#(whew) i had to actually use references

[motobug]

WAHOO im glad I finally finished this.

I personally find it fun to compare personal interpretations of characters against the canon version, so this challenge was definitely made for me.

My Finitevus is obviously very AU and he does have a big ol' black cloak as well, but I wanted to show off his Empire uniform. His arms and legs have since been replaced with cybernetics.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

one in a million when i watch smthing in the horror genre and don't end up disappointed to/and/or pissed off about it so like "also yeah i liked it. ooo" is like relative to that an off the charts rave review of media of the millennium. also i did think about mh a lot along the way so would recommend its affect/effect if you like mh's horror too

[liu-anhuaming]

all my mandarin dictionaries (and dictionary-adjacent books)

Through chatting with @don-dake and @cherrymintvampyyri, I've come to realize that I might own a less than normal number of Mandarin dictionaries. So, here's a post about all of them.

I do have two basic bilingual dictionaries (Mandarin/English): the Langenscheidt pocket dictionary and the DK visual dictionary. These are quite easy to buy and not that interesting imo, so I'm not gonna talk further about them.

I'm also going to include a couple books that aren't technically dictionaries, but are rather about etymology of characters, and that's close enough to count for me.

Okay, let's get on to the interesting stuff!

1. What Character is That? An Easy-Access Dictionary of 5,000 Chinese Characters by Ping-gam Go (second edition, 1995)

bilingual

This strange little dictionary was gifted to me by a nun who went to high school with my grandma and later lived in China as a missionary. It's organized alphabetically based on the English translation of each radical?

I have not used this dictionary for actual reference ever, because I flipped through it once and realized that it was absolutely whack. But it's cool to have I guess.

2. 新华字典 第11版

monolingual

This little guy was gifted to me by a Chinese classmate back when I was in college. It's a 字典, so it's just focused on defining individual characters and providing some words featuring that character. Despite being a mainland dictionary, it also has 注音 next to each character for some reason.

It's got some neat stuff towards the back, like the periodic table and a chart of all the 節氣 solar terms.

3. 小学生全笔顺 同义词 近义词 反义词 组词 造句 成语 多音多义字 词典

monolingual

Whew, that's a mouthful. This is an actual 词典, so it defines full words. It also provides example sentences, synonyms, antonyms, and close equivalents. Then there's a section for idioms, and another section for 多音多义字.

There's also this nifty little insert with examples of words/phrases that follow common patterns of repetition.

4. 新现代汉语词典

monolingual

I picked up this chunky guy from a used bookstore down the street from me (the owner of the store passed last year, and the store is no longer there unfortunately). This is a fairly normal dictionary, it's just bigger than my others and has more words listed in it.

One thing I also noticed is that this chart towards the end of the dictionary apparently had a strip of paper pasted on the bottom. It doesn't seem like something I can peel up without damaging the paper under it, and when I shine a flashlight through the page I can't make out any major differences between what's on the sticker and what might be on the page under it. So my best guess is there might have been some damage to the text on the page?

5. 商务馆学汉语近义词词典 The Commercial Press Guide to Chinese Synonyms

monolingual

This book is easily the one I reference the most. As the name suggests, the book is all about synonyms. It takes sets of 2+ similar words and thoroughly explains the similarities and differences between them all. There's plenty example sentences, with notes about whether the synonyms can be used interchangeably in certain contexts.

It's a great resource, but I had a bit of trouble getting my hands on a copy. It's possible that in the years since I bought it there have been more copies made available for sale though.

these next two are books I haven't explored too much since they are old and the binding is incredibly fragile and starting to fall apart. just opening them is stressful.

6. 漢字分解 Chinese Characters Explained by F.X. Keelan (aka 康愛玲修女) (1967?)

bilingual

This book was also gifted to me by the nun who went to school with my grandma, and appears to also have been written by a nun! Based on what I've found from Google, this book was published in 1967.

Rather than a dictionary, this book is "a compilation intended as an aid in grouping and remembering [Chinese characters] with a view in acquiring a reading knowledge of Chinese"(p. iii). It aims to break down characters into radicals and giving similar/related characters. It's apparently the final installment in a 4 part Mandarin Course.

This book uses traditional characters. According to Google Books, the publisher is 光啓出版社, which is a Taiwanese organization. The book includes a very long table that has Mandarin, Cantonese, Taiwanese, Hakka, Japanese, and Korean pronunciations for (what seems to be) every character mentioned in the book. The intro mentions that this is so the course is more "accessible" for speakers of other East Asian languages.

Also, look at that printing error in the third photo! The text got cut off at the bottom of the page.

7. The Structure of Chinese Characters by John Chalmers (second edition, 1911)

bilingual

This final book is the oldest of the bunch, and was gifted to me by my boss's boss for some reason? She found it in a used bookstore apparently.

This book also uses traditional characters, because simplified characters just weren't a thing yet in 1911. This book is falling apart, and opening it stresses me out. It creaks whenever I open it.

Going by the title page, the full title of this book is An Account of the Structure of Chinese Characters Under 300 Primary Forms; After the Shwo-Wan, 100 A.D., and the Phonetic Shwoh-Wan, 1833. It was published by Kelly & Walsh, which was a Shanghai-based publisher.

Someone very kindly penciled in the years the author was alive: 1825-1899. John Chalmers was apparently a Scottish missionary (bc of course he was) who apparently popularized the term "Cantonese". This book that I own in particular was originally published in 1882.

It is, as the very long title suggests, an analysis and etymology of 300 common components

It also has a nifty fold-out of all 300 "primary forms" in seal script.

[should-know-better]

Thinking about Bad Habits

Have we ever properly considered the lyrics to Bad Habits? I mean, we know the story about how the song came about from the Zane Lowe interview:

Miles: Al had that bass line.

Zane: Hell of a bass line

Alex: I played that for about 45 minutes and he did the thing that ends up being the song; and probably didn’t repeat himself at all… Bad Habits, Large Rabbits,

Miles: Blue Door [laughing]

Alex: He could have done that for like 72 hours…

And then James helped them to edit it down to make the song. But when you actually look at what they used - whew 😳 (!)

I have googled some of the definitions to double check the expressions and I don’t believe for one second that naughty Miles wasn’t aware of these alternative meanings.

“Bad habits” - okay, this is a negative behaviour

“Sick puppy” - in my naivety I originally pictured a poorly dog, but this isn’t a bad habit. It is actually ‘a person who is crazy, cruel or disgusting’ so yes, it fits.

“Thigh high” - if you’re kneeling in front of someone and they’re standing, where would you be looking?

“Knee deep” - part of the phrase ‘knee deep in trouble’ which if repeated could be a bad habit (and also ties in with the previous line)

Skipping to:

“Deep trouble” - see knee deep.

“Red lollipop” - could be a sexual connotation for sucking cock

“Pale faces” - this line had me most confused. I would have thought flushed faces made more sense. Could refer to our Northern boys having pale skin that doesn’t tan. You can become pale from fear or worry, but this doesn’t really fit. Urban Dictionary says it’s ejaculating in the hand, then slapping with that hand!!! Make of that what you will!

“Delicious” - refer back to Red lollipop (!)

I personally think that the lines:

“Should have known little girl that you’d do me wrong / Should have known by the way you were showing off”

were added later to make it more in line with record company policy, ie heterosexual.

Then we’re left with Alex singing, “c’est sur le bout de ma langue” (translated to ‘it’s on the tip of my tongue’) - which again could refer back to the ‘red lollipop.’

Finally,

“Do you want to hold hands? / Should we get back down? / Do you want a slow dance?”

These lines may or may not have been part of Miles’ original freestyling, we’ll never know, but in other words, ‘do you want to do something romantic or shall we carry on having sex?’

So there you have it. Two blokey mates are together creating a song, and Miles thinks about these images and sings them to Alex. Not gay at all. And these are the bits they use! Imagine how filthy the rest of the 45 minutes could have been; Alex has said Miles is no innocent! Obviously the lyrics could be about sex with a girlfriend but hmmmm - why is that then a bad habit?

Apologies if this is just me interpreting the lyrics this way with a dirty mind. Also apologies if I’m stating the obvious 😉. Any alternative thoughts are welcome. x

[luonae]

whew im finally done with my PL oc/custom eris i suppose. (well i wanted to draw him more but im bored) embarrassingly long post ahead so brace yourself

collection of his fits: (fun fact, all of them have a reference to milo somewhere like hearts, the cross earring M milo has, or just the letter M... also shaped like a heart)

he puts the war in wardrobe. (i couldnt stop myself from giving him multiple outfits since taking care of his looks is a pretty significant part of his character)

ok yapping time (even this is actually very condensed from what ive written):

- his favorite manipulation tactics involve shaming and guilt tripping. hes really subtle about them. also playing innocent

- he grew up with an alcoholic physically abusive father and was taught to play up his cuteness so his father would have a harder time lashing out at him and pity him, which is why he takes a lot of care of his appearance and looks. he weaponizes them and uses them as a defense mechanism too

- overconfident hedonist who fucks around and finds out lol. good at adapting to match other peoples energy and needs

- naturally book smart but not street smart. hes very well known in college for his consistently good grades. he uses his helplessness in daily situations to play the damsel in distress role (trust this guy to weaponize even his weakness)

- out of all the milos hes most similar to M milo (but hes actually introverted). his favorite milo would be pre though (he likes how miserable he looks and finds it endearing. also he likes cute things and bunnies and pre milo is the cutest to him... and the bunny one)

- if i had to liken him to any pre existing characters, the closest would be chae yul from secret alliance

- he doesnt care about 99% of things in life so its hard to see him stressed out. the only thing he cares about is milo. he thinks manipulating milo is okay because in the end milo will love him and be happy to be with him, and he will be happy to be with milo too, so its a win-win (dont mind the ethics of this logic)

- uses milo like a servant or a guard dog (v milo rejoice, youre perfect). hes really lazy and clumsy, bad at household chores. hes actually very protective of milo though. he may be bossy and manipulative towards him but if someone else hurts milo he will immediately take matters into his own hands. hes squeamish and weak to blood and gore (which would suck when hes with v milo) but he would definitely start maiming anyone who hurts milo (aside from himself lol)

- his best subject was math. his worst subject was history. his hobbies are mostly solitary activities like gaming, drawing, taking walks, and dancing

extras: he heard milo likes bunnies

and... while drawing all those colorful outfits i could only think of one thing...

(this would actually never happen because he would never apologize)

oh and i almost forgot to include these

ok last fun fact: his favorite endings would definitely be the killer (v) and arsonist (m) endings (very funny how in both of these he transforms milo into a national menace) but his least favorites would be kidnapped/taken (v) and walls (m). he would especially hate the walls one. milo get out!!!! he wants to see you!!!!!!!!

[s1llyalabaster]

Gambling on love - Sampo Koski

Where the mischevious dealer takes a gamble on the chances of winning your heart (but you, being too drunk, doesn't notice it) ~500 words, SFW but implications of intimacy

“Oh , come on! There’s no way I went over 21 with just three cards!” 

You couldn’t even count the number of Blackjack rounds you’d had this night with two hands. Pouches upon pouches of Aideen Tokens were tossed away just from one night of gambling and… way too much alcohol than you should be drinking.

“For me to go easy on you, you’ll have to pay a little somethin’ somethin’ extra, yknow?” 

Oh, Sampo Koski. The dealer who seems to have a lucky charm (or rather, a curse to players) on him at all times. Some people say he uses “black magic” to win every time, while others just think it’s sheer luck. You, however, seem to be extra unlucky when he’s the dealer. 

“Uuuugh! How come it’s always YOU that I lose to?” You growled, the shots of alcohol making you unaware that your voice was almost loud enough to surpass the Dreamscape and into the real world. Sampo smirked, eyes lidded with smugness as he lifted your chin for your eyes to meet his. 

“Only one little gemstone has gambled away his life and gave me a good run for MY own money, dear player. You’d better put out lots more effort to even be on par with him. Or…”

“Unless you beg.”

Maybe it was the alcohol that made you be bolder than ever, but your half-conscious self decided to follow his orders. Sampo watched as both of your knees hit the carpeted floor of the casino, slightly showing off your cleavage. He couldn’t take his eyes off of you, no. His prideful gaze was replaced with that of lust. But no, you were too drunk to give consent to actually do…something else with him. Sampo didn’t even know if it was the alcohol talking or not, or if future him was just going to be a one-night-stand. 

“You…”

Sampo couldn’t form a word. He’d probably been staring at you for minutes on end. He grasped your hand and brushed his lips across your knuckles, then proceeded to trace the faint lines of your palms with his slim fingers, calloused from handling casino chips and other…dirty business. 

“Whew… it sure is getting hot in here,” Sampo unbuttoned his shirt, letting his waistcoat and harness free. You looked up at him with glossy eyes, dazed from the alcohol and the sight before you. The mischievous man grinned once he caught your gaze, gripping your arm and throwing it over his shoulder to allow his strong arms to carry you. 

You felt your body slowly land on the velvet couch in one of the rooms in The Reverie. It was intoxicating how Sampo treated you like you were a doll, handling you delicately with his hands touching you ever-so-softly. 

“Don’t go…” you murmured. 

“Oh, I’ll be here with you, darling. ‘Till the end of time.” 

A/N: The "gemstone" referred was Aventurine, in case you guys didn't catch on~

[frownyalfred]

Hello! I’m not Jewish and I just learned about Pikuach Nefesh. Being Jewish yourself, I’m guessing you have a lot of thoughts on this and how it relates to Bruce’s no-kill policy. I’d be really interested in hearing them if you want to make a post!

Hey friend!

I absolutely have thoughts, but I must begin with a disclaimer:

My perspective does not cover all Jews, nor is it the authority on what is or isn't Jewish. I grew up Reform/Reconstructionist, in an ethnically Ashkenazi Jewish family, and these are just my thoughts as a Batman blog.

Another important note: different types of Jews hold the halacha (rules/principles) of Judaism to be far more important in their lives. An Orthodox Jew will observe halacha much more strictly than a Reform Jew. Despite what some people will tell you, this doesn't make either of them better. Just different.

Whew, okay. Now that that's out of the way, let's get down to business.

What is Pikuach Nefesh?

In very general terms, Pikuach Nefesh (hard ch sound in the back of your throat) allows Jews to override other religious "rules" or values in the pursuit of preserving or saving a life.

A good example of this is a an Orthodox Jewish person, who, following halacha, will not drive or operate items with electricity during the Sabbath (Shabbat). But what happens if someone has a heart attack and they need to call 911? Pikuach Nefesh would permit them to use electricity, despite it being Shabbat.

If a Jewish person who keeps total kosher is in a situation where they will starve if they do not eat non-kosher food, they are permitted to eat non-kosher food.

Exceptions

There are some notable exceptions to Pikuach Nefesh, which I suspect is what your question is getting at. The threat to an individual's life generally has to be known, urgent, and not abstract.

Murder is another large exception, with some conditions. Generally, the intentional act of killing another person, or injuring them to the point where they might die from their injuries, is not an act that can be permitted by the principle of Pikuach Nefesh.

The slim exceptions to this include highly specific cases of self defense of oneself or another against an aggressor. One may kill to preserve a life in very strict situations, but they cannot murder. There are even times where killing is obligated, such as war.

So how does this relate to Batman/Bruce's no-killing rule?

Okay. So. I've had a lot of discussions with folks about this, and the answer I've learned is: it doesn't. Not really.

Pikuach Nefesh refers to the principle that a Jewish person should preserve life over almost any other rule or halacha. It does, actually, permit Bruce to kill under very specific situations. It does actually forbid him from gravely injuring people and doing so in the name of fighting against abstract threats, which are both things he does in canon.

The last time I wrote about this, I was definitely off about the details of Pikuach Nefesh in regard to Batman. I was corrected and I stand by that correction. I didn't grow up in the Orthodox faith and I don't observe much of their halacha, which is where a lot of religious theory questions arise from. I'm not an expert, and my explanation is only as deep as my own experience.

I think a good way of looking at Pikuach Nefesh is not as a way to define what, if any, killing is acceptable, but rather, what are we obligated to do to save a life?

The more important Jewish principle shaping Batman's ideology (in my opinion)

"Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire."

This is much more of an important focal point for Bruce's Jewish-influenced ideology. The flipside of this quote, from the Talmud, is equally important: "Whoever kills one life, kills the world entire."

Bruce's no-killing rule is famously tied to his parents' deaths during his childhood. In a way, his entire world ended with their murder. He sees his mission to clean up Gotham as a way to prevent that loss from occurring for anyone else.

Saving one person, like he tells Barry in Justice League, is enough. That is a viciously Jewish thought. It is frequently quoted in reference to those who acted in support of Jews during the Holocaust, doing what little they could against a fountain of evil.

Conclusion

In that regard, yes -- Pikuach Nefesh tells us that preserving a life is the most important thing above all else. But Bruce's no-killing rule would swiftly be broken if he followed the principle of Pikuach Nefesh closely, in that he would a) likely have to kill someone in self-defense at some point in his duties and b) it would not allow him to injure or hurt people to the extent that he currently does in canon.

More importantly, Bruce's no-killing rule is a better reflection of the Talmudic quote that "he who saves/kills a life, has saved/killed a world entire."

It is not much of a stretch, in my opinion, to connect Bruce's trauma from losing his parents at young age to his outright refusal to kill later in life. The more interesting question, in my mind, is if the creation of this no-killing rule truly was shaped by Batman's Jewish creators and their view on life and death, especially post Holocaust.

Comics became more widely available during and after WWII and the Holocaust, during which time many -- many -- Jews entered the field as writers and artists. Their influences on the characters we see today are obvious, often intentionally Jewish, but just as often un-intentional.

Was Batman's no-killing rule a product of the post-WWII Jewish comic writers who shaped his character? Was it a coincidence that lined up well with the Talmud, but not necessarily all the conditions of Pikuach Nefesh?

How else does Batman represent, or not represent, the goal of Pikuach Nefesh (the necessity that a person act in the preservation of human life, above almost all else)?

[otakween]

Digimon Tamers - Episode 37

This episode was decent, but had a major case of the uglies. Everyone was off model, but Lopmon and Terriermon got it the worst with their faces changing drastically from frame to frame. It was actually kinda charming in how derpy things looked, but it definitely took away from the drama.

Notes:

I understand Jian's frustration with Shiuchon, but he crossed a line when he hit her. Not cool >:/ Glad Hirokazu and Kenta did something useful for once and offered to stay behind with her and Juri. Finally they serve a purpose!

The best looking thing in this episode was definitely all of the background art, but that's because they didn't need to animate it lol. Still, I like this "ominous final boss" setting

So the "God" all the deva have been referring to was Zhuqiaomon (what a mouthful). Aren't there like multiple Gods though? What are the other digi Gods doing rn? Are there multiple "religions" in the digital world?

Sooo Culumon is a "Digi-Entelechia" which, according to Google, is Latin/Italian for entelechy which is a concept Aristotle came up with that boils down to "the inherent force which controls and directs the activities and development of a living being." Whew! I guess that pretty much fits what Culumon does to a T. Seems like a ridiculously grandiose term for such a silly creature tho lol

I kinda think Zhuqiaomon is a little too close to a Birdramon/Phoenixmon combo in design. It's a "meh" design for me. I felt like I couldn't appreciate it much in this episode because it was mostly obscured by flames/hard to make out in general

Was glad to see that Terriermon wasn't perfectly fine after falling into a pit last episode. That raised the stakes a bit.

The scene where Guardromon just watches Shiuchon fly off into the abyss made me laugh out loud. Hirokazu's partner would be a big dumb idiot lol

Shiuchon wanting to fight for Lopmon but not quite knowing how was adorable.

Whelp, I was wrong. I guess everyone's fusing with their digimon partner now. Why are they still calling it "Matrix Evolution" that's confusing...Really liked the transformation sequence and I like SaintGalgomon's design too! I think the ultimate forms are looking much better than the perfects. Kind of feels like more care was put in.

With the ultimate forms, I wonder how much of the designs were inspired by the human characters? I don't really know that Dukemon gives off Takato vibes (same for SaintGalgomon and Jian). I guess they are more human-shaped though.

I was glad to see that Zhuqiaomon wasn't defeated so easily (I'd be mad if just SaintGalgomon was enough), but I'm also really sick of the "okay, we win! -pause for 2 seconds- OH NO! He's actually totally fine!!" twist. You're not fooling anyone Digimon, you've done this a zillion times.

[p1325]

OMG I'm gonna take an exam tomorrow

So Tomorrow I'm gonna take my advanced American literature. Here's a sum-up of what of some of the works I studied so far:

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God by Johnathan Edwards: 7 out of 10. Interesting sermon about how to let your deepest fears out. No wonder why very religious/conservative people in the US are so paranoid about everything.

Hannah Dustin's experience: 7.5 out of 10. Through three authors (Cotton Mather, John Greenleaf Whittier, and Henry David Thoreau) it displays how monstrosity is on both sides.

Herman Melville - Benito Cereno: 9 out of 10. I think the novella is an accurate depiction of its time and some elements of it aged well. If you're interested in thriller stories with some Gothic vibes about morality and complex race relations, this is the right story for you.

Henry James - Daisy Miller: 8.5 out of 10. I think Henry James has better works but I liked this story. It delves into morality, class, and gender roles set between 19th century Switzerland and Italy. Daisy Miller's character is somewhat reminiscent of the typical 19th century heroine but with an American twist. It shares many elements with The Great Gatsby tbh

F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby: 10 out of 10. Whew, what a story. The chaotic energy, melancholy, glamorous parties, and especially deception. I didn't expect this book to be this intriguing. It's no wonder why they called it 'The Great American Novel' . Funnily enough this story mirrors some elements with Beauty and the Beast and Wuthering Heights

Alex Kuo - The White Jade : 7 out of 10. Although they are short shorties, Alex Kuo could have explored the Asian American experience so much better but it is what it is. It's nice to see how he portrays the hardships and difficulties of Asian migrants in America.

Tim O'Brien - Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong and How To Tell A True War Story: 10 out of 10. Wow, The Things They Carried didn't have to go this hard. This book almost snatched my wig by how emotionally tough it was. These two stories are less emotional but more traumatic compared to the other ones.

Annie Proulx - Brokeback Mountain: 10 out of 10. I had already watched the movie years ago but wow, the short story is as heartbreaking as the movie. It's a story about the immense power of love and how pure and beautiful love is. Well done Ms. Annie Proux, Well done.

Mohja Kahf - Emails from Scheherazade: 10 out of 10. This collection of poems impressed me with the resilience and strength of the character. As a Muslim progressive woman (which might sound like a paradox to some people) she actually respects her origins without tearing anyone down and at the same time, she fights against society's prejudices. This poem collection made me think of some progressive Muslims who are torn down by both sides of society see the Far-Right in the West and Islamic societies in the Middle East. Also, one of her poems really sounds like the ultimate American experience, I'm referring to Voyage Duster If you know what I mean.

[tojikai]

I gotta say, it was lovely to see Satoru reflecting on how much of a piece of shit he was to Y/N. I’m currently drinking a cup full of his tears 🤭

It’s incredibly frustrating that it took him seeing her with Toji, a man that’s treating her right and how she deserves for him to realize how badly he messed up. Seeing these little snippets of how he had done the things to Y/N with Naomi as they’re happening to him with Toji… IT DOESNT FEEL GOOD DOES IT SATORU.

We haven’t seen much of Naomi but her actually referring to herself as Mama when it came to Yui? WHEW. It was one thing for Yui to do it on her own but for Naomi to encourage it had me so annoyed 😭 Luckily Satoru nipped that in the bud. I’m trying really hard to not think poorly of her because maybe she’s just bad at understanding coparenting and Satoru has shown Naomi that he puts her above whatever Y/N wants/thinks so she’s used to that. At the same time I feel like it’s basic empathy to get both parents permission before doing huge things like that… IDK I flip flop between both. What I do know is that it’s Satoru’s responsibility as he’s the father and he needs to advocate for the mother of his child even if his girlfriend doesn’t like it. Also that little dig Toji made (accidentally) that made about disrespecting her parents made her leave 🤭 I got a kick out of that.

But now that Satoru has admitted he’s still in love with Y/N I think he needs to break up with her. It’s unfair of him to lead someone on like that when he’s in love with someone else. Even if he’s not going to try and get back with Y/N, it’s just a terrible thing to do to someone.

Toji and Megumi oh my god they’re so CUTE. I want so much happiness for them 😭 Yui and Megumi being thick as thieves UGH i’m so happy that they’re all happy and if they’re endgame I wish them all the love and happiness oh my god.

Throughout all this, is it bad that I kind of still want them (Satoru and Y/N) to end up together? I know they’re toxic, I know Toji is absolutely lovely but if Satoru works on himself and actively works for Y/N’s forgiveness I’d love to see them happy 😭 sometimes it does take seeing what you’ve missed out to put your ass into gear and fix what’s wrong.

I wonder who he called at the end, I think it’s either Toji or Naomi… and I wonder if either person would tell Y/N or Satoru about the call. Or just stay silent and pretend it didn’t happen to keep things as they are. AHHH THE DRAMA! There’s so much I wanna say but I can’t remember it all so I’ll leave it here!

Kai you absolutely ate this chapter and I thank you so so much for the update. I’m super excited to read the rest! Do you have an estimate for how many chapters you think Sundered is going to be?

Thank you SO much for sharing your work and I hope you have an amazing weekend 🫶🏽 much love!

satoru's indifference regarding Yui calling naomi mama led her to think that it's fine. and the fact that it was never addressed/got avoided in those few weeks gave her the impression that yn sees no problem w it :(( and yeppp, satoru still having feelings for yn while with naomi, i could say it's inevitable, considering how rash and quickly he moved to naomi. it's truly sad :(( as for the call AAAAA we'll know ;> anw thankss so much for this, i enjoyed reading it <33 have a nice day !!

[inventors-fair]

NPC Commentary: Notably Nameless

As much as I make a big deal out of not knowing all these references, it's honestly the things I most look forward to about these kinds of contests. Everyone bringing their own take on their favorite properties like dishes to a potluck is a delight to watch every time. Sure, some designs can be more resonant with some knowledge of the source material, but it's just as often that something that I've never even heard of before catches my eye.

Naturally there was no shortage of media from all over the spectrum this week. I am impressed just how much of variety of designs we had across the board, however. The difficulty with designing nonlegendary creatures designed to stand out is that there's often far less room to work with in making them unique. That's only amplified when you get into designing for Universes Beyond, as there's often much less to base their abilities off of than with named or prominent characters. Even still, you all performed wonderfully this week, and I think that deserves to be highlighted.

But enough of that, let's get into the meat of this.

@aethernalstars — Kandra from the Mistborn series

Well, this certainly goes about cloning in an unusual way. We've seen something somewhat similar with the most recent iteration of Lazav, but the restriction to only stealing cards the turn they hit the yard is a fun twist. That said, I'm concerned the initial payment is just way too high here. 4 mana for a 0/2 is a miserable rate, and then you need to invest at minimum 5 more mana before this actually gets to copy anything. A reduction in the numbers somewhere is probably warranted, and I would say you're better off cranking down the initial mana cost, given that the second ability doubles as protection. Also, I don't know if this is intentional or not, but given the current wording doesn't retain the ability to exile cards between transformations, its "pool" of transformations is essentially fixed the moment it decides to commit. It's an extremely interesting idea, but the current iteration unfortunately is a bit on the clunky side.

~

@bergdg — Roughs Tough from the Mistborn series

Whew, this one's an absolute house—design-wise and appearance-wise. A trampler with reasonable stats that consistently grows is already pretty scary, but a potential fight every single turn—even at instant speed—catapults this straight from "scary" to "terrifying." The ease of sacrificing an artifact varies pretty wildly from set to set, of course, but with the ever-presentness of treasure I can't imagine it would be too difficult in a limited environment. Despite not knowing the source material, I've got to say the flavor is very cool, though. Artifact sacrifice is an interesting pair with a rough-and-tumble collection of gangsters, but it also feels very natural. It's got me interested to see more of the organization to be sure.

~

@dimestoretajic — Dragon Slime from the Dragon Quest series

Aw, little guy! A pretty simple design all-around, but there's plenty of small details that catch my eye. I do like the use of red's often unused domain of ice and snow, although I'm not sure just having ice-related powers with no wintry visual theming qualifies this as being a snow creature. The classification is a little on the arbitrary side at the best of times, but that's one part that's fairly consistent. It's kind of funny that it can copy itself—an ability extremely common among Magic's various Oozes—and yet have it flavored as something different. Not questioning your decision on the flavor, just a fun parallel. It's an odd pair with firebreathing, though; that's one of the few abilities that doesn't improve with more copies. If anything the copy ability seems like it would play more like protection—if it's ever threatened, it can just make another in response.

@evscfa1 — Tonberry from the Final Fantasy series

And the award for Scariest Creature to Revive with Alesha goes to! This is an odd one, though. We haven't seen much design space explored with self-stunning yet, and this is certainly a very extreme example of it. While Sleep-Cursed Faerie was just an extremely efficient beater once it finally untapped, this one seems more likely to have opponents quaking in fear of when it finally gets to attack. I like the dynamic created by the fact that this gets to swing every turn once it sloughs off the counters. It really does feel like it's looming and slowly approaching, which I assume was the intention. The ability to choose the nastiest ability for the situation is also pretty delightful, though I do worry that the half life mode is notably more weak than the other two, while the hand attack is much stronger. While they're all reasonable if you played fair and waited four turns, there's plenty of ways to not play fair with this thing, and a full discard too early in the game is potentially ruinous. The sacrifice mode feels a bit redundant as far as your opponent is concerned, because blocking also usually loses them a creature of their choice.

@horsecrash — Nac Mac Feegle from the Discworld series

Certainly wouldn't want to see a horde of these surly fellows bearing down on me, though the faerie type could mean it's less of a horde and more of a swarm. I'm always happy to see more exploration of the design possibilities of squad, and this feels like a great fit. Besides the value that squad always brings, it allows you to hit the condition of three opponents attacked using fewer cards, which is smart. I do worry that it's a bit all-or-nothing, though. Their low toughness means that the gap between having indestructible and not is pretty gargantuan. Indestructible feels a bit out of character for monored, as well, and I think that first strike with an accompanying power budget increase could accomplish something similar. As an aside, the reminder text of melee implies a slightly different wording for abilities that scale based on how many opponents you attack. There's no reason to assume your wording wouldn't also work, but it's something to keep in mind.

~

@hypexion — Replicator Drone from the Stargate series

It does exactly what is says on the tin. Replicate on permanent spells is still largely unexplored, and while Squad fulfills more or less the same role minus some edge cases, I can understand doing it for the flavor. This one's really hard to judge in a vacuum, though. The first question is how hard it is to sacrifice two artifacts, which you have to do at least once if you want to get your mana's worth, and that largely depends on the density of artifact tokens or artifacts that want to be sacrificed. More than that, the question is if you're likely to have the tools to take advantage of a bunch of vanilla artifact creatures. Even outside of a specific limited environment, this one strikes me as a card that's absolutely dependent on other cards to synergize with it, which can be a pretty sharp turn-off.

~

@insect-glaive — Medium Blocker from Destiny 2

Well, it's definitely a blocker, no doubt about that. I assume Taken is the name of the race, but without any context on the source material I'm a bit dubious of Blocker as a creature type. Be careful with this wording, though: anti-sacrifice effects against your opponents such as Angel of Jubilation prevent permanents from being sacrificed to pay costs or cast spells, and defensive ones such as Tajuru Preserver prevent you from being forced to sacrifice permanents by your opponents. This does both, meaning that while your opponents can't crack their fetchlands, they're also completely immune to Fleshbag Marauder or similar effects. Uniquely, this also prevents opponents from having to sacrifice permanents to their own effects, which is potentially an outright benefit for them.

~

@jestingmaniac — Jabba's Hunter from the Star Wars series

We've seen a smattering of bounty counters over the years, and this fits right in. Plus, he high prominence of bounty hunters in Star Wars—including two of the main characters of the original trilogy—means I could easily see it promoted into a full archetype in a hypothetical set. In that hypothetical set, though, I'd worry that triggering on any bounty might be a bit too much for a common. You could have it grant the bounty reward alongside the counter in a similar vein to Mathas, but that might constitute an increase in complexity that would necessitate a bump to uncommon anyway. The flavor also feels just barely not quite there. The variety of bounty hunters I've seen from the series are a hugely varied group, so I think the card actually ends up being slightly too generic. A bit of flavor text could go a long way, I feel.

~

@just--a--penguin — Umbrella Waddle Dee from the Kirby series

Who gave this little guy all of this power? My understanding of the Kirby series is that the Waddle Dees are essentially just cannon fodder, so a statline as bulky as 3/3 is a bit surprising. While it's more in black's wheelhouse, green has flirted with above-rate creatures with downsides before. Granting flying is a good pick, too, as it's a form of evasion you're less likely to have a meaningful way to deal with. That said, I think this might be a bit too efficient with the downside only kicking in if it dies. Which is to say, if it never dies, which is perfectly feasible in a color like green, you've got a powerful, low-investment beater at common. Also, while this is dampened by your opponent getting to choose exactly where the counter goes, it can actually end up being a boon depending on the limited environment. It's mandatory, so your opponent is forced to make one of their creatures suddenly vulnerable to Plummet or similar cards. Touching on the flavor for a second, I imagine the flying counter is meant to signify Kirby gaining its ability, and you could reflavor it as just a creature picking up the umbrella. That said, it strikes me as a bit odd that it ends up with flying when the Dee itself only has reach. Maybe the other creature is just better at using the umbrella?

~

@mildewpyre — Rain Deer from Rain World

What on earth is going on in Rain World? Well, not on Earth, I suppose. At any rate, this curious specimen offers some pretty hefty protection to whatever wants it. It's reminiscent of the series of white and blue fliers that grant flying to something else on attack, but in a much more dramatic fashion. The vigilance combined with triggering on block is interesting too, as odds are you'll be granting the protection to a different creature on block than on attack. Given that protection, though, I do question to comically high toughness number. While I'm sure toughness matters decks appreciate it, given nothing on the board can damage it anyway, it's really only protecting from damage-based removal, which struggles to kill creatures past 5 or 6 toughness anyway. It's very fair, though. High casting cost plus low power means this needs to find something powerful to enable before it's a real offensive threat, which feels very green.

~

@misterstingyjack — Oberon's Attendant from A Midsummer Night's Dream

Here we have the only submission taken from a play, and from a true blue classic at that. Magic's no stranger to faerie courts, though, and I think that leaves this feeling a bit unfortunately generic. That's not your fault, of course—it's just that so much of Magic's faeries are taken from either the same sources as A Midsummer Night's Dream, or just directly from the play itself, that as a Universes Beyond card it doesn't have much to set itself apart. The gameplay, too, is definitely interesting and unique, but also nothing that couldn't work in existing magic settings. In particular, while we don't see them much nowadays, Dominarian faeries are primarily green and blue, and we've even recently seen a legendary faerie in those colors who deals in auras—that's Ivy, Gleeful Spellthief for reference. But enough of my bellyaching, let's dig into the meat of this card. Four faeries is quite the ask, especially on a card that does nothing to increase that number, but that's quite the reward. An almost debilitating level of tempo that pairs extremely well with both green's assortment of buffing auras as well as blue's assortment of debilitating ones. It might be a bit on the strong side as-is, but I'd be very interested to see more of it.

~

@nine-effing-hells — Chest Burster from the Alien series

Ah yes, finally, the Alien Alien. I do want to take a second to say that emerge is such a natural fit for the xenomorph's signature parasitism that I genuinely couldn't think of a better way to do it. Asking to emerge from something specific is a great evolution of the mechanic, and picking Human as a nod to one of the most iconic scenes from the first movie is great. I do think the emerge cost could stand to be a bit lower, though. While I'm not the most knowledgeable on how to balance emerge, and 5 life is undeniably a sizable chunk, humans aren't really known for their high mana values. Having to pay that much up-front for a body that's nothing impressive is a bit of a hard sell.

~

@party-in-the-ipa — Bladefish from Dungeon Meshi

First and foremost, I would advise you to be careful with hybrid costs. While it's been shown that you're allowed to bend the rules a bit, hybrid card crucially have to be something either color would reasonable be capable of doing on their own. Black fits just fine here, as they're not strangers to powerful creatures with downsides, and though flash is a bit uncommon in the color, it's hardly unheard of. Blue, on the other hand, just does not get creatures this aggressive or efficient, especially not at this low of a mana cost. Beyond that, this card's just really, really strong. 3 power that early in the game means it can trade with just about anything while simultaneously applying huge pressure on your opponent, which the downside isn't nearly enough to make up for. If it manages to connect even once, the most the death trigger can do is even the loss out, and they still have to spend a card to get rid of it. Even beyond early aggression, flash allows this to play as a surprise blocker that hits way above its weight class. It's not all bad, though. I love the life gain on death being flavored as, well, flavor. Hopefully Shock doesn't add too much of an aftertaste.

~

@real-aspen-hours — Adaptive Xenomorph from the Alien series

Great minds clearly think alike, because this is improbably the second xenomorph with emerge submitted. This one also zeroes in on the relatively unexplored design space of the characteristics of the sacrificed creature mattering, though this does it in a much less specific way. This is a bit beyond my ken, but from what I gathered, the xenomorphs supposedly emulate whatever they parasitize, which this does demonstrate well. That said, these kinds of keyword inheritance effects work best when they're able to gather keywords from multiple sources, which emerge inherently stymies by only allowing a single sacrifice. Besides the admittedly very cute interaction of converting temporary buffs into permanent counters, you're often trading a card in hand for a slightly larger body and menace. I could see that being an attractive option in some situations, but it seems a bit more finnicky than previous cards with emerge we've seen.

~

@reaperfromtheabyss — Hideous Zippleback from the How to Train Your Dragon series

Don't be mean to the poor thing, surely it can't be that bad. Although based on that ETB, they might be on the right track. This beastie would be right at home in Shadowmoor block, at least. The two abilities make for a very effective one-two punch, which according your submission is supposed to be the breath of each of its two heads. That's clever, and it's also really strong. The fact that it blankets counters across the entire board and has evasion means that as soon as summoning sickness wears off, it's essentially free to pick off the enemies piece by piece. While I get the reasoning behind allowing it to target creatures with any kind of counter—presumably to make it a bit more versatile and prevent it from being pigeonholed into strictly -1/-1 counter strategies—I'm not sure it ends up playing all that well. Principally, the most common type of counters are +1/+1 counters, which will often push creatures out of range of the damage, severely gimping the zippleback's effectiveness.

~

@snugz — Mettaur from the Mega Man series

This is about as simple as it gets, so I'm afraid I genuinely don't have much to say about it. It's functional, and as far as I can tell the stats versus cost for that effect are about right. But in a contest all about marrying design and flavor, I'm afraid I just don't get much of anything here. If anything, wouldn't an enemy that retreats behind a shield (or under a helmet, in this case) have an effect to make itself temporarily indestructible rather than a shield counter?

~

@squeezyboi — Life Model Decoy from Marvel Comics

We've seen clones that double as removal for the original before, but all of those are either more expensive to cast or more difficult to use, so this ends up feeling a bit too strong. While scrubbing legendary-ness feels appropriate for a decoy, the fact that this is best used offensively feels a bit off. Admittedly I don't know the source material, but "decoy" implies that the person is being replaced for their own safety, which lends itself more to copying your own creatures. That would also allow it to be a fair bit cheaper, as copying strictly your own creatures is a step down. But, I'm rambling. Point is, this is a really interesting take on a clone that I can see a clear flavor direction behind, but it's just not quite there in a number of aspects.

~

@stupidstupidratcreatures — Nurse Joy from the Pokémon series

There sure are a lot of Nurse Joys, huh? These kind of effects are always fascinating to me, challenging you with an extremely strict timing restriction to try and wring the maximum possible value out of them. There's surprisingly few of these effects that return to hand rather than the battlefield, too, and the hilariously specific restriction is a great nod to the source material. As far as gameplay goes, while you're unlikely to return the full six on average, I'd imagine you're still perfectly happy if this grabs back two or three. Plus, the flash means this can be leveraged both as an offensive option to recover sacrificed resources and as a defensive one to rebuild after a wipe. It's also far less likely to break the game than Second Sunrise and its sibling, which is always a plus. This was a strong contender for the winner's circle that just barely got edged out, but don't go thinking for a second that it's not great.

~

@tavi-en-astra — The Apathy from RWBY

A horrifying sight, to be sure, not least because of how effective this is at slowing the game down. That certainly fits something called "The Apathy" like a glove, though I can't say I'm particularly happy about it. The decision to give it 1 toughness is smart, just because its toughness is in practice far higher than whatever is printed on the card. The squad cost does strike me as far too low here, though. The lowest mana cost for squad we've seen so far is 2, and given how good the returns are on multiples of these, I would say 2 at minimum would be more than justified. The effect being split across multiple bodies also makes removing it with anything short of a boardwipe a pain, which is even more of an issue when the decks that would struggle against this the most are unlikely to be packing many boardwipes for fear of hitting their own guys.

~

@thetabbybadger — Treasured Nug from the Dragon Age series

As much as I want to love this adorable little guy, and believe me, I do, I think it's unfortunately just too weak. With its starting stats, you'd have to sacrifice two Foods a turn just to give it a reasonable statline, which is likely unfeasible. Also, I'm not sure if this is intentional or not, but the effect excludes any nontoken Foods like Three Bowls of Porridge, which feels like an unnecessary restriction even if the trigger was stronger. A better baseline stat spread and/or changing the trigger to give counters would help a lot. I do love the direction here, though! Tacking a bit of life onto every food sacrifice is a great way to play into what foods already do.

~

@walker-of-the-yellow-path — Imperfect Swordsmachine from Ultrakill

Blood tokens serve as a great companion for Ultrakill's bloodthirsty robots, but that also highlights a sore point of missed potential. From my knowledge of the game, these robots are quite literally fueled by blood, which presents a perfect opportunity to explore how creatures can interact with blood tokens, and simply making on one hit doesn't quite accomplish that. It's a perfectly good card, if a bit on the weak side—especially for a creature that wants to wade into combat as often as possible—but making a creature designed to fill in the gaps of the world rather than sell it feels like a bit of a lowball.

~

Thank you once again for all your entries! @spooky-bard

[sharpredclaws]

Let's talk about the live action Avatar the last airbender, and the changes made to Aang's personality and character arc.

I understand why they removed many of the side adventures and goofing off from Aang for this version of the show. They needed to pare the story down to its bones for a shorter runtime and animating all of the creatures that Aang tries to ride would have been a nightmare for their CGI budget.

However, by taking out Aang's avoidance of responsibility and fear of his destiny, and replacing it with focus on his goals and fear of his power, they've undermined a lot of his character arc and don't provide enough context for WHY he is the way he is in the new show.

In the live action, he didn't run away that night of the storm, he went flying to clear his head and think. Which makes the scenes where Kyoshi and Bumi berate him for avoiding his responsibilities make no sense at all. References to Aang goofing off don't land, because he HASN'T BEEN. This kid has had his eyes on the prize since episode 1. It's frustrating for the same reason Sokka constantly calling Katara a little girl have been. When has she acted that way, in what way is this accusation accurate? It isn't.

Instead of making Aang afraid of the responsibility, they've made him afraid of his power. He's concerned he'll harm someone. While this is true to his character and a clever trait to emphasize, what's important to remember is that in the original show, Aang didn't start fearing his power until The Deserter, the episode where he accidentally burns Katara while learning to firebend. In that episode, we're given clear justification for his fear, because we see the consequences of when he isn't in control of his bending.

This trait also plays into the original story's ending, when he agonizes over having to kill Ozai. So again, it's an excellent choice to start depicting this in season 1. The problem is that they're not showing us. They're telling us.

In this new show, all we get is one flashback reference to Aang blowing a bunch of other students off a cliff while learning to airbend, and when he scares Katara and Sokka with the Avatar state at the air temple. I think this was a terrible choice. Aang was never afraid of his own element, and the scene at the air temple barely focused on Sokka and Katara's fear of him, so calling back to that later in this show didn't have the impact I think they meant it to. There was almost no emotional weight to the flashback scene, it wasn't given any time to breathe or make you really feel the fear this is supposed to inspire in Aang. Which would be less of a problem if this was meant to foreshadow future problems and fear. But it isn't.

It's being sold as the core, fundamental foundation of Aang's character arc. When his core was fun and avoiding responsibility, we saw that all the time, over and over, reinforced again and again with actions, dialog, and plot that showed who Aang is and how he will evolve in the course of the show.

That lighthearted fun is why he was able to build bridges, connect with people, make them laugh.

The live action just states these things. And expects us to accept it, without actually showing us.

I said when I started the show that the writing was weak, and after finishing season 1, I stand by that assessment. The cast is killing it and the bending looks phenomenal, but I have huge issues with the writing. I might break down the problems with Katara as well because *whew*....yeah. She's a problem.

[aprillikesthings]

Something I've bitched and moaned about re: my writing is that I deeply struggle to write ~feelings~ and plot and conflict; I've described numerous fics of mine as "just enough plot to string sex scenes together."

But both of my she-ra wips have PLOT and FEELINGS and CONFLICT and I know this is part of why they're such a GOD DAMNED STRUGGLE OH MY GOD

ffs the 60's au is even a bit of a slow burn; a thing I have confidently said I'd never write because I didn't think I could

BUT

I do have a scene in my post-canon thing that involves an actual argument of sorts and that I'm stupidly proud of because I think it's hella in-character

the irony is that it's literally between two sex scenes--only one of which is currently written and which tbh is not my best smut writing

(part of the plot of the post-canon fic is that they're both REAL BAD at talking about things and start doing the "why would we talk about something painful and unpleasant when we can have sex instead, and voila now we both feel better, whew" thing, which works Great until It Doesn't. not that this is based on any relationships I've had. or anything. ha ha ha don't look at me like that.)

but yeah even if I did work on the post-canon fic enough to post the first part of it, this isn't until later so ....it might not ever see the light of day (by which I mean ao3)

ANYWAY DO YOU WANT TO READ IT it's a bit over 1800 words and rated somewhere between mature and explicit. also the sex is thigh-grinding because that's legally required in post-canon spop fics. (JOKING....mostly.)

[this is uhhhh like a couple of months after the end of the show? also the scene starts, like, immediately after they've just had sex one evening]

Catra relaxes into the bed, and they lie in an easy quiet for a moment before she rolls to face Adora. “We could have been doing this the whole time, before–you know.”

Adora doesn’t need to ask what “this” refers to. “What, back in the Horde?”

“Yeah. I mean, we managed to be alone enough, right?”

Adora winces. “I really don’t want to think about what would’ve happened if we’d been caught.”

“But did you want to?” Catra’s clearly trying to sound nonchalant and isn’t entirely succeeding. 

“Maybe? I don’t know? I knew I liked you, just not,” she waves a hand between their naked bodies. “--Like this. I think I forced myself not to think about it, and focused on training instead.”

“That’s true. Overachiever.” But there’s no venom in it, and Adora smiles for a moment before furrowing her eyebrows. 

“Wait, did you think about it?”

Catra rolls her eyes. “Duh. Unlike you, I knew that other people were doing stuff. Like, in supply closets and stuff.”

“Really? Who?”

“Pfft, it doesn’t matter now.” 

“But you thought about doing that with me? Making out in supply closets?” Adora can’t hide her grin. 

But Catra’s ears droop as she looks away. “Yeah. I did. All the time.” 

“Oh.” 

“Y’know, sometimes I actually thought you knew, and were just, I dunno. Pretending you didn’t.”

“Why would I have done that?!”

“I dunno. Because you didn’t want me back?”

Adora sighs and rolls onto her back. “I’m not sure I knew I could want you like that.” She thinks for a moment. “I knew I liked you. I knew I wanted to be around you as much as I could be without getting us into trouble. I knew I didn’t mind you rough-housing with me and that I liked doing it back. I knew I liked it when you slept on my bunk. Past that–I don’t know.” 

“How about this,” Catra says, “If I’d just like, kissed you one day, up on that platform where we used to hang out. Like, I dunno, just before you were made force captain. What would you have done.”

Adora closes her eyes and imagines it: the two of them up there, just like they did day after day, before everything else happened. Before the sight of Catra’s face had ever filled her with anger. And then she imagines that younger Catra turning towards her and kissing her. And the warmth that spreads through her is unmistakable. “I would have kissed you back.” 

“Yeah? You think so?”

“Yeah. But–” Adora cringes to herself. “I don’t–I don’t know that it would have changed any of what came after that, though. It would’ve been harder. But I still would’ve done it.”

Catra is silent for a long moment, enough to make Adora wish she hadn’t said anything. 

“No,” Catra sighs, “I know it wouldn’t have changed anything you did. I wonder if I might’ve left earlier, though.” 

“Wait, really?” Adora sits up to look at her. But Catra’s frowning and she has one arm over her eyes. 

“Before Hordak made me force captain, I actually told Shadow Weaver that maybe you had the right idea when you left. But then Hordak did make me force captain, and I was so fucking stubborn, and my stupid, stupid fucking pride–” Catra’s voice cracks at the end. 

“Catra, it’s okay.” She tries to tug Catra’s arm off her face but she resists. 

“It’s not! I hurt you, and myself, and so many other people, and for what? For what??” 

“Catra, look at me, please.” 

“No!” She yanks her arm from Adora’s grip and sits up but she faces away, curled up and hugging her knees, ears flat against her head.

Adora’s chest aches. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.” 

“No, don’t apologize. You didn’t do anything wrong.” Catra sniffles. 

Adora reaches to put a hand on her shoulder. “Catra–”

But Catra jerks away from her and out of bed, and then she’s pulling on her clothes from the floor. Adora can see the tears running down Catra’s face, but she’s ignoring them.

“Catra?”

She still won’t look at Adora. “I’m sorry, I just need to go. I’ll be back.” And then she’s out on the balcony, and gone. 

Adora sits in shock for a moment before jumping out of bed, realizing she’s still naked, running back to pull on her sleep shirt and shorts, and then going out to the balcony to lean over it as she realizes: there’s no possible way she can find Catra if she doesn’t want to be found, especially if Melog finds her first.

She sits on the balcony leaning on the wall for long minutes, not knowing what to do. The night is silent outside of her own crying.

Adora eventually gets up, goes back into the bedroom, and gets back into bed. 

Hours later a shadow is on the balcony, and Catra silently walks back into the bedroom. 

“It’s okay, Catra, I’m awake.”

Catra startles. “Shit! Sorry.” 

“S’fine. I couldn’t sleep.” 

Catra doesn’t move at first, standing awkwardly next to the window. Adora can’t see her expression in the dark, other than the spooky glow of her eyes. She knows Catra can see hers, though, which isn’t fair. 

“Adora.” Her voice is thick with emotion. “I’m sorry.” 

“I know. It’s okay.” 

Catra shifts her weight from one foot to the other. “Can I come back to bed?”

“Yeah. Of course.” Adora pulls the covers back as Catra strips back down to her undies. Adora opens her arms so Catra can crawl into them, her skin chilled from the outdoors. Catra wiggles closer, her face in Adora’s neck, and Adora holds Catra while she sniffles. 

Adora blinks tears out her own eyes. “I’m sorry, too.” 

“I know, but you shouldn’t be. I just–I don’t know how to talk about everything, yet, and I just—I kind of panicked.”

Adora kisses Catra’s forehead, then rolls them over. She takes one of Catra’s hands and kisses her fingertips before lacing their fingers together and pressing their hands onto the pillow next to Catra’s head. 

“It’ll be okay, Catra.”

Catra’s eyes are still full of tears, but the unguarded and trusting way she’s looking up at Adora right now feels like a gift she’s not worthy of. 

“I love you, so much.” 

“I love you, too.” Catra reaches up with her free hand, pushes Adora’s loose hair behind one ear, and pulls her in for a kiss. 

It’s a gentle kiss at first, but then Catra angles her head and deepens the kiss, tugging on Adora’s hair and arching up to press against her with a whine, and Adora gasps at how quickly her whole body lights up with desire.

The fact that they’d already done this just hours before does nothing to dampen the heat between them. Adora straddles one of Catra’s thighs, and pushes her own between Catra’s legs. She breaks off the kiss to gasp before reaching down to grab Adora’s ass and move against her, and then they’re panting into kisses and moving their hips to grind on each other’s thighs. 

They haven’t done this since their second night in Bright Moon and it’s nearly as frantic, and for similar reasons: a desperate need to be as close as possible, to obliterate anything separating them.

Catra can tell that Adora is close and breaks their kiss to tell her, “I’ve got you, I love you–” and Adora shakes and her hips stutter and she cries out. 

She only lies still on Catra catching her breath for a moment before she’s pulling back just enough to slide a hand into her underwear. 

Catra’s hips jerk. “Fuck, Adora–” 

She can’t lie still, she’s moving against Adora’s hand and arching her back and wrapping her arms around Adora’s back and burying her face in Adora’s neck, and a moment later she’s shouting and coming apart.

After she relaxes they barely move, Adora still half on top of Catra despite both being overheated. 

There’s a deep sense of relief, like they’d just washed away all the pain from earlier, like the clear air after a storm. Adora gives Catra’s face a few soft kisses. Catra purrs with deep contentment as she falls asleep, and Adora lets it soothe her to sleep as well. 

[tayfabe75]

Do you think Maroon is about Matty?

Anon, you know I do! lol But hopefully I can make a little sense of why I think so!

Let's start with the title, itself. Obviously, 'Maroon' is a color, a dark red. This of course hearkens back to Taylor's Red album:

"The album's title refers to the tumultuous, "red" emotions Swift experienced during the album's conception; its songs discuss the complex and conflicting feelings resulting from fading romance."

The term "fading romance" reminds me of how red can "fade" into maroon, think bright red autumn leaves fading to brown. Taylor is reminiscing about a love that faded.

Though, the title could have a double meaning. Maroon is also used as a verb, meaning "to abandon or isolate someone". These are themes we see in both 'Cardigan' and 'Question…?', and I'd argue that Taylor visually shows herself marooned in the video for 'Cardigan', as she desperately clings to her piano in the middle of the ocean…

Once we get into the lyrics, we see that our mystery muse has a vinyl shelf, and our suspect also likes to collect vinyl:

"I love vinyl and I've got a lot of vinyl, but I'm more of a t-shirt collector."

Matty has also historically had roommates: he lived with his bandmates for a while, and he lived with George in London for a time, and later, with Sam Burgess-Johnson.

The first thing to strike me while listening was actually this line, but the way Taylor sings it makes me hear it this way:

And I chose you (pause) The 1 (pause) I was dancing with in New York

If this is a reference to 'The 1', well, that song almost certainly references Robbers lyrics!

And speaking of dancing in New York… that's quite reminiscent of Cardigan: "Dancin' in your Levi's, drunk under a streetlight" and "Your heartbeat on the High Line" (the latter being a New York landmark).

We have splashing wine, and a man who has a heavy association with wine, to the point that it became part of his persona, stagecraft, and silhouette circa 2013-2014 (as well as his clumsiness)

"The rust that grew between telephones" is reminiscent of Matty's lost verse from "Slut!": "Plus 44 on an American phone"

"Sobbing with your head in your hands" reminds me of this performance from late 2014 (just after they allegedly broke up) which ends with Matty literally sobbing with his head in his hands (jump to the last ten seconds of the video to see it). He would go on to describe what happened that night as being partially due to "girl stuff"…

Lastly, and this is admittedly, a strange one. But that sort of foreboding synthy undercurrent throughout the song… reminds me so much of a pitched-down version of the same sound from the Real World version of 'I Like America' (compare them here and here).

Whew! Hopefully that's everything! Thanks for the ask ♥

[yourlocalpickle]

Quiet bookworm at day, a wannabe cool hero at night. Waiko is enjoying the average MC experience - a struggle to balance a tween girl's life, and protecting innocent civilians in a (considerably low cost) disguise.

Her superpower? Just sheer determination guys. Hopefully she makes it big one day. But for now, none of the big and grown up adult villains take her seriously! She'll get them one day tho, and show them all!

Whew actually drew a background for once!! Don't get used to drawings this wholesome and innocent, I am not planning on pursuing wholesome sceneries for long. They need some spice yk? Also Waiko is a really old character, like I designed her back in 2019!

She's a (not so) regular human girl, living with her metalhead auntie, constantly anxious uncle and 3 cousins, who are all anthropomorphic chicken, with endless love for eggs and fried chicken drumsticks. Yk, the MC material.

She's trying to find out what happened to her parents, whilst learning about the recent war that struck the city. The streets are clean, painted over and bustling with life and greenery. Yet the conflict left its marks on all the 'grownups' and lead many of them down a very dark path.

With newfound justice, a new kind of evil emerged. These new 'baddies' hiding under the night's cloak, causing so much trouble...somebody has to stop them!

Yeah Waiko's view of the world is still rather childish. Thankfully. Alas, she took on the role of becoming a 'hero', tracking down these 'baddies' and catching them!

Yet, anytime she appears, the first question they have for her is "Isn't it past your bedtime, missy?"

She's working on improving her reputation.

Also old 2019 reference sheet because redesign!

Thank goodness I've improved since then, at least a little. I didn't know how to draw kids too much back then, and I had people mistake her for a teen way too much to make me feel comfortable :( so I think we finally fixed that?

[asfearlessasamango]

here i ammmmm i hope this isnt the longest ask ever lol but i cannot overstate how GORGEOUS i find your prose. the phrase “tiredness curls up in each joint like old cats in old corners” is so absolutely evocative and paints such a melancholic, beautiful, rich picture in my mind every time i remember it. i could actually get it tattooed thats how seriously beautiful i find it. most of all i loooooooove the amount of social norms, architectural details, cultural differences etc etc you infused in the story to fill in the gaps of the canon universe. the choice of using of rice paper vs. glass and all the reasoning behind it is the example that comes to mind, but im sure that if i knew more about east asian cultures, i could identify more and more details you scattered throughout the plot to turn this make believe world into a truthful parallel of the real one we have. i can only say bravo. and if you have any recommended reading for homework, i’d love to know more about these references! now back to your writing! one of thee strongest points of the story, for me, is how believable these characters are as people. they feel so fully fleshed out that sometimes it was like intruding on someone’s most private thoughts - even a little painful to keep going, and i mean that in the best way possible! i especially loved the subtle addition of zuko’s ingrained sexism and prejudice against other nations, things that ofc he’s never had reason to unlearn in this universe. he is compassionate, but can be very unkind - seems like a delicate balance, but in your story, it just flows naturally. you inhabit their heads, strengths, flaws and life experiences so well, like sokka’s blind defensiveness when he thinks of himself as helpless, his brashness and ingenuity when he sees zuko more as a puzzle to solve than a person. that goes even people who haven't gotten that much plot attention yet - like azula wearing blue lipstick (!!!!) foaming at the mouth from the thought. OFC she would!!! shes bold, shes confident and shes here to shine + now she allows herself to have fun! do “ugly” and “imperfect” things for fun! and all the parallels between this redeemed azula and the canon zuko we know. your oc who is zuko's guardian, who he calls grandma, hasn't even shown up yet and i already love and miss her. uncle iroh!!!! zuko assuming malice from uncle iroh who only wants the best for him - but ofc he doesnt know that! but we do, and it hurtssss katara and aang!!! the bath scene with aang, zuko’s forced vulnerability, their honesty, aang’s absolute grace towards zuko. suki and the kyoshi warriors! i trust they will get their turn to kick some ignorant prince ass. and the thing that draws me the most to this genre: the exploration of trauma in its aftermath. your storytelling is wonderfully brutal here. like… you draw a white picture by filling in all its shadowy contours…. if that makes sense. all the ways zuko’s life was affected by his father add up to the shape of his hurt. him not eating fatty foods to stay fit and "bend better". recognizing azula in his own reflection instead of himself. wearing his mom’s night clothes. im going feral feral feral whew! in my heart all this would’ve been a very pretty glittery letter sent to your author p.o. box. i love your story and it lives constantly in my imagination - thank you so much for sharing it with the world!!!

ohhhmg.... thank you for this!! i sat on it for a whole minute to respond right! i'm so glad you like it!! i love that you love all these characters' new lives <3 <3

there are so many Very Careful Lines to Walk in doing an ATLA au bc the original characters and cultural stories are really so complex. and i am FAR from an expert on east asian history / cultures but here are a few sources that I found helpful / interesting:

jinian qian's writing for The Millions, especially the articles "The Moon Is Beautiful Tonight: On East Asian Narratives" and "Light in the West and Shadows in the East"

chaoyang trap, which is not at all about ancient china but about very modern chinese cultural existence, especially on the Internet / social media / fandom. I can't say this has directly provided me with a lot of relevant info but it does help me figure out attitude / approaches / how things "translate" into western contexts

and of course there are so many A:TLA blogs that really keep the analytical conversations going and make ao3 as vibrant as it is-- @atlaculture, @boybff, @volkswagonblues, @azularedemptionarcwhen, @chitsangenthusiast, @azulasnailtech, @visit-ba-sing-se, @marriedzukka, @bleekay, @ash-and-starlight, @sokkagatekeeper, @azulapropaganda, @zukkababey, @comradekatara, @ofherlionheart, @chaoticsandstorm

okay i will stop blasting this post into all of atla tumblr's notifs but the above blogs are total Gs, 10/10, would not be as deep into my MFA in a:tla without these trailblazing scholars who went before me

have a lovely vintage kermit meme, mwah