#‘seek is so mean about what people like she’s trying to run fandom’

[allastoredeer]

No hate, just asking.

So you just personally like bottomAlastor and make every ship with him as bottom because of your personal likes. But this works the same way with bottomLucifer. People liking it and making him bottom in any ship. Or liking topAlastor and making him top in every ship. Maybe there are people who just go with trends in ship dynamics, but a lot of shippers just like it without any 'making mlm into hetero' meaning. Yes even when making Lucifer a bit more feminine since they do it in every ship simply cause more feminine Lucifer does things to them.

Exactly 👉👉 people like what they like and they don't need to defend or give me a list of reasons why they like it. I figured people liked bottom!Lucifer or top!Alastor because it scratches that itch for them (much like me with bottom!Alastor), otherwise they wouldn't be writing/drawing it at all.

It's why I don't seek out fans I disagree with or lurk on their pages/blogs to bombard them with reasons why I, personally, don't like how they depict radioapple (and because that's just a shitty thing to do in general, and no should be doing that. That's a one-way ticket to turning fandom into a very toxic place).

I keep my opinions and thoughts to my blog page for that reason. This is place where I can write about the things I like and dislike, post my art and fics, and interact with fans who share the same thoughts and feelings as I do. I'm sure a lot of fans would disagree, but, to me, most of the depictions of radioapple that I've seen come off as incredibly hetero coded, and a lot of the way Alastor is drawn/written squicks me out, especially when he tops. And that's not in the way that he's overly sexualized or anything, imma gonna sexualize that man to my heart's content, but Alastor's ace identity means a lot to me, and a lot of the time I just...don't feel it with him.

Now there's no "correct" way to write an ace character, as its a spectrum. There isn't a checklist of things you HAVE to follow. But with Alastor, especially when it's in a written work - especially when it's HIS pov - he doesn't feel ace. You can't tell that someone is ace based on how they talk or act - not usually - just like you can't assume a man is gay based on how he runs or talks, or a woman a lesbian because she has a short haircut. But in his POV, we're supposed to be in his head, we're seeing his thoughts and emotions. It's the perfect time to explore what he feels and thinks about relationships, sex, and everything in between, and yet most of the time he reads like any other non-ace character. It's like there's no real thought or consideration given to his identity and the experiences that come with it. Asexuality is more than "don't like sex" or "only like sex sometimes," there's so much more to it than that.

But I also know that this may be the first time some people are interacting or playing with an ace character, and just the fact that they're trying - however unintentionally aphobic it comes off sometimes - the effort is appreciated.

It's a real back and forth thing for me, obviously, LOL fandom culture and spaces can be so frustrating but so fascinating at the same time.

I don't think anyone is intentionally making the ship hetero, nor do they mean to - and besides, this is how I feel, and I know everyone isn't going to feel the exact same way. I'm sure there are people who see it as a very queer relationship, and I'm not going to judge or fight them over it. Everyone has different perspective, after all.

At the end of the day, I don't mind bottom!Lucifer (I see him as a switch, so he definitely enjoys bottoming), I just don't like how he's written/drawn with top!Alastor. It's the depiction of it that turns me off. I've seen top!Alastor and bottom!Lucifer art before that I have liked, but its few and far between, and overall not worth diving into to root out the few pieces I've enjoyed.

I like feminine Lucifer, but not to the extent that I've seen. I like the masculine side of him too, especially because he's a shortie. I like masculine Alastor, but I adore his feminine side. Alastor exudes so much gender, it's insane. He pulls off masculine, feminine, and even non-binary so well. He's versatile ❤️ And it aggravates me when he's depicted as super masculine and all the other stuff is toned down, if not stripped away.

But, like I said, that's why I stay in my little corner and I focus on what I enjoy. Ranting about things you don't like in fandom isn't bad, especially with fans that agree with you. It's very cathartic actually, and I've felt more connected with the fandom than I have since the show aired. it's only when you make your emotions, thoughts, and opinions other people's problems that it becomes a negative thing.

I'm not here to rain on people's parades, so I support, encourage even, that those who do like the things I dislike (and don't enjoy seeing me clown on them) block me. No hard feelings from me. I get it.

Damn, these posts really run away from me. They get so much longer than I intend XD

But anyway, I'm glad people are having fun with super feminine bottom!Lucifer and super masculine top!Alastor, that's the whole point of fandom, but it just isn't for me, at all, and I will likely continue to rant/clown on it with the fans who also share my opinion. I'm not going to shove it anyone's face of course, I'm keeping it to my blog, and I am A-okay with being blocked if that's not something people want to see 😊

[andreal831]

Lily Salvatore and Misogyny

I did an analysis on Esther a while back and was asked to do the same for Lily by @unabashedmoonlight. Sorry I am just getting around to it. I wanted to rewatch before discussing it in any kind of depth.

The misogyny Esther faces from the fandom is not limited to her, Lily and her heretics are constantly framed in misogynistic ways. She is yet another woman who has suffered immense levels of abuse, but is granted none of the understanding or forgiveness of her male counterparts.

When we first meet Lily, the show does a great job as painting her as the perfect villain. She appears to have almost no redeeming qualities. She is a ripper, she abandoned her own children to an abusive man, she started a new family and never looked back, etc. And this is what the fandom focuses on. They ignore the entire backstory that unfolds in Season 7 and her development. Yet, when the men in the show are critiqued for being monsters, the fandom jumps to explain it away by trauma and half-assed redemption arcs.

Lily is a perfect example of the cycle of abuse, escaping from one (Giuseppe) to find herself with another (Julien).

Lily and Giuseppe

Lily's abuse was even more explicitly stated than Esther's. There's no denying she was verbally, physically, emotionally, and financially abused throughout her marriage. To the point that she was willing to fake her own death and flee.

They even explicitly show that Lily was dependent on Giuseppe. She had to steal money from him to try and run with her own children because she didn't have any means for herself. She wasn't able to work and didn't have access to money.

During the time period they lived, Lily had nearly no resources to escape. She would have been the legal property of her husband. If she had run with her sons, Giuseppe would have had legal rights to throw her in jail. Yet she was willing to risk it to save her children. When Giuseppe found out he made certain that this was not going to be an option.

Lily also had less ability to protect her sons than Esther did since she wasn't a witch. She was not able to stop the abuse no matter how much people wanted her to. She could have stayed with her sons, but it wouldn't have stopped their abuse. She can be criticized as a mother for that, but at the same time, she was worried about her own survival as well. Giuseppe shot his own sons, it's not farfetched to believe she felt afraid for her life from such a man.

Lily and Julien

Shortly after she flees, Lily meets Julien. This is such a pivotal time for survivors. She had not had a chance to recover from the abuse in any means. It is very common for people who have suffered abuse to find themselves in second, third, fourth, etc. abusive relationships. It is a cycle. Abuse makes people feel weak and vulnerable as well as lowers their self-esteem. This can cause the survivors to seek out people who reinforce their low self-image and treat them how they feel they deserve to be treated.

In Lily's case, the only relationship she knew was Giuseppe. So when she meets Julien, and he is not physically abusing her, she truly believes he is better. She misses all of the other signs of abuse. She doesn't realize the manipulation. Julien is the reason Lily doesn't go back for her sons. She sends Oscar and Valerie to check on them and Julien convinces them to tell Lily they moved on from her death. Julien needed to stay in control of every aspect of Lily's life and he manipulated his way into getting that control without Lily even realizing it.

This is obvious by the way she vehemently tells her sons that Julien is nothing like Giuseppe. But as soon as they point out the similarities, she notices it right away and switches sides. This takes an incredible amount of strength to do. Once she realizes that Julien is no longer the man she thought he was, she turns on him. This is something the fandom tends to leave out when talking about Lily.

Her last moments are for her sons and her heretic children.

"I never had the courage to tell you before... I can choose them both."

After her death, Julien says that Lily is the only thing that kept her sane. This language is textbook narcissistic abuser. Making a person feel like every time you mess up it is their fault. They are the only thing that can keep you in line so if they ever leave, it will be their fault for everything you do.

Lily experienced abuse nearly her entire existence, but was finally able to fight back at the very end.

Lily, Stefan, and Damon

Most of the hate Lily gets is because of Damon. Damon's entire redemption plot is essentially tied to his treatment as a child/human life. TVDU likes to redeem characters by not making them seek redemption, but by making the fandom just feel bad for them and making excuses for their behaviors.

Damon and Klaus essentially get the same exact backstory because it is effective and takes minimal effort. Watching a child suffer abuse is an immediate way to garner sympathy because children are innocent. No one deserves to be abused, least of all children.

So painting Lily as a absolute villain allows more sympathy for Damon. But again, if Damon can get sympathy, it's only fair to give Lily sympathy as well. They both suffered abuse at different times. I'd even argue that Lily had better development.

Damon's last words to Lily show just how little Damon was able to grow as a character. He, like Klaus, hung onto his childhood trauma almost as a safety blanket. If he never faced his abuse, he could continue to use it to be angry. He never had to take accountability for anything. This is furthered by Damon at her funeral, acting like a child when his brother clearly needed to grieve. But that's another discussion.

Damon's development was tied to the women in his life, whereas Lily's was tied to her overcoming her abuse.

Lily and her Heretics

I also don't necessarily blame Lily for finding her family. TVDU is full of found families, even from characters that have living families. Yes, it hurt her sons to see her being more of a mother to other people, but should she have been alone the rest of her life?

Lily loved her heretics and even chose them over Julien. She wanted the best for them and even was willing to compromise with them to make them happy. This to me shows that she was a good person, but circumstances pushed her to do terrible things. Much like every man in the show.

The Misogyny of it all

Every character in the show has done bad things for various reasons. But the men get excuses and forgiveness, while the women get blame. I hate how often the show abuses women just so a man can have some kind of character development without doing anything.

Lily is a complex character. She is not all good or all bad. No one is. She wasn't evil for how she behaved, rather she was someone suffering abuse and responding to it.

I'm not saying Lily is perfect or that she deserved forgiveness from her sons. She still did so much that can be criticized. But we also can't ignore the abuse she suffered. She was a complex character who yes made terrible decisions, but ultimately was she worse than some of the fandom favorites? She did everything to fight for her and her family's survival like Elijah. She abandoned her children because of her own trauma just like Klaus did. She was a ripper like Stefan. Why are the women, who are victims of abuse, treated like the abusers rather than their fellow survivors?

[eddiediazismyhusband]

Wait was edy confirmed to have been filming last night??? PLEASEE WHEN CAN SHE JUST BE GONE

I don’t think she was 100% confirmed to be filming last night or not in all honesty- I blocked her transphobic ass a while ago so the only information i get about her whereabouts on set are from what i’m told by other people, but i think the big theory going around right now is that she always posts after others post about being on set, and people think she may be piggybacking trying to make it look like she’s there when she actually isn’t… of course this is just a theory and like i said i blocked her. a while ago so i don’t see her posts to confirm nor deny the plausibility of this, but knowing her attention-seeking attitude i wouldn’t put it past her.

And i would not fear too much anon, actors are often contracted for a specific number of episodes, so her being there does not mean her days aren’t numbered. Obviously we don’t know anything for sure, but I have my own theories- we know the time that she posted herself crying on her story and then started talking about auditioning again was around the time the show was picked up for season 8, so obviously contracts would begin being discussed at that time. My personal opinion is that she was told then that she would not be returning for season 8, and that is what sparked this attempt to stay relevant in the fandom (following cast members she never followed before, constantly posting about being on set and how “thankful” she is to have a job, interacting with people bashing the show for being “too gay,” etc.) to me it all reads as someone who is desperately trying to cling to the quickly unraveling thread that is her place on that show and it’s only a matter of time before she’s gone.

i mean ryan himself called her a ‘filler’ relationship for eddie. even the plotlines she’s been involved in this season she’s barely been there. eddie was quite literally on the verge of breaking up with her in 7x5 before his advice to buck made him decide to simply start over their relationship. My theory now is that “ghost of a second chance” has a double meaning of us seeing the ghost of a past relationship that eddie is still grappling with (maybe shannon, maybe someone else…. an old “army buddy” perhaps who he had never really understood his feelings for?) while also pertaining to the “second chance” he gave their relationship being dead. I mean the man brought his grandmother who lives in texas to his coworker’s wedding, and he barely trusts her with his kid (christopher is always being watched by someone else, he says things like “she’s already babysat this week” as if watching your significant other’s children is a burden to her) and like i said he was on the verge of ending things in 7x5…. i think it’s safe to say that their relationship is bones, and there’s no other logical direction for them to take it in, considering the fact that marisol is barely a character anyway, the fans don’t like e*y (for good reason), and they know that if they try to keep her on they will receive backlash (which we know tim sees after the karaoke debacle)

i am fully preaching to the choir here, because i have massive anxiety and the constant stress of speculating about where eddie’s (and buck’s) story goes is something that always runs my nerves up a wall… for reasons i won’t get into, eddie is a character i relate to deeply and i want to see his storyline handled with care and attention, so while the idea of the show sticking him with something as lackluster as marisol (played by a problematic untalented actress) obviously makes me stress out too, i try my best to remind myself just how little sense narratively it would make sense to keep eddie with marisol, since she is a wash rinse repeat of every romantic interest he’s had before- something they keep bringing up in eddie’s story as a bad thing.

so stay strong, dear anon… the light at the end if the tunnel has not gone out— there are things happening that none of us know, and it will do us no good to focus on the possible negative outcome when the positive outcome seems so much more likely in this situation.

Sorry to completely hijack your ask into an explanation of eddie, but if you know me you know i’m obsessed w the man so 🤷

Thank you for the ask, anon! 💕💕

[sukibenders]

Some in the Bridgerton fandom will paint Kate as being in an abusive family, paint Edwina and Mary (even Lady Danbury at times) as these villainous people who make her life miserable just to make Anthony and his family the "better choice". Like, ignoring how this trope of "villainous poc family causing the poc female character to run away into arms of a white family" is so terrible it also makes no sense when in reference to these characters themselves. Let's start with the Sharmas: we have Kate who is the daughter of a man who remarried and had a child of their own. Now, from that alone people just outright use this as a way to paint Mary in a bad light, making up the most outlandish things, when Mary admits very adamantly that she always viewed Kate as her daughter and has/will always love her. Why do you think she was so outraged by Kate being willing to accept the deal given by the Sheffields?

Now, on to Edwina. Some will hang that "half-sister" line over her head but won't give the same action to Anthony, or heck, even Kate (though she doesn't deserve hate like Anthony more so criticism for some parts). Now the line was wrong, for sure, but that doesn't mean Edwina wasn't in her right. Here we have a young girl who lost her father, is aware of her family's social and economic status, and is informed from the beginning that her finding a suitable match will either tip or support the balance of her family's lives. Edwina is literally entered into the show searching for a husband to help support her family, that's first, romance came second. So enter Anthony who, infront of her, is so charming and kind and even though him and her sister are fighting at times he still seeks her out. He's wealthy and promises to provide for her family, something that she wants. Only to find out that none of it was real, or at least, real towards her and that she was hurt in the process (by this I refer to the Sheffields ordeal and Anthony's whole attitude and his lack of respect for her). Like that's messed up and anyone would be upset over it, forgive a woman (more so a young woman in Edwina's case) expressing their feelings. Some of you want her to be Kate's cheerleader 24/7, and it shows. And Edwina was always ready to comfort Kate, from her (Kate) being detached from the world (during her wedding) to her supporting her (Kate) and Anthony being together, so let's not go on and say the Bridgertons would be better.

Now, on to the main family themselves, what we see of the Bridgertons in s2 isn't even that positive when you really think about it. From the beginning, when Anthony is looking for a wife with the most horrible standards, Violet, who notes that her son isn't looking for marriage for the right reasons and instead of trying to talk to him about it, instantly goes and states she's disappointed by his outlook and fears he won't be happy, confused as to why he's this way. BECAUSE YOU PLACED THAT WEIGHT ON HIM. Like I understand losing her husband was terrible, it was, but to then put all that pressure and weight on to your eldest and then become surprised when it starts affecting him in ways you don't like, while taking hardly any time to actually talk about his feelings, is laughable (couldn't think of a better word). Like whenever Anthony is around with valid points, she looks exasperated at times. And the other Bridgertons aren't better from Daphne literally pitying him (even tho she knew about his feelings for Kate and could have eased the situation instead of letting it go on) to Bennedict laughing at him at every turn to the siblings joking about the situation he put them in (which they themselves could have prevented but didn't & aren't affected as severely by like the Sharmas), it makes no sense how people would view them as better than the Sharmas.

Now on to Kate and how this view affects her. One big reason being is the fact that it ignores her insecurities, only paints them in a different light. Kate didn't view herself as Mary's daughter because her father had been with someone before he met Mary, long after she was born. She didn't think Mary would love her as a daughter and is surprised when she finds out that she actually does. Kate accepts the Sheffields deal because it will help Edwina, because she (Kate) understands their social and economic status and is willing to leave the only family she has just for them to be secure and happy. That's the reason she has turmoil, not because her family hates her and is abusing her! Like where did that thought even come from? Kate has issues of not expressing her feelings, bottling them up and trying to handle things herself until it blows over, that's it. And when she does express them, do you know who actively seeks to reassure her? Her mother and sister. They don't make jokes or make the environment able to express these emotions nonexistent (like the Bridgertons with Anthony), they try to help her because they love her.

Honestly, the Sharmas deserve so much better because if it isn't the show doing them dirty than it's the fandom.

[Quick edit because people were taking some things out of context, by sneaking behind her (Edwina) back, I was referring to the whole Sheffield incident because, when it's revealed, it literally put her, and her sister and mother, in an awkward position and makes her and her family look like bad people, especially in front of the Bridgertons. I reworded my original post and added context, and admit I could have worded it better, but for those who saw it as me immediately trashing Kate's character, I will state here that was nowhere near the intent and never was, sorry for the slip up]

[princesscolumbia]

Pride Month 2024 - Day 9

I have had 10 hours of sleep in the last 48...welcome to parenthood.

And now, get ready for a good egg cracking AU!

Return to Recipient

Summary:

Ranma hasn't been feeling right for as long as he can remember, and he just figured that's normal. But after Jusenkyo, and especially after Jusendo, the feeling of "wrongness" has been getting more and more noticeable... ...because he doesn't feel it in his cursed form. He continues to just cope, keeping his struggle to himself, until he finds a letter tucked into his old travel pack addressed to him, written by him, from a 48 hour period that he doesn't remember and nobody will talk to him about.

Notes:

During the writing of 🔞 And at This Point I'm Afraid to Ask 🔞, [NOTE - Yeah, these two are being posted in "most recently updated" order, so the fic that came first is being posted tomorrow for this little calendar event -Helen] I realized I was speed-running Ranma's egg-to-hatched trans journey and made an author's note of that. In the comments for that work, I got a note bemoaning the fact that I didn't spend more time on Ranma's realization, coming out, and social transition as a woman while understanding my reasoning. I replied stating that I needed a good hook, something that hadn't been hammered to death by other authors, and at the time I didn't have anything. I really got it in my head that I should do something, so I posted to Tumblr and started putting it out to the universe that I was Poly Transwoman Author Seeking Story Inspiration and Motivation, in Open Relationship with current WIPs. I was scrolling through the "Ranma 1/2" tag this morning trying to find something I hadn't read when I bumped into Dear Diary by JaquiK. I've read it, of course, and it's short and, for what it sets out to do, good. "Feels like it needs more," says I, "Wish the author would continue it, make something more of it than they did." The little author that lives in my head rent free and looks remarkably like Ranma-chan ran up behind me and socked me in the back of my head, "Dummy! There's your plot hook!" Then she backed a dump truck up and dropped about 3/4 of a story's worth of ideas on me. [*le-gasp* It me! -Christy] With the 2023 holidays in full swing (it's Cyber Monday as I type this) I'm not sure how quickly I'll get to outlining this or getting chapters 2-5 out (my personal metric for whether the author is serious about a work is if they have 5 chapters out. This has been a solid rule of thumb for long-form fiction and hasn't failed me regardless of fandom), but I wanted to get at least chapter 1 out as quickly as possible. Tags will be added as I add more chapters, mostly because my writing process means I'm not sure what tags will apply until I'm writing something that necessitates them. 😋 I hope you enjoy it.

Obviously, at 6 chapters and 35.5k words, I've met my own personal metric for being serious about a work. 😉

This one is a particular pride and joy, and I hope that people reading it are getting the 'gag' of the title and the chapter titles. While not all the chapter titles are home runs, I have put a lot of thought into making them meaningful to the story as a whole. For example, the title itself, "Return to Recipient" is a play on the postal service standard, "Return to Sender" (and, yes, made a cultural signpost by that one song by Elvis). In the case of the "sender" of the letter that kicks the whole fic off in chapter 1 no longer exists. And, yes, I could have gone with the now-standard practice of making "that girl" an alt in the system known as Ranma, but that wasn't what this fic was about. This is about Ranma's transition as prompted by her own self demanding she be true unto. And that version was a result of a dissociative episode caused by injury and never properly treated, requiring Ranma's rapid healing (likely qi assisted) to repair the damage...and part of that damage was the entire mental state triggered by the injury. (And, again, the bigger questions of whether that was a separate entity that deserved a life to live are outside the scope of this fic...or is it? 😉) So if Ranma, theoretically, wanted to return the letter to the sender, she'd be returning it to...herself, the recipient. Therefor, "Return to Recipient."

In the spirit of things being spoilertastic without revealing too much in these posts, I present to you the chapter title list:

Note to Self

Doctor's Note

Passing Notes

A Noteable Occation

Akane One Note

A Note on Shampoo's File

Notes, Beats, and Measures

Back of the Napkin Notes

Notes from Abroad

Navigational Notation

Autographs on Notebook Paper

Veterinary Notes

Bank Notes

A Noteworthy Event

Self-Analysis Notes

Ending on a High Note

Epilogue - [REDACTED]

The blue are already published, enjoyable speculation on the rest is welcome in the notes. 😁

[apatchworkstar]

Hi! This is the second part of the first tarot spread within MeMe, specifically cards 6 through to 8 (likely of three, though you know how big these things can get; especially when it’s a deep dive!). You may be asking “This isn’t the person who posted the first couple of posts, why are you doing this?” and well. @gunsli-01​/ @archivalofsins​ and I figured it might be a fun idea to alternate which blog each part of the tarot readings are on! The prior posts to be put up on her blog, then some on mine. That being said, this is mostly her words, with the occasional interjection from me.

I hope that you enjoy what is here, and a thanks in advance!

Previous posts:

Here

Here

Here

6/Below Subconscious: Ten of Wands Reversed

Wands in Mikoto’s tarot deck is represented by baseball bats. A different type of wand where, with just a wave of your arms, whatever problem you face will magically be replaced with a new, easier to solve problem. That is, if you’re good at disposing of a body of course. Something one of the Mikotos seems to be pretty decent at. So, hooray!

At a point the fandom is really going to have to discuss Mikoto and Amane comparing metal bludgeoning weapons like bats and metal pipes to wands

(Star here! A branch off point to the above is the fact that baseball and the idea of magical girl groups can be paralleled with the way of living both Mikoto and Amane have. To be more specific, the idea that they are expected to gain victory/success all the time + the idea of being a smaller part in a larger ‘team’ that has to run like a well-oiled machine to function properly and the pressure that comes with it.

Mikoto’s struggles can be compared to baseball in the sense that he’s consistently expected to put in as much physical and mental effort to secure the main goal of the group. This is to the point of putting these pressures on himself and observing other people’s behaviors with that in mind. A prime example of this is when he tells Fuuta that his behavior is attention-seeking:

Mikoto: Hey, it’s kinda a bother having you be so angry and tense all the time. You should stop trying get everyone to pay attention to you. You’re a uni student, right? You can’t act like that once you start working properly.

Futa: Huh!? Shut up. Not like I care what you say. Even though we’re in this shitty situation, you’re just chatting away, it’s stupid. Aren’t you the one who’s acting out of place here? ……also the fact you give everyone nicknames is just gross.

Mikoto: *sigh* It’s more stupid to be taking this all so seriously. I mean, it’s definitely just a reality TV program. There’s no way a real prison exists that’s this lax. Also, I don’t give nicknames to everyone. I don’t give them to young kids like Amane, or to the hard-to-approach types like Shidou-san. I mean, I’m not giving you one, right?

Futa: ……oi, which group are you trying to say I am?

He goes by the ideals that in a more adult based world {i.e. within a working force as opposed to an educational setting} not only are you meant to carry your own weight, but you’re also supposed to make things go as smoothly as you can for others and make sure your effort doesn’t go to waste. This is something he is called out for by Yuno when she asks about if it’s tiring to smile so much:

Yuno: Hey, Mikoto-san. Don’t you get tired being so conscious of others all the time? I mean, you’re free to do what you want though.

Mikoto: Eh…… Aha, what are you talking about? I’m not being conscious or anything. It’s normal to make sure to get along with everyone, right? I mean, when you put it like that, aren’t you the same, Yun-chan? You’re always smiling and getting on with everyone too.

Yuno: I don’t smile unless I actually want to. But with you, when you’re talking with other people it’s more like you only smile deliberately. So I kept thinking, don’t your cheeks get tired?

Ah, is this just what happens when you become a working adult? ……you see people like that sometimes.

Mikoto: Haha, you don’t mince your words do you.…….that was never my intention, but now that you mention it, yeah, I guess I do. This might’ve been since I started my job too…… But like, if I was rude to everyone I met, all my efforts would come to nothing, right?

A character example of what I mean, at least with baseball, is Yamamoto Takeshi from Katekyou Hitman Reborn! Specifically, his introduction. For those of you who don’t know, in the manga Yamamoto is introduced as a mainstay character when he picks the protagonist to be on his team for P.E.. After they lose, he helps the protagonist and ends up asking him for advice. As it turns out, he’s worried about holding his team back because it seems no matter how much he tries, his skill at baseball is diminishing. The protagonist suggests putting in more effort and he agrees, saying that he’ll stay behind to do practice more. The next day, he’s at the top of the roof wanting to jump because in overexerting himself, he broke his arm. This, in terms of the team he’s in, makes him an immediate detriment as opposed to where he was before. At least then, he was still able to play, even if there was a feeling of stagnation.

Amane’s is more comparable to the ideals and moral standards that magical girls are stereotypically held to. This can be paralleled to how the members of her cult hold her to a certain standard and level of belief even if she {at least initially} didn’t subscribe to those beliefs herself.)

Now, it’s the ten of wands. How much can the card vary outside of the baseball bats? Well, that’s the trickiest part about the wand cards. The depiction of wands varies greatly based on what tarot decks an individual uses. However, the wands are generally represented with a stick of some kind. The thing that changes the most is the position the wands are shown in, just as we see here with Mikoto’s variant.

The ten of wands is usually portrayed by a person carrying a large bundle of sticks in their arms, being noticeably burdened by it as they head towards a town. How the wands are carried and what they are made of tend to vary. However, they tend to be carried by a person.

This is noticeably not the case in Mikoto’s version where the wands are holding themselves up.

They almost resemble a mock bridge or passage. I wish I had something to connect this back to, but at this time I don’t. I can’t really grasp what would make Mikoto or the staff design this card this way.

(Star here again! And I’m just jumping in real quick to posit a guess; it looks like those gates at level crossings.

A level crossing is where a railway crosses a road or right of way on the level; that means without the use of a tunnel or bridge. This includes footpaths, bridleways and cycle ways.

The gates are there to prevent people going over it when a train is incoming. And where does at least part of his crime take place~?)

The sixth card in a Celtic spread is meant to represent the subconscious state of the asker. The Ten of Wands usually represents that the asker has completed a trial of sorts or is getting out of a period of struggle, the querent reaching success afterwards. Even though that may sound all well and good, this newfound success comes with new responsibilities. As such, the Ten of Wands also alludes to the querent facing new challenges and becoming the go to problem solver in relationships.

However, since it’s in reverse the meaning changes completely. It warns the asker that they are becoming burdened or constricted by things that are not a necessity within their life. Advising that they find the matters that won’t bring them any happiness, even if they were resolved successfully and drop them completely. If it doesn’t add value to the querent’s life, then it needs to go. Once gotten rid of, the querent will have sobriety of thought and move forwards in a more accurate way.

Now, Mikoto’s conscious and subconscious are completely out of whack, right? Not surprising, one’s outward appearance rarely perfectly reflects their inner self. Yet, the dissonance between these two states is concerning.

Outwardly, Mikoto is attempting to be amicable but according to this card, on some subconscious level, he knows that doing such a thing isn’t beneficial to him. Not just emotionally, but in any actual way. It brings no value to his life to behave in this fashion but he’s consciously pushing forward with it anyway and continuing to bite his tongue. When really, he should just let it out and be done with it.

“You don’t have to keep it in and hide it away.”

7/Advice or Your Influence: King of Cups Reversed

The King of Cups in Mikoto’s tarot deck is represented by several cups scattered behind the word King.

In some tarot decks the King of Cups has been depicted with fair hair, warm blue eyes and covered in blue armor with orange wings with what has been said to be their personal symbol, the peacock, adorning their crown while riding a horse. The cup they hold either having a crab inside of it or adorning the vessel in reference to the Astrological sign Cancer. It’s horse, implied to be graceful and steady, able to prance across the waters without ever disturbing the fish jumping about its hooves. The background of the card being violet, a mix of red and blue. This is meant to depict a combination or union between the elements Water and Fire.

As impressive as that sounds and how much I would love to see Mikoto depicted like that, either one of them to be honest… Nowadays, the King of Cups is more commonly depicted by a King sitting on their throne, wearing a fish amulet and surrounded by water on all sides. Sound familiar-?

(Since Gunsli brought up how Mikoto mirrors the King of Cups, I feel this is the perfect time to go into how Mikoto and Muu both have associations with royalty but in different manners. Mikoto is associated with royalty in the sense that he’s a “King of the People”. In other words, the type of royalty that works for the people. Their power comes from how liked they are within the general populace. On one hand, having this type of power means that they’d be generally well liked but on the other, it means their capacity to keep said power is far less stable than other types of leadership. Since it’s dependent on how the larger populace favours them, it means the less they are liked, the less influence they have to throw around. The line that best showcases this idea in conjunction with this reading of the king of cups is this one:

All those ridiculous accusations / Hurting it, holding it down, it doesn't change anything, does it

However, Muu’s association with royalty is more akin to the concept of “Divine Right”, as shown blatantly with this line:

I told you I’m queen, and it’s always the same/ God gave me everything, everything is as I wish

For those who don’t know, divine right in terms of royalty is the idea that the person in power was pre-ordained to rule by god, and thus chosen and shaped in their image. It’s considered that those chosen by such a rule have no need to answer to any form of democracy or the regular populace since their status has already been ‘chosen’ by a higher power. Instead, they can only be judged by the ‘god’ that considered them worthy of power to begin with and those who act against them are considered sacrilegious:

Don’t you think it’s wonderful to control them with my gentle sting/ If you want to betray from jealousy/ You know what’s gonna happen ON YOU

Despite this, she tries to come off as a “King of the People” in After Pain, highlighting the lack of esteem she has in everyone’s eyes now, and how that has made her feel as though her influence lacks power because no one wants her around anymore.

If I was gone, If I had just disappeared/ I overheard, I found out/ How much I’m not needed

My sorry spells must be wearing off/ But I guess some of it is my fault/ Maybe it’s ok as it is/ I want to feel “alive”, is it ok if I breathe?/ Tell me

If you’re going to make me the villain/ It’s ok to ignore me/ If it’s endurance, I’m used to it./ It’s just having another taste of it

This makes the snippet that we got of Mikoto’s next song fairly interesting. After all…

I should have saved you, but why are you crying?/ Rely on me, praise me with your song, I am your savior

...What is a god, but a savior to the masses?)

In the background of the card to the left, fish can be seen jumping about. On the right side, there is a ship sailing the waters. The fish in the background and the amulet the King of Cups wears is meant to represent their creativity and spirit. Both of which is implied to be sustained by the water surrounding them.

The boat and fish within the background is meant to represent the balance between the emotional and material realms. This depiction is meant to illustrate that the King of Cups has a handle of things and the querent has learned not to suppress their emotions or impulses instead recognizing and dealing with them in a controlled balanced manner.

I bet a lot of people started to understand why it’s reversed now. Also, modernly the King of Cups tends to be more associated with the Astrological sign Scorpio. The water sign generally depicted as being fiery.

The King of Cups is known as The Lord of The Waves and Water, The King of Undines and Nymphs, and The Fire of Water. It is the most active and aggressive out of all the royal tarot cards to be associated with water. For some time, Water has been used to represent the subconscious of the human mind, and The King of Cups is no exception. It is said to represent the creative spark of humanity that ignites and gives birth to unconscious images. In a way, representing the imagination or, if one wishes to think of it from a more negative perspective, intrusive thoughts.

When in the Upright position the King of Cups represents the querent’s abilities to restrain their emotions. Showing that they are in full control of their feelings and impulses and the relationship between their feelings and reasoning is balanced and fair. However, as we all know, the King of Cups appears here in its reversed form. It’s much darker and complicated evil for- nah, I’m sorry, I’ll stop blowing things out of proportion. I’m just happy to be getting back to this after the whole Mu situation.

It's not that bad. Ha, ha, it’s worse… Now I left something out about the King of Cups upright meaning. It’s not just about having a reign on both one’s feelings and logical reasoning. It is also connected to understanding or being aware of oneself. Sure, one can usually objectively believe that what they’ve done or how they’ve done it may be irrational but knowing for certain why they responded that way can be a murky endeavor. One can also emotionally discern when logic does not serve their emotional health/security or when their personal feelings aren’t being considered due to the logic being used.

Being able to actively take into account one’s emotions and then apply logic to them takes a level of personal understanding and recognition that Mikoto has admitted to lacking already. If one doesn’t have that type of emotional understanding of themselves, they are more likely to invalidate their emotions or if they have too much of an understanding of themselves invalidate logic. This is why the balance that The King of Cups alludes to is so important.

Because if it’s broken, one state of thinking will be valued over the other which will ultimately lead to dysfunction of some kind.

Now when you reverse The King of Cups- The King already said to be the most aggressive of the royal water cards residing in the tarot- you get one hell of a tyrant. It’s time to get aggressive.

People not listening? Time to make them listen through emotional manipulation. Get volatile. Huh, members of the court are saying the king seems moody. Don’t fret about that. They’re wrong; what do they know? They came asking, seeking council, right? If they don’t like the answer they received, doesn’t that mean they weren’t truly seeking an answer to begin with, just validation of their beliefs? At that point they shouldn’t have even asked! How dare they waste the King’s time.

Aren’t people who come begging for guidance and then complain about the advice given the literal worst? The trash of society, actually. The King is being nice by just listening and they still want more. Greedy ass, self-absorbed, peasants; don’t they see the King is swamped already? When are they going to listen to King, huh?!

In fact, they’ve got a lot of nerve even questioning the King! What is this, a coup?!

So, we’re in a bit of dangerous territory now. The King of Cups is all out of sorts. The balance they had before has completely deteriorated. They’ve lost their ability to handle any situation with compassion and wisdom, having difficulties when it comes to dealing with everyone seeking their help. They may appear kind and understanding to some and cold and dismissive to others.

They may now be using all their communicative talents and emotional knowledge in questionable ways. Manipulating the people around them and their circumstances to create their ideal situation.

Depending on the reading, this could be the querent themselves or represent someone else within their life. However, this is the seventh card in a Celtic Tarot spread and this is one of the cards that remains consistent between the two spreads.

It can either be representative of advice for the querent or the querent’s own influence. Now I wouldn’t blame anyone for believing Your Influence means how Mikoto impacted his circumstance but it’s not that. It’s his influence on himself.

To be more specific, this card can be read to represent how the querent views themselves and how that is affecting the situation overall. Before going into that heavy topic, let’s talk about the card from an advice standpoint.

First, let’s take the interpretation from the angle that the King of Cups isn’t referring to Mikoto himself but someone else within his life.

If that is the case, then The King of Cups could be advising Mikoto to be careful because someone within his life isn’t acting in good faith. Instead, someone is manipulating his situation to suit their own means. So, even if he isn’t yet aware of how this is being done or by who, he should be diligent and question any favors being asked of him or even any spontaneous favors being done for him.

In every situation he should be pondering things like, “Is this too good to be true?”, “How does this help me?”, “How does it help them?”, “Why would they want to do something like this?” etc. In order to avoid possibly being taken advantage of. It also implies that the person in his life that has become this way was not always like that. They usually had a grasp of their emotions and responded to things calmly. However, lately they have become manipulative and emotionally controlling.

They are seeking vengeance and vindication, an impulse they’d usually be able to control. All for the aim of administering punishment.

This card stays the same throughout the spreads because Mikoto’s situation hasn’t changed; only the person or system administering punishment has. Mikoto possibly went from one form of punishment directly to another. Something that could be supported by the repeated use of this line,

“I won’t forgive you if this is happening to me even though I’m right.”

“So, I will NEVER forgive you if this is happening to me even though I’m right.”

The only line both Mikoto’s seem to agree on and sing being one that implies they’re being disproportionately or wrongfully punished is definitely something that the tarot highlights more. Especially given how this card stays consistent throughout both spreads, but the meaning changes greatly based on the last card in the second spread being Death, a sign of new beginnings and chances.

Even though there is a chance of him being incorrectly punished, there is also a high chance that he’ll be able to get a second chance and start fresh. Which is literally what voting in Milgram is about.

So, while I personally believe this is the correct interpretation. As always, we’re going to go through every possible option.

This card could also be representative of Mikoto. In that case, it would be advising him that his perspective has become too skewed in one direction. He’s no longer thinking of the consequences of his actions or how they may affect others. Anger and the idea of getting revenge is restricting his judgement. Even though following through on this impulse would feel great or vindicating in the short term, it won’t go well in the long run.

It advises him to try to regain balance between his logic and emotions again. When it comes to careers, a focus of Mikoto’s, this card can also allude to continuing to work somewhere even though it is no longer fulfilling. It’s basically another sign that he needs to introspect and take stock of his emotions before acting in any way. Similarly to what the Five of Swords advised.

Now, the last and most interesting of the interpretations one can draw from this card in the Celtic Spread is this being how Mikoto views himself and how it impacts his situation.

By that logic, that would mean Mikoto thinks he’s a rather terrible and demanding person. This would also explain the gap between his conscious and subconscious as depicted by the cards drawn.

His Conscious card alluding to the fact that he’s attempting to remain amicable while his Subconscious one suggests he knows that behaving this way is unbeneficial. These two states of being begin to make some sense if we consider this card as representing his feelings towards himself. If he already believes he’s being demanding or too much, he wouldn’t really start asking for more or complaining about his situation. More than likely, he'd lean into being more amicable and useful just to feel like he’s not being troublesome and, in some way, justify being where he’s managed to get.

This would create a cycle of overworking to prove his own worth then feeling taken advantage of as a result. Ultimately, feeling like a worse or more demanding person because if he didn’t want to do these things he could’ve just said no, he could’ve just stopped. That was always an option and logically he has no one but himself to blame for not taking it. However, the imbalance between his emotional state removes saying “No” from the table entirely.

Let’s go back to the Queen of Swords. Yeah, remember how the Queen of Swords basically suggested Mikoto had an issue but was incapable of conveying it? This card gives us a clearer understanding of what that issue is. In fact, this card may be the last piece to discern what the conflict was.

From all the information we have on Mikoto- The new job, the tarot cards, the lyrics in MeMe; they all point to one thing. Mikoto was accepted to what should have been his dream job. His goal all along, a respectable job at a highly renowned company. It’s everything he’d been working towards but he was never working towards getting that job while taking himself fully into consideration. He didn’t want this job. He was just acting logically while ignoring his feelings on the matter.

In the Portal Timeline Post from 20/07/15 during a conversation with Amane; Mikoto says this when asked if he feels studying is enjoyable,

“Not at all! It’s just a means to an end. I only did the bare minimum needed to get into a good company. Even when it came to enrolling into college I sought out an arts university with low subject requirements. Then from there I studied curation and- Uh, you probably wouldn’t know what any of those terms are yet, huh? Hmm, since your way of speaking is so mature, I sometimes forget I need to explain myself properly instead of assuming you’d just know.”*

After being assured by Amane that if there’s anything she wants more clarity on she’ll just look into it herself and asked if he’s good at drawing he responds,

“No, not really… Of course I could do the bare minimum needed to pass the entrance exam though. Even though it’s considered an arts university, there’s still subjects where one wouldn’t need to draw at all. I’m the sort of person that likes to keep things efficient if I can. So, I worked backwards. First I looked into what sort of occupation I wanted to go into then chose subjects related to that occupation to study like direction and management~ …Ah, wait I’m doing it again…”*

*The translation here has been altered by me to add more clarity the direct translation can be found here.

How does this show that Mikoto wasn’t taking into account his personal feelings when it came to pursuing his occupation? He never really says or shows enthusiasm towards the occupation he chose. He doesn’t really particularly believe he’s good at art. His focus when discussing studying wasn’t enjoyment of the process but instead a focus on a particular outcome. That outcome being employment.

Mikoto’s main focus throughout his school life wasn’t finding anything he enjoyed doing but finding the most secure path to stable employment.

This sort of mentality is commonly found in individuals who grew up in households that underwent financial stress or were impoverished. A more recent and extreme example of this mentality has been Kobeni from Chainsaw Man. However, I’m not suggesting Mikoto’s case is that extreme in the slightest.

Kobeni is forced to work life endangering and degrading jobs and send all her money back to her family to support her other siblings. Her situation is extreme and clear fiscal abuse. However, Mikoto isn’t as far off from Kobeni as one would believe.

Did you know that children raised in poverty tend to become adults with an inclination towards more extravagant items? They spend more than their peers who were more well off than them once reaching adulthood. This is due to a lot of factors. However, to put it simply once they get a job of their own and have fiscal security and control some will play catch up trying to experience all the things they didn’t get to growing up.

Like going on trips to amusement parks, buying video game consoles, expensive phones, clothing. They could even begin to enjoy shopping as a hobby even favoring expensive/luxury items that they may have had very little access to while younger like bubble tea, horse-meat sashimi. All things Mikoto admits to liking in his interrogation.

Q.18 What are your favorite foods?

Mikoto: Horse-meat sashimi, pasta and bubble tea.

Q.07 What are your hobbies?

Mikoto: shopping / darts / photography / cycling

Many children who grow up in poverty aren’t afforded the same emotional luxuries as their wealthier counterparts. This includes individuals that are not only rich but the middle class as well. Living outside of poverty allows many people to have hope in their futures and the belief that they have more than one option.

This leads to the next issue with growing up in poverty. People’s parents expect them to do better than they did. At times, even seeing their children not as children but a means to get themselves out of poverty. There’s this pressure, intended or not, to do well and not cause problems. Because the child usually sees how their parents struggle financially and either wish to avoid making them worry or avoid turning out like them.

Q.16 What’s your relationship like with your parents?

Mikoto: My parents are divorced. I get along well with my mother though, she’s the one who raised me. I don’t want to make her worry.

This could end up making a person continually feel the need to validate their worth through material objects and accolades.

Q.08 What’s the most rewarding part of your current job?

Mikoto: I mean, it’s the top advertising agency in the industry? Anyone would be proud to be a part of it. I put a lot of work in just to get here, too.

Because these accolades and expensive purchases serve to show their peers that they’re not helplessly unrefined, they’re not broke, they are a fully grown self-sustainable adult. They can afford to eat an expensive dish or two and of course they’re fashionable. That’s just to be expected. I mean, come on they aren’t that helpless or unpopular. It’s only natural that they can do this much.

Ever heard the saying a poor man acts rich but a rich man acts poor? Or as the bible put it; One man pretends to be rich but has nothing; another pretends to be poor but has great wealth? It’s this concept, personified.

To appear on the same level as one’s peers one will flaunt wealth they don’t have. Some African Americans even refer to this as keeping up with the Jones’.

Isn’t it odd that Mikoto seems to have such expensive taste but lives in a minimalistic apartment with a record player on the cheaper side and throughout his MV we see him wearing the same outfit each day? Despite many of the others within Milgram, outside of Mu who’s in uniform for the most part, changing clothes multiple times. Even Futa is shown to have a closet of clothes in his MV. We see Mikoto wearing the same outfit outside and evening wear throughout all of MeMe.

Though maybe we’ll see him in some other clothes during Double.

The only things within his apartment are what appears to be a fold out couch, a single or “Double” sized bed, a desk off in the corner given the chair, and his television and the stand it’s on which is literally not a stand but a table.

It’s the other table we see within his mental space at the beginning of MeMe.

If he works from home, then the most expensive thing in his home would be his apple computer that we see on the desk he’s resting on in Undercover.

If that is, in fact, located within an office at his company and not within his home the most expensive thing that he owns is his television.

Now that I think about it, aren’t some of Mikoto’s hobbies strange, like maybe the way he gets to work?

To continue to put up an appearance of affluence, many people will sacrifice certain modern luxuries. You know, like biking instead of taking the train to work. In Japan, depending on the district, the train costs money. Money that Mikoto may not be able to afford.

Just like with buses in the states. Some people may find a one-time expense like buying a bike more beneficial and financially efficient in the long term than paying the fare each day or getting a car, which is expensive by itself and requires one to constantly pay for gas. Considering all this, it is likely that Mikoto grew up in a not so financially stable situation.

This would, of course, cause him to have more anxieties around losing his job and falling back into poverty as a result than being wrongfully arrested for murder. Did you know poor people are falsely imprisoned for crimes all the time? Just from being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The wrong place usually being the neighborhoods they live in.

This could easily tie into what Mikoto says when he says Es and Milgram are mistaken. He proposes that they “Um, they got the wrong person. I can’t imagine they’d know the details of what we look like. They mistook me for someone else in terms of gender or clothing style. Something along those lines.”

Mikoto comes out the gate saying he was wrongfully profiled and is now undergoing a false arrest. Which, at least when concerning US law is completely true. Everyone being in Milgram would be considered a false arrest. Technically, they don’t have enough probable cause to arrest any of them, let alone incarcerate them for long stretches of time. Mikoto and Amane seem to be the ones who notice this the fastest. They also don’t share this information with the class.

Kazui assumes Milgram is tied to an organization of some sort- possibly military related- and is afraid to see who’s pulling the strings. His assumption leans towards the concept of higher governmental powers being associated with Milgram. Kotoko’s volition to align herself with the system showcases that her and Kazui may be a bit more delusional than Mikoto or Amane. The fact that Kazui and Kotoko hold Milgram in high regard is indicative of their own self-aggrandizing natures.

Mikoto and Amane, two people who seem to have been humbled by life, know for certain that the system doesn’t care enough about them to intervene here. Amane, from the situation with her family’s cult, and Mikoto from literally just being alive, at all. Jackalope says Mikoto is like mass-produced goods in the version of Es’ voice drama translation that I’ve seen. The closest thing to that in American English and what I took it to mean was that Mikoto was a dime a dozen.

Kazui and Kotoko both think since this facility caught them then it must be strong. It has to be tied to something important, meaning it can either give them the power or the punishment they’re seeking. “Why would they or their individual actions matter to a facility such as that?” Is a question that never once occurs to them while thinking over what Milgram may or may not be. The both of them willfully fail to grasp what Es has been saying, that Milgram is Milgram and is disconnected from the law that they know.

There are so many people out there like Mikoto that we’d just refer to them as society at that point. Yet, that makes him easily replaceable; he’s not exceptional or one in a million. He’s not special and Jackalope asserts this immediately. It doesn’t matter how many talents Mikoto has or how hard he works. In every system, he’s just an office worker, the smallest cog in the world’s biggest machine where you’re either hated by people unluckier than you (the unemployed) or belittled and harassed by those above you (management, CEOs, rich people).

Because far be it for an office worker to complain about workload or long hours. Did they forget how replaceable they are? They should be happy companies don’t have a machine do all their work to save on costs of labor. The company’s money puts food on their table and keeps their utilities on. So, be happy because it could just as easily find someone more grateful to sit in that chair you’ve grown so used to. The company works you like a dog, feeds you scraps, and if you whine or cause trouble takes you out back to put you down.

That’s just how business works. Then on top of that, he has these kids asking him why he’s such a sellout/kiss ass. Going I only smile when I want to smile. Well good for you. Then at the notion that behaving in this way may be necessary for survival for some adults just going being an adult is tough, huh? Not for everyone.

Not for most of the people in Milgram actually. It wouldn’t even be difficult for Futa to get a job out of college given that his father could give him a recommendation. He could even buff up his resume by doing some work for his older sister as well if necessary. Mu’s family is rich and Yuno’s family is well off, given she admits to living not just with her mom and brother but both of her grandparents as well. That’s at least five people under one roof and she still has her own separate bedroom as seen in Umbilical.

Kazui has been discrete about showing his home life and I kind of doubt the flat we see in Half is where he lives. Yet, even if it is, he’s living in a more affluent complex than Mikoto. He’s in a high-rise with a balcony. His first trial song implies he goes to see stage plays and he wears expensive suits while on stage. Kazui is good, he’s doing fine. That’s not even going into how difficult it is to retire in most countries now but he’s just sitting on his ass at home before he winds up in Milgram to his own admission at 39 years old.

Q.15 What time do you go to sleep and wake up?

Kazui: Since I’m not working, I’m able to do whatever I feel like. I just sleep when I feel tired, and I usually wake up in the morning sometime.

There are people in their seventies still working in Japan. He's not even that fucking old, how does he have this much free time?! What the fuck did he do for a living to retire before fifty?! The fact that he studied multiple forms of martial arts speaks for how well off he was. Since training in those costs money and he trained in three forms of them. His family is probably also rich and that’s the reason he’d be a disappointment to them.

If they put all this money into his upbringing and he’s just a playboy, yeah, I’d be disappointed too. Even worse, he could be at home with a bunch of free time because his family ran a company and he’s now inherited their wealth. He said they considered him an embarrassment, not that they disowned him! Hell, if they consider him such an embarrassment and they’re established in any way they could just as easily be sending him money, so he stays out of trouble or at least doesn’t bring trouble to them.

Despite saying his family considers him an embarrassment he goes on to say his family structure is only him now. Which is vague because they can’t find you an embarrassment if they aren’t around anymore. A lot of Kazui’s answers conflict with each other. Though in this case, family could be referring to two different types, like the family that raised him and then the family he created himself. He also mentions his friend multiple times.

Saying that he has a childhood friend he looks up to and respects. Yet when asked, “Who do you want to see right now?” he answers, “They won’t see me anymore.” It’s implied later from question 17 that Kazui’s friend isn’t the one that won’t see him anymore since he answers, “Relax and go trawling. The childhood friend I mentioned before has a boat.”

I don’t know why anyone who knows someone won’t see them anymore would make plans with them if the world was ending.

Though let’s save all of Kazui’s inconsistencies for later. Basically, everyone else in Milgram is here like good thing we’re all middle class with big homes that have multiple rooms, being given allowances by our parents, or just still living with them. That or they are expressly rich in some cases. Oh, or they’re doctors, going to law school, or an old man that went to a sports university who openly states he has nothing but free time now anyway.

If I was there and wasn’t trying to be nice or understanding, I would want to kill everyone in that prison outside Amane. These well-off bastards really did just kill people because they were fucking bored or offended. Then some have the audacity to go why not just speak/behave honestly? Hm, maybe because saying what one really feels can get them fired and there’s a very small divider between unemployment and homelessness.

This dude is in Milgram like ha, ha funny joke guys if I don’t get to work soon though I will end up homeless- I’ll have to move back in with my mother at best, showing her that I’m a failure as a son and person who couldn’t hack it as an adult or at worst, live on the street. Ha, ha if I lose my job, you better take responsibility warden. Every hour this dude spends in Milgram is an hour he is not getting paid. It's been two years; his shit is probably on the street or was taken by his landlord if it was worth enough.

Even though the everyone is dead theory would be the most boring resolution to this debacle, I hope it’s true because he definitely has nowhere to go back to at this point. I was recently joking about Mikoto’s landlord being Mu’s dad. He’s probably already exported all Mikoto’s furniture.

Now, in 2022 the homeless population in Japan was rounded off to be 0%. This is because the homeless population in Japan currently sits at a little over three thousand people. This is far less than other countries but the 0% here does not mean no homeless individuals exist. This drop in homelessness was related to the pandemic. In response to Covid-19 cybercafes in Japan were shutdown. This was a bit of an issue since most of the homeless there used these cafes for shelter.

In order to fix this issue, they allowed homeless people to take residence in empty hotels and began working on reforms to fight against homelessness. Which is great news, but Mikoto wouldn’t know that. So, his concern is very much still valid. If he believes he didn’t kill anyone and this mistake will all be sorted out of course it makes more sense for him to concern himself with what may happen after.

Viewing it that way, it is reasonable for this to be his biggest concern. Because he can’t live here forever, and he has responsibilities as he keeps saying; HE’S A WORKING ADULT!

Unlike everyone else within Milgram. Kazui has no job, Shidou has job security and is considered an essential worker outside of Milgram, and EVERYONE ELSE IS NOT A WORKING ADULT! Even counting Yuno for the work she does- She’s more financially well off than Mikoto and still living with her family. It would be nice for people to grasp what it means to have your entire life and fiscal safety banking on who likes you or how well you perform. Along with the amount of mental stress that can put a person under.

This ties into the first interpretation of the King of Cups as well. Where we went over why this card possibly remains the same throughout both readings, “This card stays the same because throughout the spreads Mikoto’s situation hasn’t changed only the person or system administering punishment has.”

In the end Mikoto has still moved from one situation where he had no control over his life or feelings to another.

Before Mikoto is brought into Milgram, he’s just a 23-year-old office employee that lives alone in a small apartment. He has no one to financially depend on but himself. Unlike other characters. He either doesn’t have this support because he doesn’t want to make his family worry and hasn’t asked, or his family doesn’t have it like that anyway and wouldn’t be able to help. He didn’t live his life this way because of low self-esteem or a lack of faith in himself.

It was a meticulously planned out response for the sole purpose of avoiding poverty. He literally could not afford to dream.

Okay, okay Gunsli but is poverty in Japan really that similar to that in other countries? Well according to Japan Today, The Nippon Foundation, and The Borgen Project; yes. Yes, it is.

An article on The Borgen Project website titled “10 Facts about Poverty in Japan” from July 12 of 2020 states,

“1. Less than one percent of Japan is homeless. As of 2018, Japan has a population of 126.5 million people. According to the latest Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare statistics, Japan’s current homelessness figure stands below 5,000. This is a steady decline from nearly 26,000 people without homes in 2003. While this appears to be a remarkable feat of social reform, the truth is that the Japanese government commits millions of dollars every year to ensure homelessness remains low. The goal is to ensure that the Japanese economy appears strong. In reality, poverty in Japan is increasing. The dozens of government reforms Japan enacts each year are extremely costly and are approaching unsustainability.”

This is the same percentage we highlighted in the previous statement regarding homelessness. That information came from Tomorrow City in an article titled “HOMELESSNESS IN JAPAN: THE COUNTRY WITH THE SMALLEST PERCENTAGE OF HOMELESS PEOPLE” published on December 13, 2022. The Borgen article goes on to state,

“2. Japan is “the most equal major society” in terms of wealth distribution. According to the Statista Research Department, a total of 92% of the Japanese population has anywhere from $10,000 to $1 million in either assets or wealth. On paper, these figures appear to demonstrate an extremely healthy economy; however, they hide the fact that poverty in Japan is well over 16%. The notion that 92% of Japanese citizens fall into some category of “wealthy” may be misleading, serving as a straw-man statistic booster.

“3. A rising percentage of individuals in Japan are poverty-stricken. Japan has seen a huge and sudden rise in poverty and poor economic conditions, especially since 2012. According to The Guardian, 3.5 million Japanese children live in poverty-stricken homes. Since 1991, poverty has increased as a systemic problem for Japan, reaching 16.3% this past year. This figure could continue to rise dramatically as the working population decreases.”

And

“5. Japan pours a ton of resources into battling unemployment. Poverty in Japan entered an unprecedented era of severity after a major drop in workforce members in 1991. Before 1991, unemployment hovered just below 2% for decades, then rose drastically to nearly 6% by 2002. In fact, this singular event nearly toppled Japan as a world economic leader. Today, Japan has returned to a nearly 2% unemployment rate, although the country has had to pour a huge amount of financial resources in order to accomplish this stabilization. The country still has not fully recovered.”

The Nippon Foundation Article titled “Addressing Child Poverty” that briefly goes over research results from December 2015 that analyzed how childhood poverty negatively impacted Japan overall states,

“Japan’s rate of child poverty is above the OECD average. Overall, the rate has been rising since the 1980’s, and today one in seven children lives in poverty.​ The child poverty rate shows the percentage of children under the age of 18 who live in relative poverty. Relative poverty is defined as having income of less than one-half the national median disposable income, which for a household of one parent and one child means a monthly income (including public assistance) of 140,000 yen or less. Children raised in these households are at an extreme disadvantage in terms of medical care, meals, schooling, and prospects for higher education, and there is a clear trend of these children being unable to escape from poverty in the future.”

It then goes on to state that these children in poverty are technically costing the government more money and hurting the overall economy so it should be fixed. Which well they’ve got the spirit I guess- Anyway, JapanToday published an article on June 12, 2022 titled “Poverty in Japan Spreading and Deepening” that stated,

“TOKYO- Working 12 hours a day six days a week, Tohoku taxi driver “Junpei Noda” (a pseudonym) earned 280,000 yen a month. He didn’t know how well off he was.

It’s barely a living wage, but living with his parents he got by all right. But at 45 he’d had enough of his parents. One day, “on an impulse,” he left, went to Tokyo, flung himself into the arms of fate – which received him coldly. Six months later COVID-19 struck, dashing the hopes of this casual laborer who thought he’d found a haven of sorts working part-time at a ramen restaurant.

Poverty in Japan is spreading and deepening, says Spa (May 24-31). The pandemic was bad enough. Now there’s Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with the worldwide economic havoc it’s wreaking. The poor get poorer, the near-poor go under, and indigence becomes a hole that almost anyone, given a bad move or a bad break – or a pandemic, or a war – can fall into – tomorrow if not today, next month if not this.”

Going on to state,

“Single mothers, pensioners and the precariously employed are especially vulnerable. “Yumi Iikura,” 48, raises two teenage daughters on her earnings as a nursing home caregiver. Sometimes working 15-hour shifts through the night until 9 a.m., she barely covers household expenses of 200,000 yen a month. Soaring gas prices are the latest jolt. A car might seem a dispensable luxury, but isn’t. Distance from her workplace is the price she pays for affordable rent. The 50-km commute was a tolerable nuisance. Now it’s a financial catastrophe.”

So, yes, poverty is a problem and tends to be one in most countries regardless of how affluent they look from the outside.

If Mikoto’s family didn’t have money, how was he ever going to go to an expensive college? Was he supposed to get a baseball scholarship? Ever consider he tried that and that’s why he says this,

Q.02 Have you ever played baseball?

Mikoto: I was really big on it when I was in high school. Though I wasn’t particularly good at it or anything. Even now if I’m feeling pent up from work, I still sometimes practice swinging.

An article published on September 23, 2021 by Asia Options titled “Unlocking Sports Opportunities in Japan” states,

“Many universities will offer their students, who have achieved a high level of athletic achievement, financial support through the awarding of scholarships. Scholarships for high performing athletes provide financial aid ranging from 50,000 to 100,000 yen for individual athletes and scholarships organised for university sports teams.”

Could it be he picked up baseball in high school not because he liked it but because it could possibly lead to a scholarship? Yet, it didn’t, so now he considers himself not very good at it. Because if he were good at it then he would’ve gotten a scholarship, right?

So, it’s not difficult to imagine him internalizing not being good enough if this is an avenue he pursued.

Sport Universities are briefly touched on in one of Kazui’s statements. On 20/06/07 when Amane asks Kazui to help her study he says,

Kazui: Hm? Haha, asking yet another question that’s hard to answer. I mean, I did graduate from university, so I’d say I’m reasonably…… ah, but it was just a sports university so maybe not…… I’m not especially confident.

Hm, I wonder if Kazui the six-foot wall was able to get a sports scholarship- Nah, sports scholarships and height have no proven correlation. This is sarcasm there is a correlation. Height is something that is generally valued when it comes to sports.

So, when committing the murders using the bat may not be Mikoto tarnishing something he loved but using one failure to take care of another. Really illustrating that, “My life, it wasn’t meant to be this way” line.

Baseball failed, his back up failed, everything was falling apart and no matter how he planned nothing seemed to work out as it should. No matter how amicable he tried to be, how flexible or helpful he attempted to come off as things kept going wrong. So, why not take out two of his frustrations at once?

“If I’m feeling pent up from work I still sometimes practice swinging.”

Something I find the most telling is Mikoto never lists Drawing or Baseball as a hobby even though he does them both. Instead, he chooses Cycling, Photography, Darts, and Shopping. Hobbies are something an individual usually does for fun because they like those things. These are the things he blatantly tells us he finds fun.

Even going as far to pick a completely different form of visual art and another sport. Supporting the idea that baseball and drawing may have just been another means to an end.

Wait- but Gunsli, Mikoto went to college, he graduated; if he was really poor, he wouldn’t have been able to go at all, right? Mikoto states to Amane,

“Even when it came to enrolling into college I sought out an arts university with low subject requirements.”

If the requirements to enroll were low than chances are Mikoto went to one Japan’s public colleges. Which would explain why when questioned about his drawing abilities he stated,

“No, not really… Of course, I could do the bare minimum needed to pass the entrance exam though. Even though it’s considered an arts university, there’s still subjects where one wouldn’t need to draw at all.”

It isn’t weird for Mikoto to have taken an entrance exam for a public college either since public colleges within Japan can still have entrance exams.

This is Mikoto’s issue, it’s not one singular thing, it’s his entire life. Just like he said in his first trial line,

“My life, it wasn’t supposed to be this way.”

This is also why he can’t complain because in a way he recognizes he did it to himself.

“If I could end, if I could stop how long would this dream go on?”

“If I could break it, if I could change- Can I do it? I wonder from when I started to give up. If I could lose it, if I could choose- Is this selfish? This isn’t too much is it?”

8/Outside Influences: 5 of Wands Reversed

In Mikoto’s tarot deck, the five of wands is represented by baseball bats in front of a red and blue moon. Keeping consistent with the format shown in the Ten of Wands. Throughout the tarot deck we see several interpretations of the moon. The Red Moon on the Devil and fool card, the Blue and Yellow moon seen on the Magician, the red and blue moon seen throughout most card iterations, the Yellow with a tinge of red moon on the five of swords, and the bluish black moon shown on the fool card.

Now, we’re going to go back to the King of Cups and Hangman cards for a moment. The Hangman was covered in the first set of five for this spread reading. Both of which are impressively long, but even if one was to read it to completion, it’s been a minute between posts. So, I doubt that information would be at the top of anyone’s mind at this point. We did go over these three colors before though. Yellow, Red, and Blue.

These are three colors prominently associated with the hangman card. I stated this in part one.

“The hangman is also associated with the motif colors of both of the Kayanos seen in MeMe. Red and Blue. It is also associated with yellow. In versions of the card the Hangman is depicted with golden blonde hair, yellow shoes, red pants and a blue shirt. The red is meant to represent the passion of humanity and the human form while the blue represents calm and reflective emotions. The yellow on the Hangman’s personage is meant to represent his intellect.”

Now since this is the first card of the spread, I had no way of knowing how important that minor detail would become. I’m not a walking encyclopedia of tarot knowledge. Nor do I have MeMe memorized from front to back. However, these colors begin to appear more integral the more the spread and the song are investigated. Particularly when it comes to the moons displayed with Mikoto’s design and the two’s association with them.

From this angle, we can discern which card is representative of what person. This is alluded to in MeMe when Mikoto sees his double through the mirror and the eyes on the tarot cards. Now if we consider the eyes on the cards to represent societal pressures and being observed by forces outside oneself. Something that is showcased more during trial 2. Particularly with the use of eyes in Backdraft, though all of the Milgram trial songs have eye imagery or imagery alluding to being watched throughout them.

Amane watching her music video near the end of Magic, Kazui being both a performer and audience member in Half, Shidou through the looks of his patients’ relatives, Yuno through the eyes of the plush rabbit in Tear Drop and the balloons in Umbilical.

I’ll cut to explain this one for a bit, because it can come off as vague or subjective. Firstly, yes, I do mean the balloons. The balloons shown throughout Umbilical represent Yuno’s relationship with society. One that seems to be of a give and take nature at a glance. Though when looked into, more alludes to a one-sided control since Yuno is the one shown to be blowing up and releasing these balloons.

This fits with the information we received from her second voice drama in regards to her being in these relationships for money and with the line we see in Tear Drop “The wanted wanting the wanter. The overlap, isn’t that some sort of perfection?” There’s a relationship in the Milgram novel quite similar to the one Yuno is describing here.

The prisoner by the name of Close discussed in the novel gets into a romantic relationship with the person harassing their close friend. Also, unimportant side note, really shady morality going on with that novel can’t believe the protagonist was voted innocent despite everything that happened being unmistakably her fault. Worst experiment ever, Jackalope was right, that thing was boring. However, the relationship between this guy and Close is one of service like the one Yuno’s statement implies.

They’re together because one has something the other wants. Close is only able to be with them because she is shown to be a threat capable of putting a stop to their desires. He realizes that Close likes him, probably because the one person she’s downright stated telling about it told him, if you know then you know.

The novel tries to cheekily cover up who told him this information by just saying I heard from someone but Close literally discusses in great detail who she talks to about this guy regularly. Even stating she may be talking about him to this person to an annoying degree. Regardless of who he overheard discussing it and when, he knows about her little crush and is willing to use it as a means of creating a scenario where they both win.

He offers to date her as long as she doesn’t report what he’s been doing to the teachers. Which she agrees to; she is not a victim in this situation and goes on to help him with his harassment of this other student. Just saying, she could have said no and been grossed out by his stalker behavior; instead she chose to use the upper hand she had for her own benefit then like foisted all the blame on this guy. Something multiple characters throughout the book do despite those same people having multiple opportunities to stop him before it got to that point.

Like, incredibly fucked up that they sat back, complacent in not stopping trouble from happening and then just claim victimhood once it does. Milgram book really had me fucked up, I was annoyed. However, in this case it’s helpful. At least when deciphering this line, “The wanted wanting the wanter.”

The wanted wanting the wanter. This means that whoever Yuno was interested in wanted her but only in one aspect like in the circumstances with Close. This is alluded to in Umbilical with the lines at the end, “Are we over? Please don’t answer. What do you want to do? Please tell me.”

Now at this point, I’m pretty much certain Yuno was partaking in pregnancy entrapment or at least attempting to. It’s been heavily alluded to if not all but stated Yuno on top of being an escort/rental girlfriend may have been partaking in sex work. I don’t know how it is where anyone else lives but where I live if a sex worker gets pregnant by one of their clients that’s a bit of an issue.

Especially since it’s usually not just assumed but at points expressly stated that they should be or will be using contraceptive. Such as the pill, that one thing they can literally put in a persons arm to stop them from getting pregnant, or female/male condoms. Yes, there are female condoms though having a male wear one is usually viewed as easier. They work similarly to tampons as in yeah it’s going in there but know what isn’t sperm.

The reason why these things are usually heavily considered is because a lot of patrons/customers of sex workers are married; at times even having multiple children or households already. So, avoiding kids is well incredibly important to not turn into a homewrecker. Yuno says the person most like her is Kazui someone known for hiding his feelings and being too cowardly to act on them, to his own admission.

Yuno laments about not being capable of being the sort of girl the one she likes is interested in. In Umbilical after she says she finally found it being a pregnancy and she goes into saying I messed up I found out she can be heard laughing and giggling to herself behind those lines. She’s pretending to be upset with the news that she’s pregnant because if it wasn’t an accident on her part and she is a sex worker than that makes it sexual assault.

Something that could easily ruin her reputation when it comes to doing that sort of work and stop her from getting money. Since that’s something generally frowned upon everywhere even when a person isn’t paying to have sex with someone else. She probably even used being 18 as an excuse for her error. Despite people familiar with Milgram knowing Yuno is a lot of things but uninformed isn’t one of them.

She quickly calls out adults like Mikoto, Kazui, and Kotoko. Recognizing quite quickly that Kotoko’s actions in the long run won’t change anything. Yet she states doing something out in the open like that won’t change anything, not that behaving in that way won’t lead to change. No, she basically goes showing your full ass like that, what an ignorant thing to do now everyone knows how you really are and will be wary. So, manipulating things discretely seems to be what Yuno does more so. She’s one to spring a pregnancy on a man and ask what do you want to do now. Despite the answer being rather obvious if she was a sex worker.

Like um not to be harsh, but I paid you for a service under the assumption that you were using contraceptive, possibly because you said you were. This is like if I paid someone to do house renovations and they got injured doing them; it’s like I thought you were going to take necessary precautions because you’re a professional, that’s why I hired you. What do you mean what am I going to do about this? Pay your medical bills, you fucked yourself up on your own equipment. They would have me fucked up, this is a job; the fucking sex work is work.

That means just as much as the worker can be exploited so can the customer. Especially if they have family and are secretly patrons to a specific worker cause that can be used as blackmail material for more money. Everyone is like Yuno got an abortion that’s her murder but do you know how fucked up it is she got pregnant to begin with if she’s a sex worker? Like has no one thought of the implications there.

What crazy adult that possibly has a family and is paying for sex is gonna be like, “No I really want to have this in the most unsafe way possible contraceptive be damned I want to ruin my life tonight. I want my kids to know I’m trash of the worst caliber and I’m gonna make sure the kids you have with me know too. I’m not loyal. I can’t pull nobody with just my personality so my money has to speak real loudly.” Then he just spends several minutes crying after like a bitch which is why in Tear Drop she’s like “Just smile.” So much.

I’m getting distracted talking about Yuno again. However, in Umbilical we see multiple balloons of different colors outside of Yuno’s. That seem to represent her clients. Presents highlighted with inverted colors also appear on the staircase. Those probably signify or are gifts the men Yuno has done this to have given her. Here are the shots that show balloons outside of Yuno’s.

The balloons also appear near the different versions of Yuno we see throughout Umbilical and Tear Drop. Possibly trying to show us which presentation of Yuno her clients favored or the ones associated with that outfit choice. The red and yellow balloons appear next to both Yuno in her school uniform and how we see her dressed in the car during Tear Drop. Alluding to more than one client knowing about both.

So, that’s super fun. Given people have been assuming that each Yuno represent separate clients. Instead of, well, the other option of her dressing to suit particular clients tastes and more than one person being able to enjoy her presenting a certain way. So, like with Mikoto here, all the characters have something alluding to the appearance they put on in front of others and how they actually feel during their songs.

Some prisoners are just blunter than others. Unlike Shidou and Yuno using balloons, gifts, and flowers. Given all of this, it wouldn’t be a stretch to speculate the moon could represent their own gaze. Since the balloons in Umbilical and the other versions of Yuno in Tear Drop can be used to represent both her and her clients, there isn’t much reason for the same logic to not be applicable here.

Jackalope claims in the second trial commencement notice that Milgram cannot restrain the other Mikoto unless he is out. However, we see Mikoto observe the other one in MeMe through the mirror then very promptly just forget about it because dissociative amnesia is bitch like that. The moon would be a good way to represent which one is currently out and who is just spectating or in the background. Ha, get it because it’s literally a part of the background of the cards.

This would serve to explain why the moon in The Fool card is so odd. Though it has edges of Mikoto’s light blue it also has darkened out spots that could very well symbolize him not being entirely aware or able to observe. Either because he blocked it out or other factors have caused him to not be able to see or remember it. Meaning the double would be out and in control at this time. The same moon on the Hangman can also be seen the beneath the hooves of the horse on the death card.

However, that means when it comes to The Devil card the one fronting would be Mikoto. Basically, all cards with a red moon in the background would be indicating the double is taking the backseat and the blue one would be indicating Mikoto is taking the backseat. Then what about the Yellow moon does this mean there’s a third Mikoto confirmed? One, dual personality representation is hard to come by, two they have really leaned into the whole Double thing, three we literally just went over how the things used to represent the prisoners in their mind can also be used to represent societies view of them.

Another prime example of that being the graffiti in Backdraft-

Perfectly illustrating how ones self-image can be impacted and warped by external factors. Something Mikoto’s tarot spread alludes to a lot. Now am I against the system idea? No. I’m just stating that certain forms of dissociative identity disorder are represented more than others and for the time being I’m enjoying having the other be represented as well. That and sadly I can’t find a way to stretch it so that more than two of them being around would make sense with the information provided and I’m not going to cherry pick in order to do so.

If anyone else can find facts that align with that, good.

No, in fact I believe it means the exact opposite. The first time the yellow moon is displayed in the tarot cards it is within The Hangman card where we see multiple eyes peering in at the bottom. The only time the moon is fully Yellow is when both Mikoto’s colors are taking a bit of a backseat. This is shown within the Five of swords, Ace of Cups, King of Cups, Queen of Cups, The Magician, The Devil, and for brevity any card depicting a Blue or red moon with bits of yellow.

As we went over during the Hangman depiction, Yellow is representative of intellect. Intellect is usually used to navigate tricky situations throughout life while taking into consideration usually not just the most efficient course but the most emotionally satisfying one for the participant. So, the yellow in the cards could represent this form of planning that Mikoto has shown off and alluded to having throughout trial one.

Further nailing this point home; in Mikoto’s shirt iteration of the card the moon behind the Hangman’s head is fully red with hints of yellow around the edges

Given all of this, it seems to be yet another aspect of society that is heavily impacting how the Mikoto’s view themselves and behave. This is why during its first and most prominent appearance within the deck it is accompanied by eyes and put directly behind an art figure that in the card version appears to be all yellow or at least much lighter than the one shown on the shirt as well. The shirt that has this design also lacks the red and darkish blue sky shown to be surrounding the moon in the card version.

This would mean that in the cards we see the red and blue moon they would be working together, both would be cognizant of what is going on, or both of their mindsets is impacting the situation. This is the same with cards that prominently display both of their colors. So basically, if it has all three of these colors all three are impacting their circumstances, two of those two things are impacting the matter, and so on. The cards with red and blue moons within MeMe are The Ten of Wands, and The Five of Wands.  

It seems as though the moon in tarot deck is being used as one big eye. This could mean in cards where it is not present, none of these factors are being heavily affected by someone’s view but if those colors are present the people associated with it are being affected by that card. Such as cards like The Queen of Swords.

Now onto what this means- The Five of Wands finds itself within the outside influences position of this celtic spread. Fittingly for the discussion we just had this card embodies the outside world and how it is impacting the querent’s situation. This is another reason we went through explaining all that with the colors and how yellow may represent society and Mikoto’s attempts to navigate around or within that.

So, what does the Five of Wands mean in that context simply put let’s go over the five of wands shall we-

Context I am still recovering from a mostly all-day outing of seeing the Barbie movie- So, bear with me. Because I want to do this in a bit of unique way. This is because the five of wands is a rather unique card. As such even though it’s reversed I want to go over both meanings. So, we all fully understand the dichotomy of this card and its severity.

The Five of Wands is usually depicted in a few ways. The traditional depiction is several people brandishing five large sticks the wands haphazardly fighting with each other. It can also be interpreted as these people carrying the sticks somewhere as their sticks clash with each other and they all do their own thing. Portraying a clear lack of cohesion and conflict within the group regardless of how one interprets it. The extent of the conflict can range from jovial competitiveness to ones of a more serious nature.

Then there is the modern depiction where there are usually five wands portrayed on the card one being held in the hand of an individual or no one holding them at all. Because this is a Five card there is bound to be conflict. Just like with The Five of Swords, Five of Pentacles, and the Five of Cups. All of which deal with a conflict whether they be emotional or environmental.

However, those cards aren’t conflicts forwards and backwards. The Five of Wands no matter how you turn it is conflict without end. This is why its traditional name is The Lord of Strife. Upright or Reversed you are suffering. There is no Yes for the Five of Wands if you get this in a yes or no tarot. If it is upright it is a maybe, it is a well try it. It is the fuck around and find out of tarot cards.

Now the Five of Wands embodies the necessity of conflict. Not all conflict ends poorly, people are bound to clash with each other and through these disagreements one can within reason foster community, understanding of the individual within the whole, and move forward from it better than where they started from. This is why forwards or backwards the conflict is there, it has not been resolved and it may never be. Because on top of telling the person receiving the reading fucking try it bucko but when you get bucked don’t come saying oh to me- Reversed it is a stark warning to pull back the conflict is over and you are reaching a point in whatever relationship you are in where beyond that you will do irreparable harm. This will cause a permanent break and you should cut your losses and get yourself in check.

The querent is being told to decide whether they want to die on this hill, if they want this relationship to die on this hill, if they’re willing to kill someone over this. If all the answers to those questions are no you wipe your hands of it and move on if you’re Mikoto, well…it’s time to brandish the wand.

Because there’s a real easy way to make your problems disappear and it’s just like magic. Just of a different kind. It’s the magic of you tried the wrong one today, I am ready to die on this hill actually, I have nothing to lose, and I will take you down with me. I am fine with mutual destruction if you met yours first. You think this card is going to fucking stop me?! I’ve been given several very clear warnings before this. In this same spread!

This card wants to fuck around, you want to fuck around well guess what we about to find out together and I’m about to find out how the ground looks with you in it.

Upright, the card highlights that there may be a conflict in the asker’s life. This conflict may already exist or be brewing beneath the surface just about to bubble over. It can allude to competition in areas that the querent is not used to such as work or school. In this new environment the asker may interact with people that have the same talents who will stir up feelings of inadequacy, jealousy, envy, and greed leading to internal conflicts.

In this situation the upright Five of Wands recommends that the person asking accepts these new forms of competition as a way of bettering themselves and to let go of any malice they hold towards these new people in their life.

The Five of Wands also suggests that there may be communication problems within a team due to a situation in which everyone wants to be heard but no one is really listening to anyone else. This may lead to miscommunications, animosity forming within the team, and no one being heard overall. Ultimately causing tension and anger to accumulate until the breaking point.

Upright the Five of Wands suggest for the person asking to mediate. Get the group to talk about their misgivings and possible insecurities to hopefully resolve them. Now, I bet a good deal of people are starting to get why this is reversed from the other cards in Mikoto’s spread. Firstly, we know that he’s possibly been having trouble communicating from The Queen of Swords and he’s not feeling generous with his communication skills not really wanting to use them for the benefit of whatever group he’s in as seen through The King of Cups.

So, we’ve hit the breaking point already, whatever conflict has arisen is already a dead end which leads us to the Five of Wands reversed-

Wait, don’t go leaving now! The Five of Wands reversed mixed with the past card being the Wheel of Fortune reversed gives us a clearer idea of what occurred here. Back when we were interpreting the past card the Wheel of Fortune reversed we said it could represent that the querent has been having tough times but they may be passing soon. Because it reminds everyone that all things in life will pass, regardless of if they are good or bad.

However, a tarot spread is not just it’s parts but the sum of them. Since the Five of Wands is here and expressly states that the conflict could be brewing below the surface or already occurred that gives more context to the Wheel of Fortune. Telling us that the conflict implied through the Five of Wands and the difficulties that the Wheel of Fortune was more than likely referring to in Mikoto’s past are the same thing and at the point of this reading it has yet to be resolved.

In fact, according to the Five of Wands, instead of resolving the issue Mikoto is doing his best to circumvent it. The Five of Wands in reverse alludes to the querent avoiding all conflict by exiting the situation as quickly as they possibly can, which at times is good but can lead to a lot of animosity and frustration building up internally not only for the other people involved but on the side of the querent as well.

While everyone else involved might be happy and unaware of the issue, the querent could be stewing all on their own with these misgivings and irritations or everyone involved could be as equally miserable. However, considering at least one of his coworkers were willing to meet him after hours at an underpass and didn’t seem too much like man fuck this guy about it- The animosity does not seem shared.

Since the issue has yet to be addressed in a satisfactory way to the them, this is leading to them internalizing their anger which will lead to more problems down the line. There are only so many times that someone can avoid something, hold their tongue, and push down their anger before they end up blowing up at just the wrong time.

Also, behaving in this way doesn’t necessarily stop the behavior that is causing the conflict to cease. It warns that as much as the querent has been avoiding the conflict that they will ultimately have to address it soon. There are many times in life where walking away is an option. Many people are conflict avoidant. The Five of Wands shows up strictly to go now is not the time to be that; stop walking be here, be present, and have this conflict like an adult.

Because avoiding conflict and being amicable one hundred percent of the time is not being a proper adult. Have the conflict set your boundaries because if you don’t it’s going to get worse. Just because a person believes that them saying something for their own benefit will suddenly make them the problem since everyone else is happy doesn’t mean staying quiet is a good thing. Because staying quiet isn’t going to change the fact that they themselves aren’t doing well and no one will know that unless they say something.

However, it becomes incredibly more complicated because what Mikoto was going through was work related. Meaning his feelings frankly don’t matter because that’s just how work environments are. Hence the emphasis on being a “working” adult. So, can a person really stop being amicable if the option is be that or unemployed?

Now we are EIGHT cards deep NINETY-FIVE PAGES into this word document counting everything outside of the tarot! This is in MS Reference Sans Serif font eleven first line indented single line spacing and includes pictures. These pictures are taking up some of these pages so don’t go thinking I’ve done a lot.

However, if you’ve read this far or didn’t want to read this far let’s give a quick rundown before the end. Because this is already long and I don’t know if it will all fit in one post.

So, let’s run this down real quick.

What have we learned from the tarot so far? Mikoto’s life sucks, he was possibly financially unstable most of his life and he saw acquiring steady employment as a way of avoiding financial hardship. So, even if his company was exploitative out the gate, chances are he wouldn’t really have the wherewithal to quit. During this I even joked with another person who likes the series about how funny it would be if Mu’s dad was Mikoto’s landlord.

I discussed why it would be difficult for Mikoto to just leave his job previously when highlighting the tarot before, but this adds to that difficulty while showcasing the environmental factors that would lead Mikoto to making the decisions he did and viewing himself the way he does. This also serves to reckon with the fact that he went undiagnosed for so long. It’s not only that Dissociative Identity Disorder is difficult to diagnose, there’s also the financial factors around pursuing diagnosis and mental health treatment in any country.

Things like that take multiple sessions with a therapist to even break into. Something that, if not covered by one’s insurance provider, could cost hundreds of dollars for just one hour. Mikoto is 23 when he’s incarcerated in Milgram, this leaves him right in the vague generational area between 1995-2002 a contentious period when it comes to generational labels because no one can decide if those years of time count as Millennial or Gen Z or the secret third thing, Generation Katniss. Making that span of time a lost and vague generation with no real classification.

However, one thing people can agree on, is different years during that stretch of time are associated with more than one generation. Now, why is this stretch of time being a generation in and of itself important? Well, it's very telling. It’s a point in time in which we did have internet but it was in it’s early stages. We also had mental health services on paper but not everyone had them. In fact, everyone still doesn’t have them. Multiple disorders go undiagnosed in children of certain races and income. It’s such a common thing for the system to fail certain types of children that they call it slipping through the cracks where I am.

People are generally less inclined to care about screwing you over, neglecting, or downright overlooking you if you grow up under a certain income level or as a certain type of person. The medical educational system isn’t built for everyone and people go overlooked all the time. It’s very common and it’s usually somehow the person who slipped through the cracks job to climb back out of it. This means Mikoto doesn’t lack faith in himself because he’s naturally not confident or solely due to his home life.

There are multiple environmental factors that can impact a person’s confidence in their abilities. People are not only the byproduct of their parents but the environment they are raised in. We are all walking long form equations and every instance in our lives is just another piece of the formula. When you only focus on the part in the round brackets you miss the rest of the problem. It’s easy to think you aren’t good at anything when your environment tells you aren’t.

When you can’t get scholarships, barely get into a college with low entry requirements, or just manage to get the job you were aiming for after who knows how many attempts. It’s easy to feel ones life wasn’t meant to be this way when you plan, and plan, and plan but no matter how well you plan. How far in advance you prepare. Fuck, even if you work backwards with your end goal in mind. Your legs keep moving, your mind keeps planning, thinking this time, this is when we’ll reach the end point, this is when I’ll have finally done it.

Then the goal moves and it moves and it moves. The tasks keep piling up you seem to be moving you feel the forward momentum this situation isn’t like the last because you’re better off than where you started and the goal feels right there. IT FEELS CLOSER THAN IT EVER HAS. It is right there. It’s not a dream, a delusion, fool’s gold shining in the water it is right there. The way out something to hope for as long as you’re willing to do whatever it takes to keep going forwards because you don’t want to fail right?! You already know what failing looks like; do you want to go back to that?

It's not even like you’re asking for much. Don’t want to be rich, just well off enough to be comfortable to do freelance. Dictate your own schedule maybe do something you want to do for once instead constantly be in survival mode, because the moment you screw up that’s it. You’re poor and on the streets; are you gonna ask your mom for help move back in with her when you probably know what her finances are like already? If you work harder, you can succeed even beneath a system that’s designed for you to fail.

That’s Amane and Mikoto’s problem. They both believed there was a way out of their situations; if they just did what was asked of them, eventually they’ll treat me better, my abilities will be recognized. It’ll work out as long as I try harder. If in Magic Amane is in the process of trying, in MeMe Mikoto is at the outcome of his efforts. Yet, both their efforts led to the same conclusion; swinging a wand down as they try make their problems disappear.

Now since this has gotten long enough, in the next one we’ll be discussing the rest of the first reading and going into the conclusions. I would appreciate hearing feedback and opinions on this if anyone reads it.  Secondarily, there’s a lot I have written about Mikoto separately already but I’m focused on doing this in order. It’s been fun seeing some of the thoughts I had typed down come to fruition in tiny ways throughout trial two.

I know it’s a lot and, well, it’s not all about Mikoto but the prisoners all overlap with each other in interesting ways. I think the pairings shouldn’t be the only time prisoner comparisons are made. Especially since the characters themselves compare themselves to people outside of their pair. I think out of everyone the person Mikoto has the most in common with and works best as a foil to him is Amane. Which could be part of why he has difficulty in speaking with her. Other than that yeah I’ll try to finish the last two cards when I get the chance.

However, I have a lot of family stuff and I’ve been writing this mostly on my own.  It takes longer for me to process information so I do have to step back and actively do other things to fully process and better vocalize or even just figure out what it is I want to say. If I can do all this and I’ve seen all the creativity and consideration others in the fandom put into their ideas and theories.

I would encourage people write more stuff about their favorites and really take into the consideration how they not only work on their own but with the other prisoners. The conclusions you come to by doing that could just surprise you. Though you don’t gotta do it to this extent. Trust me, I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t have to. I’m actually chained up in a basement by Star, the way Mahiru allegedly had her lover and she’s currently forcing me to write all these theories. Help….

(>:- p)

[thedastrash]

OC Tag Game!

Ooo thanks for tagging me @kittynomsdeplume & @cleverblackcat!! This took a while to get to but it was very fun!

Favorite OC: Evil question to start. I can't possibly choose unless I set some limits for myself so I'm going to cheat and say my most popular OC. I have the most art of her by no fault of my own. Velaneth Surana is my canon HoF and Warden Commander. Vela is a very open person: never lies, has no body shame, and loves to learn about other people and where they’ve come from. She walks into every hostile situation with her best foot forward trying to make friends and allies.

Newest OC: I’m slowly congealing my ideas about Orlagh Trevelyan because I’ve been imagining what the different cultures of the Freemarches look like - especially on the coast where trade is frequent. She’s from Ostwick of course and trained as a Templar as a youth but spent summers at a monastery with her aunt in Wycome which I imagine a bit like Morocco. I’ve been staring at my Pinterest boards imagining her lonely days growing up and what it means for her to leave her walls behind and be thrust into this new organization with all these people and their differing ideals. I'm particularly interested in exploring her being a templar but having some latent magic that has been tied up in her templar abilities so long she didn't realize it was ever there.

Oldest OC: In DA my oldest OC is Topaz Brosca from my original run of origins. The one where my save got deleted right before the Landsmeet lol rip. I've recently revisited her and I'm falling in love with her again. She's a hot trans girl and stabby rogue and she falls in love with the surface world immediately. My oldest OC ever though... might be a self insert hobbit character I made for myself as a child before I knew what fandom or fanfiction was lol! I think her name was Charlie? my memory is BAD but I know that's a name I loved as a kid.

Meanest OC: Szadrine Aeducan is my final origin from DAO to get an OC and I'm slowly growing deeply obsessed. She’s involved in (literal) cutthroat Orzammar politics and ends up skipping the warden bit after the whole betrayal and exile thing. She simply deserts at Ostagar. I think she should end up kicking ass in Orlais because she would be so good at the Game.

Softest OC: Bearnard Cousland is a soft, sweet, bookish baby-gay who would rather bury himself in his research in a library than seek glory or fight battles or do politics. Bearn is the second son so he’s gotten away with avoiding some of that but of course he has to attend his lessons and participate in the tourneys. His scholarly work lends him some political savvy since he’s intimately familiar with Ferelden’s history, but he’s most interested in lost texts and translating ancient works. He never had good gay role models growing up and thinks of himself as homely and forgettable, so he never felt like that was an option for him, but Maker does he ever pine lol!

Most Aloof/Standoffish OC: Gotta be Irene Amell. She's a real bitch with resting murder face. Incredibly unapproachable, intimidating Domme energy. Tends to default dislike people and keep to herself, prefering to slink around and eavesdrop than talk to people for info. She’s very protective and loving toward her close friends and lovers, but it’s hard to get close in the first place.

Dumbest OC: Myrna Hawke is a smart woman, she's an accomplished mage, enjoys reading, quick witted, but she has zero self-awareness and has a very hard time even understanding how she feels, much less how other people feel about her. She’s absolutely clueless and fully blindsided by anyone’s interest & gets tongue tied and stupid when she’s horny. She’s also very impulsive and acts before she thinks things through which leads to getting into a lot of dumb shit.

Smartest OC: There are excellent contenders here: Bearn with his book smarts and Topaz with her street smarts, but I want to say Ithadhea Mahariel because even though they are incredibly dense when it comes to interpersonal relations, their wealth of traditional knowledge from their clan is incredible. They are not really a people person, usually quiet and solitary, but they took to hunting like they were born for it and eagerly learned everything in the realm of woodcraft and survival. They know all their clan's stories by heart and and know resources by seasons in a way that is part of their internal clock. I think this kind of generational knowledge probably outstrips the scope of any of my other OC's knowledge.

OC I’d Be Friends With: Edric Cadash is so laid back and friendly I think he’d be one of the easiest to make friends with. I want to have tea and gossip with him and have that turn into late night drinking and telling stories by the fire. Vela would be an instant friend as well; she wants to befriend everyone and she'd have an easy time with me!

no pressure tagging some of my DA OC enjoying friends: @sinquisition, @highwayphantoms, @lets-get-brave, @sandalinbohemia, @dismalzelenka and anyone else who wants to share! Feel free to @ me so I can see your post! <3

[whatiwillsay]

Go off sis re the swiftgron shipping post, but I have to push back that your whole “I am seeking the truth” is a stretch lmfao. I listen to your podcast all the time and some of the stuff your guests say is wayyy out of pocket and so far removed from reality. I get you are trying to be respectful of their beliefs but it’s unfair for you to claim one thing and then in ur podcast/patron do the exact thing some shippers do. You can’t get offended when someone starts talking smack about what you built your brand on, when in fact, the foundation lies in you speculating about a the sex life of a celebrity. The whole thing is so unserious and people need to chill out.

who said i was offended? i just disagree that i’m doing something wrong or immoral when i don’t bend the knee to outlandish conspiracy swiftgron or say every song she’s ever written is about dianna when i don’t believe they are.

my guests are allowed to offer opposing points of view that’s the entire point of fostering a conversation. i push back when i have explicit facts to debunk their points and the vibe of the conversation welcomes it. i suppose it’s worth mentioning that while my main priority is sticking to the facts and remaining rooted in reality i ALSO aim to be entertaining and platforming opposing points of view is not only entertaining BUT it’s also important because sometimes my own belief may be incorrect and i can’t find that out if i don’t allow someone to speak to me amount it.

that anon was complaining about things i personally say and opinions i’ve changed over the years. i am not hear to personally correct every person who says something outlandish or false about gaylor. i’d never actually say anything fun or interesting if i had to do that. as i said OTHER people can do what they want, say what they want, and ship what they want because at the end of the day it is ALL SPECULATIVE. so while i aim to keep stuff factual it’s impossible because everything we say is rooted in speculation.

i generally agree it is all unserious and people do need to chill out. it shouldn’t be a big deal when i change my mind on museship of a song or suggest taylor has music about both men and women. but that anon seemed to think that was unacceptable and i was simply disagreeing with them.

but i disagree that the foundation of this space is all that much about taylor. the foundation of this space is a conversation about what it means to be queer (in particular a queer woman), what it means to be closeted, what it means to recognize queerness in others, and what it means to express yourself as a queer person in this world. hence why we talk about shit like lesbian vampires, other celebs like hayley kiyoko and 5th harmony and selena gomez and etc etc, and also have MANY in depth conversations about fandom meta. taylor is the jumping off point because she’s so epic and iconic but the pool we jump into is deep and vast and goes far far beyond taylor.

sure we’re gay little weirdos and way too focused on taylor right now but as i’ve said many times we WILL run out of gaylor content in time and when that happens we will keep the conversation about queerness going while discussing other people and topics. that’s because that’s the foundation of this space- NOT taylor.

[horizon-verizon]

If Daemyra and Alys/Aemond are foils, how will they be presented to us on screen?

I'm bad at predictions, anon, so try not to be too disappointed with me. I also despise the notion of getting into Ryan Condal's -- and any major writer there -- mind.

To many in the audience, Daemyra is OTP and one of the biggest draws to the show (aside from actually hating Rhaenyra and loving Alicent for many Rhaenicent-shippers).

Since Aemond has been modified into:

a way calmer, less volatile version from the book, a person who seems victimized instead of the woman-hating victimizer

a guy who accidentally, rather than intentionally as in canon, kills his nephew while his younger nephew tries to run away from him -- Lucerys thinking Aemond will kill him because of years of hate AND Aemond literally just having told him to put out his own eye then chasing him for more than 10 minutes (let's imagine this happening, it would be a long-enough chase)...

Then I expect that the writers would present Aemond/Criston's capture of Harrenhal and taking Alys as his war prize as him "saving" her from destitution and/or him having inner conflict over how Lucerys' death went down. Others have already argued or suggested that HotD Aemond might regard Alys as something like his repentance for his actions against Lucerys (her being a Strong bastard). That the writers will pair these two either as Aemond trying to use her as his private penance or/and Alys victimizing him because she is the older one...ignoring the fact that Aemond killed all the Strong male issue and takes her as a war prize/sex slave.

You know what, I can believe that they will have Aemond lose control of his own emotions again, raze Harrenhal again (like Aegon I), see how he killed the Strongs "accidentally", and then take Alys as his publicized war prize so that he can make up for the fact that he accidentally killed her means to live (the Storng house). And then, the "whore" and "groomer"/"pedophile" Alys will encourage or begin to change their relationship into a real sexual one so she can use his authority for her own use and protection and seek revenge against those she lived with (the survivors of the House and their followers or servants) with such power. Because they probably will also present Alys living under the Strongs as being destitute as mistreated, as I already suggested.

Thus twisting Alys into some sort of gold digging tramp and repeating this current misogynist nonsense of women "trying to take men's money and only wanting them for their money" that you see bouncing around in Instagram, TikTok, etc., and real life people's own mouths. Instead of, say....a war prize trying to just survive?

I already wrote how Daemon and Aemond are foils HERE and what a Byronic hero is (what Daemon is modelled from) HERE. The show would have us think Aemond is the Byronic hero, or what it thinks a Byronic hero is.

HERE is a post I made that has pics of an NY Times interview with Condal. Here is what he says about Daemon:

We established right out of the gate, in the pilot, that Daemon is a fascinating guy, but he’s not Ned Stark. So I didn’t see it coming.

To me, Daemon is the antihero of this story. He’s a character with a real darkness to him, who’s dangerous and charming in equal parts. I knew people would be fascinated by him and latch onto him, but I figured they’d do it in the way they did with Jaime Lannister or Bronn or the Red Viper. I did not think they would oddly apply this sort of super-fandom to him and try to justify every single thing he’s done as being intrinsically heroic. It simply isn’t. It’s not the case. Nor will it be in the future.

[...]

I see Daemon as having heroic aspects to him, and I understand why people would. I mean, he’s incredibly charismatic, he’s handsome, he looks great in that wig, he rides a dragon, he has a cool sword. I totally get it. But if you’re looking for Han Solo, who’s always going to do the right thing in the end, you’re in the wrong franchise, folks.

Basically, Condal thinks/thought people justifies everything Daemon does as something that is inherently, morally good or innocuous. He believes people love Daemon because he is handsome, charming, a dragonriders, confident, etc. Basically he is a bad boy, Condal says, and people love a bad boy, but Condal's says people mistake him as a good person when he isn't.

But Condal also said some contradictory things about Daemon, seeming to flip-flop:

My post HERE of him talking about the choking scene.

LINK to post by @eschercaine

Which goes to show how much Condal knows about how fans of this series think and feel. Fans love Daemon yes for his self confidence, but many do not just love him for that. Many love that he is willing to do whatever it takes, especially violence, to protect both his family's lives and their dignities. He has been doing things like this even before Viserys became king. It is Viserys who troubles their relationship by causing Mysaria's miscarriage in canon.

And there is absolutely no indication that either Rhaenyra or her kids feared him while she was married to him in their years on Dragonstone together. But in HotD, his relationship with Rhaenyra apparently has physical abuse?! Daemon fucks Rhaenyra trying to get close to his brother?!

Keeping that in mind, as it is beyond obvious that Aemond and Daemon are thematic rivals (I already explain how in the linked post above), Condal makes Aemond the "better" person. Therefore, Aemond must and will come out looking like a victim and a "better person" next season. And apparently because these relationships hinge on the man's psychological state more than anything, their relationships will reflect the man's inner woes.

Daemyra is a relationship of wounded envy and little to no communication, a high chemistry non love posing as real love in HotD. AlysxAemond will be one of repressed angst, manipulation, and guilt, another non love but this time the war prize element will hammer in how boys can't be abusers of adults but Aemond is "just trying his best". Daemyra will spiral, falter, and disintegrate with Daemon's increasing violence corresponding to his growing frustrations with Rhaenyra's increasing paranoia. Feelings of betrayal will be presented from both characters -- Daemon wondering where her trust has gone after years of him proving it to her, and Rhaenyra just from feeling him grow more and more distant (hinted at with Daemon not being there when she lost Visenya).

[siriusist]

Hellooooo :) For the sleepover asks: do you have any book/song/movie/tv/literally anything recommendations? I always see you reblogging cool stuff for different fandoms 🤭

Okay, I do, but this is the most random assortment of my recent favourite media/music, but hopefully someone can pick out something from this (And thanks, babe <3):

Books:

Wham! George Michael and Me by Andrew Ridgeley:

In 1975 Andrew took a shy new boy at school under his wing. They instantly hit it off, and their boyhood escapades at Bushy Meads School built a bond that was never broken. The duo found themselves riding an astonishing roller coaster of success, taking them all over the world. They made and broke iconic records, they were treated like gods, but they stayed true to their friendship and ultimately to themselves. It was a party that seemed as if it would never end. And then it did, in front of tens of thousands of tearful fans at Wembley Stadium in 1986.

Andrew’s memoir covers in wonderful detail those years, up until that last iconic concert: the scrapes, the laughs, the relationships, the good, and the bad. It’s a unique and one-and-only time to remember that era, that band, and those boys.

Digital Minimalism: Choosing A Focused Life in A Noisy World by Cal Newport:

Digital minimalists are all around us. They're the calm, happy people who can hold long conversations without furtive glances at their phones. They can get lost in a good book, a woodworking project, or a leisurely morning run. They can have fun with friends and family without the obsessive urge to document the experience. They stay informed about the news of the day, but don't feel overwhelmed by it. They don't experience "fear of missing out" because they already know which activities provide them meaning and satisfaction.

Now, Newport gives us a name for this quiet movement, and makes a persuasive case for its urgency in our tech-saturated world. Common sense tips, like turning off notifications, or occasional rituals like observing a digital sabbath, don't go far enough in helping us take back control of our technological lives, and attempts to unplug completely are complicated by the demands of family, friends and work. What we need instead is a thoughtful method to decide what tools to use, for what purposes, and under what conditions.

(I've been feeling burned out from tech lately with work, and I'm trying to pull back as much as I can from using screens every moment of the day).

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton:

Before there was Kate Beaton, New York Times bestselling cartoonist of Hark! A Vagrant, there was Katie Beaton of the Cape Breton Beaton, specifically Mabou, a tight-knit seaside community where the lobster is as abundant as beaches, fiddles, and Gaelic folk songs. With the singular goal of paying off her student loans, Katie heads out west to take advantage of Alberta’s oil rush―part of the long tradition of East Coasters who seek gainful employment elsewhere when they can’t find it in the homeland they love so much. Katie encounters the harsh reality of life in the oil sands, where trauma is an everyday occurrence yet is never discussed.

Beaton’s natural cartooning prowess is on full display as she draws colossal machinery and mammoth vehicles set against a sublime Albertan backdrop of wildlife, northern lights, and boreal forest. Her first full length graphic narrative, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands is an untold story of Canada: a country that prides itself on its egalitarian ethos and natural beauty while simultaneously exploiting both the riches of its land and the humanity of its people.

(I had to go to Alberta to get my training completed, and I experienced a lot of the similar themes explored in this graphic novel. Might be stupidly Canadian for some, but a great graphic novel overall).

The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore:

Discover the gripping and inspiring true story of The Radium Girls, a groundbreaking work by acclaimed author Kate Moore. Immerse yourself in this compelling narrative that unravels the extraordinary lives of these fearless women who fought against all odds.

The Curies' newly discovered element of radium makes gleaming headlines across the nation as the fresh face of beauty, and wonder drug of the medical community. From body lotion to tonic water, the popular new element shines bright in the otherwise dark years of the First World War.

Meanwhile, hundreds of girls toil amidst the glowing dust of the radium-dial factories. The glittering chemical covers their bodies from head to toe; they light up the night like industrious fireflies. With such a coveted job, these "shining girls" are the luckiest alive―until they begin to fall mysteriously ill.

Songs:

You Deserve an Oscar by Matt Maltese

Love and War in Your Twenties by Jordan Searcy

Wham Rap! by Wham!

Everything She Wants by Wham!

She's Got a Way by Billy Joel

Movies:

The Wham! Documentary on Netflix was just a hell of a lot of fun, and inspired me reading both Andrew Ridgeley's memoir and get into more of Wham's music.

Good Will Hunting: It's the first time I properly watched it through, and loved it.

TV:

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds: I wasn't a fan of the first season, but the crossover and musical episodes (Plus adding James T. Kirk, spoilers), has really brought it around for me.

[theonlycorrectcropinions]

Scanlan in tlovm gets such bitch eating crackers energy from me. The show character is pretty great, by all rights I should be a big fan. But man, I just hate stream scanlan lmao. I hate the weird veneration he gets from the grossest bro-est parts of the fandom (this is very clearly not saying that if you like scanlan you’re a gross bro, shut the fuck up), as detailed before I hate the whole bard’s lament sitch, I hate the genesis of Sam’s “everything is a joke, except when it’s not” shtick where everything is schrodinger’s emotional moment that’s haha until it’s serious business because it feels so dishonest… and the worst part is that I lied, and I don’t actually particularly hate stream scanlan, I just hate thinking about him in any sort of analytical sense because he’s so fucking annoying.

Like, sure, I get it, what if the gag character who’d shown the depth of a kiddie pool gets serious, sure, seen it before. But if we’re supposed to take scanlan seriously then he’s a serial sexual harasser, murderer, manipulator, terrible friend, yadda yadda, shit that’s fine if he’s the comic relief guy, but not the kind of stuff that inspires any sympathy why Sam starts trying to lay in the pathos. It feels ingenuine to just flip a switch between shit the audience (just me actually, I don’t care what you do to the rest of the audience) is supposed to take seriously and what they’re (me again) supposed to laugh off. I’m not talking like ooc conversations and running jokes, but like actual stuff the characters do.

Like, Nott is a Halfling woman who gets turned into a goblin. Sam decided that since goblins have shorter lifespans they would feel emotions more strongly, so she acts a bit wild. Despite introducing her as a “little goblin girl,” (something stans like to forget when they whine about early game Nott being infantalized… she’s introduced as a little girl lmao) she’s supposed to be an adult, sure thing, got it. Why’s she eating shit? Literally eating shit in a sewer? How does that make any sense as an actual thing he actually narrated for his character to do? It doesn’t, it’s a joke, but it does make it harder to take Nott at her word later when she snaps at fjord for treating her like a child/idiot. You were just eating shit in a sewer lady, you don’t really get to be high about people questioning your decision making skills.

It’s over and over again with this stuff. It’s a joke that scanlan’s drug seeking, notts a mean drunk, fcg is a shitty therapist, until no it’s a serious part of their character actually, forget about all the times it was a joke and engage with it earnestly. No? You haven’t earned that and everything up to this point has actively undermined that kind of engagement.

Still fun characters for the most part. Sam ranks about in the middle of cast for me (the only correct opinion haver).

[kitkatt0430]

Spike and Angel

Spike

How I feel about this character

Favorite vampire (sorry Angel) of all time right here. He's the big bad. He's a fluffy puppy with fangs. He's a killer and a poet. He's complicated and ridiculous and cares so much.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Buffy, Angel, Fred, Xander

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Dawn, Tara, Fred, Willow

My unpopular opinion about this character

Honestly, no idea. I know that some of my opinions on him are popular based entirely on what part of the fandom the post reaches and those same opinions would be wildly unpopular in other parts.

I do think he got pretty badly abused in parts of S6 so I do wish he'd been the ones to break things off with Buffy. And that he would have done so to try and push Buffy to seek help after finally recognizing he couldn't give that to her. That continuing down the path they were going was hurting Buffy as much as it was him. (Possibly still a trigger for Spike to seek out his soul.) This tends to be unpopular because some people look at any discussion of Buffy's canonical abuse of Spike as erasure of Spike's equally canonical abuse of Buffy so... *shrugs* I tend to avoid the subject.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I wish Spike had gotten in contact with Buffy during his season on Angel. I really think, after everything, she deserved to know. To hear it from him. And instead Spike jumped on the 'paternalistic towards Buffy' train that Angel was the conductor for.

Angel

How I feel about this character

I like him a lot less as an adult than I did as a teenager. I mean... I always found him weird, but as an adult I really do find his whole 'fell in love with a fifteen year old at a distance' thing kinda sketchy. Vampire from a different era or not, it's kinda sketchy.

That said, he's just kinda an out of touch dork and I really do enjoy the character over all. Especially when he got his own show. His dynamic with Cordelia in particular is just really fun to me.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Buffy, Cordelia, Xander, Spike, Wesley

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Wesley, Lorne, Fred, Doyle, Lindsey

My unpopular opinion about this character

Possibly that I like his relationship with Cordelia better than his relationship with Buffy? Again, kinda depends on the part of the fandom the post floats into.

As noted, his initial interest in Buffy was kinda... sketchy. But also he's just very paternalistic towards Buffy and has a tendency to treat her as immature, needing him to make decisions for her. I can get why they both idealize the relationship, but I think that's because they're both more in love with the idea of each other than actually in love with each other.

Whereas with Cordelia, he falls for her after knowing her as a friend. They've got a much more solid base to build their relationship on and he treats her a lot more as an equal. Cordelia is able to grow as a person because of Angel's support and they really seem to see each other and like one another, faults and all.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I wish we'd have gotten a chance to actually explore what it would be like for Angel to raise a (vampire powered) human son. Just imagine Connor running into the sunlight as a kid to avoid arguments with his dad and stuff like that.

[lukamoonvibe]

Chapter Three: bitch get more creative [high school dimension] (2)

Chapter Index

Summary: 

Medalling with time has a consequence, the consequence of his choice is to be a slave to it until Fate decides he's no fun anymore or he escapes...but does he really want to escape anymore? It's been so long, what would even be the point of going back anymore? Would anyone still remember him? Probably not. No one escapes Fate and lives to tell the tale. Not even a traveller of time.

Fandoms: Crewniverse, Crewfu/Morning Lobby, Chaos Crew/Derp Crew

Characters: Anthony | ChilledChaos, Max Gamble | APlatypuss, Steven | ZeRoyalViking , Taylor | TayderTot, Zach | CheesyBlueNips, Lucas | KYRSP33DY, Apollo Willems | Dumdog, Albi | SideArms4Reason, Skadj, Steven Suptic, 5up, Madi | Kruzadar, Shelby Grace | Shubble [Updated as I add more]

Rating: Mature

Status: On Going

“Wah. What the fuck-”

“Chilled, for the love of god, shut up a listen.”

“Speedy?”

The dark-haired boy nodded, “Now, I’ve been stuck here longer than you so listen. We’re not in the system, we have to be careful who we interact with because there is a chance that they will remember us and if we just disappear they’ll question it-”

“Is that why Kruz said you’d probably be making out with Side somewhere? Doesn’t seem very ‘careful who we interact with’ to me.” Chilled jabbed, smug smirk on his face.

Speedy rolled his eyes, hitting Chilled’s shoulder, “Madi would say that shit regardless. You know her well enough. She threw me here around two months ago I think, at the end of summer break. I’m warning you because I made the mistake of seeking our friends out straight away-”

“Listen, Speedy, you may have been in this dimension longer but I can guarantee you haven’t been hopping for as long as I have. Fate has its ways of making sure you run into these people no matter how hard try to avoid it. She always sucks you away just before you can figure out why you were here in the first place. You can fight it, but it hurts. You can’t bring them with you, then you have to watch the entire timeline start and end before your very eyes and everyone dies, they always die, over and over.” his vision blurred as recalled the experience.

"Chilled, you need to calm down. I promise we'll figure it out this time. She did her best to keep us apart since that meeting where I told you but we're together here to figure it out." The pressure weighed on his shoulder, "I need you to breathe with me okay. I've watched them die too, it hurts but we can't get home if we don't work through it."

How are you so calm about this? Our friends, no people who share their appearance and personality, are just dying in front of you. Over and over. All of them, everyone, everyone except- "Shelby." He mumbled.

"What?" 

"Shubble, have you run into Shubble yet in the universes that Fate has sent you to?" His thoughts ran like a motor on a machine.

"I mean, come to think of it, no. But I'm sure she's around somewhere, why?"

Chilled steadied his breaths as his thoughts began to piece together the stories, "I can't recall how long I've been here. I just remember the last person I talked to before deciding to travel the first time was Tay."

"Okay," Speedy replied a doubtful tinge laced his tone.

"Then, the first time I met an alternate Platy he asked me to stay and I told him I couldn't, not because I didn't want to but because I knew from one of my first travels that if you try to avoid leaving she leaves you in excruciating pain until you give in." 

“You keep referring to Fate as a she, why?”

Chilled rolled his eyes, and with a wave of his hand, he continued, “Not important. And you call her ‘she’ too. Anyway, the first time I met a Ze instead of asking me to stay, he asked if he’d remember me. Which they never do once she sucks you away…or maybe they do but she doesn’t show us that.”

Speedy squinted, concentrating on his thought, “What if she just sends another us into whatever ‘universe’ she puts us in? That would explain why they ‘forget’ us. Because it’s not us, it’s a doppelganger if you will. Maybe one they wouldn’t have met yet but were supposed to earlier but something stopped it from happening?” he rambled his thoughts.

“Right. Maybe. So does that mean to send us in she has to pull our doppelganger out of the universe? Like in some kind of stasis chamber or whatever? Nah, I doubt it. Maybe she just makes a clone of us.” the thought sent shivers down his spine, imagine clones of ourselves traversing the multiverse. Did she send doppelgangers to our homeverse? I hope not. But maybe it would be better? Maybe, maybe they all just forgot about me. It’s been so long since I’ve been gone. Would they even still be alive if I got back? What if my soul purpose in life was just to suffer? What if-

“Chilled!” Speedy shook him lightly breaking him out of his spiral. 

“Hm?”

“Oh good, I thought I’d lost you there. Don’t do that okay? It scared me.” the younger man said, genuine concern in his eyes. 

Chilled looked down, “Sorry. I’ve been doing this for so long. Sometimes I just, spiral.” he mumbled, “what were you saying?”

“Oh. Just that the clone theory is more likely than her removing our doppelganger to drop us in. Then I asked if there was anyone else you interacted with that was aware you were a traveller.” Speedy recounted his last few statements.

“Oh. Yeah. Cheesy. He asked me if he could come and I said no, I told him he’d die if he tried. Honestly, I’m not too sure if that’s true but I didn’t want to risk it because as far as I’m aware she can’t just revive the dead and send them back.”

Speedy nodded in agreeance, “I told Side the same thing. I didn’t want to risk seeing him die,” he shuffled his feet, “although she doesn’t show me what happens after she whisks me away. To be fair on her though, I’ve only been stuck travelling for,” he pulled down his sleeve revealing pen marks down his wrist, “fuck, almost a year. Holy shit, the books weren’t lying when they said you lose track fast.”

Chilled chuckled, “Wait. Did you come here voluntarily? Why?” a concerned tone followed the questions, why would he choose to do this willingly knowing how long I’d been missing. I had to have been here for at least 3 years then, that’s the minimum amount of study you need before you can summon the doors.

Speedy sighed, “I did. I did it because-” a bell cut the two off and a sudden influx of footsteps and chatter outside made both men wary to continue, “you know what. We’ll continue this later, come on I’ll show you where the office is but you’re better off just choosing someone to tail and going to all their classes with them.” he explained as they exited the bathrooms.

“I will be honest, this is the first time I’ve met Apollo. I don’t really know him too well. Same with Kruz, in person I mean. Sometimes I meet them later in the piece but never at the start. Actually, it’s kind of odd I haven’t run into-”

“Anthony! Hey over here!”

He turned to face the newcomer, “Oh hey Madi, I was just-”

“Well if it isn’t our speedy little snake, I didn’t know you knew Anthony, Lucas.”

Before he could get an explanation out Speedy cut him off, “I don’t in fact I only met him today. Was called to the office to show him around.”

“In the bathrooms? You know if that’s the way you swing I won’t-”

Chilled freaked out, “No. No. We just stopped for a bathroom break. Uh-”

Kruz laughed slapping him on the shoulder, “You should’ve seen the look on your face, I was just kidding. Anyway, I’ll see you guys at break, I’m off to computer science.” she waved as she continued to class, backpack swinging behind her.

They both let out a sigh of relief. 

“You should probably just spend the day with me, here,” Speedy said, shoving a piece of paper into Chilled’s hand, “I’ve constructed a couple of different timetables for classes so that I wasn’t in the same classes as the same person. I don’t need it anymore. Take it and tweak it so we’re not also always together. I can help you later. I’ve got pics of all their timetables.” he explained as they walked to their class.

Chilled peaked down at the paper, math, brilliant, I love math.

[captainpikeachu]

Okay so this prevailing sentiment that I keep seeing about how “this doesn’t make sense why would Bucky be with a team of bad guys” really kinda annoys because...most of the MCU Thunderbolts team members aren’t even bad guys???

Ghost, Taskmaster, and Yelena literally all share similar kinds of backstories to Bucky, they are all victims of a system that either mind controlled them or forced them into doing horrible things. They’ve all broken free and are trying to make their own choices and trying to recover and get better in their own ways. 

Alexei is literally just a chaotic man being chaotic, and the last we saw of him, he was part of the protagonist team of the Black Widow film. Hardly any sense of being a “bad guy”, just a big dork guy who really wants to punch some folks and admittedly trying and sometimes failing at being a dad.

And as much as folks want Walker to be a bad guy, even the Falcon and the Winter Soldier show didn’t bother making him the villain of the story, instead head writer Malcolm Spellman even stated that Walker and Bucky are two sides of a veteran’s story, and the last time we saw of Walker, he was actually trying to save hostages and helping Sam and Bucky, with him and Bucky even working together.

The only person with remotely a whiff of possible “bad guy” is Val, and we don’t really even know enough about her to say if she’s actually doing bad things because she’s evil or if she’s just like a Nick Fury who sometimes do shady things for what she thinks are the greater good.

Sure, many of these characters have served antagonistic roles in the stories they appeared in, but being an antagonist does not equal to being a “bad guy” or being the villain. Protagonist doesn’t mean Hero, and Antagonist doesn’t mean Villain, and sometimes I fear that fandom spends so much time trying to shove characters into boxes and ends up losing sight of the characters’ complexities. 

The Thunderbolts are not just a “team of bad guys”, even in their decades of comics history, this team line up has run across all ends of the spectrum with Bucky being a member of this team at various points. The most recent new comics run is even a team of heroes led by Clint Barton himself.

And if one really takes a good look at this currently known line up of the MCU Thunderbolts team, with the exception of Val whose backstory is shrounded in mystery right now, these are all characters who’ve had trauma, who’ve been through a lot, who are soldiers and warriors who’ve all fought for what they thought was right. Sure their moralities can be a bit skewed, but they aren’t just people who go around killing people for no reason and just enjoying being bad for the sake of being bad. This is a team of broken traumatized messed up chaotic warriors seeking for another chance to prove themselves, for redemption, and is that not the kind of people whom Bucky would share commonality with? Is that not the kind of people that he might be able to help, to provide guidance and advice to? He’s walked their path, he of all people knows what it takes to make a recovery stick.

What better way to continue his journey from the ending of the Falcon and the Winter Soldier than to make him the “mentor” of a group of people each trying to seek their own redemption in their own way? Wouldn’t it be character growth for Bucky to go from the learner to now the teacher?

Honestly I think Thunderbolts director Jake Schreier said it best:

I just think The Thunderbolts are an exciting opportunity to take these characters that have been seen in a certain light and kinda bring them together, and through coming together, possibly view them in another light. 

So many of these characters on the team, we all have a way of seeing them through our various biases and perspectives, and this film might actually teach us all to let go of certain biases and see these characters in a new way through their perspectives.

[musette22]

Heat Wave

Pairing: Chris Evans x Sebastian Stan (Evanstan)

Word count: 2.5k

A/N: Like every single person in this fandom I’ve been replaying Chris’s Buzzfeed puppy interview non-stop in my mind (and also on youtube) since it came out last week, and giving too much thought to his flirty thot behavior during the Lightyear press tour, so my brain said “do the thing” and I did.

Also, you guys are familiar with the concept of ‘more cake’ right? ‘Cause that’s all this is lol. This is either very fun or very weird, so... enjoy?

Beta'd by my best boo, @rainbowsandcoconut 😘

Read on AO3

*******************

"Oh, shut up.”

Chris grabs his bare chest in pretend affront. “Shut up? That’s what I get for telling my dear friend she looks nice in a bikini?”

Scarlett rolls her eyes. “You know it weirds me out when you say stuff like that.” She drops her chin, lowering her voice into a mocking imitation of Chris’s. “‘I swear, if you weren’t like a sister to me…’ Like, what does that even mean?”

“It’s meant to be a compliment!”

“It’s a weird ass compliment. Go flirt with someone who isn’t like a sister to you and is also, you know, not married.”

“Ew.” Chris pulls a face. “I’m not flirting with you.”

Scarlett gives him a deadpan look. “You’re like the biggest flirt I know, Chris. You flirt with anything that moves.”

“’Scuse you,” Chris huffs. “Just because you can’t take a compliment doesn’t mean I’m hitting on you, alright? You think that’s flirting? I hate to break it to you, sis, but you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”

Scarlett snorts, hitching her bikini top up a little higher. “That so? Well, go subject someone else to it, is all I’m saying.”

Repeating Scarlett’s words in a high-pitched, whiny voice, because he’s mature like that, Chris turns away, towards the pool. Hands on his hips, his eyes scan the gaggle of assorted co-stars and crew members seeking refuge from today's searing heat by the poolside. It’s so hot that the Civil War producers decided to give everyone a day off from filming, and people are taking full advantage of it.

He considers his options. There’s Lizzie, maybe – but no, taken. Emily's just gotten engaged. Maybe Tina from costume..? Wait no, she’s married.

“Nobody here’s single, though,” Chris pouts.

Scarlett hums thoughtfully, looking around as well. “Well... what about Sebastian?”

Chris barks out a surprised laugh. “Seb? But he’s –”

“A guy?” Scarlett shrugs. “So what? Surely a minor issue like gender isn't going to be a problem for someone as confident in their flirting skills as you are? Or were you just bluffing?”

They stare at each other for a long moment, locked in a battle of wills that Chris is very familiar with, after over a decade of friendship with the woman in front of him.

He takes a moment to consider Scarlett’s point. He doesn't usually come on to guys, at least not with any sort of intent, but he thinks he could be persuaded. He's mostly straight, sure, but he's not entirely immune to male good looks, nor is he averse to broadening his horizons a little. And Sebastian... Well, Sebastian is Sebastian, and Chris has a soft spot, alright?

It’s true that Sebastian is newly single. From what Chris had heard, it’d been an amicable split, just two people deciding it would be better to go their separate ways. Sebastian hasn’t seemed all that torn up about it these past few weeks, and if he had been, maybe Chris’s reply would’ve been different.

But as it is, he makes up his mind, and nods. “Ok, you know what? Fine.” He runs a hand through his damp hair, cracking his neck, and then his fingers for good measure. “Watch and learn.”

Scarlett merely quirks a sardonic eyebrow.

Taking a bolstering breath, Chris hones in on Sebastian, who’s standing by himself at the other end of the pool, frantically trying to finish his ice pop before it melts all over his hand, with limited success. By the time Chris reaches him, he’s just dropped the stick into a nearby bin and is licking his fingers to rid them of any remaining stickiness.

When he turns around and finds Chris suddenly standing in front of him, he starts. “Oh, hey.”

Chris dives straight in. “Hi, baby,” he winks. “You havin’ a good time?”

For a long second, Sebastian stares back at him with his mouth hanging slightly open. “Huh?”

“You havin’ fun?” Chris repeats, flashing Seb his most winsome smile.

“I’m-” Sebastian blinks, wiping his hands on his swimming trunks. “I- yeah, it’s, it’s really hot, but nice?”

“Good, good. You here with someone?”

A small frown appears between Sebastian’s eyebrows. His eyes dart over Chris’s right shoulder, presumably at Scarlett, before turning back to Chris. “Yeah, I mean, I’m here with you guys?”

“Sure,” Chris nods, “’course y’are. But you’re not here with anyone… special?”

“Um…” Sebastian frown deepens, making him look thoroughly nonplussed. “No?”

Chris tssk’s, shaking his head. “Well, that just won’t do. Sweet guy like you, all by himself?”

“What?" Sebastian chokes out a startled laugh. "I’m- Chris, what-?”

“What’s your name?” Chris interrupts, determined to keep up his charade, especially now that he can see how flustered it’s making Sebastian. It’s pretty cute, if he’s being honest.

Suddenly, Sebastian’s expression clears, the furrow on his brow smoothing out and his mouth forming a little ‘o’ of understanding as the penny finally drops. He chuckles, bringing a hand up to the back of his neck before glancing up at Chris through his lashes with a look that can only be described as ‘coy’. “I’m, uh- Sebastian?”

Chris breaks out into a grin, giddy with the realization that Sebastian is game to play along.

“Sebastian, huh,” he repeats, tilting his head a fraction. “That’s a cute name. Suits you. Pretty name for a pretty guy.”

Sebastian bites his lip around a smile. “Ah, thank you.”

“And he’s polite,” Chris exclaims. “Aren’t you a doll. Where have you been all my life?”

Slowly, Sebastian shakes his head from side to side, like he can’t believe Chris’s antics but he’s entertained despite himself. “I was right here,” he replies, a little smirk tucked away in the corner of his ice pop-reddened mouth. “Where were you?”

“Oh,” Chris gasps, clutching his chest, “oh no, see, you can’t do that. You can’t smile at me like that and expect me not to throw you over my shoulder and carry you right outta here, pal.”

“Jesus Christ,” Sebastian mumbles, more to himself than to Chris, smiling so wide now it makes his nose wrinkle and his eyes nearly close.

Unexpectedly, Sebastian’s bashfulness sparks an eagerness inside of Chris; a desire to keep it up, to push the limits and see how far he can take this thing. It spurs him into taking a step closer, crowding into Sebastian’s personal space.

“Would you like that, Sebastian?” He reaches out to carefully tuck a stray strand of hair behind Sebastian’s left ear. “If I picked you up and swept you away, took you somewhere private, maybe?”

It’s barely audible, but Chris still catches the hitch in Sebastian’s breath. It makes his own breathing speed up in response, his heart rate ticking up ever so slightly.

“C’mon, honey, whaddaya say?” Chris coaxes, ducking his head to try and catch Sebastian’s downcast eyes. “You trust me?”

Letting out a slow breath, Sebastian looks up. His gray-blue eyes are arresting as ever, though the look in them is new, unfamiliar – thrilling. “Yeah,” Sebastian says, voice low. “Yeah, I trust you.”

Something in Chris’s chest clenches, his heart thumping heavily. He takes a slow, measured breath in an attempt to rein in his emotions before he answers, “Good. That’s real good. Thanks for trustin’ me, baby.”

A small, involuntary sound escapes Sebastian. It seems to startle him, making him avert his gaze and cast his eyes back down at the ground.

“No, don’t hide,” Chris murmurs, lifting a hand and hooking his index finger under Sebastian’s chin to tilt it up. “God, look at that face. You look a lil nervous, huh?” He smiles gently. ‘S okay, pal. Got nothin’ to worry about. I’ll take care of you.”

Chris doesn’t miss the way Sebastian’s jaw slackens, or the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. Slowly dragging his gaze from Sebastian’s throat up to his face, Chris notices Sebastian’s usually almost translucent eyes have gone dark, pupils dilated so far the black has all but swallowed up his irises. “Oh,” he says softly, gently taunting. “Did I strike a chord? There somethin’ you need, sweetheart?”

Sebastian doesn’t reply, just breathes out shakily, his eyelashes fluttering in time with Chris’s eager heart.

Around them, everything has slowed down; gone quiet. There’s a hushed quality to the previously boisterous poolside hubbub, nothing registering in Chris’s consciousness aside from Sebastian’s shallow breathing and the heat radiating from his smooth, toned torso, noticeable even in the sweltering weather.

“What is it?” Chris’s eyes roam over Sebastian’s face, cataloguing his every blink and breath. In the back of his head, a little voice is shouting at him about danger, and lines that can't be uncrossed, and stop, retreat, abort mission. It’s remarkably easy to ignore. “Tell me what you want. Lemme me help you out."

Sebastian’s back hits the wall – Chris hadn’t even noticed they’d been moving. When Sebastian licks his lips, Chris’s eyes follow the pink tip of his tongue, running along his glistening bottom lip before disappearing inside again.

Suddenly, Chris is hit with a wave of want so strong that, had he been wearing socks, would’ve knocked them clean off.

Fuck, but he wants to kiss Sebastian. He wants to kiss him bad.

Distantly, he thinks that realization should scare him more than it does. He half expects anxiety to kick in any moment now, forcing him to laugh this off as a joke while he still can, but as the seconds tick by, all that happens is that the coil of yearning in the pit of his stomach pulls tighter and tighter, until he's just about ready to jump out of his skin with it. He feels lightheaded, drunk on desire – and that’s all he’s drunk on. He hasn’t had so much as a beer all day, just water and a can or two of coke, so it's not alcohol making him feel the way he does.

This is all natural. This is real. What started off as a joke has very quickly transformed into something else entirely, and Sebastian – sweet, obliging Sebastian who played along like a good sport – likewise doesn’t look like he’s playing anymore.

Trapped under Chris’s gaze as he is, Sebastian’s expression is flayed open, trusting, needing –

“Please,” Sebastian breathes.

The sound lures Chris in like a siren call. “Yeah,” he whispers, leaning in. “I got you.”

There’s no cautious start, no tentative softness: the moment their lips touch, Sebastian moans and opens his mouth, and Chris takes the unspoken invitation with both hands, plunging in and kissing him hard. Bare chest pressed to bare chest, Chris’s hands reach up to cup Sebastian’s face while Sebastian’s settle on Chris’s waist, fingers gripping tightly as if trying to anchor himself.

Chris gets it. He feels a little like he’s lost at sea himself, like he’s halfway to drowning in Sebastian already, and they’ve been kissing for all of five seconds. Fuck.

Sebastian tastes sweet, like the strawberry ice pop he just had, though Chris wouldn't be surprised if it was just his natural sweetness coming through. Whatever it is, Chris takes great pleasure in licking the taste right out of his mouth and off his lips, too. Sebastian seems to like that, judging by the sounds he’s making; a soft groan at the back of his throat, a small sigh, a tiny whimper that stirs the fire burning in Chris’s gut up higher, blazing hotter.  

Teeth scrape lightly at Chris’s bottom lip, making him growl and tilt Sebastian’s head back a fraction so he can kiss him deeper, delving his tongue into Sebastian’s mouth and claiming him. Sebastian whimpers again, hands now straying all over Chris’s back and sides, and Chris wants to feel them everywhere.

Without conscious thought, Chris tilts his hips, pressing into Sebastian and groaning when he meets a telling hardness there. Fucking hell, that feels good.

“Chris,” Sebastian gasps wetly against his mouth.

Chris hums, rolling his hips and changing the angle of the kiss.

“Chris,” Sebastian repeats again, the word muffled but urgent. “Chris, please.”

“Yeah. Whatever you need, baby. Come get it.”

“No- Chris, we’re in public.”

Quite suddenly, Chris stills.

Oh. Right.

He pulls back a little, looking down at Sebastian’s flustered face, gaze lingering on his thoroughly ravaged mouth for a second before meeting his eyes again. “Um. Oops?”

Sebastian chokes out a breathless laugh. “Uh huh.” He bites his lip in a way that's entirely too enticing and greatly tests Chris’s restraint. “You, uh. You were saying something about taking me someplace private?”

“Jesus.” Chris blows out a sharp breath, followed by a breathless laugh if his own. “Yeah. Yeah, I can do that. Want me to throw you over my shoulder, too?”

Despite the state he's in, Sebastian snorts and quirks an eyebrow. “I mean, you can try, but you forget I’m up to about two-hundred pounds, now.”

“You are? Jesus Christ, Seb. That’s hot.”

“Oh, god,” Sebastian mutters, ducking his head to hide his blush.

Chris leans in, pressing his lips to Sebastian’s flaming cheeks. “Hey. You know you’re gorgeous when you’re flustered?”

Sebastian swears, letting his head thunk against the wall behind him. “Okay, you gotta stop that right now.”

“Oh, yeah?” Chris smirks. “Or what?”

“Or I’m gonna stop caring we’re in public and drop to my knees right here, right now.”

Well. That certainly wipes the smirk right off Chris’s face.

He swallows hard, nodding like one of those toy dogs on a car dashboard. “Alright, okay. Let’s go.” Reaching down to grab Sebastian’s hand, he squeezes it lightly before starting to lead him away to a chorus of wolf-whistles and catcalls that follows them all the way back to the changing rooms.

“Thank me later,” Scarlett yells after them, sounding horribly smug about it.

When Chris flips her the bird over his shoulder, Sebastian makes an inquiring sound. "Thank her? What does she mean?"

"Who cares?" Chris shrugs, looping his arm around Sebastian's neck and pulling him back in for another kiss. "What I wanna know is, are we actually going to make it all the way back to the hotel, because I kind of just wanna have my way with you right here in the hallway." Sebastian laughs softly, back to being bashful, and Chris groans. "This is impossible."

"So dramatic," Sebastian teases. "Tell you what, if you manage to hold back until we're in a decently private cab, I promise I will..." he leans in, whispering the rest of his words right into Chris's ear.

Chris exhales heavily. "Fuckin’ hell, Seb. Shoulda known you'd be a little trouble maker."

Sebastian bites his lip again, but this time there's a nervous edge to it. "Sorry," he says sheepishly. "Too much? We don't have to do anything, you know, if you don't feel like-"

Chris stops walking abruptly, turning towards Sebastian and taking his face between his palms. "Sebastian. This is the best afternoon of my life. I want this. Do you want this?"

"Yeah," Sebastian smiles, eyes soft and radiant. "Yeah, I want this."

"Good," Chris nods, and kisses him.

*************

READ ON AO3

[sleepingdeath-light]

Can I’m have ginger breadhouse x male reader who absolutely loves her desserts she is my favorite character headcanons

Sweet-Toothed S/O Headcanons | Ginger Breadhouse

thank you for requesting, anon!

reader is assumed as male but can mostly be read as gender neutral

note : this is my first time writing for this fandom, so she may be a bit out of character and this will likely be edited in the future to correct this

contrary to the initial impressions left behind by her mother and the destiny she’s assumed to eventually fulfil, ginger is an absolute sweetheart with a heart of gold and a love of baking that runs far deeper than her proposed evil. so having someone in her life that sees past her mother’s reputation would mean so so much to her - more than she could possibly express through any means other than her baked goods.

she first noticed you when you asked about her baking, approaching her without fear and with a genuine interest in her favourite hobby

and how could she not seize the opportunity you offered to gush about her passions?

she spends a good few minutes chatting about the intricacies of everything she’s baked - pointing excitedly at each plate and all but dancing around the kitchen before she breaks out of her state and asks if you want to try anything

that was only the beginning

accepting and enjoying her treats is enough to win her heart, finally giving her the opportunity to gush about her passion and share it without fear

but if you ask her to teach you to bake? if you want to join her in the kitchen?

good luck getting rid of her after that, she’s already declared you her favourite person (internally, of course, being far too shy to exclaim her affections to her classmates)

learns your favourite treats by heart and will bake them for you whenever she can - creating large batches for dates and special occasions to make you smile

whenever she branches out by trying a new dish, she’ll always come to you first - trusting you above all else and taking your advice and comments to heart and always striving to perfect what she creates

if someone refuses her offers of dessert and hurts her feelings, she’ll always seek you out for comfort and security

at least you appreciate her food, so things aren’t as bad as they used to be

may get you matching name tags along the lines of “head baker” and “head taste-tester” - or something equally humorous if you’ve been together for a while

gushes about her dream of being a tv pastry chef to you in quiet moments - chatting endlessly about her ideal sets, the music, the title and the dishes she’ll create, smiling ear-to-ear as she insists that you’ll be a big part of it too

she couldn’t do it without you, she says

but maybe she’ll wait until she’s done with her education and is a bit more confident around other people…