#I had to edit to add a few more things woops

[darkmagicmirror]

I've been thinking about @spicyviren 's post about Claudia preventing the sun from rising (and they made a more in-depth post today as well, which is also very good!), so last night I got curious and Googled mythology and eclipses because what if the eclipse actually happens and it's not just Viren's dream? And we know TDP likes mythological references. So...

This is so fascinating because of the "I swallowed her" comment Aaravos makes in Janai's dream.

A demon (or dragon, or-- (etc)) is eating the sun?

(*Personally, I don't think Janai's dream is necessarily accurate for telling us what happened -- but Aditi getting "eaten" by someone especially a dragon wouldn't surprise me.)

And speaking of "swallowing"...

And some of the other mythological explanations mentioned in the article I linked are also really interesting:

(The highlighting was done by Google, so it's not necessarily more important.)

And canon material, especially the Ripples short specifically, reflects a few themes here:

Abandonment - the humans are essentially abandoned by the stars (and the sun is a star): "It cannot be, wept others. The stars would not betray us!" - after the "star" falls from the sky and changes the land.

Crisis/existential threat - "With its impact came a long and terrible night: The earth bled! The seas churned! The sun and moon hid for weeks behind the sky’s screaming storm!" (Also bolded for emphasis because the sun hiding? The fact the moon does too is interesting, but the sun specifically is called out later: "And when the long, dark night had finally passed—for the sun must always rise, mustn’t it?" VERY interesting considering the sunrise mentions in S5.)

Eclipse as an act of creation - though much of the story talks about the calamity, there's also how "[the stars] had rejoiced to look down upon their newborn sea."

The Sun and Moon coupling and creating more stars - this is more of a stretch, but the Sun and Moon did get hidden together, and the Sea (of the Castout) serving as a mirror of the stars... like they're duplicating the stars, though only in image.

Mischievous acts - I personally think Aaravos is mischievous, so hmm.

One side note on the second-to-last point: if Viren learns the Star arcanum, which is very rarely understood, could that, too, be analogous to creating another star?

Anyway this all implies that perhaps a similar eclipse occurred before, when Aaravos had fallen and the Sea of the Castout was created? And we know how the Rise Again short story, which is about her pseudo-resurrection of her pet cat, correlated to S4 opening with Claudia having brought her father back to life, sort of in a repeating history sense. Aaravos's Patience story foreshadowed the fact that all he could do in S4 is wait and bide his time. Ripples could foreshadow S5 being that first "touch" that sets off greater change... and, like with the resurrection, perhaps history repeating itself, in a sense, with a potential upcoming eclipse?

And another interesting line: "The sky opened its maw and spat from its black jaws a tiny star."

It's not exactly black, but I know some people say the ridges here look like teeth...

Also, even though Sol is referring to his blindness, these lines about the Sun "never [rising] again" and an "eternal night" fit into similar themes to the eclipse and the Ripples short.

Also, just going back to the abandonment theme of the eclipse really quick--

The Midnight Star poem also talks about the stars abandoning humanity. "Elarion, unworthy whelp, / Wept as the stars turned black the sky, / They donned their masks / They turned their backs / And left Elarion to die."

(I have more to break down about that entire stanza in another post; I just want to point out the bolded parts for now.)

Now, most of these are references to the past... so what about now?

If I were to guess on how the same themes I compared to the Ripples story might apply to "current" series events...

Abandonment - Claudia feeling abandoned by Aaravos (as mentioned in the Lost Child short)? Or, alternately, Aaravos feeling abandoned (by either Claudia, after she had to flee from the battle, and/or Viren, after his rejection)?

Crisis/existential threat - IMO the biggest threat is Karim potentially joining up with Sol Regem right now. Though some would say Aaravos being close to being freed could be the threat/crisis here. But I'm an Aaravos apologist, so I am not part of that group LOL

Eclipse as an act of creation - Claudia regenerates her missing leg, perhaps?

The Sun and Moon coupling and creating more stars - Viren Star arcanum?

Mischievous acts - Aaravos again.

All of this to say-- I don't think the eclipse is just for show/because it looks cool, but if we consider the mythological beliefs surrounding eclipses, it ties in significantly to the story.

Also I leave you with a few last bits from the article that just remind me of TDP things:

"In many cultures, the darkening of the sun meant the gods were very, very angry with humanity, and about to inflict some punishment. Often, that meant that in order to appease them, you had to kill someone."

That reminds me of the stars seeming to punish humanity for daring to use magic... which is also when Aaravos gets cast down?

"The Greeks thought an eclipse meant that the gods were about to rain punishment down on a king, so in the days before an eclipse, they would choose prisoners or peasants to stand in as the king in the hopes that they’d get the eclipse punishment and the real king would be saved. Once the eclipse was over, the substitute king was executed."

This is so far off, but it reminds me of Harrow anyway? Mostly with the soulfang serpent idea of switching Harrow with someone else. Interesting.

"For the Inuits, the sun and moon weren’t a married couple but brother and sister. At the beginning of the world they quarreled, and the sun goddess Malina walked away from her brother, the moon god Anningan. Anningan continued to chase after her, and whenever he caught up to her, there was an eclipse."

Which reminds me of the line in Strangers, the short from Soren's perspective, where "Claudia had appeared and he’d done it again, a little boy chasing after his sister..."

A lot of it is probably coincidence, but it's still really interesting!

[ncat]

Variant Classes Pt. 1

With the continued expansion of 5e through new subclasses and races, the ability to create new unique characters continues to grow. Though, in my mind, one of the faults to this is that, every time you make a new subclass or such, it's just 1 more character archetype, which can sometimes feel a little lacking in terms of new possibilities.

Now of course, there's the option to just make a lot of content, which was the style of older editions, but that eventually lead to the issue of content bloat, with there just being too much content for a single person to reasonably deal with.

Though recently in my own homebrewing, I've found what I feel is a pretty good solution for such a thing: Multiplicative, rather than additive content.

This was the idea behind my Prestige Classes document, with each single prestige class being designed to be applicable to a wide number of classes at any time, meaning that with each PrC, each would add a new potential character option for each class it could interact with (or even 1 for each subclass).

So, long rambling on thought processes, Variant Classes. The idea for this is to, by adding one new class, add new character options equal to the number of subclasses a class already had, essentially being a x2.

Variant Classes are new classes that modify an existing class to varying degrees, replacing some or many of their features with new ones, creating a whole new character option. It's sorta like a Tasha optional feature, but the optional feature messes with your entire class.

So above, there are the two Variant Classes of this post: The Archivist and the Eldritch Sage

The Archivist takes inspiration from a 3rd edition class of the same game. They are scholarly mages, though they focus on divine magic rather than arcane. As such, mechanically they are very similar to the wizard (Even having a spellbook equivalent in their 'Prayerbook'), but differing from them is their spell list: rather than the wizard list, they use the Cleric list.

In comparison to the Cleric, the way they interact with spells is a bit different. The Cleric has access to their entire spell list for free, alongside their domain spells. The Archivist however, needs to learn spells, only gaining 3 per level and needing to pay for more. To make up for this is their Domain Studies, in which they initially learn a set of Cleric domain spells of their choice. At later levels however, they can learn additional diving domains, and choose which set of domain spells to prepare from each day. Yet later they even gain the ability to prepare two domains at once.

As such, while a Cleric will often have to focus on a single theme when it comes to their spells, an Archivist is more a multi-tool, able to have a wide number of domains and prepare whichever they might need for a given day.

The Eldritch Sage is a researcher into the otherworldly. They like Wizards use their intellect to fuel their magic, but rather than from direct study of the arcane, their application of magic comes from the study of the extraplanar.

Mechanically, the eldritch Sage is a warlock, with their patron instead representing ehat type of otherworldly entity they focus their research upon. Unlike the regular warlock, they use Int instead of Cha. Most differently is that they use regular Spellcasting rather than the warlocks Pact Magic, making them more of a traditional long rest based caster.

The Eldritch Sage also interacts with Invocations differently. Rather than having a number of invocations at will they instead learn a number of invocations, and can prepare a few of them at the end of a long rest. This means that they will often have more total invocations, but less active invocations.

Woops yeah, lots of text today.

Ah, you may have noticed the Pt.1 at the top of the post! That's because I actually made 4 variant classes, it's just that the other 2 will be posted seperately (very much my own choice, totally not because tumblr didn't like me dropping 20 pages into here). So yeah, I guess look forward to seeing in maybe a few days time the Mentalist and the Mountebank.

Honestly imo they're more my favourite out of the bunch, being the more radical in their changes to their classes. (Or maybe it's bias, since I am in the process of playtesting both of them in campaigns I'm in x) )

Edit: oh hell I forgot to put in the art credits, since they were all part of the images originally, but they'd be on the last page of the second set. My bad

Art credits:

Archivist.

- Clever Distraction from Innistrad: Crimson Vow by Andrew Mar

- Conspiracy Theorist from Strixhaven by Svetlin Velinov

Eldritch Sage.

- Contact Other Plane from Adventures in the Forgotten Realms by Alix Branwyn

- Magus of the Moon MtG from Time Spiral Remastered by Milivoj Ceran

Edit: Part 2 is up, and can be found here

[bluewinnerangel]

Last update: may 14 2021

Edit: So these are pretty much my favorite posts I made from the beginning of 2021 up until then ^ and since I’ve made a ton more but just havent found the will to gather them together with something like this again. Still I’ll keep a link to this one on my page, but it’s not getting updated woop. Anyway:

Favs:

Larry’s Grandpa aesthetic. A large very not serious collection that displays how they’re sharing a very specific vibe. This thing is one big meme but is also important, highly recommend.

Larry Loves Laurels - masterpost/timeline of times laurels (meaning of the name “larry”) showed up in their clothing or elsewhere.

Louis’ synced Walls to Harry’s Lights Up music videos. The parallels are known but lining them up hurts is gonna hurt your brain on a whole new level. Poor editors. 

Body/sign language

Louis and Harry knowing sign language masterpost

Louis’ Nose Tap when he’s not telling the truth masterpost

Larry’s Grandpa aesthetic euh I guess this is a masterpost (it’s just really... unhinged)

Just a few Harry behaviors that look like Louis - let’s add this here too (not mine) - or this

Related to sign language, the theory that Louis’ common hand gesture might mean “H”

Lyric analyses / Song parallels

Masterpost here

Music video parallels

Louis’ Walls + Harry’s Lights Up (literally 2 halves of the same whole)

^ + Harry’s TPWK

^ + Liam Gallagher’s Wall of Glass and/or Oasis (as part of Larry+LG masterpost)

(not larry) Zayn’s Still Got Time + One Direction’s Take Me Home tour intro video

More gayvinci code chaos

Larry Loves Laurels - masterpost

Larry Loves Liam Gallagher - masterpost

Larry Loves Fibonacci

Same old shit, different year - 6 times Louis and/or Harry aggressively larried 1, 2, 3, or even 10 years after some other larrying on that same date.

Louis finding some boss level chaos cap and posting it on instagram

When they just decided to bluegreen at the same time

The Harry’s being geniuses with grammy outfits - How Harry & Harry Lambert might have used inverted colors to create opposite looks

Larry Loves Papillon - links to papillon posts (effectively a masterpost)

Harry loves clothing named Louis/look 28

They both love to oioiii

Debunking 28 sept 2013 - but that doesn’t even matter because harry ran with it anyway

This thing about them using *** **

(mainly 2015) aggressive displays of larry:

Louis subtly shading Taylor in 2015 and Harry treating it like a love letter 

When Louis yelled for help to stop Harry from serenading him during 18 and Liam hilariously obliged (september 28, 2015)

That same day Harry was an unhinged mess including the above and 3 more examples.

Harry definitely saying “Lou” instead of “You”

That time Harry had no control at the 2014 ARIAS - from all angles

That other time Harry had no control during an interview when Louis started mumbling in French

This collective realisation about L acting like a cat on James Corden

Just misc things I guess what is this mess who knows

I I HAVE A HAYLOR MASTER-MASTERPOST

The actual reference painting of Harry’s ship tattoo

Not mine just wanna have a link to this piece of art

Oh just Harry making Louis laugh and then getting all shy about it, or: a real life Jim Halpert.

This thing about the SOTT cover and bjs

Harry said “George Michael” - not much of a post I just feel like this will come back in the faith in the future

This dumbass post about Louis wearing skull shirts that i do have more to say about but.. one day (or not).

What even is this band - 1D chaos gifs

some tags I use (these tags don’t work on mobile and I don’t get why yay): 

gayvinci code - “this lil shit did this on purpose didn’t he” type of mess.

aggressive larrying - literal aggressive displays of affection or very loud larryvinci’ing.

smart things with lyrics

welikeparallels

if only there was a name for them together - just larry being one morphed entity behaving the same

Watermelon sugar WHY - Staring at Louis’ face hours

This is a mermaid - Staring at Harry’s face hours

dancing in the street - them looking like david bowie and/or mick jagger <3

FL - tag for lyric analyses of songs on Fine Line or somehow link to them

/endofmess

[silverwhiteraven]

Wings of Broken White - Ch.8

Tag List: @marichatmay

[ Posted on Ao3 ] [ Chapter 1 ] [ Chapter 7 ] [ Chapter 9 ]

Marinette and Chat Blanc continued to see each other sporadically after their midnight meeting full of emotional rollercoastering and winged secrets. He had told Ladybug about it a few days after, leaving out the part about Marinette’s revealing of having wings. It made her heart skip to know that he would keep a secret that wasn’t his to tell even if he didn’t have to. Ladybug thanked him for being honest with her and told him to be careful, but she was happy he got the chance to spread his wings around another friend.

Ladybug also offered to increase their patrols together if he ever wanted to practice flying with her. She even teasingly said something along the lines of them both needing the benefit of practicing with each other, just in case they ever had to have each other’s backs during a fight in the skies. He accepted, looking giddy to get even more opportunities to fly with another. She also found it unfairly adorable when he joked that he wouldn't get jealous if she wanted to fly around with one of her own civilian friends.

The two even thought about the possibility of some day both flying with their civilian friends together. Ladybug had to hide her giggle at the thought that she might have to break the news that Ladybug and Marinette could never fly together, if this proposed group flight practice were to ever take place.

But Ladybug did confess to Chat Blanc, that if she were to ever choose a civilian to fly with, it would be either Nino Lahiffe or Alya Césaire, because if there was anyone besides Marinette Dupain-Cheng that was trustable, it had to be the people Marinette herself trusted most. Chat hardly held back on his approval of the choices, and it made her laugh to see his bright antics.

After that, several more months passed by the duo, and the world. School was nearing the end of another year. Akuma’s were just as rare and random as ever. Best of all, Chloé had continued to be reprimanded by an ever vigilant Adrien. She was starting to almost mellow out as the fact slowly sunk in that someone she cared about and who cared about her, too, was actually willing to go against her, and even leave her, because she was in the wrong.

All of this led up to an end of school project for their class.

The students were to work together in equal shares to put on a play, telling either one of the fairy tale stories they had studied in class, or one they made up on their own. Nino had proposed that they make a short movie out of the project so that the fruit of their joint efforts could be shared outside of class. The teacher thought the idea was brilliant, and gave them extra time and afterschool privileges to help them set up.

Marinette had been a little tired the day the class was assigning the roles. Her mind only half paid attention, causing her replies to be badly timed and delayed. Because of it, an interesting selection of character parts were assigned.

“Now, I know we’ve been delaying assigning the lead roles,” Nini spoke from where he stood at the front of the room, acting as one of the movie’s directors, “ but I wanted to make sure everyone knew what the other options were before a bunch of people tried to jump at being the Knight of the Princess. So let’s start. Any volunteers or votes for the Knight’s Princess?”

There was various various calls of names and a few ‘me!’s, and most of it all went over Marinette’s head. The only part that really registered was ‘votes for the Knight’, so Marinette half-heartedly pipped in, “Adrien could do it.”

The room went quiet and all eyes turned to her like she had just declared herself to be an Akuma or something. She blinked, wondering what she said.

Nino was the one to break the silence with a crooked and amused smile. “Marinette, you want Adrien to be the Princess?”

She gaped like a fish, realizing she had heard his earlier question completely and utterly wrong. She waved her arms around and she stuttered, trying, and failing, to clear away her mistake. She froze when Adrien burst out laughing, clearly not offended or even upset.

“Why not?” Adrien chuckled as he calmed. “Not the first time I’ve been told I’m pretty enough to be royalty. It would be a nice break from the cool-guy look I’ve been doing at photoshoots lately, too.”

The room started to buzz again with noise. It seemed everyone was considering it, liking the idea of breaking away from assigning a girl to be the Princess.

Alya pipped up above the others mischievously. “So if Adrien get’s to be the Princess, who’s taking the role of Knight? Another of the boys, or one of the girls? At this point, anyone can take the spot since we’ve decided to ignore traditional gender roles. Any volunteers?”

There was more discussion filling the room at that declaration, and a few people glanced at Chloé. She had probably been gunning for the role of Princess, but now she seemed to be pouting. “If Adrien is taking the lead role, then I still want a good one. But I refuse to be a smelly Knight! I’d rather be the King.” She stated decidedly, and the class chuckled and murmured their acceptance of her decision. They were happy to have her not throwing a fuss. It was rather refreshing, actually, to see her still being dramatic but cooperative with the class.

Murmurs continued as the class discussed the role of Knight. Marinette stayed out of it, too embarrassed that she might mess up again. It wasn’t long before Adrien hummed to himself and turned to her.

“Marinette? Would you like to be the Knight to my Princess?” She squeaked at the sudden proposal, and the class hushed. Adrien turned to the others, a small but confident smile on his lips. “She’s helped all of us in Akuma attacks before, right? Marinette acts the part of a Knight saving dames and damsels in distress naturally. I think she could do this, if she wants to, that is,” he adds with a reassuring glance. There wasa round of agreements from the others, before all eyes turned to her, breaths held in anticipation of her answer.

Retreating into the neckline of her oversized shirt to hide a fluster, she nodded her acceptance. There were a few excited woops, and Kim even whistled.

After that, all the roles and assignments for the project were set.

Marinette and Adrien were to be Knight and Princess. Chloé and Juleka took to the King and Queen. Kim and Ivan claimed a joint role of the Dragon for themselves. Rose volunteered to be the Evil Sorceress. Mylène wanted the role as the Knight’s Fairy Guide. Alix was to make props and set backgrounds in the art room. Nathaniel and Alya were the script-writers for the story. Max and Nino were on camera duty with the help of Markov. Sabrina was put in charge of coordinating, scheduling, and final edits.

Lastly, everyone was given two tasks as a group: First, if they had nothing to, they were to help their fellow classmates who were still working. And second, everyone pitches in for the costumes if they can.

Everything went surprisingly smoothly for their project once everything was divided up. Adrien got Chloé to pitch in for the costumes with him, both allowing their immense closets to be raided. Alya and Nino were able to check out cameras from the yearbook and photography clubs. Props became a group-effort when most of the class rather enjoyed, and got carried away with, the art room’s free to use supplies. Some of the musically inclined were putting together a playlist for mood and background music. Kim helped the cast members practice their lines, even standing in for a partner if someone wasn’t there.

It was fun, Marinette had to admit. Up until the inevitable hitch caught up to them, though.

The days of filming their project were upon them. The school’s courtyard had been commandeered for the majority of their sets, empty due to it being a weekend. Large green rolls of poster paper had been used like wallpaper, hung from the second floor banisters to act as a greenscreen. The stairs got covered in painted cardboard so they would look like castle walls and towers from the side.

The entrance to the school was left clear, since the class had deemed it worthy to be its own set background twice over. The first was to act as the front gate to the King and Queen’s castle for the opening scene outside. The second would be from the inside, doors closed and covered with curtains to make it look like the inside of a Great Hall. To give the makeshift Great Hall its finishing touch, Chloé had ‘borrowed’ the fancy chair from her Father’s office to act as a throne.

All in all, things went great. The story and filming opened with the Knight, Marinette, decked out in painted cardboard and foam armor, returning from a mission in another country. He was summoned by the King and Queen immediately upon arrival, to be told that the Princess, Adrien, had been cursed and kidnapped by the Evil Sorceress. To their credit, Juleka and Chloé actually did an amazing job of acting and looking like emotionally distressed parents who just lost their daughter. And when they did a flashback scene in one of the classrooms, Rose proved to be one scary Evil Sorceress with Adrien a perfect damsel in distress. They did have to redo the scene several times, though, because the Queen, Juleka, was having trouble not looking like she wished she was being kidnapped by a very pretty girl instead.

The Fairy Guide, Mylène, was then called forth to help assist the Knight in tracking down the Evil Sorceress and navigate through the Magic Woods. This part took a mix of walking along the makeshift greenscreen wall multiple times and actually going out to a few of the parks around Paris. They had to admit to themselves, though, that they mostly just wanted to run around in-costume and have fun, as well as eat a picnic that Alya’s mother and Marinette’s father had both contributed to after hearing about the project.

It was the pre-rescue battle scene that caused the hiccup. The class artists had done a too-good job on the two-person costume of their Dragon. Kim sat upon Ivan’s shoulders, allowing the Dragon to have an impressive two and a half metre height from head to ground. Kim was also very set on being very animated and expressive with the Dragon, so the mouth, full of sharp paper mache fangs, opened and closed at his command while he threw glitter out like it was fire. Ivan controlled the legs, wings, and body, which all had moving parts for mobility. The legs were strapped to his own, so they walked and stepped when he did. The wings were controlled by Ivan’s Raven wings, allowing them to move realistically. Kim, acting as the neck, would twist around, and Ivan, needing to keep balance, would follow his movements, causing the whole dragon to lumber around and sway like it was alive.

The Fairy Guide, Mylène, couldn't bring herself to face the Dragon at all, let alone appear on set with it. What really took them off guard, however, was the Akuma that came along as the class was gathered around Mylène.

[robynmarkius]

Language Differences

So I have a bit of a long ramble, which involves Spoilers for the end of 5.3; obviously. Some of it’s already out there as I replied on mobile while half asleep, but it led to talking to the lovely @shiro-from-cafeberry​ about the German text. (Once again, thank you so much! I enjoy talking to you! :D <3 I have discovered I have even more questions for you to help with. lol) I then bothered my friend and co-writer @xehniscreations​ about French and she said it’d be a good practice to shake off the rust. (She ended up translating the whole ending scene for practice! <33 lol )

This all started because I am married to a man who has a degree in Linguistics and a simple questioning of one line/part led to hours of jokes and discussions. Which then turned into me putting my game client into two languages that I don’t speak a word of just to see what a character said... XD And! And! Learning a few other things along the way. I’ve been having so much fun with this and I hope you all can too. Plopping a cut here so as not to completely destroy anyone still trying to avoid Spoilers... or those who want to prepare some tissues. lol

I have cried a lot in the process of this entire Translation, and keep crying. lol As long as this post/translator ramble got, I made sure to post the ‘screenshot comic’, “Remnant” [as its own post] for the sake of focus. That was the scene that started this trip down the rabbit hole, after all. xD

After three days of editing this post, I decided to split it, so that this was just the ending scene. There’s flashbacks I also covered, but this was getting extremely long and I realize that I had not asked Shiro about the first flashback at all! So I still have things to finish and more to talk about before I have more.

For now, though, let’s talk!

Part One: Elidibus’ Explanation

The lines in question came from when Elidibus picked up the crystals, then told us he heard the voices of despair/cries and lamentations of his friends. After which there’s a slightly awkward explanation about how there were lots of opinions and thoughts about the world/star, which led to Elidibus pulling himself free of Zodiark in order to help his friends. It bothered Hubs because it felt kinda “clunky”; he explained:

“I think it’s because of a general norm of Japanese society we hear so much about. That it’s important to have a consensus and not to stir up trouble or stick out too much; which is how that part kind of reads. Your direct Translation is fine. I just feel like the localization team just kinda gave up when they wrote the English version. They could have give a little more context on it when they wrote it. Instead, what happens is, it feels out of place and awkward where it is. It also doesn’t give the context of when Elidibus freed himself from Zodiark. Is there any context that says that wasn’t when Hydaelyn shattered the star into the reflections or Shards?”

Putting aside his question about when Elidibus actually separated from Zodiark for now; as that’s a whole ‘nother discussion that’s rather interesting; I finally understood what he meant by my Translation felt clunky. It was accurate to a “direct translation” versus a “localization”. I re-translated the whole part just to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, and made sure that the final lines I wrote in English still made sense. lol

First, I wanted to note the differences in terms; in case I slip when putting this together. ^^; The literal translation of 「十四人委員会」 would be "Fourteen-person Committee"; but in the context of FF14, (at least in English,) we call it the "Convocation of Fourteen", so I try to stick with that for final translations. What makes anything with the Ancients more difficult, is that they're not speaking a language that we can immediately understand, but rather making sounds that our Echo/超える力/l'Écho/Kraft des Transzendierens interprets into words we/the WoL/WoD can understand. The downside is lack of clarification for actual translation if you don't fluently read or speak another language. lol

For example, when Elidibus speaks, we hear the words spoken, so if there's a kanji that's said more than one way, I can hear which definition is correct by listening to the sentence. But the Ancients' "woop woop wop wah wahp woo" is harder to interpret... but, at least it's the same in every language, right? XD For German, they have “The Convent”, and French has “The Council of Fourteen”.

Second, in English, we called him “The Emissary”, which is another term for “Mediator; Arbitrator; Go-Between” which is the definition of the term 調停者 [shouteisha] , his Japanese title. When translating from German, Shiro used the term “The Advocate”. His French title is “le Médiateur” His role seems to be the same, at least, he settled disputes, found the facts, kept things in check, and generally maintained balance. That was the seat of Elidibus; which is necessary to understand why he said what he said about being needed. (Those titles come from the first flashback as well as the second one; which I’ll get to in the next post. <3 )

The English lines that started this conversation are: “Divided -- over the fate of the star. A rare occurrence, always fleeting. But not this time. Not this time... Reconciliation. Elidibus. I was needed. I withdrew myself from Zodiark. For them...”

Japanese: 世界の行く末について、たくさんの意見が出た…… そんなことは珍しいから、委員会のみんなが悩んでいた。

だったら、エリディブスが手助けしに行かないと…… そう思って、ゾディアークから零れ落ちたんだ。

Final Translation: (after edits and all this discussion) "A great many opinions were expressed regarding the fate of the world, Everyone in the Convocation was troubled, since such a thing was unusual.

That being the case, I could not go help them in my role as Emissary. I believed that they needed Elidibus, so I pulled myself from Zodiark.”

In French, from Xehnis: "Le Concile avait perdu sa cohésion...Face à l’anéantissement, les avis divergeaient sur la marche à suivre pour sauver notre planéte…

Ça ne leur ressemblait pas...Plus que jamais, ils avaient besoin d’Elidibus...Ils avaient besoin de moi...Alors, je me suis détaché de Zordiarche pour voler à leur secours…”

Her final translation: “The Council had lost its cohesion...In the face of annihilation, opinions differed on the way to save our planet…

It does not resemble them...more than ever, they needed Elidibus...they needed me....so, I detached from Zordiark to fly to their aid…”

The German lines, from Cafe Berry’s Shiro, along with the explanations: "Die Zukunft der Welt hing in der Schwebe und Chaos machte sich breit. Die Ascians waren zutiefst gespalten. Der Konvent uneins..."

Here, they are talking about how the Ascians, and most importantly, the convent is divided. How the future of the world was not clear and with that chaos spread.

"Elidibus, der Fürsprecher, musste etwas tun. Ich musste etwas tun. Und so spaltete ich mich wieder von Zodiark ab ..."

Here, Elidibus says that Elidibus, as the Emissary, had to do something. HE had to do something. So he split off from Zodiark.

Their translation they gave me then, was: "The future of the world hung in the balance and chaos spread. The Ascians were deeply divided. The convent divided ...

Elidibus, the advocate, had to do something. I had to do something. And so I split off from Zodiark again ... "

This was the part that my husband had called into question; with my original translation to:

"Many opinions and thoughts came forth, regarding the fate of our world.... The Convocation was worried, as such a thing was unusual."

世界の行く末について、たくさんの意見が出た…… そんなことは珍しいから、委員会のみんなが悩んでいた。

The literal translation of it all, would be: "The world's future/fate concerning/regarding, a great many/a lot (of) comments were brought up/expressed......

such thing(s) are/is curious/rare/unusual because/since, committee of everyone("Everyone on the Committee") (was/were actively being) troubled/worried.”

There was also the lines that followed, which were also rough to word in English, so the whole section had felt awkward.

だったら、エリディブスが手助けしに行かないと…… そう思って、ゾディアークから零れ落ちたんだ。

“if that's the case, Elidibus (from) assistance (as/in the role of) to go/to do (could not),

so/appearing that/seeming that considered/believed/reckoned/judged/decided/desired, Zodiark (from) spilled over/scattered from (n'da - 'no desu' / 'no da' used to add emphasis)"

I had tried: "I decided that they needed Elidibus, but as I was I couldn't help them, so I pulled myself away from Zodiark.

Which was another way to put the idea of: "That being the case, Elidibus could not go rescue/help, I believed, then spilled and fell over/scattered from Zodiark."

It ended up: "A great many thoughts and opinions were expressed regarding the fate of the world, Everyone on the Committee was troubled, since such a thing was unusual.If that was the case, I could not give them assistance in the role of Arbitrator. I believed that they needed Elidibus, so I fell/scattered from Zodiark."

In the end, for this part, it really helped to learn what was said in French and German, because it helped solidify more what was trying to be said, and that there probably is at least a little societal influence in the Japanese text. If it hadn’t been for Xehnis and Shiro’s assistance, I probably wouldn’t have landed on something that felt comfortable enough in English. <3

They all feel different, but have the same general idea: that even after Zodiark was summoned; and Elidibus became his Heart; things hadn’t been fixed. Things continued to grow worse, and they began to fight, and have conflict. As Arbitrator/Emissary/Advocate/Mediator, Elidibus’ job was to maintain balance, and settle disputes, but he could no longer do the job of his seat as the Heart of Zodiark, and it seemed to be destroying the Convocation; making things worse; so he yanked himself out of a Primal to go tell everyone to SIMMER DOWN, NOW.

Sidenote/Side Question here... I wonder what happened with Venat and Hydaelyn...? Perhaps we’ll get clarification in the future, as the only person who’s become/been anything like Elidibus has been Minfilia as the ‘Words of the Mother’, then sent off as an “Emissary” of sorts to the First. lol

This all led to wondering about the last line; as it was clearly different in the Japanese Audio than the English Text. I do want to state that I think what they did in English worked just as well for the emotional gut punch intended from Elidibus’ last words; but it’s very different. It did lead to looking at the flashback in Anemnesis Anyder where we heard the line about the rain, which will be in the next post.

English: “The rains have ceased, and we have been graced with another beautiful day. But you are not here to see it.”

Japanese: 私が最後に残ったって……��方ないじゃないか……。 Translation: “There’s nothing for it then, is there? I’m the last one left...”

French: Je devais partir en dernier... Comment aurais-je pu abandonner mes amis, esseulés en ce bas monde? Translation: “I had to leave last...how could I abandon (forsake) my friends, lonely in this lowly world?”

German: Es ist vorbei ... Alles verloren ... Ich bin der Letzte ... Translation: "It is over. Everything lost... I am the last..."

Japanese can also be read as “I’m the last one left... I guess it can’t be helped, huh?” but even in context, it didn’t flow quite as well as I’d like.. but that doesn’t take away from the crying, does it... ; A; I got the term “Remnant” from Japanese, where “watashi ga saigo ni nokotta tte” would literally translate to “I’m the final remnant”/”I’m the last leftover”, which I did word as “I’m the last one remaining/left.” (It is also 'Sumo term, cried by the referee to indicate that a rikishi is still in the ring’, but that didn’t quite feel right here, however, you can take the sumo joke if you’d like. <3)

I’m going to repeat that I think referring back to the line he was told back when he’d gotten the title of Elidibus wasn’t bad, and it did still work very well to convey that lost, lonely, longing he was left with as a remnant; what little was left of him, lamented the loss of his beloved people; people that he’d just wanted to save. This is evidenced in French and German; where he states that he’s all that’s left, everything is lost, it is over... that he had to go last, so he wouldn’t abandon his friends.

I appreciate that we gave Elidibus all the constellation stones, which, in a way, let him finally be with all of his friends once more. All the stones, except for ours; we kept that, because Hades made it for us. He made it for us to remember, so that the story of the Ancients wouldn’t be forgotten; the ‘truth’ he made sure he told us when we asked about the past.

At least, that’s what I choose to believe for now.

[Next Post >>]

[clockworkmoose]

Oof 2020 recap.

I stepped down from my job in... End of Jan? Early Feb? with the intention of 1. getting away from a crazy employee I was not being paid enough to deal with and was not allowed to fire, 2. Finally had enough savings that I wasn’t a constant ball of insecurity, and I could take 9 months off with no income before I’d start worrying, and 9 months felt like a good time frame to try and be self employed and sell crafts/plushies at conventions.

Because why wouldn’t there be a bunch of conventions to sell things at in 2020???

Not working 50 hour weeks was also supposed to give me time to plan August wedding, and make wedding dress.

March, start sending out wedding invites. Two weeks later, Cuomo shuts down the entire state. *~*Timing~*~

Send out “woops hold that thought” cards.

The fiance had to transition to teaching his classes over zoom, and making youtube videos, which ends up being a 12-hour, 7-day a week time commitment. On the plus there, that was a huge crash course in video editing he finally had a reason to learn. And serendipitously, me had his brother had gotten him a bunch of camera and recording equipment to bully him into doing movie reviews on youtube, so he actually had the stuff he needed to teach online effectively. He takes over half of my craft room immediately after I reorganized and spread things out to make sewing more efficient and organized. Sewing stuff gets re-squished back into the corner. :<

April, i sew so many masks. so so many. i do not like sew mask. ;~;

Etsy sticks more fees on their site! I make a website! Web design has changed a fuckton since ye olden dayes of neopet pet pages! I have no idea what I’m doing; can’t even add a glitter trail following the cursor around! Where is the option for autoplay music in the background! Lame!

Mid June, and no end in sight for, ...y’know, so we cancel August wedding and push our deposit back to 2021. Fiance was really bummed about not getting the specific date so like a week later the venue says we can still show up with a small group and get “official married” outside on the day. I’m not gung-ho for this at all, but James is, so we decide to do that; start scrambling. I make my dress but like. From what was supposed to be the first drape fabric, because fabric store’s still closed. I like it, but idk!

I didn’t think I actually cared super much about wedding details, like I didn’t have a “dream wedding” as a kid or have a moodboard or anything... All I was really hoping for was having family there since I only get to see all the cousins maybe once every 7-10 years, and making my own dress. Since big family gather was obviously not allowed, not even being able to make my dress in the way I saw it in my head was just kinda... disgruntling? I guess? Sad emotions I can’t really put to words, and not strong enough to overrule fiance having strong happy emotions about getting to keep our original wedding date.

New York gathering limit is raised to 25, so my family (6) and his (2) plus us and officiant (3) all get together and yay, officially married on August 1st! Until we get paperwork from NY state, and ha ha funny story, officiant signed the paperwork for August 2. Officiant apologizes, sends in a correction letter, so now we’re officially married on the 2nd, but have a footnote in state records that says *(actually it was Aug. 1).

So like, I’m happy we got married, that’s a happy part of the day, but 1. family wasn’t there, 2. didn’t get to make the dress I was hoping to, 3. we didn’t even get the fucking date we did all this for??? It’s a complicated mix of emotions and I’m finding myself just kinda ignoring the fact we actually got married instead of trying to grapple and force the positive feelings to outweigh the negative. SHRUG EMOJI HAHA. DEALING WITH OUR FEELINGS? SOUNDS SUS.

September, my former job reopens, asks if I want to come back, because the person I trained as my replacement ended up quitting because she didn’t want to come back. Neither do I.

October, they hire a new manager, and I end up going in to train her a few days, and cover for her a few more days, and now I’m on call to help out, because I am a big wimpy pushover and did actually really like my job, and like the new lady taking over and don’t want things to be hard for her.

November, I got glasses! I have discovered that the world should NOT be blurry when it is 10 feet away from you.

I know I struggle without a defined definite schedule and my brain latches on to any possible distraction, so this year has been heck. Mental health-wise, I’m doing much better now that I’m not in daily contact with chaos employee! But productivity and focus-wise? ZIP ZILCH ZERO. It has been a STRUGGLE. I don’t have a distraction free zone because of James doing work-from-home teaching, and I don’t have a defined schedule of social events and work shifts to keep me on task. I kinda feel like my brain has turned into a bunch of smokey fog that’s just kinda swirling around inside my head, and every once in a while I emerge and realize a week has passed and I have not checked my email or talked to another non-husband human being in that time.

Oh, and small schadenfreude update on chaos employee- she didn’t have a job until the state reopened, wasn’t eligible for unemployment during the shutdown apparently, her husband finally got the divorce he’s been pushing for for the past decade, and she had to sell her 5k$ sewing machine to be able to make the monthly payments on it. And when she came in to the store once it reopened, new manager had already been warned that she was banned from the premises.

But before she was chased out, she rambled on about how she thought the government was tracking her phone so she got a new one and didn’t back up any of her contacts, and she was hoping new manager would give her my number again because we’re “””best friends.”””””””  Manager declined to assist.

CHAOS LADY DOESN’T HAVE MY NUMBER OR ADDRESS ANY MORE. :D

[bumbord]

b e s t f r i e n d

At 1:00 pm, everyone was trying to stay awake during a hot and sunny day while the math teacher discussed algebra. I was busy trying to understand the lesson; the teacher called you to recite, “psst boi ano answer?” you asked the person beside me, and I didn’t pay any attention to it. He was called next, and both of you didn’t know the answer. The two were asked to stay standing up. I was called next, and I, unfortunately, didn’t know the answer and was asked to do the same. However, I didn’t realize that that was the start of a new friendship.

I was a flight risk, with a fear of falling

Wondering why we bother with love, it it never lasts

The three of us started hanging out; we all had the same interests, and we were all crackheads. We hanged out during recess, sharing the snacks we (I) had. We talked about different video games and YouTubers that I never got to do with my other friends. That was the very first time I felt comfortable being friends with the opposite gender until my friends pointed out that you and I would look good together.

You learn my secrets and you figure out why I’m guarded

You say we’ll never make my parents’ mistakes

The two of us started talking just us, and the other person didn’t mind. We sent each other messages every night; we asked each other all kinds of questions. I got to know you better and you got to know me better. My fears, secrets, and dark thoughts; you learned a lot about me, and I didn’t regret sharing them with you. I can’t lie; I started liking you.

Do you remember, we were sitting there, by the water?

You put your arm around me for the first time

You made a rebel of a careless man’s careful daughter

You are the best thing that’s ever been mine

One year later, we weren’t classmates anymore, but we still stayed as close friends, and I still like you. Prom was months away, and I was scared to be partnered with someone I didn’t know. You asked me to be your partner, and I jumped with glee that night. Who would have thought the guy I liked would ask me out for prom. I learned that you liked someone else, a classmate of mine specifically. I was disheartened, but I didn’t want to force you to like me back too. I forced myself to stop liking you; I stopped being as responsive as I was before since I was hurt. I thought it was the smartest thing to do, but it wasn’t.

And I remember the fight, 2:30 am

As everything was slipping out of our hands

Prom night arrived; if this happened a few months earlier, I would still be jumping with glee. I told myself that that night would be the last night that I would like you. That would be the last night I would feel the butterflies in my stomach. That would be the last night I wished to be held by you. The song Perfect by Ed Sheeran played, you asked me to dance, and I accepted it. We were quiet for a moment, and I looked at you for a moment. I looked at you to try and figure out my feelings, and something clicked that said that I didn’t like you anymore. I finally accepted that the person in front of me could never return the feelings I want.

…

Braced myself for the goodbye

‘Cause that’s all I’ve ever known

“I like you,” those were the words you said to me. I couldn’t believe it, and I should have been happy. I was only conflicted; I couldn’t think rationally that time. I was overthinking everything, I didn’t want to say anything that I would regret the next day. I played it safe and said “Dati nagustuhan kita, ngayon hindi na”. I thought that was the best answer, but it wasn’t. My pride was the one that’s preventing me from taking it back, or maybe I was scared. I was immature at that time, so I knew our friendship was going to fall apart. That was the last time I could be with you until saying goodbye.

I didn’t know you liked me too; if only you said it sooner, things might have been different, or maybe it was for the best.

You are the best thing that’s never been mine

Disclaimer: I was reading through my notes from the past years, and I was listening to the song used while I read parts of that specific moment. The person and I have talked about this and are cool about it now and there are no more hard feelings. I wanted to compile and try to polish the notes I had since I thought it would be a good story (?)

Edit 1: forgot to add the link of the song woops

[glassworkspiderlilies]

giyushino week wrap up!

aaaaand that’s a wrap!! thank you to the moderators of giyushinoweek, and to everyone who liked/reblogged/commented on/sent me asks about my fics!!

it was a wild ride to write 8 fics in basically a week or so; i keep saying the fics were hastily or frantically written but LMAO considering how little fic i put out nowadays and how long it usually takes me to write because i edit as i go (which means i take f o r e v e r ), i was seriously just screaming like I JUST GOTTA DO IT I JUST GOTTA GO WITH IT I DON’T HAVE TIME the entire time haha. it was really good to be able to just think of a thing and run as far as i could with it, though!! it’s been quite a long time since i was able to do that, and it was really nice to have a project to work on in the back of my head. <3

ideally, if i work myself up to it, i’d like to revisit all of these and spruce them up to post to ao3, but we’ll see. :’) 

under the cut is just some thoughts on my process during this and also writing each of the fics, if you’re interested! favorite prompt, the most difficult parts to write, what the fic was originally was, things like that. 

thank you again, everyone!! back to hibernation and occasional slow snail pace writing i go, haha.

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re: writing process -i tried writing a fic per day during the week before the actual event, which...kind of worked!! ideally, i was going to write a mostly complete fic each day, and then spend the week of the event editing each one before i posted it. what really ended up happening was that i partially wrote several, but not all of them, during the previous week, and then spent the week of finishing up, editing, or writing the whole thing more or less the day before the prompt was “due”, LMFAO. my weekday schedule is pretty structured because of work--I have maybe an hour or two of free time before i have to sleep--so i doubled down a bit more on the weekends. i know like it wasn’t imperative that i meet the “deadline”, but i really, really wanted to!! i figured i’ve written a fic per day for fandom weeks before so why can’t i do it again, but BOY i don’t know who i was back then. i mean, i still did it (yay!) but it seemed so much easier then?? either i was just writing more back then or less afraid or...something, or it’s just been so long that i don’t remember what i felt, LOL.

-i was really quite nervous in the beginning to post the fics, since again, they’re pretty hastily written and my usual writing process is much more “careful” and drawn out. but, it was also freeing as the week went on to just post and not worry, because the point of the week was to have fun, and not necessarily to write the best work i expected of myself within a limited time. (oh, how the perfectionist in me still hisses, though.) still, i’m glad people liked them, and even the extra notes that i just kinda spit out for some of them. :’) i do wish that some had gotten more attention than others, but those ones don’t show up in the tags and i’m not sure why, so. alas. 

re: the fics -confession: as of now, i feel pretty neutral about all of them, since i wrote them in a frenzy. at some point i’ll probably go back and read them and feel differently (and catch my mistakes! oh no!), haha. -a lot of them ended up being AU, which is...??? unexpected?? but i think it was just easier to put them in an entirely different setting, so i could play a bit more loose with their characters, haha. 

day 1 - glance (or hug) -this one...im pretty sure was one of the ones i waited until the last possible minute to finish up. it’s pretty basic event-wise, one of the few more regular slice-of-lifey ones for the week. it was surprisingly hard to get down the “movement” of it all; a glance is hard to describe in detail and in any other way, but i had really wanted to create kind of this...fleeting, almost nostalgic atmosphere in the back and forth of “he keeps looking, she keeps missing”, if that makes any sense. oof, it’s still hard to describe what i had wanted to achieve even outside of the fic!!

day 2 - soulmate (or family) -this one was SUPER HARD to write!!! originally i had wanted to go with a “A sees flashes of what B sees” soulmate prompt, because i figured that would be SO disorienting and would be fun to play with. but i ended up not being able to run with that one. i had also wanted to do the “soulmates write on themselves and the words show up on the other’s arm” idea, based off of what i had started in a 100 word drabble i did, but that deserved wayyyyyy more exploration and angst i was able to write in the time i’d allotted. i do like the “tattoo” soulmate aus the best, i think, and i did want to explore the one i did more, buuuut. alas. soulmates aus are something i prefer to read rather than write, i think, they can get so complicated!! 

day 3 - AU (or touch) -i’ve already made enough notes on this haha, but this ended up being a little too ambitious!! it wasn’t originally supposed to stop where it did, but i just...kinda got stuck and couldn’t bring myself to continue it, because i knew it would just keep going and needed more thinking out. so i just stopped it at the scene break, and hoped it would be decent enough. :’) surprisingly people seemed to enjoy this one most of all????? or maybe it was just the au itself that was a appealing, haha. regardless, i was surprised at the amount of notes this got!

day 4 - demon & wedding -soooooo this might’ve been my favorite prompt LMAO, like when i realized what i wanted to do for this day, i got excited because like, oooh yeah, pain. definitely wanted to go in on this to flesh out and explore various aspects more than i did, but i think of all the ones i wrote, i might be the most pleased with this one so far. 

day 5 - moon (or angst) -honestly, it’s a surprise i didn’t choose angst for day 5. writing about shinobu’s death would’ve been so easy, but i’ve seriously been putting it off since i started writing for kimetsu no yaiba. both “a blade of honey” and “if not cut at dusk”, which are my longer fics, were intended to be about shinobu’s death scene and turned into something completely different, and i ended up avoiding it for day 5 even though it could’ve been so easy. it’s denial, probably! anyway, shinobu’s MAD BOLD here. she would never. maybe. there’s two shinobus that i think about--the "usual” one, modeling herself after kanae, and one who’s more in line with her younger self/inner feelings. i think i went with the latter for a lot of these fics, because i didn’t have to be as careful with dialogue. giyu might’ve suffered character-wise, though, woops. but again, maybe shinobu would, in the vein that she wants to win and have the last laugh, haha. still, i feel more like she wouldn’t. :P oh, also, do you remember ages ago, when AMVs were still widespread, that scene that was everywhere in naruto where hinata’s bathing/training at the waterfall and it’s like really pretty and cool and stuff? yeah. that’s what i wanted this one to be, a little, LMFAO. genuinely surprised that people thought this one was pretty spicy!!

day 6 - kiss (or ocean) -confession: i wrote all of this while i was at work LOLLLL. it was a slow day, i promise. this might’ve been the easiest one to come up with, because the “quick, kiss me!” to escape situation is a classic. the characterization is preeeetttyyyyy loose here, but it was also kind of fun, honestly. my day 5 and day 6 run in pretty similar veins though, so i had kind of wished the endings were a bit more distinct from each other. 

day 7 - date (or crossover) -honestly i had wanted to do like, a soul eater crossover!! really i was planning out an au, but i think a crossover specifically has characters of two series interacting, and then i was Tired and was like, i can’t do that. crossovers aren’t something i usually read, either, so the planning got too complicated and i gave  up. the date idea was also one that came much later and one that i finished up last minute; i’d wanted to make it a little more cohesive and come up with better things for sabito’s list, but. eh. it got longer than i expected too! ideally there would’ve been more of the college life, and sabito and makomo. i thought about doing another additional notes for this, but there was wasn’t enough i had wanted to add on. really it was just the majors for them i’d been playing with--shinobu as a med student (possibly a minor in horticulture/botany, SOMEHOW), sabito & giyu as hydraulic engineering majors (sabito more on fieldwork, giyu more on research), and makomo as a marine veterinary student. shrug!! the lines of “you do realize we were set up, right” and “this was a date, tomioka-san” were the highlight for me, haha. and i’m inordinately fond of the title.

day 8 - halloween (or n*sfw) -sexy stuff isn’t my forte at all!!!! so halloween it was, but. i was thinking of skipping out on this one, and then was like, oh what the hell, you’ve come this far, of course you’re going to go the last leg, too. already wrote enough notes on this one too, but yeah, this one really was quick, and just barely meets the prompt, i think, lmao. ended up being more of a fantasy au, which was fun, though there was a lot left unexplored. ultimately just glad that i was able to come up with something for the last stretch. :)

please feel free to drop me an ask if you have any thoughts or comments! i’d love to hear your thoughts on the fics for the week, if you’d like to share. :) 

thanks for reading!!

[marybeatriceofmodena]

So I saw TLJ for the second time yesterday, this time with my sisters.

They absolutely loved the movie: and this time around, with me thinking about and digesting everything, I actually really loved the movie this time around, since at first, I liked it, but I didn’t love it, and I wasn’t sure if it was going to worsen or get better after more viewings.

TLJ is divisive, which I expected, but I didn’t expect it to be *that* divisive. I do think it will be better received after IX comes out, though.

With this said, that movie is going to age very well. Sure, it’s far from perfect, but it’s going to become a textbook example of a Heroine’s Journey with all the big sexual awakening metaphors, while Finn and Rose’s plot has very universal themes about the Dog Eats Dog side of politics in the greater scheme of things that have always proven true throughout history, and that will sadly probably always stay around.

I did notice a few things this time around – there are some things I’m going to skip since I’m keeping them for the other parts of my very long TLJ review (one will be all about the Skywalker Drama with bonus Snoke and the other about Finn and Rose, and maybe I’ll squeeze the Resistance in as well), but I have other little details to add, notably about Reylo.

Also, there is no fucking way Ben won’t be redeemed and Reylo won’t be the endgame in some way or another. And if they make the stupid-ass decision of keeping it platonic (yes, it’s stupid-ass at this point, no one will convince me otherwise), it’s going to be one of the biggest wastes in the history of cinema. I’m not even exaggerating. But after TLJ and with all the overt sexual subtext going on, I’ll be mighty surprised if the Mouse House still has cold feet about Reylo. My prediction about it pre-TLJ was “Go big or go home”, and they definitely went big. With the second viewing, I’m pretty solid on that perspective.

I’m going to try and see it again next week, because that might be the last opportunity I get to see it before going back to class. 

Now that I know the plot to the movie, the editing feels a lot less choppy for me. It’s not so much how they’re placed, because I can understand why they’re placed the way they are, but the transition between scenes is not always smooth and sometimes, some scenes that should all be merged into a longer one get cut, which kind of breaks the overall feel. But I get that the reason is that TLJ is so multilayered and has so many things going on at once with a big cast that it’s hard to manage.

Hux’s facial expressions are absolutely hysterical. He’s become one of my favorite characters I love to hate. Also, Domhnall Gleeson is a phenomenal actor.

I wasn’t so sure after my first viewing, but now, I’m pretty certain Kylo thinks Leia died after the TIE Fighters bombing the Raddus’ bridge. It would make sense, considering she had a near death experience and was then comatose, so perhaps that made her unresponsive through the Force, which led Kylo to believe she was gone. Therefore, him wanting to burn the Resistance to the ground, while it’s not good at all, makes a lot of sense and becomes all the more heartbreaking: remember how Kylo was pissed at Finn in TFA? It’s partially because he views him as being responsible for bringing Han to him. That’s how Kylo is: he tends to lash out on the world and whoever he believes wronged him (and most of the time, it isn’t really justified), and TLJ pretty much showed why he’s the way he is. He hates the Resistance because, like the Rebellion and the New Republic, she chose to fight rather than to be present, and ultimately, that’s what caused her death. So him telling Rey to “let it burn” becomes all the more heartbreaking. What’s worse? When he picks up the golden dice in the Rebel base on Crait, I think it’s at that moment he realizes that woops, Mommy was alive all along and he fucked up. Big time.

Rose is still my favorite character in the entire movie. Fight me. 

Maz totally banged the Master Codebreaker. No one will convince me otherwise. 

Rey’s first time meditating with Luke? That was totally a metaphor for masturbation and her discovering her body. Sorry not sorry. It all ends with her seeing the hole on Ahch-To that’s supposedly the “Dark Side” and is basically a big metaphor for a vagina, and her gasp that sounds an awful lot like a gasp of pleasure while water comes out of the hole? IT’S FORCE MASTURBATION GUYS. DON’T LOOK AT ME LIKE THAT, BLAME RIAN. And of course, Luke is terrified because a) He’s a sixty-year-old virgin, and b) He’s the Father figure here, and he’s terrified not only of the Heroine becoming a woman by exploring her forbidden sexuality, but also of her Other Half who’s in the middle of a pretty ugly adolescent turmoil and can’t seem to truly go from boy to man.

And of course, straight after, we get some Force bond scenes with Kylo with off-the-charts UST/BST, where Kylo is peacocking around and looks every inch the Dangerous Dreamboat/Byronic Hero ready to seduce the Gothic Heroine, and Rey standing her own and matching his intensity is why the scenes don’t come out as predatory (same went with Han and Leia in ESB, though they went more for the old Hollywood screwball comedy approach).

Also, there should have been another Force bond scene between the third and the fourth. To refresh your memory, the third is when Kylo tells Rey what really happened between him and Luke at the Jedi Temple, and the fourth is the hand touching. The Mirror scene happens in between. Like, it works fine, but there was a little transition missing.

The fourth Force bond scene managed to be EVEN BETTER on second viewing? Like, Rey tells Kylo what happened in the Mirror scene, and you can feel her voice tearing up a bit. Meanwhile, not only Kylo is listening, but you can clearly see his eyes are glassy, and he looks like he’s about to cry as well. He sympathizes with her, and you just know he understands exactly how abandoned and lost she feels. “Don’t be afraid, I feel it too”, amirite?

First time, I didn’t notice Rey and Ben tearing up when they touch hands. I think I got all teary-eyed too, lol. I don’t think they only see each other’s future, but I think they also see each other as who they truly are. And that’s the moment where Rey falls in love with Ben.

I am… honestly not sure what exactly Rey saw, and what exactly Ben saw when they talk about each other’s future. At first, I thought they saw the two of them fighting against the Praetorian Guards, but I really don’t know at this point. I think it’s possible Rey saw that, but I think Ben saw something else. And if it’s the case… count me excited for IX. But Reylo is real, guys, and it’s endgame. 

Rey is at her prettiest whenever she’s around Kylo/Ben. Like, in the coffin/pod and in the elevator, her face is all lit up, and it makes her traits look very soft and sweet. Seriously, she totally spent hours in the shower and fussing around with her appearance before boarding the Supremacy, to the point it really feels like a teenage girl going on her first date, I’m not even kidding. Boy do I love couples who go and kill gross old humanoids and their guards on the first date.

I’m going to mention it in the Finnrose part of my review, but boy did they waste Gwendoline Christie.

The transition between “Rey gets her heart broken and leaves the Throne Room while Kylo’s unconscious” and “Rey shows up in the Millennium Falcon happily gunning at FO TIE fighters” is still kind of jarring, but not as much as the first time. I wonder at this point if she’s having pretty much the same “screw you” disposition Kylo’s having on the other side of the battle. But of course, for both of them, it fades away pretty quickly when they have to face reality again and realize that “Welp, we screwed up”. Kylo gets that realization when he sees Rey on the MF’s threshold via Force Bond while holding Han’s dice, and Rey at first is a mix of sadness, compassion/pity but also a fair amount of “You’re sleeping on the couch tonight”, but when she sees Finn caring for Rose later, I think it’s at that moment she’s starting to get inklings of “I may have made a mistake…”. I think she’s going to understand it fully only in IX, though. It won’t be as harsh of a realization as it’s going to be for Kylo, but still.

Hux is totally going to backstab Kylo at the first opportunity he gets. Just the smug look he gives Kylo just before he goes in the control room and finds Han’s dice, you can tell that Supreme Leader or not, he still considers himself far superior. So because of that, I really don’t think there’s going to be a big time jump between TLJ and IX.

I probably forgot a ton of little things, so next time I’m seeing the movie, I’m taking notes. 

[ilyasvieltrevelyanshepard]

Nights on Illium

Well, another weekend enjoying the MEWC! This time I publish later than planned, but at least, here it is ;)

I had this idea roaming inside my brain for weeks now >_< and yesterday it screamed to me to be written at last hahaha

Is a fShoker ^_^ with some sassy comments and smut at the end :P

As always, no hard editing on this works. Hope you enjoy it! Obviously, the smut is under the cut... and well, a big part of the fic too xDDD I created another short-long fic >_< sorry hahahahahahaha

The Normandy docks in Illium after the madness of recovering Subject Zero from Purgatory,  where, as always, everything has gone FUBAR as soon as Jane has put a foot in the prison. Joker has been sitting on the Normandy, hearing everything, with the vitals of the ground team on his screens, worried to death every minute of the mission. After the battle, Shepard has almost run to the cockpit, sealing them inside and sitting in the floor beside him, just letting him pet her hair until she relaxed enough to talk with the rest of the crew and face Jack again. As soon as she storms away from him, he selects the destination, opening the extranet to book a room on a place Liara has recommended him last time they visited. He has ignored every question from Miranda and Garrus about why they are going to Illium again, turning off the speakers diligently. The damned button is getting old thanks to the cancer ship and her diatribes, but who cares?

The ship lands softly in the designated dock, one of the best and closest to the market area, a gift from Liara, and he can’t thank her enough for that. As soon as the control tower gives them the green light, he contacts Shepard. “Hey, Commander. Are you alive?” A soft grunt is his answer, and he chuckles softly, “Glad to hear that our new team member didn’t kill you for sure this time. I have a surprise for you.”

That seems to pick her curiosity, because he can hear the sound of her shifting, on the couch maybe? “Is the reason we are docked on Illium without anyone having selected the destination?”

“You are no fun, Shep. Do you want my surprise or not? We can return to the ugly and dirty Omega if you prefer.”

He can hear her sighing before answering him. “No. The team deserves a rest, and Illium is a nice place to have it. Besides, now that we have a convict with us, we can’t even go to the Citadel until we have her controlled. Let the asari deal with her for a while.”

Adjusting the cap on his head, he stands from the chair, straightening his back and popping some bones in the process. “Then is settled. Will you join me in the cockpit in around five minutes?”

The sound of her standing from wherever she has been sitting reaches him, making him smile fondly, “Sure thing. I’m on my way. I hope that surprise will be worth enough for the scolding I’m going to have from Miranda tomorrow.”

“I truly hope so.” The hiss of the elevator’s doors closing signals her position, and he fixes his cap before blocking the consoles and leaving the cockpit, leaning on the wall beside the exit and talking with her using the omnitool. “Will you protect me from her ire? I’ve been ignoring her for the past hour, and you know how bad she deals with not being the world’s perfect belly button.”

Shepard appears on the CIC, giving a short nod to Chambers on her way to the cockpit. “That will depend on how good your surprise will be.” Her strong step filled the silence of the hallway that leads to the bow of the ship. Seeing him leaning against the wall, she smiles at him, closing the comms. Stopping in front of him, she crosses her arms. “Ok. I’m here. Where’s my surprise, Flight Lieutenant?”

“Oh, we are in rank mode again, huh? Ok, ok, Commander. My surprise is outside the ship. And I plan to keep you there all night. Maybe it will be good to let the team know that you will be--” He closes the distance to her, a mischievous grin plastered on his face, and keeping an eye to the few crewmembers that are roaming the CIC, “completely inaccessible for the rest of the day and night.”

A matching grin grows on her face, and she raises a hand to put it on his chest, enjoying the hard muscles she knows are hidden under the uniform. “That sounds like a challenge.”

With a wink, he steps away from the wall, tilting his head and pointing with his hand to the door. “Let’s see how it goes. But Commander, I’m the only one allowed to bring weapons to this mission.”

She chuckles, following him while writing the message to Chambers, asking her to inform the rest of the team about the free night. “Feeling cocky, huh?”

The Normandy’s door closes behind them, and Joker sets the pace to a slow stroll. “We can call it a weapon, Jane.” Looking at her over his shoulder, he giggles his brows while his mouth turns into a grin, “I know, for sure, that it can make you scream and turn you into a useless ragdoll. It's pretty effective with you.”

Shepard pushes his shoulder, making him laugh, “Definitely cocky. Now I’m curious about that surprise.”

“You will see soon enough. We need to grab a skycar. Sorry, but you will need to keep my slow pace for a while.”

With a chuckle, she steps beside him, “Didn’t I have to do it every single time, Casanova?”

They leave the docking hallway, taking the door that leads to the cargo area. They have just reached the stairs that lead to their destination when Shepard’s omnitool begins to beep. Raising it, she opens the commlink, and a very pissed Miranda appears on the screen. “Lawson.”

The biotic’s voice sounds as angry as one can imagine by her look, “Commander. Why in the void are we on Illium? And where are you?”

With a roll of her eyes, Shepard’s face turns into a severe frown, fixing her gaze on Miranda’s face on the little screen. “We are here because I want it. You don’t need to agree or even know about my decisions or course of actions, Lawson. Remember who is in charge of the fucking mission and who is your commanding officer.” Closing the comm without leaving Miranda talk, Shepard keeps walking in the taxi’s direction, with a very amused Joker in her tail. “Shush. Don’t break the magic of the moment.”

Joker fights very hard to keep the grin away from his face, but he knows he is failing spectacularly when she rolls her eyes at him when they reach the taxi console. They share a little giggle while the taxi arrives, with Shepard trying to look pissed with him, but he reads her like an open book, knowing that she is fighting the laugh as hard as him. The car arrives, and he opens the door for her, making her chuckle and call him ‘Casanova’ again. He enters the car too, turning on the screen to select the destination. He can see Shepard looking intently into the screen, trying to see where they are going. Taking off his cap, he puts it on her head, lowering the visor until it covers her eyes. “No peeking, Jane. I want to surprise you, remember?”

Her huff accompanies the movement of her arms crossing over her chest, “Fine. But really, I expect it to be an awesome surprise.”

The skycar takes off, surprising Shepard, who makes a soft ‘woop’ making Joker chuckle. “I hope it will be awesome, but time will say. We will be there soon, don’t worry.” Less than five minutes later, the car is landing on a private terrace on the Sanves hotel. Joker has used a good amount of credits to have this suite for the night. Taking a deep breath, he closes the distance to her, pulling off the cap while giving her cheek a soft peak. “Welcome to paradise, Jane.”

Shepard lost the ability to talk while her brain accepts what she is seeing. They have landed on a terrace, covered in green and flowers. A big room can be seen through the windows, and a little pool and a jacuzzi lay to her right. She keeps examining her surroundings but moves a hand to capture one of Joker’s, interlacing their fingers. “Well, consider me surprised, love.”

Squeezing her fingers, he raises the hand to his lips, giving her a sweet kiss on each knuckle before letting it go. “Wait until you see the room. Come on, the taxi has to leave, and I want to enjoy our time here to the max.”

They exit the taxi, which takes off as soon as the doors close behind them. Shepard is still in awe, looking around, touching the flowers of the flowerpots around her. Joker walks to the doors, using the code from the booking mail to open them. As soon as he steps inside, the sound system and the lights inside and out turned on. Everything is bathed in a pale and soft blue light, giving the room an ethereal look, with the shiny metallic surfaces and the white furniture. Shepard is leaning against the doorframe when he turns in the middle of the room. She wears a lopsided grin, and her arms are crossed over her chest, “I must admit that I  didn’t expect this.”

Joker picks the bottle of sparkling wine from the table, together with a pair of glasses, before moving to her. “I can add the ‘I’m the one who can surprise the mighty Commander Shepard,  twice, to my CV.” She sticks her tongue out to him, stepping away from the doorframe when he comes closer. “Now, my dear Commander, I must ask you to hand over your clothes until tomorrow. No garments allowed for the next twelve hours.”

“Bossy.”

“You love it.” He winks at her, passing beside her on his way to the pool. It is the main reason he booked this very room. The water gives him more freedom of movement, taking away the weight from his legs. Reaching the deck chairs beside it, he puts the wine on the little table between them, putting the cap on one of the chairs and turning to face her. When he finds her still at the door, looking at him with a quizzical frown, he shakes his head, pointing to the pool. “I believe I'm being pretty obvious here, Jane. Use that strategist mind of you to add one plus one and move your freckled ass here, my love.”

Her soft chuckle travels directly to his heart, and Gods above, the way she is moving her hips while walking to the pool is going straight to his groin. “Don’t know if I like that bossy side of you, Jeff. But it looks like a good day to try things, huh?” Stopping in front of him, she keeps eye contact with him while her hands begin to work in her clothes. The formal uniform she wears whenever she isn’t inside of her armour gets opened with a deft movement of her fingers. The jacket fall from her shoulders, getting caught on her hands for some seconds before she let it fall to the ground. With a wink, she bends a knee, unlacing her boots, one after the other, before doing the same with his. He is looking every movement with predatory eyes, and when she finishes with the laces, Joker puts a hand on her shoulder before she can stand, “Now that you are down here, mind to help with my trousers too?” She mutters a ‘bossy’ under her nose, but he can hear the amusement in her voice. Her hands travel up his legs, in a slow movement, until her fingers find the waist of his pants. Moving to the centre of it, she opens the button and lowers the zip, slowly enough to make him growl. Once his trousers are opened, he puts a finger under her chin, raising her face to look at him. He keeps pulling her up until she is standing in front of him. Closing the little gap between them, he captures her mouth in a life-sucking kiss, putting all his passion and dirty thoughts into it, making her gasp and lose her mind on it. Joker lets his hands roam over her back, finding the perfect spot to grab her ass cheeks and pulling her against his body, grunting softly when her curves mould perfectly with his hardness. Her hands are working clumsily with the closings of his uniform, making him break the kiss with a half laugh, half grunt. “Clothes off, Jane, right now.”

Shepard steps away from him, panting softly, and begins to take off the garments, using the feet to pull off the boots while she peels off the tank top from her upper body. He does the same with his own clothes, letting them half folded on the same chair as his cap. She is in her underwear in record time, and Joker has to smile at her. The eagerness he always brings on her is the better aphrodisiac he never heard about. Pulling down his pants, he steps out of them, letting them fall unceremoniously over the chair before taking her back in his arms. Her skin is so soft… even before she healed the angry scars, her skin has been perfect. A game for him. A map to follow, enjoying the moles and battle marks over her back, following the trail of wounds of her belly, the bones of her ribcage, the firm muscles under his soft skin. His fingers find the closing of her bra, opening it with a little twitch of them, making her giggle. “You magic fingers are working hard today.”

Following the line of her spine, Joker slides his hands under her panties, lowering them while he bites her neck, enjoying the little sounds she makes. “I’m gonna show you how hard my fingers can work on that beautiful body of yours.” When her panties are around her ankles, he uses a hand to raise her leg, encouraging her to step away from the discarded garment. She takes the hint, taking one ankle from the fallen panties before throwing them into the pile of clothes near the chairs. Pushing her away from him with a hand on her chest, he grabs the bra and pulls it away from her, letting it fall to the ground. Looking intently into her eyes, he keeps pushing her to the edge of the pool, stopping at the last moment with a chuckle. “I was planning to throw you into the water, but I don’t want to finish my night at the medbay. Wait for me in the water, will you?”.

With a giggle of her own, she grabs him, pulling him to her body and letting herself fall into the water, dragging him with her between her laughs and his swearing. They landed with a big splash, water spraying everywhere around the pool. They surface soon, and she runs away from him, giggling like a child. “I’m sorry, Jeff. It was so tempting to not doing it!”

Following her, he corners her near the steps of the exit, “I’m not mad. But now I have to think on a way to make you pay for it.” She let him capture her, pinning her against the wall. Her legs instinctively wrapping itself around his waist. The water makes her float, giving him the chance to keep her in that position. He uses the tip of his tongue to follow the hard line of her jaw, finishing on her hear, before tracing the shell of it, making her gasp. Biting softly the lobe, he keeps kissing and biting her neck, until he reaches the pulse point, where he sucks, hard enough to leave a dark bruise, marking her skin. A loud moan escapes her control, fuelling Joker’s passion. Straightening his back, he fixes her gaze on her face, waiting until she recovers a bit of control and looks him back. “Rest your arms on the edge.” She does as told. She can be the Commander everywhere, but right here, right now, she let him take all the decisions for her. Leaning booth arms on the edge, she lays her head back too, resting the upper part of her shoulders and head on it too. He untangle her legs from his back, grabbing her ass while stepping back. He raises her body until it is floating over the surface of the water. His right hand finds a perfect spot on her small back, keeping it floating in the perfect spot, while his left hand opens her legs for him. Her foggy mind can imagine what he wants to do, but she screams his name anyway as soon as his tongue touches her inner labia. Knowing and feeling are two different things, and soon she is thrashing under his care. The hand on her back keep her floating, while the other keeps her inner labia open to let his tongue move in whatever direction he wants. He plays with her with gusto, tongue playing with her clit before moving to enter her, lapping her juices in a greedy way. She is a gasping mess in no time, with trembling legs and broken voice, and he can’t feel more proud of himself. He is tongue-fucking her when the first telltale of her orgasm hits him, and he pulls away from her, making her shudder and swear. Kissing her belly, he lets go her hips, moving closer while she lowers her legs. Stepping to the wall, he rests her body against it, extending a hand and grabbing her arm before pulling her against him. Her body is pliant under his touch, and he knows exactly what she needs. Turning her over her heels, he rest her back on his chest, using both hands to pin her against his body. “Time to show you some magic with my fingers, love.”

Her head falls to his shoulder the same moment his hand grabs one of her breasts, twisting the nipple between his thumb and index. The other hand slides down her abs, finding the heated core of her body. His deft fingers find the hardened nub of nerves immediately, using the tip of his fingertips to trace it, putting the perfect amount of pressure to make her moan. He keeps teasing her until her hand grabs his wrist, nails digging his skin. Sliding his fingers even lower, he finds her entrance, delving inside of her in a swift movement and enjoying, maybe too much, the loud way she screams his name. Feeling his own erection pushing under the wet and ungrateful material of his underwear, he decides to give her what she needs before they can move to what he wants. His fingers keep moving in and out of her, and he adds the pressure of his palm on her clit to the mix, biting her shoulder hard enough to make her gasp every time. Soon enough her inner walls begin to pulse around him, her breath quickened and her moans growing louder by the second. With a knowing smile plastered on his face, he pinches hard her nipple while using his tongue to draw a trail up and down her neck. When her back arches, he bites her pulse point again, hard and adding some sucking, just like she likes it. Shepard is moaning his name, totally oblivious that they are in the open, with other suits in the same level that can hear her screams. But he can’t care less right now. The feeling of her body crumbling under his touch is intoxicating. He keeps his fingers moving inside of her until the pulsing walls begin to relax around him. “Still with me, love?”

Shepard pushes herself away from him, turning in his arms until she is facing him, still breathless. “Always.”

That word. That overused and straightforward word is better than any promise, any ring. She means it. Joker can see it in her eyes, in the way she tilts her head to one side when she says it. And with her, it means literally always. For whatever time they have in this God’s forsaken galaxy, she will be his. His hands cup her face, lowering her until their lips are almost touching. “You know I love you, right?” Her answer, close the gap between them, sealing their mouths, tongue delving inside finding his and dancing with it for some seconds. Pushing away from the wall, she wraps her legs around his waist as soon as they move, eliciting an approving growl from him while he turns to pin her against the edge again. Still kissing her, Joker uses a hand to lower his underwear, freeing himself from the cage of wet material. Even in the heated water, he can feel the heat emanating from her core, which just adds to his own raging fire. Breaking the kiss, he leans their foreheads together, sharing the broken breathes they are trying to take. Her hand slides down his chest, enjoying the hard muscles of his upper torso as she always does, touching more than necessary, fingers following the curves of his chest, the lines of his ribs. Her hand finds its way to his erection, wrapping her delicate fingers around it, caressing it, wrist moving up and down until she gets the moan she has been looking for. “Don’t be a tease, Jane.”

Using her free arm to surround his shoulders, she raises up her body, face hovering in front of his, “Said the pot to the kettle, love. But don’t worry. We have the rest of the night for the teasing. Right now--” She positions his stiff member in her entrance, hand keeping it in place while she lowers her body, engulfing him in a slow motion. “Gods, Jeff--” Her head fall back, a low moan, the kind of sound you can feel as well as hearing, escapes her. “Yes!”

Joker didn’t need any more word from her. Positioning his legs better, he pushes her back to the edge, where she rested her elbows. His strong arm surrounds her waist, keeping her in place, while the other hand grabs the edge of the pool with white knuckling force. He has dreamt of taking her this way for years, and now he is finally doing it. Pushing away from her slowly, the heated water can’t compete with the blazing hot of her core, making him shudder when it touches his cock. With a quick movement of his hips, he enters her again, causing her head fall back in a silent scream. Repeating the motion, he keeps moving until he finds the spot he has been looking for. The shiver that runs up and down her body when he finds it is the signal he has been waiting. Stepping forward, he pins her body entirely against the wall, and she wraps her arms around his neck. His hands move to her hipbones, finding the perfect spot to grab her and move her body up and down in rhythm with his hips. None of them has enough blood in their brains to form coherent words, and the only intelligible word that one can make between their shared moans and gasp are their names. Soon than he wanted, Joker can feel the pressing sensation of his orgasm coming to catch him, and he can’t do a single thing to fight against it. His hips begin to move harder and faster, making her groan at the sensation, while he buries his face in the crock of her neck, inhaling her essence like a perfume. Feeling the end near, he bites the mark he has put in her throat before, making her shudder. Her inner walls tremble with her when he keeps punishing her skin, making his body react to it. “Damn, Jane. You feel too good to be real.” His husky voice, breathless for the effort and the passion of their lovemaking seems to be her breaking point, and she moans her name, louder than ever, nails piercing the skin on his back. His own release is not far away, and after four or five thrusts more, he buries himself as deep as possible, unloading his charge inside of her with a low grunt. They milk one another for several seconds, bodies trembling for the effort. His brain seems to be online before hers, and grabs her body again, taking the few steps that separate them from the stairs. They are still connected, and he hasn’t no intention of breaking the contact yet, so he manoeuvres them with care until he is sitting in one of the steps, water barely reaching their chests. Joker awaits until she comes down from her high, wearing a contented smile on her face, even when she is still trying to catch her breath, just like him. “I love you, Jane Helen Shepard.”

She cups his face with both hands, giving his lips a soft peak, before kissing his nose, his forehead, his eyes, making him giggle. “And I love you too, Jeff Moreau. Thanks for the present.”

Moving her face lower, nesting a hand on her hair, he positions her face where he wanted it, lips ghosting in front of hers, “You had just taken the wraps of the present, love. The night is young.” She was giggling when he kisses her again, their tongues dancing to the rhythm of their hearts. The night will be a present for both of them, just like that second chance. Shepard can’t be happier for that, and she thanks any God out there for it.

[inhalingwords]

Monthly Wrap Up || October 2017

Henry IV, Part 2 by William Shakespeare || Henry V by William Shakespeare || The Winter’s Tale by William Shakespeare || A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare || Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare || As You Like It by William Shakespeare || Hamlet by William Shakespeare || Instrucciones para salvar el mundo by Rosa Montero || Kudottujen kujien kaupunki by Emmi Itäranta || Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay by Annie Proux, Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana || Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë || The Gap of Time: The Winter’s Tale retold by Jeanette Winterson || Puhdistus by Sofi Oksanen

Henry IV, Part 2 by William Shakespeare

Disease, darkness, decay. 2 Henry IV is a sequel and it shows tbh. It’s boring, Prince Hal is obnoxious, there is not a thing in this play I much care for. The prologue is alright.

Henry V by William Shakespeare

Henry V continues and -- thankfully -- ends the story in the Henriad. Like 2 Henry IV, I didn’t enjoy this one either. I mean, it’s a fine play (and tetralogy) about war, kingship, honour, patriotism, etc., except that that’s precisely the problem. All of that presented as it is in the play(s) is directly opposite to my own values and morals. I don’t think it’s honourable that king Henry V wants to wage war with France only because of some titles and dukedoms to add to his name/”imperium” (+ to distract the populace with external unrest away from civil unrest) or that he threatens French towns with rape and pillaging if they don’t let them in so he can have them surrender “peacefully”, and that’s all supposed to make him out to be this great, amazing king because “band of brothers! we happy few! he totally gets down with the lowly commoners! wooo”, like, no thanks.

The entire concept of these plays is to bump up English/British nationalism/patriotism and be a reminder of these “”””glorious””” things done in the past “under God’s will”. lmao. It’s jingoistic propaganda and that doesn’t interest me.

The Winter’s Tale by William Shakespeare

Now, The Winter’s Tale is a severely underappreciated Shakespeare play imo. There are not sufficient words to explain how much I loved reading this play!

The Winter’s Tale is a lovely tragedy-that-turns-to-comedy about jealousy, family, time, redemption, rebirth, healing, and hope in the middle of darkness. There are some real kickass female characters (Pauline! what a woman! i love her! and Hermione, who is Great™), one of the most famous stage directions of all time (”Exit, pursued by a bear”), queer subtext, cute romance, and one of the most beautiful scenes in Shakespeare (that last scene with the “statue” Hermione, damn!).

A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare

This was actually my second reread of this play this year, I already reread it back in March. But because I recently bought the beautiful Arden edition of the play, I just needed to reread it once more. And I’m glad! This is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays (hence why I bought the separate edition). I love the whimsy, the fairies, and the aesthetic, but I also really appreciate the plot, the running away into the woods and all the love-magic shenanigans.

I greatly enjoyed the Third Series Arden edition’s emphasis on the theatrical staging history across the world. It was very interesting to read about (also: wtf I didn’t know there’s a history of female!Oberons, that’s my new favourite interpretations at the mo, so yess, thanks). The entire Introduction was top-notch and I found much to think about; my favourite things is how the play has very much a dreamlike quality with many alarming things bubbling underneath the surface that are never quite brought into focus and problematised.

Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare

Holy moral ambiguity and manipulation, y’all! There’s no clear villain in this play, everyone’s a bit sketchy, and the central theme is of political rivalry and machinations. My favourite thing about Julius Caesar (and other plays like this) are the many layers, like when you consider the historical time depicted in the play, the context of Shakespeare’s time when the play was written in, and also the context of present time when I myself am reading this play. 

I ended up liking this play much more than I expected to, and I’m looking forward to reading it again in the future (and seeing some great adaptations in the meantime!).

As You Like It by William Shakespeare

As You Like It is a wonderful pastoral (romantic) comedy that both brings the pastoral to life and parodies/critiques it. It’s absolutely charming and also very queer (thereby claiming it’s place on my list of fave Shakespeare plays pretty much automatically). It’s also the play with the female character who has the most lines out of all Shakespeare’s female characters (woop!). The characters are what really make this play for me: Rosalind, Celia, Orlando, Jaques, I love them so much, and I might even go so far as to say I even enjoy Touchstone.

Hamlet by William Shakespeare

I have to admit: this was my first time reading Hamlet, I haven’t seen a movie or stage adaptation of it, and, going into the play, I only had a very general idea what it was about (along the lines of “there’s a Danish prince called Hamlet, it’s a tragedy, people die”) and I knew a handful of quotes out of context.

That said, like for many others, my experience of reading Hamlet was that of recognition. I kept encountering quotes I knew and it proved super interesting to finally get the full context for them. I find Hamlet an intriguing play, (especially philosophically, psychologically and metatheatrically speaking) and I’m looking forward to seeing some stage/movie adaptations of it.

Instrucciones para salvar el mundo by Rosa Montero

Instrucciones para salvar el mundo is a milestone book for me: it’s the first book I’ve ever read in Spanish. Sadly, I can’t whole-heartedly recommend it for others. I like it... I think??

The problem I have with the book isn’t that it’s bad, it’s that I feel like I really love the theme and the central concept of the book so much -- there’s beauty in life, sometimes you don’t even realise how privileged you are and how much you have, how much life in itself is worth until you’re staring death in the face, that these darkness in the world but also so much goodness and beauty and happiness -- BUT something about the execution was just lacking. The characters felt a little bit too much like stereotypes (the two boring white male protags, one of whose wife is death so he’s grieving and the other who is cheating on his wife; the black sex worker who is Good and needs to be helped; the Moroccan suicide bomber, etc.). I did like two of the female characters (Cerebro, an old scientist, and Fatma, the sex worker) but they were more peripheral characters, just passing through the bigger plot of the two dudes, one of whom was so obnoxious I nearly put the book down because of him.

So, yeah. The book is good but not awesome, and I feel a bit let down.

Kudottujen kujien kaupunki by Emmi Itäranta

Kudottujen kujien kaupunki (UK: The City of the Woven Streets, US: The Weaver) is easily my favourite book of the month.

Earlier this year, in April, I read Itäranta’s first book Teemestarin kirja (engl. Memory of Water), which I loved, so I was expecting to like Kudottujen kujien kaupunki, and it honestly still managed to blow me away and even exceed my expectations. Once again, there’s a dystopian setting, environmental themes (this time, water pollution), beautiful writing, and fascinating worldbuilding, but with explicit wlw main pairing this time. My heart soars. Itäranta has definitely landed a spot on the list of my fave authors.

Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay by Annie Proux, Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana

Proulx’s writing style isn’t necessarily my fave -- it’s quite sparse, unornamented and to the point -- but the story is beautiful and touching in all of its horror and it definitely packs a punch. It’s about rural homophobia, internalised homophobia, love and desires, repression, and life.

This edition also featured three short yet insightful essays about adapting the short story to the big screen.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

I…. like Wuthering Heights?? I’m baffled because I was pretty much prepared to dislike it due to so many people talking about how the relationship is really unhealthy and shouldn’t be romanticised, so I was expecting some sort of 1800s version of Twilight/50SoG, but… that’s not what this is?? 

Wuthering Heights is not a love story, it’s not a romance, and it’s not supposed to be. It’s not written as such. The relationship (between Cathy and Heathcliff) is not in any way portrayed as a romantic, healthy pairing you’re supposed to root and strive for (like in Twilight/50SoG) with the expectation that the reader is supposed to be sighing about how romantic and thrilling everything about the romance is. In Wuthering Heights, the abuse is portrayed as abuse, as negative and abusive, and the narrative does not support the reading of Heathcliff as a romantic hero and “Mr. Perfect”.

So, yeah. I like Wuthering Heights. In terms of the locale and characters, the scope of the novel is very small and almost claustrophobic, but the emotional magnitude is astonishing. Some of the characters are vile, selfish, and repugnant much of the time and yet I was so swept up in the story and invested in knowing what was going to happen, that I really enjoyed reading about them and I couldn’t help but symphathise with them because of the masterful storytelling. The portrayals of passion and revenge are so vivid I got chills. And I enjoy the double nature of the book; we have the one half (Catherine and Heathcliff) and the other half (Cathy and Hareton), and I love how it’s one of those hopeful stories about breaking the cycle of abuse, the younger generation doing better than the older.

The novel is also highly atmospheric. The moors, the nature, the wilderness. It all reflects the characters and the fact that the novel is so pointedly not about high society and social niceties.

The Gap of Time: The Winter’s Tale retold by Jeanette Winterson

My first venture into the world of Shakespearean book adaptations -- and I am so glad it was with such a great one!

The Gap of Time is a remix of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale (a tragedy-turns-to-comedy that I read for the first time this month and love a lot!), and to me it’s a very successful one. There are so many things brimming with insight (I feel like I marked up at least 2/3 of the book!), some nice winks at the source material and Shakespeare in general, and tbh I gotta love anything that takes the queer subtext in Shakespeare and makes it explicit. I really enjoy the way Winterson modernised the story and dived a bit deeper into themes like time and family, which were already present in the original play.

However, The Gap of Time did feel a bit rough and unpolished at times, although I wonder whether it was intentional and meant to reflect the way reading one of Shakespeare’s (or anyone’s) plays feels like (since obviously they are meant to be seen and not read per se, and consist of nothing but dialogue).

Puhdistus by Sofi Oksanen

In February, I read the first book in Oksanen’s Kvartetti series about Estonia’s recent history and the East/West dichotomy of Europe. This month, I finally picked up the second novel (and the most well-known of the three books that have been published in the series). I was much impressed reading it, and I can see why it became such a sensation.

Puhdistus is a story about shame and sexual violence from the PoV of two women of two different generations set against the backdrop of Estonian history (from 1940s to 1990s, mostly preoccupied with the occupations of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, deportations, the Forest Brothers, and surveillance). The novel is at times brutal and sad, you might even call it a psychological thriller (though I myself wouldn’t go that far), but there’s also a constant thrum of hope of survival persisting throughout an the ending is hopeful. I find Oksanen’s writing a joy to read and I think I’m going to pick up the third book in the series sooner than I picked up this one.

[megatraven]

Girl Crush

Right okay so this took forever but it includes the first three femslash feb prompts and is also a late birthday gift to @starscrumbling :D EDIT: I forgot a read more lol woops

Summary: After not having spoke for a little while, Alya decides to call Marinette, only to run into her in an unlikely place.

AO3

Snow fell over the city, wrapping it in a blanket of cool cleanliness as lights shut off and many Parisians went to sleep. The sky was dark but the city glowed softly still, and with its silence, very few would find it perfect to be outside just then.

Alya was not one of those few. Sure, sometimes the quiet could be nice, and being alone could be a gift, but there was always such a thing as too much. While she trekked through the snow, the quiet began to bug her, and it didn’t take long for her to think of a solution. Removing her hands from the warmth of her pockets, she took her phone out and began scrolling through her contacts.

“Wow,” she breathed, feeling a little guilty when she finally got to the one she wanted. “I... haven’t talked to her in so long.” She tapped the contact, and her thumb hovered over the call button. She didn’t notice she’d paused in the middle of the park, and her brows drew together as she considered what the consequences of calling so late could be.

On the one hand, they could catch up and the quiet of the city could be drowned out by their talking. On the other, Alya could be cursed out for waking her up. Deciding that even being cursed at was better than the lonely feeling she had, and before she could talk herself out of it, she hit the call button and put her phone to her ear.

A small smile lit up her face when she heard the familiar ringback tone.

~ ♪ ♫ Feel the magic in the air,

Allez, allez, allez

Levez les mains en l'air

Allez, allez, allez

Feel the magic in the air,

Allez, allez- ♫ ♪ ~

Hey, you’ve reached-

“...Marinette?” Alya asked, cutting off the message with a quick tap of the ‘end call’ button. She stared for a moment longer before rushing forward, shaking awake the girl sleeping on the park bench. “Marinette! Girl, wake up! What’re you doing, sleeping on the bench while it’s snowing out!?”

It took a little more shaking before Marinette opened her eyes and yawned. “Mmm... A-Alya? What’re you d-doing out here?” she questioned through chattering teeth.

“What am I- girl, what are you doing out here? I’ve heard of ‘blankets of snow’ but you shouldn’t take it as a literal blanket, Mar!” She sighed and pulled her friend into a hug, hoping to share her warmth. “Mon Dieu, you scared the hell out of me,” she whispered.

“I-I was dr-drawing,” she explained, gestured to a sketchpad that had a layer of snow covering it now. “F-first snow, you know? Good i-inspiration.” Alya tightened her hold when she felt Marinette shiver and bury her face in the crook of Alya’s neck.

“Mhm. And how long were you out drawing for?”

“Not t-too long! But, um, it’s b-been a long few weeks, and I h-haven’t been sleeping well. Th-the peacefulness put me to sleep I gu-guess.” A full-body shiver went through her then, and that drove Alya to action.

"C'mon, get up. I live closer, so you can crash at my place tonight," she said, helping Marinette to her feet. She kept her arm around the other girl, who in turn wrapped both of her arms around Alya.

"Um, s-so about the last t-time we-"

Alya cut her off with a look. "We can talk when you get warm, okay?"

Marinette looked like she wanted to say more, but she bit her tongue and nodded instead. The rest of their walk carried on in silence, save for Alya occasionally commenting on the sights or closeness to her apartment.

When they finally did arrive, Alya made quick work of climbing the stairs, despite half-dragging Marinette alone. She hoped that what had happened between them hadn't been the source of her sleepless nights, because Alya knew Marinette, and she knew it took a lot for her best friend to be capable of falling asleep while walking. Of course, it only usually happened when there was a big design competition coming up, but Alya hadn't heard anything. Then again, her and Marinette hadn't spoken in awhile either.

Sighing, she tried not to jostle Marinette as she dug out her keys and opened the door. She didn't flick on the lights, used to arriving and maneuvering in the dark, and walked until she could drape Marinette over the couch. Detaching herself from her best friend's vice-like grip proved to be a challenge, but it was something she had experience with, for better or worse.

Alya took off her own jacket, and laid it over Marinette until she could get a few blankets and some hot chocolate going. Luckily, over the years, she had acquired quite a lot of blankets, thanks to Marinette herself. It was, as she put it, 'a travesty among travesties' that she only have two blankets. Alya chuckled at the memory of it. Man, that girl is dramatic, she thought with a shake of her head. She quickly took a few blankets out of her closet, pausing only to add a couple more into her pile in case they'd be talking for awhile. She walked back out to where Marinette dozed, and made sure she stepped quietly, avoiding any creaky spots in the wood she'd come to memorize.

She took a quick moment to watch her friend sleep, enjoying the startling calmness Marinette exuded when she slept. Her lips were drawn into a small smile, and she looked completely at peace. Alya smiled down at her friend, and reached down to sweep her bangs out from her face, only allowing her touch to linger for a second. With a content sigh, she took her jacket away and replaced it with a couple of blankets. Marinette automatically snuggled into them, which Alya had expected, but she also grabbed onto Alya's arm when she made to pull away.

"Mari?" Alya asked, her voice quiet and gentle. "Mari, you have to let go, or I can't make us hot chocolate."

She didn't respond for a good moment, and Alya was convinced she was asleep until she tugged on Alya's arm and mumbled, "No hot chocolate."

Alya let herself be pulled down, taking care not to sit on her friend. "No hot chocolate?" she repeated, and Marinette shook her head, enough so that her hair fell over her face again. Alya snorted and quickly swept it away. "So what, then?"

"Mmm… talk. Bout stuff." she answered, yawning as she said so. She stretched her body out and adjusted her position so that when she finished, her legs laid over Alya's. Her tired gaze found Alya's own and a frown tugged at her lips. "Sorry for not calling."

"It's alright. I didn't either, so I guess we can both take the blame there, huh?" Alya responded with a small smile. It took a few seconds, but Marinette returned it in full, and it took just as long for Alya to realize that her best friend's smile filled her with butterflies. "Anyways, um… I'm sorry if I didn't respond well- okay, wait, no. I know I didn't respond well, because I was really surprised? I mean, I was always under the assumption you were… well, straight, I guess. That, uh… that sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? I know I shouldn't have assumed-"

"Shh. It's okay. Assuming is what people do. You know what Americans say about assuming, though, don't you?" Marinette says with a smile. Alya snorted in response. "Really though, it's okay. I never… I didn't ever tell you or anything. And I did chase after you know who for like a good couple of years. Guess I was kind of ignoring anything else, so I didn't even realize things until our last year of lycée. But when I did notice it was like a switch flipped or something. I suddenly noticed like everything, the little touches, the ones that lasted for awhile, the way you and others moved, and it was just like. Wow."

"But it's been years since then, Mari…"

"I know. And I meant to tell you, I did! But in lycée you were with Nino again, and I couldn't say anything that might hurt you or him. And then you guys broke up again and even though it wasn't so bad I knew you were still sad and needed space, so I obviously wasn't gonna tell you then. After that, I guess… I never found a good opportunity. Last time wasn't very ideal either, but I was, admittedly, a little tipsy-" Alya laughed at that, and Marinette shot her an unamused look before continuing, "-and you looked so goddamn amazing and it just… slipped out." She sighed and closed her eyes, laying her head back against the arm of the couch. "I didn't mean to make things so awkward."

Alya stayed quiet while all the information sunk in. Marinette stole a glance at her, and was relieved to see that her best friend didn't look mad or uncomfortable about it.

"I didn't even get a chance to say something," she finally whispered."You ran out yelling something, and I- I didn't... I didn't go after you. Or call. Or message or email or anything." She swallowed and looked at Marinette. "I'm really sorry, Mar. You ran out and I thought you made a mistake. I didn't want things to be awkward so I just…"

"Waited." Marinette finished for her. When Alya nodded, Marinette found herself sitting up and putting her hands on Alya's shoulders. "I did too. We both made a mistake in doing that, I guess. But I want you to know that even though we didn't talk for a little while, I still thought about you, and I still really, really, really want to be friends, at the very least. Like I really wouldn't know what to do without you in my life? I fell asleep in the snow on a park bench while we weren't talking, for crying out loud!" She threw her hands up and was about to launch into one of her ramblings, but Alya was always one to calm her down enough to prevent it.

The situation they found themselves in didn't change that.

It was Alya's turn to put her hands on her friend's shoulders, and when she successfully got Marinette's attention, she pulled her into a hug. The blankets fell from Marinette's form, and Alya's fingers dug into the cloth of her friend's shirt. It was soft beneath her fingertips, but she knew Marinette was softer still. She took a deep breath, appreciating the scent of vanilla, new fabrics, and paper that clung to Marinette, as it has since the two met. Her eyes shut and her hold tightened as she listened to Marinette's semi-frantic heartbeat slow into a rhythmic tempo. Eventually, Marinette returned the hug with just as much love and care as she rested her head against Alya's chest.

"Girl, I don't think there's anything in the world I want more than to stay in your life." Her voice was quiet, but in the silence that had permeated the apartment, it was loud and clear. "No matter if it's as an acquaintance, a fan, a friend, a best friend, a girlfriend..." She heard Marinette's breath catch. "As long as I get to be greedy and steal even just a minute of your time, I think we'll be just fine." She pulled away just enough to smile at Marinette, whose eyes shimmered with tears ready to spill. She wore a small, nervous kind of smile, one not unlike how she smiled in front of previous crushes.

Alya winked at her, which made Marinette lean forward and laugh into her shoulder. Her laughter proved to be contagious, because soon both were laughing, Marinette into Alya's shoulder and Alya into Marinette's hair. When it finally died down, they stayed in the same position until Marinette pulled away just enough for them to be looking at each other.

"S-so, uh… girlfriend, huh?" she asked, nervousness taking root again, though this time it was accompanied by hope.

"Mademoiselle Dupain-Cheng, are you asking me, greatest reporter of all time, to be your girlfriend?" Her voice was teasing in an effort to lessen the building tension, and to the relief of them both, it worked.

"Why, Mademoiselle Césaire, that's exactly what I'm asking," she answered with a smirk.

"Ah, yes, in that case," she started, leaning forward so her nose pressed into Marinette's cheek, "I would be honored to have such a title."

"Really?" she breathed.

"Really." Alya placed a quick peck on the corner of Marinette's lips. "Now, you're still kind of cold and I swear you look like you're gonna pass out at any second, so let me make us some hot cocoa and then we can get some sleep. Sound good?"

Her girlfriend- Marinette's my girlfriend now! Alya thought with glee- hummed, thinking about the offer.

"I think sleep sounds better. Cocoa's got nothing on blankets and cuddles, you know," she said in a very serious, certain tone. Alya snorted and moved to get up anyways, but Marinette, in a shocking show of strength, pulled her back down. This time, they were laying next to each other rather than sitting, and neither could lie about how nice it felt to share in each other's embrace. "You won't leave me to freeze, will you?" she pouted.

"Alright, alright, you've twisted my arm. Cuddles it is."

Together, they wrapped themselves in the plenty of blankets Alya had brought out until the warmth and rightness of their proximity lulled them both to sleep.