#//but still have to handwave a lot so bear with me!

[olderthannetfic]

A hanfu isn't just a robe, though. It's a specific type of traditional outfit that has even more specific variations, and while you could describe it more specifically (e.g. she put on her red ruqun, with a pleated horse-face skirt), it isn't always relevant. I've never seen anyone bring this up for, say, kimonos, and I don't think the GOT comparison is fair, either. It'd be more like "he puts on his armour". What type of armour—lamellar, chainmail, heavy, leather? It doesn't always matter. 1/2

--

2/2. Putting down a category of traditional clothing as "meta terminology" also rather irritates me. Again, looking at kimonos. Perhaps it's unfamiliar because CN fashion isn't as widespread as JP, but it's literally just what the broad category of clothing is called, and within the context of danmei fandoms, it shouldn't be unfamiliar knowledge. Trying to Americanize everything by simply calling everything a 'robe' loses the point entirely and is the equivalent of really terrible translation. Sorry, one more thing. When I picture a "robe", I think of wizards. DND. Bathrobes. None of which bear any similarity to a hanfu, and unless you want to describe "a parted robe made of flowing Yun brocade with loose sleeves that wraps around the body, with a wide collar that has its right lapel crossed over its left, tied at the waist with a belt, with a jade pendant weighing down the long skirt" every single time it's brought up, I'm pretty sure "hanfu" is a more accurate descriptor by far.

Uh... anon...

1.

'Robe' is an extremely vague term that absolutely is used for all sorts of garments from all over the world.

The fact that you associate it with a tiny fraction of its conventional meanings isn't going to change how other people use it.

2.

I am indeed more familiar with kimono than hanfu, but I thought the other people did make explicit what their issue is, and it exists for Japan too.

Depending on when your canon is set (or its vague, handwave-y apparent time period for more fantasy canons), the word may not have been in use yet.

'Kimono' as a word is possibly as recent as the 19th Century, though I see one etymological dictionary saying 1630s. Prior to the 19thC, a lot of things we would now call 'kimono' were known as 'kosode'. The further back you go, the more other terms there are and the more the distinctions matter.

I'm personally a fan of fiction set in the Heian period, and they would absolutely not have been calling anything a "kimono" then, nor do the robes look like modern kimono.

Furthermore, a generic-ass word like 'wear on upper body'+'thing' doesn't get its modern interpretation until it has significant competition from Western clothing. Today, it has a relatively narrow range of interpretations based on the calcified form of traditional Japanese clothing that still hangs on.

It's an absurd affectation to insist on calling all ancient Japanese clothing 'kimono'.

That wouldn't be de-Americanizing your writing.

That would be "According to keikaku".

--

From what I've seen in other people's meta posts about Chinese fandoms, the reason people object to 'hanfu' in fic is that this word has gained a lot of popularity in very recent history as part of the hanfu revival movement.

While it existed before that, it wasn't used so consistently, and it mainly turned up in contexts talking about Chinese as opposed to foreign clothing. It doesn't seem to have been a general term used like "So-and-so put on his completely normal outfit to get ready for the day".

People are using it (outside of fic) to talk about a specific range of historically accurate Chinese clothing. It doesn't cover everything, and in the modern and highly gatekept usage, it specifically doesn't cover historically-inspired fantasy costumes like those on The Untamed.

If you're Chinese and you feel it should cover those, fair enough, but that isn't what a lot of the hanfu education blogs have been saying.

People aren't pulling this out of their asses out of a desire to be American. They're getting it from hanfu blogs asking them not to use the word like that.

If you think those blogs are wrong, please say that.

[poorlittleyaoyao]

vines I am staring at your MY canon divergence au and would love to hear more about it!!!

OKAY SO.

This AU exists for two main reasons:

1.) A lot of fix-it fic for JGY seems to focus on him being "saved" from his canon fate via romantic relationship, and that simply doesn't cut it for me. You really want to free him from the destructive weight of his misplaced filial piety in a way that doesn't just handwave it all away? You save his mom. You save his mom and enable them both to know JGS is a lost cause from the get-go and give them the means to forge a different path.

2.) WQ and MY are my faves and I want them to hang out!

As I said, I will almost certainly not write the whole thing out. I did post the inciting portion where MY actually arriving in Qishan and WQ starts treating MS, but as you can see, I did not finish it over the summer as intended, because I am the world's slowest writer. But I think about the ways it could go a lot! It's a little thing--just pushing a canonical event earlier in the timeline and changing the impetus--but it has SUCH impact. Aside from what I mentioned in the tags of that other post:

-MY no longer has any ties to Qinghe. He and NMJ can still clash (since MY is for all intents and purposes a Wen), but it's not personal in quite the same "I lived in your household for a substantial amount of time" sort of way

-WQ has someone she can talk to who's in similar straits! This is all based on CQL canon foremost, and what's striking to me about her is that she never gets to be a kid. Even at Cloud Recesses, while her peers are having a silly goofy time, she's on high alert doing WRH's work. WN's behavior suggests that he knows the vibe is weird, but he doesn't seem to understand exactly how fucked things are, which in turn implies that WQ is deliberately shielding him from it. That's so much stress that she's bottling up! With MY there in the same situation of abetting atrocities to protect beloved family members, at least she has someone to confide in (while their situations are juuuust different enough to conflict).

-MENG SHI REACTS TO: EVERYTHING. Those five sentences of information about her are so interesting. She's clever! She's shrewd! She's also compassionate, I feel, because MY had to get his altruism and his loyalty to those who show him kindness from SOMEWHERE, and he certainly didn't get it from his dad, WRH, or anyone else he grew up with. I have a whole backstory for her that I cannot write because hooo boy the effort required would not be worth the reward, but I want so much to explore how she'd respond to the fucked-up situation of being beholden to the Evil Regime. On the one hand, she knows the Wen clan under WRH are doing horrible things, and I don't think that would sit well with her. On the other hand... MY inherited his survival drive from somewhere, too. What does MS feel she owes to society when that society abused and degraded her?

-MS and WQ would also have some things to talk about on the "making great sacrifices for family" front, I think.

-Less seriously, XY meets MS and probably calls her a slur to be edgy, and she hits him right back but in a way that he finds fun rather than takes personally, and now she's on XY's list of People He'll Murder For On The Slightest Provocation.

-MY and/or MS might know about the core transfer and that sure is a fun piece of information for more people not named Jiang Cheng to possess!

-I think MS gets to date WZL firstly on account of WZL being a total catch who respects smart women going by his ??? with YZY, secondly on account of them both getting a lot of shit from society for their work (though the one who voluntarily disables people for a living is treated more respectfully by far bc this is a horrible garbage world!), and thirdly because MS is going to have to bear witness to Xiyao and Chengqing and she deserves something for herself there.

-I mentioned "what about after the war?" in the tags of that other post, but ahhh the Optimal Outcome here fixes EVERYTHING. JGS offers to legitimize MY. MY kind of wants to tell him to fuck himself, but realizes that his and MS are in a highly unstable position and he needs to go all-out on convincing people He Was A Good Guy All Along. (WQ and WN don't have that luxury with their Wen surname.) He accepts on the condition that prisoners are treated with mercy and MS is also granted security. JGS provides exactly neither of these things, as MS is either shunted off to a prison camp with the Wen remnants or she's isolated within Jinlintai as a means to keep MY compliant. How do we solve this? Unclear! Maybe XY finds out JGS is being a dick to Meng Shi, A Person He Likes, and he impales him about it. Regardless, we have MY and the Jiang sibs (plus Jiang-in-law Zixuan) all conspiring together, and in an ideal scenario, I believe in them.

-There are also a lot of sad messed-up ways this could go, but. I do not want it to this time. At least not for my two faves and MS. Everyone else........ debatable.

Again, I cannot stress enough that this is not ever going to be an actual longfic. I have written one (1) longfic ever and it was three years ago and not even that long. But it has POTENTIAL.

[dross-the-fish]

I have a small criticism. I feel like you're treating Victor and Adam as though they are mentally and emotionally on equal footing. I know you don't intend to be, but that's kind of ableist. Adam doesn't have the advantage of a full life experience so his actions can't really be held against him in the same way as a normal person. It's arguable he doesn't fully know the extent of the harm he's causing and I feel that, if anything, it's Victor who should bear the brunt of responsibility.

I get where you're coming from but I have to respectfully disagree.

Adam is a fictional character created through extraordinary means and with superhuman abilities, including above average intelligence (he learns how to speak fluently without directly being taught language and seems to easily comprehend that his actions are wrong and harmful) I don't really view him as being mentally disabled. We can say he's socially stunted and that he has no baseline for human interaction but I don't feel like that's enough that you can handwave what he's done or absolve him of the responsibility for his actions.

Do you know that before he kills William he had planned to kidnap him and basically raise him so that he would have a companion? He was intelligent enough to figure that a child might be unbiased and could be raised to see past his appearance and he is willing to kidnap said child. Then as soon as he realizes the kids is a Frankenstein and squeezes the life from him, after which he CELEBRATES because now he knows how to hurt Victor. He then frames Justine out of spite because he presumes that if she saw him she'd also recoil in disgust.

I believe Adam could have been kind, sensitive and benevolent if given a chance. But he wasn't given a chance and that's not solely on Victor. Victor had no idea that Adam had any capacity for learning or reasoning and he could not have predicted Adam would come after his family.

I think what makes Adam salvageable is the fact that he does learn to regret his actions and feel genuine remorse for the lives he's taken and he realizes that revenge didn't do anything to ease his pain. I do view Adam as a tragic character who was horribly mistreated by Victor and by society as a whole and I do feel sympathy for him. I can do that while still acknowledging that this is a very dark character who does and thinks horrific things that end up costing innocent people their lives.

And honestly? For me that's what make the character interesting, that he is complex and has a lot of depth to him. I think he's a good character and I enjoy analyzing him because he is a fully nuanced person.

[minorfamilysupremacy]

it is insane to watch bible's actions nowadays. i will say, even back in kp era, there were one or two things he said that made him deeply unlikable to me, but like most i just ignored it. but holy hell has the facade dropped. the only thing he is now is a professional victim and you can tell he is SO pissed that his little show failed. these interviews or rather fluff pieces are just for bible to be sad on camera because it's the only way to stay relevant and ensure his fans continue to attack and blame build for everything, because despite it all, his fans couldn't be arsed to watch his show so this is all he has left. they will continue to beat the dead horse of "it was a thing that happened between two people", because anything else would mean they had to admit they chose the side of the woman who was sentenced to prison. oh and btw bible, weird how you never faced any repercussions for your social media posts about underage girls, rape, and transphobia... sure has its benefits being close to ponf hasn't it. god I hope karma comes for all of these people.

yeah, as an ex-stan i know i personally handwaved away a lot of stupid shit as his being young and having been catapulted into overnight fame and blah blah blah, but no. we got played for fools. dude's a piece of shit through and through and it's honestly kind of horrifying to watch. like, really, dude? pond is the fading star you want to hitch your wagon to? i'm just embarrassed watching him make a bigger and bigger ass of himself in every interview. it's always someone else's fault, he's always the victim, bloo bloo, crocodile tears (even more embarrassing since a lot of these interview questions are sent in advance so he can practice his fake waterworks).

and i think in his warped little mind, it IS build's fault that 4m is such a shitshow, or at least he's firmly convinced himself as such, because he and pond are glued at the asshole now and he can't let himself go against the party line. i've always thought sammon deliberately turned in a subpar product -- after all, did BOC ever say boo about the plagiarism accusations? because i sure don't remember it. and poi was punching way above her weight class by dragging in a much more respected writer when she was just trying to have a petty grudge match against her ex. i lost respect for sammon in the entire debacle for other reasons (i draw a hard line with animal violence, and the very vague details i know make it just sound gratuitous and lazy writing), but i was shocked she even stuck around to give them SOME kind of script. pond must have the best lawyers in thailand when he draws those contracts up.

but 4m was a shitshow not because of build, but because of poi and, more importantly, because of pond. pond sat back and dithered about which nong (gag, dude) he could wring more coins out of and tried, unsuccessfully, to play both sides like the loathsome little quisling he is. he did fuck-all to protect his talent and then he gambled on the 4m name still having enough appeal to gawkers to be successful, when anyone with two brain cells to rub together could have told you the project should have been scrapped with a quickness. (besides, if the version of the show we ultimately got bore ANY resemblance to its original vision, i sincerely question what was so tear-jerking about it. but i have a feeling what it was originally envisioned as is a far cry from the steaming pile we got.) the fact that they couldn't get anyone to pair with bible for ages is yet another red flag pond ignored, because god forbid he admit to any fuckups, and the coping about how jes is actually So Much Better and Lovely and Wonderful and their chemistry is So Incredible is...well, it's fucking pathetic. it's clowns all the way down.

and pond further bears responsibility for that fuckup of a 'rollout' of the show. how many countries did it get aired in, officially? seven? eight? half of those were places where explicit gay sex (which, as near as i can tell, is a good portion of the show to make up for the limp writing) is banned. european and american fans got entirely shut out from official support. i suppose that's probably because when build was in berlin, he personally spoke with the german government and explained that they needed not to air this particular show as an act of revenge, right?

but bible is never going to fucking look at the dumpster fire his life and career have become and lay the blame where it belongs, because he and pond are in this creepy symbiotic relationship where pond pimps him out to keep the business going -- seriously, jeff fucked off ages ago and mile is MIA with schrodinger's girlfriend, so they have no major talent outside bible to rely on -- and in return, bible gets shielded from repercussions outside of some well-deserved social media jeering. and both of them constantly pat each other's asses and soothe each other's egos and keep each other from any kind of introspection.

bottom line is, pond thought build was expendable at the time, because he was rolling in so much KP goodwill he thought the gravy train would never stop. turns out build wasn't expendable, so now pond's gotta choke the life out of the other half of the pairing to make sure he doesn't give up the grift (his constant european vacations don't pay for themselves, do they?), and that other half is more than content to play his simple-minded lackey because it's easier than having to fucking put a modicum of effort into anything.

karma will get them -- of that i have no doubt. there's too many rumblings of discontent, too many oldheads who have turned anti, not enough new people to stem the hemorrhage. man suang, for all pond's windbaggery, sank without a trace. THC is more notable for its controversy and rigging than anything else. DFF and 4m both couldn't sustain themselves through their entire runtimes and even people with no axe to grind with BOC were critical about the latter. they keep scrabbling for relevance in idiotic ways -- a sitcom with bible? a sitcom?! with what fucking comedic timing? -- or are late to the party -- they're supposedly planning a GL, which, by the time it gets to market, will just be one of many. gap was a while ago. GL isn't as much of a novelty as it was. and i mean, let's face it: do you trust this fucking studio with GL? i wouldn't trust pond to take out my trash without ripping the bag open, spilling it everywhere, and then making childish vague references about how SOMEONE he used to know paid off the hefty bag company to make his (pond's) life harder.

pond's all ego, greed, and stupidity. he'll trip over his dick (well, harder than he has already) soon enough. i personally can't wait to see it happen.

[agwic]

my opinions on post-canon homestuck

i see so many opinions on this mess. always. but especially now that it's back. and most of these opinions are bad. so here i am, to grace the world with my objectively correct take, which is that post-canon homestuck is bad exclusively because it does not include best spidertroll aranea serket.

PART 1: OVERALL OPINIONS

ok more seriously(but no less pretentiously and arrogantly, this is homestuck after all) i did in fact enjoy reading the epilogues and hs^2 and was sad to see it go. im unsure if i thought it was good, but i would rather it exist than not exist, and if that doesn't mean it was good, what does? I do think this new team will probably do a better job though. that doesn't mean im glad the old team got harassed off the project, obviously. ugh i dont know what crowd im pandering to with this. if i start with what i disliked about post-canon homestuck, it'll scare off the people who liked it, even though i think they're on the right side of this fandom conflict. but if i start with what i liked, it'll scare of the people who hated it, who make up a majority of the fandom, and also have quite a few good points. i guess ill just assume the crowd which was more charitable to post-canon homestuck will also be more charitable to me, and start with what i disliked.

PART 2: CANONICITY

is post-canon homestuck canon? the epilogues say that they're "outside canon" but not "non-canon". this is a shitty answer and anyone with the pattern recognition skills necessary to recognize a double negative can tell. i feel like the epilogues knew this was a shitty answer, but that doesn't mean i don't want a better answer. maybe we'll get a better answer, eventually. now, the correct answer is that post-canon homestuck is not canon, but still has a bearing on canon. because that's the only answer that doesn't cause several issues. like, if they're just fully non-canon, basically just fanfiction, then that would open up a gaping plot hole in homestuck, of "hey wait what about the masterpiece and lord english". some people think you can just ignore this fact, but i am not one of those people. on the other hand, if they're just fully canon

PART 2.5: THEY DESERVED A HAPPY ENDING

hey wasn't the intermission after act 3? do i need to rearrange this post to be a weird meta reference to the act structure of homestuck? the answer to one of those questions is yes and the other is no, but getting more into that is for another section. anyways yeah, the title kinda says it all. what was the point of homestuck if, after all that, they opened the door to the new universe, and shit just kept happening. this is also why you can't handwave that earlier plot hole with "oh they just went back to handle it at some point and died" because that doesn't sound like a happy ending to me. and if they don't get a happy ending after all that, then homestuck just becomes a neverending black hole of infinite cynicism, which i am not a fan of and would be horrible. and even if, after all of the post-canon bullshit, they get another happy ending, who's to say that happy ending won't be ruined for no good reason like their last one was? i mean other than the fact that they'll presumably be out of classpects by then. oh that's another reason this can't be wholly non-canon, we need those classpects. someone needs to explain to me what a sylph is and kanaya did a pretty shit job at it if im being honest, and im sure aranea would have had a good explanation but they fucking erased her from existence so.

PART 2.5.5: MY HEADCANONS! NO!

that's not how numbers work. but anyways, another reason declaring this as wholly canon would be shitty is that post-canon just kinda stomps over a lot of headcanons for little reason. trans girl roxy, for instance. also people who think jade doesn't have a dog dick exist and are quite loud but they're not me so they don't matter. let's talk about trans girl roxy. or not, since all there is to say on the matter is that roxy is a trans girl. i could go into why i have this headcanon but does it matter? does any of this matter? no not really. but im sure you have some headcanon which post-canon invalidates for no reason, so you can empathize with me here.

PART 3: VRISKA DID SEVERAL THINGS WRONG

alternate title: "kate mitchell did in fact have some bad takes". this could be folden into the previous sub-section but vriska's too important for that. actually fuck no, vriska isn't important at all. you know who is important? the answer is aranea in most scenarios, but in this case, the answer is tavros. when hussie glorified vriska and shat on tavros, it felt like a joke, like literally everything hussie ever did. when kate glorified vriska and shat on tavros, i got the impression she genuinely believed the shit she was spewing. now, did she deserve to be harassed for her horrible takes? obviously not, that would be something vriska would do, and thus hypocritical. especially the blatant lies, because wow i just googled "kate mitchell homestuck" and people are lying even more blatantly about her now that they were back when hs^2 was ongoing? anyways this section isn't about kate mitchell, it's about vriska, and by that i mean it's about tavros. speaking of tavros am i literally the only person on earth who projected onto tavros while reading homestuck? like i rarely get the impression that other people are actually sympathetic to tavros, they all just see him as pathetic. which makes me sad. even though he is pathetic. oh vriska also did another thing wrong, which was indirectly cause aranea to metamorphosize into a piece of sh

PART 4: THE META SHIT

despite the title for this section including the word "shit" we're now onto the good parts of post-canon homestuck. because the meta shit was genuinely entertaining to me, and also i've seen enough analysis of it to know that it's not just surface level bullshit trying to look interesting. it's been long enough since i read the epilogues that i probably couldn't contribute anything to that discussion but i have it on good authority that this is good and not just my brain activating whenever i see meta shit and/or time travel. oh also this is the section where i was supposed to talk about structuring this post based on homestuck but im not doing that

PART 5: HOMESTUCK WASN'T OVER

this kinda contradicts one of the earlier sections. but it's true. there were several plot threads left hanging by the end of homestuck proper. most notably caliborn's masterpiece, the defeat of lord english, and the four missing classpects. the meat epilogue handily dealt with those first two, and if hs^2 doesn't deal with that last one i am going to track down andrew hussie and silently hand to him a strongly worded letter while holding a butter knife. i know i already said this but it bears repeating. i need to know what a sylph is. so that i can write my 10,000 page aranea-centric fanfiction. im begging you. do you not want to see my 10,000 page aranea-centric fanfiction? do you not w

PART 6: THERE WAS SOME OTHER GOOD STUFF IN THERE TOO

putting actual trans characters in homestuck was a good idea. shame they picked the wrong one. i imagine they'll get around to making june canon eventually. i cannot state my opinions on jade's dog dick or else risk being forever barred from the homestuck fandom. some of the gamma kids are interesting. tavvy and yiffy, specifically. i wanna see where those two characters end up going. "deltritus" is a funny name. i sure hope that ripping off the main plot point from "to boldly flee" was intentional. im not sure if that last sentence was a good thing. but it was an entertaining thing. um, the more homestuck there is, the more likely aranea gets brought back? ok yeah now im grasping for straws but im sure you get the idea

PART 7: I'M STILL CALLING IT HS^2

why did they rename it. that was a very silly decision.

oh hey 7 parts that's nice. if i moved part 2 to the end it might mirror homestuck better. but im too lazy to do that. pretend that this mild oversight is actually a brilliant creative decision okay? okay.

[liminalpsych-in-teyvat]

Notes for A Matter of Duty - Chapter 4: A leaf drifting in the sea

An actual plot-heavy chapter! And is there a thing such as un-porn? Porn that turns you off? (I guess that’s the definition of a squick.)

This chapter took the longest to write so far... in part because it required me to actually figure out more of Inazuma's political situation, and plan out the political intrigue that I've so far been vaguely handwaving. (I'm going to have the Inazuma section of the Genshin Impact wiki memorized at this rate. And Ayato's entire story quest.) Hat tip to my nesting partner who is good at political intrigue plot and workshopped it with me, otherwise I would probably still be stuck.

Also took a while to write because I had to make up an original character, because I couldn't find an Inazuma NPC that fit the role. I planned for Toru to be creepy (his placeholder in my notes until I figured out a name was "Creepy Old Man"), and then learned more about him as I wrote/outlined further, and thought maybe he wouldn't be creepy after all. (Maybe he's just a lonely old man and it was a big misunderstanding?) Aaand then I wrote the actual chapter and never mind, he's rather creepy and writing that scene felt gross and squicky. Might have to just gloss over/summarize future scenes with him because I don't particularly want to sit in that feeling again, but we'll see how things develop. (I'm outlining way more than I normally do with this story, but I'm still ultimately a seat-of-the-pants kind of writer, and it always feels somewhat like I'm following the story/characters where it happens to unfold rather than making deliberate choices. If I try to force it into a different shape than the one it wants to take, it never works as well.)

I know you can't buy miso soup from Shimura's, but it's where you get the recipe, so I assume it's on the restaurant's menu somewhere.

I didn't intend to write the origin story of Thoma's aversion to alcohol in his "Least Favorite Food" voice-line, but it happened anyway. ("As far as food is concerned, I'm fine with anything. If we're counting beverages, though... I'm not very good with alcohol. Don't laugh, and before you say it — yes, I've wondered what this says about my identity as a Mondstadter. But, y'know... too much alcohol is bad for you, anyway. So not drinking is a good thing.")

Also, a note: Gonna be depicting all sorts of varieties of sex work and sex worker in this story. We’re pro sex worker rights and decriminalization around here, SWERFS can GTFO, you probably won’t enjoy this story if you’re here for a “sex work bad / all sex workers are victims / save the poor sex workers” kind of story. A not insignificant number of my friends are sex workers in one capacity or another, from legal licensed full-service girlfriend experience to side hustle passion hobby to cam work and stage work, all across the gender / sexuality / romantic orientation spectrum. I’ve heard a lot of stories and perspectives from them over the years, and my writing’s informed by that. I know it might at first look like we’re going down the “sex worker as victim” plot line, but bear with me and it’ll develop into more nuance over time.

And again, a sampling of my Google search successes when studying up for this chapter:

Japanese etiquette according to a fascinating 1897 article in the Sacramento Daily Union. Particularly focused on hospitality.

Japanese gift etiquette, around giving and receiving gifts.

Visiting etiquette in Japan, according to another 1897 article, this time in the Hanford Journal.

Japanese slipper culture, because yes, there is a technique and etiquette all around the various times to wear and remove different kinds of house-slippers. I'd lay money that Inazuma incorporates this aspect of the culture, because you can find shoes sitting right outside the door of a few different Inazuma houses, even if they don't bother animating it because that would probably be too much trouble.

Etiquette of feudal Japan, covering bowing, speech, audiences, and especially sword or weapon etiquette.

Drinking etiquette in Japan. Why yes, most of my research this time was around politeness rules, how could you tell?

Japanese economic history prior to the Meiji restoration, aka during the Tokugawa Shogunate / Edo period which is the closest analogue to Inazuma. There were... a bunch of other articles on historical Japanese economics, but I won't bore you with them. Let's just say that as brilliant, detailed, well-researched, and cohesive as Genshin Impact's worldbuilding is, they really drop the ball on economy design and government design.

Summary of the fic itself with content warnings, tags, etc below the cut so you can decide if you want to read it or not before you click on the link.

A Matter of Duty

"Back then, I had no choice but to accept the position I was in. While I desperately looked around for powerful supporters, I endured smear campaigns and attempts to exploit me. I had no other choice... I didn't mind what became of me, but my family... No one can ever be allowed to trample over my precious family."

How Ayato secured powerful supporters, endured exploitation, and weathered the storm of the years following the death of his parents... and how Thoma helped him contend with a bunch of self-serving, degenerate public officials.

And how, after much stilted fumbling and well-intended sacrifice, they learned the truth of one another's hearts.

Note: Mind the tags. More specific content warnings will be given at the beginning of each chapter, and the story tags will be updated as needed. All characters involved in any sex scenes are adults.

Rating: Explicit. It's porn with plot. Porn as a vehicle for plot, or plot as a vehicle for porn, you can interpret it either way. (I prefer: porn and plot as a vehicle for ~feels~)

Tags that I'm not actually turning into tags here, but it gives you an idea of what you're in for: Kamisato Ayato/Thoma (Genshin Impact), dubious consent but not between Ayato and Thoma, slow burn, sex ed, first time, self-sacrifice, humiliation, exhibitionism, oral sex, anal sex, bdsm, bad bdsm etiquette, rough sex, breath play, impact play, bondage, service kink, abuse, sadism, codependency, shame, guilt, jealousy, possessiveness, trauma, ptsd, dissociation, political sex work, or sex work for political maneuvering, or political survival sex work if that’s a thing, exploitation, blackmail, political machinations, political intrigue, no aftercare, maybe someday some aftercare, hurt/comfort, mostly hurt for a long time but eventually comfort, oblivious disaster gays, for such socially savvy people they are terrible at personal relationships, dominant Ayato, submissive Thoma, top Ayato, bottom Thoma, Ayato is incredibly parentified, Thoma has no sense of self-preservation, self-sacrifice isn't a contest but don't tell Ayato and Thoma that, it's like the snipe-the-check game at restaurants but with sex and politics, Kushiel's Impact, no really this was in my drafts for the longest time as Kusheline Thomato Fic, everyone's an adult in this timeline except Ayaka, she gets protected at all costs, original characters out of necessity, finding appropriate existing Inazuma npcs for some of these roles was impossible, no beta we die like ayato's parents

Full fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/47604337?view_full_work=true

Chapter 4: A leaf drifting in the sea: Thoma completes Ayato's deal with the elderly accounts manager of the Kanjou Commission. He mostly keeps his promise to not push himself in the process. ...Mostly.

Chapter contains: sex work (for political favors), oral sex, significant age difference, alcohol, pressure to drink alcohol, drunkenness, more plot than porn. Also general... creepiness/squickiness, I guess? Aka writing this made me uncomfortable and I'm not sure exactly how to content warn for it.

[fuchsiamae]

13, 18, 25, and 50 for fanfic asks

13. Do you listen to music while you write?  If yes, what have you been listening to recently?

(oh fuck you, you know the answer to this and it's embarrassing.) so. I only recently started experimenting with writing music, and I've found that one mood-appropriate song on loop is helpful. but in the last month or so, idek why, but I've been using whole musicals that I was into in high school. more varied than a single song but my brain can still treat it as white noise bc I know it so well. so for the last few weeks it's been this production of phantom and this sweeney, just over and over again.

18. Do you enjoy research?  Which fic of yours required the most research?

"enjoy" is the wrong word. I enjoy it like a bear trap. sometimes research turns up fun new ideas, but on the other hand, one time in like 2012 I agonized over picking Exactly The Right date for a fic and then looked up the weather on that date in 1962 or whatever. it feeds into my desire to Do It Right, which is a problem. trying to embrace handwaving and narrative justifications rather than getting a good grade in historically or scientifically accurate fic.

on the other hand, sometimes you just gotta look at 1950s cars for a solid 6hrs. bear trap.

25. What’s your favorite part of the writing process (worldbuilding, brainstorming/outlining, writing, editing, etc)?

learning to enjoy the zero draft. spitting out the idea with no polish, the way I'd write it out in a no-effort post or explain it to someone. helps articulate the core of what the thing is, even if it's in unusable language, because the unusable language is evocative to me personally. like emotional shorthand.

50. How would you describe your writing style?

uhhhh. I lean colloquial. tend towards short sentences -- rare that I use more than two commas at a time, and I like short punchy words for emphasis. shorter overall, which means I'm good at squeezing a lot out of a few words, and less good at long rich descriptions when I want them. I feel like trashy romance novel is my vibe, which is weird because that's a genre I never read, but I never read them so that could be way off the mark.

[marcogarciadiaz]

placement  ~ self-para

tagged: Marco, with Maine Office of Child & Family Services NPC, Loren Abbott

location: Marco’s house

what: In the middle of prepping for the long weekend, Marco gets an unexpected phone call

when: Sunday, July 3rd, 2022 @ 11:45am

tw: drug abuse (non-explicit and mentioned in passing)

Marco wasn’t exactly the type for a normal 9-to-5 office job, but he had to admit, getting long weekends for federal holidays was one of the upsides of a career in construction. No one wanted a whole-ass construction crew renovating their basement on a holiday, so at the very least he could count on the downtime.

He hadn’t even settled on his plans for the Fourth yet, to be honest — one of the guys on his crew had invited him around to a late afternoon barbecue, and he had half a mind to throw together a batch of his abuela’s cornbread and take him up on it, and there was always fireworks up at the pier once it got dark, but he hadn’t gotten as far as doing anything about it just yet. It wasn’t like he had a significant other to plan around, and the rest of his family was thousands of miles away, so winging it sounded like as good a plan as any.

He’d barely started throwing together a sandwich for lunch before his phone started to ring on the kitchen counter. With a frown, Marco licked mustard off his thumb and reached for his cell. Screening unfamiliar calls wasn’t exactly an option in his line of work — one missed call could be a lost job or disgruntled client, and while he made decent money, ignoring work wasn’t really good for business.

Not to mention it could always be someone else calling…

Marco thumbed the screen of his phone to answer the call, managing a gruff “Garcia,” as he put it on speaker and went back to making his sandwich.

“Morning, Mr. Garcia Diaz,” a tired voice echoed over the connection. “I hope this isn’t a bad time?”

Marco stood a little bit straighter; Loren Abbott was one of the nicer social workers he’d been in contact with over the course of working through his certification as a resource parent, and the fact that she was calling on a Sunday morning probably meant this wasn’t about his paperwork.

“Ms. Abbott,” he replied, leaning against his elbows over his phone. “This isn’t a social call, is it?”

“Afraid not. Will you be home this afternoon? I think we might have a placement for you, if you’re free in the next few hours.”

He’d been planning for it, training for it, even expecting it, but Marco’s throat seemed to lock up for a moment. “I’ll be here. You need me to get anything ready?”

“Not just yet,” Loren hedged, still sounding tired, but maybe a little bit less discouraged. “We’ll make sure you have the basics, at least, and I’ll be on call for anything else. Just — keep an open mind, yeah?”

“I can do that,” Marco answered. He hesitated for a moment, his hand hovering over his phone. “Hey — if I’m allowed to ask — boy, girl, or sibling group?”

There was a moment of hesitation on the other end of the call, before Loren finally answered, a hint of a smile in her voice. “Girl, this time. Her name is Mia.”

****

An hour later, Marco was pretty sure he was being punked.

“That’s a baby,” he said, staring blankly at the little bundle of pink blankets and dark hair in Loren Abbott’s arms.

“Technically she’s an infant, but we’re not splitting hairs,” Loren answered. She turned slightly so the baby girl in her arms could see Marco over one shoulder. “Mr. Garcia Diaz, this is Mia Lynn Reyes. Her mother was hospitalized last night for an overdose, with no other family in the area that we can locate. CPS got involved after the living conditions were deemed unsuitable, and Mia’s to be placed in temporary resource care while her mom recovers.” Loren glanced up at him seriously. “Assuming there’s no further medical complications, we’re probably looking at court-mandated rehab and home assessments, so estimated six months minimum.”

“She’s a baby,” Marco echoed, maybe only semi-hysterically.

“According to the records we have, she’s about six months old, so teething and about to start solid foods, actually.” Marco was pretty sure Loren was laughing at him at least a little bit, at this point. “We packed up what we could, so you don’t have to start from scratch — formula, diapers, car seat and stroller, pack-and-play, some changes of clothes and basic supplies. If the placement is formalized like we expect it to be, you can make more permanent arrangements for a crib or changing table, but the pack-and-play should work for the first few days.”

“…Why me?” Marco was very aware that he sounded a little lost and probably looked more than a little shell-shocked, but he couldn’t quite comprehend why anyone, especially an intelligent social services professional, would be handing a six-month-old baby girl over to him.

Loren hesitated for a moment, as if she wasn’t sure quite how truthful to be. “Because you’re bilingual, honestly,” she answered finally. “We don’t have any information on Mia’s father, but her mom’s family was Puerto Rican. Anything familiar could help, especially if it could ease the transition for her.”

As if he could say no to that. Hesitantly, Marco held out his hands, and Loren transferred the little girl into them with only a little awkwardness. He’d had infant classes as part of his resource training, and he’d held his own nieces and nephews when they were small, but he hadn’t ever expected to have an actual infant placed in his care. He’d been expecting an older kid, maybe ten or eleven with a smart mouth and sullen attitude, or maybe a sibling group that didn’t want to be separated — but not this.

Marco tucked one hand behind her dark curls self-consciously, trying to remember everything he’d ever been told about supporting a baby’s head and how to not accidentally break her. There was so much pink, and she was so tiny, and he’d never been fully aware of how big and rough and calloused his hands were until he tried not to flinch at one thumb brushing the little girl’s cheek. She looked up at him with wide brown eyes, too bright and intelligent to not see immediately how far out of his depth he was.

With one last mildly panicked look at Loren, he started to murmur into her hair in a low stream of barely coherent Spanish — half nonsense, half introduction to the infant that she was probably too young to understand in the first place, but it gave him something to focus on, at least. The only response he got was a little burble of curiosity, and a tiny hand tugging at the patchy scruff on his cheek.

Dios, he was in so much trouble.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 299: No Chains Left

Previously on BnHA: Horikoshi was all “and then AFO broke out all of the inmates from six other prisons and took a nap. well anyways, here’s the hospital angst.” Kacchan woke up two days later and was all, “WAIT BUT HOW ARE DEKU AND TODOROKI AND ALL OF THE OTHER CHARACTERS EXCEPT IIDA DOING” and then we cut to Shouto’s room where the other U.A. kids were sitting around being Mutually Traumatized and giving each other moral support and such. Everyone was alll, “...”, and then the rest of the Todofam showed up, INCLUDING POSSIBLY REI?! which, omg. The chapter ended with Kacchan STOMPING THROUGH THE HALLS all “WHADDYA MEAN DEKU HASN’T WOKEN UP YET”, dragging along Satou and Mineta behind him, fueled by the power of ALL OF THE FUCKS HE NOW GIVES. He gives so many fucks now you guys. This boy cares so much he can probably deduct it on his taxes.

Today on BnHA: SPEAKING OF PEOPLE WHO GIVE A LOT OF FUCKS, the story cuts abruptly to Hawks, freshly recovering from his near-death experience, and pondering the threads that have weaved the tapestry of his life and led him to this moment. Basically he grew up in poverty with his Jerk Dad and Jerk Mom until his dad got arrested one day and his mom sent him off to go Find Money Or Something, and so he rescued a busload of people and found himself a new career. Back in the present day, Hawks and Jeanist ride around town in Jeanist’s Jamborghini having awkward encounters with civilians in a country on the brink of social collapse, and visiting Hawks’s mother’s home. Hawks is all “I know from an outsider’s perspective it must look like my life currently sucks, but now that the HPSC is gone, my public image is shot, and my parents are finally out of my life, I’m actually feeling SURPRISINGLY GOOD.” Anyway so he’s gonna go meet up with Endeavor now, and p.s. this chapter was fucking fantastic though, damn.

oh my god?? is this Hawks narration?? something about him growing up watching the heroes on TV and thinking of them as fictional characters

okay I scrolled down a little bit more to see the rest of that “Keigo” panel, and wow

this is basically a shed. poor boy definitely grew up rough. let me tell you guys, I came in here ready for some BakuDeku shenanigans; I was not prepared for Hawks Flashback Angst. I AM HERE FOR IT, but also wow I gotta brace myself now lol

HELLO MISTER HAWKS’S JERK DAD, SIR

BnHA sure does have an array of Jerk Dads, doesn’t it. makes me appreciate characters like Masaru and JirouDad all the more for bucking the trend

anyway. so Horikoshi, you really thought that one itty bitty chapter of hospital catharsis would be enough to calm us all before you went right back to showing us child abuse huh. my god man can we rest

BABY HAWKS

swear to god this kid can’t be more than five or six, and yet he has this completely blank look on his face even with his dad looming over him being all threatening and shit. like he’s shut down his emotions to protect himself. imagine what has to happen to a child for him to have learned this at such a young age. fuck

AND MEANWHILE THIS GUY

don’t mingle with humans?? not “other” humans, just humans?? what is this implying here?? and also holy shit Hawks definitely didn’t inherit his looks from his dad orz

then again he doesn’t really bear much of a resemblance to his strung-out mom here either

omg omg omg. and this child is basically trapped here in this environment with these two people. this explains a SHITLOAD about Hawks’s personality though you guys. his ability to completely separate his real thoughts from the face he presents to the outside world. his pragmatic approach to analyzing and solving problems. his layers of emotional walls. turns out almost none of that came from the HPSC training -- that was all learned hands-on in his own personal do-or-die survival nightmare childhood!! oh, boy

and small wonder then that he latched on to Endeavor so strongly if he really is the one who brought down his dad and inadvertently saved him from this. also, just putting this out there, I know people are always talking about him and Dabi being foils, and I think it’s very interesting how Touya grew up in a household where he saw firsthand the dark side of hero society, and so ended up becoming a villain in order to bring it down. whereas young Keigo had almost the exact opposite experience, growing up experiencing the dark side of villain society and becoming a hero in order to bring about a world where no one else has to experience that. just. both of them are so determined not to become their fathers. some interesting parallels there

so Hawks was sort of an accident after his parents had “thanks for helping me not get caught after I killed that guy” sex, and now this little boy is growing up in squalor and being beaten by his father for things like Sitting In The Wrong Out-Of-The-Way Corner Trying Not To Be A Bother To Anybody. holy fuck. this is so rough to read through you guys

wait so does Jerk Dad have a an eyeball manipulation quirk?? because he doesn’t have the wings like his son, but wth are these things??

this presumably also means that Keigo has never been to school or anything either. he basically doesn’t exist. he thinks heroes are fictional characters, he doesn’t realize that they’re real people. these are people who could help him if he could escape and find them, but he doesn’t know, and they don’t know about him

OH MY GOD HE’S JUST SITTING IN HIS CORNER HUGGLING HIS ENDEAVOR PLUSH OH MY GOD

how could this child possibly have an anti-fandom when he’s done NOTHING WRONG HIS ENTIRE LIFE. huh. just explain that to me. lol I mean I’m not looking to pick a fight with anyone, but also, MAYBE I AM, idk?? this kid has gotten me all riled up lmao

anyways, Protect Keigo 2021, and thank you Horikoshi for these three very terrible pages. I am pleased to inform you that you’ve effectively gotten your point across and you may now commence saving this kid already

YAY

oh no, Keigo’s dumbass jerk dad tried to steal a car and the popo nabbed his ass and now his mom can’t just sit around neglecting her VERY YOUNG SON all day long, oh horrors. sorry lady my tiny violin is on backorder. just imagine that I’m playing a very sarcastic song on it for you

anyway so what are you gonna do now, abandon him? I can hardly imagine he’d be worse off, if anything it might be a near-instant improvement

LMAO HE’S ALL “WAIT WHAT ENDEAVOR’S A REAL FUCKING DUDE?!”

AND THEY SAY THAT A HERO CAN SAVE US~~~~ I’M NOT GONNA STAND HERE AND WAAAAAIT~~~~~ I’LL HOLD ONTO THE WINGS OF THE EAGLES, WATCH AS WE ALL FLY AWAAAAAAY~~~~

lol what a randomly pivotal moment in his young life. TIME TO GO MAKE THESE MEMES INTO DREAMS YOUNG ONE

anyway so his mom freaked out and grabbed him and they wound up at a train station with her TELLING HIM TO GO GET HER SOME MONEY, oh my god. SURE MOM LEMME JUST WALTZ RIGHT ON DOWN TO THE “JOBS FOR FIVE-YEAR-OLDS” STORE AND TELL THEM I NEED SOME CASH. ffff manifesting someone to come help him in 3... 2...

...

SIGH, JUST GO RESCUE THE PEOPLE FROM THE BUS, KEIGO. is this the outfit he was wearing when that happened?? it must be, right?? I can’t imagine them surviving more than a couple days out here unless this starts getting REALLY dark in a way I know that even Horikoshi won’t explore, so yeah. cut to the HPSC now please. never thought we’d be glad to see them. I mean sure, it may be an “out of the frying pan...” case, but good god

THANK YOU!!

and I guess it was his mom’s eyeball quirk then. anyway, whatever, see you again never, hopefully. lol oh man. thaaaat, was upsetting. need to center myself here for a sec. NAMASTE

OH YAY THE PRESENT

so we cut from Baby Hawks Angst straight to Present Day Hawks Angst, huh. not that this exhausted and traumatized lil lad isn’t still a baby to me too, I’ll have you know

BEST JEANIST, ALWAYS WITH THE JOKES

“WHEW, THOUGHT YOU DIED ON ME FOR A SEC THERE KID.” lmao. Caleb will no doubt ruin this by making his word choice all stiffly formal as usual, so I’m just going to treasure this “WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT, I’M FRESH OUT OF FUCKS” version of Jeanist while I can

look at him, driving his Jeanistmobile

again, is it any wonder Kacchan was bitching about Endeavor’s dinky little car when he was used to riding around town in style like this. anyone else staring at this panel trying to figure out how this car is somehow secretly made of jeans

NOOOOO

FUCK YOU DABI LMAO. PUTTING THESE VOICE ACTORS OUT OF A JOB ONE BY ONE

anyway so Jeanist is all “GOOD THING IT’S THE FUTURE AND WE’RE SO GOOD AT MEDICAL SCIENCE” to handwave how Hawks went from one step shy of being a very handsome corpse, to sitting around texting Jeanist in a car all of two days later

OH MY GOD, AND FINALLY AN EXPLANATION FOR THIS

wait a minute. I’m so confused lmfao. soooo, was Hawks all “anyway, here’s Jeanist’s dead body, you can examine it but please don’t look at him too closely and also I’m gonna need that back unharmed.” how tf did you pull that off lmao

(ETA: also isn’t this technically confirmation of the ol’ Noumu Jeanist theory lol. I’m gonna go ahead and say it is.)

NO BUT PLEASE, CONTINUE. I unironically love reading Horikoshi’s overly convoluted “SEE IT’S NOT A PLOT HOLE” explanations

lkldslfk so wait, you’re telling me Hawks convinced Dabi and the League to put Jeanist’s body in storage, and basically just hoped they wouldn’t use him for any experiments until he could put his plan into action and have the HPSC’s people break in and find and revive him?? WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG. A FOOLPROOF PLAN IF I’VE EVER HEARD ONE

fff this man really asked Jeanist to risk it all to prop up his little cover story, and Jeanist was all “sure why not” omfg. anyways, thanks for recapping all of this out loud for no particular reason in your car conversation you two

LMAO NOW WHAT

TROUBLE YOU SAY? GOOD THING THE NEW NUMBER ONE HERO IS ON THE JOB THEN

okay no it’s just some random thugs strolling around terrorizing the downtown. fuck ‘em. so Jeanist is making short work of them now

uh oh

won’t come? not can’t, but won’t?? what???

WOW

well I guess that makes the local heroes A BUNCH OF SHITHEADS now doesn’t it?? jesus

and okay, serious question, if the cops are spread too thin and the heroes have literally walked out on the job, what exactly is stopping everyone from deciding to use their quirks to defend themselves, legal or not? nothing, as far as I can tell. society just got a hell of a lot more chaotic

anyway so this is an interesting panel here

man, Dabi really did pull it off, didn’t he. well anyway so here’s that better world all of the villains were wanting, you guys! isn’t it so great?? everyone’s terrified and angry and losing hope and society is inches away from collapsing into total anarchy! but hey, at least we exposed the number one hero as a hypocrite

anyway so what are these guys up to

fucking hell, he’s visiting his mom. I really wasn’t prepared to commit this much emotional energy towards reading this chapter today. BUT VERY WELL, WE PRESS ON

?? wait she’s not there?

is this supposed to explain how Dabi knew who Hawks really was? except that there’s the little matter of how he even know where to find his mother in the first place. feels like we’re still missing something there, but oh well

OH MY GOD

RHA I TAKE BACK EVERY WORD I EVER SPOKE AGAINST YOU. YOU ARE A SCANLATION GROUP FILLED WITH ANGELS LMAO. I WILL TAKE THIS PANEL IN MY HANDS, AND TREASURE IT AND KEEP IT SAFE

ANYWAY, BECAUSE MY TIRED BIRD SON’S LIFE SUCKED SO MUCH ALREADY, IT TURNS OUT HE’S ACTUALLY PLEASED WITH THIS NEW TURN OF EVENTS LOL HOW ABOUT THAT

GOOD FOR YOU BBY. YOU GO OUT THERE AND BE YOUR OWN PERSON

and in all seriousness, I love that identity he chooses -- chooses, because it actually is him making a choice now, possibly for the very first time in his life -- is “guy who helps people”, though. it really is nothing short of miraculous that he held on to that kind of optimism and desire to do good even with everything he’s been through. there were so many times he could have chosen to turn his back on the world in retaliation for the way it treated him. but he didn’t!! and here he is now, finally free, and what he wants to do with the rest of his life now is simply to help others. anyway please excuse me for a moment, I need to go find some sort of basket or a big vase to put all of my fresh new Hawks Feels in, pardonne-moi

YEAH BOIIIIII

“FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS, MISTER JEANIST, WHERE DID YOU FIND YOUSELF THAT SWEETASS CAR.” hey, all I’m saying is if this boy’s wings really aren’t growing back, he’s gonna need to find himself a new means of transportation y’know?

oh my god you guys it’s a flashback to his mom buying him the Endeavor plushie when he was like two because, and I quote, ALL MIGHT WAS TOO EXPENSIVE

oh my god oh my god. my boy out here with a new lease on life finding hope in the darkest of times

wasn’t your throat supposed to be all fucked up lmao. Horikoshi was suddenly all “oh shit the VAs are gonna be pissed at me if I keep this up huh”

“that’s why Bubaigawara was such a great guy” motherfucker IT IS A TERRIBLE DAY FOR RAIN. FORECAST SAID NOTHING ABOUT THIS

:’)

yes ma’am. yes indeed. confirmed, I really will straight up fight some motherfuckers for this child. well not really, but YOU KEEP YOUR DISCOURSE OFF MY LAWN AND OUT OF MY BLOG YOU HEAR. THIS IS A HAWKS-FRIENDLY SPACE. WE RESPECT TAKAMI KEIGO IN THESE STREETS

and he’s saying (or is he thinking?? what a weirdly shaped speech bubble this is) that even if what Dabi said about the Todoroki household is true, “I’m not sure it’s the same now.” which happens to be ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. man this whole chapter really is all about saying “fuck the past” and moving forward and I am living for it

SON!!!!

“the first step is at my beginning” fklkjlk. what an iconic fucking line??

AND HIS WINGS!!!! THEY ACTUALLY ARE GROWING BACK AHHHHHHH. “PUT A RAINCHECK ON THAT CAR, JEANIST-SAN.” THE HAWKSMOBILE CAN WAIT, RIGHT NOW HE HAS TO GO INSERT HIMSELF BACK INTO THE TODODRAMA WHETHER THEY LIKE IT OR NOT

you guys. I came here ready for some BAKUDEKU HOSPITAL ANGST, and I got DIDDLY SHIT of that, and none of my other kids were even in this chapter, but!!! ASK ME IF I CARE LMAO omg. because bird son is hanging with his new best friend, and he’s out here Finding Himself and picking up the pieces and putting them back together stronger than ever because RESILIENCE HAS A NAME, AND IT’S SPELLED H-A-W-K-S, and you guys. profound, my love for this child. holy shit. hey google, play Silence by Marshmello

[meirmakesstuff]

1/2 Hi Meir! I saw your answer on WWC, and since you mentioned you're professionals, I figured I'd ask directly: I'm writing a second world fantasy with a jewish coded people. I want to be clear in the coding but avoid the "if there's no egypt, how can there be passover?" so I called them Canaanites. I thought I was being clever by hinting in the naming that the whole region does exist, but I've since read that it might've been a slur in fact? Do you have any advice on this?

2/2 I did consider calling the group in question Jewish, but aside from how deeply Judaism is connected to the history of the Israelites, I haven't used any present-day real-world names for any other group, (I did use some historic names like Nubia). I feel like calling only one group of people by their currently used name would be othering rather than inclusive? Or am I overthinking this?

Okay so I want to start out with some disclaimers, first that although WWC recently reblogged an addition of mine to one of their posts, I am not affiliated with @writingwithcolor​, and second that the nature of trying to answer a question like this is “two Jews, three opinions,” so what I have to say about this is my own opinion(s) only. Last disclaimer: this is a hard question to address, so this answer is going to be long. Buckle up.

First, I would say that you’re right to not label the group in question “Jewish” (I’ll get to the exception eventually), and you’re also right in realizing that you should not call them “Canaanites.” In Jewish scripture, Canaanites are the people we fought against, not ourselves, so that wouldn’t feel like representation but like assigning our identity to someone else, which is a particular kind of historical violence Jews continue to experience today. I’ll get back to the specific question of naming in a moment, but because this is my blog and not WWC, and you asked me to speak to this as an educator, we’re going to take a detour into Jewish history and literary structure before we get back to the question you actually asked.

To my mind there are three main ways to have Jews in second-world fantasy and they are:

People who practice in ways similar to modern real-world Jews, despite having developed in a different universe,

People who practice in ways similar to ancient Hebrews, because the things that changed us to modern Jewish practice didn’t occur, and

People who practice in a way that shows how your world would influence the development of a people who started out practicing like ancient Hebrews and have developed according to the world they’re in. 

The first one is what we see in @shiraglassman​‘s Mangoverse series: there is no Egypt yet her characters hold a seder; the country coded Persian seems to bear no relation to their observance of Purim, and there is no indication of exile or diaspora in the fact that Jews exist in multiple countries and cultures, and speak multiple languages including Yiddish, a language that developed through a mixture of Hebrew and German. Her characters’ observance lines up approximately with contemporary Reform Jewish expectations, without the indication of there ever having been a different practice to branch off from. She ignores the entire question of how Jews in her universe became what they are, and her books are lyrical and sweet and allow us to imagine the confidence that could belong to a Jewish people who weren’t always afraid.

Shira is able to pull this off, frankly, because her books are not lore-heavy. I say this without disrespect--Shira often refers to them as “fluffy”--but because the deeper you get into the background of your world and its development, the trickier this is going to be to justify, unless you’re just going to just parallel every historical development in Jewish History, including exile and diaspora across the various nations of your world, including occasional near-equal treatment and frequent persecution, infused with a longing for a homeland lost, or a homeland recently re-established in the absolutely most disappointing of ways.

Without that loss of homeland or a Mangoverse-style handwaving, we have the second and third options. In the second option, you could show your Jewish-coded culture having never been exiled from its homeland, living divided into tribes each with their own territory, still practicing animal, grain, and oil sacrifice at a single central Temple at the center of their nation, overseen by a tribe that lacks territory of their own and being supported by the sacrifices offered by the populace.

If you’re going to do that, research it very carefully. A lot of information about this period is drawn from scriptural and post-scriptural sources or from archaeological record, but there’s also a lot of Christian nonsense out there assigning weird meanings and motivations to it, because the Christian Bible takes place during this period and they chose to cast our practices from this time as evil and corrupt in order to magnify the goodness of their main character. In any portrayal of a Jewish-coded people it’s important to avoid making them corrupt, greedy, bigoted, bloodthirsty, or stubbornly unwilling to see some kind of greater or kinder truth about the world, but especially if you go with this version. 

The last option, my favorite but possibly the hardest to do, is to imagine how the people in the second option would develop given the influences of the world they’re in. Do you know why Chanukah is referred to as a “minor” holiday? The major holidays are the ones for which the Torah specifies that we “do not work:” Rosh Hashannah, Yom Kippur, and the pilgrimage holidays of Sukkot, Passover, and Shavuot. Chanukah developed as a holiday because the central temple, the one we made those pilgrimages to, was desecrated by the invading Assyrian Greeks and we drove them out and were able to re-establish the temple. That time. Eventually, the Temple was razed and we were scattered across the Roman Empire, developing the distinct Jewish cultures we see today. The Greeks and Romans aren’t a semi-mythologized ancient people, the way the Canaanites have been (though there’s increasing amounts of archaeology shedding light on what they actually might have been like), we have historical records about them, from them. The majority of modern Jewish practice developed from the ruins of our ancient practices later than the first century CE. In the timeline of Jewish identity, that’s modern.

The rabbinic period and the Temple period overlap somewhat, but we’re not getting into a full-scale history lesson here. Suffice it to say that it was following the loss of the sacrificial system at the central Temple that Judaism coalesced an identity around verbal prayer services offered at the times of day when we would previously have offered sacrifices, led each community by its own learned individual who became known as a rabbi. We continued to develop in relationship with the rest of the world, making steps toward gender equality in the 1970s and LGBT equality in the 2000s, shifting the meaning of holidays like Tu Bishvat to address climate change, debating rulings on whether one may drive a car on Shabbat for the sake of being with one’s community, and then pivoting to holding prayer services daily via Zoom.

The history of the Jews is the history of the world.  Our iconic Kol Nidrei prayer, the centerpiece of the holiest day of the year, that reduces us to tears every year at its first words, was composed in response to the Spanish Inquisition. The two commentators who inform our understanding of scripture--the ones we couldn’t discuss Torah without referencing even if we tried--wrote in the 11th and 12th centuries in France and Spain/Egypt. Jewish theology and practice schismed into Orthodox and Reform (and later many others) because that’s the kind of discussion people were into in the 19th century. Sephardim light Chanukah candles in an outdoor lamp while Ashkenazim light Chanukah candles in an indoor candelabrum because Sephardim developed their traditions in the Middle East and North Africa and the Ashkenazim developed our traditions in freezing Europe. There are works currently becoming codified into liturgy whose writers died in 2000 and 2011. 

So what are the historical events that would change how your Jewish-coded culture practices, if they don’t involve loss of homeland and cultural unity? What major events have affected your world? If there was an exile that precipitated an abandonment of the sacrificial system, was there a return to their land, or are they still scattered? Priority one for us historically has been maintaining our identity and priority two maintaining our practices, so what have they had to shift or create in order to keep being a distinct group? Is there a major worldwide event in your world? If so, how did this people cope?

If you do go this route, be careful not to fall into tropes of modern or historical antisemitism: don’t have your culture adopt a worldview that has their deity split into mlutiple identities (especially not three). Don’t have an oppressive government that doesn’t represent its people rise up to oppress outsiders within its borders (this is not the first time this has occurred in reality, but because the outside world reacts differently to this political phenomenon when it’s us than when it’s anyone else, it’s a portrayal that makes real-life Jews more vulnerable). And don’t portray the people as having developed into a dark and mysterious cult of ugly, law-citing men and beautiful tearstreaked women, but it doesn’t sound as if you were planning to go there.

So with all that said, it’s time to get back to the question of names. All the above information builds to this: how you name this culture depends on how you’ve handled their practice and identity. 

Part of why Shira Glassman’s handwaving of the question of how modern Jewish practice ended up in Perach works is that she never gives a name to the religion of her characters. Instead, she names the regions they come from. Perach, in particular, the country where most of the action takes place, translates to “Flower.” In this case, her Jewish-coded characters who come from Perach are Perachis, and characters from other places who are also Jewish are described as “they worship as Perachis do despite their different language” or something along those lines (forgive me, Shira, for half-remembering).

So that’s method one: find an attribute of your country that you’d like to highlight, translate it into actual Hebrew, and use that as your name.

Method two is the opposite: find a name that’s been used to identify our people or places (we’ve had a bunch), find out what it means or might mean in English, and then jiggle that around until it sounds right for your setting. You could end up with the nation of the Godfighters, or Children of Praise, The Wanderers (if they’re not localized in a homeland), The Passed-Over, Those From Across The River, or perhaps the people of the City of Peace.

Last, and possibly easiest, pick a physical attribute of their territory and just call them that in English. Are they from a mountainous region? Now they’re the Mountain People. Does their land have a big magical crater in the middle? Craterfolk. Ethereal floating forests of twinkling lights? It’s your world.

The second option is the only one that uses the name to overtly establish Jewish coding. The first option is something Jews might pick up on, especially if they speak Hebrew, but non-Jews would miss. The third avoids the question and puts the weight of conveying that you’re trying to code them as Jewish on their habits and actions.

There’s one other option that can work in certain types of second-world fantasy, and that’s a world that has developed from real-world individuals who went through some kind of portal. That seems to me the only situation in which using a real-world name like Jews, Hebrews, or Israelites would make sense. Jim Butcher does this with the Romans in the Codex Alera series, and Katharine Kerr does it with Celts in the Deverry cycle. That kind of thing has to be baked into the world-building, though, so it probably doesn’t help with this particular situation. 

This is a roundabout route to what I imagine you were hoping would be an easier answer. The tension you identified about how to incorporate Jewishness into a world that doesn’t have the same history is real, and was the topic of a discussion I recently held with a high school age group around issues of Jewish representation in the media they consume and hope to create. Good luck in your work of adding to the discussion.

[herbgerblin]

A continuation of this and this.

This is very nebulous, because answering asks individually would be very time consuming. I was concerned that I’d accidentally go off topic, or that the way the asks were phrased meant that I’d have to jump though a lot of mental hoops before getting to the heart of the matter. So like, bear with me:

“Yes, but [insert retroactive justification here]”

The McElroys have made decisions, and who can—with the rapid growth of their franchises—afford to make better decisions. Like hiring a diversity/cultural sensitivity consultant to give them feedback before finalizing the production of their content. It’s disappointing when their intentions are not enough, or when the ramifications of their intentions come out negative. But the options to mitigate the damages are definitely out there.

“Enough about Lucas, imagine Kravitz...”

Imma be real with you, chief. The desire to turn attentions to what Kravitz’s design might look like, rubbed me the wrong way. Because 1.) it felt like handwaving away the issues that BIPOC were bringing up about Lucas in favor of something doing “fun” and 2.) like Lucas, Kravitz’s design has already been decided upon. Whether we’ve seen it or not, we have no baring on what he’s going to look like in the graphic novels. 

It’s fun to speculate, but BIPOC have been made uncomfortable by the decisions being made by the book developers for years. And they are a large part of what made the franchise so successful to begin with. (I joined the fandom after the first GN already came out, so much of this is still fresh for me.) That’s not something that should be swept under the rug. A lot of folks have already reached their breaking points in term of support, and for others, that point is coming.

And like, I know Kravitz is probably going to be fine. But I’ve already braced myself for worse case scenarios. First worse case scenario is: he’s white/an abstract color/design and we lose an opportunity for positive black, gay, male rep. Second worse case scenario was this. I hate to say it, but he’s Schrödinger’s black guy right now. And as funny as that is, the fact that we STILL are dubious about the design decisions being made is cause for concern. 

“Well, the cast already has a lot of people of color”

What often goes unrealized, is that that statement is always one step removed from, “Haven’t you people (of color) had enough?” And that is a dangerous mentality to have. The idea that we are one big conglomerate of non white people kicking and screaming about every little choice ever made. When in reality, we are different ethnic groups who have found grievances with different designs—and also the lack thereof—and we are trying to uplift each other. Everyone who has spoken up about this deserves the right to see themselves represented. And those who haven’t, shouldn’t feel like they’ll be glossed over if they do.

I appreciate the people who, instead of reacting immediately to my opinions on Lucas’s design and came running at me with speculation and inquiries, took the time to absorb what was being said, and sought out what other people had to say. I’m not some wise old guide who knows or understands the answers to everything. I’m a fan of a podcast who happens to be Black at the same time. My values may be different, but my desired fandom experiences aren’t.

Also, while we’re at it, here’s my paypal: paypal.me/everlastingrandom

[brawltogethernow]

So, I don't think I've ever asked you this... what IS the whole point of the Spider-Sense? It really seems like something that only exists for writers to ignore or work around when they want to inject Legit Tension into a story.

I’ve thought about this power so much, but never with an eye to defend its right to exist, so I needed to think about this. The results could be more concise.

Ironically, given the question, I have to say its main purpose is to ramp up tension. But it’s also a highly variable multitool that a skilled creative team can use for...pretty much anything. It does everything the writer wants it to, while for its wielder always falls just short of doing enough.

I went looking through my photos for a really generic, classic-looking example to use as an image to head this topic, but then I ran into the time Peter absolutely did not reimburse this man for his stolen McDonald’s, so have that instead.

A Scare Chord, But You Can Draw It

That one post that says the spider-sense is just super-anxiety isn’t, like, wrong. It’s a very anxious, dramatic storytelling tool originally designed for a very anxious, dramatic protagonist. I find it speaks to the overall tone of the franchise that some characters are functionally psychics, but with a psychic ability that only points out problems.

Spidey sense pinging? There’s danger, be stressed! Broken? Now the lead won’t even KNOW when there’s a problem, scary! Single character is immune to it? That’s an invisible knife in the dark oh my god what the fuck what the fU--

Like its counterpart in garden variety anxiety, the only time the spider-sense reduces tension is in the middle of a crisis. But in the wish fulfillmenty way that you want in an adventure story to justify exaggerated action sequences, the same way enhanced strength or durability does. Also like those, it would theoretically make someone much safer to have it, but it exists in the story to let your character navigate into and weather more dangerous situations.

For its basic role in a story, a danger sense is a snappy way to rile up both the reader and the protagonist that doesn’t offer much information beyond that it’s time to sit smart because shit is about to go down.

Spidey comic canon is all over the board in quality and genre, and it started needing to subvert its formulas before the creators got a handle on what those formulas even were, and basically no one has read anything approaching most of it at this point, so for consistent examples of a really bare bones use of this power in storytelling, I’d point to the property that’s done the best job yet of boiling down the mechanics of Spider-Man to their absolute most basic essentials for adaptation to a compelling monster of the week TV series.

Or as you probably know it, Danny Phantom. DON’T BOO, I’M RIGHT.

DP is Spider-Man with about 2/3 of the serial numbers filed off and no death (ironically), and Danny’s ghost sense is the most proof in the formula example of what the spidey sense is for: It’s a big sign held up for the viewer that says, “Something is wrong! Pay attention!” Effectively a visual scare chord. It’s about That Drama. And it works, which won it a consistent place in the show’s formula. We’re talking several times an episode here.

So why does it work?

It’s a little counterintuitive, but it’s strong storytelling to tell your audience that something bad is going to happen before it does. A vague, punchy spoiler transforms the ignorant calm before a conflict into a tense moment of anticipation. ...And it makes sure people don’t fail to absorb the beginning of said conflict because they weren’t prepared to shift gears when the scene did. Shock is a valuable tool, too, but treating it like a staple is how you burn out your audience instead of keeping them engaged. Not to go after an easy target, but you need to know how to manage your audience’s alarm if you don’t want to end up like Game of Thrones.

The limits of the spider-sense also keep you on your toes when handled by a smart writer. It tells Peter (everyone’s is a little different, so I’m going to cite the og) about threats to his person, but it doesn’t elaborate with any details when it’s not already obvious why, what kind, and from what. And it doesn’t warn him about anything else-- Which is a pretty critical gap when you zoom out and look at his hero career’s successes and failures and conclude that it’s definitely why he’s lived as long as he has acting the way he does, but was useless as he failed to save a string of people he’d have much rather had live on than him.

(Any long-running superhero mythos has these incidents, but with Peter they’re important to the core themes.)

And since this power is by plot for plot (or because it’s roughly agreed it only really blares about threats that check at least two boxes of being major, immediate, or physical), it always kicks in enough to register when the danger is bearing down...when it’s too late to actually do anything about it if “anything” is a more complex action than “dodge”.

Really? Not until the elevator doors started to open?

That Distinctive, Crunchy Spider Flavor

The spider-sense and its little pen squiggles go hand in hand with wallcrawling (and its unique and instantly identifiable associated body language) to make the Spider-Person powerset enduringly iconic and elevate characters with it from being generic mid-level super-bricks. Visually, but also in how it shapes the story.

I said it can share a narrative role with super strength. But when you end a fight and go home, super strength continues to make your character feel powerful, probably safer than they’d be otherwise, maybe dangerous.

The spider-sense just keeps blaring, “Something’s wrong! Something’s wrong! God, why aren’t you doing something about this!?”

Pretty morose thing to live with, for a safety net! Kind of a double edged sword you have there! Could be constantly being hyperattuned to problems would prime you for a negative outlook on life. Kind of seems like a power that would make it impossible for a moral person to take a day off, leading them into a beleaguered and resentful yet dutiful attitude about the whole superhero gig! Might build up to some of the core traits of this mythos, maybe! Might lead to a lot of fifteen minute retirement stories, or something. Might even be a built in ‘great responsibility’ alarm that gets you a main character who as a rule is not going to stop fighting until he physically cannot fight anymore.

Certainly not apropos of anything, just throwing this short lived barely-a-joke tagline up for fun.

One of my personal favorite things about stories with superpowers is keeping in mind how they cause the people who have them to act in unusual ways outside of fights, so when you tell me that these people have an entire extra sense that tells them when the gas in their house is leaking through a barely useful hot/cold warning system that never turns off, I’m like, eyes emojis, popcorn out, notebook open, listening intently, spectacles on, the whole deal.

It also contributes to Peter Parker’s personality in a way I really enjoy: It allows him to act like an irrational maniac. When you know exactly when a situation becomes dangerous and how much, normal levels of caution go out the window and absolutely nothing you do makes sense from an exterior standpoint anymore. That’s the good shit. I would like to see more exploration of how the non-Parker characters experiencing the world in this incredibly altered way bounce in response.

It’s also one of many tools in this franchise hauling the reader into relating more closely with the main character. The backbone of classic Spidey is probably being in on secrets only Peter and the reader know which completely reframe how one views the situation on the page. It’s just a big irony mine for the whole first decade. A convenient way to inform the reader and the lead that something is bad news that’s not perceivable to any other characters is youth-with-a-big-exciting-secret catnip.

Another point for tension, there, in that being aware of danger is not synonymous with being able to act on it. If there’s no visible reason for you to be acting strange, well...you’re just going to have to sit tight and sweat, aren’t you? Some gratuitous head wiggles never hurt when setting up that type of conflict.

Have I mentioned that they look cool? Simultaneously punchy and distinctive, with a respectable amount of leeway for artists to get creative with and still coming up with something easily recognizable? And pretty easy to intuit the meaning of even without the long-winded explanations common in the days when people wrote comics with the intent that someone could come in cold on any random issue and follow along okay, I think, although the mechanic has been deeply ingrained in popular culture for so long that I can’t really say for sure.

It was also useful back in the day when no artists drew the eyes on the Spider-Man mask as emoting and were conveying the lead’s expressions entirely through body language and panel composition. If you wiggle enough squiggles, you don’t need eyebrows.

Take This Handwave and Never Ask Me a Logistical Question Again

This ability patches plot holes faster than people can pick them open AND it can act as an excuse to get any plot rolling you can think of if paired with one meddling protagonist who doesn’t know how to mind their own business. Buy it now for only $19.99 (in four installments; that’s four installments of $19.99).

Why can a teenager win a six on one fight against other superhumans? Well, the spider-sense is the ultimate edge in combat, duh.

Why can Peter websling? Why doesn’t everyone websling? Well, the spider-sense is keeping him from eating flagpole when he violently flings himself across New York in a way neither man nor spider was ever meant to move.

How are we supposed to get him involved with the plot this week???? Well, that crate FELT dangerous, so he’s going to investigate it. Oh, dip, it was full of guns and radioactive snakes! Probably shouldn’t have opened that!

Yeah, okay, but why isn’t it fixing everything, then? Isn’t it supposed to be why Peter has never accidentally unmasked in front of somebody? ('Nother entry for this section, take a shot.) That’s crazy sensitive! How does he still have any problems!? Is everything bad that’s ever happened to characters with this powerset bad writing!? --Listen, I think as people with uncanny senses that can tell us whether we are in danger with accuracy that varies from incredible to approximate (I am talking about the five senses that most people have), we should all know better than to underestimate our ability to tune them out or interpret them wrong and fuck ourselves up anyway. I honestly find this part completely realistic.

*SLAPS ROOF OF SPIDER-SENSE* YOU CAN FIT SO MANY STORIES IN THIS THING

The spider-sense is a clean branch into...whatever. There is the exact right balance of structure and wishy-washiness to build off of. A sample selection of whatevers that have been built:

It’s sci-fi and spy gadgets when Peter builds technology that can interface with it.

It’s quasi-mystical when Kaine and Annie-May get stronger versions of it that give them literal psychic visions, or when you want to get mythological and start talking about all the spider-characters being part of a grand web of fate.

Kaine loses his and it becomes symbolic of a future newly unbound by constraints, entangled thematically with the improved physical health he picked up at the same time -- a loss presented as a gain.

Peter loses his and almost dies 782 times in one afternoon because that didn’t make the people he provoked when he had it stop trying to kill him, and also because he isn’t about to start “””taking the subway’’””’ “‘’“”to work”””’’” like some kind of loser who doesn’t get a heads up when he’s about to hit a pigeon at 50mph.

Peter’s starts tuning into his wife’s anxiety and it’s a tool in a relationship study.

It starts pinging whenever Peter’s near his boss who’s secretly been replaced by a shapeshifter and he IGNORES IT because his boss is enough of an asshole that that doesn’t strike him as weird; now it’s a comedy/irony tool.

Into the Spider-Verse made it this beautiful poetic thing connecting all the spider-heroes in the multiverse and stacked up a story on it about instant connection, loss, and incredibly unlikely strangers becoming a found family. It was also aesthetic as FUCK. Remember the scene where Miles just hears barely intelligible whispering that’s all lines people say later in the film and then his own voice very clearly says “look out” and then the room explodes?? Fuck!!!!

Venom becomes immune to it after hitchhiking to Earth in Peter’s bone juice and it makes him a unique threat while telling a more-homoerotic-than-I-assume-was-originally-intended story about violation and how close relationships can be dangerous when they go sour.

It doesn’t work on people you trust for maximum soap opera energy. Love the innate tragedy of this feature coming up.

IN CONCLUSION I don’t have much patience for writers who don’t take advantage of it, never mind feel they need to write around it.

[deputychairman]

Coronavirus 2020 lockdown is a Time of Reflection so I watched the Rise of Skywalker again and this is how you could make the Star Wars sequels better:

You write all 3 films before you start, DUH.

The writers got paid, right? It wasn’t like they were writing a WIP on their lunch breaks? No? Good. Just making sure.

We delete the line “somehow, Palpetine has returned.” Oscar Isaac is a proper good actor and he did his best, he’s played Hamlet and you can see him do his best. He searches deep inside himself but as we all know, you can write this stuff George but you sure as hell cant say it.

We delete the “somehow, Palpetine has returned” plot line altogether. When JJ Abrams meets his own eye in the mirror he knows I’m right. He wrote TROS in the same way he wrote Lost: making crazy shit up as he went along, which is also my approach to work and I respect his improvisational ethic, but no. Not the time nor the place, babe.

I’m up for caring about han & Leia’s child who got manipulated to the dark side, but not when he’s also a genocidal fascist. Maybe tone that down? A lot?

Like maybe instead he could say he doesn’t like space!dogs?

He’d then have to rescue a space!dog at the end but that wouldn’t be too hard

I’m up for accepting Han & Leia’s child as a potential love interest for Rey, siempre y cuando his actor is not physically repellent to me (I get it! That’s part of Adam Driver’s charm and some ppl are into that! But you’ve gotta sell him to EVERYONE here) and - this is a deal breaker still - he’s not a genocidal fascist

I’m up for accepting he was manipulated all his life, but if you only show me him being evil and then the “hahaha I was manipulating you all along!!!!” reveal and not how he struggled to resist it then I still....don’t......care? About him? And (this bears repeating) once he’s massacred civilians, tortured people and been a genocidal fascist, it’s too late!!!! You’ve made your bed and you must lie in it! Which is why he had to die at the end but I might have *cared* that he died at the end and that would have been better.

Sorry, “somehow, Palpetine has returned” - was that the best idea you had?? really. really truly.

If you pitched this trilogy to John Boyega today he’d say thanks, my people will call you.....I’ve got this community theatre project.......,, my cat is going thru a hard time atm he needs me at home.....I’ll let u know.....

Nobody needed the Holdo plot line either even though we love Laura Dern and her purple hair, but a problem that would be solved by a 2 minute staff briefing or a 2 line email is not a problem at all. Likewise a plan that revolves around nobody looking out the window. We’ve all handwaved a plot in our time, but mostly in our capacity as unpaid volunteers and not at the helm of a Hollywood blockbuster

Sometimes.......having a massive budget for a space opera so then your goal is making money not telling a coherent story........is worse

[thegirlwholied]

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but my biggest disappointment in Wonder Woman 1984 was... Steve. 

Yes he’s the perfect Wonder Woman boyfriend; yes I love how he backs her up in the fight scenes; yes I love Chris Pine; yes they have great chemistry and are adorable...

and yes the scene in the movie that most hit for me was their goodbye. 

But uh. I get that maybe the creative team wanted to avoid the complicated stuff and just have fun? But Wonder Woman (2017) showed you can have both fun & address the complicated stuff. 

And Steve Trevor, in that movie, bearing the weight of war, was part of the complicated stuff:

You don't think I get it, after what I've seen out there? You don't think I wish I could tell you that it was one bad guy to blame? It's not! We're all to blame! (I’m not). But maybe I am.

My father told me once, he said, "If you see something wrong happening in the world, you can either do nothing, or you can do something". And I already tried nothing.

1984!Steve is not complicated. He’s delicious. He eats Pop-Tarts. He is a Pop-Tart.

There’s a reason, when plots with time travel involve World War I, there’s usually That Moment. You know, the what do you mean, World War I. It’s probably a trope by now. But tropes exist for a reason and that one exists because it is one HELL of an emotional beat. You sent this man to the National Air & Space Museum, founded after World War II with an initial collection of mostly post WWI & WWII aircraft, and had him in DC within walking distance of war memorials, and had him in Diana’s apartment where she had a concentration camp photo... and you’re not even going to spend a beat on that?

The guy who we were introduced to, who drew Diana away from her island, talking about the ‘war to end all wars’, and we don’t get a beat? Who was worried about ‘weapons far deadlier than you can imagine’ and how ‘every kind’ of weapon now kills innocents, and the plot is set amid the specter of Cold War nuclear annihilation...and not a beat? 

I’m not saying it’s a plot-hole; you can handwave it with off-screen conversations or the lack of PTSD as ‘well, he did just come from heaven’. I’m not saying everything needs to be on-screen: we don’t need to know the details of Steve ‘trying nothing’, for example. 

But the movie is lesser for ignoring it, and Steve’s character is shallower. Hello, Pop-Tart. A perfect boyfriend, but one who, when he’s insisting any other guy could do for her (not exactly sounding like the guy who pointed out he was ‘above average’, and I’d buy he feels he’s not worthy but I’m not sure I buy his faith in other men being automatically more worthy?)... is not exactly demonstrating a lot of depth beyond, well, being charming Chris Pine, making crumbs in bed look appealing. He’s a dream! 

...honestly he almost felt to me like not-real Steve, versus the Steve who argued with Diana, who, yes, things were good with but also difficult with, but since the movie neither explored a) the question of ‘is dreamstone!Steve real’, pretty much just running with ‘yes’ rather than making us wonder if he was more conjured from Diana’s wish/memory versus his true self, but that is a whole different plot or b) how it’s a lot easier to love the memory of someone than the more-complicated real deal, but real is also better... that’s all moot.  

Yes, there should have been joy at more time with Diana and modern marvels (...though, uh, I question the choices of subway and escalator; they were in 1918 London, which would already have had escalators in its Underground). But in the first movie, for all Diana’s delight at babies & ice cream & snow, it’s balanced with recognition of the horrors of the world, which when seen through fresh eyes are so much worse than those taking them for granted, just as the joys are made new again. And so the echo aimed for, of Steve taking in 1984 with fresh eyes, was muddled for me, by its lack of depth. The movie reaches at commenting on ’80s greed & materialism & Cold War threats, but it almost doesn’t matter we’re in 1984, because it doesn’t use that right-there tool - the perspective from the past, with values pulled straight out of a more-despairing time - to add any color. It’s all pop, no tart. 

When I find myself dwelling on media it’s always because a) it was just that good, b) it was just that terrible, or, most often, c) it just missed being better, being great, and sometimes I’m not sure how they missed it - Wonder Woman 1984 just missed, for me, and this is the central reason why. Did I enjoy watching it? Do I love an Indiana Jones callback, and the Diana/Steve chemistry, and Kristin Wiig and Pedro Pascal? You bet. I enjoy eating a Pop-Tart, too. 

But it leaves me still wanting something with more substance. 

[misterbitches]

i had the misfortune of finally watching/getting through what happened in whatever episode where he gets raped so im gonna talk about it and tag it cos that's what a bitch fuckin feels like, got it? i do what i want aint no limit bad ass bitch aint never been timid. woopsie realized i got the nicknames confused oh well lmao

it's just logistically and plot wise like there's literal plot holes in this and i'm taking the production and set-up into account along with the actual content and development. im an ARTIST OKAY im jk i mean i am and i am pretentious and terrible but look. i didnt get that degree and im not in a house worth of debt for nothing ok. it's called writing on tumblr about my grievances of shows that dont matter and do not respect me as a fat black american woman either so it is my fault yet here i am.

anyway it was worse than i imagined and their talk after (with chengren) was even worse. that's what i mean about making the lines their own (the actors) bc teng teng sounded like a straight up motherfucking moron and im like

bECAUSE IT'S HIM EVEN THO IM LIKE WHAT THE FUCK DID U JUST SAY U STUPID BITCH? but then it's like awwww and they also care about his wellbeing obviously??? but no? but it's like ok still teng teng said it even if it's stupid because he is a character and charles puts that forth. the people that fail the most to do that are xing si's family but that's not the actors fault because it's the literal material. you're like wait what but you just said...?

so i know they have no script editors i guess i think i find this season ACTUALLY fascinating because of just how egregious it is. i also went back and watched history: obsessed which i thought i liked because of their chemistry even though god the production....but i tried rewatching it and i was like wow this is worse than i remembered and the production issues were even worse because some of the music was SO LOUD AND BAD HOLY FUCK and their whole rship isssssss a sight to behold lmao

so man i guess it really is the power of anson/charles. which is good cos we love to see it...sort of but also a lot.

i honestly....because i've been able to pay attn more to the aftermath of the rape going back and putting it into more context and focusing (just barely lmao) is hm even worse. the inconsistencies are insane. it's not even just about the act but the writers have zero idea where they are going because they have no interest in exploring it. but the way in which it happens is like fascinating. yong jie literally thinks he owns xing si and it doesn't matter if he was kissing him or not or asked for a kiss on the lips (which dude what the fuck? i'll get to that) because he was plied with "extremely strong drinks" and his mom knew about it....which girl congrats you're an accomplice to the rape of your son by your other son?

but first of all...the kissing thing. in what fucking world would he (xing si) want that unless he thought he (yong jie) was someone else. i can't say their attraction is evident because we are being lead by this team to think so; they create this false sense of sensuality already so to me that signifies that they never intended for them to have a bond as brothers. it just feels cheap and fucking lazy (which it is.) even if he did, which doesn't make sense considering the context THEY CONSTRUCTED, it wouldn't matter because he was so fucking drunk which.... at that point nothing is fun, you feel sick, who wants sex like that? does he not have whiskey dick? did they have a condom? was it not painful for him considering? even if this was something to easily get over like was the dick good? it couldn't have been. and then, on top of that, there's the fact that you can change your mind or whatever but also that people do get aroused in these situations bc it is human nature (that's if they can literally get aroused which if the drinks were allegedly sooooo strong that nigga would be out so....again like even practically here it doesnt add up. have these people ever been drunk? if not, write what you know girl. cos sometimes it's like i think some of u r trying to be cool when u dont have 2 b lmao)

so yong jie coming on to him previously may be seen as like push-and-pull but here's the thing. right after it happens (the rape and it's rape so call it that you'll be okay) xing si gets up and goes home and is terrified and upset. he acts like what we have seen or even felt after a violation. he's scared, clutching his bag, it's like...you know...decently coming off as truly distressing (the actor isn't bad at all and i like that he's dark. i just massively hate this for him but hey at least he can show some chops.) like honestly man that fucking sucks and hurts to see. if we've been there we feel it. or part of it is realizing belatedly what happened. a lot of times that drop in your stomach is the worst.

but somehow for some reason, to which i cannot understand, the three of them begin to talk as if xing si pressured him? which maybe i missed something and that is possible—dont feel like going back to look—but that also made no sense. like what kind of false memory is this? why would he think he wasn't willing? and if he thought yong jie wasn't and that he pressured him how does he remember like...anything about the sex?!?!??!? besides waking up and being with him. like i guess he felt yong jie's MASSIVE DONG imprint but ??!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!??!? MAKE IT MAKE SENSE!!!!!

god then the logic of the top/bottom thing is like i said i wasnt going to get into it but it's actually really funny. this whole thing was hilarious. honestly because I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT THAT MEANS. he could have totally raped him in that way but how did you get to this CONCLUSION FROM THAT??????? BY YOUR LOGIC THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS? IF HE IS THE BOTTOM AND PENETRATION IS THE ONLY FORM OF TRUE CONSUMMATION AND RAPE BECAUSE APPARENTLY, BASED ON ANATOMY, IF YOU HAVE A DICK IN UR BUTT UR A GIRL THEN HOW. DOES. THIS. MAKE. SENSE. AND THEN

AND THEN

AND THEN

AND THEN

this whole stupid conversation happens so we get to the conclusion that xing si violated him ok cool but that means that something is wrong. that is the CONCLUSION WE CAME TO A SECOND AGO?

also the other rapist is a villain and muren isn't in love with him so, once again, you're breaking the rules of your own world about acceptability which is why most of this is absolutely mind bogggglinG that iit's fuckign comical. like i actually when i can stomach it start laughing or my jaw is slack because it's so insulting as a viewer because there is like 0 logical followthrough.

because whatshisface barges in, kisses him in front of his friends without permission, then says whether you were willing or not which is hm. at that point how u gonna change that around but let's not bother with logic here. i am simply here to point out how this makes no sense according to the rules they set up even outside of the basic rule of life which is hm dont rape people maybe.

so now we know xing si was raped, they believe he was raped, he himself believes he was raped, and whatshisface literally says he doesn't care even if he was willing (he wasn't) so he admits to rape. i don't believe in the police and i hate them (BL industry needs the cops but dont get me down that road) but no one...thought to go?

because according to history 4 logic nothing matters so im sure if he went to the police you could handwave the homophobia since there's no actual context for anything besides their whimsy. but they dont want to do that because they aren't interested in an arc of growth; redemption isn't possible unless he is removed from the family but again no work on thinking this through or thinking about the victim's feelings. because gay sex? who fucking knows. supposedly progressive taiwanese writers of gay shit (like how supposedly progressive the world is. as in it is not and this behavior is the norm and bl perpetuates that) can't think of transformative justice?

and then they gave bad advice so we wont acknowledge that because teng teng doing anything wrong/stupid is frequent but hurts me and also that storyline is not real so i pretend they are not there outside of this post

so all of this is just straihgt up clownery now because it's fucking absurd like logically, practically, human-wise. the kissing thing is inconsequential but it was such a lazy cheap way out lmao cos they really wanted it to seem consensual but that's not how it works. on top of that their attraction makes no sense because whatshisface is just there. he is just there. he's nothing and no one so the sentiments are even more empty and on top of that he doesnt listen to a single request fucking obviously because the basis of their relationship is fucking rape so fucking listening and respecting his partner is not on his list of fucking priorities. he's literally so fucking annoying even without being a rapist it's like someone please beat his ass.

and then after all of that you want us to feel bad? with your horrible writing, poorly misplaced music, stupid costumes (those fucking SHOES THEY ARE HIDEOUS, AND MOST OF THIER CLOTHES DO NOT FIT IT'S LIKE WHY), questionable fucking editing. we're supposed to wnat them together? this sounds literally fucking crazy but bear with me lmao even with the rape they could at least have SOMETHING i mean like i cant believe im fucking saaying this. but like in addicted heroin which is fuckin tragic and awful at least there's a MODICUM of interest but honestly that show s a fucknig drag. idk they lookd good together? here we have 0. nothing. and it doesnt motivate. watching obsessed again i can see why i liked it in the beginning bc they have good chemistry but the acting and production adn like everything about it plus the rape-y vibes it's just too much. you need to pick one thing so if you're going to be a shit writer at least supplement it with something. this thing is nothing.

and even more nonsensical and what boggles my mind frankly out of all this is the mother's involvement and the father's final response. there are NO consequences? theyre all happy?

ok so lets go through this:

1. 2 boys grow up 2gether, one of the boys is fucking psycho, the mother knows but does nothing??????????????

2. one of the sons moves out so his father doesn't get a hint that's he's fucking gay. ok fine. he has 2 best friends, a job, an apt. he is fine.

3. aforementioned brother is obsessed with him for SOME REASON besides being crazy?

3.5 no one has done anything during him growing up to help him not be crazy?

4. mom says to husband who is their father also just in case we forget "im afraid he will lose his humanity"

4.5 again, do nothing. 0. just like oh man hes crazy. guess that's just our son ;)

4. who cares. plies him with alcohol purposefully to rape him. not even dubious (even though dubious is fucked and not okay or is just not. fucking real. these shows are contextless when they want to be or even movies or whatever so it's like largely not up to the task to understand complexity in human rships and then oversimplifies it constantly because that's what we do IRL. but people have fucking feelings you know and we realize when things don't feel good or right to us either very quickly after or having to process it. and once you're eyes are opened you may feel as something was fucking ripped away from you. for the modc couple this would be a very logical conclusion for the high schooler the thirty year old dated but again logic or feelings are up to their whimsy. no one cares bc everything can be counted as dubious so honestly it's a fucking stupid fucking topic like again why are we litigating what is and isnt consent when you could just like idk. read cues? consent? wait? not be a freak? like we all know what is proper human shit so even if we are watching this uncritically which u cant bc it's glaring and stupid it's just even more dumb) so it was honestly a rape plot like he literally planned it soooooooooo??!?!

5. aftermath of rape the victim is like literally fucking bereft and confused. and a rape victim. like that's what they are insinuating and what also he is to be clear.

6. boy tells him "idc if i raped u i luv u lmao"

7. mom ENCOURAGED THE BOY to get him drunk because her other son was too nice? she encouraged her adult son to rape her adult step-son (but her real son because she repeatedly says you are my son and the dad does too THEY GREW UP TOGETHER WHEN THE KID WAS IN AN IMPRESSIONABLE STATE) so THIS ALSO MAKES EVEN LESS MOTHERFUCKING SENSE

8. everyone finds out about his rape and he isnt mortified he's just concerned about himself being gay to his dad?????? except it's not really about his gayness bc now it's about his sudden love for his rapist brother? which? hm ok. understandable the dad is like wow i do not think i like this

9. dad knows all of it is fucked up, everyone does, knows the mother fucked up, knows he fucked up. doesnt like it because he is normal. so we know this is terrible? ok great so—

10. father says "i can't accept this...but i'm willing to give you my blessing" ok see here's the thing. when you write you have to think about the things you are putting on the page and what you have written previously. this quite literally made no sense how the fuck are you going to not accept them but give them your blessing? does this crew know what the fuck words are? i'm assuming they went to some sort of school to obtain jobs here bc there cannot be natural talent or experience. maybe most of them are rich. fuck i do not know but this also makes no sense. just the literal logic of it it's like fucking insane the whiplash.

10.5 apparently this father is also shitty. everyone here sucks and they are basically begging me to think xing si is a fucking idiot so i dont even want to look at him if he is an object he doesnt matter so now i want to kick him. thanks a lot you made the victim get absolutely fucking nothing

they KEEP PUSHING the brother thing it is so insane and it's liek GUYS WE GET IT WE UNDERSTAND THEYRE "RELATED" BUT NOT RELATED SO IT'S OK HE WAS "RAPED" BUT NOT RAPED but you're GOING BACK ON YOUR OWN RULES!!!!!!!!!! WE GET THAT THEY ARE BROTHERS!!! WE'RE OVER IT NOW BUT WHAT IS THIS WHEN WE ALREADY ESTABLISHED SOMETHING? I AM CONFUSION? they flip flop between my son, my brother my actual brother, and cannot fucking distinguish between love for your father and love for your romantic partner? so to me what i see is that the father wants to fuck the son. that's the conclusion i am garnering now considering nothing matters and his love for his "brother" is the same as his love for his dad lmao. they couldnt even do that in a way that made sense. like damn anybody can get anything. these ppl who are doing this have to be fucking rich and/or have connections.

also this guy sounds literally like a textbook abuser like he says constantly "im the best choice" is a rapist is awful holds capital (oh hees "saving" smh ur trapping her!!!!! RETIRE!!!!) also wears terrible shoes so i am like ur alllllllllLLLLL FUCKING CRAZY ur all literally crazy and then they are trying to set rules and boundaries in their fucking house like WHY ARE THEY LIVING TOGETHER EVEN? even tho oh my god they know he raped him and for some reason they are both allowing to live in the house but they dont want them to have sex??!?!?!??!??!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!!?!?!?!?!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?! i get that this is their house but this is like at this point these ppl are writing anything and now whatshisface is acting like a 2 yr old again and we are supposed to find this cute? like it makes 0 sense why do u fucking care u literally encouraged ur son to rape him so they cant have consensual sex under your nose now and have to wait four years? this is coming from the son who couldnt wait until someone was sober enough to realize hes fucking psychotic and should be killed also the fact that they act like being 20 means u have no fucking brain like this kid is in med school supposedly how do we know like hes a liar and an idiot so. also wait do they mean undergrad? how are you in med school at 20? is he a genius? girl i dont care lmao i guess i missed that but it's not like it matters so whatever

even if we ignore the stupidity of the literal acts, the grossness of the content, the absolute inability to write coherently or even remotely in a way where we would even want to see them together which is like....u set it up at the beginning so he punches "the love his life's best friend" also holy fuck im sorry remember when he punches muren because xing si got too drunk. so i'm guessing whatshisface is that good of a bartender that he makes super strong drinks and gets xing si drunk but his alcohol is magical therefore it doesn't make him sick. his alcohol is the type that gets you drunk but somehow doesnt get to your liver even though that's how we get drunk but dont ask guys he's only in med school and a bartender so i think he knows best (seriously have the main writers had a day of fun in their lives? have they ever been drunk? are they toddlers? drunk babies could probably do better tho.) i get that he was also jealous but if this kid is SOOOOOO genius (he understands social cues lmao he has the cpacity to project onto his victim so im like miss me with the not understanding shit. go to a fucking therapist like seriously did no one care abt this kid? his mother thinks he's like almost a goddamn murderer. how is she not dead? how are they all not dead? how do any of them know how to drive with this type of brain?) then he would understand that they are very clearly friends since he watched them part in a very platonic way and since he apparently knows what love is cos he thinks....he can....make someone fall in love with him bc he loves them? again, i wouldnt know hes 20 and taiwanese and im 29 and black from AMERICA so im WESTERN* so you know. different life experiences i guess XD

even if we do mental gymnastics to get it to a place where they "had sex" and he didnt rape him there's 0 ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ties to the literal story they wrote and the rules they set up. i'm going ot assume they dont know wtf theyre doing and i know for a fact we all care more about their dumb show than they do but it's actually startling how piss poor this is it's like idek what to compare it to. the continuity is awful awful awful they needed a script supervisor majorly and they are making bank and are going to make fucking bank fof this shit. and itll just continue like that until IRL material changes and that's facilitated by these very same groups they choose to profit off of and exploit by propelling it into the mainstream and litigating homosexuality through capitalism. and i'm being specific with homosexuality. i dont want a GL market like at all and i know why we wouldnt have it either and that has everything to do with the nature of BL, capitalism, coercion, and the fanbase being young girls and women. i don't think in this day and age we can safely say all the fans are straight; i'm sure a majority but many women or people on the gender spectrum and sexuality spectrum also consume it. frankly, it's possible the women who write it could be or something too. i dont rly believe any1 is str8 lmao but im just saying it's not out of the realm of possibility. but it isnt about that at all. that's why we wont see "good" female characters (like well written) often that's why we won't see trans women or kathoeys or fat people or black asians in it. a lot of it is is a choice we participate in whatever. but holy fuck dude u could at least respect the audience's fucking intelligence. i'm talking about everything i think that is encapsulated in the project but it's even more jarring and worse because it's so insanely inconsistent and poorly done. like how we jump from one conclusion to another is wild to me. even their first "night together" and he wakes up im like girl....u no ur ass felt it. this nigga broke into his house and was like "im gonna have u" like it's getting weird

just make xing si suffer offscreen not us the stupidity is staggering, mind blowing, hilarious.

how wong kar wai, a straight man from HK (or at least married to a woman), or barry jenkins, a striahgt black man, write/do stories well about people they wouldnt knw about their experiences directly is....well thinking like using their brains and like knowing all types of people? the man who co-wrote moonlight is a hOMOSEXUAL, leslie cheung was fucking gay or queer (and he committed suicide and that's important also RIP homie) both are hailed as queer cinema like WKW wanted to do something else and invested time into it, changed the way he played around with structure, moved away from his crime oriented stuff. he THOUGHT about it and this film is about their reality. it's a harsh film, idk how i feel about it (but my fav movies of his are the crime ones or the messy ones where it's clear he didnt write a script lmao fallen angels is one of my fav movies its' abt assassins kinda) but i know it means something. and he didnt like what HK had previously wasnt enough. it is not the only cinema that should be shown since it's such a stark reality and depressing but it is a real depiction so we can have all sorts of stuff. no this isnt WKW level or moonlight level but i know for a fact these people think they are doing something because artists always do i say this as one and someone who is equally as useless. you're making a statement.

i also hate the westerner component of peoples analyses. first of all dont do cultural relativism. we can critique and respect. but second of all how are we going to keep saying "dont put western ideals on this" when that is what is happening anyway because that's part and parcel for soft power and capitalism. how about taiwan's history with the KMT? what about the regimes young people fought about? aided by US imperialism which permeates through society and affects material conditions, views, democracy, identity and that goes into culture and media. hm? what about that? is that reality too fucking western for people? that we are doing the same thing again now? is that okay to talk about or is that only on your time?

then there's the argument that this is just entertainment. yea no shit but the thing is if we r gonna talk about marginalized groups and watch bc of marginalized groups and then be expected to identify then i dont see why i cant put this in context. even if it wasnt fucking serious we'd still judge it. but it's so pompous and again like i wouldnt say EYE think it's art but it is "art" in the literal sense and no self respecting artist would ever go "man this means nothing." of course im not sure if they do respect themselves so hey but u cant just go oh man it's entertainment when it literally rests on the fact that HOMOS are MARGINALIZED. it literally rests on the fact that WOMEN ARE OBJECTS. you either want progress or you dont. i dont understand being so demanding but not beign specific in the demands and not trying to use your brain. if you dont want to use your brain don't. but if you are looking , engaging, and keep making these arguments or telling ppl it doesnt matter whilst complaining about how much others care is hypocritical at best, willfully obtuse at worst. both bad. :)

(also all this + another thing; it is insulting to have this like wedding happen based off of this stupid relationship when people fought so hard and had to push it. now they can use the material conditions to their advantage but it's so ridiculous. also because there is difficulty still in getting married in taiwan i'm honestly like....the boldness of the writers...)

[signsofsam]

Buddie Week, Day Six: All We Know is Touch and Go

Eddie reaches over, forcing one of Buck’s hands out of his hair, wrapping it in both of his own. “We have to believe they're going to be okay.”

“But what if they’re not? Did I tell them I loved them before we left? Do they know we love them? Did I hug them enough? Did I-”

“Buck, just breathe, okay? Stop inviting trouble until we know more.”

“They’re back there all alone, Eddie. Our boys are alone,” Buck murmurs, turning to his husband, and he’s broken, eyes sad, and there are tears brimming, ready to be unleashed. “What if-”

Eddie shakes his head. “We’re not ‘what if’-ing this, Buck. We can’t. We hope for the best, and we wait for the doctor.” He kisses the back of Buck’s hand, and Buck lets out a breath, trying to center himself.

AO3 Link Here

Prompt: “Just breathe, okay?” + hurt/comfort

Notes: Title is from State of Grace by Taylor Swift. You can find the other stories in this ‘verse here and probably should read at least a few of them to know who the OMC is in this fic. Also: we are practicing suspension of disbelief and general magical handwaving over all the medical inaccuracies that are in here because a doctor/healthcare provider I am most certainly not.

And someone please let me know if Google Translate failed me anywhere.

--//--//--

They were just going to get ice cream.

It’s all Nate can focus on: they were just going to get ice cream, and Eddie and Buck are going to kill him, because now the truck is pressed against the concrete median of the highway, other crashed cars around them, and his blood’s splattering onto the seats and Chris won’t wake up. Would they send him back? 

They wouldn’t do that, would they? They...no, you know they love you, and this won’t change that.

But he’s gotten Chris hurt.

Fuck. Just fuck.

He really likes his family. 

He doesn’t want to go anywhere.

“N...Nate?” Chris whimpers, and he gasps, turning too quickly to look at his brother, and pain explodes in his head.

“Shit, shit, shit shit shit,” he breathes out, waiting for the pain to settle into something more manageable, so at least he can see. When he finally attempts to open his eyes again (and God, it hurts, but he has to check on his brother), Chris is watching him, worried, his right cheek red, bruising, a lazily bleeding laceration on his cheekbone. His glasses are gone, and there are more cuts peppering his face. There’s melted ice cream on his face (“I don’t see how you can eat that while I’m driving,” Nate had been complaining, just before the crash, and Chris had given him the biggest shit-eating grin as he took another huge bite of his mint chocolate chip), but for the most part, he looks okay.

Nate still can’t help but breathe out, “Buck and Eddie are going to kill me.”

Chris frowns, reaching over with an unsteady, shaky hand. “Did...did something hit your head?”

“What?”

“You’re talking nonsense, Nate. Did you hit your head?” 

“I got you hurt.”

Chris’ frown deepens. “No, you didn’t. A car hit us. You’re bleeding.”

“I know. I’m getting blood all over-”

Pain explodes again as sirens cut through the air, and this time, thankfully everything fades to black.

--//--//--//--

“They’re going to be just fine, Buck,” Eddie whispers. They’ve been waiting for a doctor for a few minutes, and honestly, they probably both look a mess, still in their uniforms, halfway through a shift and just getting back from a rather disgusting run when Athena called, and now Buck is sitting in a hard plastic chair, hunched over, hands clenching into his hair, foot tapping over and over and over, and through his own worry, it makes Eddie hurt. “We’re here now, and they’re going to be fine.”

He reaches over, forcing one of Buck’s hands out of his hair, wrapping it in both of his own. “We have to believe they're going to be okay.”

“But what if they’re not? Did I tell them I loved them before we left? Do they know we love them? Did I hug them enough? Did I-”

“Buck, just breathe, okay? Stop inviting trouble until we know more.”

“They’re back there all alone, Eddie. Our boys are alone,” Buck murmurs, turning to his husband, and he’s broken, eyes sad, and there are tears brimming, ready to be unleashed. “What if-”

Eddie shakes his head. “We’re not ‘what if’-ing this, Buck. We can’t. We hope for the best, and we wait for the doctor.” He kisses the back of Buck’s hand, and Buck lets out a breath, trying to center himself. 

“Is this what it was like? When Chris had to have surgeries when he was younger?”

“Every time,” Eddie answers. “We would be waiting, me, Shannon, Mom and Dad the one time I was gone-” he flinches here, and Buck squeezes his hand. “That one was the hardest, and I don’t think I”ll ever forgive myself for being gone. So yeah, the uncertainty and the worry and the fear...it’s always there, but now, now I have to believe it’s going to be okay. I have to, and you have to, even though we’re scared shitless.”

“I couldn’t imagine not having you here to share the weight,” Buck murmurs. “I’m really glad we’re here together. It makes it so much easier to bear.”

They don’t have to wait much longer, thank god, because Eddie’s about to press against Buck’s knee to settle his leg, and they both stand when the doctor calls about Chris. “He’s okay?” Buck asks before the doctor even has a chance to give them her name, but she smiles at him, nodding. 

“Christopher is going to be okay. He has a mild concussion, some cuts and bruises on his face, and he’s going to be very sore for the next few days, but nothing permanent, and nothing overly serious. Oh, and I’m Dr. Rodriguez. It’s nice to meet you both. Which one is ‘Dad’ and which one is ‘Buck’ because I’ve heard a multitude of compliments about both and still don’t know which one is which.”

Eddie likes her immediately.

Chris is still in a bed in the ER, and he smiles widely as the curtain opens. “Dad!” he cries happily, and Eddie’s heart tightens as he wraps his son in a hug, as gentle as possible. He feels Buck hug them both tight, and their world is a little more right. “Dad, lemme go! I’m okay!”

“Mijo, you were in a car accident; let me hug you a little longer, hmm?” he whispers, pressing a kiss into Chris’ bedraggled curls.

“Yeah, Chris, let us baby you a little longer,” Buck adds, and Chris huffs, but puts up with a hug for another minute or two before he starts shifting, uncomfortable enough that they both let him go. “You’ve got a hell of cut there, kiddo.” His hand is shaking when he touches Chris’ cheek, just barely, pulling back when Chris flinches. “Sorry about that. I’m just worried.”

“I’m okay, really. My head hurts a lot, but the doctor said I shook my brain a little and it’s going to take a few days until I feel back to normal, And I’m pretty sure my morning exercises aren’t happening for a few days.”

Eddie can’t help his smile. “I think you’ll be okay if you skip them for a few days.”

“Have you...have you guys seen Nate yet? Is he okay? He was talking nonsense in the truck-”

“The doctors are still working on him,” Eddie says, careful with his words; Dr. Rodriguez said there was another doctor working on Nate, that he’d come find them as soon as he got a free moment. “But they’ll come get us soon, I’m sure.”

“Dad, he said something about you guys hating him, because I got hurt. But he got hurt, too! Can you...this wasn’t his fault. He didn’t do anything wrong. I begged for ice cream, and we’d just gone to get some-”

“Superman, neither of you did anything wrong; it was an accident, and they happen,” Buck interrupts, running his hand through Chris’ hair. “No one’s angry at either of you; your dad and I were so scared about both of you, scared that we wouldn’t get the chance to tell you again how much we love you and what amazing men you are both growing up to be. You can ask your dad-I was a mess out there waiting.”

“He really was,” Eddie confirms, grinning when Buck and Chris roll their eyes. “I mean it, Chris! He’s dramatic.”

Chris laughs, and Buck gasps at him, eyes wide. “Christopher! I thought we were buddies!”

When a nurse comes to grab one of them to talk to Nate’s doctor, Eddie goes, Buck having settled half on Chris’ bed, their son drowsy against his shoulder. “I’ll hold down the fort here,” he whispers as Eddie gives him a kiss. 

“He was unconscious when the paramedics got to him,” the doctor explains, “but he woke up here, agitated and worried. We gave him something to keep him calm so we could examine him, so he’s going to be a touch out of it. He’s got a concussion, and there’s a nasty cut on his hairline from where his head hit the window. His side of the vehicle impacted the median of the road, and it caused damage to the left side of his body. He has a couple of fractured ribs, he’s got bruising from the airbag, whiplash, but most concerning, there’s damage to his spleen that we need to watch, but the CT confirmed it wasn’t as major as I first feared.”

“Do you want to admit him?”

“I would like to keep him overnight, especially with his concussion and to keep an eye on his spleen. We’re waiting to get him transferred to the children’s floor, hopefully it shouldn’t be too much longer. You can wait with him until they come to get him.”

Eddie thanks the man, opening the curtain as quietly as possible, and Nate...Nate’s watching him apprehensively, tracking him as he moves, suspicious. The laceration on his forehead really is nasty, large and circled in darkening bruises. There are smaller cuts peppered down his cheek and neck before disappearing under his gown, and his left eye is nearly swollen shut. 

He looks awful, but he’s alive, and really, that’s all that matters to Eddie.

“Hey, mijo,” he murmurs, heart clenching when he sees Nate’s bottom lip wobbling. “Jesus, kiddo, you gave us quite the scare.”

“I didn’t-” his voice is soft, hoarse, and he winces, swallowing once. “I didn’t mean to get Chris hurt. Please don’t send me back. I’ll do whatever I have to to stay.”

“Nathan-” Eddie breathes out, hugging his eldest son as tight as he dares, feeling his kid sag in his arms. “Baby, you aren’t going anywhere but upstairs to a room and then home with us when we can take you. I know you aren’t thinking clearly right now, and that everything’s a little jumbled, but Nate, Buck and I? we aren’t at all mad at you, for anything. We wouldn’t be mad at you if the accident had been your fault, and it wasn’t. Athena said the driver beside you swerved into your lane and hit the truck, that’s it.”

“I just wanted to get ice cream,” Nate whispers, and Eddie can hear the tears, feel them getting the collar of his shirt wet. “I didn’t-”

“You were being a good big brother, mijo. We are never planning on you being anything but part of our family, being our kid; nothing you do is going to change that.”

“I thought you were going to hate me.” The confession is said into Eddie’s shirt, and his entire world freezes and he thinks about how scared Nate must have been, waiting for them to come, wondering if they wouldn’t. “I really didn’t want you to hate me.”

“Nunca, mijo. Never. Buck and I will always love you.”

“That’s good,” Nate finally answers. “Because I think I totaled your truck.”

Eddie laughs, the first real sense of normality since Athena’s fateful call. “I needed to replace it soon anyway.”

He stays with Nate until they come to transfer him, promising him either he or Buck will be with him as soon as the nurses allow. He gives him one last kiss on his forehead, one last gentle squeeze on his shoulder, one last “I love you,” and watches the bed until the elevator doors close behind it before retreating back to Chris’ curtain. He’s a little surprised to see Chris dressed in comfy clothes, Buck standing beside him, awkwardly holding his crutches. “What’s going on here?”

“Doc discharged him, and Mads brought them both some clothes from home. Chim called her for us,” Buck explains, handing Chris his crutches when asked. Together, they make their slow way out to the waiting room, where Maddie’s sitting, typing away on her phone. She smiles when she sees them, giving both Eddie and Buck a hug in greeting. “I guess I can go home with Chris, get a quick shower and then come relieve you?”

“Aunt Maddie can take me home,” Chris informs them, grimacing just a bit as he grips his crutches, the walk more painful than usual. “You both need to stay here.”

“Superman-” Buck tries to argue, but Chris stops him with one raised eyebrow.

“Buck, Nate’s the one in the hospital; I’m getting to go home. He’s the one who’s not alright right now. He needs both of you. Aunt Maddie said she and Chim could stay with me already, and you guys can stay here. I want to make sure Nate knows he’s just as important as I am to you guys. I know that, and you know that, but he’s not sure of that right now, and it’s important that we all make sure he knows.”

Eddie knows he and Buck have lost this battle (and seriously, Chris is fourteen; how are they losing battles to fourteen-year-olds?), so he shakes his head when Buck starts to argue with Chris. “You will go home, take a hot shower, and get some rest?”

“That’s the plan.”

“Promise?”

“Dad-”

“Mijo, I don’t want to worry that you aren’t doing what the doctor said while I’m here.”

Chris rolls his eyes, but nods. “I promise. Home, shower, cuddle with Scarlet, and then bed. Aunt Maddie can text you all about my very boring adventures.” He hugs his father, squeezing as much as he can muster. “As long as you take care of Nate.”

“Always, kid.”

--//--//--

Nate wakes sometime during the night, groggy from the meds they’ve given him to help manage the pain while he tries to sleep. Everything feels off, and he’s a little desperate when he looks around, the room empty until he turns his head ever-so-gently, the ache of moving that much starting to build, and he sees them both, sprawled out on the unused bed beside him, both of them facing him, Eddie spooned around Buck, their hands intertwined, resting close to Buck’s heart.

They’ve stayed.

It’s what Eddie promised him, when he was still confused, still worried that everything was his fault and they were going to send him away, but somehow, waking up now, more clear headed, it means something more.

It means everything.

They’ve stayed.