#(yeah this is about stranger things but it's not the only instance. this is something that happens more and more and it sucks)

[hella1975]

all hate to tiktok for taking 'having a space to more openly and actively talk about different cultures' to mean 'cultures are NOT to be shared and we must be vigilantly defensive of our cultures for fear of appropriation, a word that can be applied to any multicultural interaction'. like of course cultural appropriation is a very real problem but ive seen with the access to global multicultural conversation that tiktok provides it's made people TERRIFIED to even interact with cultures other than their own for fear of 'doing it wrong'. like at some point you have to acknowledge that in the real world of the great outdoors, the majority of people are eager to SHARE their cultures. yes there are ignorant questions and biases but also... how do you think those things get unlearnt? i dont understand how deciding that multiculturalism is an elephant in the room instead of a normal thing that should just be talked about and lived with is supposed to benefit anyone? and kids on tiktok are CONVINCED that it's a time bomb of a conversation to have and therefore must be avoided at all costs but like. people generally LOVE their home and their culture and are PROUD of it and want to share it. how have we made it so that showing genuine interest and a desire to understand something so integral to a person's identity is now feared and borderline demonised?

[creature-once-removed]

.

[pumpkinhimiko]

"Mistranslations" that are not mistranslations

Now with an additional part 2.

NISA has made plenty of mistakes while translating the Danganronpa series (and I've complained about them before), and so they have a reputation of being untrustworthy. But because of this reputation, I feel like fans are too quick to trust whatever anyone that isn't NISA states as absolute fact. So, I want to examine some instances of fan translators claiming NISA has mistranslated something, when, no, actually, they didn't.

Kokichi's last words

人にやらされるゲームなんて…楽しい訳あるかよ… A game you're forced to play... how could that be fun...

This is probably the most widespread myth in terms of "mistranslations that aren't", with the original post that makes this claim having over 2k notes: that Kokichi in the original Japanese actually says, "How could a game where you're forced to kill people be fun...?" Unfortunately, it's just not true. Fortunately for me, there's a reddit post here that breaks the line down in detail, so I don't have to do any work.

Anyway, I really wanted to make this post because of this thread, which makes several false claims.

 Kokichi says he's afraid of friends in general

オレは、そういう『仲間』が他人よりも怖いけどねー。I'm more afraid of those kinds of [friends] than strangers.

So... souiu, meaning that type of/that kind of is right there, directly before nakama (which can mean friend, especially if it's in a shounen anime, but can also just mean companion/member of a group). I don't understand how you can miss this. Not only is it right there, this claim on its face doesn't make sense. Why, in this context, would Kokichi suddenly blurt out that he's afraid of having friends? It has nothing to do with the conversation they're having.

Shuichi's words to Kokichi after the 4th trial

王馬くん、もういいだろ ? Ouma-kun, isn't this enough? その話を聞かせてくれよ。Tell us about that.

Okay, you've probably heard the phrase mou ii a lot if you watch anime, and it's almost always accompanied by a frustrated huff. Because it is, in fact, something you say when impatient, fed up, what have you. It literally means "good already", carrying pretty much the identical meaning of the English phrase, "that's enough" or "I've had enough". Shuichi does not say it's okay as in it's daijoubu, which is the word you use when trying to comfort someone. He is very much frustrated here and telling Kokichi to fess up.

Citation needed

I couldn't find a line like this in Kokichi's FTEs, but maaaaaaaybe I missed it? Shuichi's narration comments quite a few times on Kokichi acting childishly throughout the game, but I couldn't find anything like this in specific.

EDIT: Correction, I did find it, and it's covered in part two. Suffice to say, the OP got this line completely wrong.

That Kaito thing

Yeah this is patently false. It's also already been touched on in this thread with comments backing it up, so there’s another thing I don't have to get into. I'll put the text here though.

オレはテメーみて一に胸クソ悪い真似までして、If I have to mimic your sickening behavior, 生き残りて一とは思わねーんだよ。I don't think I want to survive.

Shuichi's words to Kokichi after the 4th trial part deaux

I've seen varying claims on how these lines were translated, from them being slightly tweaked, to the claim they were completely butchered to make Saihara too aggressive. I'm just going to leave it here and let you come to your own conclusions.

ダサいのはキミの方だよ…王馬くん。The lame one is you... Ouma-kun.

百田くんの周りにはいつも人が集まってくる… Momota-kun always has people around him... でも、キミの周りには誰もいないじゃないか。But, there's no one around you.

キミは…その程度のヤツって事だよ。That's... what kind of person you are.

This is snappy in its own way, though, if you consider that 程度 is closer to meaning grade/level/degree rather than simply "type of". "That's the level of person you are," basically.

And if you doubt me on any of this, I encourage you to do your own research, get second opinions if you can. I know not everyone knows Japanese, in which case you can't really help but rely on someone else and hope their translation is accurate. That said, at the bare minimum, I think people should provide screenshots and the original Japanese text if they're going to claim something is a mistranslation. Like, I don't think you should be able to say "actually in Japanese Kokichi says he volunteers at animal shelters in his free time but NISA cut it!" and have half the fandom believe you with no proof.

[thisismeracing]

Mick+ betrayal + angst. Hurt me queen.

Betrayal | MS47

⸺ the one where Mick doesn't know what to do when love is over, and he ends up hurting Yn even more. Or when it took him only two weeks to go out and date the other girl. ✓ mentions of cheating and break up.

⁕ one word, a thousand stories blurb night (CLOSED) ⁕ my masterlist and my taglist

What do you do when love is over?

That's a question that not everyone will have an answer to, and even if they do, there is no guarantee it will be the right one. The one that prevents heartbreak, tears stains, and screaming matches.

Mick tried to end things on good terms. And though he knew love was not over for her, he was already in love with someone else, so he decided that lying was a good idea. Mick told Yn that he wanted to break up because he needed to focus on his new seat, to give his undying attention to getting better and better and not going through the rough path he went to previously. That was the most absurd thing Yn ever heard Mick say, and she had heard him say that horses could fly one very drunk day.

When Yn pointed out that she never questioned his timing or asked for more attention than he could give, she reminded him that during his two years in Haas, she was by his side. When she cried, asking him how could love stop him from reaching his biggest goals. When she whimpered that love would actually push you towards your dreams, and support you, Mick could only shake his head and repeat that he was sorry. Which he was, in some way.

He never thought he would fall out of love with her, never thought that he would live a day where her laugh didn't bring him the most joy, or that watching her doing mundane things wouldn't be as interesting as before, but it happened.

And that's how Yn found herself at his doorstep two weeks after their breakup to get some of the things she wasn't able to on the same fateful heartbroken week of her existence.

She knocked on the door, the weird feeling creeping into her body. It was strange to wait by the entrance as if she were a stranger, and as if that was not her house a couple weeks ago.

"Coming!" She heard his cheerful voice exclaim before the lock turned and the door opened. The smile Mick had on his face vanished the second their eyes met, and they had been together long enough for Yn to recognize the guilty look on his face, just seconds before the feminine frame showed up behind him.

She was wearing one of Mick's shirts just like Yn used to. She looked happy. Comfortable. She looked at home. As if they'd been together for more than two weeks. As if their story was older than that.

Yn gulped, her throat closing and eyes watering, but she kept her instance, "I came to take the rest of my stuff..."

"Y-yeah, of course," Mick took a step back, allowing her to enter the house that had a completely new smell. "Mhmm- this is...this is Debby, my- uh- my girlfriend. Debby this is-"

"Spare me, Mick," Yn interrupted. "She knows who I am, and it seems like I'm the only one between us who did not know about her before."

"What do you mean?" he asked, brows furrowing, and body turning toward her, ready for confirmation. But oh Yn was so tired.

She just turned her back to the couple and ascended the stairs. The bed they used to share and everything else seemed the same as the day she left, except there was Debby everywhere. Each small detail that made it Yn's and Mick's little fort was off.

"She was just a friend. You know I wouldn't cheat-" he came up to the room, looming by the door while Yn gathered the last of her clothes from the closet and sorted her things from the new feminine things in his bathroom.

"Ain't it funny how I brought it up and you told me I was paranoid?" She reminded the day Debby and Mick started following each other and they started to message non-stop. Yn trusted him, but for the first time something seemed different, and when she tried to communicate Mick brushed it off.

When the blonde opened his mouth to retort, Yn cut him off, "Guess you didn't cheat but you're still a traitor, Schumacher. And I hope she breaks your heart the way you broke mine. I hope you broke each other's heart."

Mick took a step back as if her words were a fist swinging on his face, making him lose his balance. It was the first time he saw Yn that hurt, the first time her eyes had so many tears and so much loathing.

Yn threw her things inside the bag without caring to arrange it, just as Debby reached the room. Granted, the girl seemed a bit sad about the whole situation, but it did not wipe out how sad and hurtful it was for Yn.

"When you're sleeping in the bed I made with him, don't you forget about the way he betrayed me, because that was exactly what it was: betrayal. And he'll do the same with you, you can be sure of that," Yn smiled painfully and zipped the bag. "I wish you two a very sad life."

Hours after Yn left Mick was still thinking where does the love go? Does it turn into hate? Does it disappear? Did he make the right choice? Was he a traitor?

And for the first time, his house did not feel like his own. It felt like the home he once shared with Yn, except now it was broken.

― ⋆🪩 VOICEMAIL: Yup I wrote it listening to Traitor by Olivia Rodrigo how'd you guess? lol Don't forget to reblog and comment *mwah* luv y'all!

[thelightsandtheroses]

six. even the iron still fears the rot

Your Hand In Mine | Joel Miller x female reader.

Chapter summary: the past comes back to haunt you leading to a drastic decision. Chapter warnings: angst, discussions and flashbacks to descriptions of cults, religion and cult behaviour, past emotional abuse, love bombing and manipulation, the cult leader is a dangerous person, one instance of physical violence, guilt, PTSD , there is the very briefest allusion to homophobia (not direct), flashbacks, discussions of death and canon typical violence, passing mention of being an orphan, breakups, reference to pregnancy (reader is a single mother).  Reader has a backstory but no physical descriptors. Word Count: 4.4k Notes -This is a big chapter, beginning a plot I have had planned for a long time and that I was so nervous about. I must thank the lovely @joelsgreys encouraged and supported me to write this idea from the start. The chapter title is from Ptolemaea by Ethel Cain (who can you believe I only discovered last week?!) Also I changed the image aesthetic a bit as I've loved seeing some other fics with this sort of three pic moodboard recently.

Previous | Series | Next

“We need to talk about the Junction.”

In seven words, Beau and Sean have swept away every sense of security, of hope, of foolish optimism from you.

None of you speak as you unlock the library with shaking, sweaty hands. It takes three attempts to put the key in the lock, you can hear a strange sound, almost like an injured animal in the distance. The three of you walk in.

You lean against the wall, shutting your eyes as you try and centre yourself before you can look at your best friends’ faces.

“What’s happened?” you ask finally. "Why are you bringing up the past?"

Now is not then, you tell yourself. You are not that person anymore - you are a mother, you are stronger, more resilient. You repaired your cracks with gold. You are whole, you are different, you are you.

The Junction has no idea what they’re facing. If they’re here. If this is happening.

Sean reaches into his pocket and produces a small piece of paper. There’s a design on it, simple but familiar.

“Tommy and Joel found this less than five miles away on patrol. It was carved onto a tree.”

“Carved?”

“Yeah, so they took a sketch of it. They were asking around the Tipsy Bison about it, wondered if had seen the symbol before - knew it wasn’t Fireflies or FEDRA, guess it worried them. They showed it to me,” Beau says flatly. “I wondered if it was them, so I went straight to Sean. He said - he said it was, or he thinks it is. We need you to confirm it though.”

“It’s them, isn’t it?” Sean asks, his voice soft and eyes desperate for you to say no, to stop this nightmare in its tracks.

You can’t say it. You can only nod, meeting your best friend’s heartbroken eyes reluctantly.

“Scouting symbol,” you say quietly. ‘He designed it as a code but he designed a lot of things like that, I didn’t expect much  would come of it at the time. I guess -” You pause. “If they’re nearby then it sounds they lost the settlement and have been moving around. I can’t remember exactly what the symbol was meant to mean, but it was definitely for scouting, or to mark - to mark something.”

You thought you would have more time. Time to build something with Joel, to watch Gabriel become the man you know he will be. You had started to hope, to dream.

Dreaming has always been dangerous.

You’ve been on borrowed time for seventeen years.

You expected to panic, to feel more anxious or upset. You had thought you’d sob, fall apart on the floor like you have before, burn with the agony of it all. There’s ice running through you instead and a cool detachment. You don’t recognise your voice, don’t recognise your body. You’re gone, an observer watching a stranger so far away from reality.

“How soon can we get ammo, get supplies?” you ask.

“You can’t think we’re going to outrun this, sweetheart. Not when they’re less than five miles away,” Beau says, shaking his head.

“We’re fucked,” Sean whispers, “less than five miles this morning, they could be - shit. We can’t even run, can we? We’re fucked.” He looks down at his hands, rakes his hands over his hair.

Your past has finally come back to haunt you.

You should have just told Gabriel the truth about his father.  You should have told him where you took him away from.

You should have told him a lot of things.

2004

“We are at a moment right now where the only thing we can do is change. The old ways failed us; we let our hate, our differences, our selfishness dictate our lives and we have all paid a price for this. In our loss, in their names, we stand at a junction and we have a choice right now. Will you listen to me? Will we move forward together and carve a new path, take the route to peace and away from the horrors we have seen?”

The world’s changed a lot in the last six months. Pandemics, death, a whole new dictionary where abbreviations like FEDRA, QZs mean something now and some many words have become redundant. There’s been a lot of death. Survival, that feels like the best outcome right now, living feels like something impossible.

They’ll find a cure soon. The smartest people left in the world are working on it.

They’ll find a cure soon.  This can’t go on like this forever.

They’ll find a cure soon. There’s no other option.

One day in a year or two, you’ll look back on this with Sean and giggle. Do you remember the winter of 2003? Do you remember when we had to live in a QZ and when mushrooms became sinister for a short time? It’ll be something to tell your grandchildren, huddled around a fire and after a long and normal life. You’ll go back to cinemas and dinner at restaurants, to finally getting broadband installed, to a future. There will be scars, of course, but society will move on before you’ve even recognised those.

Humanity will survive, it will endure this. You have to believe that.

There are rumours though - rumours of life in and outside the QZ being lawless, of the loss of society, that humanity isn’t thriving right now.

You had different plans for this year. You didn’t expect to be in a small one bedroomed apartment with Sean. You didn’t expect to be an orphan - or an assumed one at least. Maybe they’re still alive. You hope they are, hope their flight made it to their location, that Cordyceps isn’t so bad over there. You wonder what their lives are like - a two-week vacation that’s turned into months. You’ll laugh about this with them one day.

You live in denial because it’s easier. Because one day this will be all a bad memory. You’ll be back on the path towards the life and career you were working towards, and the months spent picking up shifts in a laundromat and community kitchen to live in a run-down building will soon be a distant memory.

You meet him on a Tuesday. You’re at the laundromat and reading a battered library book, enjoying this rare moment when you’re alone,  when he walks in.

There’s something about him that immediately commands your attention. He’s tall, muscular and carries himself with confidence.

“Hi,” he says, noticing you watching him.  “Haven’t seen you before.”

You nod, placing your book down quietly. “There’s only one dryer working, I’m afraid.” You’re not sure if there’ll ever be more than one dryer working at this point - there’s a shortage of parts and tumble dryers are hardly a priority right now. The one working dryer will just become a Frankenstein of other machine parts, of hope and duct tape until it finally dies. Maybe there will be a cure by then though.

“That’s no worry. I’m Ethan,” the man replies with a faint smile.

You say your name in response and he repeats it like he’s trying to store it in his memory. You feel exposed, perceived in a way you hadn’t anticipated.

You suspect though. You suspect that somehow an axis has marginally tilted, a change has occurred.

You don’t believe in love at first sight. Life isn’t like a movie after all, or if it is, then right now it’s only a horror film. You don’t believe that you can just fall someone instantly. Or you didn’t.

It’s magnetic, his energy, his charisma. You love how his voice sounds, the way his hair falls slightly into piercing eyes. He speaks with care, looks at you like he really cares what you think to his words. He reminds you of the men you’d fantasise about meeting while in college. You thought you’d just wander into a coffee shop on your way to your next seminar and there he’d be.

Even here in a dingy and dirty laundromat, you feel those butterflies.

You’re sure you’ve never met anyone like him before and you have a sense that you will never meet anyone else like him.

You have no idea how right you are.

“Is it a church thing? Really?” Sean asks, taking a gulp of water before leaning against the kitchen sink. “I thought you said after your parents -”

“I don’t think it’s really religious,” you say, “Ethan told me it was more about a sense of self than anything theistic. It’s like a support group from what he said.”

“Thought you hated therapy.”

“Yeah, well, then the world ended.”

“Touché. Can’t you go alone?”

“I could, but I don’t want to,” you say, a teasing smile as you meet your best friend’s eyes.  “I want you to meet Ethan. Tell me what you think.”

You need Sean to meet Ethan because it feels like Ethan could be important. You want Sean to like him, to approve of him. You need to him to.

“I don’t know, hon, it sounds - I don’t know what it’s about.”

“Sean, it’s just a workshop, what harm could it possibly do?”

Sean cocks an eyebrow and sighs. “Fine, we’ll check it out. How bad can it be?”

Famous last words.

“The Junction is here. Humanity has failed in our mission, but it isn’t all lost. We can start afresh, become something better. Every one of us in this room has hope, has what is needed to rebuild our world to save us. The threats of cordyceps, of violence cannot stand in our way …  we must not let these evil forces win.”

It starts so slowly. You become friends as he frequents the launderette more and more. You get to know each other..

You’re not what sure to expect from his workshops but his words are compelling. He makes sense. What he says is rational - until it strays into something else, but it’s still got that root of logic. He’s just stressed, you reason, more people are talking about the workshops.

You fall for him.

He brings you a bunch of roses to the laundrette. Roses.

You haven’t seen roses since the outbreak, you’re not sure anyone has ever bought you flowers like this. You have no idea how he’s got them, but he’s got them for you.

He’s so smart, so compassionate and it’s more than that, he really listens to you. Falling in love with Ethan is the easiest thing in the world.  You hadn’t spent much time dating before the outbreak, had been too afraid in the immediate aftermath. You think Ethan might be the first man you’ve ever fallen in love with.

He starts to invite to sit with him at his workshops, places an arm around you when you speak in sessions. You swell with pride because out of everyone, he’s chosen you.

So you drag Sean to more workshops, you bring friends from your apartment building. You want more people to hear Ethan because he’s changed your life. What else could he do for people?

Time passes. Ethan’s language starts to change again. It’s starting to shift from collective processing of the trauma, the unceasing horror of the last year to something different. It’s less about you all and more about Ethan, about his visions and him. Ethan knows the way through the Junction.

He’ll lead you all through.

It’s your fault really, what happens next. You set everything in motion. You’re almost mugged on the way home from the launderette one night. His next workshop talks about the pain of this post-cordyceps world, of the way FEDRA encourages lawlessness to steer us from the right path, towards evil and ruin.

He says that the QZ is actively fighting against you all need to do. It is fighting for the wrong turn at the next junction. That can’t happen. You can’t raise a family here, make a life, not when society continues to fall apart in front of you. You’re scared walking to your apartment at night now, so you think he must be right. There’s the possibility of something better with him.

So when Ethan says maybe it’s time to leave the QZ, you think he might be right. Of course you’d go with him, where else could you go? You beg Sean to come with you, you’re terrified he’ll die when the QZ falls otherwise.

That’s another mistake.

2005

“The thing is, it’s not about cordyceps. Not really. That was only the vehicle to lead us here, to show me the way forward. We must build afresh here. I have been spoken to and I know this - this community is the only way humanity survives. I will lead us to ensure that humanity is not lost. We had to leave the QZ because the agents of chaos and evil were there, they knew what we needed to do, they knew my mission. We have a chance here. We have a chance here to grow and survive and thrive. This is my mission, our collective goal. The Junction will succeed where FEDRA failed, where the old ways. I received a message; we’re heeding it by being here. The hard work is being done now. The Junction is the future.”

The Junction move to what was once a gated community many miles outside of the QZ. It’s self-sufficient to a point, with high walls, generators, and access to facilities. In some ways,  it’s almost like a miniature QZ- it’s better though.

 A former resident suggested the location to Ethan and he said he knew right there and then it was where you all need to be. He said it was a sign; that he was told everyone needed to be there.

It’s going to be idyllic. That’s what he’s promised. It’s what you believe.

You love him.

You marry Ethan on a summer’s day to the entire Junction as witnesses. You are so in love, you don’t see the looming clouds, the storm ahead. It’s a whirlwind romance, a sign of hope in this terrifying world. Your relationship, he tells you, is a symbol for all of his followers, it’s the lynchpin to keep your community together.

You read through his notes, they’re less like inspirational words and more like sermons now, but he says that’s fine. He says he’s spoken to the Divine . It’s his duty, his destiny. It’s yours to help him too.

You believe he is a good man. It’s your responsibility to help him lead everyone through this mess.

You love him.

When you’re in love you can excuse things though. Those subtle language shifts: we to I, debates on decisions to instructions, the focus on how you represent him as opposed to how you feel, what you want.

The pressure starts to constrict around your neck just a little. It’s all becoming too much, you’re not Ethan, you don’t know how to be a leader, or a leader’s wife.

You take every note he offers in the spirit of self-improvement , tweak every behaviour to get things right. Ethan needs this from you.

The Junction needs this from you.

You need to do better.

You love him.

And if you notice the way Sean’s brow furrows every time you speak or see him now, the way he shakes his head sometimes, or the way he opens his mouth but doesn’t seem able to say the words he wants to,  you put it aside. He’s struggling to adjust - that’s all.

It has to work here.  If it doesn’t, you know you will die outside the Junction, that the QZs will already be falling. Ethan tells you he’s heard on the radio numerous have already fallen. You can’t find the same messages on the radio when you try alone though. You believe him though.

You’re the last stand for humanity.

This is the only way.

Ethan is your only option.

You are so in love with him.

Time passes. There’s a bad harvest, the seeds don’t take. Ethan says, it’s a sign the group’s faith is false, that they are somehow poisoning the group. Ethan becomes obsessed with the fact he needs to root the traitor out.

You’re not allowed to proof-read his speeches anymore, not involved in his congregation. He won’t discuss his beliefs, his visions with you.

You are in love with him though.

His eyes on you feel searching, scathing, and sinister.

You start to feel scared; a twisting sense of sickness and fear that perhaps this, this isn’t going to be okay. This isn’t just an intentional community, is it?

You have doubts about Ethan too, about the glint in his eyes, about the way he sometimes talks about Sean or other congregants, about you. 

He doesn’t like you leaving the house these days because you keep saying the wrong things, keep unintentionally undermining his views. You stop answering the door to Sean, you listen to old radio broadcasts and wish you could be a better wife. A better believer.

After one sermon, he breaks the radio by throwing it against the living room wall. Your world becomes so much smaller again.

The doubts are getting louder now. Maybe the Junction is … no, that word belongs in movies and tv shows, in a time that’s long since passed. However, maybe it’s not what you thought. Maybe Ethan’s not what you thought.

It’s just … you really do love him, right?

“Is it you?” Ethan asks, eyes wild and desperate. You’re not sure what’s happened; one second you’re in your kitchen, sitting at the table and talking to him and now you can feel the cold wall against your back, Ethan’s hot breath so close to you, the feel of his hand on your hair. “Are you the reason why? Are you the reason why this is falling apart? You don’t believe, do you? It’s you, it’s you. You’re a curse, you’re a goddamned curse.” “Of course I believe, of course I do.” “You’re lying.” He’s right about that. Ethan is not who you thought. The Junction is dangerous. You need to leave. You know this now. You don’t want to die here.  You don’t want Sean to die here either; you bought him into this mess, the two of you need to leave this place soon.  Alive.

Jackson, WY, 2024

There isn’t much of a choice. You need suppliers, weapons, a plan before you can even think about leaving Jackson.

Beau’s right - this isn’t something you can outrun. It isn’t as simple as it used to be. Gabriel’s too old to be told he’s going on an adventure and cheerfully tag along without question - it was hard enough getting him to leave Kansas.

There’s Joel too, Ellie … you don’t know what to tell them.

You know that Jackson isn’t safe with the looming threat of the Junction. You’ve built a life here; a home and you want to protect that.

Besides they could already be here, you think, mentally running through every trader or newcomer you remember seeing in recent weeks.

“Is everything okay?” Gabriel asks softly, sitting next to you on the faded couch. “Beau and Sean seem … tense.”

“They’re fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

Gabriel frowns, looks away.

You could tell him. He’s sixteen. You could tell him the truth. He wants the truth.

You can barely live with it though; barely live with your own part in it all. You proofread his sermons. You want to give him a father that’s safe, a memory of a good man. Not a deranged, dangerous cult leader.

The air is thick with smoke. You can hear the flames consuming the wooden building, can hear people yelling in the distance. Your distraction failed. There’s a gun in your hands, aiming at him. You can’t stop shaking. “Just - just let us leave,” you say desperately. “You’re my wife.” “Ethan -” “You’re pregnant, you think I didn’t know?” Your panic heightens. This is the reason you’ve been desperate to escape with Sean, to find somewhere else ... you didn’t think he knew. “I won’t let you go like this. I won’t let you take a child from me.  My child. They’re going to - when he’s born, everything will be okay again.” No. Ethan cannot be in your child’s life. You cannot raise a child in a cult. You raise your hands once more and pull the trigger.

“You know I love you, right?” you ask your son.

“Mum,” he groans, sounding out every syllable - the epitome of a teenager, ”Of course I know that.”

“Good, I’d do anything for you, kid.”

 Love.

It’s a strange word; a weapon, a revelation, a lullaby. You grew up with messages about soulmates, about princesses finding their Prince Charming and happy-ever-afters. The world changed; those views were exposed for their naïveté more than ever. It became a dream. Something for other people, not you. Then you met Ethan and love became real, tangible. Dangerous.

You didn’t want that type of love again. Relationships were casual, you kept detached, held something back.

Then Joel stole your goddamn bench and ruined everything.

You feel an ache in your stomach as you watch him working on the porch of an empty house. The mailbox says it belonged to the Bensons, you wonder where they are, what became of them, who will move to this house one day.

“How is it?” you call.

Joel looks up and over at you, a smile widening.

You want to drink in every detail of Joel, commit every freckle, the feel of his fingers on your skin, the sound of his voice as he talks to you, the way he looks when he wakes up … every single part of him.

“Hi,” he says lowly, wincing slightly as he stands up. “It’s in pretty good shape actually - just the porch here needs some work.”

“Wow,” you say, aimlessly swinging your hands as you move closer to him.

“How’s the library been?”

“I wasn’t there today,” you say, honestly, “I had to help Sean.” Not that either of you achieved much. You were in the greenhouses and spent most of your day planning, panicking, and pacifying your anxieties.

There were no immediate solutions to the situation you’d found yourselves in so none of you slept much last night as the worry permeated your mind. Except for Gabriel, perhaps - your beautiful son, the reason you needed a better plan.

Well, there are other reasons too.

Joel touches your shoulder gently. “You okay, sweetheart? You look -”

“Don’t, don’t you finish that sentence, darling,” you say in your breeziest voice.

Joel frowns slightly, furrows his brow.

“How’s Ellie?” you ask, desperate to get this conversation back on track.

“She’s good. Gabriel?”

“I think he has a girlfriend,” you admit, giving yourself just a moment of normality. “Or boyfriend. I think he’s dating, regardless.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Uh huh, he’s got the signs.” It pulls at your heart; your son won’t want to leave Jackson. He’s building a life here. A decent one.

You were starting to do the same.

“I am not looking forward to that with Ellie,” Joel admits.

You raise an eyebrow. “Really? You’re worried?”

“Who doesn’t worry?”

“Touché.”

“So, what’d I owe the pleasure of this visit to?” he asks, honey sweet as he slips his hands around your waste, leans close to you, his lips on the edge of your collarbone. “not that it isn’t a highlight of my day.”

“Just wanted to say hello.” You feel the heat of his breath as he chuckles, kissing you briefly.

He smells like soap and the outdoors. There’s a lingering hint of mint, of firewood too.

“That works for me.”

He guides you against the wall and as he works his way up your neck, to your jaw, mumbling sweet nothings against your skin, you wish it could be different.

You want to stay here in this moment, or at least you want to stay here with Joel right now.

They could already be on their way.

“Joel -”I love you.

The words hang in the air, unspoken but clear. He must know, surely?

“Yeah?” he asks, looking at you carefully.

“I don’t think this is working anymore.”

You know you shouldn’t look at him, but you owe him this at least.

His face crumples; confusion, shock, uncertainty. You watch how he works through every moment before shaping his expression into something blank, a look you haven’t seen him wear before.

“Why?” he asks gruffly.

“I just think we need to pause things.”

“Is it because of what happened with Ellie?”

“No, no, not at all,” you say in a panic, remembering the stern conversation you’d had after Ellie’s suspicious accident.

Joel is in the kitchen with his arms folded, flannel rolled up to his elbows and his  scarred, tanned skin exposed. “Total honesty […] that goes both ways, sweetheart.”

Joel was right and he deserves honesty, he deserves someone who can tell him their truths, but you can’t. Not yet.

Not when Gabriel doesn’t know, not when you fear the inevitable judgment on Joel’s face. You helped him edit his sermons, you married him, you didn’t see it until it was too late. Ignorance doesn’t excuse complicity to you though.

You need to protect Ellie too, protect Joel, protect Jackson as well as your family. The Junction would be so dangerous to them - they’re an invasive species, they see something habitable and they would take it over, spread the rot from inside. They might already be doing that.

You can’t be with Joel right now. You just can’t.

A thousand words sit at your lips; you will yourself to give him some sort of explanation, some sort of better parting. When you’re dead, he’ll remember this. maybe it’s better this way. You ruin yourself to him now so he doesn’t have to mourn you, so you’re not another loss or excuse to shut his heart away. You are committing a kindness to him and incomparable damage to yourself because you do love him. You do, you love him in a way that terrifies and soothes you all at once. You feel like it’s been years and decades but maybe Joel is the right person for you at last.

You will not damn him to mourn another lost love though.

This is a kindness.

“I’m sorry,” you say flatly and you step off the porch and away from him, unable to look back in case he disappears.

It’s for him, it’s for him, you’re doing this for him, for Ellie, for Gabriel, for Sean and Beau. This pain is your penance.

Tag List

YHIM: @orcasoul@pedropascalsbbg @yoursoulsunbreakable@iamskyereads@genetics4life@everyth1ngfan@frickatives@perennialdoll247@joelsgreys@pedrobaby@missladym1981@noisynightmarepoetry@picketniffler @titlee78

Everything Pedro tag-list: @harriedandharassed@pedrostories@hiroikegawa @pedrosaidsheispunk @pastelnap

[thesupernaturalhouse]

Right so- Emily's personality ir charlies design for the hazbins Fallen au?? Which should I talk about first??

Let's go with Emily-

Alright! So, Emily is still her cheery self but also due to the nature of the au defiantly isnt all niave and trusting and stuff

In this au, she's learning about seras lies from others, which I think would give her trust issues. I also made her more, angry

I imagine in the au she holds grudges a lot more, mainly against alastor, and has more of a silent anger type personality- here's a small snippet of the pilot for the au

Emily: alright so now we watch *Katie starts throwing insults* ...oookay- vaggie, spear, down *gently holding said spears tip down

Vaggie: wha- but, come onn

Emily: no 'come onn' I don't think you scaring people with you angelic spear is a good ide- *Katie says soenthifn homophobic* .....neveemind *releases spear* do whatever you want ant. I want that bitch to fear for her life

Or it'd go something like that, I'll work out any kinks when I start writing the story, first I wanna awake an episode layout whoch is harder then it loks- I have the ideas but I need it in a list so- jsut gotta sort through all that

Like she isn't like Vaggie, spear raised, but not like Charlie, easy to forgive.

I do imagine she bites her tounge however if you ask for her hienst's opinion, she will NOT hold back. I think once she and Husk become more of a father-daughter duo, he starts rubbing off on her, and she starts blurting some ruder things out

He is so proud of his little(200k year+) girl

It's probably the most evident when I have her tell of Alastor- which will also be one instance of her being super protective over her found family.....listen I know yall love Alastor i do to, but I think he fandom over hypes him, and so does he himself, and I want Emily to kinda call him out, and threaten him in this au

But that'll be another post :)

Remember how I said charlie and slaviathen are like Ron and Tammy 2 but without all the sex? Yeah, well, then Emily is Diane! Vaggie is to but vaggie mostly focuses on getting them out and stuff. Emily and slaviathen just have passive aggressive argument and comments thrown at each other

"Always a pleasure to meet you charlies friends" "*strained smile* always a pleasure seaweed hair stranger" "oooo-Kay let's go- and let charlie Dela with this"

Why vaggie is passive with sleviathan and Emily is the protective one? Honestly idk but I think it's funny :) maybe it's cause Vaggie knows Charlie doesn't tale shit from slaviathen one bit so lets her gaurd down more because she knows charlie has it, so she's more passive or smth

Emily meanwhiem can't STAND being talked down to so absurd bites back no matter what. Which is also why her breaking point would be Katie calling them a slur.

She hates being talk down to, which stems form her years in heaven being treated as a child by almost everybody, good intentions or not it was still always so condescending to her. Especially when it was from Sera or the other heaven born and elder/arch angles

So she definitely internalized that, remember how I said she was often referred to as 'lucifers replacement' by many elder angles?? Yeah, that's where it MOSTLY stems from

She'd also have resentment and hatred for lucifer because of it all, like "I never want to meet whoever the fuck lucifer is" kinds mentality, it's due to this that she refused to search him uo and relaize he was her girlfriends, one of them, DAD

So the dad beat dad episode is...fun!! Emily gets piss drunk with HER dad, husk after realizing the short man in the middle of the living room is lucifer

It's after that whole song at the beginning happens does she realize he's lucifer, cause charlies only referred to him as dad so-

......I should start drafting a psot for her and Peter's relationship- mlm and wlw solidarityyyy

She also be a lot more sexual active I think because liek heaven is restricted so being in hell with norestricrions she definitely is THRIVING on that freedom

I have a scene planned out for when Angle takes them to that bdsm club that involved her buying black silk stuff because why not-

Anyways, the finale change in Emily, I think, for her personality that is would be she absolutely take sfter a more Sloth like sin

"Screw both of you I'm sleeping in!" She absolutely HATES waking up early in the morning, especially if it's after a night of certain events. Vaggie will throw clothes at her and force her to get up. Charlie will already be downstairs full of energy-

[silverskye13]

Mortals are insane. That goes without saying, but Cub likes to remind himself every once in a while, just in case he’d somehow forgotten. Mortals are insane. Granted, most mortals think he’s insane, but that’s just the baffling way mortals perceive the vex. In fairness, vex are insane. He knows this about himself. It's just that he’s insane in a very different way to mortals. The word “crazy” is a lot more fluid than people think it is. 

For instance, crazy mortals will see a massive crack in time and space growing beneath Grian’s base, and they’ll walk right in. A crazy vex will follow, just to see what happens. Mortals are crazy because they’re daring and curious. Vex are crazy because they want to see what chaos ensues. See? Very different. It’s not that Cub isn’t excited to see what’s on the other side, it’s that he’s more excited to see how what’s on the other side is about to break, irreparably, because his pack of mortals sauntered in. It puts a smile on his face, like watching an artist make a new painting. It’s exciting. It's unpredictable. It’s insane.

The world on the other side is beautiful. It’s a world of empires. It's full of glorious, wondrous things, and people, and places, and all of them Cub comfortably calls insane. There are not-mortals living here. None of them are vex, but some of them are incredibly not-mortal. Granted, some of the friends he follows are not-mortal, but they’re not-mortal in a familiar way. He's defined their edges. This is an edgeless world he's walked into, off the side of the familiar into whatever's beyond it. 

Katherine is mortal, he thinks. The colorful ruler of Chromia, Scott, is barely-mortal. Pearl is not-mortal in a fundamentally different way to how she normally is back home, and Cub thinks that’s fantastic. That’s the kind of chaos he’s here for: irreparable changes, the fabric of the world reweaving itself. 

Katherine's kingdom, Glimmer Grove, is beautiful. Cub immediately takes in the clash of black and gray against pink and white, some curse, he thinks, spreading through her lands. If he really tapped into the magic of it, he might be able to tell what it is, but there's no fun in that. Secrets are at their best when they're unspooled slowly in their own time, sowing their little seeds of chaos. So Cub instead walks with the others and feigns ignorance when Scott points out the oddities in the architecture. He can't tell if Pearl and Impulse are playing along too, or if they really can't see it, but that just adds to the fun. How long can they dance around what each other knows? 

Insane.

Katherine gives a flourish of her pink dress as she stops them before a building. She's bouncing on her toes with excitement. Cub thinks she's terrible at keeping secrets, and those are the best kind of people. She leans in toward them, grinning, "Can you keep a secret?"

She is the best kind of people.

Cub plays with a humble smirk, "I can keep a secret, yeah."

Impulse gives him a sidelong glance that Cub pointedly ignores. He's too busy looking trustworthy. The rest of them agree, yes, we love secrets. Katherine, in that lovely way the best kinds of people do, believes them only because she has a secret she desperately wants to tell. She laughs and beckons them after her, leading them to a false door in her keep. It's a secret base, she tells them in an exuberant sing-song, a secret she's never told anyone, that she's giving to these complete strangers. Mortals are insane. 

Impulse shoots Cub another look, this time disapproving. Cub shrugs. He can't explain to Impulse that, vex or not, he hadn't coerced this with magic - though Impulse is right in thinking that's something he'd do. Explaining this would mean telling Katherine and Scott (and maybe Pearl, if more than just her not-mortal-ness has changed without her knowing) that he's vex, and he doesn't want to do that. Not yet anyway. You can never really tell what people think about vex. Besides, Katherine isn't done sharing secrets, and it would be bad form to reveal his own secret while listening to another. It makes him look less trustworthy, and it takes away from the impact of a well-placed reveal. He’d never steal another secret-sharer’s thunder. 

"So the real secret," Katherine grins as she closes the door behind them, "is I'm a monster slayer."

She takes a wicked looking battle ax down from its mount on the wall. The blade is sharp as shattered glass, and carries the dangerous aura of a weapon lovingly and frequently used. Cub thinks, maybe, it could kill him. He tries to hide his grin. 

There is a noticeable silence after Katherine reveals the ax, a pause that breathes just a moment too long. Scott looks bemused, like he'd somehow expected this. His magic eye glitters, trying to decide if it's monstrous. Pearl looks excitedly curious, like this is the most interesting thing she's learned all day. Impulse looks at Cub again. This time instead of being suspicious, he looks nervous. Cub squints his eyes and smirks.

"That's amazing," he says, and he means it. Mortals are full of wonders. She also reveals to them a deadly looking bow, and tells them about a magical transformations she does to “murder the bad guys”. The room is peppered with applause and praise, and Cub is grinning wide and excited, and he hopes it doesn’t look too terribly vex of him. He loves heroes. He loves seeing what they’ll do. Chaos. When he was an evoker-tied vex, he loved watching them suffer too, but he’s shaken that part of his vex-ness at least. He does think Katherine is the most interesting person he’s met today. Katherine swears them into secrecy and they leave, and Impulse watches the spring in Cub’s step dubiously.

“You should stay away from her, buddy,” Impulse cautions. “You’re a monster. She's a monster slayer.”

“Oh definitely, definitely,” Cub chimes a little too enthusiastically, and Impulse frowns at him. “But Impulse, she kills bad guys, and I’m on my best behavior.”

“Cub we just got here,” Impulse groans. “You need to stay out of trouble until we feel these people out. Some of them are scary, and they have their own agendas they’re pushing.”

“When have I ever started trouble?”

Impulse pauses to think about this. The answer is “often”, but people are rarely around to watch Cub start trouble. They’re generally only in the know when he escalates and finishes it. Impulse shakes his head, “You should still be careful.”

“I’ll be careful.” This, at least, is truthful. It’d do no good to go and get himself killed by a monster slayer two days into this new wonderful world, especially when it’s very possible vex magic will be needed to fix the portal. Vex have unpredictable magic; there’s no telling if it’ll help or harm a situation. In truth, Cub isn’t completely unconvinced his magic broke the portal in the first place, just by merit of him stepping through. What he does know is that he doesn’t want to leave. Not now. Not when there’s so much going on here. This world, he decides with the utmost fondness, is insane.

They take a tour. They meet gods and goblins, a witch in the woods. None of these, Cub notes to himself, are considered monsters by the monster slayer. Katherine speaks of them fondly, with no signs of magical transformations or smiting. Of course, it is daytime. Who's to know what will happen when the moon rises? 

He's to know, as it turns out, because Katherine calls him, Impulse and Pearl back to her place. She's a little more nervous this time. Cub can't smell mortal fear -- that's not really a vex trait -- but he's known mortal fear enough times to know there's a little bit of it here in Katherine. She wants them to prove their loyalty, and then once they prove it, to give them an ax and a uniform. It’s insurance, Cub thinks. It’s a lot harder to share a secret once it’s yours. Not that he was planning on sharing it anyway. He wants to see how this plays out. Impulse keeps throwing him sideways glances, getting increasingly nervous as the evening goes on. Cub remains unflappable, smiling, because why wouldn’t he find this fun? A vex that’s a monster slayer.

The moon rises.

As it’s rising, Katherine gives them a challenge. Prove you’re a monster hunter. Bring back the head of a monster. The vex in Cub goes to war with itself briefly, while it ignores another of Impulse’s furtive glances. He thinks it would be incredibly fun, incredibly chaotic, if he gave his own head to Katherine. But then again, that goes back to the problem of Cub wanting to know how all this plays out, wanting to chase the chaos of a new world, and needing to be alive to see how the Rift gets fixed. So he does something better.

The moon rises, and Katherine turns her back on them and raises her ax to begin her transformation. Pearl and Impulse start to scurry into corners to change into their uniforms. Cub waits until the Monster Slayer is mid-transformation, too caught up in her glitter and moonlight to watch. Then he snaps his fingers.

He, Impulse and Pearl are showered in glittering moonlight. Music only they can hear strikes up to the sound of rock guitar and drums. Who doesn’t love a good anime magical girl transformation? Cub finds himself laughing through his.

They land back on their feet, decked out in Monster Slayer regalia. Pearl is beaming. So is Cub. Impulse looks even more unsettled than he did before.

“Alright Monster Slayers!” Katherine calls, before Impulse can chastise Cub for the reckless use of vex magic in front of someone who probably kills vex in her spare time. “Bring me some monster heads!”

"Cub," Impulse whispers to him just before the all scatter in different directions. "You're insane."

Cub thinks that's funny, coming from a mortal. He grins. "I know."

[the-s1lly-corner]

Hello how are you :3? I was wondering if you could write E.J., Hoodie, and Masky with a s/o that has a lot of scars? (Toby too but platonic for him) I’m not sure how many people we can request so if it’s too many just Hoodie? I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable and thank you!

Various!Creepypastas w/ a scarred!reader

waaaah im so sorry for not seeing this sooner! i didnt recieve a notification for this ask!! really theres no limit to how many characters you can send in! i think my personal max varies from prompt to prompt!! mix of how they approach the concept of a scarred lover (friend in tobys case) with some hints of fluff! cause of scars will be vague as admittedly i didnt know if you meant general scars or SH! side note i hope this posts right! im writing this on my computer, im used to mobile!! + apologies for any weird wording or typos, im listening to music and im getting hyped!! not proof read we die like my spiderverse brainrot

Includes: Eyeless Jack, Hoodie, Masky and Platonic!Toby!

CWs: touch and go talk of potential past trauma, body image issues, vague mentions of SH(?) in EJs part + Toby's parts

admittedly admin doesnt know if its technically SH due to the nature and motiv but personally id still count it as such and tag it as such

Eyeless Jack;

he gets it, he really does. the basic run down of my hc/take on ej is that he wasnt always some flesh eating monster; just some dude who got caught up in some bad stuff

so naturally, he doesnt... really vibe well with the concept of eating human flesh, which can lead to a few... instances. from intentionally to accidentally harming himself while hes lost in his instincts

so hes no stranger to being a little roughed up around the edges

but hes a stranger to comforting; he'll likely approach it from a logical side before trying anything else. "you've been hurt," before going on a small tangent about the formation of scars. hes not the most... emotionally... good... available... person

so youre going to need to lay out the general basis for what you need for basic comfort, on days where your scars become an issue; be is needing comfort or a distraction. it may take him a while, but hell eventually start to pick up on cues and hints as your relationship develops

otherwise hes very neutral about them, again approaching them with a blunt view; seeing it as neither good nor bad. he doesnt draw attention to them, but he doesnt act like theyre gross

really just. vibing with it, doesnt make a huge deal of it since he feels he doesnt have any place to judge, nor does he feel its his business to pry for information

solid 6/10 imo, hell comfort you if you express that you need it but hell likely not go out of his way to do it

Hoodie;

Soft touches, he almost does it before he has your permission to touch you

naturally he has his own fair share of scars from various.. activities

really im still all jumbled up with how i wanna write him and masky; not sure if i want to make them like how they are in their MH source or lean into the proxy thing that was prominent in the early days of the fandom... lowkey leaning into the proxy thing for this post because im more... versed..? in that, but anyhow

hes more upfront and compassionate than eyeless jack, in fact hes probably the most caring out of the four in todays post... maybe thats because i read one (1) fic years back that changed my entire approach to his character but! yeah

subconsciously trails his hands on them when the two of you are holding one another; something gentle and intimate, not too obnoxious to make you self conscious, but not careful enough to go unnoticed

i view hoodie, and by extension brian if i end up considering him and tim fully seperate from their 'proxy' parts, as a very tactile person

true to the popular fanon interpretation, hoodie doesnt speak much. but that only makes him a better listener, so on days where things get hard, hell let you talk his ears off with anything thats bothering you. very rarely, hell speak up and offer some words of advice, most times hell inch closer to grasp you. though it does get awkward since most the time hes just. blankly staring at you silently without emoting or saying a word

overall? personally hes a 7/10 for me, i would rank him higher if he were more verbal, but thats just because admin has an easier time venting if its a two way convo; but overall hell make sure that your scars dont effect your worth

Masky;

very similarly to hoodie, masky also has his own set of scars for the same reasons

he probably starts pointing out his own scars to you and mumbles about where they came from if he knows their origins

this doesnt mean "oh hes invalidating your experiences and hes trying to make it about himself," but more so "hes showing that he really does get it and he doesnt mean to talk over you"

much like EJ he approaches scars with a very blunt and upfront mindset, but to a lesser extent. he admits that whatever led up to the tissue forming, it hurt. emotionally and physically, and hes not going to deny that simple fact. hell listen to you, have a conversation with you about it, and try to help you through whatever you may be currently going through regardless of if youre injury is relevant.

or at least, thats what hes trying to do.

hes still has his own personal issues regarding going about his own problems in a healthy manner but hey thats something for another post; maybe, if i remember

honestly this post doesnt have enough fluff imo, and i can kinda see masky doing this, but imagine he boops his mask against your scars in a mockery of a kiss (doesnt take off his mask often, in fact youll probably never ever see him without it on), i can see jack doing this too tbh

thoughts? 8/10, gets the bonus points for being less awkward to rant to imo, plus i think asides ej, i think i have a bias for masky for the simple fact i had the fattest crush on him when i was in middle school

Toby;

okay! this one is going to be interesting for one main reason! i actually havent touched tobys character in YEARS! so hes probably going to have the shorter list... obligatory i havent built any solid hcs for him past what was going on in the fandom in the 2010s, before toby briefly became a mild discomfort... but we're back in business baby!! (^^ dont feel bad for requesting for toby btw! hes no longer a discomfort, and if i didnt want to write for him i wouldnt be including him right here!!)

obviously we cant talk about his part without talking about his cheek. and other, similar hcs. while i dont think most of the self inflicted marks on his body were from a place of.. for lack of better words, darkness; it doesnt change the fact he still has them. i think a lot of them are from the fact he cant feel anything; accidental burns, gnawing through his cheek, digging his fingers deep into himself. really i could go into detail, but due to the aforementioned fact that my take on him isnt as developed as other characters + i really dont think its appropriate for this post (or really, anywhere on this account,), ill stop there

while he cant relate to the physical pain of what caused your scars, he can sympathize through your feelings. do you feel sorrow, or anger to whoever hurt you? hell be getting worked up right with you, because to him youre one of his closest friends

i feel like he doesnt talk much about his past, regarding his family. but hed tell you, and you can sure as hell bet that hell do his absolute damndest to grant you the same feeling of security.

hell probably touch and prod without truly meaning any harm, but thats because he can have problems with boundaries, but hell listen if you sit him down and tell him it makes you uncomfortable if it does

more so emotional than outwardly... supportive? idk the words, but hes very empathetic with you and tries to relate to you through emotion rather than feeling what you felt. honestly? kinda based for that, but maybe thats because i dont see feelings about this topic being touched on, usually its straight up about how the scar makes the person look or the physical trauma they had gone through, but idk, maybe thats just a me thing

he can be an asshole at times but hell usually backtrack and cool off somewhere else if you call him out on it imo

not sure if its because as im LITERALLY investigating his characteristics and interpretations as we speak, but i think im starting to relate to him so ER-OH!

anyways, i wish i could make his segment more... in tune with the characters above but its probably going to take me a while until im comfortable with how i portray this dude, which sucks because as a kid he was probably one of my favorites

i dont think im going to give toby a rating like the others; since i dont think i can accurate rate him due to the lack of proper concrete ideas outside of him being empathetic to your emotional pain since he cant relate on how much it hurt

im gonna end this here since im starting to sound like a broken record on tobys part so!

i hope you enjoyed this! characterization may be a little off but i blame that mostly on the fact that i kinda fell out of the loop in regards for writing for these guys (that damn spider movie! the brainrot threw me off my creepypasta grind!/j) but its good to be back writing for this fandom! it was a fun little brain exercise trying to figure out each character goes about this kind of thing without making them all the same!! with that being said, im going to go listen to an audio reading of tobys story so i can regrounded in his character and hopefully do him some justice in the future!

[apatheticlexicographer]

not to be unoriginal but seriously i'm never not thinking about the one way sign and just how gay/byler coded mike's room is in general.

like??? we only get one angle on his room, but all of the decorations except that sign are clearly tied to either his character (past or present) or the plot.

the two black and white art prints are from the basement in a previous season i believe. i haven't watched conan but from what i've heard the plot is some kind of foreshadowing for the russia plotline. pinboards are usually places to display mementos that mean a lot to you, so the couple of wills drawings that can be seen there make sense. the big tiddy dragon man is obviously a d&d thing. even the barely-visible guitar is another nod to how much mike is trying to copy eddie in this season!!!

but the one way sign??? the fuck does that represent??? it's big as hell, directly above the part of the shot you're led to focus on while watching (mike) making it easy to pick up on peripherally on a single watch, and points straight at the closet. with how deliberate literally everything else in his room is, one of the most prominent pieces of decoration being filler makes no sense.

meanwhile he has two images of very muscular male figures on his walls, one of which is dead centre of the shot and has a tiny wizard casting a fireball on it (big tiddy dragon man ilysm) AND has will's art on his corkboard despite being in a rough patch with him and just tossing el's letters away.

(side note: something about his drawings being directly next to the lamp and the recurring association of will and lamps/lights throughout the whole show, and the way the blocking places him under the light sources so frequently when he's with mike. something about his drawings being representative of mike feeling like he's lost him due to the s1 scene with the binder. something about him being mike's light even when they're so physically and emotionally distant from each other. yeah.)

and let it be said, the stranger things set designers DO NOT FUCK AROUND. there are countless instances of people noticing little pieces of set decoration that follow characters throughout the entire show, or innocuous graffiti and posters that foreshadow major story beats. one of my own personal observations from an analysis i never finished is a perfect demonstration:

a trophy in will's room in s2, and a matching one in mike's room in s1. a matching set from one of the party's science fairs, presumably.

another lamp-shaped trophy in will's s4 room...

and an exactly matching trophy from a photo shared on finn wolfhard's instagram IN DECEMBER OF 2017!!! those trophies are such a minor piece of set decoration that i couldn't even find a screencap of mike's that was clear enough to use, but it's still custom embossed. that's how hard the stranger things set design goes.

so the wealth of queercoded and will-centric imagery in mike's room??? the seemingly "random" road sign??? that's not coincidence or laziness, no matter how hard some people will argue that it's not that deep. on the contrary, it's probably substantially deeper than we'll ever know T_T

[golbrocklovely]

i'm gonna make this post since i have like ten asks wondering my thoughts on it. and i don't really feel like repeating myself over and over again.

long story short, i'm disappointed.

so… snc did a video with elton and corey. they addressed the rumors that have been circulating about elton and the things he has done to snc, none of which were true. and i'm glad that that can finally come to a close and the death threats can calm down. bc while i never liked elton, he didn't deserve death threats.

but let me get into the video.

i don't feel like rewatching it, so if i get some things wrong, idc. but what i know for certain is that elton flat out said "the fans drove us apart and made me act the way i did." which, is just a flat out lie. HE started way back in late 2020/21. i have proof. i've seen it with my own eyes. i was literally there while he was tweeting out things against snc. if he is that easily persuaded, he should reconsider his career choices. fans took it too far, i'm not disagreeing with that; but to pretend that him and corey didn't shade snc for years and that the fans started a beef between them is ridiculous and incredibly incorrect. elton started a battle that he didn't think was gonna continue for as long as it did. he believed his ego and thought fans would side with him in his unjust belief that snc were copying him. and it didn't play out in his favor, so he just got more bitter and bitter over the years about it. once ppl started making up lies about him, something he had no issue doing to snc, that's when things went "too far".

again, did he deserve death threats for being petty? absolutely not. did he deserve lies to be made up about him? no. but do not pretend to be an innocent bystander in a war YOU started. you handled things publicly and then got pissed when the public had opinions. idk what you expected. snc didn't do anything to elton. they didn't copy him, they didn't take content that was his and change it around to be their own. that is something elton CLAIMED to have been the case. and now he tries to blame it on fans and that they were the ones that claimed that. his apology is null and void when he turns around and says "yeah i said some things i shouldn't have but it's actually the fans' doing that made me think that way." you are full grown adult man with multiple businesses. act like it.

and i cannot fathom under any circumstance why snc would ALLOW elton and corey back into their lives. they bad-mouthed you two for YEARS. they did it in front of fans on tour! they cultivated a fandom that was happy to see you guys fail or get called out. i get you feel bad that fans took things too far. that maybe you were petty too in some instances, that you could have reached out sooner. but YOU DIDN'T START THIS. they don't deserve loyalty or to be in your lives again bc fans were assholes! and you shouldn't want someone in your life that will believe a stranger over you. bc what is there to say that elton won't turn around and shit on you again? he obviously has issues talking shit out. what about the next time he thinks you slighted him? you think he's gonna be rational and act like an adult and talk to you? probably fucking not.

snc bitch time and time again about feeling used, that they always feel taken advantaged of. they keep their inner circle small bc they can't trust anyone. colby literally talked about not being able to date outside of the industry bc what if the girl he's with wants something from him. they do all of this complaining, only to bring elton and corey back in. two ppl who will only BENEFIT from being their friend again. they have been losing subs and followers for years now ever since they started this war. they have nothing to lose being your friend again. they will USE YOU.

it became very apparent to me that snc only want elton and corey back in their lives for memories' sake. they had a three hour conversation only to go back and talk about the good ol times. there's a reason why those moments are in the past. elton literally still sees you guys as the young 20 year olds he has to "take care of". he literally said he loveD you guys, past tense - bc now he hasn't hung out with yall in so long. and you want that back in your life bc you miss feeling young and have uncle elton around? let go of 2017. that was a life time ago. there is no reason to have this man back in your life. and same goes for corey. neither one of them even wished you well publicly when you were diagnosis with cancer or going thru chemo, colby! what about that screams good friend material??

i know i am one person with one opinion. you don't have to listen to me, and that goes for everyone reading this. if you're happy they're back together, that's great. good for you. but i will not be supporting any content that comes from elton/corey and snc. if they do a video together, go on a trip - i will not watch it. i don't care to see two men who i care about hang out with two other guys that literally wished them the worst for three years straight.

snc are allowed to make whatever choice they want. if they want these guys back in their lives, that's the choice they make. if they accept elton's apology, that's fine. but i will not support it. it is such a disappointing feeling to see the ppl you care about act like floormats personified. you guys are so desperate to be seen as good and positive and it is mind-numbingly annoying. who cares if you're an asshole sometimes?! set boundaries for christ's sake. and follow thru on them. stop listening to fans who have the attention span of a spoon and are only here bc they think you're hot.

…this goes into a longer issue i've had with snc for a while now. and that's that i'm no longer excited to be an avid watcher of them. everything that has happened this year was proof, to me, that they should have taken an actual, long term break, the moment colby got sick. they started out the year not even being with each other on colby's bday. and even before that you could tell something was off with the two of them. it was clear colby wanted a break, was aching for one, and sam was the one that wanted to jump right back into work the moment the new year started. then colby got diagnosed, then sam and kat broke up, then colby went thru chemo, then sam needed to get his shit sorted out so he went to therapy (and still very much needs it). then they celebrated colby being cancer free and jumped back into the amount of work they were used to doing. this doesn't even take into account that colby never got time to recover from even realizing HE HAD CANCER, or the fact he was working all while going thru chemo and before that too. they NEVER took a break. taking a week off to black out in japan doesn't count. they are so obsessed with working and numbers, it's not even funny.

and then this podcast with kris… while i did enjoy it, it became very clear to me that snc are really only making content anymore for views and money. and look, get your coin, this is your job after all. but at what point do you start making content you actually enjoy making? bc the moment they shitted on 25x25, something they very much loved when it was happening, that was enough proof that they only care about views and money anymore. the only reason they stopped that WAS bc no one watched it. and ppl didn't stop watching it bc it was inauthentic. you were travelling during a deadly pandemic… what did you expect fans to do?? not to mention you cold turkey-ed content that ppl signed up for (haunted stuff). of course the views are gonna plummet. it wasn't bc the editing was weird and new, which is what yall love to latch onto even to this day. you guys were so excited for that content, and now shit on it bc it's become the joke to the fandom, half of which wasn't even here when you made that content.

you collab with ppl no one even cares to see you with bc you know it will bring in views. who the fuck wants to see yall and bella poarch at the conjuring house??? none of these collabs make sense anymore, unless you just want to get views. all the content you have put out this year has been mediocre at best. you talk about quality over quantity but really should have just considered not working and taking a break since one of you was literally going thru fucking cancer.

i just feel so deflated. i'm not even excited for the conjuring house. i don't care about hell week. i can't even be pissed that sam is barely helping with the edit still. none of this fucking matters anymore.

yall don't care, so why should i?

do whatever makes you happy, i guess. but don't complain when you realize it doesn't, bc i'm not gonna be here to hear it.

also, if any of you get pissy at me bc you feel like this is a good thing and you want to see them collab and i'm taking it too far... respectfully, i don't give a single shit about your opinion. have yours, i'll have mine.

[yutaleks]

i have a genuine question, this is just pure curiosity, no judgement lol

what's the appeal behind incest? :o also i'm assuming it's specific kind of incest, like sibling x sibling, and not parent x child??

i mean i know it's a kink so maybe there's no explanation, i'm just curious xD it's totally fine if you (or others) don't wanna answer ofc!!

well your assumption is incorrect LMAO I’ve written and read parent/child incest fics just as often as sibling/sibling. Familial relationships have different contexts and implications, not limited to just sibling/sibling.

I don’t necessarily think any kind of kink has to be appealing in order to have the right to exist, so I don’t think trying to justify it will actually mean anything or give it any kind of standing that it doesn’t already have. If that makes sense. Like you don’t necessarily have to understand it to make it any more or less of a valid thing to read or write about.

That aside, I can tell you personally what I feel gives it appeal to me:

Sibling/sibling:

It is a balance of a relationship that is inherently taboo but the characters feeling so much for each other that they overcome that hesitation and go for it anyway. Like a “despite all odds” taken to an extreme. A level of devotion and kinship that not only transcends physicality (the two characters are blood related, made from the same flesh and bone. So to speak) but also morality (despite inherently how “wrong” it is for them both to be together, they don’t care).

Taking away the “incest” and looking at it strictly from those two reasons (a character who is cut from the same cloth, who loves me above all and against all odds) I think it is psychologically some form of self-love and acceptance that you cannot achieve by thinking of the character as a random stranger. I’m not a psychologist so idk if that makes sense, but I think to me it fulfills this basic desire: two people who are made of the same flesh finding themselves desirable.

Like irl i hate myself right. But like. Someone who came from the same flesh as me. Who lives the same life as me. They are lovable. And they love me. Does that make sense? I’m saying this as love not as something sexual btw. I’ll touch more on this later.

And I have to tack on that even in the cases of step-siblings/adopted siblings or “pseudocest” as some people call it, I still think the same logic applies. It’s still incestuous. Blood or not, you’re still in the same familial “role” in which you are designated to be siblings. The “kink” still exists in the very same fashion, in which you treat each other as siblings or are raised as siblings. The same makings of a blood-related siblings fic exist in a “psuedocest” fic so if you’re running circles trying to make up some difference between the two, you perhaps are just making excuses to yourself lol. Because the fics are exactly the same, minus the “they aren’t actually related” disclaimer. lol

A sibling/sibling relationship (blood or “pseudo”), if done in a manner which is more closely paired to real life instances of incest, will probably feature abusive or abhorrent situations for the involved characters. That is the nature of incestuous relationships in real life. It is probably a different topic entirely on the appeal of fiction which depicts abusive or traumatic incidents but thats for another post I think. Just as with incest itself I don’t think anyone needs a reason to justify why they would want to read traumatic/horrific situations in fiction and I don’t think there is any correlation between this and personal morals/values but yeah. Anyway

Parent/child:

I think in the case of parent/child usually that kind of relationship is paired with an insane amount of trauma. Something like that would not occur without either something terrible happening, or abuse happening. And again I don’t think anyone needs to justify why they enjoy those tropes in fiction.

I do think there is more of an element of gender roles in a parent/child incest fic vs a sibling/sibling scenario. A fic which is father/daughter is going to be entirely different from father/son or mother/son, mother/daughter. Each one of those has different psychological implications, I feel like. Because the role of “mother” “father” “son” “daughter” all have ingrained societal roles that we are typically expected to follow.

I think when you read a fic which features parent/child incest, there’s a LOT happening psychologically between the characters. It’s usually subversive of what typical nuclear family roles are, in ways that inspire disgust in readers. Like the role of “son” typically has such a barrier from the role of “father” than when the son steps in and takes the role of father (being his mothers sexual or romantic partner) it typically makes people very uncomfortable. And even within the fic one party of the relationship may be uncomfortable.

Some readers perhaps find appeal in that exact feeling of being uncomfortable—the same way you squirm in your seat at a horror movie or when things are unnatural to you. Do you ask people why they enjoy horror movies or why they enjoy murder mysteries? The things that happen there are unnatural as well, and inspire feelings of disgust, but it is because incest is an affront to nature and the gender/familiar roles that are so ingrained in us? Is it because the thought of your father or mother taking on the role of your lover disgusts you? Why? I’m not saying they shouldn’t, but I’m asking you to think about why they do?

Like I’ve written personally many fics of the sibling/sibling variety. But I’ve only ever once written mother/son and once have written father/daughter. And I find it intresting how different the responses are to those. People are very disgusted by parent/child incest in ways that they are not disgusted by sibling/sibling incest. And I wonder why. Deep down they are all immoral. What is it about parent/child that pulls out the most abhorrent disgust from readers? Anyway. I find that reaction just as intresting as the trope itself. Like what does it say about the human psyche that we have such reverence of the relationship to our parents. Is it because I personally do not have such strong feelings about my parents that I don’t feel particularly strongly about parent/child vs sibling/sibling?

I don’t think I know enough about psychology to offer an answer to that question. But I find all aspects of the parent/child topic fascinating. I think maybe because I particularly feel very unloved by my parents that I also find a scenario in which parents feel so strongly for their children to be different to me. I personally grew up in an environment where my mother openly told me many times how much she hated me and how I ruined her life. And my father never said anything to me at all to really indicate that he felt differently. So in particular when I come across fics in which parents want to have a relationship with their child it feels very foreign to me. I think I approach it wanting to understand it or wanting to feel wanted? Not the sexual aspect of it obviously (put down the keyboard, morality police). I think there is a difference between reading a fic with the desire of being wanted as a person vs reading for sexual gratification. NOT THAT ONE IS ABOVE THE OTHER. It’s perfectly fine to feel sexual gratification from reading immoral fiction. But I don’t actually get sexual gratification from reading smut fics, it (For Me) is about being desirable above morals and above what is acceptable in real life.

I think there is an entire different conversation to be had about why people cannot see the distinction between love and sexual desire. I know what you’re thinking reading this: but aleks, the incest fics you read and write have sex in them, so wtf are you talking about? Well. When I read a fanfic that feature incest I usually do not care for “porn without plot” fics. I think incest fiction and pwp do not go together very well. Like I said earlier, incest is usually the product of trauma or abusive scenarios, or unhealthy/unestablished familial roles. These things take time to build up in a fic, and require backstory. In order for an incest fic to reach the point where the two characters will engage in romance, there will have to be backstory to justify why they love or want each other. And this comes before the sexual part. I think, for me, that is where the appeal of an incest fic lies. In that part of the story where they take a “bad” relationship (estranged relatives, or abusive situations, or traumatic situations) and then sort of “fill it” with love/nurturing/etc in the culmination or romantic feelings/feeling of admiration. Idk if I’m getting my point across. But the base need of “fixing” a bad situation with romantic love is what I’m talking about here, not about “fixing” the bad relationship with sex. To me sex is the product of a romantic relationship or feelings of desire, not the product of the damaged relationship itself. Does that make sense?

Anyway. In my mind the smut is not the cause of the incestuous relationship, but the feelings of attraction/desire are.

Incest kink in situations where they aren’t actually related:

This does not pop up as often in fiction explicitly. but I think this version of the incest kink is actually hands down the most intresting to me. I think it is hard to do in a fic so it is not done often. But I think someone who is a stranger doing a roleplay, or taking on functionally the role of a relative, I think that is like… a dynamic I want to study under a microscope. Something about being nurtured and loved by a stranger in a way that you were missing from a relative or on purpose to enact a sexually gratifying taboo… phew.

I haven’t posted it yet but I do have one part of the series I’m working on where the character will choose to pretend to take on the role of your brother. And there’s a reason for that, given earlier in the story. It is to fill in a role that you find lacking. I think it’s intresting to think about…

I think this may in some ways link to more popular kinks like mommy kinks or daddy kinks (WHEN THEY ARE DONE WITH NUANCE/when it is less about the spoken “mommy” or “daddy” and more about the ROLE of “mommy” or “daddy”) because that is a person taking on a role that may have not been done “correctly” the first time. What I mean by that is, putting it simply, like when someone says they have “daddy issues” so they look towards a fatherly partner who, unspokenly, or maybe even spokenly and more obviously, takes on a fatherly role in their personal life (does things for them that are typically reserved for the familial role of a father). Same for someone with “mommy issues” who looks towards a nurturing partner who “mothers” them. This is probably not what you think of when you think of incest kink, but I think in some ways the tropes are the same. I think a lot of this is to fill a role that was not done correctly during the child-rearing portion of your life, and you look to self-soothing through these dynamics in adulthood. Or something to that effect. (This is my own thinking of it and not psychological advice or fact LOL)

Anyway.

TLDR: I think for me a lot of these incestuous dynamics fulfill a need for me that I did not have as a result of various traumatic circumstances that don’t need explanation. I personally have never really found sexual gratification in fanfiction (aka I don’t “get off” to it, but more like, it stimulates/fulfills this inherent desire to be wanted). Aka I should seek therapy but instead read fanfiction to cope with self loathing. 😁

But as a general rule of thumb I do not believe that people inherently need to experience trauma to find these things either appealing or at the very least intresting, or sexually gratifying. People have always been attracted to something taboo, the same way people enjoy horror or people rubberneck on the highway. Things that are “wrong” are just intresting because they are different. The mind is stimulated by things that are different to us. I don’t think it has to be any deeper than that… though in many cases it is. But it doesn’t matter. People don’t have to have a reason! Enjoy your taboo fiction or don’t if you don’t like it! Every kink is valid even if it’s not for you in particular. 😊

[beom1e]

ephemeral twenty two | stupid, naive

genre slice-of-life, angst. warning alcohol, mention of life-threatening accident, deception. playlist ml. wc 1.52k.

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parties were becoming your groove. you’d climbed the social ladder and knew most of the people in the room now, no matter whose apartment you were in. it felt amazing to finally have real friends and even casual friends, but it was all so bittersweet. you were living the life your best friend had wanted for the both of you, without them by your side. and graduation was inching closer, the slew of students on campus decreasing by the day as classes came to an end and exams came into view. the thought of leaving your university behind, without your best friend following along with you, was sickening. it wasn’t supposed to happen like this.

‘are you feeling okay?’ soobin waved his hand in front of your face, pulling you out of your thoughts. ‘you look pale.’

‘what?’ you called over the sounds of voices and music playing through large speakers. ‘i’m just sobering up, i guess.’

‘are you having fun?’ yeonjun practically sang as he slid into the empty spot beside you. ‘beomgyu is looking for you.’

‘he’ll find me eventually,’ you breathed out, reaching for the cup in front of you. forcing a smile, you turned to yeonjun. ‘and of course i’m having fun.’

‘i’m gonna go find kai,’ soobin spoke, sliding off the seat beside you and heading into the main room.

‘your boyfriend’s stressing about whether or not you’re enjoying yourself,’ yeonjun smiled, making you smile in return. you stared down into your cup, forcing your smile to stay and not fall like it so badly wanted to. ‘i don’t know what you’ve done to him, y/n.’

‘what do you mean?’ you laughed shortly, tilting your head to the side. beomgyu came into your line of view, smiling at the sight of you amidst his conversation with a friend.

‘i’ve never seen him this happy,’ yeonjun stated. ‘at least, not since the accident.’

‘what accident?’ your expression turned to confusion.

‘when we were all going home for the summer last year,’ he elaborated. ‘beomgyu was getting his train back to daegu, and he fell onto the tracks when we were joking around. he wasn’t hurt, but it left him in this weird state of shock where he hardly spoke to anyone anymore.’

your grip on the cup tightened, and your expression dropped. there was only one other instance in which you’d heard this story, and that was through an anonymous stranger.

‘yeah… he had to get a new phone, right?’ you pressed. ‘new number and all?’

‘yeah, so he did tell you?’ yeonjun was just as confused as you had been when he began to tell the story. ‘because you seemed clueless just a minute ago.’

‘in a sense,’ you swallowed.

‘maybe i shouldn’t have said anything,’ he felt a wave of guilt. ‘i asked beomgyu once if he had told you about it, and he shut me down claiming he had and to never bring it up around you. i thought it was a little weird, but he’s my friend, so i followed his orders.’

beomgyu had just made his way over to yeonjun when you stood, spun around and pushed your way through the crowd to find your way out. of course, he only followed you, thinking you were playing some sort of game with him. the crowd was thick with fellow students, forcing you to push yourself through and repeatedly apologise. you were followed with every step, his presence looming and making you panic. the last thing you wanted to do was to speak to him, and if he caught up to you, you’d be forced to do exactly that.

you picked up the pace, circling around to the open door out of his apartment. once you had grabbed your jacket, beomgyu realised that this wasn’t some game. he’d seen your interaction with yeonjun, thinking nothing of it, but clearly something was said that had forced you away from him. he caught you as you slipped outside, but you pulled your arm away from him and pushed open the door into your own apartment. you slammed the door in his face, feeling your eyes well up with tears and your throat burn.

as you stepped into the kitchen, the door was opened again by beomgyu. when he met your eyes, he felt his heart break. he opened his mouth, about to speak when you cut him off.

‘how long have you known that i was the person you had an anonymous friendship with?’ you started, voice shaky as you tried not to cry.

‘what are you talking about?’ he tried to evade the question.

‘isn’t that why you wouldn’t give me your number?’ you pressed, unable to believe he was trying to find a way out of this. ‘yeonjun told me about the accident… the one i’d only heard from you as ‘g’. and when i asked for your number after our first date, you claimed you hardly used it and preferred social media. you knew then, right?’

‘y/n, how did you…?’ he trailed off.

‘how did i figure it out?’ you laughed bitterly. ‘well, let’s see. my long-term crush suddenly asks me on a date after never having even a trivial conversation with me, and then he refuses to let me text him. and yeonjun blurted out that you purposely avoided talking about the accident on the tracks around me to keep yourself and this online persona separate. so now, my boyfriend who claims that he loves me, doesn’t want to tell me that it was him i’ve been texting all this time?’

‘are you saying that i don’t love you?’ he frowned. ‘because that isn’t true, y/n.’

‘it’s not exactly easy for me to believe that right now,’ a tear rolled down your cheek. ‘don’t you see what you’ve done?’

beomgyu fell silent. he never expected things to go this way. out of the thousand and one ways he had expected this to go — each with an appropriate reaction and solution — this hadn’t even crossed his mind. you were never supposed to figure out that he had known all along, you were simply going to be surprised and relieved to find out. he would have feigned surprise too, and shared his relief that the stranger he had trusted all of his secrets with just so happened to be the love of his life. that hoped for happy surprise was now tainted with a truth he should have shared with you months ago.

‘i’m sorry,’ he spoke softly. ‘i should have told you the moment i found out.’

‘why didn’t you?’ you wiped at the tear. ‘was asking me to meet up with you your way of making up for the fact you’ve lied to me our entire relationship?’

‘you were never supposed to find out like this,’ beomgyu knew that lying now wouldn’t help his case. ‘my plan was to act just as surprised as you would be tomorrow.’

‘so you were going to lie to me for as long into the future as we were going to last?’ you scoffed. ‘i can’t believe you.’

was this some sort of joke? were you just a pastime? a silly college girlfriend of his that he didn’t really care about? maybe his friends were in on it too, that you were the butt of the joke and once everybody stopped laughing, you’d just be tossed aside and forgotten about.

had beomgyu ever loved you? or had he been leading you on and updating his friends on the desperate girl who had been crushing on him for the past three years?

you felt used, stupid, naive.

‘i’m sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘i never meant to hurt you.’

‘that’s it?’ you sighed. ‘you’re not going to fight for me?’

‘i don’t want to add fuel to the fire,’ he sighed in defeat. ‘i don’t know what’s going through that pretty mind of yours right now, y/n, but i never had bad intentions. i messed up and i hurt you, but that’s all there is to it.’

‘are you sure?’ you sniffled, using your sleeve to wipe at your tears. he nodded softly, taking a step closer towards you. ‘wait, don’t… i need to be alone right now.’

‘okay,’ he backed away, reaching for the handle of your door and pulling it open. ‘call me if you need me.’

once the door had closed behind him, you dropped to the ground in tears. you didn’t know how to feel about it. he’d betrayed your trust, and now you had no concept of what had been real and what had been prompted by his knowledge of your ‘anonymous’ identity.

everything had happened smoothly and quickly, but not naturally like you had thought. but you had loved him so dearly. had any of it been real? and from what point on did he become sincere in his feelings for you? did he even mean it when he told you he loved you, or was he rushing into it for the sake of this ideal boyfriend you sought in him?

you sobbed, and buried your face into your knees.

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[beebotea]

hey, are you listening? — part 02

summary: in which uni students decipher vague tweets and emotions... + ie: second-year students y/n and xiao are forced to work through their term project (and feelings) as their friends attempt to meddle with their love lives ‘for the greater good’ cw : swearing, slut-shaming, suggestive, reader she/her pronouns.

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02. redemption party

act 1, scene 1

—

act 2, scene 1

With a frustrated sigh, Xiao stood up and walked out the door, leaving his cousin to finish smoothing out his hair alone.

“Hey, wait man! It was a joooke,” Scaramouche called from within the room, before Xiao heard the door open up again behind him. “It’s not like everyday we see you take any sort of interest in anyone… Come on a small thing like that is gonna shake up the great and mighty all powerful Xiao?” The (barely) younger cousin gave the other a light punch on the shoulder.

Despite often playing with Scaramouche as a kid and rooming with him for almost a year now, Xiao still never got used to the way he would joke and tease others. The teasing Hu Tao did wasn’t even close to how much of an instigator the bowl cut wearing male in front of him was. Although, it wasn’t his teasing that bothered the black and teal haired boy this time…

“Would you feel better if I said sorry? You don’t hear that one from me everyday!” It was true, an apology from the boy was rare, occurrences of such instances being far and very few in between. However, Xiao only shook his head in response.

“I don’t know, Kuni, sorry for getting so worked up I guess.” Xiao mumbled.

“You’re not usually that upset over a text… something the matter? Is it the girl? Oh! Did you already confess to her and got rejected? You sneaky bastard~—Ow!”

“No it’s not that—“

“Then why don’t you just talk to her like the other guys said? You’re clearly curious and I know you think she’s attractive. Who knows maybe you won’t be a virgin after tonigh—Ow! Stop hitting me!”

“Then stop saying stupid things. And you know I don’t like talking to strangers. You don’t either.”

Scaramouche shrugged. “Yeah but if I want something, like a hookup or a relationship, then I’ll put in the work to get it. What’s that thing you always say? ‘Everything requires a sacrifice,’ yeah?”

“…”

“And it’s not like you’re starting from scratch either, you guys have a common class to talk about.”

With another sigh, Xiao pats his cousin’s back in a silent thanks for his effort to console him. “I’ll think about it.”

“What’s all the commotion?” The two look up to see Kazuha and Heizou emerge from their room all dressed up and ready for a fun night out with their friends.

Scaramouche gave a look to Xiao to which he received a shrug. The indigo haired boy told their dorm mates of Xiao’s dilemma.

“Hey if you want I can wing man for you!” Heizou smiled at him.

“And I can find you a nice drink to ease the nerves alright? Everything will be just fine, my friend. But until then, we really must get going. We’re already late and I don’t want Aether yelling at us in front of Lumine’s friends when we get there.” Kazuha spins Xiao around and the three Inazumans escort the Liyue native out of the dorm and towards the tavern.

—

act 2, scene 2

Y/N looked over to Hu Tao who pointed into the general direction where Kaveh and Tighnari would come from. Surely enough, the four Sumeru musketeers emerged from the street corner and was walking towards them. Y/N fidgeted in place as she heard the oncoming voices of Aether’s other friends, a few she recognized and some she didn’t.

From that crowd she saw, Heizou, Xiao and Gorou from philosophy, and Childe from first year ethics. However, the boy with platinum blonde hair with a red streak, the one with a mullet and a snarky smile as he conversed, and the other with turquoise braids were relatively unknown to her other than one apparently being Xiao’s cousin.

Before she could snap her attention back to her two arriving friends, Y/N had accidentally caught a glimpse of amber eyes and made eye contact. The two quickly looked away as if nothing happened.

“Come on, Y/N, let’s go wait inside. Ooh we should order the good drinks before they’re all gone! You can talk to your boy crush laterrr~~” Hu Tao gave Y/N a wink before dragging her into the tavern by the hand.

The twins spotted the two friends and dragged them to one of the three tables immediately. It seemed that Aether even helped out with seat assignment—which was strange because she’d never heard of a seating arrangement for a party at a bar… Luckily, Y/N were seated beside Hu Tao with Yanfei sitting across from the two. A quick glance around the table told Y/N that the the rest of the table would consist of mostly Aether’s band mates.

“Hey! You slackers! Took you long enough to get here.” Aether’s voice echoed through the tavern and the party goers turned to see the incoming group.

He brought the arriving stragglers to their tables and sat everyone down as Childe was pulled by the ear to the center of the three tables.

“I can’t tell whether this is a college party or a wedding reception…” Y/N whispered to Hu Tao as the guests took their seats. Y/N’s giggling seemed to be cut short when she realized who had just taken a seat next to her.

Xiao had just sat down in the chair beside her, his cousin taking his place between him and Yanfei. Hu Tao’s side of empty seats were filled with the boy with braids and Heizou found himself in the empty seat beside Yanfei.

Amongst the new crowd, Y/N had only ever spoken to Heizou before… once.

Hey, can I borrow a pencil? Man alive I’m so stupid for forgetting my stuff on the first day.

Oh, yeah sure no problem.

Thanks! I’ll bring it back after class.

Ever since then, the two only interacted with vague waves and friendly smiles of acquaintances. In other words, Y/N was at a loss on what to say or even begin to converse with Aether’s friends.

All eyes turned to Childe in the center who thanked everyone for showing up and dressing up for his party, not expecting everyone to go all out. The guests around Y/N cheered as he confirmed that all drinks would be on him tonight and wished for everyone to have a good time.

Luckily, the boy with the braids sitting beside Hu Tao was the first to break the silence after Childe’s speech.

“So… I’m guessing not everyone is acquainted with each other so I’ll start! My name’s Venti, I’m in the Performing Arts program and I’m the leader, keys and vocalist of our band, 6WIRL! Asides from the guys and Hu Tao, it’s very nice to meet you two.” He gave Y/N and Yanfei a cute and welcoming smile that helped them calm their nerves a little.

“Nice to meet you! I’m Yanfei. I’m in Pre-Law as of now.”

“Woah, Pre-Law? That’s so cool! Allow me to introduce myself, I’m Shikanoin Heizou, future detective and current Criminology student. I’m our group’s resident drummer!” Heizou’s smooth voice spoke up next as he greeted everyone.

“I’m Y/N. I’m a student in our Bachelors of Marketing program. It’s nice to meet everyone!”

“And I’m Hu Tao! Business Management major~”

“Xiao. I study psychology… I play bass for 6WIRL. Nice to meet you guys.” Xiao mumbled from beside you, still not taking his eyes off of his phone since sitting down.

“I’m Scaramouche. I’m in Mechatronics Engineering and I play lead electric guitar. I’m also this idiot’s cousin.” Scaramouche side eyed his cousin and playfully slapped his shoulder a little harder than warranted, a signal to get him off his phone.

“Eh… don’t mind them heheh, those two are notorious for being ass at making friends.” Venti smiled at Y/N, who eyed the duo. “And our last two members are over… there, Kazuha, our rhythm guitarist and Aether, our vocalist and backup leader.” He pointed over at the table closer to the doors where the male twin and platinum blonde boy with the red streak of hair sat.

The rest of the evening played our fairly well, Y/N’s table of seven became quite talkative as Heizou and Venti continued to joke around with everyone and Scaramouche eased himself into the conversations.

It had turned out that Hu Tao and Venti were part of the same performance club for a little back in first year, which was why they had already known each other quite well. Even the members of other tables came to join the conversations and bring over cool drinks that they wanted to share with everyone. Y/N ended up making a good amount of new friends that night and increased her contacts list by quite a few numbers.

However, to her, the night seemed to be a little bitter as she couldn’t help but notice Xiao disinterested in all of the chatter. Even the few times she tried to initiate small talk with him, she was met with dry answers that barely met her ears.

Perhaps he wasn’t feeling well or maybe he didn’t really like her presence to begin with… Y/N, who hoped to get closer with the black and teal haired Liyuen decided to give up on the night’s original conquest. Perhaps it was a better idea to switch gears for his quick-witted and shaper-tongued cousin, who had been eyeing her like a slab of meat the whole evening.

—

taglist  —  comment to be added!

@ashhh-14​  @sanghyuksgasolinestationscream​

—

[scribefindegil]

Howdy, I think you might be making an ekurei shipper out of me XD I never really thought about them much but I'm really resonating with these posts. Not only that but I'm realizing that its so up my alley because I love love love like, unusual fantasy situations where characters experience intamacy in unconventional ways, something I feel like I don'tfind very often outside of my own and my friends' writing in our own lil corner. Like woah...the romantic potential of possession, being closer to your partner than humanley possible...imagine how humbling it would be to realized you are loved and trusted enough to be invited to share your partner's mind and body as an act of love instead just using that ability against strangers to your own ends...[cries a little] Who even needs that dang guard. Maybe I'm so enraptured with this stuff cause I'm ace, lol

Yeah yeah yeah that's it exactly!! The potential for sff to create types of intimacy that wouldn't be possible in real life is a huge part of its appeal! I've seen people compare Dimple possessing Reigen to Steven Universe fusion and I've compared it to drift compatibility myself and both of these things are very tasty, but for me it hits even harder because for them the intimacy is a choice, not a natural byproduct or an intentional prerequisite. Like, it's one thing for a sff setting to make an unconventional form of intimacy part of its worldbuilding like SU and PacRim do, but it's another thing entirely when it isn't an established part of the worldbuilding but something that the characters figure out on their own!

Like you said, for most of his existence Dimple has used possession as a tactic of violation and control. That's what you do when you're an evil spirit! It represents where he is at the beginning of the series; his view is that relationships are about who has the most power and who has the least, and if you have more you're going to use it to manipulate and subsume anyone less powerful than you. And then he starts changing! And by Season 2 he's using possession as a form of protection, not for himself but for Mob. Even when he possesses people without permission (Shinra and that one bully), he's not doing it to help himself! He does it to Shinra to get him out of danger (and says, notably, that if he let Shinra die then Mob would never trust him again), and he does it to the bully to protect Mob (and he stops when Mob says to!). And then in Mogami Arc we get the first instance of Dimple possessing someone because they explicitly asked him to, where he protects Mob's body while his soul isn't in it. Possession not only as protection but as trust! And you can tell from his reaction that this is something that Dimple has never considered before! And you can tell from how shocked he is during World Domination (manga) when he's able to possess an unconscious Mob that he especially never considered that trust like that could be an ongoing thing!

The point is, by the time Dimple meets Reigen in the middle of a psychic tornado, his concept of what possession can be has already undergone some major changes due to his friendship with Mob. But there's never been anything like what he and Reigen are able to do. There's been trust, there's been protection, but there's only ever been one consciousness in a body at a time. There's been vulnerability of body but not vulnerability of mind.

And it would have been easy for Dimple to push Reigen's consciousness down until they got to Shigeo. That's another thing that gets me; there's no reason that they had to both be awake on a technical level. But on a thematic level it is Everything to me that they're able to achieve a state that we've never seen before, that I bet if you'd asked them before this happened they both would have said was impossible, that is dependent on complete vulnerability and openness from two characters who will fight tooth and nail to prevent anyone else from seeing who they really are. It's about their shared familial love for their boy and it's about how much they understand each other in that moment.

And, like, I'm also ace, and generally not much of a shipper, and I tend to care a lot about group dynamics and platonic bonds, and I think that part of the appeal of ekurei bodysharing stuff is that even if you write about it in the most romantic way, you have to remember that the first time they did this it happened because of their shared platonic love for their kid so to me it feels just. Infused with all the different types of love and connection that the show is built on. Sometimes when someone focuses on a romantic relationship it gets deified in a way that undersells all the other bonds the character has, but for me at least romantic ekurei only works because of their other connections.

[mango-fizz]

ALL of My Splatoon Agents Headcanons! lets gooo 💫 this will be VERY long akdhjsdhs sorry grab a cup of tea or something.

Agent 3 (Captain): They/Them, Lofted Bed with Desk underneath

Three doesn't talk very often, only when it's absolutely necessary. In Alterna, Marie mentions that they're too shy to really speak out loud, so she speaks for them, and I read once that selective muteness is a sort of extreme anxiety response. They don't really talk to strangers or people they're not very close to, for instance Neo 3, Off the Hook, or Deep Cut lmao. They definitely talk openly with the Squid Sisters and 4 and 8 (and of course, Gramps), but will usually prefer not to if it's not necessary.

They're super badass and responsible, always getting things done in an efficient manner and doing their best with every mission. I mean, how else do you think they became Captain, right? But they also might be a little insecure, a little anxious. Yes they do their best in missions, but that's because they desperately want to be useful, because they're worried something might go wrong, things like that. They even drop out of school to be an Agent full-time (again, Captain)

In regards to the other Agents, they're kind of stern and aloof, but more in like the tired oldest sibling kind of way. Don't eat that, don't go there, you'll catch a cold, etc, taking care of the newer recruits. They picked this up from Callie and Marie, who did the same for them when they first joined. Neo 3's reckless tendencies remind them of their younger self.

Now, I mention all of this in my fics, so I'll keep it brief. Three is reckless, always pushing themselves even when they shouldn't and regularly forgetting to take care of themselves (thats when they were younger, they're definitely better about it now). They carry a sort of guilt, a sort of anxiety, about the events of Splatoon 2, and I mean both of them. They feel bad for almost killing Eight like twice, even if the second time wasn't really their fault, and they feel bad for not helping Callie when she needed it, which is also not their fault. But, you see, Callie and Marie are their older sisters. Their family. A precious part of their life that they were lucky enough to obtain when they previously had nothing. So, yeah, I guess they feel a certain type of way about what happened.

Oh, also! Sanitization scar, yeah its there, maybe not as big as everyone else draws it but it's definitely there sjfhsjdhs on their forehead splitting their right eyebrow, it's a bit like a cut. It's covered by their Captain hat now, but even then the teal green has definitely dulled over the years. Now it's just a grim reminder and nothing more.

Three used to live alone in an apartment in Inkopolis that the Squid Sisters had generously offered them. Living alone is difficult. Thankfully, Four and Eight arrived, and now they're all roommates :)

Three is, again, a bit aloof n shit, always trying to be responsible and cool, but the younger agents are experts at cracking that facade. Three is actually super soft for them!! They definitely make jokes and snort at things Four says. Hums along with songs Eight listens to and compliments her poetry.

Three thinks they're a bit annoying, Four particularly, but they also always always always help them when they're sad, or hurt (not that it happens often, they're all capable agents after all). That's what older siblings are for, after all. Isn't that great? Three has 4 siblings now! And a gramps! I'm so happy for them.

I tried to keep this short but basically all my Agent 3/Captain feelings can be found in these two fics. I poured my heart and soul into them! [Family] [Home]

DJ Sango. I don't know what to make of DJ Sango but I'm eagerly awaiting the Squid Sisters collab. Agent 3 is the secret third Squid Sister, after all.

Agent 4: She/Her, Top Bunk

I feel like Four is more…… outgoing? She's the youngest and the shortest. She's the baby. She gets Eight to do stupid shit with her and then they both get (very fondly) lectured by Three. Sometimes she convinces Three to join in and then they all get lectured by Marie instead lmao. She's kinda……. like a gremlin. A Creature. She does her best :) She's trying so hard. She's very energetic. I think she would do her best to make Eight feel welcome and comfortable and make sure that she's having fun :))

Four didn't really understand, at first. I mean, what she went through doesn't even compare to what happened in the metro, yknow? She's definitely the most, how do i say, optimistic? She usually is the one who has to do most of the comforting, but she doesn't mind. Sometimes Eight has a nightmare, and Three and Four have to comfort her. Sometimes Three needs help with their head injury, so Four and Eight have to take care of them, and that's okay.

She likes helping people, and cheering them up. That's why she helped Marie in the first place, right? She just looked so sad in the corner of the Square... Four is happy that she was able to help :) Truly, they all appreciate it more than she knows. And of course, Four is besties with Callie and Marie. Four and Callie can match each other's energy easily sjfhsjdhsj and... she was there for Marie during her lowest point so... she's very grateful :)

In the time after getting Callie back, sometimes she would go and check up on them. It's not her responsibility, she's already done more than Marie could ever repay, but she cares about them, and... it's not like she has anywhere else to go.

She comes from the countryside canonically, and also didn't know who the Squid Sisters were, but for some reason I see her as being very streetsmart and things like that. Maybe she didn't know who the Squid Sisters were before, but she definitely does now, and bonds with Eight over their love for the idols.

A bit after they all moved in with Three, Marie made Four and Eight go back to school, bummer. (This matters to no one else but me, but the high school Four and Eight go to is the same high school Callie and Marie went to.)

Four is a natural athlete, but a bit of a troublemaker. After school she likes to go play turf and do a few Grizzco shifts. Imagine her surprise when she finds out about Mr. Grizz 💀

Four is very physically affectionate, always hugging or otherwise touching the other agents. Shoving, poking, patting, punching, holding, bonking, you name it. I've definitely projected that onto the agents lmao. I'm pretty sure I've made them bonk heads with each other as a form of affection like three times now.

If Four doesn't show up in Side Order, you'll never hear from me again on account of my spontaneous combustion.

Agent 8: She/Her, Bottom Bunk.

I feel like Eight would be generally more curious/nervous about everything since, I mean, she just got to the surface yknow? (also amnesia I think.??). Also, she doesn't know inkling very well, but that's okay, she's learning! Marina helps her :)  (when Marina is busy, Shiver fills in 🤫) But, maybe by Splatoon 3 she's good enough at it that she doesn't need lessons anymore. I mean, it has been 5 years. Okay look I just want an excuse for all the Octolings to interact with each other is that too much to ask? But that's a bit difficult because Marina and Eight have more in common with their upbringing than Shiver, but that's a topic for another day.

Eight is just happy to be here!! She is incredibly strong, agile, and good with any weapon :) Think of Yor Forger. Very strong, sometimes without realizing it. A little clueless, a little silly. Red and black color scheme. As a result of this I think she would try to be very very gentle as much as possible, but she still enjoys playfully roughhousing with the other agents. She also makes a lot of goofy facial expressions. You'd think this would be Four, but no, it's her ksfhhfsdkfjh

So... the metro. Right. I think... Eight carries a sort of sadness with her. At least at first, right? It's... tough. Having to adjust to everything, losing your memory, coping with The Horrors tm. That's why she'll always be grateful to Off the Hook for offering her a place to stay at the Houzuki mansion during her first days in Inkopolis. Marina's been there, so she offers much comfort. Pearl also does her best to make her feel welcome and safe, like she did with Rina. Eventually she does go move in with Three and Four though because... because I said so ksfhjkfjhf

Eight is afraid of blenders. Autobombs.

It took a while for Three and Eight to really become... what's the word I'm looking for. Stable? I mentioned Three carrying unnecessary guilt. Eight doesn't hold it against them, of course not. But, I mean, have you seen that shit? I never played Inner Agent 3 but just watching a video of it has me awake at night dude that shit is scary as fuck. Three splashdowns in a row? Dear god. Anyway, they made up and it's chill now so it's fine. Still no blenders though.

Eight loves Off the Hook, and she loves the Squid Sisters. Calamari Inkantation and all that. Wait til she hears the banger of the century Ink Me Up dude that shit goes insanely hard. Actually, wouldn't it be so fucking funny if Eight came up one day like "Guys, I'm so obsessed with this song by a group from the Splatlands, they're called Deep Cut!" and then when Deep Cut show up as Marie's new employees she's like holy shit.

She goes to school with Four and it's the most fun she's ever had in her life (that she can remember), she doesn't understand why Four hates it so much. She's also obviously very naturally athletic, but she enjoys the arts and literature a lot more. Because she writes poetry lol 🤓

She's happy to stay an agent, I think. Maybe not on the front lines like Captain and the Squid Sisters are, but she's available as backup should she ever be needed. She wants to focus on her new life on the surface with her wonderful new family. She doesn't even remember if she had any parents, let alone friends. But now, she has all these people who care about and support her. For that, she would claw her way out of the Metro a hundred times over again. She loves them.

........So, Side Order, huh? Hehehehehe.

Damn. That's crazy.

Neo 3: They/Them, Living Arrangement Unknown

I think Neo being a gen Z kid is the funniest shit ever.

They're the hardest to think up a personality for, I don't really know what to make of them. I think they would be kind of epic, yknow? 🗿  They have no idea who any of these people are or what is happening, how did they even get into this mess bruh. Well, at least they get to hang out with Deep Cut so thats a plus. I think Neo and Four would get along the best, they both kinda have that chaotic energy, I feel. I would say Neo is like halfway between Captain and Four, personality-wise.

There's like,,,, a very vague botw Link vibe going on with them. Not sure though. I mean, look, they hang out in the desert and also have a salmonid for a pet. Like, what's goin on with all that.

They're generally very chill about everything that happened in Alterna (existentialism aside.)

"Why didn't I tell you that I went to space? Dunno. You never asked. 'S whatever. Yo, wanna see Little Buddy do a trick?"

~*~

I am holding you at knifepoint to watch this person's channel, because they deadass rearranged my entire brain chemistry (here is their twitter).

And also, this person's channel, because I greatly enjoy their agents content and it makes me giggle (here is their insta).

Both of these are important to understand how I came to characterize the Agents the way I do.

If you made it this far, I thank you profusely for reading!! These funny little guys mean a lot to me. Splatoon in general means a lot to me. Man. Damn. Fuck. I haven't even gotten into the Squid Sisters.

Anyway. Thank you so much. I hope you were at least entertained by my rambling and I hope you have a great rest of your day! I love you 💕

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 06/02/2024

He is Back.

Season 6 No Album Release (Read More)

Ripped by eg_9371

Requested by Alex Worm and an anonymous reader!

Hey, so, SiIva Team - what the fuck is the deal with the goat?

Like, SiIvaGunner hasn't exactly been a stranger to creepy rips, particularly during its early years. On *** EVERYTHING IS FINE ***, for instance, I talked about the legendary horror that rips of the game "Barbie Horse Adventures: Blue Ribbon Race" have instilled into the audience thanks to just one rip back in Season 1, and we of course have Netyasha Roozi's excellent annual PlayStation Console BIOS rips of every Halloween, such as Play In MissingNo's Station. Yet, for as ominous and spooky as these rips are, I at least feel like I sort of GET them. Even four years on from its debut on the channel, I still don't know what the hell to make of "the standing goat".

Beginning with a rip of Cave Story's Mimiga Town theme back in Season 4 Episode 2, the confusion was immediately apparent - the 10 second video featured in the rip is from a moderately-popular Instagram post describing the goat statue's creepiness factor, and the song used is an arrangement of Pissy Pamper by Young Nudy and Playboi Carti - to my knowledge, with zero actual relation to one another. And sure, Mimigas in Cave Story are fuzzy little guys in an ominous world, that kind of befits the standing goat video - but the thing was, after this video's explosion in confusing reception, the goat just KEPT showing up. He would be recreated in different per-game artstyles like Deltarune and Ace Attorney, yet never properly...explained?

Yet, most bizarre of all, it seems as if for a small while the channel was playing at some sort of culmination to all of its buildup. During DJ Professor K's one-day takeover, an otherwise inconspicuous rip had the message "He is coming." hidden in its description - only for said rip to be followed up by Game Over/Password - Altered Beast, an arrangement of Pissy Pamper that effectively jumpscares you with the goat's presence by the end of it. The message hidden in its description? "He is here. Run.". And this Altered Beast rip was also part of an already-existing pattern with rips featuring the goat: "Memory", "Mysterious Crash", "Good Night", "Game Over" - several rips utilizing the creature seemed to explicitly be hinting at something far more ominous than what the video alone lets on.

Which brings us to the first true descent into this madness, one that stood out like nothing else quite did during Season 6's Halloween event: He is Back. In an event otherwise characterized by its lighthearted use of David S. Pumpkins, in-universe contextualized as little more than a fun halloween party, there's something yet more unsettling about the goat we've all been wondering about, reappearing in a rip that feels flat-out dangerous in atmosphere. The messages from the video description continue, this time saying - "Look behind you. I said, look behind you." - as if there's someone we aren't aware of attempting to save us from whatever this...creature is trying to achieve on the channel. Althewhile, the Pissy Pamper audio instrumental added on top makes what's otherwise primarily garbled noise from P.T.'s radio stations turn into a...surprisingly listenable, sort of glitch-hop-like banger?

The video end by leaving us with more questions than answers, as the video abruptly cuts to an error screen with the words "HE IS HERE" repeating over and over in many languages. And since He is Back's upload, we've...barely seen the goat anywhere. There's been yet one more possible development to his story, during Season 7's "The Cult of Proto" event, yet his fate and relevance to the channel remains as mysterious as it did many years ago.

For all that has and hasn't happened in the later Seasons of SiIvaGunner, I truly do love that mysteries like this still linger within the channel's mythos. And yeah, deep down I do know that these goat videos aren't meant to be amounting to anything bigger - they're just a silly, bizarre in-joke that's gradually taken on more and more creepy undertones. But there is something genuinely fun about that progression even having happened in the first place, isn't there? The goat could've easily just been left as one of many wacky out-of-nowhere jokes that Season 4s episodes debuted, yet he's been quietly sticking around, used by a small handful of rippers who seemingly have more in stock for the little guy than one would first think.

I, for one, welcome our good friend Billy with open arms.