#choosing to interpret them in a poor light

[queer-reader-07]

i love when people seemingly do everything in their power to interpret what you’re saying in the most bad faith way possible. it’s so fun and nice. (sarcasm)

[the-asterism-artist]

I'm trying to get back on my Fantasy Life/general creative kick after some... incidents. So, let's talk about Itri, his internalized ableism and how I am choosing to interpret Port Puerto society for the Eight of Lunares AU!

TW: ableism, neglect, child abandonment, mentions of disorders, internalized ableism

I admit I typed all this out outta my mutual @roseombre 's concern for Itri so now I'm here- thanks to Roseo for making me try to develop EoL more again lmao sorry ya gotta suffer

I see Port Puerto as a very self-sufficient, prideful society; take what you have to with the concern of who you take from second. I personally see community as less prevalent in how you explore Port Puerto compared to Castele. Actually, family seems more important than the people you live around as seen with Olivia's story. Along with that, the pirates and sailors are a big part of Port Puerto culture, lifestyles requiring doing what you have to to survive and independence. Plus, nobility in lots of history (and now) steal and exploit those below and the nobility in Port Puerto are VERY present.

All this to say, I've already placed Itri at the bottom of a very competitive and fierce food chain; a poor orphan boy with 'behavioral issues'. May as well explain how they got to where he is once placed into such a society.

With nobility revered and independence prided in, Itri quickly learned to go on his own, especially since no one in his life had the resources nor the care to actually understand their problems. Itri was in the minority of the population in terms of status anyways. No one would care. But, of course, Itri continued to live and provide for themselves, truly just to prove that they could.

And this all feeds into the idea that SURELY, he isn't disabled and doesn't have any disorders. In Itri's head, nothing is 'wrong' with them. Not to say that mental and/or physical disabilities and disorders are inherently wrong, just that in a mindset deadset on survival and independence, oftentimes these types of things can be seen as a burden or a hindrance. When you're supposed to do everything by yourself, make a name for yourself, needing help in any capacity RARELY cuts it unless getting a disability from doing something 'noble', like serving Port Puerto.

So a kid with no money to pay for help and no ears to listen, used to being left to their own devices and 'rolling with the punches'? Itri is not going to get his torn ear checked, not even when they ended losing hearing in their right ear since "It's a waste of money and no one says anything important for me to hear". He's not going to go to the doctor for broken bones since they'll heal on their own time and Itri had to get to work. He won't be concerned when their ribs get extra exposed since they're used to it.

And so, when he starts both developing different issues and having his previously existing issues come to light with his new life in Castele + EoL's traumatizing plot, Itri figures it's 'not the kind of thing we do'. That someone like them can't have these kinds of problems since he's 'too strong for that'. That or it's not as concerning as continuing to accumulate Dosh. Extreme anxiety, paranoia, autism, psychosis, codependency. All of this is, in Itri's mind, shit for the weak that they don't have time for. It especially gets worse the more both Itri and Nashira cling to each other in the wake of Ryna's murder.

So that explains that one piece of art and any controversial stuff Itri will say in the future! I specify that last part as I feel people get too caught up in the detachment of morals in characters (murder, genocide, etc) that when they talk about more 'grounded' things, it suddenly reflects on the author. When in reality, I want to depict different perspectives while also giving an outlet for myself. This experience of Itri's is based on my internalized self doubt regarding my depression and autism because I am 'high-functioning and low maintenance', just to the extreme. It's cathartic to have a character who not only cannot accept help but cannot even accept that help is needed in the first place.

Thanks for listening to me, BYE!

[psychic-refugee]

Wenclair as a ship in itself I understand. It can be fun, and interpretation is up to the fan content creator. Wyler, Wenvier, Enjax, Wenclay and AroAce Wednesday I think are all equally valid interpretations. Just as any other combination.

Shipping non canon relationships is a choice made by personal preference.

I less understand the expectations of Wenclair being actually possible to become canon. I feel like it’s only possible in the sense that “anything is possible” because no one can ever truly predict the future.

However,

Tim Burton does not have a history of producing LGBTQ+ focused projects. There are barely any background characters that are prominently and explicitly queer in his long CV.

The Ottingers are outliers and background characters with a second of screentime. I have doubts we’ll ever see them again, and honestly, they are the farthest I think Burton is willing to go.

Millar also doesn’t have a history of writing main cast LGBTQ+. He and Gough only reference the relationship between Enid and Wednesday as “friendship” and “sisterhood” when confronted with the idea of Wenclair. (NME, 24 Dec 2023).

Netflix has a documented poor history of treatment of shows with prominent lesbian leads (First Kill, I Am Not OK With This, and Warrior Nun).

Given all of that, I’m also not in the writers’ room, so time will ultimately tell if my skepticism is warranted.

Nonetheless, there is overwhelming evidence that Wenclairs have detrimentally affected Jenna and Emma. I don’t see them wanting Wenclair to happen and they certainly aren’t entertaining the mere possibility of it any longer.

Jenna has not mentioned Wenclair in a positive light since that one interview in Teen Vogue, 9 Dec 2022. It’s been over a year since; a lot of stuff has happened. Plenty of reasons for Jenna to have changed her mind.  

Emma made a non-committal comment about “how anything is possible” when it comes to S2 and Wenclair. (Variety, 30 Jan 2023)  But, again, that was over a year ago and a lot of toxic behaviour has happened since then.

Just as with Jenna, Emma has a lot of motivation now to not support Wenclair becoming canon.

Emma also pushed off the possibility of Wenclair beyond S2, she gave the excuse of Wednesday needing a “season of singleness.” Id. Wednesday WAS single in S1, she never claimed anyone as an SO. It sounds more like Emma was a hostage trying to appease her kidnappers by telling them what they wanted to hear. She pushed off the idea of Wenclair to a season that’s not guaranteed to materialize. That’s called passing the buck. If S3 never happens, then she’s not responsible for adhering to an implied promise of Wenclair being possible at all.

Now, Emma has made it a point to stress that shipping is fine as long as it doesn’t cross over into real people. (NME, 27 June 2024).

Wenclairs failed to do that in a spectacular fashion.

Emma admits that Wenclair was a joke they told amongst themselves when it first became apparent it was a popular ship. Id. Wenclair is “funny” to them because they never intended for it to be a ship, but fans choose to interpret it that way.

People ran with Jenna’s comments, but I believe she was supporting it in jest in the way Emma reported in June. Jenna even framed Wenclair only happening in “a perfect world.” (9 Dec 2022) She said it would only happen in an impossible circumstance. I don’t get how people took that to mean she was trying behind the scenes to make it happen, or that it was a secret interpretation fans were meant to figure out on their own.

I think if she knew how much her “fans” would sexually harass her and Emma with the idea of Wenclair, she would not have said it at all. I think with how careful Jenna is with what she posts now, she knows better to say things off the cuff or in jest.

Wenclairs have taught her harsh lessons on how to interact with social media and interviews.

I think it says a lot that Jenna has only been photographed with her stylist in the past several years. She has had plenty of opportunities to do pictures with the cast since filming started, specifically Emma and yet…

Wenclairs have been so rabid and hostile to anyone challenging their fantasy that she only feels safe being seen with Enrique Melendez, her employee, or her family. That’s not normal.

I think there’s a reason why Wenclairs hyperfocus on Jenna making the ship happen and not Emma.

Jenna clearly doesn’t mind doing roles that involve sapphic elements (Miller’s Girl and The Fallout). The same cannot be said about Emma. Wenclairs are so quick to jump on Jenna’s CV of “kissing women” and pointing to that as proof of her queerness. By THEIR same logic, what does it mean if Emma has not done any role where she kisses women?

Jenna’s a great actress and I think could have chemistry and a rapport with a tree if the script called for it. I think she didn’t mind the idea of Wenclair at the time (regardless of how farfetched the possibility was or that it was never originally or seriously considered), but I don’t think she ever intended for people to interpret her characterization of Wednesday that way.

I think both Jenna and Emma regret implying or joking about the possibility of Wenclair as the fans started to sexually harass them on IG with comments on how they are for sure lesbians (neither have stated so) under their posts that have nothing to do with the other as well as everywhere else. Neither can celebrate their own separate accomplishments without Wenclairs mentioning the ship or obnoxiously asking “Where’s Jenna/Emma?”

Wenclairs also post explicit art of Jenna and Emma’s likeness in public forums such as Twitter/IG (and tag them or send it to them directly), and harass male coworkers Jenna has romantic scenes with (Finest Kind). Emma’s male co-star in AGGGTM has also experienced harassment.  

Jenna has outright said she quit Twitter because she was sent explicit AI art of herself right after Wednesday took off.

I 100% believe it was sent by a Wenclair account and it was sexual Wenclair art, given the timing and their appalling behaviour to date.

“I ended up deleting [Twitter] about two, three years ago because of the influx after [Wednesday] had come out, these absurd images and photos, and I already was in a confused state that I just deleted it…It was disgusting, and it made me feel bad. It made me feel uncomfortable” (Entertainment Weekly, 25 Aug 2024) (emphasis added).

I think Jenna coming out and specifically saying there would be no romance for Wednesday (Digital Spy, 8 June 2023) after the December 2022 article is another direct consequence of Wenclair harassment. She changed her tune very explicitly and Netflix has not contradicted her, nor have the showrunners, writers, or Burton ever shown committed support for Wenclair. At most it’s “we’re open to it,” and that was before the harassment got as bad as it is.

Jenna’s playfulness is completely absent in all these interviews since Wenclairs started to harass her. Whatever they were “open to,” the Wenclairs shut it violently.

I wasn’t aware until recently that the Wenclairs were so creepy, invasive, and lacking even the barest of social graces that they were also harassing Jenna’s family.

Here is Aliyah, Jenna’s sister, scoffing and clearly exasperated by the shipping. I highly doubt this frustration comes from being asked just once, she’s probably fielded this question way too many times. She no longer follows Emma on IG.

There are also reports of other IG Lives by Aliyah outright stating that the shipping was out of control and detrimental to their family. Of course Wenclairs are completely crickets about this.

It’s bad enough Wenclairs shove their personal fantasies in Jenna and Emma’s face, but they do it to their siblings? Likely when the siblings were minors or barely adults as Aliyah is only 20.

Emma in the Variety, 30 Jan 2023 article also says her sister would show her stuff, meaning her family was also getting exposed to it.

The latest Vanity Fair article states that Jenna won’t ever make any romantic relationship public. (6 August 2024). She states that her relationships are “hers” and that her fans can’t separate the real her and the celebrity they have built up in her head. Id.

She makes an effort to use gender neutral terms when it comes to a romantic partner. I respect that she doesn’t want to come out as either heterosexual, homosexual, or anywhere in between or outside of the binary. That is her choice, I think there’s a vast difference between keeping things private and being in the closet. Either way it’s also NONE OF ANYONE’S BUSINESS.

But I think it’s undeniable that even though she would get a lot of support if she were queer, Wenclairs have made it so unbearable that she won’t reveal a partner or come out at all.

Wenclairs have made it unsafe and hostile for her to acknowledge her own sexuality publicly, much less a partner.

I think it’s too late for Wenclairs to back off, it looks like they already ruined the friendship or at best drove it underground if the total lack of social media content of them together is indicative of anything.

If they are still friends, then they don’t trust Wenclairs with knowing about it and don’t want to share it with them. It looks like Jenna doesn’t want to share any friendship publicly anymore.

Unless it’s to promo movies or a brand deal, she rarely posts pictures on social media anymore. It’s very rare she posts personal pictures of herself doing non-work outings. She’s keeping her personal life extremely close to her chest.

How exactly do Wenclairs expect a friendship to survive constant, sexual harassment? How can they hang out together when everything they do together is sexualized? Why would anyone think the actresses would encourage a storyline that would invite more?

How do they expect Jenna to support Wenclair to become canon if it means her future male coworkers will be harassed? If it means any romantic partner who isn’t Emma in the future will be harassed? If it means that if she were indeed involved with Emma, that there would probably be a bigger explosion of porn that is shoved in their face?

How do they expect Jenna or Emma to support Wenclair if their families are being harassed about it?

Wenclair has been a curse upon them, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

[susie-dreemurr]

CH3 Theory: Kris shared the ”Roaring Knight” title with this chapter’s final boss

I’ve made a poll saying I might make a short theory video on this before playing chapter 4, in order to properly process all this new information first, but just in case I decide to give up, here’s the script I just wrote for the video:

Playing chapter 3, one of the things that drew me in the most were the S-Class gaming scenes. They provided a significant amount of material for theories, especially on what’s up with Kris.

Às I played, one of the things that drew me in the most were the S-Class gaming scenes. They seem to provide a lot of potential for theories, especially regarding what’s up with Kris.

Ramb talks of how, as a child, they and “that girl” brought the library laptop home, therefore letting darkner characters like Queen, Spamtom and Tenna meet, seemingly to play pretend in the light world. Ramb acts overly familiar with Kris and their mentality, claiming to know them, and throughout the S-class quest, questions them on what they want. Could this really get you what you want? Your poor mother is in grave danger because of this. Your knife is getting dull. While on its own these dialogues coud just reference only the third fountain, they do not exist in à vaccum

Eventually, Kris meets the S-class game version of Tenna. He starts talking about his past with Spamtom, which is a whole other can of worms, and says “they never should have brought that laptop.” He then notices Kris and is startled, dropping the bombshell of:

Later on the game, Tenna says he was alone until the Knight came. While showing an image of Tenna similar to how ch2 ended, we hear him say how he struck a deal with the Knight to “keep the trio busy” só he could be watched again. This instantly reminded me of this dialogue.

I had already thought Kris was the knight after ch2 but this had made me all the more certain. Kris was the knight, and wanted Tenna to pretend they weren’t in front of their team, wanted Tenna to distract and keep them in this for some time, something that among other things, called back to the theme of escapism prominent in this chapter.

I was so certain, and yet… at the ending, we meet a mysterious character named the Roaring Knight. I was confused, thinking maybe I interpreted it all wrong, but… maybe not.

Às Queen said, the “knight” could be any lightner with the will to create a fountain. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume “The Roaring Knight” is just a title, and not necessarily a person. It is not impossible for that Kris and this mysterious character (who I’ll be calling “Cavaliera” for simplicity’s sake) are working together, both *sharing* this title. Not just in a “Kris opened à fountain once” way, but they’re specifically working together às partners, maybe even taking turns on opening fountains.

In S-Class, mini-Kris enters the bunker and specifically stabs (and kills) Tenna’s character after he anxiously mentions their deal, reminding me of the phrase “stab in the back.” This obviously foreshadows Cavaleira literally striking Tenna in the back (possibly killing him) and kidnapping Undyne to the bunker. I am sure Toby Fox didn’t choose this specific form of foreshadowing for nothing, and believe it’s also meant to signal these two at LEAST working together.

There’s also the fact that Ramb chastises Kris over the situation they put their mother in by intentionally opening the fountain with her inside the room, questioning if this would “get them what they want.” After chapter 2, many speculated on why they did so, and after watching how Cavaleira original kidnapping target was Toriel, i think Kris did this as part of this plan they had together.

Às à bonus, We know the dark worlds are shaped by where the objects are in the light world. Kris and “that girl” got darkners like Queen, Tenna and Spamtom to meet by bringing their light world equivalents together to “play pretend.” They could have either done this intentionally, or genuinely been innocent back then and only later found out they could alter dark worlds like this, but regardless it doesn’t hurt to keep note of this.

If both of them share the “Roaring Knight” title, it’s possible Kris struck the deal with Tenna (às they were the one who opened the fountain [which Tenna knows] and dó not have an alibi from then to Susie waking up) while Cavaleira watched over the show to keep Tenna from breaking the deal for whatever reason. Tenna certainly wouldn’t have reason to mention the identity of the KNIGHT, especially if Kris was involved, it goes against his goal to stay on and have an audience!

I believe I’ve made myself clear on why I think they share thte title, but who IS Cavaleira? Às I want to keep this vídeo short (bc i do want to play ch4 soon, plus this has less evidence) I don’t want to go in depth on it, but I think it is either Mayor Holliday or December, leaning more towards the latter.

Dess’s current absence feels more haunting than the Mayor’s ever did, because it doesn’t have the explanation of “work.” People talk of her às if she was gone. Her connection with Kris and Noelle, how she explored the forest near the bunker (which might have gaster connections) with them, the DECEMBER spelling bee, this… weirdness surrounding her made fans agree she‘s important long ago.

Cavaleira’s design includes horns almost identical to the Hollidays, gaster-like hands and a sword that sometimes looks like a bat. Thsi cant be a coincidence toby Fox pls pls pls

TL;DR: Kris and Dess are working together and share the title of roaring knight (real)

I want to end this off saying I don’t think Kris or Dess are evil or even want to hurt anyone. They could do all this for the sake of some greater good, an objective I just have no way of knowing yet. Regardless of ch4 denying this or not, I enjoyed this little (rushed) thought experiment.

[oneeyedcritter]

The Colors in The Great Trickster

My own interpretation of the colors in Noire's anecdote. Not as exhaustive, but I just wanted to get my thoughts down.

Red

The color of the lights in Noire's studio in the beginning. In this chapter, Noire reminisces on the time she, Teresa, and Qi Xing had begun filming C07.

Possible meanings: Passion, Creation

Blue

In this chapter, we see Noire hospitalized after the accident that inevitably cripples her. We also witness her poor relationship with her subordinates, which she coldly dismisses, her work always taking first priority.

Possible meanings: Sadness, Isolation

Green

Before the accident, the effect of Teresa's loss becomes palpable as Noire struggles at work. The script for Shadow Spy, her current project at the time, feels incomplete without Teresa's corrections. Noire begins to realize she might not have been as self-reliant as she'd thought. After a moment of contemplation, she makes the sudden decision to visit Teresa's grave — a visit that she herself knows is long-overdue after her glaring absence at her own colleague's funeral — and she hits the road in no time. Only for a red traffic light she mistook for a green one to cut her trip short.

Possible meanings: Stagnation, Sickness (Both of the Body and the Mind)

Purple

Noire flops three movies in a row. Investors have now become few and far between, and people are leaving her in search of greener pastures. She weighs her options: risk making one more movie or sell everything she owns to keep food on the table. She chooses the former as her one last shot in the dark, ordering Lin to begin work with In Spring Bloom, but ultimately prepares herself for the worst to come. Before, she probably would have stayed on this sinking ship, but she has come to a few epiphanies ever since the accident. One of them is that she never could have reached these heights of fame and success on her own.

In the next chapter, it's revealed that Noire's assistant, Lin, sold some of her own belongings for Noire's benefit. One of them is a purple shirt (or dress?) she used to wear to work.

Possible meanings: Mindfulness, Courage, Defeat

Aqua

After refusing treatment for months since the accident, Noire finally goes to the doctor for a checkup. During the visit, she tells the doctor how she's come to terms with her injury. She tells him how her crippled legs were a reminder of how she was not a pillar of her own craft and that she still needed and relied on a lot of people. This was precisely what Teresa's loss had taught her.

Possible meanings: New Horizons, Humility and Grace

Yellow / Gold

The dark period in Noire's career passes, and her films begin to take the spotlight once more. On that year, the Best Director Award goes to her, and she makes a trip to the stage on her wheelchair for the first time in years. Showered in praises and accolades, she makes a speech of gratitude toward the people who stuck with her up until now. Shortly after the ceremony, she and Lin head to their flight to Los Angeles. On the plane, Noire talks about how they're heading to the unknown, asking Lin if she's still willing to take the risk of going with her despite it. Lin, loyal as ever, agrees.

Possible Meanings: Success, Wealth, Wisdom

White

We see a glimpse of Noire's relationship with her mother. It's heavily implied that Noire has been suffering from child neglect, having a mother who prioritizes work over her own child. Noire only ever received the attention she was starved for when she began to relay to her mother something she overheard her aunts were talking about, but in the end only makes up a story to keep her mother's attention. This is probably how she began making her own stories, inevitably leading to the career she has now. The memory then cuts to Noire in her studio making the exact story from her own anecdote. She then poses a question about the truthfulness of the story that was just told, leaving the audience with the message that stories... are just stories. The poem in the cover of her anecdote kind of enforces this message:

The lights are dim, and the chairs are soft. Please, take a seat. Forget the spilled popcorn in the corner and forget yourself in this retreat. Stories are but well-told lies. This is a truth bittersweet.

Possible Meanings: Purity and Innocence, Impartiality or Neutrality

[abattre]

Naruro is a Japaneese manga right, so it only makes sense for us to take the Japaneese culture into consideration when watching the show. I don't know how to explain this but all I can find are americans using only their own culture for describtions. For example Sasuke being called emo and edgy, that's not even a thing in Japan, how is Sasuke nicknamed that when Kishimoto himself probably has no idea what that even means. (He's traumatized, not trying to act diffrent)

Another example are Sakura, Temari, Ino, who are seen as some sort of girlbosses and queens who would never take any shit from any man when in reality they're doing all the cooking and the cleaning in their houses, just like the traditional japaneese woman in real life. (I've read the Shikamaru novel and bro's never in the kitchen, it's always Temari. And I know Sasuke is usually absent but when he comes back it's always Sakura who's making dinner)

There's also Hinata who's considered the best girl in the series, the wife material, the keeper, the woman of every dudebro's dreams, while Sakura is seen as the toxic crush who rejects the poor, sweet, good guy and chooses the hot 'badboy' over him. (I'm not her fan but I swear I've seen some people hating on her only for not loving Naruto back. Maybe she reminds those insecure men about the rejections they got from their real life girls?)

And don't even get me started on Sasuke getting called abusive and misogynistic for defending his life when ninja women attack...

I'm just saying, lots of fans project their own lives and beliefs onto the show and it often dosen't make any sense

(I hope you understood my broken english, I tried so hard, it's my third language so it's not easy for me, I also hope you don't mind the spelling mistakes but feel free to correct them for me if you find any)

oh that's really interesting! i'm not well versed enough in japanese sociology to corroborate on the subculture aspect there, but i agree that the western fandom's interpretation of sasuke is heavily weighed down by the stigma of being put in the emo trope box. i think the emo thing has become so kitsch now that it's kind of just an easy out for the fandom to avoid engaging with the moral aspect of sasuke's story. like.. they want a light-hearted excuse to justify characterising sasuke's reactions as superficially as possible so it fits their narrative of him being just a straight villain in shippuden

as far as kishimoto's motivations go, i think the intentions there were just a bit lost in translation then? also the fact that we don't get the whole context for why sasuke behaves the way he does until the end of the original series run is probably what ingrained the idea most people have that sasuke was just standoffish because he was arrogant and nothing else... i guess a lot of fans have a hard time overcoming that initial impression. even after we find out about the massacre & itachi most of the fandom is like.... utterly incapable of forgiving that he had priorities outside of his friends and konoha because they can't get past the notion of thinking he's just power-hungry for the sake of it. they're fundamentally uninterested in engaging with the nuance of sasuke's situation because they didn't find sasuke likeable enough to show some grace for his circumstances and trauma by the time we get that information. which crazy but ok... skill issue i think

as for the girls.... kishimoto cannot write them as has been said by everyone for forever.... but yeah. the way he tried to paint over his misogynistic writing with the girl-boss feminism thing is a really weird counter-balance that doesn't work for me. i think sakura is probably the best example of that... she has a Big kinda aggressive personality that gets cut-up with kishimoto pacifying her in both the story and her behaviour but he's tropifying her so hard on both ends they never meet in the middle in a way that makes sense. so it comes off as a really disjointed characterisation on the whole with her motivations & actions being kinda flip-floppy one way or the other depending on whatever situation she's in. the housewife thing was probably just kishimoto not knowing how to end their stories in keeping to the girl-boss side of things he halfway set up, so he threw them all into the same fold of what he thinks is the ideal Happy Life conclusion all girls must have in his head. which is just getting married and being a traditional japanese housewife because of course it is

funnily enough, i think the sakura hate on that end also just goes back to people resenting sasuke for his role in the story. they exalt hinata for always being loyal to naruto and never being interested in anyone else... but sakura is Evil because she never fell in love with him and couldn't get over sasuke so she must be irredeemable and the Worst Ever. the self-inset bias etc etc. it is most definitely a projection issue lmao. it's been like 20 years and they still can't get over it so i'm not really holding out hope for an overhaul on sasuke's mass mischaracterisation. rip </3

[ejzah]

@mashmaiden also pointed out that the twins’ birthday would be coming up, or passed if you follow my timeline.

***

Firsts

“Are you having a good party?” Deeks asked Sophia, lying on his side while she and Caleb played with sorting cups and blocks.

“Yah,” she responded matter of factly, not looking up from the two cups she was trying to force them together.

A few feet away, Kensi and Rosa were taking turns building towers for Caleb to immediately knock down. Roberta, Callen, Anna, Sam, and Fatima had also come to celebrate the twins’ first birthday, and were currently embroiled in a highly competitive game of “Don’t Say Birthday” (with twins, baby, Sophia, Caleb, and present added into the mix of banned words to up the difficulty). At the moment, Roberta and Sam were tied.

“Alright, that’s my last pin,” Callen announced, handing it over to Fatima. “I’m out, try not to kill each other.” He wandered over, stopping beside Deeks. “When you invited me, I assumed it would be the one year olds fighting, not my partner and your mom.”

“Yeah, we probably should have stuck to bingo,” Deeks said, laughing at their antics.

“Ti,” Sophia instructed, patting the spot next to her. When Callen didn’t immediately respond to her directive, she patted the floor more emphatically, scowling at him.

“I think the birthday girl would like you to sit down,” Deeks interpreted.

“Oh, of course.” Callen hastily sat down. “Wouldn’t want to get on her bad side.”

“Definitely not.”

Sophia patted his shoulder, apparently satisfied and then lifted her light blue birthday dress to cover her face, and shouted “boo!”.

This time, Callen didn’t hesitate to hold his hands up and copy her, making Sophia giggle in delight.

“Incoming!” Kensi called out right before Caleb came running towards them, a party hat in one hand, and a green block in the other.

Deeks held out his arms, catching Caleb against his chest before he could crash.

“Hey buddy, how you doing?”

Caleb didn’t say anything, choosing to bury his head almost in Deeks’ armpit instead.

“I think he’s reaching the end of his endurance,” Kensi said, picking up a few toys as she moved closer. She brushed Caleb’s curls back from his temple, pushing her bottom lip out. “My poor baby. You’re just having too much fun.”

“Caleb reached up and clumsily forced a party hat on top of Deeks’ head.

“Thanks, kiddo,” Deeks said, pulling the attached rubber band under his chin. Both he and Sophia had started the party out with their own hats, but quickly dispensed with them. He’d seen Sophia’s discarded under the table, while Caleb had repurposed his as a container to hold a variety of snacks.

“I think it’s cake time,” Kensi told Rosa, who excitedly jumped, heading for the kitchen. She had kindly volunteered to the two smaller cakes for Sophia and Caleb to destroy and a larger cake for the rest of the party to enjoy.

“Guys, we’re about to sing “Happy Birthday” and have cake,” Kensi announced more loudly, addressing the rest of the guests. “So, I officially call an end to the game. Who has the most safety pins?”

“Me,” Anna said, raising her hand. “I have twenty-two.”

“Impressive,” Deeks commented.

“Yeah, won by nefarious means,” Sam said darkly.

“All I did was engage you in pleasant conversation.” Anna shrugged innocently.

“How’d you lose yours?” Kensi asked Fatima, who shook her head.

“Oh, I folded ten minutes ago and started refereeing these two,” she said.

“Ah, nice to know that even if we’re not coworkers anymore, the crazy still remains,” Deeks teased, picking Caleb and Sophia up and toting them over to the dining room table. Kensi took Sophia from him, getting her settled in her high hair, while Deeks worked on Caleb.

Sophia clapped her hands together, babbling about cake and other things Deeks didn’t quite catch.

“Oh, those are so beautiful, Rosa!” Fatima exclaimed as Rosa emerged from the kitchen with a tray containing two tiny cake decorated in teal and white frosting topped off with white number one candles. She brought them to the dining room table as everyone gathered around, and Caleb reached towards the candles with awe in his eyes.

“Caleb, don’t touch. Hot,” Kensi warned him, and Caleb pulled back, repeating,

“Hot?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Let me get a picture of you all together,” Roberta said, gesturing for Kensi, Deeks, and Rosa to scoot closer to the twins and

“Beautiful.”

They sang an abridged chorus of happy birthday since the twins were starting to get antsy.

“Sophia, Caleb, blow out the candles,” Kensi encouraged then when they finished singing.

Caleb screwed up his face and blew hard, blowing out the flame and also spraying the cake with a good amount of spit. Seeing her brother’s example, Sophia let out a short puff of air, frowning when her candle stayed lit.

“Try again,” Deeks encouraged.

It took three more tries before Sophia blew her candle out and then she immediately stuffed a fist into the cake. Caleb went head first instead, getting a mouthful of just frosting.

“Oh, I don’t envy you guys tonight when that sugar crash happens,” Sam said, chuckling at their future misfortune.

“Totally worth it.” Deeks gestured to the twins, somehow already completely covered in blue frosting and cake crumbs.

***

Later, after everyone had left and the mess cleaned up, Kensi and Deeks sat on the couch, the twins between them, just taking a moment to themselves.

“It’s crazy to think a year ago, these two weren’t even earth-side,” Deeks said with quiet awe.

“I know.” Kensi brushed her fingers over Caleb and Sophia’s cheeks. “And now they’re walking, starting to talk, eating anything they can find, and getting into lots of mischief.”

“Yeah, they definitely got your sweet tooth.”

“Hey, I didn’t see you turn down that second piece of cake,” Kensi retorted.

“It was really good cake. If Rosa decides she doesn’t want to be a lawyer, she could totally open a restaurant,” he said, turning his attention back to the twins.

“We’re pretty lucky,” he murmured.

“The luckiest,” Kensi agreed.

[vindicated-truth]

Rewatching the scene of Jaeyi throwing eggs at Joowon while knowing everything that really happened now puts everything in a whole new light.

For one thing, it now brings to light Nam Sangbae's and Oh Jihoon's kindness to Joowon after all of it. They are being kind, but they're also overcompensating out of guilt.

Sangbae keeps his distance and only approaches Joowon with a new towel when they're alone, while Jihoon takes it upon himself to clean Joowon's car.

Jaeyi is the one truly innocent in all this (I'll get to her actual reaction in a while) and while her actions towards Joowon may not be justifiable, it's understandable, because she's innocent.

However, Jihoon and Sangbae are two people who know something about Minjeong's murder that they haven't disclosed to anyone, each for their own reasons. Jihoon knows for sure that Jeongje was the last person Minjeong was with before she died, and he's also the one who leaked Dongsik's warrantless arrest to the media. And Sangbae knows for certain that Dongsik was the one who placed Minjeong's fingers in front of the grocery store. He deleted the CCTV footage of it after all.

Sangbae and Jihoon watching Jaeyi be angry at Joowon while knowing for sure that Joowon himself is just doing his job and is running around in circles because of the secrets each of them choose to keep now brings to light why both Sangbae and Jihoon feel compelled to extend a certain kindness to Joowon.

They're overcompensating out of guilt. They both know that Jaeyi's shop wouldn't have been unnecessarily searched had they disclosed the secrets they know. Her resulting anger is partly the consequence of their own decisions to keep these secrets.

And as for Jaeyi herself—

It's fascinating because I even consulted @rumpleteasa about the nuances of the Korean language lol because I've learned that Korean dialogue usually don't have a specific subject or pronoun used, and you'd usually have to rely on context clues to derive the subject.

During the entire exchange between Jaeyi and Joowon, Jaeyi had been talking about Joowon stigmatizing an innocent person, and Joowon's interpretation is that Jaeyi meant Dongsik.

This is particularly fascinating because:

1) Joowon doesn't actually think that Jaeyi herself is guilty, because his focus is on Dongsik as the murderer, and he's just trying to find out where the murder might have occurred. He's sneering at Jaeyi not because he thinks she is guilty, but because she trusted in someone who isn't innocent, and that is Dongsik. 2) Joowon seems unaware of the fact that it's Jaeyi he might have also stigmatized now, even if it hadn't been his intention.

The reason why I say this is because as soon as Joowon tells Jaeyi off for trusting someone like Dongsik, Jaeyi instead silently pulls out the search and seize warrant of her shop and throws it at Joowon.

To me, that action means she is actually also talking about herself.

And it makes sense narratively, because all the scenes leading up to this confrontation had been a peek at her background and the gossip she had to endure when her mother went missing, which is now mirrored in the present when she's again enduring gossip for her shop being searched as part of a murder investigation.

Her anger is due only in part of her defense of Dongsik, whom she does love and care for. But to me, watching it now knowing for certain that she's innocent, her anger is stemming from how she is now stigmatized too.

(And I believe both Sangbae and Jihoon realize that then too. Hence, again, their actions overcompensating for the guilt of what they choose not to reveal.)

And as for Joowon himself—

I'll preface this by saying that I personally do firmly believe that the system of law enforcement is corrupt and broken, as it has become a system of oppression to the poor and the powerless, and has become a tool of maintaining the status quo of the wealthy and the powerful.

That being said, our naive and innocent Han Joowon is actually wholeheartedly talking about the spirit of the law as he tells Jaeyi this:

This is all a show? Is life easy for you? I really envy the world you live in. That if I put a show like this, innocent people become culprits and people all believe that. If that unseemly world of yours, that kind of prejudice, is the only reason I'm getting egged, you are taking Korean Police as shit.

It's arrogant. And it's cruel.

But the thing is—he's right.

Take note that, knowing Joowon's real character as we do now, he really was talking about the spirit of the law here, even as he seems blissfully and naively unaware of how truly broken the actual system already is. And at this point, he's also blissfully and naively unaware of how easy it is for an innocent person to be stigmatized, as Sangbae did warn Joowon about.

But it doesn't take away the fact that Joowon, despite it all, is right. Everything he's doing is just following the course of the investigation, and simply doing his job as he should, because more than anything he does want to catch the murderer whom he now has reason to believe also killed Lee Geumhwa, and more than anything he wants to bring justice to her too.

And while Jaeyi is right that Joowon has now stigmatized an innocent person like her, Joowon is also right in his point that the spirit of the investigation shouldn't be disrespected like this, if (in his case in particular) it is nothing more than a means to get to the truth.

Which again, if only Jihoon and Sangbae had chosen not to hide these truths, neither Joowon nor Jaeyi would've had to endure any of this.

It does bring to light now the importance of reexamining every scene with the nuance that we now know, instead of just blindly assigning blame on the characters. We as the audience have omniscient knowledge of everything that's happeing, but what the characters themselves know are incredibly limited.

That's why our judgment and perception of the characters tend to be skewed when we forget that what we know isn't necessarily what they know at that point in the story.

[covertblizzard]

an analysis of nocturna as the human parallel to the night of gotham

(or rather, what she could have been)

she's raised by gotham essentially, and she's been on both sides of the gotham life, an orphan on the streets of gotham and the rich (and criminal) of gotham

she's hurt by the existing system in a sense, she got injured working in gotham observatory, i'm assuming some kind of state lab funded by wayne enterprise which is definitely one of the rich and powerful

she's simply not cruel enough to be the night of gotham, but perhaps that is a statement that it is not the night of gotham that is inherently cruel, but some of the people (in power) of gotham and their actions are what is the actual cruelty

she basically steals from the rich and technically, up to this point, her actions have limited harm to the poor. a lot of the rich aren't even reporting because what she's stolen wasn't worth the trouble of the spotlight of the news going to them. of course we know the nights of gotham are infinitely more dangerous to the poor and helpless than the rich and powerful, but i like imagining the implications that by staying in gotham, their investments actually aren't growing as much as they could have (nocturna steals from them but not enough to really hurt their pocket, gotham doesn't quite cause their investment to fail, but choosing to move elsewhere could potentially increase it)

i know jason is still jason circus-boy todd here, but let's set that aside, and just think of the idea that jason as a hopeful little child of gotham despite everything softens the night of gotham and brings her to her heel to stop her misdeeds. that gotham night's salvation is not in what power can bring her but in what she can do for herself in light of something kind and lovely and innocent to protect, to care, and to nurture.

in conclusion, i think gotham's rich and powerful should just leave and let the people take back the land and space and opportunities that is theirs and build back their own community in their own way (does this even make sense? i don't know. i'm just badly interpreting the storyline and i like to imagine the idea of people given the opportunity to grow and succeed and make something together on their own and not having some rich weirdo dictate "how i can help you improve". the end)

[choisunjaeisactuallymine]

hello!! to be honest, I do not know how to make requests, but I hope that I am doing it correctly. your profile says that you accept requests for Reality Quest, so can I ask for romantic relationship headcanons for the most popular guys in the fandom (Dowan, Eunsung, Sunjae) with/without a yandere theme (depends on your preferences, but I would ask for a light yandere)? and, of course, if you don't want to write this, then just ignore it!

WHEN I TELL YOU I JUMPED WHEN I SAW A REQUEST- thank you for reviving our fandom pookie

and yes u are requesting correctly lol dwdw (i know the desperation our fandom is literally nonexistent)

Light Yandere! with RQ Hot Trio

Ha Dowan:

i've said this once and i will say this again, but yandere Dowan is so pathetic you wouldn't even want to date him irl. He pretty much follows you everywhere because he doesn't have a schedule of his own.

Your friends are his friends even though they all think he's weird. he sleeps after you text him goodnight and he wakes up at the crack ass of dawn so he can "coincidentally" meet you in your neighborhood.

would unironically be the "what a manipulative conniving dictator" guy when he hears about your ex situationship. tenses up and glares at him when he passes the poor dude. so obvious about it both you and your situationship knows Dowan has a thing for you.

he confesses to you by trading you an appletun like the nerd he is.

it's kinda giving inexperienced yandere x willing reader. you probably make him combust every twenty minutes by teasing him for being shameless. here are some of those occasions:

he stares you down whenever you show a sliver of skin. positions his head in the weirdest angles to try to get a better view of your cleavage. last time happened: yesterday

he sniffs your clothes and bedsheets. last time happened: just now

somehow gets sick on command whenever you don't message/talk to him for more than 3 hours. literally forces his body to shut down because of how desperate he is for your attention. last time happened: last week

he knows how to fight. he's grown. yet whenever you leave him unattended he shows up with bruises and cuts that he wants you to kiss(lick) better. last time happened: this morning

this is an ongoing list

Han Eunsung:

mature. protective. strong. protective. eloquent. did i say protective?

Eunsung is like the least insane yandere. He's normal for the most part until he starts growling like a dog at the people who try to talk to you (the other two bark).

charismatic yandere. he's smarter and more socially aware than he looks. he's studied the men in those romance dramas you watch to perfectly encapsulate their tone and actions

not forceful. thinks it's cute when you choose to submit to him. like Sunjae i don't think he minds a bratty girl. yan!Eunsung is more creative with his punishments. however you want to interpret that

i genuinely can't imagine a guy like him acting too yandere, i'd say his main traits would be that he literally never lets go of your waist or hand and that he forcibly does tasks for you like he's your dad

enforces the power dynamic by placing dishes away in the top shelf rather than the lower drawers. goes out of his way to tighten all bottle caps so you need to ask him for help. never bends down to kiss you. please break up with him.

actually no, if you take my advice he might just accidentally lock you up and chain you to the bedpost. the other two may beg for you to stay, but Eunsung doesn't need to waste his breath. he knows ur a bratty babe

yeah he also chooses the socks you wear for the day. slips them on for you in the morning before you get off bed so your feet don't come in contact with the cold, hard floor

would literally kill the other two if you told him to. he worships every bit of you...like you replaced the image of religion in his head. he now worships you and you only

i might be projecting

Choi Sunjae:

FREAKy. that's the one trait that differentiates him. thists after you in your instagram comments on main. you guys are crowned the FREAK couple on campus. he'll laugh whether or not you like it.

Sunjae likes to see his influence on every part of your body. customized jewelry with his initials, nails painted in the crimson shade of his eyes.

sometimes leaves you alone in questionable situations so he can rescue you. he likes giving others the impression that he is the knight in shining armor to the unobtainable girl (you)

i think he's similar to usui takumi. i think he would totally blackmail you into wearing a skimpy costume just to blackmail you again with a picture of you in the costume.

but the moment you get too close to another man you'll suddenly feel a hand across your waist dragging you away (dating or not).

he's a lil mean. one time you got into a fight with him and ran away crying. when Sunjae came around looking for you, he found you crying next to a classmate who was hugging you out of concern. let's just say it didn't end well for either of you. you and your classmate both took the next day off, but for different reasons.

secretly Sunjae just likes seeing you cry. he likes being the hero saving you from those negative emotions. he's happiest when he wipes away your tears and treats you like the princess you are

will attempt to discreetly rub his cologne on you at any given moment. you think he's caressing your face out of love? think again. will also randomly rest his head in the crook of your neck to check if the scent is still there.

yan!Sunjae is just his freakier twin i swear. i can't think of anything because lowkey his normal self would be doing this shit too

extra:

i swear im not dowan biased but he's so easy to write for. like i just imagine this rabid dog drooling over y/n's shoe and thats him. eunsung is zayne from lads and sunjae is hisoka. thats it. they're equally insane i think

[chobani-flip]

buddie goggles and why you might enjoy wearing them more if you acknowledge them

so yeah, i think the buddie goggles are a real issue. (ive had them too, fellow shippers, no judgment) like, is it possible that buck and eddie will at some point start a deeply fulfilling romantic relationship? yes. is it what's happening on screen right now and what the show is 100% suggesting is imminent? no. sorry, it's just not.

look, the thing with analysing and interpreting any text is that it's very much about finding things that the text is doing, what could be there, looking at it from different angles and choosing to focus on certain aspects: that's why you have feminist readings of X and queer readings of Y, etc

but if you go looking at a text with the intention of looking for authorial intent and secret messages the author is leaving that only you and the fandom can pick up on correctly? that's such a slippery, tricky slope.

consider:

simply communicating ideas face to face to one single other person can often end in misunderstandings

communicating ideas in writing?... well, we live in the pissing on the poor era of the internet, don't we.

like, how many times have you read/written something, looked at the comments and gone: but...that's not what's there? like, interesting that you see it, but also, i don't know where you got that from

see where I'm going with this?

there is so much that goes into the making of a tv show besides the script and actors' delivery that i am absolutely not an expert on: costumes, set dressing, blocking, lighting, editing, soundtrack...

taking any of those aspects and analysing it and looking for connections is my favourite thing to do and read about and...

ngl, watching the show and looking for buddie in all of them is so much fun. i love it, it's what got me into 911 in the first place.

but i promise you, the moment you stop acknowledging that that's what you're doing, that what you're doing is a Buddie reading of 911, and instead proclaim it as the one single truth? that's when you set yourself up for a wild and not always pleasant ride.

and this isn't about having or not having faith in the writers or buddie or the one they call tim, and honestly, it's kind of telling that the word "faith" is used so often.

it's about accepting that while watching a tv show, we're all putting ourselves in a position of observing the shadows of plato's cave with binoculars on a low-visibility day. (ok. that's a really pretentious twatty thing to say, but i'll leave it there because i think the image is funny. ) and no amount of media literacy is going to give you a clear insight into the minds and intentions of all of the people creating the show (can we please stop shouting at people to get "media literacy" if they disagree with our interpretation of a text, even if what they're saying sounds dumb)

now, i don't know if yall were here for the TJLC thing back then, and I am absolutely not saying that what the Sherlock show did and what 911 is doing is in any shape or form similar, however, on tumblr and amongst the fandom, the lead-up to season 4 and then the secret fourth episode fallout felt exactly like what some parts of the 911 fandom are doing now. so... just take care, friends. and don't be dicks to people who disagree with you over a ship.

[hiswordsarekisses]

“We are so quick to assume the very best about our own motives and the very worst about others’.

(The first red flag of assumption is that it is followed by accusation. The reason this way of thinking will open us up to the devil, is because it is his behavior that we are mimicking when we assume and accuse. The devil is called the “accuser of the brethren.”)

Surely this is some of what the psalmist cried for in Psalm 139: “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!”

Surely this is what Solomon wanted us to know when he said, “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit.”

Love first assumes the best…

“Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7).

Love is always choosing to believe the best about other people rather than the worst.

It puts aside sinful cynicism to assume others are operating out of good motives instead of poor ones.

Love hopes all things by looking toward other believers with the sincere desire that they are operating out of the best of intentions and the hope that they will accomplish great things for the Lord.

And if 1 Corinthians 13 does not already do enough to call us to examine what we assume about others, we can turn as well to James 3:17–18 where we read that “the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.”

We can turn to the sobering words of 1 Corinthians 4:5: “Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God.”

Here is what I conclude: It is sinful to assume bad motives;

And it is sinful to not assume good motives….

So when you see a post that jumps out at you, don’t immediately interpret it as saying something contentious or defensive.

When you read an article or see a video, choose to grant the grace of believing and hoping and bearing and enduring all things.

(And pray if you think they may be in error. You do not have to point out every error you think you see. God is very good at His job.)

Think of that person as a brother or sister in Christ and choose to look for the best possible ~ NOT the WORST possible, explanation.

Love calls us to assume the best RATHER than the worst.

Love calls us to regard them with hope RATHER than suspicion.

Out of love for God and our brothers and sisters, we ought to grant them the SAME MERCY, the SAME GRACE, and the SAME HOPE we grant ourselves.

~ excerpts from the writings of Tim Challies

[mumblingsage]

Books are going back to the library this morning so it's time for some rapid reviews of ones I finished recently!

First: Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson, aka the one everyone seems to be reading these days. As they should! At 250 not-overcrowded pages, it's a smooth read that went swiftly once I put the time in (I read 30 pages on a 45-minute treadmill session, and I do not read quickly on a treadmill). That said, it's a literary novel, so don't expect a plotboiler. Patience will be rewarded as layers of history unfold.

Also, some parts are quite funny!

I'd resolved to read this one this year because someone on Bluesky said current events were turning them into "the grandfather from Gilead," and yeah, "For all this His anger is not turned away, but His Hand is stretched out still" is a vibe. Fire and brimstone preaching hits different when it's from a guy who aided John Brown and saw through Bleeding Kansas.

But the narrator, John Ames the grandson, is a milder type. Or perhaps just a cooler one. The book is in the form of papers written to his young son to be read after his death, which John Ames knows is rapidly approaching--he married late in life and his heart is failing him. So every line is tinged with love and grief and also Ames's congenital optimism (I suppose he might call it faith). Goddamn, does Marilynne Robinson know what words to use to end a scene. And her scenes are short, sometimes several on one page! It's like she's just showing off!

The sweetness doesn't mean there's no conflict. Not only between the various generations of John Ameses (Johns Ames?) but also with the bonus John Ames, John Ames Boughton, son of the narrator's best friend, who sweeps into town with a history of delinquency and worse behind him and seems to be getting far too close to the narrator's son and future widow. The narrator's optimism gets a bit white-knuckled at parts, leading to some of the best lines--

Now, you have to ask yourself, How lonely would a child have to be to have time to make such a nuisance of himself?

and

Harm to you is not harm to me in the strict sense, and that is a great part of the problem. He could knock me down the stairs and I would have worked out the theology for forgiving him before I reached the bottom. But if he harmed you in the slightest way, I'm afraid theology would fail me.

As part of my ongoing needle-threading of "I enjoy reading about kind-hearted people, pleasant people, and even polite people, but they can't be superhumanly composed all the time," this book is a stellar entry. (I also suspect we're meant to find the narrator too mild and nonconfrontational at times--likewise his father, who falls far short of his grandfather's crusading righteousness by turning pacifist--and I could even buy a somewhat cynical interpretation of the ending where what narrator presents, quite humbly, as a visitation of grace is instead an outburst of relief. But then, finding out you were wrong can leave you seething in embarrassed, confused resentment as much as relief; that John Ames chooses gratitude is part of his charm.)

The book is written through the lens of Marilynne Robinson's Christianity (her essays contain their own smooth, scorching brimstone on subjects such as justice toward the poor), so you'll probably get the most from it if you're able to vibe with or at least tolerate that. I'm an ex-Catholic but the tone is so gentle and non-preachy that it didn't trouble me at all. Hell, it's written with such convincing detail and confidence that I got swept up into the sheer Protestantism (the men running these churches have wives! And children!) without a qualm. Once or twice there's a reference to theological debates that went over my head (perhaps the point of that one scene is that nobody knows what predestination actually means?) but since the primary purpose of those references/debates is to shed light on the character dynamics, and those are all happening in subtext rather than the literal dialogue anyway, I don't feel deprived.

[shiroandblack]

I don't know if the 07-Ghost fandom is dead or alive, but it's still one of my favourite mangas to this day and I wanna talk about how love is both a blessing and a harbinger of doom in this manga. Let's start with Vanessa Antwort aka Chrom's legal wife and queen (because sadly, Millea Klein was a concubine because she was 'too lowborn' to be the Queen of Raggs).

We know that Vanessa was deeply in love with Chrom, but Chrom was deeply in love with Millea. However, Chrom also didn't treat her badly at all. When Ayanami said that she was granted the greatest consideration, aka having the political power as queen and also having Tiashe/Teito (considering in this era his name was Tiashe, I will be calling him Tiashe here) kept away from her sight, he was correct. While yes, this was definitely for Tiashe's safety because she absolutely did not look fondly upon him, but I think this was considered a concession to Vanessa because Tiashe is basically a living reminder that Vanessa will never be the 'first' in Chrom's eyes. Also I imagine it would be deeply humiliating for a queen, who has yet to have any children yet with the king, to have a concubine's child, who until she and the king have a child is the heir to the throne, be paraded in front of her. So yes, I agree with the notion that she was treated well in Raggs. Especially by Chrom, who despite not loving her the same way he loved Millea, held a degree of fondness or friendship for her and I think treated her with the respect and dignity her status as queen warranted. I think that in another world where Vanessa was not in love with Chrom, this whole political marriage might've worked out well.

Now, we all know Vanessa and Wolfram basically helped start the Raggs war which saw the Raggs kingdom destroyed and its people displaced simply because of . . . Unrequited love. Wolfram, the Emperor of Barsburg, was deeply in love with Millea (who was originally born in Barsburg) while Vanessa was deeply in love with Chrom. Don't get me wrong, these two were manipulated to the high heavens, however it's also important to remember that they did choose to do these things despite knowing it was objectively wrong. So many atrocities in 07-Ghost were done in the name of love, but so many wonderful things as well.

The first example I can think of is Castor and Lazette, who while not a romantic relationship (I don't interpret their relationship as romantic, however if you do then it's your prerogative) is still a relationship full of love. Castor, a young heir to an old and wealthy noble house, died for Lazette, a character whose very species is considered inferior to Castor, nevermind social status. And we see him being moved enough by the depth of Kuroyuri and Haruse's relationship (I'm sorry if I got his name wrong it has been years, it's Haruse right?) to give Haruse another chance at life, instead of the poor, half-life Ayanami was able to grant him. And Labrador's entire past was a tragedy, but he sacrificed himself for love as many characters have done.

Now, let's consider what is arguably one of the most important love stories in 07-Ghost. Verloren and Eve. Of which the entirety of the plot of 07-Ghost wouldn't have happened without them. Verloren and Eve loved one another and when Eve died, it all came apart. It's ironic that despite Verloren acting as if Eve was murdered unjustly, he is in fact her murderer. Her death was unfortunate and dare I say it, almost accidental. She fell back and Verloren touches her to catch her, and we know that as the god of death, his touch kills everything. And because of this, he is obsessed with finding her reincarnation on earth to the point he basically kills people just to see if their soul is truly Eve's and he reincarnates time and time again, just to continue his search for her. And we find out that it's basically all for nothing, because Eve has reincarnated as the light in every human's souls, as the goodness in their hearts. I personally think that it's very fitting that someone as warm and empathetic as Eve had basically become the manifestation of human kindness.

So yeah, I find it beautiful that 07-Ghost shows the duality of love. How love, while generally a positive emotion, can also lead to something terrible. The worst crimes in 07-Ghost are all done in the name of love.

[marquisedegramont]

I'm sorry to say this, but I think making Vincent someone who was born to legitimate wealth, and only got into the world of organized crime under the High Table as an adult, is kind of the least dramatic and least sympathetic interpretation. If he was born poor and underprivileged, and found crime to be his best route to the power and luxury he craved, that's both dramatic and sympathetic…if he was born to a rich crime family, that's maybe not quite as dramatic, but still sympathetic in that he might have preferred a more peaceful life as an art dealer or something, but was never allowed a choice. But if he already had wealth and privilege, but chose to go into crime because he craved more, that puts him in kind of an unsympathetic light. Just my opinion obviously but there it is.

What if I want to make him unsympathetic?🥺

On the serious note, as much as I really liked the headcanon that he came from an underprivileged and lower class background which is a headcanon brought on by both fans and Bill Skarsgård himself, people can have multiple interpretations to how they see characters and their backstories.

I just choose to make him unsympathetic because that’s how I personally see it. I always saw him as someone who’s ambition was dangerous for both himself and others, which was an idea mainly brought on by the last quote said to him by Harbinger (“A man’s ambition must not exceed his worth”).

Don’t get me wrong, I like villains to sympathize with, but to me the entirety of the John Wick villains are people who are either nurtured to be this way or they chose to be horrible people.

But to me, I really had the idea to make it hard for people to sympathize with him. You can write villains from rich and privileged backgrounds and still find a way to make an audience sympathize with them

[ahmedmootaz]

Good evening! As I was ubering to my house I had 2 questions that I think you'd be able to give good insight on.

If you had to kill a cast member in AiP (LC+LOR), who would it be and how would you execute it in your fic? I know we've had our close calls, but I do wonder how you'd handle having to get rid of a character, as I always find trouble on what to do with characters after they've had a journey.

What are some scrapped/ saved for other fics ideas you've had while creating in AiP?

Dear Anon,

Now that's quite the questions you've got there. I've given it a passing thought once or twice before, but now that you've asked, I've thought about it long and hard, so thank you for the fun thought exercise! Now, for the answers...

When it comes to a character I'd personally kill off, I'll be fully honest and admit that this probably comes back to my personal bias. I find it difficult to let go of characters which I like, so killing a member of the cast would probably need quite the strong and compelling narrative in order for me to follow-up such a task. In a way, the aftermath is the most important thing in such a scenario, not the death itself, as the interesting thing to read/analyse would be the reactions of those who have to grapple with the fact that someone they knew -and likely held dear- is no longer there. It's also a tough balance because I personally wouldn't want to always remind the readers about the passing of said character, but rather have the subtle yet permanent presence of their absence, if that makes any sense.

And with the AiP cast in particular, I'm not ashamed to say that I am quite attached to all of them, so choosing one to kill off is by no means an easy endeavour, but if I were forced to choose, I think I might cheat a little and go for X as my poor sacrificial lamb.

Now, the reasons for this choice are plentiful, seeing how X has a positive relationship with most of the cast, enjoys a long-enduring history with Ayin and Angela, and none of the Librarians think badly of him. By all means, I think that his absence can fulfil the sorts of reverberations in the plot that I think would justify his killing, where the knowledge of his absence is, in its own right, a silent presence that cannot be filled since he would be long gone.

As for how I'd go along with this idea, then I admit that I once entertained a little plot bunny about such a scenario. For me, I think that I'd either go for a sort of sacrificial death against a stronger foe, perhaps even the Distortion, during the inevitable re-confrontation with the City that Angela is planning, or I'd go with the hinted plot point of TMFoA where X has the ten year timer above him before his duration as a clone 'expires', as both situation offer a very interesting perspective to explore from the point of the view of X, someone who was mostly untouched by the vileness of the City thanks to his close presence to the Light and to the fact that his memory was constantly wiped, albeit imperfectly in my interpretation, which prevented him from succumbing to the City's cycle one way or another, even if it wasn't all that good for his health in the long run.

Regardless, what this presents us with is the first man "born" after the Light's release without any sort of lasting influence from the City beyond some ghostly sensations here and there, and thus in a sacrifice scenario, it would be a testament to humanity's lasting goodness in a way, seeing how even with so much to live for, X decided to give it all up for other people who likely wouldn't even know about him, not to mention if would be a good way to really harken how much the 'greater good' principles were drilled into him and offer an interesting monologue if such a scenario were to be written between X's desire to reject those notions that have chained him for millennia and his will to embrace them because he still wants to do the right thing despite how much the notion of 'the right thing' pained him.

And when it comes to the scenario of the 'slow withering' ending, if we were to call it that, it'd definitely be less climactic than the aforementioned potential sacrifice root, but it would also be very interesting to explore as a way of killing X off since there's always the chance of saving him one way or another during that decline, so it's almost guaranteed that he's the one who rejects being saved. It would present the dilemma of Angela's presumed immortality since it directly relates to her, seeing how a mere ten years was all it took for X to pass, and it would reverberate within her and cause a fear of losing the rest of the Librarians since she cannot age while they presumably do, and it would additionally put Tiphereth in the spotlight since she knows what it's like to have someone close to her who likely doesn't want to be saved, like how Enoch seemed so willing to 'shed his skin', as he put it. So this scenario would not only bring forth the immortality VS. letting life take its course arguments into the monologues and dialogues, but it would also relate to various characters involved, which would make the moment of the death the important part while the aftermath would be less critical to focus on in comparison because at that point, most would have come to terms with it since it was an expected and slow process for X.

And of course, by no means does this mean that I plan to kill off X anytime soon! I like him as much as everyone else, but it is very interesting to explore all of these options and analyse them if briefly, so once more, thank you for such a fun question!

2. Oh man, this is a good one. There are plenty of scenarios I've had in mind about other characters taking up the roles of the Trio of Idiocy as sorts of spin-offs that I thought about exploring at some point, such as a 'Adventures in Motherhood!' side-show with Angela, Gebura and Binah at the foray of the parenting experience instead of Ayin, X and Roland.

But when it comes to unimplemented ideas in AiP itself...I thought about adding a scene where Ayin and Roland make a little makeshift grave for Angela (and...Roland's child, since I assume that Argalia made sure that was also part of her puppet...) as a sort of apology to Roland for everything that has happened directly or indirectly thanks to him, however, I felt that such a scene didn't particularly work for AiP's atmosphere and would be better left for a more specific post-AiP extras segment or event one-shots detailing various events around the Library. I've also canned various different ideas for the "Slices of Life" Chapters, such as a more detailed cooking adventure with the kids, some more focus on X and his girls' history lessons, and I've thought about giving Gabriel some focus in a Chapter somehow, but I just didn't find anything that worked, so I tried compensating for that by involving him more than some of the others in the Sweeper Saga.

I've got to admit that I've had plenty of inspiration for other 'Fics while writing AiP, like exploring what-could-have-beens in certain spoilery situations, exploring more AUs like the 'Adventures in Motherhood' ones, etc...

Of course, if you want any detailed information or something of the sort, I would be happy to provide, but I don't want to bloat this answer too much otherwise.

Once again, thank you so very much for the interesting ask! I always like thought exercises like this, and I do hope that the responses pleased you! Until next time, stay safe, be well, and see ya'!