hand on his cock, the lube sounding downright sloppy in the silence of the room.) 

You would stand up to your full height, come to him in the doorway, put your face so close to his and say: 

“If you’re gonna spend so much time staring at me like a gaping idiot, then you should do something about it.” 

Stiles had to stop the swift movements of his hand and clutch his grip tightly around the base of his cock, making his entire dick throb hard as he edged off his own orgasm. 

He still wasn’t sure why the idea of you calling him an ‘idiot’ in such a brazen tone made him want to cum so hard - but he didn’t have time to unpack all that now. 

He grabbed up the panties again with his non-lubed hand. Something in the back of his mind thought that it would be a crime for him to get them dirty. Another part argued that he would absolutely love to get them covered in his cum, not clean them, and then return them to you. That it would be fucking thrilling to have you wear them in that dirtied state. 

Though he knew that would never fucking happen. 

If he returned the panties to you covered in his cum, then you would slap him, call him a pervert, and likely have Scott beat the shit out of him with his newly harnessed werewolf strength. Stiles pushed this thought to the back of his mind, though. 

Out of curiosity, he lifted the fabric to his nose and took a whiff. They smelled like fresh laundry - a nice lemony detergent. Of course they weren’t ones you had previously worn - they were a pair you had been planning on wearing tomorrow. 

He distantly wondered if that meant you would not be wearing underwear tomorrow, because he had taken your intended pair. And that could have led his mind down a whole different filthy track, but instead - he began to wonder what a pair of your dirty underwear might smell like. 

You should take a pair of used ones. A voice in his mind told him. Snatch them right out of the hamper. Come on, you’re over at her place all the time. She won’t even notice them gone. 

Terrible idea. Terrible rabbit hole. 

But what would they smell like? 

He wasn’t deluded enough to think that pussy smelled like roses. He had never been close enough to one - a real pussy - before to actually know. Yes, he was a virgin. He could have said that he was waiting, ‘saving it’ for you - but every other girl, including you, was smart enough to look past him. There were plenty of other guys who were better looking and more charming than him, and probably better in bed than him, that girls had chosen instead of him. 

He wondered if your pussy smelled like that perfect bit of sweat that you gathered at the end of a long day. Sometimes when he went to hug you before the two of you parted ways, he would catch a whiff of the tiniest undertone of musk, a good amount of sweat paired with the berry scented body spray you had put on that morning, and orange tic-tacs you had popped after lunch. It was a delectable combination. 

He imagined that your cunt would smell like that bit of sweat, combined with the blueberry body wash you used - the one he knew about and loved because of the time you had insisted he use your shower while stinking up a study session because he had skipped the showers after lacrosse practice when he was late to be with you. 

He imagined getting hints of that blueberry body wash smell coming off your thighs when his head was buried between them. What would your cunt taste like? That was a mystery he wanted to solve live. 

He could always imagine the other aspects so well. 

He could imagine the feeling of the heat under his tongue, the perfect feeling of your wetness mixing with his spit. He imagined getting to bounce your swollen clit against his tongue and while feeling your moans and cries of his name vibrate through your body as he pleasured you so well - the feeling of your pubes brushing against his cheeks as his entire face became soaked with your wetness. 

But the taste - that was something he could never conjure up in his mind, no matter how hard he tried. 

He knew that eating your pussy would be perfect. Not just because he would be giving you pleasure, serving you. But he so often dreamed of having his head smothered by your thighs, having you grab his head and shove him tighter into your cunt, you purposeful and demanding. You having that beautiful control over him while he drowned in your wetness. 

He knew that he would likely cum in his pants from eating you out if he ever got the privilege of doing so, and even if you laughed at him - stupidly, he would find that hot too. 

Stiles picked up the pace again, pumping his cock in hand evenly and firmly - even reaching down with the other hand to cradle his balls, gently rolling the flesh in his hand as he got lost in another fantasy of you. 

He imagined the two of you in his bed - textbooks forgotten and pushed off onto the floor, your dress hiked up around your hips, and again, those fucking purple lace panties. He was on top of you, hovering on his knees so that his hard cock wouldn’t brush against you (even through his jeans) while the two of you sloppily made-out. 

It wasn’t long before you pulled away from his kiss-swollen lips. 

“Stiles,” You purred into his ear, kissing along his neck. “You know, you’re so pathetic.” 

These words had his cock jumping, spurting out precum - in his fantasy, it made his underwear messy as you undid his fly. 

In the real world, it made his hand messy as he continued to rhythmically jerk his cock. 

“I’m not gonna let you fuck me.” You told him, contrasting these words with your intentions as you put your hands inside his waistband and shoved his pants and underwear down over his hips - down to his knees until his hard, throbbing cock was exposed. “Not until you prove yourself.” 

Before Stiles could ask the question, the beautiful, fantastic you that he had made up inside his mind gave him the perfect answer. 

“Get yourself off by rubbing your pathetic dick against my panties. And then - I might let you fuck me.” 

In the real world, Stiles let out a throttled moan - a choked sound that surely would have had his father knocking on the door to ask if he was okay if he was at home. And then he rushed to grab the panties again, and without even thinking, he used his sticky lubed up hand to position the fabric around his dick. It was a coarse roughness compared to the slick smoothness he had previously been feeling, but it did wonders to complete his fantasy as he delved back to the you inside of his mind. 

He started rubbing the slightly lube-sticky rough fabric up and down his dick at a very slow pace as he imagined it: 

Being perched between your thighs, with the fabric of the panties stuck to your wet cunt, his cock hard and leaking as he tucked himself right up against you and began to rub his dick against you in order to get off. Just like you wanted, just like you had ordered him to do. 

“Please.” Stiles chanted, the words leaking out of his lips, chanted into his empty bedroom as he pleaded to the imaginary you that would always have a hold over him - just as tight of a hold as the real you had. “Please, please - oh fuck.” 

He moved the fabric over his cock faster as he moved his hips faster in the fantasy, imagining how hot your pussy would feel against him, imagining your nails digging into his hips as you looked up at him with mocking and adoration in your eyes. He imagined you forcing his hips faster, trapping him in place with your knees bracketed around his thighs, showing him absolutely no mercy. 

“Please, please, please.” He chanted, knowing with a distant part of his mind that he must have sounded utterly delirious. “Please, Y/N, lemme cum-” 

“Cum for me, Stiles.” 

Confirmed by that fantasy version of you and truly unable to hold it any longer, Stiles arched up off the bed, cumming all over his own fist. Just as he had predicted, it was an utter, uncontrollable mess. He shot cum all over his stomach, and absolutely soaked the fabric of the panties - making a horrible mess of them. Which, the lube had definitely already done. He laid there for a single moment catching his breath before it truly hit him. 

Fuck. He had fucked up. 

You would definitely notice the underwear missing after a while and he certainly couldn’t return them to you in this condition. 

… 

Stiles spent the next hour in the bathroom, absolutely panicking over how to get them clean. Luckily, he wasn’t a total idiot and he looked up the washing instructions online - and after hand-washing them in warm water with a ‘gentle’ detergent (handsoap was the best that he could do), they came out perfectly clean. 

The only problem? 

Hang to dry. 

He set his alarm for early, earlier than you suggested, and prayed that he wouldn’t sleep through it. In fact, he set three more alarms just to make sure. He couldn’t have you or his father barging into his room to wake him up when he had a pair of your stolen panties pinned to his corkboard in order to properly dry them so that he could sneak them back to you in good condition. 

… 

The next day, he departed for school by 6:45 with the stolen goods hidden away in his bag, ready to sneak them back into your room later that afternoon. He made it to the library ten whole minutes before seven, and you seemed shocked that he was not only on time - but early. 

“Wow.” You said, having just gotten there yourself, spreading out your items at a table - including a tray with some coffees. “You know, Stiles, I am impressed.” 

“You don’t have to act so - so shocked.” He replied, partially interrupted by a yawn. 

You leaned over to get a pen from your bag, and Stiles’s eyes immediately went to your ass, unconsciously trying to spot panty lines through your dress and tights - wondering if you were even wearing underwear because he had stolen the ones you had intended for today. 

Focus, Stiles. Focus. 

“Well, if you weren’t here by seven sharp like I told you, I was gonna pour this in the garbage.” You told him, taking his coffee out of the paper tray and sliding it toward him. 

“You don’t have to be so mean.” He chuckled, airy and light - very secretly annoyed with the way your ‘mean’ streak affected him sometimes. Why did he have to be turned on by you scolding him and punishing him? Why? 

“Hey, if I’m not mean then you never get anything done.” You told him truthfully. “And you know how it works by now. Good boys get rewards and bad boys get spanked.” You told him, letting out a bright laugh - indicating that it was clearly meant to be a joke. 

But instantly, it shook his mind with imagery of you bending him over the table, ripping his pants down and spanking him until he came untouched and cried for mercy, forcing him to agree that he would behave and listen to you. He became downright dizzy at the thought. 

You meant it as a joke - he had to sharply remind himself. But the way you so casually called him a ‘good boy’, said that he was deserving of a ‘reward’ - it sent chills down his spine and already had his cock waking up. Too early. Bad rabbit hole. 

If he was any sort of brave, he would have pushed it more and asked you what kind of ‘reward’ you had in mind. But he wasn’t, and he was too tired to analyze the potential consequences. 

“Oh!” You said, as though suddenly remembering something. You moved to grab your bag again and Stiles closed his eyes to forcefully keep himself from staring at your ass. “You left this at my place last night.” You told him, sliding his English textbook across the table toward him. 

He was too busy trying to calm his own lust that he missed the smirk on your face - the mischief lingering in your eyes, the intention in your tone. He was too caught up, drowning in his own affections for you that he never would have pieced together that you had taken in and hidden it on purpose as a ploy to get him to come back. That you had put out some other bait for him to find. 

“Thanks.” He said quietly. “So - what do we need to go over before the test?”

“Everything.” 

Stiles groaned.

...

Due to much pressure, not the sequel has been posted. I am fully of the belief that this fic is complete and perfect on its own, but if you would like to keep reading, click on the link below. I highly encourage you to leave a comment before you press on, though, and tell me what you enjoyed about this fic since you have gotten this far.

Happy reading!

Keeping Reading Here: Stupid For You - Virgin!Stiles Stilinski x Fem!Reader

[linkcharacter]

Really like the recent analysis. I know I speak of curly in a more defensive way than most but I generally try to get the point you made across at the end of the day with my analyses on him and his behaviors.

People love to lock analyses around Curly solely based on what he could’ve done as a physical action and have this avoidance to acknowledging the realistic barriers at play when it comes to those solutions. It’s. The game tries to treat the pre-crash section as if they are grounded in social and organizational realities. So the what if he did this questions about the situation always fall short when the real answer is he either couldn’t or it wasn’t an actual viable option. But then when they talk about what he actually did do it’s surrounded by such bad faith interpretations that his actions were completely intentional or still not affected by outside sources. He’s a very much “road to hell is paved with good intentions” character. He cared too much and that’s a big part of his problem.

There’s such a “perfect victim or nothing” mindset in the fandom where people can’t admit that there are no such things as perfect victims but that also shouldn’t mean that even if there were it would absolve them of the mistakes they made. People want to moralize every action of every character that they don’t realize that some actions are done without any specific morale factor. People just do things, like you said. People assumed failed intentions immediately flip the thought process behind them “he meant to do good but bad happened, he must be bad” and that just is not how people work. It’s how perceptions work but only of the observer.

It’s such a sensitive topic because, yes, you are supposed to be frustrated, even mad, at what Curly didn’t do, but you have to acknowledge the fact these were good intentioned acts even if that good intent did jack squat in the end. That his responses are human and it’s supposed to be uncomfortable and hurt that they were realistic faults of his.

He enabled his friend and it ended bad for everyone including him. No one really tries to argue this fact but everyone seems to think it has to be tied to the morale dilemma and not certain human natures and social factors.

This is all to ask, why do you personally lean towards thinking Curly wouldn’t turn Jimmy in? Are you speaking in the short term of realizing how bad he got or long-term/overall? I feel like he could but it would not be easy and no matter the necessity he’d always have this guilt at feeling bad for doing it.

Ah yes Curly the most imperfect human man character.

Yep yep yep absolutely, people love to assign morality onto characters and call them good or bad and diminishing the depth and nuance of Mouthwashing, filling discussions with bad-faith interpretations or speculating on inconcrete understandings of the incomplete, intentionally vague, context. I adore Mouthwashing to no end for having this oppressive suffocating and constant atmosphere surrounding everything in the game. Really shows off that the environment festers, no one well-meaning guy could create a happy ending with individual actions alone because it's all systematic.

To elaborate from your question tho, at the point Curly was in (if Anya wasn't pregnant scenario), definitely no don't think so (would depend on Anya a too on whether or not she would go to the authorities outside). Curly knew Jimmy was a danger, and I do believe that subconsciously Anya's report to him on Jimmy gnaws at him, but not vividly enough. I want to point out a moment where Anya tells him about the pregnancy, he begins asking "Who would you-", then he's nudged by Anya that she told him and he should know who it is, and he does, instantly saying he's known him a long time and will talk to him. That moment of, for a second not connecting that Jimmy is the assaulter responsible just makes me drag my palm across my face for how much of a man (derogatory) Curly acted like for one dialogue line. Like he just 'forgot' for a brief moment that Jimmy harassed Anya prior? Granted, he instantly believes and takes Anya seriously, immediately dropping the search for the gun he was on in that scene, realizing the severity of the situation and of Jimmy. We also don't know what Anya has told him specifically, how long ago it happened, etc. but the 'implications' of the scene make me believe Jimmy's known sexual harassment on the ship slipped Curly's mind due to him being more invested in "the bigger picture" of Jimmy, not latching onto a harmful and a very serious fucking trivia fact about Jimmy because of his perception of who his friend is as a whole (and with his foggy sleep-deprived mind at the moment), 'losing a needle in a haystack' with how much unknown history Curly and Jimmy shared, so to say.

Maaaybe in some other circumstances, like if Jimmy didn't crash the ship or smth long term I could see him doing it, it would take a lot effort like you said, no matter the necessity. We will never know. If we're going into speculation and imaginary scenarios though, if Anya HERSELF were to try and get justice, Curly would be backing her up undoubtedly (still not disconnecting himself from Jimmy though and feeling guilt on his behalf). But that's all suppositions from my reading of the characters.

[bellherald]

Law & the Voice of All Things

Oda's left enough back hooks that Law could be revealed to have the Voice of All Things at any moment and it would make not only complete sense but explain a confusing scene in Dressrosa that stuck out as being rather odd, both in manga and anime.

There have been a bunch of scenes that can be interpreted at hinting at VOAT for Law, but the thing that definitively made it stand out as plausible if not soft-confirmed is how the Dressrosan rooftop scene happened compared with Luffy's fall from Onigashima. Law communicates with Luffy in what appears to be telepathy, considering his mouth is closed and neither Doflamingo nor Trebol overhear anything. When the chapter first came out, people were wondering if it was perhaps the prelude to a flashback because it did not look like whispering. Weird, but ultimately ignored considering there were a lot more pressing things going on at the time and we'd yet to have Zou elaborate further on the Voice of All Things.

Then years later, Luffy falls off from Onigashima.

And suspiciously similar formatting appears. A telepathic communication that only the other can overhear in the exact same style of bubbled text. Law (unknown-speaker) and Luffy (VOAT-only listener) had communicated in the exact same way as Luffy (VOAT-speaker) and Momo (VOAT-only listener) did. Going even further, Law might've overheard Luffy talking to Momo as well (unknown-only other listener).

In 1015, when Luffy was telling Momo he's going to come back and kick Kaido's ass and Momo was translating that, only Kid reacts during this. Oda usually pairs him up with Law when doing this type of reaction scene so the exclusion is a notable choice. Immediately after that, Law's submarine and crew find Luffy. Then Law pops up and doesn't doubt it for a second, believing Luffy will be back up soon. It would make sense if he had heard it from Luffy already and knew he was fine.

It explains why Law wasn’t worried that time Luffy went down but then next time he was, because Luffy wasn't saying anything. And there's the fact both Law and Momo are shown reporting very specifically that Luffy's voice has gone out in that moment. It could just be observation haki but its incredibly suspicious to be tied together with Momo like that and the different reactions Law had despite Luffy, by all means, going down the same as before.

On a more meta level though, it's incredibly interesting that we have learned that Roger had a special way of hearing Poneglyphs that Luffy doesn't seem to replicate, meanwhile Law is off in the corner not saying anything and being a secretive D. who doesn't share with the class. Especially since Law has demonstrated the capacity to sense seastone since Punkhazard and "coincidentally" found the Ponegylph in Kaido's massive, sprawling castle.

Sensing seastone is probably the weakest point to mention since Poneglyphs are not made of seastone, but it is an interesting facet of Law's perception that I can't recall anyone else having. Since the VOAT is all about a unique talent of hearing both animals and objects, it is worth pointing out in my opinion.

This also explains how Law knew what chains on Punkhazard were safe to be enchained in if he is able to HEAR sense it. He can feel the energy of seastone and sneakily swap the chains about to be put on him with the identical non-seastone variety. He was able to send that note to Chopper without any noticeable Room or movement after all. Law is a sneaky dude.

Regarding hearing the Poneglyphs themselves, one of the odd things about Law instigating the Rockyport incident is that he was originally motivated by rumors of a Poneglyph being present on Hachinosu. Law having a prebuilt capacity to hunt down Poneglyphs by hearing them would give extra context to what he was doing looking for one, especially if he can glean anything from the voices within them like Roger could.

Shout out to the first scene that demonstrates just how shifty this bastard is and began to cause people to wonder; where Oda chooses to show he is conspicuously saying literally nothing ("....") while confirmed VOAT people are hearing things. Damnit Law! Telling us nothing and standing there suspiciously...

The evidence is not conclusive and most of it can be explained as different coincidences, but the allusions to Law potentially possessing it keep happening and that Dressrosa moment is suspicious. Trying to explain it away as "just whispering" isn't quite right, and seeing something similar occur between confirmed users of it made me genuinely believe Law has the Voice of All Things.

[dontbesoweirdkira]

Hi! I love your interpretation of the yan batfam so much bdnfbfkjfnd I was wonderong how you think Dick and/or Jason would react to a rather compassionate batsis?

She's definitely not on board with their obsession but she can understand where their coming from and gives them like ACTUAL compassion.

Ik you said Dick enjoys having a positive image in front of others most of all his younger sister, so how would he react to her seeing his flaws but still, being kind? Jason strives to be "normal", so much so he spirals sometimes, but like what would knowing/experiencing genuine closeness (not pity or false pretenses) change?

Idk if either of them would redeem their bad habits, but am curious to know what being truly seen and accepted would do to them, especially by someone they care about so much. The bats can have their walls pretty high up after all

A/N: sorry about the late responses. I've been out of it the past few days.

context dick context jay

Okay so when you are dealing with yanderes... you are dealing with extremely unstable people. There are so many ways thus could go but here's just one

Dick

Maybe your compassion makes Dick chill out a bit with his unhealthy tendencies. I think initially he'd still be uncomfortable and bothered that you can see right through him. You can see all his flaws and you don't revere him like the others which is bad. It will still anger him and he'll try manipulating you into loving him like everyone does at first.

A heart to heart with him could work. You acknowledge you know he's crumbling and has really horrible coping mechanisms but that doesn't mean that you don't love him. That you respect him even more because you see just how much passion he puts into everything that he does. It isn't his fault he craves so much validation when he had the upbringing he had but he doesn't have to pretend to be someone he's not to please you. That even if he doesn't smile as much or be selfish sometimes that you won't love him any less. You give him a space to be authentic with you with no judgment.

"erm,,,okay. I'll keep that in mind."

He's a bit taken back by it and doesn't know how to exactly process what you just said. I've mentioned before that he doesn't exactly know how to just be himself because for most of his life he was always being someone that others needed.

He's still on guard for a while. He will dip his toes in the waters by maybe not smiling as much with you or rescheduling your hang out session to go out on a date just to see your reaction. Did you truly mean it when you said he was allowed to be selfish? He was fully expecting you to hate him but seeing just how unbothered you were made him go...oh!

I think this shifts his obsession with you. He's still very much yandere but i think he's much more child-like ? I mean Dick still is obsessed with you and all that jazz but before, he wanted to be the best older brother/father figure. His happiness was dependent on how much you needed and revered him. But now you're becoming his safety blanket for when he's stressed, tired or upset. WIth you he can just lay on your shoulders without speaking and you won't even mind. He can be kind of assholey or dark and you will understand he's just in a mood and what he says never leaves the two of you. You won't take away your compassion or love based on how he acts...the first non-transactional relationship he's ever truly and it's pretty great. He finally feels like a brother and not like he's playing house anymore.

Don't get me wrong, he's still your older brother who gets on your nerves but there's just this mutual appreciation there that lacks with the others.It's clear to the others that he loves you just a bit more than the rest. When it's movie/game nights, he will allow you to sit it out or not tag along to restaurants. He's very protective and defensive over you. He doesn't feel as much of a need to do all that stupid crap with you because if he wanted your time, he could have a peaceful moment on the rooftops with you instead.

Jason

Hmm..i think Jason will just always feel a bit outcasted. There are plenty of people who do care about Jason in the comics but it's hard to relate to someone who's been through what he's been. It's just so unique to him. He knows you don't truly understand what it's like to have spirits of the Lazarus haunting you in your sleep. He knows that you cannot feel the pain of being replaced by someone you're now forced to see as a brother.

When i wrote my last piece a few people took it as me saying the reader found Jason to be odd. Really what it was is that Jason put those thoughts into his own head because he internalized the joke because of his own insecurities. The reader was perfectly fine with Jason being a little off...it made sense as he would've just come back from being dead and is trying to find a bit of normalcy.

It's funny though because while he's trying to be "independent" it's painfully clear he's still very much attached to you and is still unknowingly mimicking you.

I think though if reader sat down with Jason and explained he doesn't need to change or be "normal" because you love him the way he is, maybe he will relax a bit. But i think there would always be voices in Jason's ears telling him he needs to be perfect. My version of jason is around 20-ish year old who is a bit emotionally stunted and disoriented because he's just coming out of the pit. After a few years of being integrated back into the family he'll understand that you actually do love him as a brother and he serves a great purpose even if that purpose doesn't look the same as Dick's.

[genericpuff]

I find something that annoys me is how people misunderstand why Persephone is considered the goddess of spring.

It’s because Demeter makes it spring when she returns. Not because Persephone has some awesome sick flower powers and she makes it all pretty before returning to her 10000/10 husband.

Agreed! But also, if I can offer up my own food for thought / interpretation: Demeter didn't necessarily create 'winter' as we traditionally perceive it, rather she created famine.

In that same sense, Demeter isn't even necessarily "making it Spring" when Persephone returns - she makes the land fertile again, allowing mortals to harvest their crops and thrive. Thus creating the "seasons" of harvest and drought.

Like many of the myths we've preserved and still read today, The Hymn to Demeter was a story created to explain natural phenomena that we didn't yet know how to explain. In Demeter's case, the story of her separation from her daughter explained the cycle of nature - why the clouds would no longer rain, why the ground would dry and crack, why the soil would become brittle, and why the crops would lose their will to live. It wasn't necessarily because she brought about 'winter', it was simply that she stopped performing her own duties, which were specifically dedicated to the harvest, especially that of wheat and grains (both of which are INCREDIBLY important foods that played their own massive role in the evolution of the human race - they weren't only essential to keeping both humans and livestock fed with their carb-heavy components, but could also be used to make fabrics and tools.)

Just as people prayed to Poseidon for safe travels across still waters, so too would people pray to Demeter for a bountiful harvest. Whenever there were droughts, you could understand it as the period when Persephone would return to the Underworld; or you could even blame it on yourself, or even your own fellow mortals, if you felt that perhaps Demeter had been disrespected in some way so as to bring about a drought as punishment.

This is why The Hymn to Demeter also functions as a foundational story for the founding of The Eleusinian Mysteries - a cult that worshipped Demeter, and other deities attributed to the harvest (ex. Dionysus) whose initiates were sworn to secrecy, never to speak aloud what practices were happening within the cult. And they did a damn good job of it too, because to this day we still don't fully know what went down in those cults. They're mysteries, after all :')

Demeter wasn't the only god who was attributed to the harvest and the weather patterns that would cause drought, but she's certainly one of the most popularly discussed, undoubtedly due to the fact that her story is one of the oldest and most well-preserved, and she was attributed to some of the most essential crops of that era.

But as it would happen to many myths over the centuries, the exact cultural contexts and intentions behind her original story have become either lost, or re-interpreted so many times that we can't even fully trust that Homer's version is "accurate", at least not without any way to retrieve those original oral stories that predated both him and other famous poets whose work we still study and analyze today.

But hey, that's just my own interpretation! One out of the thousands that have existed and the thousands that will undoubtedly go on to exist. I'm sure my own interpretation of it isn't perfect or foolproof, but I hope it offers up some fun food for thought!

[skeletonh0e]

"You write Sans as too nice!"

"You write Sans as too mean!"

Guys imma remind ya'll of a very important thing when it comes to my husband. Which is,

Sans is an extremely mysterious and furthermore extremely flawed character. Toby Fox literally said he wanted Sans to feel real so like most people there's a lot of layers and complexity to him

Not to mention similar to most people we know, we just don't have the full context behind a lot of what they do. This is especially the case with Sans.

Also should go without saying but this is about Vanilla undertale Sans, not his AU counterparts where their entire gimmick is that they are nicer or more evil than bis default self.

The first one "you write Sans as too nice", Sans is not a character known for cruelty

He's friendly if cheeky toward the player / Frisk, strictly talking within the pacifist route. While we'll talk about that whole promise to protect later but this isn't something exclusive to just the player or player character

Sans is established to be fairly popular and openly friendly within the underground, he has a decent amount of friends and people seem to like him. While I wouldn't call Sans a goodie two shoes that goes out of his way to constantly help others clearly he's established to a friendly and chill dude

Also while clearly he loves to play pranks and goof around, he's also down to go alone with the players antics as well to a certain extent

All this indicates that Sans is a good natured guy for the most part, plus it's worth nothing it's very implied that the reason Sans has so many jobs is to afford the place he and Papyrus live at

Sans sounds pretty nice, there's a lot of basis that allows you to interpet his character in a very positive light

Onto the next one "you write Sans as too mean"

Sans can do some shady shit

Granted he immediately attempts to play it as a joke and it's unclear how serious Sans is actually being here, not to mention his motivation behind saying this. The dramatic timing with the music stopping and everything certainly IMPLIES he wasn't joking but there's some room for interpretation. Besides I wouldn't be surprised if he was serious but wouldn't have followed through when the time came but more on that later

Also a friend pointed out while he jokes with everyone, he only plays pranks on Frisk, while we can assume he does it to other monsters we only witness it done to Frisk

Pranks can be interpreted in a variety of ways depending on your relationship with the person doing them, and whether or not you find the pranks funny. I found Sans to be funny and most did but, not everyone will

Trying to sell snow to a little kid (even if he doesn't follow through on the extremely high price), asking you to foot the extremely pricey bill at Grillby's (though again he doesn't follow through) the telescope prank or volunteering to stack hotdogs on someone's head without asking...all of this could be seen as passive aggressive forms of bullying. Not saying I think it is or at least if it was, that it likely wasn't all intentional on Sans' part.

At the end of the "dead where you stand" speech, this can casts his past actions in a negative light, he tells you he was, "Just kidding." Where is the humor in a "joke" like that? And then for the bonus round, he'll make a smart alecky comment that goes something like, "I've done a good job looking out for you. You haven't died a single time!"

But anyone who isn't a master at undertale gameplay (most players especially first time ones) has died at least once upon leaving the ruins if not SEVERAL times by this point

And Sans knows of resets, so this is him being a bit of a dick here tbh. Unless you go the route of assuming that Sans is truly completely 100% oblivious which the game doesn't support even if it's amusing to think about

Now on the trust pacifist ending at least we get solid confirmation, that Sans likes Frisk and is their friend but there's a lot of ambiguity about where this starts in game. Did he straight up not like Frisk at the start but kept his promise reluctantly? Did he only change his views at the end of true pacifist? Did it change in-between the journey? Or were all these pranks really just good natured and Sans never meant ill will to begin with? Up to you, which brings us to the next point

The genocide route

Though obviously the context for the genocide route vs the pacifist route are entirely different, I do think the information we're given reframes some of his actions in the pacifist route. We all wanna rag on Sans for threatening a literal child but-

We have the ability to reset. Which need I remind you the only other character we know for a fact had this ability was Flowey. Who uh, is not a good dude need I remind you and he did his own genocide routes in the past. The difference between us the player doing a genocide route is that we followed through until the end, Flowey didn't.

It can be a bit harsh but idk about you, if I found out someone, even if that someone WAS a kid had the ability to control time like that....would you trust them? Would you like them right off the bat regardless of how good of a person they seemed?

Of course how much Sans remembers different timelines is unclear and again entirely up to interpretation, for the most part he is aware of resets but doesn't remember them. But I have seen theories arguing he does so again depending on the context here this can reframe Sans' actions.

Also worth noting that he does mention that he did want to befriend the anomaly (the player/frisk), thinking they just needed a good laugh or something akin to that. Which certainly could indicate his pranks were truly good natured and not an attempt at bullying, but also he could just be saying this to throw the player off. Sans is not above using manipulation to get the player to stop, i.e him pretending to spare us for example

You're quickly noticing a trend here.

Sans may be doing something with the best of intentions, Sans may be just being a straight up dick. Sans does not wear his heart let alone his true intentions on his sleeve. Which is why he's such a compelling character to begin with.

That's not to say we know NOTHING about him, he cares about Papyrus clearly, he cares about Toriel (I will come back to this too dw), he's shown to be extremely clever, observant and he definitely does like jokes. The takeaway should not be that Sans is some unknowable character, the takeaway should be a lot of things are simply unclear about him. Much like people we know irl.

Think of Sans like a puzzle, we have some pieces but some are missing and while we can actively do our best to fill in the blanks we'll likely just never know the complete picture

However, a common theme with Undertale is there are no bad people simply people put in difficult situations with no right answer. Which brings me to the neutral routes which given the sheer number of neutral endings there are it'd be impossible to cover them all ESPECIALLY since this post is already super long

But

I will address a few things

The first one being "why doesn't Sans intervene when the human starts killing?" well the reason can vary depending on the extremity of the players actions here, however we have to address the main thing here.

We can debate how much Sans actually remembers about different timelines and previous resets all day, but he is aware of them. To quote the man himself if YOU lived everyday of your life knowing you'll just start over like your previous actions just didn't happen....what would you do?

The man is DEPRESSED as a result, he keeps through the motions but he has given up and doesn't believe his actions matter. Does that justify not doing anything up until the VERY end of the genocide route and straight up not doing anything in more brutal neutral routes?

Hard to say. Would you do though?

Sans knows who he's dealing with. It does not matter what he does he can't stop you. The only reason he trys in the genocide route is BECAUSE YOU'RE ABOUT TO END THE FREAKIN WORLD

Plus someone pointed out in a weird way waiting that long to see if you ever change your ways or show even an ounce of mercy by sparing a single monster is in a way holding true to his brother mentality of even the WORST person can change

Also remember he doesn't just NOT give a fuck if you kill everyone he cares for, Sans doesn't take action against you because he knows there's no point but Sans never goes "okay lol" he is very much upset at you ESPECIALLY if you kill Papyrus or Toriel

I couldn't find the screenshot of it but I believe in one of the neutral endings where you do kill toriel and papyrus he basically goes "you better watch yourself kid," implying he might actually hunt you down. Not 100% clear if the threat is meant to be interpreted that way, it could be more of a "stay away" than a "I'm coming for you" but still

Plus in some neutral endings he shows legit regret over not doing more

Now I've established Sans can be nice, Sans can be cruel or just kinda mean, Sans does a lot of things that pretty ambiguous in terms of intent, but Sans is also extremely flawed. Which brings me to the finale conclusion of this character analysis (?) (whatever you wanna call it?)

His promise to Toriel

Now, this is not a Soriel post even if I do admit I like the ship. However, people who act like he doesn't care about her are legit smoking crack, his promise to her was legit to comfort her, he gets along with her, in one neutral ending becomes her roommate and is actively upset by her death

Regardless of how you wish to interpret that relationship, clearly he cares about her and the two have a strong bond.

But as many people have pointed out....Sans actually does break this promise, he doesn't really do anything to protect Frisk throughout the entire game unless you count not trying to kill them on sight. Now granted with resets being a thing this creates something of a loophole

Cuz yeah Frisk did die but didn't die ya know? They can come back. There's no perma-death

But while we all want to hold Sans up to the standard of being this ultimate protector, here's something to point out that I feel like a lot of people tend to forget

Sans has 1 HP, think about that. What does that mean for him as a monster? One hit and he dies, literally, one hit. I've seen some people make the argument that HP doesn't stand for Hit Points, it's stands for HoPE

What happens to monsters when they lose enough hope? They fall down. They die. So not only is Sans physically weak but honestly I think my human standards he'd be chronically ill as if he has one hope could he literally die at any moment?

Now. Granted there is a theory that the characters choose to display their stats and that they say so this could again be Sans trolling or straight up lying but if we're going to take the "you'd be dead where you stand" line at 100% face value then we take this at 100% face value

Can Sans really be that good of a protector or would doing so actually get himself killed?

Everyone talks about how hard the genocide fight is because THATS him acting as the games last defense to stop you. There is no one else. There will be nothing else if you continue. It's why he try so hard because he has to. There will be no more world. No more him. No more anything. He's pulling out all the brakes because otherwise he's just fuuuuuucked

If Sans followed Frisk around it'd take him getting barely hit for him to die, which while Frisk can reset imagine how tiring that would be. Sans is good at dodging yes, but he gets tired pretty easily. Now you can find workarounds sure but regardless it's a lot of hassle isn't it?

This also brings me to the reason why I don't think Sans would follow through if he did attack us right outside the ruins. How long would this man actually last in a pacifist fight? Especially if the human hasn't done any harm? I feel like he'd tire easily or quickly be talked out of it, Sans isn't a ruthless killer unless he's pushed to be one

How much can Sans actually do? Does he not act in the neutral routes not JUST because of extreme depression and a defeatist attitude but because he knows that he can't do much in a fair fight? Hell, even in genocide Sans has to actively fight dirty to be such a challenge

You can argue him not at least trying anyway is cowardly or bad, but idk man. If you were chronically ill and you knew for a fact this kid can just reset then come back life would you really bother? I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that the kid is fine and it's better to risk it

Frisk can reset sure, Sans can't. And Sans doesn't have any reason to trust Frisk would being him back to life if need be.

There's a lot of difficult questions to be asked here and decisions good or bad have been made, Sans is a good guy sure at least I think so but even good guys don't always know what to do or make the right decisions.

[majimaisms]

@ccile03 has very kindly invited me to give my two (million) cents on this and i wanted to explain, as best i could, how i interpreted majima's character arc in pirate yakuza. however. this post definitely got away from me, so be prepared, this is going to be a LONG one, and it's the most comprehensive analysis i've done of majima as a character to date. i think i just wanted an excuse to talk about the game, honestly

introduction

i think i should start by saying that i think what we see in this game is not an arc for majima in its entirety, but the culmination of one that we had been observing (glimpsing, really) from the sidelines for years. so the question of "what arc did majima have in this game?" is really a question of "what arc did majima have in this series?" and to answer that, we have to start at the beginning.

from the moment he's introduced in the first game, majima is shown to be cynical and nihilistic.

scott strichart, who was in charge of majima's english localization throughout y0-k2 and y6-y7, had this to say about this scene, which i completely agree with:

First, you need to understand Majima's primary motivation - Saejima. Ever since he missed participating in that hit, Majima's singular, driving goal is to give Saejima the opportunity to confront him and exact whatever punishment he feels is appropriate. So Majima sets out from square -1 to get back into the Tojo Clan and gain enough power and position to do that. But as you know, in Y0, he discovers that some costs are too great, which throws his entire life's purpose into question: How do I balance my own sense of right and wrong with the tenacity I must have in order get back into the clan and to Saejima? That answer comes in the shape of three different dudes who give him three different answers to how one is "tenacious" - Lee, who would go to ANY length to protect the ones he loves, Nishitani, who throws his entire self into his pursuit of pleasure, and even Sagawa, who as Majima tells him, is "practically immortal." But what happens to his three paragons of tenacity? Well, you know that answer if you've played Y0. What happens when Majima attempts to take the moral high ground? What happens when he dares to show some modicum of emotion? [...] And the evidence of Majima's mindset in Kiwami is right in the first few lines when you meet him: What's the point of doing the right thing? "Doing things that way is going to break you." But no… that's just a projection. Majima is the one who got broken. And if you've played Y2 through Y5, you see the facade slowly start to fade. It's a really interesting growth of the character.

note the parts i highlighted in bold. we will get back to these later.

i think to understand majima and what this game does for him as a character, you have to understand both his problem and how he has tried to solve that problem. you have to understand his tragedy. and for that, you have to understand the psychological consequences of being part of an organization like the yakuza. the emotional impact it has on your life, on your relationship with yourself, and why. this context informs most of my analysis because i think its inextricable from majima as a character. i will also be heavily quoting simone weil to talk about these ideas, so please bear with me.

1. understanding the problem (and what it isn't)

the thing is, it's not easy to do awful things to other people. it's not easy to extort money from people, it's not easy to threaten them, it's not easy to attack someone when it's not in self defense. it's not easy to be mean. it's not easy to lie, cheat, steal. all of these things have an emotional toll: guilt. now, guilt goes away if you let it, but that has a spiritual toll. but where does that guilt come from in the first place?

simone weil says:

There exists an obligation towards every human being for the sole reason that he or she is a human being, without any other condition requiring to be fulfilled, and even without any recognition of such obligation on the part of the individual concerned.

All human beings are bound by identical obligations [...]. No human being, whoever he may be, under whatever circumstances, can escape them without being guilty of crime; save where there are two genuine obligations which are in fact incompatible, and a man is forced to sacrifice one of them. The imperfections of a social order can be measured by the number of situations of this kind it harbours within itself. But even in such a case, a crime is committed if the obligation so sacrificed is not merely sacrificed in fact, but its existence denied into the bargain.

majima is torn between two incompatible obligations. his obligation towards every human being in the world, and his obligation towards saejima. whether or not his obligation to saejima is a genuine one is a matter of interpretation (as in, whether or not he was really responsible for failing saejima. i think there is merit to his sense of responsibility regarding this, but that's another post) and an important distinction to make, but the fact remains that it registers to majima as a genuine one.

weil also says:

There is a reality outside the world, that is to say, outside space and time, outside man's mental universe, outside any sphere whatsoever that is accessible to human faculties. Corresponding to this reality, at the centre of the human heart, is the longing for an absolute good, a longing which is always there and is never appeased by any object in this world. That reality is the unique source of all the good that can exist in this world: that is to say, all beauty, all truth, all justice, all legitimacy, all order, and all human behaviour that is mindful of obligations. Those minds whose attention and love are turned towards that reality are the sole intermediary through which good can descend from there and come among men. Although it is beyond the reach of any human faculties, man has the power of turning his attention and love towards it. Nothing can ever justify the assumption that any man, whoever he may be, has been deprived of this power. It is a power which is only real in this world in so far as it is exercised. The sole condition for exercising it is consent.

now, you don't have to agree with any of this, but i will be using this framework and language to make my points because i find it useful.

what this all comes down to is that "moral behavior" is not something done only for the sake of others, and that in fact there is no distinction between the sake of oneself and others. you cannot hurt others without also hurting yourself in some way. my analysis rests on this key point.

weil says that corresponding to these human obligations, we can identify a number of human needs, some of which have to do with the physical side of life (like food, shelter, security) and some of which have to do with the moral side.

They form, like our physical needs, a necessary condition of our life on this earth. Which means to say that if they are not satisfied, we fall little by little into a state more or less resembling death, more or less akin to a purely vegetative existence.

she says that human collectivities (family, country, organization, etc.) fulfill these needs. the collectivity that majima is part of is the tojo clan and in a broader sense, the yakuza. they are not part of civil society, but as weil notes, their obligations towards people outside of the yakuza are not lessened by this fact, and anyone whose attention and love is turned towards "good" is aware of this. so they feel the full weight of these obligations. majima feels this weight.

we can see here that majima is being driven by a need, a need that corresponds to his obligations to other people. he calls it "being a man", weil calls it "being mindful of obligations."

weil has identified some of these needs, which she calls "the needs of the soul", as follows:

HONOUR is a vital need of the human soul. [...] honour has to do with a human being considered not simply as such, but from the point of view of his social surroundings. This need is fully satisfied where each of the social organisms to which a human being belongs allows him to share in a noble tradition enshrined in its past history and given public acknowledgment. For example, for the need of honour to be satisfied in professional life, every profession requires to have some association really capable of keeping alive the memory of all the store of nobility, heroism, probity, generosity and genius spent in the exercise of that profession.

PUNISHMENT is a vital need of the human soul. [...] The most indispensable punishment for the soul is that inflicted for crime. By committing crime, a man places himself, of his own accord, outside the chain of eternal obligations which bind every human being to every other one. Punishment alone can weld him back again; fully so, if accompanied by consent on his part; otherwise only partially so. 

Initiative and RESPONSIBILITY, to feel one is useful and even indispensable, are vital needs of the human soul. [...] For this need to be satisfied it is necessary that a man should often have to take decisions in matters great or small affecting interests that are distinct from his own, but in regard to which he feels a personal concern. He also requires to be continually called upon to supply fresh efforts.

i find this language and framework for talking about the concepts of virtue, guilt, redemption and how those things tie into one's professional and social life very useful when exploring the relationship rgg characters have to the yakuza and to themselves.

i will be focusing on these three needs for now because i think they are where the crux of majima's struggle lies. not only majima, but every yakuza who feels the weight of human obligations. because the work they do as yakuza does not fulfill their need for honor, and the crimes they commit by not fulfilling their obligations (as they are exploiting and profiting off innocent people, depriving them of their vital needs) creates the need for punishment. this is part of why we see these characters go to prison so willingly.

being yakuza means effectively denying one's own need for honor. this compels these characters to remedy this by clinging to whatever amount or kind of honor they can maintain. it's this cycle that keeps them going, that pushes these characters to commit the extraordinary acts of heroism we admire them for. it's because they are driven by the need to make up for something. for being yakuza.

weil says:

[...] a collectivity has its roots in the past. It constitutes the sole agency for preserving the spiritual treasures accumulated by the dead, the sole transmitting agency by means of which the dead can speak to the living.

she says that the need to be rooted is the most important need of the soul, and that being part of a collectivity, a "social organism" as she calls it, and having active participation in it is the only means of fulfilling this need. yakuza are no exception. RGG's consistent theme of carrying on the dreams of others is a form of "the dead speaking to the living", that is to say, a form of fulfilling the need for roots – which by the way is the name of the book these excerpts are from.

Every social organism, of whatever kind it may be, which does not provide its members with these satisfactions, is diseased and must be restored to health.

There are collectivities which, instead of serving as food, do just the opposite: they devour souls. In such cases, the social body is diseased, and the first duty is to attempt a cure; in certain circumstances, it may be necessary to have recourse to surgical methods. With regard to this matter, too, the obligation for those inside as for those outside the collectivity is an identical one. [...] Finally, there are dead collectivities which, without devouring souls, don’t nourish them either. If it is absolutely certain that they are well and truly dead, that it isn’t just a question of a temporary lethargy, then and only then should they be destroyed.

the yakuza, by measure of the number of situations it creates where incompatible obligations have to compete against each other, is a deeply imperfect social order. but as weil notes, sacrificing obligations and denying their existence are distinct compromises. "guilt goes away if you let it" – this is where that distinction lies. to free yourself of guilt, you have to deny the existence of these obligations, and so deny your own need for punishment. and the spiritual toll of that exchange is pragmatism, which weil describes as "spiritually crossing a boundary equivalent to death."

she says this about denying the existence of obligations:

Actually, such a negation is impossible. It amounts to spiritual suicide. And Man is so made that in him spiritual death is accompanied by psychological diseases in themselves fatal. So that, in fact, the instinct of self-preservation prevents the soul from doing more than draw closer to such a state [...]. Almost always, he who denies all obligations lies to others and to himself; in actual fact, he recognizes some amongst them. There isn’t a man on earth who doesn’t at times pronounce an opinion on good and evil, even if it be only to find fault with somebody else.

many yakuza try to avoid guilt (and the need for punishment) by denying the existence of human obligations. simply put, it's a way of running from accountability.

but guilt is not the reason for majima's struggle with this. majima has already decided that he is not going to cross that spiritual boundary to avoid guilt, because he understands that the consequences would be nothing more than a self-betrayal. he has too much respect for the truth to lie to himself like that. his "longing for an absolute good" compels him to accept his need for punishment. and he is not confused about what he thinks is right or wrong.

yakuza 0 was not about majima trying to decide whether or not killing an innocent girl was wrong. he knew it was wrong. it was about whether or not it was worth it to kill an innocent person. if he had been grappling with whether or not murder was wrong, it would've been equivalent to "spiritual suicide" as weil calls it. but he never denies the existence of such an obligation on his part – he never pretends it wasn't wrong to kill a defenseless civilian.

and his takeaway was that it was not worth it. it was not worth it to kill makoto to fulfill his obligation to saejima. he sacrificed his obligation to saejima, but no "crime" was committed in this process because he did not deny the existence of his obligations towards anyone. his need for honor was not sacrificed, and thus no self-betrayal took place. once again, denying human obligations is synonymous with self betrayal in this framework.

majima simply will not do something that he knows he will regret later out of guilt, and he takes care to predict what he will feel guilty about so as to avoid this outcome. his judgment regarding this remained solid throughout y0, even if it wavered at times.

another example of majima being torn between two genuine obligations was in y5.

this scene is remarkable to me because it's the only other time, aside from y0, we see the consequences of majima "daring to show a modicum of emotion." his obligations are being used against him. the "longing for an absolute good" in his heart is being used against him. because in order to fulfill his obligation to saejima here (to not put him to the same impossible choice), he would have to sacrifice a much more universal one, as well as a personal one to kiryu. and then how could he "call himself a man"?

saejima tells him that if he was the kind of person who would let haruka die, he would've killed him anyway. but this doesn't stop majima from still being apologetic in this scene – he still feels the weight of his responsibility to saejima, even if they are in agreement that it should be sacrificed. the existence of both obligations are acknowledged, thus no "crime" takes place, just like in y0. once again, we see that majima's problem is not in denying the existence of obligations.

majima's struggle here has to do with how to prevent things from coming to a point where he has to sacrifice obligations in the first place. this was his takeaway from y0. the obvious answer to this is to quit the clan, but it's too late for that. he already did that and just ended up going back. his obligations to the people in his life (saejima, kiryu) and his need for roots keep him tied to the clan.

so, what does he do instead?

2. understanding the "solution"

this is where we return to scott strichart's comment.

"How do I balance my own sense of right and wrong with the tenacity I must have in order get back into the clan and to Saejima?"

it's misleading to think of his obligation towards saejima as something to be balanced against his sense of right and wrong, as strichart puts it – in reality they are one and the same. the fact that he has to be tenacious is merely an extension of his obligation towards saejima.

more importantly, this is not a question of what moral philosophy to subscribe to, or anything that has to do with speculative reasoning. the singular question majima is struggling with the most in his life is a question of "how" – it's a question of methods.

majima has always been primarily concerned with methods. he is someone who locks onto ends and produces means to achieve them. this is what makes him resourceful. he gets his way, because he finds and makes a way. he is all about getting results.

but strichart's question is only half of majima's problem. the other half comes from his answer to the first one: "by preventing situations in which i will find myself having to choose between obligations."

majima, like strichart, has identified correctly that these situations arise only when he "dares to show a modicum of emotion." thus, the goal should be to simply stop doing that. but how is he going to do that? what method should he choose for that?

his answer to that question is mad dog. this is an answer equivalent to "whichever method works." because the factors that he takes into consideration when trying to formulate an answer for that "should" are concerned entirely with the effectiveness of the method. in other words, majima's mistake is that he doesn't think what he thinks is right or wrong should be the most important deciding factor in determining his methods for preventing situations where he has to sacrifice obligations.

it is, ironically, his dedication to solving this problem without sacrificing either obligation that makes him cross that spiritual boundary. because you see, this too is a form of pragmatism. he's essentially trading one form of spiritual death for another, and so he is still stuck in the cycle of honor and punishment. because methods are not exempt from human obligations either, yet he is denying the existence of those obligations. their existence is "denied into the bargain." pragmatism is the justification for this denial. "the world doesn't give two shits if there's a point or not, so it's better if i don't either."

weil understood the crucial role methods played:

Everything in creation is dependent on method, including the points of intersection between this world and the next.

"the next world" she is referring to is the one she says is the source of all "good" in the world. she is concerned with how to align her methods with her obligations, which is itself a problem of methods.

to majima as well, the most valuable resources in the world are methods that are effective and align with his obligations. why betray himself like this if he can avoid it? and he learns methods from observing people. this was why he ended up following shimano. this is what his "men i respect" thing is about. he means, "people i can learn something from."

but despite being already disillusioned with shimano's methods by the time he dies, he's never been able to successfully replace them with anything else. unable to find anyone around he could learn from, he has resorted to compromise. he decided he couldn't afford to commit to aligning his methods with his obligations. he has prioritized his continued survival and success in the yakuza because of his obligation to saejima, at the cost of his soul. mad dog is the product of that exchange. mad dog is the solution, the justification, the lie.

this is a sacrifice he has had to make because of the social order he exists in. this is why the yakuza is a "diseased" social organism, as weil calls it. this aspect of the yakuza and majima's views on it were explored in majima saga in k2.

let's take a look at majima's methods:

you might note, at this point, that all of these things are things kiryu would never do.

this was what fascinated him about kiryu. because kiryu is suggesting there is a right and wrong method, and not only that, he's saying it's a factor that should be considered, that deserves our attention and love, and we should be mindful of it. he's the embodiment of the principle that we can't justify denying our obligations. this is what he admires kiryu so much for – that he is not betraying himself in the way majima has. he has things to learn from kiryu, and that is what majima respects most above all else.

kiryu represented a solution to his self-imposed spiritual exile. however, this solution was not as straightforward as you would think.

fighting has always been a form of communication, of debate, in RGG. when majima and kiryu are fighting, these are the conflicting ideas that are being tested against each other. and he wants kiryu to prove his methods wrong. because he hates his methods. he realizes he's fighting for the wrong side, and he wants everything he represents to be defeated. to be able to be defeated. and he trains and mentors kiryu specifically for this purpose. he has made himself into a mascot of this spiritually vacant philosophy, but at least he can offer its enemies (which includes himself) something that would effectively function as a training dummy. he is giving kiryu the opportunity to know his enemy. this is a noble goal. it justifies the continued existence of mad dog.

this was a method he thought would work. it's pretty clever, you have to give him that. but in fact, it's only another instance of the two incompatible obligations problem. he's fulfilling his need for honor and punishment, but he's failing to fulfill his need for responsibility towards kiryu.

he needs to make up for this ongoing failure, so the series is full of examples of him going out of his way to help kiryu (y2, y3, y5, iw and now pirate yakuza). as weil said, majima "requires to be continually called upon to supply fresh efforts" for his need for responsibility to be fulfilled. he's glad for the opportunity to help kiryu. he needs kiryu to need his support. in simpler terms, he wants to be useful. he feels this need as it corresponds to his obligations towards kiryu, which are identical to his obligations towards anyone, but which he feels more keenly with kiryu because he's stuck in this cycle of honor, punishment and responsibility, trying to make up for the lack of one through fulfilling the other. and it's specifically tied to kiryu because he can only fulfill his need for honor/punishment through kiryu, because kiryu is the only one strong enough to defeat him in a fight. and yet he is failing his other obligations to him in the process BECAUSE of his method.

it would not be too much of an exaggeration to say that the integrity of majima's soul rests in the balance that is the conflict between himself and kiryu. this is why this conflict cannot end. it will remain self-perpetuating so long as they both remain mindful of obligations. they are yin and yang.

let's go back to scott strichart's comment again.

And if you've played Y2 through Y5, you see the facade slowly start to fade. It's a really interesting growth of the character.

while i agree with this, it should be noted that even though majima's facade slowly fades, nothing substantial takes its place. he literally dies in yakuza 5, and he is reborn as nothing more than a mascot, a symbol, a boss fight as far as the games are concerned. just as he was in kiwami. his methods do not change, because he still can't afford to change them. because he is still yakuza.

but he is feeling the emotional and spiritual toll of continuing those methods.

he doesn't have it in him anymore to keep up the act, to prop up mad dog to act as an interface between himself and the world around him.

note here that majima is the perfect visual representation of a dead thing – he's literally wearing the skin of dead animals, and "majima goro" is the first among them. the fact that he is narratively dead in y5, a game about dreams where everyone has an honest job is really, really on the nose when you consider things in these terms.

but y5 does a spectacular job of reminding majima why he needs to stay dead, why he chose to avoid emotional attachments and obfuscate the ones he does have in the first place. if it weren't for an impossibly unlikely chain of events, either haruka would've died or saejima would've had to kill majima. majima doesn't want to risk anyone being put to that choice again. kurosawa's whole plan hinged on the fact that he identified this as a weakness in majima that he planned to use against him – and it almost worked.

this is what he risks happening every time he has conflicting obligations. every time he "shows a modicum of emotion." he has enemies who will use it against him to hurt his loved ones. so even if he is disillusioned with mad dog, as long as he cannot think of a better method of preventing this, he needs to keep up the act. his "solution" has become another cage he finds himself in, because he can't escape the bigger cage he's in: the yakuza.

this is not a problem unique to majima. any yakuza mindful of their obligations struggles with similar problems, because it's the yakuza as an organization imposes this problem on them. it devours souls. this was why it needed to be destroyed.

3. the dissolution, and pirate yakuza

you would think that being out of the yakuza would finally solve a bunch of these problems for majima (and saejima and daigo.) instead, this is the state they're in.

because they understand that they were not the only ones who gave their souls to the clan. there were thousands of others, and those thousands joined the clan because of them. because of the promises they made. it is their responsibility to honor their men's sacrifices and their own promises by taking care of them after the dissolution, but they have no way of fulfilling their need for responsibility, honor or punishment as it concerns their obligations to these people.

the shame, guilt and helplessness is really setting in as they are forced to face their failure. and the sacrifices they made along the way? they have nothing to show for any of it. all the justifications, all the self-betrayals, all the compromises. the obligations they sacrificed. the people they've hurt. this is where it all culminates.

this is how lost they are, how lost majima is – he seems to be doing the worst out of the three of them – in the absence of any methods to reconnect to and do right by the social organism he's part of, his roots. they are cut off from any means of helping the people they used to lead and feel responsible for. they are uprooted.

weil says:

Uprootedness is by far the most dangerous malady to which human societies are exposed, for it is a self-propagating one. For people who are really uprooted there remain only two possible sorts of behaviour: either to fall into a spiritual lethargy resembling death [...] or to hurl themselves into some form of activity necessarily designed to uproot, often by the most violent methods, those who are not yet uprooted, or only partly so.

Whoever is uprooted himself uproots others. Whoever is rooted himself doesn’t uproot others.

majima, saejima and daigo fell into the former category. it is a testament to how mindful they are of obligations that they did not fall into the latter.

kiryu tried to break them out of that spiritual lethargy in infinite wealth, reminding them of their obligations. remember what i said earlier about kiryu being the "embodiment of the principle that we can't justify denying our obligations"? this is him doing it again, as always. and this was the single most life-affirming thing he could do for them.

on the growing of roots, weil had this to say:

The problem of a method for breathing an inspiration into a people is quite a new one. [...] It is unfortunate for us that this problem, in regard to which, unless I am wrong, we have nothing we can look to for guidance, should be precisely the one that requires today the most urgent solution on our part.

she identified the problem of growing roots as a problem of methods of inspiring people. on this, she wrote:

It sometimes happens that a thought, either formulated to oneself or not formulated at all, works secretly on the mind and yet has but little direct influence over it. If one hears this thought expressed publicly by some other person, and especially by someone whose words are listened to with respect, its force is increased an hundredfold and can sometimes bring about an inner transformation. It can also happen that one needs, whether one realizes it or not, to hear certain words, which, if they are effectively pronounced, and in a quarter whence one would normally expect good to come from, infuse comfort, energy and as it were a food.

just as this was the case with kiryu in infinite wealth, it is the case with noah in pirate yakuza.

violence is a tool. majima has always viewed it as such, but here noah is telling him that not only is it a tool, he doesn't think it's an inherently bad one. he thinks it's cool. he is radically accepting of majima in a way he has never experienced before.

we know that majima has had a complicated history with violence. he hit his wife and left her. he's been using it as a method to keep his subordinates in line for years – something he ideologically does not agree with, but has accepted as a necessary sacrifice. it's not a coincidence that the first thing majima remembers about himself is his guilt surrounding his violence – guilt enabled to become manifest in the absence of his justification, in the absence of mad dog, which had acted not only as an interface between majima and the world, but between himself and his own needs. everything was filtered through mad dog.

but instead of condoning violence via majima's philosophy of pragmatism, which majima has used as a justification (a lie), noah is offering him a way out of the dilemma he's been stuck in for decades. he suggests that as long as you're fighting for the right thing (which majima is in this case), violence is a perfectly acceptable method that does not constitute a crime, and thus, should not create a need for punishment. it's reassuring to majima in exactly the way he needs. it's also something no one else in his life could reassure him about, because they're too busy feeling guilty about their own violence. only someone who is truly "innocent" could absolve majima of this guilt.

majima's face in that last shot is all the evidence you need for its impact. this is what he's needed to hear his whole life, and it would not have had the same impact coming from anyone other than a child. and it had to be this specific child, because:

To no matter whom the question may be put in general terms, nobody is of the opinion that any man is innocent if, possessing food himself in abundance and finding someone on his doorstep three parts dead from hunger, he brushes past without giving him anything. So it is an eternal obligation towards the human being not to let him suffer from hunger when one has the chance of coming to his assistance.

this was the model on which weil based her theory of human needs and obligations, because it was "the most obvious obligation of all." it also happens to be the opening scene of pirate yakuza.

noah's attention and love is demonstrably turned towards human obligations. he is also notably the only person around who has fulfilled this most obvious of obligations. majima himself acknowledges this, saying he "never thought hawaii would be so cold."

noah represents an ideal for majima that he has aspired to his whole life: innocence. this is why he is inspired by noah. the "method" of inspiration in question that majima had been lacking comes to him in the form of a person. and it had to be a person, because majima has always been inspired by individuals. and not only majima, either. RGG as a series is full of examples of this.

It is only through things and individual beings on this earth that human love can penetrate to that which lies beyond.

it's our connections to individuals that remind us of our obligations towards every human being. love becomes universal through the particular. weil understood the important part love plays in motivating people to change. it was her answer to how to grow roots again – her answer to the question of how to inspire people.

it is precisely this form of inspiration that majima had been deprived of for decades, especially after the dissolution as he'd sunk into depression. and this was always the solution, but there were several obstacles to it prior to this game:

he could not afford to have personal human connections in his life, even after the dissolution. he'd learned the hard way what happens when he "dares to show a modicum of emotion," as scott strichart put it.

as long as he was still relying the same tools, he could not effectively change his methods. this game forced him to do that by taking away his favorite tool: mad dog.

even if he wanted to use his violence only for the right things, he had obligations to the clan that would have him using that tool for less-than-noble ends.

because of this, even after the dissolution, he was stuck in the cycle between honor and punishment which obfuscated the truth and confused him. and there can be no inspiration without access to truth.

all of these problems were imposed on him by the social order he was part of – namely, the yakuza. this is why its dissolution was a necessary prerequisite to majima's "growth", but it was still not enough on its own. the amnesia was the second prerequisite.

he needed to face his past, but for that to help him in any way, he first needed to be inspired, so that he could look back on events with a new perspective. and the amnesia was the prerequisite for the inspiration, because it reduced the weight of his guilt and thus his need for punishment, breaking the honor-punishment cycle.

what this game is for majima is an exit. it's an exit from the emotional and spiritual exile he's imposed on himself, that the yakuza has imposed on him, and the self-alienation he's suffered because of it. amnesia is what it takes for him to be reunited with himself. he had to forget who he is so he could be who he is. such was the extent of his self-betrayal.

within the space provided him by this exit, there is room for change. transformation. for majima, that means changing his methods. this game is addressing a problem he's been aware of for decades but could not do anything about.

some examples of him facing his past with this new perspective:

he's realizing what he was to these people, who looked up to him, who he allowed to look up to him, who he took upon himself to lead – and he's hating what he sees. he doesn't like his methods. and he's running from the responsibility of doing right by them, refusing saejima when he asks him to go back.

he's afraid of facing how much he's failed his subordinates by his own standards – a reality he'd lived with for decades before his amnesia. the fact that we actually see how much it bothers him in this game is invaluable, because it means he's letting himself acknowledge that. he can no longer rely on the lie (justification) he had been telling himself to sustain this self betrayal. he is disillusioned with his own pragmatism. noah has exposed the lie, and he allowed it to be exposed. he is now ready to take right and wrong into consideration when deciding his methods – all because noah has reminded him of his obligations in a way that commands his attention, in a way he can't turn away from, and because he no longer has to sacrifice his soul to the clan. this game is, effectively, undoing the spiritual death he had undergone.

he's outright calling his old self, his old ideas, his old methods, "dumb as shit." majima is reinventing his identity, his reputation, his presence in the world and his connection to it. he's been given a chance to become someone he can be proud of again – this is why he likes the way noah looks at him, why he doesn't want to give up on it. it motivates him to commit to his transformation instead of wallowing in guilt like he was in infinite wealth.

he's getting to do it all over again with noah in a way he himself actually approves of, with a clear conscience. not just because noah is a kid, not just because he's lost his memory, not just because he's not yakuza anymore, but because of all those things in combination. that is to say, none of these factors are arbitrary. they were each necessary for achieving this state for majima – a state where change is possible, and he is inspired to change.

"captain majima" is someone he can be proud of.

he rejects his legacy as a yakuza completely. this goes as far as rejecting his bond with saejima. he doesn't want to be called "kyoudai" by him, he'll only answer to "captain." as he's coming to terms with how much it went against his nature to be yakuza, he's trying to distance himself from it as much as possible.

but he's running. he's not trying to run from his responsibilities to the yakuza like saejima thinks – he's running from owning up to his legacy. this is why he pretends to still not have his memories back when shigaki confronts him.

but it's not just the yakuza: the nebulous entity that told them that. it's what majima told them. it's what majima built his legend around.

yakuza 0 was not a game of positive character development for majima. it was the story of how and why he learned to betray himself. it was the origin story of his justification, his nihilism. it was the birth of mad dog. and this game is the counterpart to that – the death of mad dog.

One of the indispensable foods of the human soul is LIBERTY. Liberty, taking the word in its concrete sense, consists in the ability to choose.

the mad dog legend wasn't something that majima stumbled upon against his will like kiryu's dragon of the dojima legend. majima built this. he wanted this. he was trying to rise in the ranks (for saejima), and his legend is what it is because he was so, so wary of being taken advantage of. not only out of his own need for liberty, but out of the obligation he feels towards everyone else. this is the price of turning yourself into a weapon: you have to be very, very careful who you allow to wield you, and towards what end. that becomes your responsibility.

this was why majima was apologetic in that y5 scene – he had failed to prevent kurosawa from using him, and he understands that it is his responsibility to prevent that. this is why the mad dog legend is what it is. he had to find a way to "tear his leash" so that no one could wield him.

but his own preoccupation with freedom, his fear of being used by others, this fight he's been fighting against himself for decades has made him a bad role model. he's finally facing that, and not only that, but he is remedying it, too.

his own unhealthy treatment of himself, his own betrayal of himself, has done actual harm to others. his own misjudgment has led people who looked up to him astray. and he should've known better. done better, been more.

he should've been the one inspiring his subordinates, he should've been the one reminding them of their obligations. instead he has created a legend that has done just the opposite. a legend that has given people another excuse to deny their obligations. because that legend was born out of majima's own excuse for denying his own obligations. THAT is majima's failure. he has failed others in the exact same way he has failed himself. it could not have turned out any other way.

he has failed as a leader, as a patriarch and he's acknowledging that. but that on its own doesn't do much in the way of helping him. this game is about majima stepping up to not only hold himself accountable, which he already HAS been doing, but to do something about it. holding yourself accountable for mistakes you just continue to make or cannot begin to make up for is the very definition of being stagnant. this is the "state more or less resembling death, more or less akin to a purely vegetative existence" he was in for pretty much the entirety of the series, reaching its peak in infinite wealth when he had been cut off from all means of effectively taking responsibility.

and he is finally being given the opportunity to take responsibility – a vital need. he is being given the opportunity to undo the damage, to guide them towards a better path, to remind them of their obligations. just like kiryu.

majima, in true kiryu fashion, is telling these people exactly what he himself needs to hear – needed to hear, and that noah made him realize the moment they met. he is being given a second chance. an opportunity to redeem himself, to START redeeming himself. start over. and he's paying the same kindness forward. if it's not too late to for him to start doing the right thing, then it isn't too late for shigaki either, and vice versa.

[...] man has the power of turning his attention and love towards it. Nothing can ever justify the assumption that any man, whoever he may be, has been deprived of this power. [...] The sole condition for exercising it is consent.

majima understands this, and he understands that applying this principle to shigaki necessitates that he apply it to himself also. a person can always, always choose to do good – not only that, they are compelled to at all times. it takes energy to resist it. this was what caused his burnout in y5 and arguably y4 before that.

this game is about majima taking responsibility for his legacy as a yakuza, much like kiryu did in infinite wealth. this is what they're using his amnesia for. a story about him wallowing in guilt or trying to fulfill his need for punishment would have been the opposite of growth for majima, because the whole problem was that his method of trying to achieve personal growth through honor and punishment had not been working for him. a radically new approach was required. you can't fix something with the same tools that broke it.

just as his own neglect of his needs had caused the problem, the solution also comes from fulfilling those needs for himself. he has to stop betraying himself in order to make things right with the people he's failed. to take responsibility, he has to give up mad dog.

this does not necessarily mean giving up violence, but it does mean using it as a tool for ends that do not conflict his needs. a good example of this is the scene where he threatens to cut fingers.

it's his last resort, not his first one. he is being given room for that now. it's important to note here that he is not threatening to cut fingers to punish someone for insubordination as he has done his entire life – instead it's in the name of ensuring cooperation between others (a noble goal), for something he has no personal stake in. he doesn't want any of the money, he refuses to take a cut of it. he is not playing the antagonist here, and he is very open about his intentions unlike the "old" majima goro who obscured his intentions at every turn for the sake of playing the antagonist.

y0 was the last time we saw majima so earnest, because it was y0 that taught him not to be earnest. this game is undoing the damage.

[...] complete, unlimited freedom of expression for every sort of opinion, without the least restriction or reserve, is an absolute need on the part of the intelligence. It follows from this that it is a need of the soul, for when the intelligence is ill-at-ease the whole soul is sick.

sure, he didn't hold his tongue against his superiors, we've seen him do it countless times throughout the series. but to be able to openly express his goals, his intentions, his own judgment and act accordingly is a previously unthinkable mode of living for majima.

once again, it's about methods, and this game IS the difference between methods, especially as it concerns communication.

it's the difference between "if adults like us are good for anything, it should be nurturing that hope" and "keep that up, and it'll break you." him establishing himself as an ally, instead of an antagonist. he has played the antagonist his entire life, because it was the only way he could think to fulfill his obligations, but the world doesn't need more antagonists. and he's been failing not only his subordinates or himself, but kiryu and everyone else he loves as well.

this is what this scene in infinite wealth was about. majima's methods are destructive, not only to everyone he cares about, but also to himself – because there is no difference between those things. such is the nature of love.

majima finally, finally gets to play the hero after a lifetime of playing the antagonist. he's taking the leaf out of kiryu's book that he couldn't until this point, that he so admired kiryu for. it's a dream come true for him – maybe the oldest one he had.

and in some ways, this is also majima carrying on kiryu's dream, by applying the lessons he learned from him. by emulating him, he's honoring kiryu's principles. he'd told him, all the way back in 1995, that he'd "see those ideals of his to the end." well, this is what that looks like in its most effective form.

this ending really says it all, in my opinion, because it's majima looking at the journey and finding joy in that instead of the end goal. for ONCE in his life. maybe for the first time in his life. because for the first time he is ABLE to do that. for the first time there is something to enjoy about the journey. he is so unconcerned with results here that he doesn't even take the money.

he has been so, so preoccupied with reaching his goals that he has sacrificed the journey, the "methods" and betrayed himself in the process his whole life. this is where it stops.

[...] honour has to do with a human being considered not simply as such, but from the point of view of his social surroundings.

i think it's fair to say that his new methods and outlook on life are here to stay.

conclusion

this game is no joke. it's the most beautiful and profound thing they've done with majima... ever.

to be honest, whether or not most of this should be called "growth" is debatable – i think it can be said instead, more accurately, that growth was not the point of this game. the point of this game and how significant the things it does for majima lie beyond "growth". its value comes from the fact that it fulfills needs for majima that he had not been able to for decades.

majima's problem was not that he needed growing. his problem was that he had been in spiritual exile for 40 years. pirate yakuza was not just "upbeat", it was a celebration of majima being reunited with his soul. and as any celebration ought to be, it was joyful and inspiring. the light tone of the game is not because it is lacking in depth, but because the nature of the subject matter lends itself to hope more than anything else.

a game that was conceptualized as an infinite wealth gaiden had to deal with these themes. to tie the loose end that is majima, so to speak – to give a satisfying conclusion to his arc we'd been observing for years. just as infinite wealth was about kiryu's relationship to the yakuza, this game is about majima's relationship to the yakuza and the yakuza's relationship to him. it cannot be thought of separately from infinite wealth and what it was for kiryu. pirate yakuza and infinite wealth are the yin and yang to each other, just as majima and kiryu are to each other. majima has always been, before and above all else, a narrative foil to kiryu. this game is no exception, they're just changing how they're exploring that in the narrative. it's almost like an inversion of what the series has done with the two of them so far, but still united in one theme above all else: hope for the future.

whether or not these themes have been done justice in execution is entirely up to you to decide, so you can still be disappointed with how the game dealt with them – after all, a method still has to be effective to be a good one – but i hope i have been able to give you some perspective on what this game accomplishes with majima as a character.

thanks for reading <3

[lannistertwinz]

Most takes on Jaime and Cersei’s sexual dynamic strike me as insufferably convoluted. "Oh, Cersei only enjoys being submissive with Jaime because, by identifying with him, she can mentally inhabit his role as the dominant/sexual aggressor." There is absolutely NOTHING in the books to suggest this. We get several sex scenes between Jaime and Cersei, yet all are seen externally (through Bran) or from Jaime’s perspective. We never experience them through Cersei — which is probably why people resort to extrapolating the Cersei/Taena scene to an entirely different context and dynamic. And when she does have recollections about their sexual encounters, there is never any indication that she is living vicariously through him in those moments.

The more logical and humane way to interpret it — without reducing Cersei to a walking pathology — is to acknowledge that, like most people in real life, she is influenced by gender constructs that become ingrained in her sexuality. Something that IS present in the books is her deeply traditionalist view of masculinity. To Cersei, Jaime’s passion, forcefulness, and dominance — though often inconvenient — are attractive because they fulfill that ideal:

Outside a cold wind was rising. They stayed up late into the morning, drinking Arbor gold and telling one another tales. Taena got quite drunk and Cersei pried the name of her secret lover from her. He was a Myrish sea captain, half a pirate, with black hair to the shoulders and a scar that ran across his face from chin to ear. "A hundred times I told him no, and he said yes," the other woman told her, "until finally I was saying yes as well. He was not the sort of man to be denied." "I know the sort," the queen said with a wry smile. "Has Your Grace ever known a man like that, I wonder?" "Robert," she lied, thinking of Jaime. - A Feast For Crows, Cersei IV

The reason this dynamic doesn’t play out with Robert or Osney is simple: she dislikes them both and sees sex with them as something imposed on her. Moreover, she lacks the emotional connection she shares with Jaime.

I (and others before me) have pointed out that Cersei is most likely heavily inspired by Scarlett O’Hara, the protagonist of Gone With the Wind, a book George R. R. Martin has referenced numerous times. Like Cersei, Scarlett explicitly states her desire to be a man and throughout most of the novel she expresses that she does not enjoy sex — she sees it as something inherently degrading and as part of her duty as a wife:

All that passion meant to her was servitude to inexplicable male madness, unshared by females, a painful and embarrassing process that led inevitably to the still more painful process of childbirth. That marriage should be like this was no surprise to her. Ellen had hinted before the wedding that marriage was something women must bear with dignity and fortitude, and the whispered comments of other matrons since her widowhood had confirmed this. Scarlett was glad to be done with passion and marriage. - Gone With The Wind, chapter XI

The first time we see her actively enjoying sex is in the infamous rape scene between her and Rhett (in many ways portrayed as the quintessential male figure), which takes place at one of the most tumultuous points in their relationship — precisely because she derives pleasure from the sense of feeling overpowered:

Suddenly she had a wild thrill such as she had never known; joy, fear, madness, excitement, surrender to arms that were too strong, lips too bruising, fate that moved too fast. For the first time in her life she had met someone, something stronger than she, someone she could neither bully nor break, someone who was bullying and breaking her. Somehow, her arms were around his neck and her lips trembling beneath his and they were going up, up into the darkness again, a darkness that was soft and swirling and all enveloping. [...] Oh, she should be ashamed, should shrink from the very memory of the hot swirling darkness! A lady, a real lady, could never hold up her head after such a night. But, stronger than shame, was the memory of rapture, of the ecstasy of surrender. For the first time in her life she had felt alive, felt passion as sweeping and primitive as the fear she had known the night she fled Atlanta, as dizzy sweet as the cold hate when she had shot the Yankee.- Gone With The Wind, chapter LIV

What we see with Cersei and Scarlett is not so different from what we observe today. There’s a reason why bodice-ripper novels, the dark romance genre, and movies like Fifty Shades of Grey or 365 Days — all featuring physically imposing and sexually aggressive/predatory male characters — have been and continue to be popular among women. Whether this is a solely social issue is not for me to say, but the fact remains that we are conditioned to find certain attributes more attractive for each gender:

Lady Merryweather's dark eyes shone with mischief. "Just so. Scars make a man look dangerous, and danger is exciting." - A Feast For Crows, Cersei IV

Cersei sat on the bed beside Lady Merryweather, listening to her soft breathing, watching her breasts rise and fall. Does she dream of Myr? she wondered. Or is it her lover with the scar, the dangerous dark-haired man who would not be refused? She was quite certain Taena was not dreaming of Lord Orton. - A Feast For Crows, Cersei VII

And what Jaime and Cersei are doing here is simply responding to that environment. After all, Jaime himself holds a rigidly conventional view of what makes a "good woman" — an expectation that both Cersei and Brienne defy, albeit in different ways:

And what is it you like in a woman, m'lord?" "Innocence." "In a woman, I said. Not a daughter." - A Dance With Dragons, Jaime I

Jaime and Cersei's chapters are filled with moments of them playing up these personas for each other and finding a sense of purpose and comfort in them. Why would their sex life be any different? Incest aside, there’s nothing particularly subversive about it — and there doesn’t need to be. There’s no need for overwrought pseudo-psychoanalysis that reduces these characters to a handful of select traits and undermines their characterization.

[blessedarethebinarybreakers]

This post used to hold a poem inspired by the Rev. Munther Isaac's declaration that "God is under the rubble in Gaza."

After a few anons and a conversation with a Jewish friend, I've decided to take the poem down because, regardless of my own intentions with it, it risks feeding the long and extremely harmful history of blood libel, because I included imagery of the infant Jesus and his parents being killed by an Israeli soldier, as many Palestinians are being killed now.

Before talking with that friend, I wrote in this response to an anon about my intentions with the poem — but while I do believe that intentions do matter, they don't matter nearly as much as impact does.

My friend helped me come to the conclusion that while the poem I wrote could be interpreted as I intended by people who already have all the context I wrote it in (see below), it could also all too easily be interpreted much more harmfully by those who lack that context — or worse, who are looking for more fuel for their antisemitism. The poem is not worth that risk, not at all.

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Ultimately, I hold two things I believe to be true in tension:

that Christians throughout the ages have found deep comfort and encouragement in understanding Jesus as suffering in and with them. I support all Christian Palestinians who, like Rev. Isaac, experience God-with-them in this way — in this horrific time, they deserve any ounce of comfort they can derive. And them personally seeking and finding the Divine presence with them is not antisemitic.

that for Christians like myself in the USA, who live in the beating heart of Empire and Christian Supremacy, it is vital to take care in how we talk about this theology in this current situation, where the oppressors are Jewish. Providing more fuel for Christian antisemitism is inexcusable, and I deeply apologize for writing and sharing a piece that can be used in that way.

Because modern-day Israel is a Jewish state, exploring that Divine solidarity in this context comes with a great risk of perpetuating the long, harmful history of antisemitic blood libel and accusations of deicide. How do we affirm God’s presence with those suffering in Palestine without (implicitly or explicitly) adding to the poisonous lie that “the Jews killed Jesus”?

In wrestling with this complexity, I tried to write this poem to uplift both Jesus’s Jewishness and his solidarity with Palestinians. Jesus was born into a Jewish family, his entire worldview was shaped by his Jewishness, and he shared in his people’s suffering under the Roman Empire. His solidarity with Palestinians of various faiths suffering today does not erase that Jewishness. Nor does it mean that Jewish persons don’t “belong” in the region — only that modern Israel’s occupation of Palestine is in no way necessary for Jews to live and thrive there, or anywhere else in the world.

I also aimed to point out that Israel is by no means acting alone in this attack on Gaza or their decades-long occupation of Palestine. There is a much larger Empire at work, with my own country, the United States, at the helm. Israel is entangled in that imperial mess, and directly backed and funded by those forces — not because of what politicians claim, that we have to back Israel or else we’re antisemitic, but because Israel is our strategic foothold in the so-called Middle East. How do we name our complicity as our tax dollars are funneled into violence across the world, and act to end that violence?

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I'm sorry this post isn't as articulate as I want it to be. All of this to say: I deeply apologize for any hurt my poem caused. I understand how horrific Christianity's history of — and ongoing present — antisemitism is, and how it poisons and warps so much that could have been beautiful. I'll keep educating myself; I'll keep having hard conversations; I'll keep working to uproot antisemitism in myself and my communities.

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I'll close with a list of resources for learning about Palestine's history and getting involved.