#i don't think erik's needs explanation
Explore tagged Tumblr posts
thunderboltts · 2 years ago
Note
Erik, Mac and Robbie for the blorbo ask!
SOME OF THE GUYS OF ALL TIME FR FR <33
Erik Lehnsherr:
Tumblr media
MacGyver:
Tumblr media
Robbie Turner:
Tumblr media
2 notes · View notes
urdreamydoodles · 3 months ago
Note
Hi hi!! Hope your day’s going well!!
I adore the krakoa headcanons you have for the x-men, how willing would you be to do something similar for mcu characters?? Idk if there’s an equivalent though, if not it’s no problem ❤️
MCU CHARACTERS X FEM!READER
A year after your death, you are resurrected and reunited with your lover
Characters: Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, Bruce Banner, Clint Barton, Bucky Barnes, Sam Wilson, Peter Parker (Tom H.), Stephen Strange, Thor Odinson, Loki Laufeyson, T'Challa, Marc Spector, Steven Grant, Jake Lockley, Scott Lang, Wade Wilson, Logan Howlett, Matt Murdock, Frank Castle, Benjamin "Dex" Poindexter, Wanda Maximoff, Pietro Maximoff & Erik Lehnsherr
Requests are reopened since I'm going to have surgery for my scoliosis...yes, it's bad news, it's a major operation, so I need your requests to feel better. PLEASE SEND ME REQUEST. I don't have surgery for another four months so I have plenty of time since I'm at home! I can't wait to see all your ideas, I LOVE YOU <3
Tony Stark
- Tony Stark, the man who could build a new world with his hands but could not stop them from shaking when they lost you. He spent a year in ruins, laughing too loudly at parties that could not fill the silence you left behind, drowning in half-finished projects where your ghost lingered in the curve of every wire. He never stopped talking about you—not to his friends, not to himself, not to the night. You were the equation he could not solve, the loss he could not engineer his way out of.
- When he sees you again, standing in the flickering light of his workshop, the wrench in his hand slips, clattering to the floor. He doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe. His mind, sharp as ever, gives him ten different explanations, each more impossible than the last, but his heart—his battered, grieving heart—gives him only one. “Tell me I’m dreaming,” he says, voice hoarse, because the alternative is something he cannot afford to believe.
- And then you speak, and the walls he built to keep himself from shattering crumble in an instant. He is across the room before he knows it, hands gripping your arms, your face, tracing the proof of you. The ache in his chest is unbearable, but not from pain—it is the sheer weight of having you again. “They told me I was crazy,” he murmurs against your lips, against your skin. “Guess they were right.”
- You are back, but time has moved without you, carving deeper lines into Tony’s face, dulling the arrogance that once carried him like armor. He watches you like you might disappear again, fingers always brushing your wrist, your hip, the pulse at your throat. He doesn’t sleep much—he never did—but now, when you wake in the night, he is already awake, watching the rise and fall of your breath as if it is the only thing tethering him to reality.
- He brings you everywhere, makes no excuses for it. “My ghost, my rules,” he says when someone questions it. He builds new suits and doesn’t let you out of his sight, not when danger is near, not when a single misstep could take you away again. He has never been a man who believed in second chances, but for you, he will believe in anything.
- The world thinks he is Iron Man, but you know the truth: Tony Stark is just a man who loved and lost and refused to let death win. He holds you like a miracle, like proof that he was right to fight for the impossible. And for the first time in a long time, he is not afraid.
Steve Rogers
- Steve Rogers has always known loss—has carried it like a second skin, worn it like a name he could never leave behind. But losing you was different. It was not the cold silence of the ice, nor the distant ache of time slipping through his fingers. It was immediate, brutal. It was your blood on his hands, your last breath against his cheek. A year passed, and he carried on because that was what he did, because that was what you would have wanted. But he stopped looking at sunsets. Stopped drinking coffee the way you used to make it. Stopped believing that the world could ever feel warm again.
- When he sees you again, standing in the doorway of the safe house, the shield strapped to his back feels heavier than ever. His breath catches, his heart stumbles, and for a moment, he wonders if this is some cruel trick played by an enemy who knows exactly where to cut him open. But then your lips part, and you say his name, and the sound of it is like the first breath after drowning.
- He moves toward you slowly, hesitantly, as if one wrong step will shatter the illusion. His hands hover over your face, your shoulders, trembling with the unbearable need to touch, to feel, to know. And when you don’t disappear, when you are warm and real beneath his fingers, something inside him breaks. His arms crush you to him, his breath shaking as he buries his face in your hair. He is crying, but he doesn’t care. “I held you,” he whispers. “I held you.”
- After that, he does not let you go. The world calls him Captain America, but to you, he is just Steve—the man who wakes up in the middle of the night just to press his forehead against yours, the man whose grip tightens every time you reach for his hand, as if to reassure himself that you are not a dream. He does not know how to make peace with this miracle, so he does not try. He simply loves you harder, holds you closer, refuses to waste a second of the time he was so cruelly robbed of.
- He is more protective now, but it is not the suffocating kind. It is the quiet, steadfast kind, the way he always positions himself between you and an open door, the way he memorizes the sound of your breathing while you sleep. He does not speak of the past year unless you ask, but when you do, the grief in his eyes is something ancient, something that will never fully fade.
- Steve Rogers has always carried the weight of the world, but with you beside him, it is lighter. You are proof that even after all the battles, all the sacrifices, the universe still has kindness left to give. And he will spend the rest of his life earning it.
Natasha Romanoff
- Natasha Romanoff has survived on borrowed time for as long as she can remember. She has lost, she has bled, she has walked away from battlefields without looking back. But losing you was different. It was the one wound that did not heal, the one loss she could not turn into fuel. She did not cry. Did not speak of you. She simply moved forward, faster, harder, with reckless abandon—because if she slowed down, even for a second, she would have to feel the hollow space you left behind.
- When she sees you again, standing in the shadows of a dimly lit alley, her knife is in her hand before she even registers what she is seeing. Her body reacts the way it was trained to, but her heart—her traitorous, fragile heart—stutters in her chest. “No,” she breathes, shaking her head as if denying it will make it any less real. “No, I buried you.”
- And then you step closer, into the light, and she sees the familiar curve of your smile, the warmth in your eyes. She drops the knife. It clatters against the pavement, forgotten, as she crosses the space between you in two strides, her hands fisting in the fabric of your jacket. Her lips crash against yours, desperate, searching, as if she can taste the truth in the way you breathe against her mouth.
- After that, she is different. Softer, in ways only you will ever see. She touches you constantly—not in fear, but in reverence. A hand at the small of your back, fingers trailing over your wrist, knuckles brushing against yours as if reminding herself that you are here. The world may question, but Natasha has never cared for the world's judgment. You are hers, and she is yours, and that is all that matters.
- She does not let you fight alone anymore. Not because she doubts your strength, but because she refuses to feel that kind of loss again. She watches you when you sleep, when you move through a room, when you laugh. She memorizes the details she once took for granted—the exact color of your eyes in the morning light, the rhythm of your voice when you call her name.
- Natasha Romanoff has spent a lifetime making peace with ghosts, but you are not one. You are flesh and blood, a heartbeat beneath her palm, a warmth she never thought she would feel again. And this time, she will not let you go.
Bruce Banner
- Grief is not an emotion Bruce Banner can afford. He has spent a lifetime suppressing, locking away the parts of himself that feel too deeply, because feeling too much is dangerous, and losing you nearly ended the world. The Hulk roared in agony that day, the earth itself trembling beneath his wrath, but even in his most furious state, even as he destroyed everything in his path, you were gone. And no amount of strength, no amount of science, could bring you back.
- He stopped fighting after that. Retreated. Isolated himself in a place where no one could see the way his hands trembled when they weren’t balled into fists, where no one could hear him whisper your name like a prayer, a question, a plea. He stopped shifting into the Hulk—not because he was afraid, but because the monster within him had nothing left to fight for. There was only silence, only the ghost of your touch, only the unbearable weight of having lived when you did not.
- So when you return, standing before him in the quiet of his lab, he does not react at first. His mind, trained to doubt, to question, to disassemble and understand, tells him it cannot be real. That the chemicals in his brain are firing incorrectly, that his grief has finally shattered him in a way no transformation ever could. But then you say his name, and it is not just sound—it is gravity, it is a force pulling him from the abyss.
- He crosses the room in a single breath, hands hovering over your face, your shoulders, your waist, unable to trust his own touch. He is afraid to break you, afraid to break himself. And then your fingers slip into his, grounding him, reminding him that this is not a hallucination, not a cruel trick of his subconscious. You are warm, real, here. And just like that, the weight he has carried for a year crumbles to dust.
- After that, he does not leave your side. He watches you sleep, not because he doubts, but because he cannot waste another second of the time he was so certain he had lost. He builds new defenses, new protections, because if death could not keep you, then neither will any enemy foolish enough to try. He teaches himself to trust happiness again, to allow himself to feel, because with you beside him, it is no longer a danger—it is a gift.
- Bruce Banner has always been afraid of his own power, but with you, he is not afraid. He is a man, not just a monster, and for the first time in a long time, he believes in the possibility of a future. A future where he is not alone. A future where he is not running. A future where you, against all odds, are still his.
Clint Barton
- Clint Barton has never been one to dwell. The life he leads does not allow for it—grief is a luxury, mourning a weakness, and the only way to survive is to keep moving. But when he held you in his arms, felt the last shudder of breath against his skin, something inside him shattered. And he did not put the pieces back together. He let them fall, let them burn, let the silence swallow him whole.
- The others saw him continue—heard his sharp wit, watched him loose arrows with deadly precision, saw the same easy smirk that had always been there. But they did not see the empty spaces where you used to be. Did not see the way he avoided the places you had loved, the way he drank in solitude, the way his hands curled into fists whenever someone mentioned your name.
- So when you return—when you step into the dim light of his hideout, when your voice cuts through the silence he has lived in for a year—he does not believe it. He grips the bow at his side, tension in every muscle, because this is a trick, a trap, an illusion designed to destroy him completely. But then you move closer, and the way you look at him—the way only you ever have—makes the doubt in his mind fracture.
- And then he is there, hands gripping your waist, your arms, his forehead pressed to yours as he exhales a breath he did not know he had been holding. He does not ask how, does not ask why. He only pulls you closer, lets himself collapse into the only thing that has ever truly felt like home. His fingers are tight against your skin, unwilling to let go, unwilling to lose you a second time.
- After that, he is different. Lighter, in ways only you will notice. He is still Clint—still sharp, still reckless, still throwing himself into danger without hesitation—but there is a warmth now, a flicker of something that had long been extinguished. He touches you constantly—not in fear, but in reassurance. His hand on the small of your back, his fingers brushing against yours, a quiet, wordless promise that he will not take a second of this for granted.
- Clint Barton has always been a survivor, but he did not truly live until you returned. And now, with you beside him, he has no intention of losing that again. He is yours, wholly and completely, and this time, no force in the universe will take you from him.
Bucky Barnes
- Bucky Barnes knows the taste of loss better than most. He has drowned in it, clawed his way through decades of it, watched everyone he has ever loved slip through his fingers like sand. But losing you was different. Losing you was not the slow, creeping erosion of time. It was a blade to the gut, a wound that never closed, an ache that settled deep in his bones and refused to let go.
- He did not grieve the way others did. He did not cry, did not rage, did not seek solace in memories. He simply stopped. Stopped talking, stopped trying, stopped allowing himself to feel anything at all. Because feeling meant acknowledging the gaping wound your absence had left behind, and that was not something he could survive.
- So when he sees you again, standing in the doorway of his apartment, he does not move. Does not breathe. His mind—trained to expect deception, to anticipate betrayal—tells him this is a trick. But then you step forward, and the way your eyes soften when they meet his, the way your lips part in a quiet whisper of his name, makes the world tilt beneath his feet.
- And then he is there, crossing the space between you with the kind of desperation that only comes from losing something you thought was gone forever. His hands tremble as they frame your face, his breath shuddering as he drinks in the impossible reality of you. He does not trust words, does not trust his voice to hold steady, so he simply presses his forehead to yours, breathing you in, grounding himself in the proof of your existence.
- After that, he does not let you go. He does not speak of the past year, does not tell you how empty it was, how he spent every night staring at the ceiling, waiting for sleep that never came. He only shows you in the way he touches you, in the way he holds you closer at night, in the way his fingers linger on yours as if afraid you might vanish again.
- Bucky Barnes has spent a lifetime being taken, being controlled, being used. But you are the one thing that was his, the one thing that was real, and now that you are here, he will fight for you with everything he has. You are his salvation, his anchor, his second chance at something he never thought he deserved. And this time, he is never letting go.
Sam Wilson
- Grief is a weight Sam Wilson carries well, but carrying it does not mean it is light. It sits in his chest, heavy and unmoving, an ache that never quite fades. Losing you was not a clean wound—it was jagged, raw, a battlefield farewell written in blood and breathless whispers. He held you, watched the life slip from your eyes, and still, somehow, he had to stand up. He had to keep fighting. Because that’s what you would have done. That’s what you would want.
- But wanting and doing are not the same thing. He laughed in public, told stories that made others grin, carried himself with the same easy confidence. But alone? Alone, it was different. He spoke to you sometimes when the night was too quiet, when the wind sounded too much like your voice. He ran until his lungs burned, trying to chase the memory of you, knowing he never really could.
- So when you stand before him, alive, breathing, real, the world does not feel like the one he left behind. His first instinct is denial—a trick, an illusion, a cruel joke played by something with too much power and not enough mercy. But you look at him, and there’s something there, something he recognizes too well. Love. History. You. And suddenly, the weight in his chest is gone.
- He moves before he can think. One step, then two, then his arms are around you, his head buried in your shoulder, a shuddering breath breaking from his lips. His grip is tight—too tight, maybe—but he doesn’t care. He needs to feel you, needs to know this isn’t a dream he’ll wake from. He says your name like it’s the only word he remembers, his voice thick with everything he couldn’t say when you were gone.
- After that, Sam is different. Lighter, freer. He still fights, still leads, still carries the burdens of the world on his back—but he does it with you at his side, and that changes everything. He touches you constantly, a hand on your back, fingers brushing against yours, small, quiet reassurances that you are here, that he did not imagine this.
- Sam Wilson has lost many things. He has seen friends fall, watched the world tear itself apart. But this? This is something he never thought he’d get back. And now that he has you, he swears to himself—he’s not losing you again. Not now. Not ever.
Peter Parker (Tom Holland)
- Peter Parker does not know how to exist in a world where you do not. The pain is not sharp, not a clean wound he can stitch together with time. It is suffocating. Slow. A weight pressing down on him, stealing the air from his lungs, making every step feel heavier than the last. He was holding you, talking to you, and then you were just… gone. And nothing he did, no amount of strength, no web-slinging through the city, no late-night patrols could change that.
- He keeps going. He has to. That’s what Spider-Man does. That’s what you would have wanted. But some nights, when he is alone, when the mask is off and the world is quiet, he feels like a boy again—small, lost, powerless. He whispers apologies into the dark, tracing the memory of your touch, trying to pretend he still remembers exactly what your voice sounded like. Because he’s terrified he’s forgetting.
- And then, one day, you are there. Standing in the shadow of a flickering streetlamp, watching him with the same eyes he never thought he’d see again. At first, he doesn’t move. He can’t. His brain refuses to process it, refuses to accept this impossible, beautiful reality. And then you smile—small, hesitant, you—and he breaks.
- He crashes into you, arms wrapping around you so tightly it almost hurts. His breath stutters, hands shaking as they press against your skin, your hair, anything that proves you are real. “You—” His voice cracks. “You died.” And it’s not an accusation. It’s a question, a plea, a broken whisper of disbelief. But you are warm, solid, here, and he holds onto that with everything he has.
- After that, Peter is clingy. He doesn’t mean to be, but he is. His fingers find yours without thinking, his arm curls around your waist at every opportunity, his webbing pulls you to him when you step too far away. He is afraid—afraid this is temporary, afraid that one day he’ll wake up and you’ll be gone again. But he also smiles more, laughs louder, lives in a way he hasn’t since he lost you.
- Peter Parker has lost so much. But this? This is a miracle. And Peter—Peter is going to make sure he cherishes every single second of it. Because this time, he has you. And that? That is everything.
Stephen Strange
- Stephen Strange is no stranger to loss. He has lived through pain, through heartbreak, through the destruction of things he once believed unshakable. But losing you—that was something else entirely. That was not just loss. That was devastation. It was the kind of pain that settled into his bones, that made the world feel quieter, colder, less.
- He did not weep. Did not rage. Did not crumble beneath the weight of it. Instead, he buried himself in his work, in his magic, in the relentless pursuit of something—anything—that could fill the void you left behind. He scoured the multiverse, searching for answers, but found only silence. Death, it seemed, was absolute. Even for you.
- So when you stand before him, alive, whole, untouched by the grave, he does not react at first. His hands twitch at his sides, eyes sharp, mind racing through a thousand possibilities, a thousand explanations. This must be a trick, a deception, some cruel game played by forces beyond his understanding. But then you speak his name, and the way you say it—the way only you say it—breaks him.
- He crosses the room in three steps, hands cupping your face, searching for any sign of illusion. But there is none. There is only warmth, only life, only you. His breath stutters, his fingers tighten, and for the first time in a long, long time, Stephen Strange allows himself to feel. His lips crash against yours, desperate, searching, as if trying to convince himself that this moment is not slipping through his fingers.
- After that, he is possessive. Not in a way that is suffocating, but in a way that is unmistakable. His cloak wraps around you when you are cold, his hands find yours beneath temple robes, his magic lingers in the air around you like a silent guardian. He does not say it—not outright, not often—but you know. You have always known. He cannot lose you again. He will not.
- Stephen Strange has faced the impossible, has bent time and reality to his will. But this? This is the greatest miracle of all. And he, a man who once scoffed at faith, finds himself believing in something again. Because if the universe had any mercy, any kindness at all, it would let him keep you. And this time, he will fight for that with everything he has.
Thor Odinson
- Grief and gods have never mixed well. Mortals mourn with time, with rituals, with whispered prayers to the sky. But Thor? Thor does not know how to grieve in a way that does not tear the world apart. He held you as you died, cradled you against his chest, his hands helpless against the tide of fate. The sky wept with him that day—thunder cracking, the heavens splitting open in rage, the storm inside him unfurling with no battle left to fight.
- He left Earth after that. It was too loud, too full of life, too painfully real in your absence. He searched for answers in the stars, in old myths and forgotten magic, in the whispered promises of gods who had lost more than he had. But the truth was simple: not even the might of Thor, not even the power of Asgard, could bring back the one thing he truly wanted. So he drank, and he fought, and he laughed too loudly to hide the fact that he was breaking.
- And then, one day, he turns, and you are there. Standing in the golden light of the Bifrost, impossibly, beautifully alive. His breath catches in his throat, Mjolnir slipping from his fingers, his entire body frozen between disbelief and desperate hope. “This is a trick,” he says, but his voice is hoarse, unsteady, as if saying the words out loud might make them false. But then you smile, and he is undone.
- He crosses the space between you in an instant, crushing you against him with a force that nearly knocks the breath from your lungs. His hands tangle in your hair, his forehead pressing against yours, and his chest heaves with something between laughter and a sob. “You have returned to me,” he whispers, reverence in every syllable. And then he is kissing you, fierce and unrelenting, as if proving to himself that this is not some cruel jest of fate.
- After that, Thor does not let you go. Not truly. His arm is always around your waist, his hand always at the small of your back, his eyes watching you as if you might disappear the moment he looks away. He tells you, constantly, in grand declarations and quiet murmurs, how much he loves you, how he will never lose you again. You are his greatest treasure, more precious than any throne, any kingdom, any power the cosmos could offer.
- The God of Thunder has lost much—his home, his family, pieces of himself that may never fully return. But you—you are here, in his arms, alive once more. And Thor, a warrior who has fought countless battles, swears that he will fight against gods and monsters alike to keep you at his side.
Loki Laufeyson
- Loki knows loss better than he knows himself. He has lost love, trust, family. But losing you—that was different. That was a wound he could not charm away with silver-tongued words, a pain he could not outwit or outmaneuver. You died in his arms, your fingers curling weakly around his wrist as the light in your eyes faded. And for the first time in his life, Loki Laufeyson was powerless.
- He did not rage. He did not scream. Instead, he withdrew, wrapping himself in silence and solitude, retreating into the shadows where grief could not be seen. The world continued without you, and he played his part well—smirking, deceiving, spinning tales as if he were not hollow inside. But in the quiet moments, when no one was looking, he traced the ghost of your touch on his skin and whispered your name like a prayer.
- So when he sees you again, standing before him in the flickering candlelight of some forgotten sanctuary, he does not react—not at first. His body stills, his breath catches, and his mind races through every possibility, every cruel illusion that could explain this. But then you speak his name, soft and familiar, and something in him shatters.
- He reaches for you hesitantly, his fingers brushing over your cheek as if expecting you to dissolve beneath his touch. And when you do not—when you are warm, and real, and here—a sharp breath leaves his lips, and he pulls you against him with all the desperation of a man drowning. His grip is tight, unyielding, as if trying to convince himself that you will not be stolen from him again.
- After that, Loki is different. Not softer, not weaker—if anything, he is more dangerous, more cunning, more willing to do anything to ensure you remain by his side. He keeps you close, always within reach, his sharp wit reserved for those who dare to threaten what is his. There is no force in the universe he fears, no power he will not challenge, if it means keeping you safe.
- Loki Laufeyson has never believed in fate, in mercy, in second chances. But you? You are proof that even the most broken of men can find something worth living for. And this time, he will not lose you. Not to death. Not to gods. Not to anything.
T’Challa
- T’Challa was a king before he was a man, a warrior before he was a lover. But you—you—were the one thing that belonged solely to him. With you, he was not a ruler, not the Black Panther, not the protector of a nation. He was simply a man in love. And then, in a single moment, in the chaos of war, you were gone. And he—T’Challa, the unshakable, the wise, the just—fell to his knees, holding you as the life slipped from your body.
- He did not mourn in ways the world could see. There were no public displays of grief, no speeches of loss. He carried the weight of your death in silence, bearing it with the same quiet dignity that he bore every burden. But in the stillness of his chambers, when no one was watching, he let the sorrow take him. He traced the last place he had held you, whispered your name to the night, and wondered if he would ever learn to breathe without you.
- So when he sees you again, standing beneath the glow of Wakanda’s golden lights, his heart stops. His breath catches. And for a moment, he is afraid to move—to hope. But you step forward, your eyes locking onto his, and everything else ceases to matter. The world falls away, and there is only you.
- He crosses the distance between you in a single step, his hands cupping your face with reverence, with disbelief, with a depth of emotion he has never let himself show before. He does not ask how or why. He only whispers, “My love,” as if speaking the words aloud will make them real. And then he kisses you—slow, deep, a promise, a prayer, a thousand unspoken words pressed into your skin.
- After that, T’Challa is your shadow, your shield, your unwavering protector. He does not smother you—he respects you too much for that—but he watches, always. His fingers linger against yours in quiet moments, his gaze softens whenever you speak, and when he holds you at night, it is with the quiet, unyielding certainty that he will never let go again.
- T’Challa has lost many things—his father, his home, pieces of himself in battles fought for the greater good. But this? This is something sacred. And a king who has been given back his heart will protect it with everything he has.
Marc Spector
- Marc Spector has never been good at losing people. He has lost too much, buried too many, carried ghosts in the hollows of his ribs and the shadows of his mind. But losing you—watching you die in his arms, feeling your body grow cold as his own blood soaked into the ground—was something else entirely. It didn’t break him. It obliterated him.
- He stopped pretending after that. Stopped holding himself together, stopped fighting for anything beyond survival. He threw himself into missions with reckless abandon, took every fight as if he was begging for someone to land a fatal hit. He couldn’t sleep in your bed, couldn’t bear to hear your name spoken aloud. He tried—Khonshu knows, he tried—to find a way to bring you back. Bargained with gods, hunted down forbidden magic, but nothing, nothing, worked. So he gave up. He accepted that this was his punishment, his curse, to keep losing the things he loved until there was nothing left of him.
- And then—then—you were there. Standing in the doorway, alive, whole, looking at him like you weren’t a phantom haunting his grief. He didn’t move at first, didn’t breathe, convinced you were another trick of his fractured mind. But then you spoke—soft, hesitant, like you weren’t sure if he would even want you back. And the moment your voice reached him, Marc snapped.
- He was on you in an instant, his hands on your face, your shoulders, your arms—anywhere he could touch, anywhere he could convince himself you were real. “Tell me I’m not dreaming,” he whispered, voice shaking, breath unsteady. And when you smiled, when you nodded, he kissed you—desperate, bruising, like a man drowning who had finally found air.
- After that, Marc is different. Not softer, not gentler—he has never been those things—but determined. He refuses to let you out of his sight for too long, refuses to take a single moment for granted. The nightmares don’t go away—sometimes he wakes up reaching for you, convinced he’s lost you all over again—but you are always there, grounding him, reminding him that miracles exist.
- He still fights, still follows the path Khonshu carved for him, but now, there’s something else driving him. Not vengeance. Not guilt. You. You, alive and breathing, laughing in the golden light of morning, rolling your eyes when he gets in one of his moods. And if he has to fight every god, every monster, every force in the universe to keep you by his side? So be it.
Steven Grant
- Grief is a lonely thing. And for Steven, it was lonelier than most. He didn’t have Marc’s rage or Jake’s cold detachment—he just had absence, an empty space beside him where you used to be. You had been his bright thing, his sunbeam, the warmth in his life he never thought he deserved. And then, in a moment of violence and blood, you were gone.
- The flat was too quiet after that. He still made tea for two, still caught himself turning to tell you something, still found little reminders of you everywhere. Your books on the shelf. Your perfume lingering in the air. A sweater you’d stolen from him, draped over the back of a chair. He couldn’t let go, couldn’t move—just existed, stumbling through the days with a polite smile and eyes that held too much grief.
- And then, one evening, as he shuffled into the flat with the exhaustion of another day spent pretending he was okay, he saw you. Standing there, real as anything, watching him with that soft, hesitant look you always had when you weren’t sure how he’d react. He didn’t even think. Didn’t question. Just dropped whatever was in his hands and ran to you.
- “Oh, love,” he breathed, his voice cracking as he cupped your face, pressing his forehead to yours. He was crying—of course he was crying—but he didn’t care, didn’t even try to stop. “I—I thought—oh God, I thought I lost you.” His hands trembled as he touched you, as if afraid you might disappear if he wasn’t careful. But you didn’t disappear. You were here. And when you kissed him—gentle, reassuring—he let out a broken, disbelieving laugh.
- After that, Steven becomes more himself again. The light comes back into his eyes, the warmth into his voice. He tells you every day how much he loves you, how grateful he is that you came back. He holds you for hours sometimes, murmuring little things against your skin, afraid that if he lets go, the universe will take you away again.
- You are his miracle, his impossible, wonderful second chance. And Steven, the man who never thought he was enough, now knows one thing with absolute certainty—he will never take you for granted again.
Jake Lockley
- Jake doesn’t grieve the way others do. He doesn’t sit in sorrow, doesn’t cry himself to sleep. He compartmentalizes, shoves it all into a locked box in the back of his mind and throws away the key. When you died, he didn’t break down. He didn’t scream. He just acted. Found the ones responsible. Made them pay. Made everyone pay.
- He convinced himself that was enough. That revenge was all he had left to give you. But when the dust settled, when the blood was washed from his hands, there was nothing. Just an emptiness so vast it threatened to swallow him whole. He became a ghost, slipping through the world unnoticed, unseen. He only spoke when necessary, only acted when called upon. If Marc and Steven noticed how much darker he’d become, they didn’t say anything.
- And then—then—you were there. Sitting in the backseat of his car like you belonged there, like you hadn’t died in his arms a year ago. He slammed on the brakes so hard the tires screeched, his pulse roaring in his ears. He didn’t turn around at first. Couldn’t. His hands gripped the steering wheel like a vice, his knuckles white with tension. “Not funny,” he rasped, his voice low, dangerous. “Not a game I wanna play.”
- “It’s not a trick, Jake,” you whispered. And that was all it took. He turned, his breath catching as he finally let himself look. Let himself believe. And the moment he did, something inside him snapped. He surged toward you, pulling you into his arms with a desperation he rarely let himself show. His face buried in your neck, his breath shaky and uneven, his body trembling as if the entire world had just shifted beneath his feet.
- After that, Jake is ruthless about keeping you safe. He doesn’t care how you came back—only that you did, and that nothing will take you from him again. He’s always watching, always waiting, always a step ahead of any potential threat. He doesn’t say it out loud, but it’s in the way he tucks you close against him in crowds, in the way his fingers ghost over your pulse like he’s memorizing it.
- Jake Lockley is not a good man. He never claimed to be. But you—you are the one thing that makes him want to be. And if death couldn’t keep you from him, nothing else will either.
Scott Lang
- Scott never truly believed in happy endings, but he believed in you. He believed in the way your laughter could turn an ordinary day into something extraordinary, the way your hand in his made him feel like maybe—just maybe—he was enough. Losing you shattered him in ways he didn’t even know were possible. You died in his arms, your blood on his hands, and in that moment, he stopped believing in miracles.
- He tried to hold it together for Cassie. He smiled, told jokes, did his best to pretend he was okay. But he wasn’t. His apartment felt too big without you, the bed too cold. He found himself talking to the empty air, half-expecting you to answer. The worst part was the moments right before he woke up, when his brain still tricked him into thinking you were next to him, breathing softly in sleep. And then he’d open his eyes and reality would sink in like a knife to the gut.
- When he sees you again, it’s like the universe plays a cruel trick on him. He blinks, rubs his eyes, thinks he’s hallucinating. But then you smile, that soft, knowing smile he dreamed about, and everything collapses. He doesn’t think—just moves, just grabs you, just feels. “Oh my God,” he breathes, his voice shaking, his arms wrapping around you so tightly he might never let go. “Tell me this is real. Please tell me this is real.” And when you nod, when you whisper his name, he lets out a half-laugh, half-sob against your shoulder.
- Scott becomes clingy after that—not in an overbearing way, but in a you-can’t-leave-me-again way. He constantly reaches for you, constantly checks if you’re still there. He makes up for lost time—cooking you breakfast (badly), taking you on spontaneous road trips, making you laugh until you can’t breathe. Every moment is precious now, every second a gift. He refuses to waste a single one.
- He tells you everything he couldn’t before. How much he missed you, how much it hurt, how many times he caught himself looking for you in a crowded room. He never wants to take you for granted again. Every night, he holds you like you might disappear in the morning, presses kisses to your skin as if he’s trying to memorize you all over again.
- Scott Lang doesn’t know why the universe gave you back to him, but he doesn’t care. All he knows is that this time, no force in the world—no villain, no bad luck, no cosmic cruelty—is going to take you away from him again.
Wade Wilson (Fox)
- Wade doesn’t mourn like other people. He doesn’t wear black, doesn’t cry softly in the night. No, Wade’s grief is ugly, loud, chaotic. After you died, he became worse—more violent, more reckless, more unhinged. He threw himself into fights he knew he couldn’t win, hoping—praying—someone would finally land the killing blow. But they never did. His healing factor cursed him to keep living, to keep hurting.
- He talked to you like you were still there. Made jokes to the empty side of the bed. Left your favorite snacks untouched in the cabinet. The others tried to check on him—Weasel, Domino—but he just shoved them away with a laugh, a joke, a bloody fight he walked away from without a scratch. “I’m fine,” he’d say, voice hollow behind the mask. “Totally normal levels of depression. Probably a seven out of ten. Maybe an eight. Who’s to say?”
- And then, one day, you walked through his door. Just like that. No fanfare, no dramatic music—just you, standing there, looking at him with that same familiar amusement in your eyes. He froze. Blinked. Looked down at the bottle of vodka in his hand. “Oh,” he muttered. “Guess I finally drank myself into hallucinations. Took long enough.” But then you said his name, your voice real, and everything inside him broke.
- He tackled you before you could even take a step closer. Knocked you onto the couch, onto the floor, onto him, his arms squeezing so tight it was a miracle you could still breathe. “If this is a dream, I swear to Ryan Reynolds’ beautiful abs, I will murder my subconscious,” he babbled, his voice cracking. He touched your face, your arms, every inch of you, just to be sure. And when you laughed—when you really laughed—he just lost it. Full-on ugly sobs, face buried in your neck, refusing to ever let go.
- After that, Wade is worse—but in a different way. He never shuts up about how lucky he is. Clings to you, wraps himself around you like a human (questionably clean) blanket, dramatically declares that if you ever die on him again, he’ll personally go to hell and drag you back himself. He texts you every five minutes when you’re not around. If you so much as sneeze, he’s already googling life-threatening illnesses.
- But beneath all the jokes, the over-the-top antics, there’s something soft there. Something raw. Wade Wilson doesn’t believe in happy endings. But he believes in you. And if the universe was kind enough to give you back to him, then maybe—just maybe—he’ll finally start believing in second chances too.
Logan Howlett (Fox)
- Logan is no stranger to grief. He has lost more people than he can count, buried more loved ones than he dares to remember. But losing you—you—was different. It wasn’t just another loss, another name on the long list of people the world had taken from him. It was the loss. The one that finally made him want to lay down and never get up again.
- He disappeared after that. Vanished into the wilderness, into the places where no one could find him. He drank himself into oblivion, picked fights with men twice his size just for the chance to feel something. The nightmares were worse—your face, your voice, the way you reached for him as you died in his arms. He could still feel your blood on his hands, still hear your last breath. There was no escaping it. No running fast enough.
- When he sees you again, it’s not dramatic. It’s not loud. It’s silent. He turns, expecting an enemy, a threat—only to see you. Standing there. Alive. His breath catches in his throat, his heart hammering against his ribs like it’s trying to break free. For a long moment, he just stares, his jaw clenched so tight it aches. “No,” he finally rasps. “No, that ain’t possible.” But you just step closer, your hands trembling, your eyes pleading. “Logan,” you whisper. And something inside him snaps.
- He moves before he can think, his arms wrapping around you with the force of a man drowning who has finally found solid ground. He buries his face in your hair, breathes you in, his whole body shaking. “If this is some kinda sick joke,” he growls against your skin, “I swear to God—” But you just hold him tighter, and he finally—finally—lets himself believe it.
- After that, Logan is fiercely protective. More than before. You are his second chance, his proof that maybe—just maybe—the world hasn’t taken everything from him. He keeps you close, always within reach. He doesn’t talk about the time you were gone, doesn’t say how lost he was without you—but you see it in the way he touches you, like he’s making sure you’re still real.
- Logan has lived a long life, filled with too much pain, too much loss. But now, with you back in his arms, he thinks—just for a moment—that maybe, maybe, he finally has something worth fighting for again.
Matt Murdock
- Grief became a quiet shadow in Matt’s life, a presence that never left. He carried it with him in the way he adjusted his tie, in the way he spoke to Foggy and Karen like he was fine when he wasn’t. He still went out at night, still fought in the streets, but the fire inside him had dimmed. He no longer fought to save the city—he fought because it was the only thing that numbed the ache of losing you.
- He whispered your name in his prayers, his voice breaking over the syllables. In his apartment, your absence was louder than anything else. He reached for you in his sleep, his hands closing around nothing, waking up with an emptiness so heavy it stole his breath. He let the guilt drown him—because you died in his arms, and no matter how many bones he broke or how much blood he spilled, he couldn’t change that.
- When you return, he knows it’s you before you even speak. The world is full of sound, full of heartbeats, full of voices—but yours? Yours has always been different. His entire body stills, his breath hitching in his throat. He listens, waiting for the trick, the deception, because he knows what death feels like. But then you say his name, and the world tilts sideways.
- He moves without thinking, reaching for you, his hands trembling as they trace over your face, your hair, your lips. “You’re real,” he breathes, almost afraid to say it. “You’re real.” And when he finally lets himself believe it, when he pulls you into his arms and holds you so tightly it aches, he lets out a broken sound—somewhere between a sob and a prayer.
- After that, Matt is different. He refuses to let you go alone anywhere, his protectiveness manifesting in quiet touches, in the way his fingers always seek yours. He’s softer now, more open with his emotions, because he’s lost you once and he won’t make the mistake of taking any second for granted.
- At night, when the city is quiet and his scars ache, he traces over your skin as if memorizing every inch of you all over again. “I don’t know how I deserve this,” he whispers against your hair, his voice raw with devotion. “But I’m never letting you go again.”
Frank Castle
- Frank has always been good at loss. Not because he accepts it, but because he survives it. Losing you, though? It was a different kind of wound, one that never stopped bleeding. He didn’t cry. He didn’t scream. He just became colder. The world lost all color, all meaning. He didn’t live after you were gone—he just existed, a weapon with no purpose but destruction.
- He stopped talking. Stopped caring. The men he hunted became nothing more than names on a list, their deaths nothing more than numbers. He never said your name, never spoke of you, because acknowledging you were gone would break something inside him that even he couldn’t put back together.
- And then, one night, you stand in front of him, breathing, alive, looking at him like he’s still the man you loved. He doesn’t believe it at first. His grip tightens around his gun, his entire body coiled and ready for a fight because this? This is cruel. And yet—your eyes. Your heartbeat. The way you whisper, “Frank?” like it’s his name that brings you back to life.
- His hands shake as he reaches for you. He touches your face like it’s something fragile, something that might disappear if he presses too hard. And when you don’t, when you lean into his touch with a softness he thought he’d never feel again, something inside him shatters. He pulls you against him, his grip almost desperate, his breath ragged. “I lost you,” he rasps against your hair. “I lost you, and I didn’t—I didn’t know how to keep going.”
- Frank becomes your shadow after that. He’s gentler with you than he’s ever been with anyone, but that protectiveness? That fire? It’s stronger than ever. If anyone so much as looks at you wrong, they won’t live to make the mistake twice. But with you? With you, he is something softer, something almost human again.
- He doesn’t pray, doesn’t believe in fate. But at night, when you sleep beside him, warm and real, he presses a silent kiss to your forehead and whispers, Thank you. He doesn’t know who he’s thanking. Maybe the universe. Maybe you. All he knows is that this time, he won’t waste a single second.
Benjamin "Dex" Poindexter
- Losing you broke Dex. And when Dex breaks, he destroys. He tried to keep it together—tried to pretend he could move on, that he could keep living without you—but the anger, the madness, the unbearable emptiness inside him only grew. The world felt wrong without you. He felt wrong. He stopped sleeping, stopped feeling anything but the burning need to punish whatever took you away from him.
- He lost control after that. Killed without hesitation, without remorse. Let his mind spiral, let his demons win, because what was the point of fighting them without you? You were his anchor, the one person who made him believe he could be more than the monster inside him. Without you, he had no reason to pretend anymore.
- When he sees you again, he doesn’t react the way most people would. No tears, no disbelief. He stalks toward you, his entire body trembling, his breath uneven. His fingers twitch like they’re reaching for a weapon—like he can’t decide if you’re a dream, a trick, or something worse. “You’re dead,” he says, voice flat, empty. “I held you while you died.” And then, quieter, almost desperate—“Tell me this is real.”
- The second you touch him, the second your fingers brush over his, he breaks. He surges forward, his arms crushing around you, his breathing ragged against your skin. “Don’t leave me again,” he whispers, his voice shaking. “Please. I can’t—I can’t do this without you.” And for the first time in a year, his mind is quiet. The rage, the spiraling thoughts, the unbearable emptiness—it all stops the moment you’re back in his arms.
- After that, Dex is obsessive. He always had that trait in him, but now? Now it’s even worse. You are his, and he refuses to let anything take you away from him again. He follows you like a shadow, sleeps with his arms locked around you, memorizes every detail of your body just in case the universe dares to rip you away from him again.
- There’s a darkness inside him, one that never truly fades. But with you alive, with you real, that darkness is tempered by something softer. Something dangerous. He’s not just a killer anymore. He’s yours. And if anyone tries to take you from him again? He’ll burn the whole world to the ground.
Wanda Maximoff
- Grief clung to Wanda like an old, tattered shawl, woven with the ghosts of everyone she had ever lost. She had thought she had reached her limit—that the universe could take no more from her than it already had. But then it took you. And that, she realized, was the cruelest cut of all. She had survived wars, watched cities crumble, lost her family, her brother, her home. But losing you? That was the first time she felt herself break.
- She became something else after you died. A ghost walking through her own life, untethered from the world. The wind carried whispers of you—the echo of your laughter in a marketplace, the ghost of your breath against her skin in the moments before she woke up alone. And the anger—God, the anger. She lashed out when she fought, red energy sparking at her fingertips with a ferocity she couldn’t contain. She wanted to hurt the universe the way it had hurt her.
- And then, like an answer to a prayer she had never dared to whisper, you stood before her again. At first, she thought it was another cruel trick, another illusion meant to unravel what little remained of her sanity. But then—then she felt you. Your heartbeat, your warmth, the undeniable reality of you. And the moment that truth settled into her bones, she collapsed into you, shaking, weeping, hands clutching desperately at your arms, your shoulders, your face.
- “You were gone,” she sobbed, burying herself in you like she could merge her soul with yours. “I—I felt you leave me.” And for the first time in a year, her magic did not rage. It did not spark and burn with untamed grief. It simply was. It curled around the two of you like a shield, like a silent promise that she would never let you be taken from her again.
- After that, Wanda became something softer, but not weaker. She still held the storm inside her, but now, it had purpose. Now, it had you. She held you like she was afraid the wind might steal you away again, always touching—fingers brushing over yours, arms wrapping around you in sleep, a protective hand against the small of your back in public. She had lost everything before. She would not lose you again.
- At night, when the world was still and your breath rose and fell against her chest, she whispered things she could never say in the daylight. Apologies, promises, prayers in a language she had almost forgotten. And when you stirred, murmuring her name, she simply kissed you—deep and slow, like she could pour her very soul into you, like she could make you stay this time.
Pietro Maximoff
- The world never felt fast enough after you were gone. Time slowed into something unbearable, something suffocating. Pietro had always outrun grief before, always left it in the dust, but your death? That was a weight even he couldn’t shake. He stopped joking. Stopped running for fun. The world lost its color, its spark, its meaning. What was the point of moving quickly when you weren’t at the finish line anymore?
- He tried—he really tried—to pretend. To act like he was okay, to throw on that smirk and tell people, “Eh, I’m fine.” But Wanda knew. She saw it in the way he sat still for too long, the way his hands trembled when he thought no one was looking, the way he lingered in places that reminded him of you. His speed was once his escape, his freedom. Now, every step forward only took him further away from the last time he held you.
- And then—then he sees you. And for the first time in his life, he can’t move. He just stares, his heart a violent drumbeat against his ribs, his breath caught somewhere between a sob and a laugh. “No,” he whispers, blinking rapidly, because this has to be some sick joke. “This isn’t real.” But you are. And the moment you take a step toward him, he snaps.
- He moves too fast, too desperate, grabbing you like you might vanish if he lets go. His hands cup your face, his lips press against every part of you he can reach—forehead, cheeks, hands, lips. “You’re real,” he gasps between kisses, between shaky laughter and choked sobs. “You’re—you’re real.” And suddenly, the world isn’t slow anymore. You are his new gravity, the only thing keeping him from spinning out of control.
- After that, Pietro is obsessed with feeling you close. He picks you up just to hear you laugh, carries you even when you insist you can walk. He talks more, filling every silence with his voice because silence is what haunted him for a year. And he touches—not just because he wants to, but because he needs to. Holding your hand, leaning against you, brushing his fingers over your cheek just to remind himself you’re here.
- And at night, when he curls around you in bed, his heartbeat thrumming like a song against your skin, he whispers things he’s never said before. “I thought I lost you forever.” “I never stopped looking for you.” “If you ever leave me again, I swear I’ll outrun death itself to bring you back.” And when you tell him you’re here, that you’re not going anywhere, he presses a lingering kiss to your shoulder and finally—finally—lets himself breathe again.
Erik Lehnsherr (Fox)
- Erik was already a man carved from loss, molded by grief, his soul tempered in the fires of tragedy. Losing you was not just another wound—it was the moment he snapped completely. He did not rage. He did not weep. He simply became something else. Harder. Colder. More dangerous. Without you, there was no reason to hold back. No reason to believe in anything but vengeance.
- The world paid for your absence. He became relentless, his war against those he deemed responsible for suffering escalating beyond reason. He did not believe in mercy anymore—because if the world had shown you none, why should he? But in the rare, silent moments when he was alone, when his hands were still for once, he would stare at the space beside him and feel something that terrified him. Emptiness.
- When you return, he does not react as a man should when seeing his lost love brought back to life. He does not run to you. He does not whisper your name like a prayer. He simply stares, cold and unreadable, his mind calculating every possibility—illusion, manipulation, deception. And then—then you reach for him, and the moment your hand touches his, his composure shatters.
- His hands shake as they frame your face. His breathing is shallow, his eyes burning with something unreadable. When he speaks, his voice is low, trembling with something dangerous. “Who did this?” he demands. Because someone had to bring you back. And Erik Lehnsherr does not believe in miracles. But when you smile—when you whisper, “I’m here, Erik”—his fury dissolves into something broken, something human. He kisses you like a dying man gasping for air, his hands gripping you as if afraid the wind might steal you away.
- After that, Erik is ruthless in his protectiveness. He keeps you close, watches you with the sharp gaze of a predator waiting for the world to try and take you again. But in private, in the spaces where no one else can see, he is something else. His hands are reverent as they hold you, his voice is soft when he speaks to you, and his nightmares—the ones filled with loss—fade when you press a kiss to his temple.
- He does not believe in peace. He does not believe in forgiveness. But he believes in you. And that? That is the only thing in this world he will not let go of again.
2K notes · View notes
xandezsims · 7 days ago
Text
L&D Trans Sim Tagging: EA Made an Oopsie
Xan here. Remember how I never got into Fullbody outfits, in the original Trans Sim tutorial? Well, I am honor-bound to get into it a little. Why? Because I made a discovery, and it's...not great.
TL;DR: The Part Flags for most of Life & Death are messed up. Trans Sims are wearing the wrong meshes and it cannot be avoided; EA has to fix it.
If this concerns you, please upvote the report, and spread the word. They have ignored the Sims community about gender-related glitches in the past. Help us make them fix this, so we don't have to.
In-depth explanation about the problem below.
I was stoked to see we got clothes for both frames in the newer packs. Finally, Sims can wear whatever gender clothing they want! That's the goal, right? But, recent testing made me wonder how they handle opposite-frames. I thought I could learn something to help with inclusive tagging. So, I stuck Carmen in a dress from L&D, and:
Tumblr media
It passes from the front, but...her chest. That's the opposite gender distortion. The one caused by putting a AM (masc frame) mesh on any AF (female) Sim, trans or not. I've definitely talked about this.
Tumblr media
I went and cloned both meshes to check the tags, and sure enough:
Tumblr media
Quick tagging lesson: toggling Restrict Opposite Frame means Carmen can't wear the AF one. She has to wear the AM frame dress, because as a trans Sim, her frame is AM. (Literally, the Opposite Frame of her gender.) But because she has breasts, she inherits the chest distortion all female Sims get wearing a man's top. The same applies for Erik, her counterpart (AM w/AF frame).
With a sinking feeling, I went back to the game and tried...everything.
Tumblr media
I ran out of space, there are more. Trans-men are the same. I got halfway through the AM catalog and ran out of willpower. I'm betting almost every item made for both frames in this pack is tagged wrong. It's locked by frame, instead of gender. With pants, that's not a problem--but tops, dresses and suits will all be swapped.
So, now we know Fullbody meshes work similarly to tops. They need to be locked by Gender. And it's really just that tag. To test, I went back to my cloned dresses, and fixed it with two clicks:
Tumblr media
This means all women regardless of frame can use the AF, and all men can use the AM. And here's the result: AF dress on AF Sim, AM dress on AM Sim. They literally swapped dresses.
Tumblr media Tumblr media
So, easily fixed! That's 2 files out of...all of them. (sigh) I filed a Bug Report, linked above. Hopefully the amount of evidence I provided will get an actual response. That, or they'll think I'm an arrogant prat for telling them how their game works. But, I didn't break it.
Moral of the Story: this is a great example of what not to do if you make cc, or if you retag what you download. Remember, if you want to limit who can wear a mesh:
"Restrict Opposite Gender" for Tops and Fullbody; this makes sure all AF and AM Sims wear their meshes, and don't end up with chest lumps.
"Restrict Opposite Gender" for AF Bottoms; Trans-AM Sims break in half. Don't Restrict AM Bottoms at all. They fit everyone.
Or, Don't Restrict Anything, if you want all options. Note: distortions will happen. Mark your gender filters. They help a lot.
Earrings, Hats, Makeup, Gloves, Socks, Tights work for everyone
Necklaces and Nails are "Restrict Opposite Frame"; Trans Sims can't wear these from their own gender. They don't fit.
If you got this far, thank you for sticking it out. My innocent question turned into a tagging lesson (again). But, if it helps anyone in the future, I'll be glad. At least now we know there's a problem.
Please boost the Bug Report, share if you found it useful, and thanks for reading. I'm on the soap box again re: trans inclusion, but it's still Pride and I can't not stand up for my people. The more we know, the better we can do on our side.
Finally, tagging some folks who might want to know, if they don't already (feel free to ignore): @sejianismodding @the-crypt-o-club @yooniesim @whyhellosims @thefoxburyinstitute @sims4tutorials @mmfinds @gncc
133 notes · View notes
purrlockswatson · 7 months ago
Text
Susan Kay's Phantom, WHY?
Tumblr media
Lord save me from Erik and Christine's child. I'll never recover from all the times the existence of that child hurt me - not in a good way.
The last 80 pages really turned the grasshopper for me. Kay built a beautiful opera house, then sent a flaming, gunpowder-loaded chandelier through the roof. I enjoyed the first three-quarters of the book. It took incredible storytelling and research to build up that sprawling history only hinted at in the closing of original novel, and I love how the story made a spectacular Frankenstein Phantom from many adaptations.
But then came Christine.
Kay's afterword makes it worse for me. She states she doubts that A) Raoul would doubt Christine's love for him, and B) whether pity is a strong enough motivation for Christine to go back to Erik in spite of her fear. Ergo: Raoul was right when he suspected Christine loves Erik.
Well, I can clear up both of those points - A) Raoul is an insecure, jealous boy; B) aside from pitying Erik, Christine thought she could pacify him by going back, making pity AND fear her motivations, which she explains in Apollo's Lyre.
But Phantom's loyalty to the original is beside the point. What disturbed me about this explanation is that Kay meant it to be a love story. But there is no love.
I have already harped on to two friends about Phantom of the Opera and sexuality (thanks to @blackforrestpunk and @blackghostm2o for putting up with me). I think I can write an essay on the subject. After all, vampire fiction is my area of expertise.
⚠️Warning: Heavier subjects discussed below. I don't usually post content like this, so I thought i should give a heads up.⚠️
Leroux's Erik was never sexually attracted to Christine. All his fantasies he concerning her were purely romantic, even domestic ('a wife to keep amused on weekdays and take out on Sundays') whereas in Webber's adaptation, seduction is a recurrent theme in the Phantom's songs. There is nothing wrong with adding this extra layer to Chrsitine and Erik's relationship, as long as it doesn't overshadow their artistic bind through music.
But in Kay's Phantom, towards the ending, Erik's music becomes purely a sexual euphemism. It's a hypnotic drug that he uses to control Christine, and of course, there is that scene where he describes himself assaulting her by playing Don Juan Triumphant.
That is deeply misguided. Erik's music was his one connection to the purest, truest part of humanity. He was treated like a monster and often lives like one, yet he could express and evoke feelings that no most people could never, through his song.
And there is the child.
Erik thinks that Christine looks exactly like his mother. He speaks of her as his daughter. He is, self admittedly, old enough to be her father. And they still have a son together. There is no context, no possible way, that this is romantic. Horrible things can happen in a book. But it needs to be clear that it is horrible. Not so with this abominable ending. It was written as a romance, the bittersweet parting of starcrossed lovers. If Kay set out to write a love story for Erik and Christine, she did not do it: there is no evidence whatsoever in the text I read that Christine and Erik love one another. Erik lusts after her; Christine is drawn to his dark broody mystery. That is not love; it's Twilight.
I will reread this book for the sake of the brilliant child Erik, who I see myself in, and for Nadir and my feline lady Ayesha, but I will never be reading past Erik's delightful meetings with his old friend. As far as I'm concerned, he lived in his damp cellar in peace, with a large salary, to the end of his days.
More rants, I mean, very dignified and reasonable reviews of POTO adaptations here.
86 notes · View notes
miscellaneousbullshit · 1 month ago
Text
I love AFTG desperately but I genuinely think the main POV charactrs are the least interesting. Or well, that's not exactly it, but I KNOW their stories and I HAVE the explanations of how their minds work and I don't really need/want any more, y'know? The reason I can't seem to get this series out of my head is because there are SO MANY great side characters and I can't get them out of my head. I want to know EVERYTHING about them. I want their prequels. I want their futures. I want fanworks centered around them and their lives and perspectives (something that i've noticed are really hard to find? Any recs are always appreciated!) I love Neil and Andrew and Jean and Jeremy but WHERE are my Renee POVs? My Dan and Matt love stories (PLEASE I love them sm, I need to see how Matt got through to Dan when she was very much not interested in dating at the time)?Where are my Allison and Seth star crossed lovers tales? My Ananya/Cody/Pat fluff? My Thea Muldani healing journeys? My Nicky and Erik angst and hurt/comfort? My Wymack and Abby moments? Allison, Dan, and Renee's enemies to friends arc? The Vixens side adventures while the cheer for the Foxes? Betsy Dobson's backstory? Aaron Minyard's life with Tilda? Aaron Minyard's life in general? Aaron mending his relationship with Andrew (without him always being painted like he's in the wrong when Andrew has done some shitty things and routinely fails to give him any grace whatsoever)? Where is Katelyn falling for this grumpy guy in her first year bio lab? Where is Kevin day just trying to get THROUGH his day? Where is Maria's story of being trafficked 'rescued' and how it affected how she raised Nicky and views her husband? Where is my Wymack and Dan father/daughter moments? Wymack and Kevin's bio family journey? Where is my Xavier story? Where is my Stephanie Walker (who we only see ONCE in canon) taking in and loving teenager gangster Natalie SO much she becomes calm, faithful Renee? Where is Riko's pov villain origin story? Where is Erik's quiet distaste about how Nicky's cousins and teammates consistently and brutally shit on him and devalue him when all he does is love them? Where is Mary Howard's life on the run? Where is Stuart's memories of his sister? Where is Mary and Nathaniel's marriage and how Neil came to be? Where can I read how Cat and Laila met and fell in love? About Laila's family and backstory? How Allison broke away from her parents? How Abby became a fox (she's their nurse but no one who works with the team has a squeaky clean past. Wymack's parents were wicked, but how did Abby end up at Palmetto?) Hell, I would read the dean of Edgar Allen's pov of realizing he has no control over the Nest and the panic and anger at the implications it has for his career and I'd read it GREEDILY. I'd read Kayleigh Day and her friendship with Tetsuji Moriyama and the birth of exy and i'd SCREAM. I want these characters and their lives and their stories without Andreil or Jerejean always being the focus. I've seen the core romances, I've read them a thousand times over, and I don't want to read them anymore. I want to read the LIFE, y'know? So many compelling characters and details and I can't find enough of any of them. There's more to the series than the main ships and I wish I could find more content about it. Give me stories centered around the dozens of brilliant and compelling side characters, I'm BEGGING
40 notes · View notes
exqorcism · 8 months ago
Note
Honestly, I’m getting tired. It’s literally bts pics from a tv show. He’s not even playing Jesus in the show. People are just looking for a reason to hate him at this point and it’s really pathetic. I was not okay with him posing with those guys and I felt like people had a genuine reason to be upset with him, but I also thought double standards were rearing its ugly head again. Let’s get mad at nick for posing with guys dressed as Lyle and Erik but let’s like and repost thirst edits of Nick and Cooper made up of scenes from a show where they play … Lyle and Erik Menendez. People are holding him to a standard that other celebrities aren’t held to. He can’t do anything without people picking him apart and “canceling” him. It’s honestly annoying.
YES YES YES 🗣️ louder for the cunts in the back!
nicholas chavez is not problematic.
so. i actually feel so bad for him because it must be so hard. he's just gotten popular how long ago... a month? two? and people are trying to cancel him so bad.
he can't do ANYTHING without getting hate - first people started bringing up his love life - since when is it anyone's business? calling him a bop, a man whore. people are feeling way too comfortable nowadays.
next ━ "nicholas doesn't support the brothers", "he doesn't give a fuck" ━ how can YOU know that. he doesn't owe anyone a ny thing. he doesn't need to be as vocal as cooper is about it ━ as i wrote in here aaand here. i honestly won't even talk about it anymore after this post because it's fucking annoying.
the picture with the dicks dressed as menendez brothers ━ disgusting. i'm not gonna defend this one because well. he could have refused to take it. he's a grown ass man, for gods sake. although, as i mentioned before, he is HUMAN. he is LEARNING how to be a big star, what he should and should not do. let's not pretend we are all angels, bffr. we all make mistakes, and sometimes we don't even realise we do something that might be considered wrong.
now... the (hot) god damn pictures... can we stop being so sensitive and fucking annoying!!!!!! 😁 i saw that post and thought that he looks so good, the brat dance made me smile sooo much ━ then i saw the comments... he is not. mocking. religion. he is not mocking your beliefs or your god.
"cancelling" an actor for being an... actor is fucking embarrassing. i just have to laugh.
why is everyone so obsessed with this man, with everything he does? why are haters the first ones in his comment section? god, even i am not that fast and i'm fucking obsessed with the guy. come on... people just hate to hate.
and! surprise! he doesn't owe you an apology ━ if you're offended by the pictures ━ because it's just the show. people think he dressed up as jesus for halloween... do your fucking research. read the caption. stop harassing the poor man i swear 😭
in this house we don't hate on nick ━ of course he needs to be held accountable for the menendez brothers picture, no explanation needed ━ but nothing else.
it's kinda funny because my man is just working, being an introvert and people think he's a soulless narcissist.
i guess people just hate rich, popular and hot men that live their best life... i kinda feel sorry for them, ngl.
and one more thing before i finish... nicholas' love life. the insults i've seen online are so concerning. why are people so comfortable to comment on other people's relationships? why do people believe everything they see on tiktok or twitter? calling him a "man whore" is wayyyy too much. like let this man breathe around another woman? or have female friends? god forbid talk to another woman...
i don't want to comment on his girlfriend because... i want need her man, why would i even talk about her 😭 i have my own opinion but lemme just not...
woof woof i'm yapping. but yes anon, i agree with you. 100%.
and finally! if u wanna talk about it (or just talk about nicholas...) then my dms are open!
and remember!!!! to treat people with kindness ♡ 🫧
(celebrities are also people).
77 notes · View notes
polydamnory · 8 months ago
Text
⚠️Something's Wrong Spoilers⚠️
Tumblr media
"They don't need to accept you-" YAH, I DON'T THINK THEY AGREE, JAMIE! Asset baby you deserve so much better than what the world keeps throwing at you.
Anyways, some take aways!
"The worst of us" is an accurate way to describe Marcus, thank you James
We don't really know what the Asset's sense of self was like before Marcus' code overtook them, but god do they sound like they have very little of it now. A "mockery of personhood" - it sounds like the've just become overwhelmed with self doubt and possibly self hatred (I'm assuming those were their words because it doesn't feel in character of James to essentially put those words in their mouth)
IF THAT'S FUCKING YOU MARCUS I SWEAR TO GOD-
Also what's with that weird music/sounds in the background during the call? Have we heard this before and I'm just not picking up on it?
Wow James is on edge - why does he sound so accusatory towards them? The frustration is palpable. He also sounds weirdly arrogant at times? This feels different than how he normally speaks to them.
The Meridian does NOT like the Asset - really just called them a fake and dropped them like a bag of rocks. Also, this could just be that Erik couldn't get the other VAs in time, but this doesn't sound like Min'Ara or E’Laetum. It's also only one voice and the transcript specifically lists the character talking as "Meridian". So who exactly is this? Does the Meridian have a consciousness outside of the two sovereigns that make it up? Because it also kind of sounds a bit like the Drove (is that the term? for all the other sovereigns trapped in death?)
Odd how James specifically says to have all the Deltas (demons) put back in containment when he said earlier only some of them were there via compulsion. Has some kind of fucked up implications on how the department treats even the demons that work for them of their own volition.
And lastly, as a phone was for some reason heard ringing again, I distinctly heard a whispered voice say "wake up" once again. No theories here on why that keeps getting repeated - the only idea I have is that this one of those classic "but it was all a dream" twists but that's stupid and I refuse to believe that's the explanation for all this.
48 notes · View notes
sleeplesssmol · 1 year ago
Note
Imagine if, somehow, Vertin got turned into pre-Breakaway Smoltin. Would chaos unfold in the Suitcase?
At first I was going to say "yes" but after really thinking about it...
Vertin's team is soooo protective of her. She'd be in safe hands. Also, Smoltin was a menace because she was forbidden from being true to herself. I think the team would be happy to show her new places, help her catch Critters, and tell her stories about their adventures. They'd give her the childhood she was robbed of. Even the little ones like Erik, Eagle, and the others would be happy to play the role of "Big Sister".
I'm sure she'd still get into shenanigans but everyone is in on it!
Also, maybe this could be an important time of healing for Sonetto. She gets to hug Smoltin. It's something she wish she did more of when they were younger instead of breaking her little heart. She'll be the one giving Smoltin toffees and sweets this time.
However, she is also unwilling to share Smoltin which means that the team is actively fighting over her. While Vertin was the black sheep at the Foundation, here she's the apple of everyone's eye 🍎
Regulus wants to show her all her favorite records.
Sotheby wants to show her potions and talk her ear-off about crazy ideas.
Druvis makes a swing out of tree branches in the Wilderness for Smoltin.
Blonney and Desert Flannel want to dress her up like a little doll.
Jessica introduces her Critter friends to Smoltin and the little one curls up between the fluffy Carbuncles.
Click is following her around and taking pictures of these precious moments.
Smoltin is in awe at how big Matilda and Sonetto are now! Matilda acts normal but admits to Sonetto in private that seeing Smoltin like this hurts. This is the life Vertin deserve; one full of happiness and belonging. She also remembers the day she thought Vertin was Reversed like the others which is something she never talks about, not even to Sonetto.
Smoltin befriends Pavia's dogs, who recognize her scent as the person who gives them treats. Pavia acts annoyed but makes no attempt to stop Smoltin from playing with his puppies. He even offers her some of his precious Gelato and is pleased by her excited reactions when she eats it. He tells her to smile like that more often because he's sick of her stoic face (referring to Vertin as the Timekeeper).
Oliver Fog wanted no part of this. He's only concerned about getting her back to normal, but X thinks the whole thing is hilarious. He is in no rush and takes his time showing her his inventions. He likes that Smoltin and Vertin are always curious and listen intently to his explanations, even if he can tell they don't quite get it.
Mesmer Jr. gave her exactly one head pat. She has a lot of baggage too, but in that moment seeing Vertin reminded her of their childhood before the Break-away event and the Parade. She and Smoltin were friends at one point. Part of her misses how things used to be and the other reminds her not to dwell on these things. Its easier to not care.
As fun as it is spoiling Smoltin, the team begins to miss their Timekeeper. Without Vertin leading them, there is a noticeable hole in their lives. She was a friend, leader, parent, and everything else they needed her to be. They develop a deeper appreciation toward her. After all, absence makes the heart grow fonder.
There are so many fun possibilities with this idea I'm sure other people have many. Feel free to share!
66 notes · View notes
pacing-er · 6 months ago
Text
Krakoa Era Reading List Cherik Version (part 5)
8. X Lives and X Deaths of Wolverine
A lot of rapid fire plot stuff and time travel fuckery. Centers around Wolverine, Jean, Moira, and Xavier and established some essential stuff for the following volumes. There are no Cherik interactions in this arc at all, but it may be necessary to skim through for plot reasons. Thankfully it's relatively short with only 3 volumes, combined into a single omnibus.
After this point the reading order gets super fucky so I'm trying my best 😭 Yes, there are reading guides that go issue by issue but I'm not keeping like 20 tabs open with all the different titles and switching between them.
9. Legion of X (Issues #1-5)
Mostly just Legion and Nightcrawler hijinks. Charles is in a scene interacting with his brother and David in a way I found pretty funny. Magneto does not appear at all in the first five issues, everything after that point contains major plot developments that are covered in Immortal X-Men, A.X.E Judgement Day, and X-Men Red.
10. Immortal X-Men 2022 (Issues #1-4)
The start of Professor X and Magneto's divorce era Krakoa edition 🙃 Magneto became disillusioned with the concept of Krakoa after everything that happened in Trial of Magneto and Inferno. Then a lot of conflicts happen one after the other and everyone's mad at each other. They are separated so not many shippy moments, but the initial breakup is worth reading:
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
You can read this one up to issue #4, after which I recommend reading all of A.X.E. Judgement Day.
11. Hellfire Gala: Immortal
Charles is in a single panel and that's it. Some pretty big villain!Moira stuff happens but idc so I just skimmed through it. I didn't read it so idk where it sits timeline wise but I think it's skippable.
12. A.X.E. Judgement Day
The entirety of the Judgement Day arc, happy to say that this one is only 6 issues instead of sixteen 🙃 You get a detailed explanation of major developments that are echoed in the rest of Immortal X-Men, Legion of X, and X-Men Red. You can read this one first but you won't get the context for certain things that are mentioned in passing. No Cherik interactions, unfortunately.
13. X-Men Red
Basically what Magneto and Storm have been up to on Arakko after Mag retires from the Krakoa council. Some really badass moments and I found the difference in Arakko and Krakoa culture to be super interesting. You also get to see Magneto's final words to Storm (about Charles), and later on some pretty intense Charles angst as he attempts to cope with Erik's permanent death. Tbh at this point I'm getting pretty tired of going back and forth between different titles so I read this one all the way through. Of the 16 issues only issues #1-11 have Cherik bait, with issue #11 specifically dealing with plot points from Sins of Sinister. I THINK if you want to read in the correct order you can read up to issue #10, read everything Sinister, and then go back and read #11. Everything from that point onwards in X-Men Red is Arakko and Storm-centric.
14. Immortal X-Men (2022) (Issues #5-10)
The conclusion of the Judgement Day arc and the lead up to Sins of Sinister. I really enjoyed the dynamic between Mystique, Destiny, and Sinister. Charles is called annoying a lot and Magneto's death is mentioned multiple times. Then some more unexplained developments are shown which I need to read the other titles to get context for. Great. Don't worry about Dr. Stasis or Nightcrawler's horns just yet, because by issue #10 there's a whole lot more to worry about. After a very cool monologue from Xavier we get a direct lead in to Sins of Sinister.
15. Legion of X (Issues #7-10)
Charles being a bad dad saga continues! Whole lot of twists and mysteries that are not resolved by the end. I think a lot of people will be frustrated by Charles behavior here, but to be fair he is likely being influenced by something/someone as shown in immortal X-Men. I find legion's storyline to be interesting so I didn't skip anything, but there are no Cherik ship bait-y moments aside from Charles generally missing him and being lonely.
Tumblr media
Idk where this sits in regard to Sins of Sinister, but seeing as Nightcrawler has horns and Charles doesn't have a diamond on his head, it likely sits somewhere between Immortal X-Men #8-10 on the timeline. Or simultaneously? There's a lot of timeline fuckery happening. I'm honestly so confused.
16. Sins of Sinister
Gotta be honest I didn't expect this one to be such a complicated read. Basically X-Men Red, Legion of X, and Immortal X-Men all build up to this single issue, at which point there's a whole new series of titles to read set in this Sinister-verse. Originally I planned to cover the whole sinister business in this post but it's a lot so I'm gonna cut it here. I think that Sinister is genuinely very funny so I do plan to read it all.
Tumblr media
According to this helpful guide on reddit, I seem to be on the right track. There are a LOT of titles going simultaneously for this period in Krakoa history, covering branching plots for Wolverine, the Marauders, Sabertooth, and more. I'm mostly concerned with plots having to do with Charles and Erik, so I'm not going to bother with those (maybe I'll check out Sabertooth idk). The important thing is that I've read all the primary interconnected titles: Immortal X-Men (*only up to issue #10), A.X.E. Judgement Day, X-Men Red, and Legion of X.
Honestly there are a lot of great moments, which makes it even worse that this is such an awfully complicated experience. I wish anyone attempting to read it all good luck and I hope this post is even remotely helpful.
26 notes · View notes
astroyongie · 6 months ago
Note
Can you do a rexting after break up for tbz too pleaseeeee ☺️
Like the one you did for skz 🩷
Thanksss
The Boyz: Texting You After a Breakup
Tumblr media
Note: again, I like to make these a little poetic and dramatic. Helps making ideas for future one shots
Sangyeon
"Fuck, y/n do you know how long I have been trying to reach you?" "I want to roll the numbers again, see if you will finally pick up. I miss your voice you know" "I want to feel my stars align again with your own." "When will you understand that even if the earth breaks and heavens won't open up for me, I can go through it as long as you are mine?"
Jacob
"hey y/n. please read this before you delete my number" "When you left me that day, I felt like I was walking bare feet into the ocean" "Not to drown but to be held by something reluctant to let go" "I am just trying to say that.. I love you. Please, let's fix things"
Kevin
"Y/n fuck these half asses excuses about us not being compatible and you being afraid of commitment" "When you can't swallow your demons, you become starving" "Darling, I'm noticing your flaws. I always have" "They're exactly what I want, even if you won't believe me"
Younghoon
"Listen, I have gave you time enough to think this through" "I can't know what's wrong if you don't talk to me, y/n" "I know every time you collapse into me, I know I can melt away this suffering you are feeling" "So please, lets this be the start of something new"
Hyunjae
"I miss you so fucking much" "I guess it goes to show, does it not?" "That we've no idea what we've got until we lose it" "I love you so much"
Juyeon
"Please understand that you have hurt me just as much a I did" "I remember now why I can't pretend when I am with you" "Yeah fuck this. I never think of you and all this screaming silence" "You want to leave? so be it. Just don't come back to me with your cheap talking"
Chanhee
"I am so sorry. Back then I didn't understood what you needed, that you were suffering and that I wasn't good for you" "So show me that which I cannot see y/n" "Even if it hurts me, I want to be here for you" "Even if I can't sleep, at least I know I wouldn't be hurting you"
Changmin
"You got this wrong y/n" "This break up is't my fault and it's time for you to realize it" "I'm not here to be the saviour you long for" "Only the one you don't deserve"
Haknyeon
"I think I own you a few explanations after our break up.. I ought to be honest y/n" "You are not sugar nor salt" "You are like something which is caught between black and white, not quite either day or night" "Y/n you are perfectly misaligned, and as long as you are lost, I cannot be the one who enlightens you"
Sunwoo
"Fucking hell I can't do this anymore y/n" "I can't stay away from you, can't you understand that? I am sorry pleas reconsider this" "I need you to tell me you met me in past lives, because I never felt tis empty before" "what might be eating me from the inside darling? please come back"
Erik
"Just listen to this y/n." "Have you ever had a hunger that whetted itself on what you fed it?" "Sharpened so keen and bright that it might split you open?" "Ever since you felt I can't stop feeling miserable. Call me. please"
40 notes · View notes
anukkuna · 6 months ago
Text
Day 8: Favorite underrated Spatort moment(s)
Once again, I'm gonna name two (whether you think they're underrated is up to your interpretation ofc)
(It's not one moment, but) Many things Pia and Esther do:
E.g. Their phone call in FdG oder their talks in KdE.
Tumblr media Tumblr media
Esther: *sus* "Wo bist du?"
Pia: "Ich hab' kurz geschlafen, 's is' alles gut."
- Esther und Pia, Der Fluch des Geldes
Also, their talk in FdG after Rost left with the car (hence the short missing scene fic I wrote)
Tumblr media
I think it's a valid point of criticism though, that, especially in FdG, their scenes mostly seem written to care for and push the male (Hörk's) storyline. For example, the scene with Rost and his car is here to show that Pia will write Leo, while their phone call is meant to highlight that they need to look out for the boiz once again).
Very sweet was on the other hand:
Tumblr media
Pia: "Du kannst meine Liebe nicht kaufen."
Esther: "Dein Herz gehört sowieso schon mir."
Pia: "Genau..." *smirk*
- Pia und Esther, Die Kälte der Erde
I don't think that this moment is underrated by the fandom, but compared to a lot of the male-centric hörk stuff around, it might be? And for regular Tatort audiences (like my parents) it’s definitely underrated, especially when you consider how much emphasis the show places on Hörk's relationship for the general viewer. (Also, there is little heterosexual explanation for this (in my mind))
2. Lida's confession:
Tumblr media
The moment in which Lida opens the door and greets them after calling Adam herself to confess that she killed Erik Hofer.
I think it’s underrated just how much symbolism is lies in this. Earlier in the episode, it was Adam who visited her, making the effort to get to know her and listen. Together with Leo, he dug up the past by going through all the files. Adam and the past are major themes in this episode - he, who literally returned to Saarbrücken because he wanted to come back to Leo.
Yet, it was Lida who called them herself and confessed. Might as well be that they would have caught her anyway, but she was brave and faced what she had done, confronted and overcame the past - although it came with a price. Revenge comes with a price.
These are also messages underlying the confession/confrontation scene - and they contain themes and conflicts for both Leo and Adam.
I feel like, this is partly why they look so pained in comparison to Lida who looks confident when she opens her door.
Tumblr media
Leo and Adam have (not yet) turly talked about what happened. Adam told Leo to suppress his memories of what happened fifteen years ago. Their past hunts them and will continue to do so for quite a while.
14 notes · View notes
messenger-of-stupidity · 1 year ago
Text
William thoughts hehe
I listened to it in art class today and accidentally started drawing his crown icon in the corner.
Anyways
His accent (even when redone by Erik) still itches my brain.
But, the fact he split up the explanations was pretty smart. He recognizes that Sam and Vincent are different. Sam is more comfortable with himself, holding less doubt about the person that he is than Vincent is. Vincent has had so much character development. So has Sam of course, but not from the same 180 personality shift Vincent has.
Vincent used to be our flirty-shoes-on-bed vampire. Now he's a dork who has a thing for crowns (COUGH COUGH). So William realized that Vincent would have more questions than Sam did and wanted to have a space for Vincent to ask all those questions. As for whether or not I think Vincent will leave...
No. I don't think he will. I do think he'll try to push more diplomatic solutions to the issues that rise up. Maybe, since Porter has been labeled as the hitman for the clan, Vincent will take charge over diplomacy. He certainly knows how to handle people if given some time to prepare. I could see Vincent and Lovely being the first resort, and if that doesn't work, Porter (and prolly Alexis) get involved. We know imperium Alexis isn't above bloodshed, so some of that has to transfer over to Canon. This way, Vincent can live knowing that they tried peaceful resolutions first. And, like a lot of other people are saying, he's too closely tied. Lovely and Vincent's whole sense of community lives within the clan. The Shaw pack are friends, but the clan is their family. If they stopped being Solaires, they would kind of be loners. No matter what William says about always being welcome.
But Sam.
Sam is absolutely leaving. He asked the questions he needed, and got the answers that came with them. He's already closer with the pack, having game nights and vacations and celebrations with them. David has told him he's family (I'm pretty sure). He even has some inside jokes now. Something I'm not sure he has with his clan. He'll definitely stay friends with Vincent, and always be grateful to William for distancing Alexis from him.
But being part of the clan seems to be painful for him. He doesn't enjoy any of the clan gatherings (Vincent takes some enjoyment from them, since he was looking forward to spending the summit with Lovely. Sam was not excited to go, even with Darlin and some of the Shaw pack coming) and is only close to Vincent and William. Plus his "That's all I need to know" totally sounded like a "Farewell then". He knew there was an option to leave, and with another sense of community waiting for him, he's going to take it.
Plus, he never took the Solaire name. I'm sure William offered it, but he didn't take it. Vincent did.
I am curious about how David is going to react to this. William invited his pack to a gathering where he had a double assassination carried out. And there's some tension between the older vampires and werewolves, so no matter how small of a chance there was, David's pack could have been blamed simply because of outdated prejudice.
Even if that didn't happen, it's not like David wants Angel anywhere near something dangerous. Like a potential vampire fight breaking out. We know how seriously David takes protecting his pack. I wanna see the conversation David has with William for putting his pack in a position to be involved indirectly with what happened.
64 notes · View notes
dross-the-fish · 1 year ago
Text
Phantom Ramble
I think one of the reasons I'm personally so resistant to viewing Erik and Christine's relationship as a romantic one is due to the fact that for most of the book I don't fully trust Erik as a character and I can't imagine Christine does either. Erik has a pattern of creating himself, whether it's the phantom of the opera, the angel of music, or even "Erik" we never really find out who he is. He says he wants to be loved for himself but he never is himself. He keeps himself hidden out of fear of rejection. Not just on a physical level but on an emotional one as well.
The name he gives Christine "Erik" is a name he came upon "By accident" and I've seen some people mention that in earlier versions of the story, like the original newspaper in which it was serialized, Christine stated that Erik picked that name because it's Scandinavian and he was hoping to use it to get closer to her, which is definitely a thing he would do and if not for the fact that the Daroga also knew him as Erik in Persia I would agree that's the most likely explanation.
I've always felt strongly that Erik cannot be taken at his word. He strikes me as the type to say anything he has to say to get what he wants and he has grown so accustomed to wearing masks that he is unable to take them off. Even when he's physically unmasked he still can't bring himself to reveal who he really is. Perhaps because he doesn't really know anymore, he has become his masks. His deformity made it necessary to hide from the world and every angel, phantom, friend, teacher or father figure he became feels like had to be meticulously created so he could slip on the role and play the part convincingly enough to fool those around him. This includes Christine. I think he was hoping that Christine would be the one who could see past the performances and I don't think she's able to for the majority of the book. Even when she's fascinated by him or feels pity she never comes across as someone who really KNOWS him. That's not her fault he has, intentionally and unintentionally, made himself unknowable.
Even the Daroga doesn't really know Erik, he has more insight than most people but Erik is as much a mystery to him as to anyone else.
Erik's world is the theater and he is a perpetual actor in his own narrative. It's instinct for him to simply become whatever he needs to be to frighten people away or draw them closer and I don't think he knows how to stop doing that anymore. He's so distant from himself that views his real self as dead, the real him is nothing but a corpse.
I think that's also what makes the ending, the final unmasking so poignant to me because that's the moment when Erik, the living person, not the character, is seen for the first time. It's the mask coming off for real at last.
"I tore off my mask so as not to lose one of her tears… and she did not run away!…and she did not die!… She remained alive, weeping over me, weeping with me. We cried together! I have tasted all the happiness the world can offer"
What Christine offers him in this moment isn't what I interpret as romantic love it's acceptance, it's compassion, it's seeing him and understanding him. She gives him this when he least deserves it and I feel like this is what makes Erik's redemption meaningful. That his humanity is acknowledge in his darkest moment by the person he's hurt the most. That he is shown that much grace and kindness and that he lets her go without getting the romantic fulfillment he was trying to coerce from her will always be infinitely more touching to me than seeing them in a successful romantic relationship.
I think I also just get tired of seeing romantic love touted as some be-all-end-all redemptive healing force and the thing that could "fix" this character and give him a happy ending.
Again, not saying people can't or shouldn't write their fluffy comfortable or their dark twisted Eristine fics, by all means, have fun and enjoy what you do, but I feel like there's very little appreciation for the redemptive arc in the book that isn't viewed through a romantic lens.
70 notes · View notes
kay0783 · 1 year ago
Text
The wedding has finally arrived!!! 💒🔔✨
As much as I love these characters, I would really like to transition to focusing on the vampires now, specifically the Solaires (duh lol). There's so much potential for new characters. Dimitri Rebane, more Porter audios, mayyyyybe William audios (👀), who knows!!! (Please read below!!!!! I have so many ideas and need to dump them somewhere) (⚠️pun not intended⚠️).
People may not agree with me on that, but hear me out! Vincent and Sam left the house of Solaires, so we could get audios here and there about where they (and their relationships) end up. Since the wedding is done and David stated that during the summit, someone from the house of Wright told him to stay away from the Solaires, that would give more of a reason to have dispersed audios for Vincent and Sam and to include new characters. They've been around for a long while now, and the werewolf culture is hashed out, so I feel that there isn't much else to do with them.
Here are some arcs that I think would be cool to enter:
1) Although we know about werewolf culture, we only know a little about vampire culture and their politics. I would absolutely LOVE to see how that comes to play in Porter and Treasure's relationship (*Important note*: During the summit, when it was pointed out by the Prince of the house of Bennet that Vince killed someone, Porter was Q.U.I.C.K to defend him by saying that Adam violated the bite/claim marking). It seems that Porter is very protective of Treasure and values the relationship with them, so I think there's opportunity to hash out Vamp culture/politics through that. Ex: Someone has an eye out for Treasure, Porter freaks out but they don't know why, then we get an explanation. Idk why, but it's interesting to me that Porter covered for Vince that quick, and for *that* reason. Of course that could be explained away bc he literally killed a King and was in charge of creating an alibi, but it felt like foreshadowing to me. At some point Treasure is going to have to be informed that their man's a hitman, and maybe it's the toxicity in me but I think Porter being quick to unalive someone for violating that bite claim could be an entry way into that conversation.
1.5) If we get Will as an official character (listener wise), then we can see how his and Porter's...uhhh...relationship. When we were introduced to Porter, he was very adamant (again, no pun intended) that Treasure's friends were not good people and went into a tangent about transactional relationships. I fully feel like this was a projection of his and Will's friendship. To support my point, the next audio was him contemplating the validity and ethics of the friendship. He even questioned if he was scared of Will. It would be great to see this explored further by more vamp politics videos. In my recent post about Porter, I wondered whether Will is going to manipulate Porter into becoming next in line for succession. Alexis is trash, Vincent is gone...so who's left???
2) Speaking of monarchies and successions, I know the fooliverse audios are not supposed to be taken as canon, but it's interesting that Erik brought up a whole new character for Milo's audio. Dimitri Rebane. Like...we get a first AND last name??? For a non-canon arc??? 🤨 We didn't even get Asher's last name until what? Almost a year ago? Erik seems very organized and well thought out, so even though the fooliverse arc itself isn't canon, the characters sure are. AND Mr. Rebane is a KING??? How come he wasn't brought up in the summit??? Hmmm.....🤔 Wouldn't it be crazy if he does become a canon character and ends up murdering Will and taking over the Solaire clan? Maybe he messes up the friendship with Porter to no return (maybe by messing with Treasure somehow) and Porter helps Dimitri become king because he's better, and he won't have to take up more responsibility than he could handle.
3) I get it, some people may prefer werewolves to vampires. But I think everyone forgot that THERE'S A WHOLE ASS WEREWOLF PACK THAT HAS NOT BEEN COVERED YET‼️‼️‼️We have the Keaton pack, but does anyone remember during one of Erik's channel anniversary streams where he did a kahoot-style game and alluded to the Moore pack (no, not Lasko lol). There were four options, the Shaw pack, the Keaton pack, the Moore pack, and some other answer. The Moores was the correct one and he even gave a geographic location to them in comparison to the Shaw and Keaton packs. We dead ass could have a whole nother set of characters from a whole different pack if he didn't give them the Frederick and Bright Eyes treatment and just ignored their whole existence .
That's all the brain dump I have for now. Sorry if I fried yours in the process, but I've been thinking about the Moore (or More) pack FOR YEARS.
(Also, Monarch Baz got pissy with David for not understanding vamp politics, AND it's confirmed that some vamps are involved with the inversion and close-knit case, which is more support for my reasoning and theory that we might be headed towards a vamp arc soon). If you guys like me dumping info and theories like this, PLEASE let me know. If not, I'll definitely keep my posts shorter in the future. Thank you for reading!!! 💜 Stay safe, drink water, and drive safe!
In the mean time, Dimitri from the movie Anastasia is my head canon for Dimitri Rebane.
28 notes · View notes
thevulturesquadron · 1 year ago
Note
Hello! If you don't mind answering, what are your thoughts on Rogue only mentioning Gambit during E.7 ? It felt weird after all these episodes and exploration of their relationship.
Ahoy there! 🛸
Well... I try not to put too much thought into it. Overall Bright Eyes felt like a moment of transition towards the finale (with an absolute kick-ass Rogue). I am happy they had an episode that showcased a part of what Rogue was going through after Genosha, because, as Amelia Vogh said - 'a survivor is the last thing I’d wanna be.’ So Rogue has a lot to process: the guilt and grief over losing Gambit, the uncertainty and anxiety around Magneto and well, the death of so many people around her. Remember what Magneto said? “We shall not live our days wondering if we could’ve saved more.” Rogue is doing just that - and it's hell.
About Rogue focusing just on Gambit - it makes sense. She held his body in her arms. That moment is with her probably every time she closes her eyes. The way I see it, there are two reasons why the focus has been only on expressing her feelings for Remy.
1. It might be just the way it is. Rogue and Gambit will always be 'the couple'. More so for TAS. They are one of the most well-known and popular Marvel couples so, after the drama was done, the writers needed to pull that ship back on course. It was always going to be like that and I'll be here for the ride. Not everything in media has to be written to match my preferences. Plus, the show has kept both of them in character and written them exceptionally well so far. Especially with Gambit, I am grateful for the care they put into portraying him, because in comics it's such a mess, depending on who's writing him. So I am expecting the focus to be on Rogue and Gambit from now on.
2. The other reasoning (from a media literacy perspective), and the one I prefer -  is that she's processing. It might turn out to be true or it might not - the show will tell us. But at this moment it does look like that. Grief, guilt, shock. First of all, in Magneto's case, there was no body. The rule is until the search is called off, if there is no body, there is no death confirmation. So Rogue is struggling to accept it. What she knows is that Remy is dead - that is a reality she cannot avoid and it consumes her. On the other hand she was refusing to face the possibility that Erik was also gone. Then Kurt made it real. In the privacy of that moment between them he said what she wasn't allowing herself to think or accept: that she lost more than one person she cared about. Secondly, also why it makes that moment with Kurt so much more heavy, is that no one else in the team knows of the emotional connection she has with Erik. Everyone who knew the depths (Gambit and, in parts, Madelyne) are dead. I don't think Rogue can voice her grief in front of the rest without an explanation. She can however channel it through Gambit’s loss. What is worse is that her feelings for Gambit are now intertwined with a lot of guilt, and she probably feels like she has failed him in particular. And it breaks my heart. I don’t think that’s fair towards her and I am not particularly a fan of that, but X-men has often times put drama ahead of character development. 
So is it the first one? Is it the second one? Who knows, maybe it’s a bit of column A, a bit of column B. But there is one thing that I would have liked the episode to show more of: I wanted to see Rogue processing what it meant for her to survive Genosha, to survive the genocide. I care more about that, about her humanity, her struggles and convictions, unrelated to the romantic aspects. Romance is not the ultimate form of love, and it doesn’t have to be the most intense display of love either.
46 notes · View notes
sarcasticgaypotato · 2 years ago
Note
tell me about chell, that potato hauling criminal
Tumblr media
Chell is such a fascinating character to talk about because she, even more so than Caroline, isn't a character... but she absolutely is, at the same time.
On the surface, Chell is simply a player stand-in. She's silent, her actions are decided by the player, and we never get the game telling us outright how she feels or what she thinks. The closest we get to a backstory comes from an Easter Egg (which I've already said I don't necessarily consider canon) and insults made at the player's expense. Insults that, for all we know, are completely baseless.
Chell can reasonably be whatever the player decides she is. (If she's like me, she's actually terrible at tests and fails at puzzles repeatedly before giving up and googling the answers.) Your Chell could be compassionate towards the robots— trusting Wheatley right off the bat and being torn up by his betrayal, forgiving PotaDOS and working together easily— or your Chell could be a silent, bitter, furious killing machine, craving robotic blood and hating every second she's stuck in this hellhole. Neither Chell is technically wrong, but neither is right either.
There's a lot that could be said about the personal projecting that people often do to their favorite characters in fandom, especially with characters as open-ended as Chell, but that's an entirely different can of worms. TL;DR If it makes you happy to picture a character as being like you, go for it. It might not be my cup of tea, but you're not asking me to drink it, so who cares?
All that rambling out of the way, who do I think Chell is?
I think Chell has more character than first glance would give her credit for. We can learn a lot from what actions the game's story forces her to complete and how other characters react to her, ultimately giving us a lot more to work with than Caroline.
Chell is intelligent. If you complete the games (even if you're terrible like I am), you've completed complicated tests and outsmarted a robot that nobody else has survived before. She has a logical brain for solving puzzles as well as a quick wit for thinking on her feet and getting through life or death situations. Chell might have some internal damage from her time in stasis, but she's not slow.
Chell is tenacious and stubborn as all hell. Canon material tells us this outright, I don't need to elaborate much. Chell refuses to be kept in Aperture against her will, she refuses to stay down, and she was willing to risk dying in space just to beat Wheatley. Our girl can hold a grudge if she wants to.
Chell is a little bit of a shit. There's an achievement for breaking all of Wheatley's monitors. Chell doesn't have to do that... but she can, and I think she does. Her jumping when told to say certain words? She's playing dumb knowing Wheatley's not going to get that she's making fun of him.
Chell is fair. She held up her end of the deal with Wheatley, he didn't hold up his, so he learned his lesson. GLaDOS saves her life, even when she didn't have to, and held up her end of the deal? Chell leaves Aperture without a fuss. She doesn't try to kill GLaDOS again or wreck shit on her way out. I believe that Chell's respect is hard to win back once you've lost it, but with the events of Portal 2, GLaDOS succeeded. Chell is perfectly willing to work alongside a partner, and in fact she does so quite well as we've seen, but only if they give her the respect she deserves. If you cheat her you are going to regret it.
Finally, concerning the 'mute' part of our favorite dangerous mute lunatic; I personally am in the camp of 'Chell can speak, she just doesn't want to give the robots the satisfaction.'
There are out-of-universe reasons for Chell not talking. Erik Wolpaw actually talks about the decision to keep her silent in the Kotaku article "Why Chell Doesn't Speak" and I'd recommend hearing what he had to say on the matter. However, that explanation doesn't necessarily need to dictate in-universe ones. I think Chell can speak because frankly, it checks out with the other observations I've made here.
She's a bit of a shit, so yeah, if she noticed it bothers the robots that she's not talking, of course she'd keep it up to annoy them, and she's stubborn enough to keep at it even when she's allied with one of them. Further, she's smart, so she would know that she has very little control in a place like Aperture. This is one thing she has complete control over, this is one card she can hold over everyone else, and she's going to keep it.
All that combines to become my Chell. She's probably different from your Chell, and that's okay, but I think I've made a pretty good case for why I see her the way I do.
I could spin potential backstories for her, but they'd all be very headcanon and speculative, so I'll save that for another time.
42 notes · View notes