#I mean I’d be doing the exact same thing if I were a senator on pre-war Cybertron

[novafire-is-thinking]

He looks so happy talking about his obsessions 🥺 ^

Shockwave using his political power almost entirely for passion projects will never not be funny to me.

Like, “Yes I am a Senator. No, I will not be giving up my scientific endeavors. Wanna hear about my newest project?” :D

Proteus: You go here now. My game. My rules.

Shockwave: Oh, there’s a game? I’m so sorry. Let me just ignore you and play by myself then.

Proteus: …Off with his head.

[buckyownsmylife]

Secret Door: the one where there’s a ball and some undisclosed feelings

President James Buchanan Barnes is the first president to occupy the White House without a first lady ever since… well, President James Buchanan Barnes. But he’s not too worried about it, since he got his best friend from college acting as his VP, supporting him just like only someone who knew everything about him could do. What happens when feelings from the past start to resurface?

Or the one where you and Bucky used to date but now you got a country to run.

for general warnings and author’s notes, please go to the fic’s masterlist.

Y/N’s P.O.V.

“Are you free?” I asked as I chanced a glance inside the oval room, only to find James looking down at nothing in particular with a defeated look on his face. My movement had him glancing up to meet my eyes though, and a beautiful smile brightened his expression at the realization that I was the one talking to him.

“For you? Always.” He excitedly waved me in, already leaping out of his chair. “Come here, darling. I need one of your hugs.” I opened a little smile of my own at his request, but more tentatively than I would have if I hadn’t seen just how tired he looked before he saw me.

I was worried about him. Even now, while I had his arms around my body, his beard tickling my neck, it didn’t seem like he was really here at all. And it felt like he thought the same if the way he squeezed me was any indication of just how hard he was trying to be more present in the moment we were currently still living in.

I tried to pull away, but his arms only tightened around my smaller body, and so I relented, letting him rely on me for as long as he needed to. It was the least I could do, not for the President of my nation, but for my best friend since college.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” I asked once he finally let me go, still keeping me close by holding my wrists delicately but with purpose. He seemed to consider my words, lips pursed in thought, that cute little frown that made me want to bury my thumb between his eyebrows appearing on his face, but ended up shaking his head.

“Not really. What I would like is for you to come have dinner with me tonight. Do you think you can make it?” Of course I could. No one in their right mind would pass up the opportunity for dinner with the President, if not for his title, at least for his personal chef, but it wasn’t my case.

I could never say no to him because his company was my absolute favorite. I’d always chosen him over anything, and he’d done the same for me. But tonight, I knew neither of us could retreat into any sort of personal encounter because we both had the same social gathering to attend.

“I’d love to, but the ball, remember?” I watched as realization struck over Bucky, and he slapped his own forehead and groaned, making me giggle. He really was such a manchild at times, even if only with me.

“Ugh, do we really have to go?” Rolling my eyes at his whining, I fixed his suit while I bit on the inside of my cheek, so I wouldn’t just relent and laugh. I knew he was only saying this for show, an immature effort to get on my nerves.

I really did know him too well.

“Yes, we do. We can have dinner tomorrow. I’ll ask your assistant to clear off your schedule, I don’t know of any major commitments you have to attend.” When I finished fixing his clothes, I noticed the lack of response, and so I looked up to find him staring down at me with the most lovesick expression in his eyes. I laughed, but only to try to soften the mood of the room, ignore the way it made my heartbeat pick up.

“You really are the perfect woman, have I ever told you that?”

“Only all the time.” I smiled, thinking back fondly on everything we’d shared that led us here. It was a hell of a ride, but it was definitely easier with him by my side.

“It’s because it’s the truth.” I nodded, accepting his words as I prepared to leave, but then a gentle hand on my elbow had me looking back. “What color is your dress for this evening?” The question made me curious, but it wasn’t entirely out of the ordinary. Bucky was always looking for ways to show me that he cared.

“Yellow.” He nodded, releasing me as a silent way to say that I could leave. I smiled back at him, nodding in return.

“I’ll see you tonight.”

Bucky’s P.O.V.

The sound of heels against marble in the nearly empty hallway alerted me of her arrival. Turning around, I found her wearing the most beautiful and elegant yellow dress, the exact shade I had chosen to wear as a tie for the evening.

“Oh, wow,” I commented, opening a smile after I was able to close my mouth. “You look wonderful, sweetheart.” She looked extremely suspicious of me, although a huge smile took over most of her face.

“I like your tie.” Chuckling, I subconsciously adjusted it before reaching out to take her hand, wanting to close the space between us as soon as possible. The feeling of her warm skin always made me feel comforted, even if I didn’t know that I needed any sort of comfort. 

She seemed to know it, though. She always did. It was why I knew my decision to ask her to become my vice-president was the right one to make, even though our previous history together would make our run a peculiar one, to say the least.

“Good, you were supposed to appreciate it.” She hummed in acknowledgment but didn’t give me any more shows of how it affected her, eyeing the knot I’d just secured before reaching out for it again. Maybe it should make me irritated, but I could only find it adorable, how she insisted on double checking my outfit when I was sure nothing was wrong with it.

“Sam helped you with it?” At the mention of my assistant, I looked up from her cute little face to see that he was standing right behind her, sporting a knowing smile on as he watched our interaction, just patiently waiting for us to decide to leave.

“You know it.” She smiled up at me then, and suddenly there was an unspoken conversation between us that I didn’t want to break. I wasn’t too sure if what she was trying to communicate was the same I wanted to hear, but a guy could hope.

All hope eventually ends up lost when there’s a presidential commitment to attend, though. I should have known it by now.

“We really should be going,” Sam’s voice interrupted us, and still I smiled. She returned it as well, knowing this was our life, this was what we did - at least for the next three years.

“Shall we?” I asked, offering my arm to her, who bowed teasingly before accepting it.

“We shall.”

Y/N’s P.O.V.

Time would pass and we would eventually step out of power and I still wouldn’t become accustomed to all of this. All of the press, the fake smiles, the insipid conversations. But it was a part of the job. And at least I had James by my side to help me deal with all of it. If there was one thing I admired about him, it was his ability to make every situation exciting.

“I don’t think I actually told you just how beautiful you look tonight,” a familiar voice murmured right by my ear, hands slotting themselves over my hips as one of mine clutched my chest in surprise. I guess I truly had been distracted, staring out at the beautiful garden from the balcony I managed to find so I could get a breath of fresh air.

“You really think so?” I asked, turning around to meet his eyes. He had a cheeky smile on his lips, the one that made him look younger than he was - the one I adored so much.

“Oh, yes. You’re also incredibly distracting. I couldn’t focus on a single conversation people tried to hold with me tonight. But you know what?” I hummed, tilting my head to signal him I wanted to hear what he was going to say. “I find myself enjoying this distraction.”

It was impossible not to giggle - he’d always been a charmer, and that was the reason why I fell so hard for him back in college. If there was a reason we worked well together, however, it was because I knew how to give him a hard time.

“I mean, I would too, if I was stuck in a conversation with Senator Johnsson. Although everything is distracting when you’re near that man.” He tried to control his laughter, he really did, but in the end, it broke free, floating in the air around us and coaxing my own to join his.

By the time he was finally able to breathe again, he was shaking his head, his eyes crinkling in the corners, in that familiar way that I knew meant he was thinking I was too much.

“Well, then. I think I’ve earned myself a small break from all that boredom. Mind if I join you out here?” It was my turn to shake my head with a small smile, stepping to the side to give him more space to breathe.

“Not even a little bit.” It was silent for a second as we stared out to the garden, just reveling in each other’s companies. Despite how frequently we saw each other, it wasn’t usually this quiet, or ever this peaceful. It felt good to just feel enchanted by his proximity again.

But I knew I couldn’t stay there too long, and if he wanted some time to relax, I should probably get back there and distract people so they wouldn’t come looking for him. That was my plan when I took a step back, almost turning around to open the door when I felt his hand clasping me.

Only it wasn’t over my shoulder or arm, which was probably his original goal. Somehow, in the effort to keep me still, he didn’t anticipate in which direction I’d turn, so he ended up with a hand curled around my breast.

“I-I’m sorry,” he was quick to apologize, immediately dropping his arm. “I didn’t intend to.” He looked so utterly embarrassed by the situation, it was almost heartwarming. I felt the overwhelming urge to console him, not even for a second feeling uncomfortable because of what had transpired.

Bucky’s P.O.V.

“James, it’s okay,” she comforted me, her hand over my shoulder. “I’ve felt your hands in far more intimate places, remember?”

How could I ever forget?

The door slammed behind us but we were too busy lost in each other’s lips to care. I almost tripped on a forgotten sneaker as I tried to guide us to the couch, unwilling to worry about one of my roommates walking in on us right then.

It’s not like it would be the first time.

Her hands reached around her own torso to get rid of her shirt and bra, and I was left with my mouth watering at the sight that really should be familiar by now. She still hypnotized me all the same.

“C’mon, James,” she whined, hands tugging on my hair to try to pry me away from her nipple. “No foreplay. I need you now.” I groaned, finally relenting and letting go of her breast to work on unbuckling my belt as my cock twitched at her words.

“Naughty little slut,” I sneered, wrapping her hair around my fist when she positioned herself on her knees for me, holding onto the armrest of the couch. “I’m gonna fill you so good.”

She gasped in satisfaction upon feeling my cock stretch her out, something that had my heart skipping a bit every time. “Only I can make you feel this good, huh?” I asked, pulling on her strands to make sure she’d listen to me, even despite how roughly I was pounding her.

“Tell me,” I ordered, all insecurities and nerves, a young man still in college, finally exploring all of his sexual desires with the woman of his dream. Thankfully, she always gave me just what I needed, not only physically, but emotionally too.

“Yes, yes, Bucky. Only you, baby. God, you fuck me so fucking good.” It always thrilled me to no end to hear her usual perfectly composed self say the nastiest shit when I had my cock inside of her. Only I got to have this side of her, only I knew all of her.

She felt like home, in more ways than one. Whenever I had her, it was the best, sloppiest sex ever, and even years after I’d last touched her, I could still remember it perfectly.

I don’t think I’d ever be able to forget.

“God, you are such a fucking tease,” present me jokingly chastised, burying my hands in my pockets so I wouldn’t reach out and touch her again. The need was always there though, and it was overwhelming each time.

“Too much?” She joked, biting her lower lip as if it wasn’t the sexiest fucking thing ever. It made me groan, more out of desire than frustration at her words, but she’d never know.

“Just short of enough. Maybe it’ll keep my hunger at bay for a little while longer.” I looked up at her from under my eyelashes, trying to gather how she felt about what I was implying, but other than seeing her eyes widen a little bit, she gave me nothing.

She really knew me all too well by now.

“Still,” I continued, trying not to let the situation become awkward. “It seems like you’re not wearing a bra…” I teased, eyebrows raised high as if I was judging her for it. “Care to explain yourself, madam vice president?”

When she threw her head back to laugh, it exposed more of her delicious neck, and I unconsciously licked my lips at the clear skin I saw there. It didn’t use to look that way when we were together. I was very much into marking her all over - immature, possessive, and extremely in love with the woman before me.

“With this dress?” She asked, looking down at herself and making me look down at her neckline automatically. God, she was incredible. “Of course not. Can’t wear panties either.”

And just as I groaned at the new information, she giggled, winking over her shoulder as she reached out for the door. “Why must you tease me like this?” I shouted over the music, but all I could hear in response was her delighted laugh, and honestly, that was more than enough.

[libermachinae]

Night Shift

Also on AO3! Summary: Prowl and Jetfire analyze leads on a Decepticon smuggling operation, working together late into the night trying to find the missing connections. A sleep deprived slip of the tongue leads Prowl to revisiting old choices. Word Count: 2146

---

Prowl didn’t keep track of his chronometer this late in the night. Morning was inevitable, and he knew he could rely on a burst of messages from Orion to let him know when it had arrived. As such, he had no idea what hour it was when Jetfire broke through the productive silence.

“How did you come up with these predictions?” Jetfire asked. Worst of all, he was speaking with his mouth full, apparently too incensed by Prowl’s logic train to be bothered with common decency. “Every gun you’ve pulled in has been running on fumes; I’ve had to scrape the insides of the barrels just to figure out what they’re fueled on.”

The impressive thing about Jetfire was that even as a voice over the comms, he sounded like the biggest bot in the room. It wasn’t just that his voice was deep; Orion, who wasn’t that much taller than Prowl, had a voice you could feel through the floor panels. It was something about the way Jetfire talked, deliberate and straightforward, rarely stuttering even when caught off-guard. It was refreshing.

“I’ve outlined the logic process in my report. I won’t be repeating it,” Prowl said, scrolling back through his files.

“What are they teaching in the enforcer academy that reports don’t need to communicate anything?” Jetfire grumbled

It would be a reasonable estimate to say they spent 50% of these near nightly calls complaining about their targets, their coworkers, and the administration, and another 40% about each other. Prowl sat through them strictly as a matter of convenience, being a faster mode of communication than the intermittent data bursts preferred by the sanctioned enforcer agencies.

Having someone at the other end of the line also assisted the rust sticks and nucleon microcubes in staving off recharge protocols.

“It’s as I explained to Tumbler: it communicates everything I intended it to.” Ideally, very little to anyone who couldn’t have worked it out themselves. That way, the important information stayed with those who could actually use it, and the rest—

“Who’s Tumbler?”

Prowl lost his train of thought as the rest of his processor caught up to what the .5% he reserved for conversation had said. He froze, rust stick halfway to his mouth.

“No one,” he said.

“Okay.” Jetfire drew out the word. “Did he buy that line?”

No, of course not. Tumbler was always relentless about that sort of thing. His curiosity and drive could have lent to the makings of a detective or captain if he’d dedicated them more often to investigations and less on critiquing Prowl.

“He was young and failed to grasp the necessity of efficiency in our line of work.” Prowl had tried to be patient, but he’d been young too, and Tumbler was the first partner he’d had who would listen to him. Even if it was just to argue that Prowl’s opaque writing was the cause of their inefficiency.

“Hmph.”

Jetfire liked to intersperse their conversations with meaningless noises, and although Prowl needed more samples before he was certain of his explanation, he believed they meant Jetfire didn’t agree with something he’d said but was ending the discussion prematurely. It was illogical, leaving a matter unsettled for which a solution existed, but normally Prowl’s priority queues were ordered such that work came before ideological disagreements.

“What?” he asked, finally setting down the rust stick.

“You’re normally terrible with names,” Jetfire said without hesitation. “I’m just trying to imagine what a bot would have to be like to leave that much of an impression on you.”

“He was talented,” Prowl admitted.

“Do you keep in touch?”

“No.” Prowl straightened his back and flared his sensory panels, ready to move on. “It was not a practical partnership. Being together diminished our respective abilities and prevented us from fulfilling our responsibilities. It was for the betterment—”

“Hey, hold on, Prowl,” Jetfire said, his rolling voice enough to draw Prowl up short. “I know that you—but, you know what that sounds like, right?”

Prowl frowned, immediately recognizing Jetfire’s social theory tone.

“Pragmatism,” he said. “We can’t have everything we want in an ordered society. I—we did what Cybertron needed of us.”

“By disposing of a part of yourself?”

Tumbler hadn’t liked that explanation either.

“We weren’t conjunx.” And for very good reason. There were more important things in life than feelings or fleeting commitments, and it was idealists like Jetfire who—

“Just because it didn’t have a name doesn’t mean it wasn’t important.”

Prowl’s thoughts stumbled. He hadn’t expected Jetfire to say that, not because it was out of character but because he was right. That was the exact sentiment Prowl had tried to put to words maybe half a dozen times and now it was being turned on him like a spotlight.

“There are things that should never be sacrificed,” Jetfire went on. Prowl felt his silhouette thrown into sharp relief. “Things we’re worse off for letting go of.” He paused. “A while ago, I was made an offer: instant entry to the academies. No exams, no fees. Everything I’d ever wanted. In return, though, I would’ve had to give up my wings. My… sponsor, I guess, knew I had the processor for science, just not the frame. They asked for me to give up one part of myself to let the rest go free.”

Prowl shook his helm, leaning away from the speaker. Jetfire’s tone was the same one he occasionally used with Bumblebee. With Prowl, he was hard edges and warning lights. They weren’t this for each other. They didn’t do this.

“You were nearly the victim of a scam,” he said, searching blindly for familiar ground.

“I’m sure it seems that way,” Jetfire said, unperturbed. “Do you get it, though? Giving up any one piece would’ve meant tacit agreement with the Functionists, that I wasn’t fit to do my work in any form but what they prescribed. Even if I’d told myself it was for Cybertron, it really would’ve been a sacrifice in their honor, and nothing would ever be worth that.”

Prowl wasn’t entirely obtuse. He understood what Jetfire was saying, but he couldn’t afford to hear it, not with everything he had already done and the plans he had yet to set in motion. Maybe Jetfire had found a way to live that allowed him to maintain his idealistic commitments, but most mechanisms weren’t so lucky. Everyone had to give up something.

“And now you’re here, working on behalf of the Senate,” Prowl said, just to prove that point.

Jetfire made his noise again.

“Right, I forgot,” he said. Annoyed or frustrated: the usual feelings they brought out in each other. “Waste of time. Forget I said anything.”

Prowl wouldn’t, but he also wasn’t going to give Jetfire an excuse to keep pontificating.

It would have been a waste of their time, anyhow, because however sincere Jetfire was in his admission, Prowl had never understood the hypocrisy of bots who would claim to reject Functionism while maintaining an almost fanatical devotion to their frames. In some intangible sense, maybe he did enjoy the opportunity to go for a long drive, but he couldn’t imagine himself grieving his tires for their own sake. He tried to compare it to what he had felt when Tumbler had said going to Kaon was a selfish, pretentious idea and immediately recoiled.

“Results are exactly what I told you,” Jetfire said. Prowl realized he hadn’t gotten any work done in the last several kliks. “Not nearly the concentration of materials to support your theory the Decepticons have contacts in Uraya, and a few that will probably trace back to Kaon, like everything else.”

“I’d like to see for myself,” Prowl said, standing. He didn’t often get this badly distracted, and it was easy to pin it on the state of his desk: used energon cubes and wrappers from the cheap snacks he kept fueled on littered the spaces he should have been using for case notes and displays. When was the last time he’d cleaned?

“Really?” Jetfire asked. “The data’s pretty clear.”

“Humor me.”

“What do you think I’ve been doing?”

Neither said goodbye before they hung up: another of their customs.

Prowl cleared the mess into the trash. Exhaustion was nibbling at his processor like a corrosive. Another couple shots would get him through his morning meetings, and then a regular midday fueling would carry him over until he could recharge properly in the evening. Before that, though, the day had to begin, an event he discovered was closer than he’d expected when he stepped outside and saw the horizon just tilting toward the pale blue of an oncoming dawn.

The air was gentle, the pleasant cool that foreshadowed a blistering day. Jetfire was a dot over the Rodion skyline. Prowl glanced up at the few stars that could punch through the light pollution and was reminded, suddenly, of the time he and Tumbler had discussed getting a little patch of metal out on the Tungsten Moors. The barren sparkfields had felt nonetheless fertile with possibilities, and they had gotten hung up on whether it would be more practical to live in a house with two stories or just one. It had been a fantasy, nothing more; even on their joint income, it would have taken millions of years to save up. But there had been something, if not fulfilling, thrilling about it, making plans that didn’t hinge on work or promotions.

He wondered if Tumbler remembered that conversation.

Jetfire’s slow approach gave Prowl time to dwell while keeping an idle optic on his teammate. There was nothing spectacular about Jetfire’s flying: Prowl had worked with and chased down fliers who were faster, more maneuverable, and flashier in every way. But there was something resolute and sure about the way Jetfire coasted, a steadiness that Prowl would have appreciated sooner if he’d noticed it, his thoughts of Tumbler and past mistakes and pointless sacrifice sliding away as he watched Jetfire’s flight.

Jetfire’s flying was beautiful, in its own way. Its understatement reminded Prowl of his own assembly line colors, but with an underlying confidence that left Prowl feeling inadequate. Though technically strong, his power was limited to what he could siphon off Orion and their other high-level contacts. He’d experienced a taste of the real thing under Sentinel, but that had been an especially tenuous connection, liable to snap had he ever tugged too hard. Jetfire’s power was all his own. Not overwhelming, not enough to make the changes Cybertron needed. Incomparable, really, to what Prowl had wielded. But it radiated from the tips of his wings to the burn of his thrusters, self-realized, without reservation or concession.

Prowl’s tac net pinged him with the results for a problem he hadn’t realized he’d plugged in: 50% Prowl should have been strong enough to find another way, 50% choosing Tumbler would have made him stronger.

A perfect 50-50 meant his systems were badly in need of defrag. He cleared the cache and set his tac net to reboot, shaking his helm to dispel the resulting vertigo as Jetfire landed on the steps below him. Prowl waited patiently for him to complete his mode switch, taking two steps back so they would be at optic level with each other.

“Pleasant flight?” he asked.

“Wouldn’t trade it for anything,” Jetfire said with a smugness that allowed Prowl to scoff as he motioned for the datapad.

Jetfire handed it over. Prowl knew he was being watched as he powered it on and reviewed its contents, but he took his time, using Jetfire’s results to run through a few warm up calculations as his tac net came back online.

“You didn’t check for copper fluoride,” he commented.

“No,” Jetfire said slowly, “because it wasn’t one of the compounds we were investigating.”

“Run the tests again.” Prowl tried to return the datapad, but Jetfire refused to take it. “The chances we would find evidence of materials native to the Urayan region were always slim to none. However, the old blackmarket pipeline between Kaon and Yuss ran directly underneath the city. Does that make more sense?”

Prowl saw the moment Jetfire finally saw the case as he did, a knotted web of deceptions meant to dissuade even the most seasoned detective from untangling its core. Jetfire took the datapad from Prowl and stowed it, though the hard look in his optics did not waver.

“Could’ve said that from the beginning,” Jetfire griped.

Prowl didn’t bother to respond. What was done was done. Talking so much about the past was a waste of time neither of them could afford, because for all that it might have mattered, nothing they said could change any of it. All they had was the future, and the possibility of starting each day stronger than they had the one before.

[commander-marlo]

Foxiyo - A spider embarrassed me in front of my favorite senator

Thank you @sexyrexy7567 for telling me fox is scared of spiders! I had a lot of fun writing this =D

Summary: After a meeting with a clone hating senator, Riyo thinks about the humanity of the clones. Not expecting to find out that they could actually be afraid of anything, let alone spiders of all things.

Words: 1500~

Riyo has a meeting set up with senator Garos. A man who presents himself as authoritative and adamant, which aren’t poor qualities for any senator to have. Having a strong opinion and showing adequacy is an important quality to have in the senate and as a leader. 

But Senator Garos takes it too far by letting his adamancy cloud his judgement, he’s easy to draw conclusions and his authoritative nature makes him imperious. It was exhausting enough to listen to the man trying to continuously persuade her to have his same opinion. It had already rubbed her the wrong way that he was so pushy in his persuasions, but their conversation this afternoon added to her feelings of uneasiness around the man.

It had already started at the beginning of their meeting, they hadn’t even started their discussion about politics before the man pointed to the commander at her side. “If you could tell your clone to leave the room, Senator Chuchi. I’d like to speak to you in private.”

Riyo feels uncomfortable by the thought of being left alone with the man and feels relieved when the commander decides to speak up on her behalf, saving her from the stress of having to decide to be left alone with the man or to awkwardly decline his offer. “I’ve been assigned the task to protect Senator Chuchi. Leaving her unguarded while on duty would be against protocol, senator.” 

“I didn’t ask you clone, I asked the senator. Now go, I’d like to go over this next bill with senator Chuchi in private.” The man was hissing through his teeth, clearly biting back annoyance as he commanded Fox out of the room. Who in return turned his attention to her, clearly not willing to leave his post unless she herself gives the order, while reminding her of the following fact, “My men and I have a duty of confidentiality, senator. I’m sure-”

“Are you ignoring my orders? I could have you decommissioned for disrespecting a senator!” The man threatens. 

Riyo quickly steps in to defend the commander.  “Senator Garos, it is highly inappropriate of you to send away my security for me, don’t you think?”

That seems to get the man to settle down again. “I see what you mean, my apologies. Would it be possible to speak about this matter in private, senator Chuchi. I’m sure standing guard outside will provide enough security as is.”

“I understand your reasoning, but having the commander stand besides me shouldn’t be a problem. They do have a duty of confidentiality as the commander mentioned before. If anything were to happen, no matter how small the chance, it would be good for both our protection to have the commander as security with us.”

It appears the man can’t think of any reason to counter her reasoning and ends that part of their conversation with - “If that is what you think is best, senator.” - before finally moving on to the topic of politics, sending one last glare to the soldier that stands behind her. When she is done, she is escorted back to her office by the commander. Setting down her datapad at her desk as she lets out an exhausted sigh, before sitting down on the chair behind it. 

“Are you ignoring my orders? I could have you decommissioned for disrespecting a senator!” The meeting overall had gone well, but the words at the beginning of her meeting seem to have had an impact on her. She knew senator Garos was known to dislike clones, lightly said, but he threatened so quickly with decommissioning of all things. It wouldn’t be the first time he got a clone shipped back to Kamino for that exact reason. He didn’t think of them as people. 

“They might look like men, but these clones are droids in disguise. Don’t let their faces fool you.” She had heard him say once before. Before she came to Coruscant she didn’t know what to think about them. She begrudgingly has to admit that if he had told her that before she had gotten to know them, then she might have been persuaded to believe him with the way they didn’t show any other kind of personality trait then ‘soldier’. 

It was only when Padme told her about some of her interactions with clones that she started to notice that they are more than what meets the eye. She had tried to see it for herself once, asking a trooper about how he and his brother’s were doing and was quite surprised when the trooper stammered out that he and his brother’s were doing fine and thanked her for asking. There was also this time where she had received a box of pantoran sweets from her family back home and had asked commander Fox once if he wanted to try one. He declined, but had suggested for the trooper guarding the entrance to her office to try one in his stead. Resulting in the senator offering him one.  

Said trooper had nervously replied, “I’d love to, but it is against regulations to remove my bucket while on duty, senator.”

“I won't tell anyone you ate something while on duty, if you won’t tell anyone I distracted a trooper from leaving his post for a minute for some sweets, do we have a deal?” She had joked while holding out the box to him so he could pick one out. 

The trooper had looked to his commander for reassurance who told him to quickly pick one and then get back to his post. 

She remembered the way the trooper smiled after he had lifted his helmet and had tasted one of the sweets she had held out for him. She could almost imagine stars in his eyes, thanking her and the commander before putting his helmet back on and rushing back to his post. She had offered another one to the commander, who declined her offer again, saying he wished not to make use of her generosity and that he was already thankful she had been willing to give one of the sweets to one of his younger brothers. 

It was then that she had realised something about the commander. He was selfless, protective and caring. Definitely not a droid. She smiled while she thought back on that time amongst other occasions, It was only when a startled yelp came from the commander that she looked his way. Seeing just in time the way that the commander had jumped aside, a thud coming from his helmet as it was thrown on the floor with haste. “Commander Fox, are you alright?” she asked surprisedly, hurriedly walking around her desk and his way to check on him, curious to know what had caused such a reaction from the commander. 

He had looked up at her in shock, stuttering as he rambled on his explanation, “I-I’m sorry, ma’am. I know i’m not supposed to remove my helmet on duty, it’s just that... uhm.”

During his attempt to explain, she had crouched down to pick up the commander’s helmet from where he had thrown it off, only to be stopped by his spooked warning, “Wait! don’t pick it up, it...uhh.. could..still.. be there.” 

She halted her actions as she looked back at the commander, seeing his unease as his gaze seemed to linger around the room, before asking, “It being what, commander?”

“A...spider, ma’am.” he admitted, hesitantly so. Clearly still embarrassed by the whole ordeal, while trying to scramble his composure back together.

“A spider, commander?” She asked, surprised by his response as she picked up the helmet. 

“It crawled onto my vizor, which startled me. I apologise, ma’am. It won’t happen again.” The commander said stiff and apologetically. When Riyo reaches out to hand the helmet back to him, she notices the unease in his eyes as he looks at it. 

She giggles a bit at that, “It’s alright commander, I checked, the spider’s gone.”

He shyly takes the helmet out of her hands, quietly telling her ‘thank you’ before placing it back on his head. She can’t help herself, amusement clear in her voice as she teases the man,  “Didn’t think you’d be scared of spiders, commander.” 

“Well, it’s not something I'd want to be known for, senator.” 

“Don’t worry commander, your secret’s safe with me.” she laughs, throwing the man a wink, before turning around and walking back to her desk. A violet flush on her cheeks as she realises how straightforward she was to actually tease the man like that. A man she now knew not only was selfless, protective and caring, but was also quite lovable when embarrassed and also had a shocking fear of spiders. She giggled at the thought. 

No, definitely not a droid.

[melodythefab]

So I may have made an artificer and I may have played her and she may be just a tad feral but anyways here’s some highlights-

Quier (fellow party member)(pronounced Queer)- Hi, I’m Quier-

Adelaide (my character)- aren’t we all.

~~~~~~~~~

Training Captain- so, we had our own artificers look at your… what was it, a gun? And they said it was maybe the singular most destructive thing they’d ever seen, so you’ll get that back later.

Adelaide- that’s the point! That’s the whole point of a gun!

~~~~~~~~~~~

Adelaide- starts infodumping about guns*

Puckett (a new NPC friend)- *listening and providing comments when they can*

Adelaide, internally- I’ve only had Puckett for 20 minutes but if anything happened to them I would kill everyone on this island and then myself-

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Adelaide- *misses nearby enemy* that was a warning shot! You won’t get another one!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*fighting in training*

Puckett- *gets pretty seriously hurt by a half-orc rogue and a human fighter*

Adelaide- *pushes herself in between Puckett and the others* if you so much as touch my friend I swear to all the gods I will make you wish you were never born.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Half-orc- *does damage to Adelaide*

Adelaide- *looks over* as soon as I get my alchemist supplies back, I will melt your insides-

Half-orc- We’re in combat training wtf 👁👄👁

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*meeting the senators of the Republic of Pirates*

Adelaide, to Kymera (other party member)- I could, like, kill a man!

Dwarven senator- *mods in approval*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Adelaide, frustrated- *throws training crossbow on the ground*

Adelaide, immediately after- *goes back and picks it up because it’s the only weapon she was given*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Adelaide- *carries half-orc, who is over 2 feet taller than her, to the infirmary* oh my gosh I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean it, Puckett got hurt and I got worried and that happens sometimes I’m so sorry 🥺

Half-orc- oh no, I totally understand I’d do the exact same thing. Good for you.

Adelaide- *gives awkward hug*

[ironmandeficiency]

feelin’ like a woman

pairing: hardcase / reader

word count: 4322

summary:  you’re desperate to go somewhere where proper conduct isn’t expected, and you perk up at hearing about a clone-friendly bar called 79’s. fox gets protective over you and his worry only increases when the object of your affections is a member of the five-oh-first.

warnings: implied smut, the reader and hardcase are thirsty af, that along with the drinking makes me think rated m is most accurate for this fic

“come on, padme! i need someone to come with me!”

“you seem to forget that i’m painted on the sides of several of their ships, any clone would pick me out from a crowd just as quickly as my husband could.”

“then let them enjoy a night with the highly esteemed senator fighting for their rights as people!”

“that’s why you’re going, is it not?”

you groan in defeat, flopping onto padme’s bed theatrically. that was the exact opposite of why you were going. you were indeed an avid fighter for the rights of the clones, but you didn’t have the notoriety that padme did. no, you were planning on going to 79’s to let loose and drink people under the table without shame and have enough fun to satiate future boredom at the upcoming senator’s gala.

“you can have a disguise, or claim to be a body double for the former queen of naboo!”

padme rolled her eyes at the idea. “any member of the coruscant guard will see through that immediately. and speaking of, aren’t you going to need one of those disguises you’re so keen on making me wear?”

“nah, i’m not as popular as you, my friend. i don’t think i’ll be picked out as quick as you would be, or even at all.”

“but i’ve heard that anakin and his men have returned from their last campaign. surely some of their men would recognize you after your rescue from separatist lines a few months ago.”

“lucky for me that the men in blue aren’t snitches.”

--------

you were mostly right about not being widely known.

fox, when he saw you in a dress much tighter and shorter than anything he’s ever seen you wear, nearly had a stroke. at first he tried to blame the glass of unknown substance shoved into his hand by someone in the 327th for making him hallucinate stewjon’s senator wearing a scandalous dress while drinking at a clone bar. then he heard your voice when you asked for stewjoni scotch, and he knew for certain it was you.

his steps were fast and wide as he approached you, a hand gripping your arm almost vice-like to keep you from pulling away. “senator, what do you think you’re doing here?!” he spoke through clenched teeth akin to the way parents chastised their children in public.

“what i’m doing, foxy boy,” you smirk as the bartender sets the bottle and two glasses before you, “is getting shitfaced.” he filled both glasses, extending one towards the commander of the coruscant guard. he didn’t pick up the glass (which you expected) so you picked up yours, clinking the transparisteel against his chestplate with a wry smile.

fox does not approve of this, not at all. but he loosens his grip slightly because he’s aware of how that could possibly be twisted against him if the wrong person saw him. “do you have any idea how dangerous it is for you to be here, senator? you could have been murdered or kidnapped on the trip here, and a drunken senator would be quite easy to take advantage of after half a bottle of this scotch.”

he was worried about you, which was really sweet of the overworked commander (although quite unfounded because you were surrounded by soldiers of the republic, you’d be fine). you had enough faith in their morals to know if anyone got too handsy, clone or otherwise, one of them would defend your honor.

“my friend, you seem to forget that i was born and raised around this stuff,” you raised the drink to your lips and downed it in record time as you continued. “it might as well be in my blood at this point, foxy. but could you do me a favor and refrain from exposing my position? it’ll ruin my chances of any fun, and that would mean i’d have to leave the relative safety of dozens of soldiers.”

fox was resigned to his fate. you did have a fair point, he can monitor (protect) you much better when in a clone-friendly bar than he could in a place where he wasn’t even allowed inside because of his clone status. guess you were staying here.

“well not every brother in here has the same respect for women, sena-“ he cuts himself off and is unsure of how to address you without the title. fox was rightly worried about addressing you by your name. names were near-sacred to him and his brothers, and they held the same power to those in high positions of power like you were. would you be comfortable trusting him with something so precious as a name?

you pick up on his trepidation and immediately give him permission to call you by your first name (again), your other hand grabbing the untouched scotch and downing it with practiced speed. it isn’t like you haven’t been friends with fox since the first time he was assigned to float with your protection team, and you trusted him with your life. he wouldn’t take it lightly and most definitely would be professional whenever decorum was called for.

“alright y/n,” fox’s mouth wrapped around your name with calculated hesitance, almost doubting whether you had even given him permission in the first place. “from now until tomorrow, or as long as we’re in this bar, i’ll only address you as y/n, a random civvie that came to drink with a few soldiers.” the second time he spoke your name it was with a bit more confidence and a twinge of humor.

you brought a hand to the bar top with two rapid hits, drawing the attention of the bartender. the man took the hint and refilled the glasses in front of you both. before he could walk away, you grabbed one of them and gently slammed it back onto the bar, the bartender once again refilling it with the amber liquid.

it was almost comical, the way fox’s eyebrows shot up at the speed with which you took the third helping of scotch. “oh i’m here to do a lot more than drink, my friend,” you grin widely and rest an arm on his shoulder. “i’m here to party!”

the words had been out of your mouth for mere seconds when a clone with blue paint on his armor and inked onto his face approached your right side that was unoccupied by your favorite member of the coruscant guard.

the geometric blue on his armor clearly distinguished him as five-oh-first material, but you had never met this particular soldier before. he had a wild side to him, that much was obvious with the loud confidence he used when he invited you to hang out with him and his group toward the back.

there were a couple familiar faces occupying the booth he gestured to and you grinned at the sight of a cog-headed man downing a shot of something purple. it had been too long since you had seen jesse and co. and you figured that since you were here to party, who better to do it with than some of the rowdiest clones in the gar?

this was another thing fox didn’t like, and the list seemed to only be growing. many of the men under rex’s command had a well-known reputation for being something far less than tame. the idea of his friend (apparently you considered him a friend and it would only be fair of him to do the same since he was now given permission to do so) getting “shitfaced” with the loud men worried him.

they were vode, there was no reason for him to fear for your safety.

your manicured hand came to pat his cheek with affection, bidding him a farewell and directions to find you if he needed you. the other trooper grinned as he offered his hand, lacing his fingers with yours as he guided you to where his closest brothers sat.

fox grabbed the remaining glass of scotch and downed it the same way you had. it was gonna be a long night.

--------

when hardcase returned to the booth with you as his plus one, every head turned (echo and rex choked on their drinks as well) once they identified you.

“jesse! long time no see!”

“y/n! wouldn’t have pegged you for a 79’s kind’a girl, good to see ya!”

“senator y/n! you look stunning as always!”

“why thank you fives, but you know that flattery won’t get your hands anywhere closer to where you wanna put ‘em.”

laughter bounded from everyone around hardcase as you slid into the booth next to jesse, your interlaced hand pulling him next to you.

he was stunned. he had just invited a senator to his table with that much confidence and she actually followed him? a senator?! that knew his brothers?! how did she recognize fives and jesse (and presumably everyone else) in the first place?! part of him hoped the honorific was an inside joke he wasn’t privy to but common sense paired with the way echo and rex choked at the sight of you told him that you actually held that title.

it didn’t take a genius to know where exactly fives wanted his hands to go and the fact you didn’t lose your shit at the implications had hardcase reeling. what kind of senator were you? apparently a fun one, if the finesse you held when downing the scotch earlier held any weight to the idea.

“you know me too well, gorgeous.”

“knowing you at all is too much for anyone, fives.”

your laugh at echo’s snarky comment was loud and without inhibition and hardcase loved it. you were a breath of fresh air, something warm and bright amidst the murky, choking cloud that was the war and he wanted you to stay next to him as long as you were willing.

kix returned to the booth loaded down with drinks and was pleasantly surprised to see you laughing it up with hardcase and the others at something said that (what he correctly guessed) was at fives’s expense. you greeted the medic with a grin, quickly extending a hand towards him that he quickly filled with a brown bottle.

before you could open it and take a sip, jesse gently nudged your side with an elbow. an eyebrow quirked up as he gestured to his bottle and then to yours, and you quickly understood what he wanted to do.

“you’re on, jess.”

everyone else at the table (minus hardcase and tup, the only other man at the table you didn’t know prior to tonight) knew what was going to happen now. with an amused sigh, kix resigned himself to having to deal with an insanely drunk jesse later tonight as the latter opened his bottle and set it in front of him, waiting for the countdown. being the designated vodsitter was a necessary nuisance because they clearly couldn’t be trusted to get themselves back to the barracks safely.

fives began the countdown at three, a hand smacking the table with each number before shouting “go!” you and jesse quickly snatched your drinks from the tabletop and began chugging at a speed hardcase hadn’t seen a civvie (well, non-clone) drink with.

hardcase couldn’t help his eyes from wandering down your body as a couple drops escaped the corner of your lips, slowly making a path down your exposed neck and chest and disappearing into your dress. there had never a been a time he wished he was a tiny droplet of beer, but tonight had him thinking that he’d be content with such an existence if it guaranteed him gliding down your body the way your beer did.

damn his mind was weird sometimes.

he was pulled from his thoughts at a victory yell emitting from your throat, an empty bottle banging against the table. jesse’s head was in his hands, a playful groan making itself known at his now apparent loss.

you beat jesse?! he was the champion!

guess not anymore.

you playfully half-bowed at the cheers of the rest of the table’s occupants before wiping the corner of your mouth with a thumb. what he didn’t expect was the way you licked the tiny bit of beer away from the tip, or the way he felt something stir in his abdomen at the sight of your tongue flicking out for a brief second. did you know you had this affect on him?

conversation came back for a few minutes, everyone joking around and having a great time. you were going on about something to do with the ryloth senator’s bothersome lack of ability to shut up when you cut yourself off mid-sentence, seeming to notice something the others didn’t.

“y/n, what-“

you hold a finger up to silence him and after another couple seconds, your eyes light up at the familiar tune beginning to play from the music box in the corner by the dance floor.

“hardcase, move your ass! i love this song!” he quickly does as you ask, secretly relishing the way it feels when you lightly push him out. what would your hands feel like on him without his pesky armor in the way?

you’re barely out of the booth when a female waitress approaches you with another brown bottle the same as the one you finished off a while earlier.

“the three gentlemen from the three-twenty-seventh enjoyed your little show earlier, wanted to see if you’d do it again.” you could hear the eye roll in her voice, seeming a bit bothered for you at the gall the men she pointed to had.

you shot her a sympathetic smile before sending a flirty wink towards the men who bought you the drink, taking it from her hands with a flourish. she seemed to visibly relax when you were nonchalant about the whole thing, turning to go back to work.

if they wanted a show, they’d get one.

it took a tiny hop on your part to get yourself sitting on the table, being careful to avoid spilling the drinks of your blue-painted friends. you crossed one leg over the other as you sent a small salute with the bottle toward the table before bringing it to your lips. the liquid sent a warm burning sensation to your throat, and you tilted your head back with an almost seductive elegance.

another couple drops escaped your lips and followed a path similar to the prior bottle’s contents, and hardcase was once again enraptured at the sight. when the bottle was empty, you hopped off the table and set the bottle down. now that you had a few drinks in you and a great song was playing through the bar, it was time to dance.

hungry eyes burned into your body as you made your way to the dance floor. you knew there were a couple five-oh-first boys eyeing you as well as the three men who gifted you the last drink. disguising your curiosity as a flirty twirl to the song, you spun and took a head count of your admirers.

at least eight soldiers’ eyes were glued to you, the men having varying motives as to why you had their attention.

fox was casually nursing another glass of scotch at the bar but that nonchalance didn’t fool you. if you gave even the tiniest indication that you were less than comfortable with something, the guardsman would immediately come to your aid. it was the calculated calm that one would see in predators in the wild and you were thankful fox was on your side.

you didn’t pay much mind to the three-twenty-seventh members that sent the second bottle your way outside of knowing that they were watching you. the battalion was familiar to you only by name and paint color, and you weren’t looking to get chummy with men from a group whose commanding officer you weren’t well acquainted with.

tup, who you had discovered was the youngest of the blue men group you were drinking with tonight, was in absolute awe. he’d seen plenty of women who were able to fake a confidence like yours, but yours wasn’t even the slightest bit artificial. your name has popped up among the men with stories of how you were shooting down clankers right along with the five-oh-first during your rescue from seppie space. the fact you were as wild as the stories led him to believe was startling and quite validating.

most of your blue-clad companions were watching your departure the same way they’d watch a commando kick ass: with excitement and barely-contained anticipation. it was entertainment to them. they knew that you knew about the lingering eyes on you. you were just playing the part of the naive but sexy party girl that wanted nothing more than to drink and dance.

what you pretended to want was mostly true, but you had a more concrete goal in mind now than you did when you first arrived: your new goal was to jump the bones of a certain tatted heavy gunner.

a blind man could see the heart eyes hardcase has been throwing at you since he approached you at the bar. the trooper was everything but subtle in his enthusiasm to please you. the lust in his eyes as they roamed your body reminded you of the drought you’d been stuck in for far too long, senator work not leaving much time for the finer pleasures life has to offer the bold.

there was a tall and vibrant pitcher of water in blue paint that you hoped would be more than willing to flood your desert later tonight. maybe if you played your cards right and made your intentions known things would go your way.

only one way to find out.

among the cards was a little extra sway to your hips as you walked and a half-spin, urging him to follow you to the dance floor with a wink.

his brothers were encouraging him to get up and go, but he was suddenly nervous about you for the first time tonight. did you really want to dance with him? he didn’t think so. you were absolutely phenomenal and he wasn’t even an arc trooper, what would you want with him?

doubts were shoved away from his head when you went back to the booth and pulled him from his seat, a wide smile gracing your features. fives, tup, echo, and jesse drunkenly hollered in celebration of his good fortune as you laced a hand in one of his and he swore to the maker that he could never forget the way your hand felt in his.

once you found a prime spot on the floor, you turned to face hardcase and pulled him closer to you. your hands made their way to the nape of his neck and your hips began to sway. the trooper took the hint and his hands moved down your body and came to rest comfortably on your waist.

did all clones have such large hands? if so, how did you not notice that pleasant physical feature earlier? more importantly, would they feel as large as they did now when spreading you open for him before absolutely railing you the way you hoped he would?

the song continued and with it went what little structure your dancing had. hardcase was right on board with it, the two of you dancing like fools just enjoying each other’s company. you laughed as he playfully twirled you out of the blue and wow, his smile is dazzling. he was laughing right along with you and you’d be lying if you said it didn’t make him more attractive than he already was.

then he pulled you closer, chest flush with his. callused hands returned to your body and traveled lower and lower, one resting on your ass while the other pressed into the small of your back. his eyes became softer as he lowered his head, whispering a question of consent, whether it was okay for his hands to have gone so far down your figure.

it was endearing you even more to the mirthful soldier and if you weren’t careful- oh who were you kidding? you were too far gone to contemplate what it meant for you to have something so intimate with a trooper and frankly, you didn’t care now the same way you wouldn’t in the morning.

he was flesh and blood and dazzling smiles and playful jokes, and you wanted to continue being the reason he smiled so wide. you had half a mind to send a holopic of your lips on hardcase’s to the longneck senator burtoni just to piss her off because look at this man, he was spectacular and you dared anyone to imply that he was anything less.

you were snapped back to the man in front of you when his hand kneaded your ass in the most heavenly way possible, not even bothering to conceal the soft moan that worked its way out of your throat. there was no way hardcase didn’t hear it, not with how he tensed for just a brief moment before doing it again with both hands just to see what you’d do.

another moan added emphasis to your growing arousal, slightly louder than the last one but still quiet enough that the dancing strangers on almost every side couldn’t hear.

hardcase grinned like a loth-cat at the sound. he couldn’t believe his night was going so wonderfully and for a brief, blissful moment he forgot that he’d have to leave 79’s before the end of the night and in three days’ time, return to the front lines.

the harsh slap of reality obliterated what little jitters and anxiety he had about you on the spot. he tightened his hold on you before asking for permission to kiss you the way he’d wanted to since you sat down next to him.

the reply you granted him was simple enough and got the point across with zero chance for it to be twisted the way some fellow senators would twist the words of themselves and others. honesty and openness were rare in politics but they were abundant when hardcase was this close to you, and they only grew in size as your lips collided with his.

you could taste the beer on his tongue and something else you didn’t recognize that had you hungry for more. it was sweet and strong and distinctly hardcase and oh fierfek, if his mouth was this good right now, imagine how skilled it’d be when-

rough kneading elicited another moan that wasn’t as private as the others, your mind storing away the humorous sight of a couple veering their path away from you and hardcase’s affection in thinly veiled disgust.

“is there somewhere we can go for a bit more privacy?” the aroused timbre of his voice was something you weren’t prepared for and if he hadn’t been holding you so tight against him, you were confident in the assumption you’d have melted to the spot.

but the implications didn’t lose their intended effect; in fact, quite the opposite. you pulled him in for another kiss and this time, decided to push yourself against the codpiece of his armour, see how he’d respond.

there was something almost primal in the noise he made and you were desperate to hear it again. you repeated the motion and received the same response, deciding to answer the pressing question he posed as he relished in the pressure you were giving him. “i can get us into a hotel in the middle levels where no one would know me, see what happens from there.”

the confidence in his next words struck you like lightning. “i think we both know what’s gonna happen from there, sweetheart.” his lips began setting a path along your jaw and down your neck, pausing only to lightly bite the soft skin resting above your collarbone.

“what are we waiting for, then?”

hardcase’s tongue lapped at the spot his teeth just released for a moment before lifting his eyes to yours. “a cab to get us the kriff outta here.”

he (almost unwillingly) detached himself from your body and intertwined his fingers with yours, smiling as you guide each other towards the exit and right by your former table. as predicted by hardcase, his vode that were still conscious drunkenly shouted their congratulations and reminders about protection.

you laughed right along with them for a moment, bidding them a good night and safe trip home.

before getting to the bar doors you paused. fox would want to know that you were safe, and you’d feel immensely guilty for letting your friend needlessly worry. scanning the bar, he wasn’t at his previous spot and you cursed for a moment before finding another trooper with red paint, telling them to pass along a message.

they nodded and turned to do so, at which point you pulled hardcase closer to you and emerged from the doors hand in hand.

a speeder cab nearly passed you up, jerking to a stop at the loud whistle of hardcase. another thing his mouth could do. interesting.

the cabbie asked where you wanted to go, your answer sounding almost out of breath since hardcase thought that mid-conversation was the perfect time to slide his hands up the exposed skin of your thigh. never had you been grateful for the solid divider that isolated cabbie from passenger before this moment.

at the end of the night, you both had predictions turn into truths; hardcase was correct in guessing what exactly would transpire between the two of you, and his hands did feel as large as you hoped they would as he split you open with calculated ministrations before nailing you to the hotel bed.

[dwellordream]

“...Today, most – though by no means all – free countries (along with a number of rather unfree ones) have shifted from mass conscription based militaries to professional, all-volunteer militaries. The United States, of course, made that shift in 1973 (along lines proposed by the 1969 Gates Commission). The shift to a professional military has always been understood to have involved risks – the classic(al) example of those risks being the Roman one: the creation of a semi-professional Roman army misaligned the interests of the volunteer soldiers with the voting citizens, resulting in the end (though a complicated process) in the collapse of the Republic and the formation of the Empire in what might well be termed a shift to ‘military rule’ as the chief commander of the republic (first Julius Caesar, then Octavian) seized power from the apparatus of civilian government (the senate and citizen assemblies).

It is in that context that ‘warrior’ – despite its recent, frustrating use by the United States Army – is an unfortunate way for soldiers (regardless of branch or country) to think of themselves. Encouraging soldiers to see themselves as ‘warriors’ means encouraging them to see their role as combatants as the foundational core of their identity. A Mongol warrior was a warrior because as an adult male Mongol, being a warrior was central to his gender-identity and place in society (the Mongols being a society, as common with Steppe nomads, where all adult males were warriors); such a Mongol remained a warrior for his whole adult life.

Likewise, a medieval knight – who I’d class as a warrior (remember, the distinction is on identity more than unit fighting) – had warrior as a core part of their identity. It is striking that, apart from taking religious orders to become a monk (and thus shift to an equally totalizing vocation), knights – especially as we progress through the High Middle Ages as the knighthood becomes a more rigid and recognized institution – do not generally seem to retire. They do not lay down their arms and become civilians (and just one look at the attitude of knightly writers towards civilians quickly answers the question as to why). Being a warrior was the foundation of their identity and so could not be disposed of. We could do the same exercise with any number of ‘warrior classes’ within various societies. Those individuals were, in effect born warriors and they would die warriors. In societies with meaningful degrees of labor specialization, to be a warrior was to be, permanently, a class apart.

Creating such a class apart (especially one with lots of weapons) presents a tremendous danger to civilian government and consequently to a free society (though it is also a danger to civilian government in an unfree society). As the interests of this ‘warrior class’ diverge from the interests of the rest of society, even with the best of intentions the tendency is going to be for the warriors to seek to preserve their interests and status with the tools they have, which is to say all of the weapons (what in technical terms we’d call a ‘failure of civil-military relations,’ civ-mil being the term for the relationship between civil society and its military).

The end result of that process is generally the replacement of civilian self-government with ‘warrior rule.’ In pre-modern societies, such ‘warrior rule’ took the form of governments composed of military aristocrats (often with the chiefest military aristocrat, the king, at the pinnacle of the system); the modern variant, rule by officer corps (often with a general as the king-in-all-but-name) is of course quite common. Because of that concern, it is generally well understood that keeping the cultural gap between the civilian and military worlds as small as possible is important to a free society.

Instead, what a modern free society wants are effectively civilians, who put on the soldier’s uniform for a few years, acquire the soldier’s skills and arts, and then when their time is done take that uniform off and rejoin civil society as seamlessly as possible (the phrase ‘citizen-soldier’ is often used represent this ideal). It is clear that, at least for the United States, the current realization of this is less than ideal. The endless pressure to ‘re-up‘ (or for folks to be stop-lossed) hardly help.

But encouraging soldiers (or people in everyday civilian life; we’ll come back to that in the last post in this series) to identify as warriors – individual, self-motivated combatants whose entire identity is bound up in the practice of war – does real harm to the actual goal of keeping the cultural divide between soldiers and civilians as small as possible. Observers both within the military and without have been shouting the alarm on this point for some time now, but the heroic allure of the warrior remains strong.

...But as I noted above, we’ve discussed on this blog already a lot of different military social structures (mounted aristocrats in France and Arabia, the theme and fyrd systems, the Spartans themselves, and so on). And they are very different and produce armies – because societies cannot help but replicate their own peacetime social order on the battlefield – that are organized differently, value different things and as a consequence fight differently. But focusing on (fictitious) ‘universal warriors’ also obscures another complex set of relationships to war and warfare: all of the civilians.

When we talk about the impact of war on civilians, the mind quite naturally turns to the civilian victims of war – sacked cities, enslaved captives, murdered non-combatants – and of course their experience is part of war too. But even in a war somehow fought entirely in an empty field between two communities (which, to be clear, no actual war even slightly resembles this ‘Platonic’ ideal war; there is a tendency to romanticize certain periods of military history, particularly European military history, this way, but it wasn’t so), it would still shape the lives of all of the non-combatants in that society (this is the key insight of the ‘war and society’ school of military history).

To take just my own specialty, warfare in the Middle Roman Republic wasn’t simply a matter for the soldiery, even when the wars were fought outside of Italy (which they weren’t always kept outside!). The demand for conscripts to fill the legions bent and molded Roman family patterns, influencing marriage and child-bearing patterns for both men and women. With so many of the males of society processed through the military, the values of the army became the values of society not only for the men but also for women as well. Women in these societies did not consider themselves uninterested bystanders in these conflicts: by and large they had a side and were on that side, supporting the war effort by whatever means.

And even in late-third and early-second century (BC) Rome, with its absolutely vast military deployments, the majority of men (and all of the women) were still on the ‘homefront’ at any given time, farming the food, paying the taxes, making the armor and weapons and generally doing the tasks that allowed the war machine to function, often in situations of considerable hardship. And in the end – though the exact mechanisms remain the subject of debate – it is clear that the results of Rome’s victory induced significant economic instability, which was also a part of the experience of war.

In short, warriors were not the only people who mattered in war. The wartime social role of a warrior was not only different from that of a soldier, it was different than that of the working peasant forced to pay heavy taxes, or to provide Corvée labor to the army. It was different from the woman whose husband went off to war, or whose son did, or who had to keep up her farm and pay the taxes while they did so. It was different for the aristocrat than for the peasant, for the artisan than for the farmer. Different for the child than for the adult.

And yet for a complex society (one with significant specialization of labor) to wage war efficiently, all of these roles were necessary. To focus on only the warrior (or the soldier) as the sole interesting relationship in warfare is to erase the indispensable contributions made by all of these folks, without which the combatant could not combat.

It would be worse yet, of course, to suggest that the role of the warrior is somehow morally superior to these other roles (something Pressfield does explicitly, I might add, comparing ‘decadent’ modern society to supposedly superior ‘warrior societies’ in his opening videos). To do so with reference to our modern professional militaries is to invite disastrous civil-military failure. To suggest, more deeply, that everyone ought to be in some sense a ‘warrior’ in their own occupation sounds better, but – as we’ll see in the last essay of this series – leads to equally dark places.

A modern, free society has no need for warriors; the warrior is almost wholly inimical to a free society if that society has a significant degree of labor specialization (and thus full-time civilian specialists). It needs citizens, some of whom must be, at any time, soldiers but who must never stop being citizens both when in uniform and afterwards.”

- Bret Devereaux, “The Universal Warrior, Part I: Soldiers, Warriors, and…”

[peachyteabuck]

enemy of my enemy is my lover

summary: you planned on just going to a meeting with an adversary, hoping to gain more territory in the process. you left with something much, much better. 

pairing: mobster!bucky barnes x mobster!reader

words: 3,226

trigger warnings: smut (oral - f recieving and vaginal sex), mob dynamics

notes/other: this was inspired by ask received by @bucky-plums-barnes a long, long time ago about a mobster!bucky headcanon that describes the plot to this fic. while i could not find the exact ask (trust me, i tried), i credit the anonymous genius & gen heavily for inspiring this. thank you both!

ask box / masterlist / commission info / ko-fi

Each step you make is loud, sharp; the sound of heels clicking against the cold, cracked cement of New York City. It’s something, one of the things, that makes you powerful – sends this thick feeling of invulnerability through your veins, as if you’re some deity returning to her alter.

That feeling – one of untouchable power – has always been…sort of…hard for you to conjure. It’s not like you’re not not powerful in this world absent your fantasies. You run the second most powerful mob in the country! You’ve got a large pull in international trade! You’ve got major influence in congress and almost every state senate! You’ve got money, a smoking hot and super amazing boyfriend, and loyal coworkers. What else do you need?

Regardless of all that, roaming the streets at night never fails to send a special kind of shiver crawling across your skin. It’s a particular type of fear, one that makes you pull your steel grey coat closer to you as you roam the street, makes your hand cling tighter to the .45 in your deep, righthand pocket.

As you reach the alley where the deal you’re brokering is supposed to take place, your phone buzzes a few times in a row. You have an urge to check it, to make sure the man you love is okay, but letting your guard down now wouldn’t be wise. You’ve got to keep a keen mental sharpness about you to make sure no one kidnaps you (or worse) or fucks you over at your own deal, but still, the only person who would be texting you at this godforsaken hour is the man you left at home, and in this business you can never be too careful about the ones you care deeply about…

Your thoughts are interrupted (quite rudely, you might add), by the sound of a thick winter coat shuffling – as if someone were to be rolling their sleeves up. The noise of the fabric gets louder as the person – a man, you soon realize – steps closer. A man with sharp cheekbones and a dark beard and beautiful, pillowy lips.

His gaze, even under the dark baseball cap that lacks insignia, seems hauntingly familiar. You can’t place it, and it seems rude to ask if you’ve met before, given the circumstances. Still…something seems…recognizable about this mystery man.

You don’t realize it, though, until the man opens his mouth and asks about the new baby seal in the San Francisco zoo. It’s the right code, that’s not what throws you. Rather, it’s the gravely voice of the man you’ve been dating for years that stops you in your tracks.

“Bucky!?” you call out, completely confused and abandoning the correct coded response. “Why are you out here?”

Bucky, now meeting your eyes, seems just as bewildered as you are. “I, uh…I’m….what, what are you doing here?”

You have no idea how to respond, mind too baffled to form words. “Wh…what…”

You step closer, carefully – as if he was some rabid cat you found behind your apartment building. His beautiful baby blues are wide, eyes narrowed – you gasp when you get close enough to smell the cologne, his cologne, the exact scent you bought him for Christmas the year previous. “Are…are you…you’re…are you the White Wolf?”

Bucky visibly steps back at the mention of the street name – the street name of the guy who runs the mob that (similar to yours) is based in New York and works in black market goods. He tries to hide his shock, just in case what he thinks is happening definitely isn’t happening. In all honesty, Bucky can’t tell which one would be worse. “And, you’re uh. You’re…um…are you….are you She-Devil?”

If you were disoriented before, you have no word to describe how much your brain is short-circuiting at the thought that this man – the man you love, has secretly been running not only a mob, but a rival mob, this entire time.

“Do…wait,” you shake your head to try and collect your exceptionally scattered thoughts. “Are you the guy who wanted to negotiate territory with me?”

Bucky hesitates for a second, body tense and reluctant to say anything. You’re both still, not daring move a muscle and the both of you stare each other down. It feels like an eternity before he does anything, your surprise only growing as a massive, shit-eating grin spreads across his gorgeous, scruffy face.

It’s a look you know well, one you’ve come to both love and despise. It’s the same look he gave you when he told you he wanted to build (not pay someone else to build, build himself) a deck in a house you moved out of two months later, when he almost got a face tattoo, when he sold your house (you know, the one he wanted to build a deck for) to buy one three streets away. That’s the look he get when some grand idea that will probably turn out to be a disaster – the look that says “this may be a disaster, but the only way to see if it is will be to try it.”

In an instant, Bucky closes the gap between you and presses his lips to yours. As he arms wrap around you, you can feel him rub at the small of your back, just as he always does when he’s trying to keep you calm. “Yeah, babygirl. That’s me. I’m the White Wolf.”

You press your face in the warm embrace of his coat, muffling your speech. “But why didn’t you tell me?”

Bucky shrugs as he answers. “Didn’t want you to feel unsafe, I guess. Didn’t want you to worry about me.” He presses a kid to the top of your head. “Better question, why didn’t you tell me?”

You sigh, your small voice becoming even tinier. “I dunno…same reasons as you, I guess. Felt like I’d be dragging you into something you wouldn’t want to deal with.”

Bucky barks a laugh into the night, the sound reverberating off the tall buildings. “Seems reasonable.”

You pull away but refuse to make eye contact as tears well in your eyes and cloud your vision. For a mob leader, you’re very emotional. “Baby, are you sure? Like, are you sure this is okay? I mean, we kept this major part of our lives from each for literal years…like, does that say something about us as a couple? And we’re, like, rivals, we’re supposed to be competing against each other for money and goods and ports and clients and-“

Bucky cuts into your anxious ramblings by pulling you back into a tight bug. “Hey, hey! Baby, listen. This is a good thing! A great one, if you want it to be!”

You wipe at your nose with your hand. “Are you…what do you, are you sure? What do you mean?”

Bucky nods, eyes ablaze with excitement for the future. “Of course, baby, listen. Separate, our mobs are both powerful, right? We can agree on that. But together? With the territory, the influence, us...together, we could rule the fucking world.”

Technically, he isn’t wrong; with your strategy and Bucky’s brutal execution, your combined business could easily become the apex predator of the mob scene within the Western hemisphere. What Bucky had, you lacked, and vice versa. You’d studied his…business…for years (before you knew it was Bucky who ran the Pack, of course) as you climbed the ranks of your own mob. You know they have hands in several international black markets, have relationships with lots of lots of rich people who do lots and lots of bad things and pay lots and lots of money for those bad things.

Oh God, you’d never think being power-hungry and love drunk could feel so good. Your mind fogs over with all the things you could do if you had Bucky and his gang by your side, you could do anything. Simply by territory you’d be outgunning Hydra, let alone the combined wealth and human capital. You’ve never felt this exhilarated before in your life, the freezing night air electrifying your rib cage and-

Bucky and you grin madly. Wordlessly, you clasp hands and walk back to your shared apartment halfway across town. Both of you are silent until you’re safely inside your secured home. As you pull your hair up into a messy ponytail, Bucky began grabbing bowls for dinner.

“You know-” he said as he ladled soup out of the deep red Crock Pot. “Now that we aren’t desperately trying to hide our occupations from each other, we can move into a bigger house?’ Bucky says it like a question, but you know better.

Normally you’d tell him “no, of course we can’t do that, we can’t afford it.” But now that you both know that you’re each hiding hundreds of millions of dollars in offshore accounts, slush funds, and dummy corporations throughout the world…

“Sure,” you shrug. “Why not.”

Bucky grins like a child on Christmas. “If we’re gonna rule, we need the proper palace.”

You forego giving into Bucky’s terrible, awful joke to hang up your studded coat, to take off your business casual navy-blue pants and black button-up in, and change into a pair of workout shorts and some tie-dye hoodie you thrifted about ten years ago. Bucky calls them your “thinking clothes,” attire you wear specifically to center yourself, to clear your mind of everything except the task at hand.

During dinner, you and Bucky begin to plan how you can consolidate assets, personnel, jobs, and everything that comes with heading mobs. It’s a long talk, one that lasts long into the night and ends with hastily-drawn diagrams and maps strewn around your living room.

It takes hours and way too many pots of coffee, but eventually the plan for the merger is laid out in front of you – all the graphs and math and official language handwritten in your neat cursive (along with a few notes scrawled by Bucky) on over twenty sheets of pristine printer paper.

Bucky sighs happily when he sees it all finished. He’s standing, desperate for a bird’s eye view of the entire thing.

You, on the other hand, are much too tired to stand. You settle for, “How does it look, babe?” as you draw two lines for each of your signatures below both of your full names.

When you look up, you see Bucky – eyes twinkling with joy. “It looks…,” he sighs, happily. “Amazing. I love you so much.”

You giggle, drawing lines for a few witnesses (you’ll make a few of your associates sign tomorrow). “I love you, too, babe. Now, you still got that champagne from our visit to France?”

Somewhere between the front room and the wine fridge, Bucky had you pinned against the wall and was cupping your clothed pussy.

“While I think you look great,” Bucky murmurs against the hot skin of your neck. “You’re wearing just a little too much for me.”

In an instant he tears the skimpy shorts from your body, the sound of ripping fabric making you moan;

“Fuck,” you gasp as one digit, then another enters you. “Holy shit that feels good.”

Bucky pulls away enough to look you in the eyes, smiling as he watches your jaw slacken from the pleasure. “Yeah? You like that?”

If you could speak you would, but each word just comes out as a breathy moans. Your first orgasm hits you like a wave, Bucky pulling it from you with crooked fingers and his lips on yours.

When you come down Bucky carries you to the bed, undressing himself as you do the same.

He pulls you to the end of the bed by your ankles, pushing your legs up to your chest. He enters you easily – bottoming out within a few thrusts.

You and Bucky moan into each other’s mouths as he fucks into you.

“Oh God,” he groans, moving to kiss at your neck. “Holy shit!”

He rubs at your clit with the thumb of one hand as he bites bruises in your collarbones, desperate to hear the symphony of sweet sighs and deep moans as you near another peak.

“Come on baby,” Bucky murmurs into your lips. “Come on, cum around my cock for me.”

It doesn’t take much after that – a few more circles around your clit in time with his thrusts and soon you’re scream and nearly tears the sheets from how tight you’re gripping them and your whole body convulses from pleasure.

Bucky finishes himself onto your stomach, head thrown back in pleasure as he does so.

He takes a minute to collect himself, still panting as he grabs a tissue to clean you off.

After water and a snack (two granola bars you had stuffed into your bedside drawer an unknowable amount of months ago), you curl into Bucky’s chest, tracing the litany of tattoos there. “Weren’t we supposed to drink to celebrate?”

Bucky lets out a full belly laugh. “Probably. But the alcohol is all the way downstairs. Plus, I know something else I can drink to celebrate?”

You wrinkle your nose. “Only you? Why don’t I get to get drunk?”

Bucky just smirks, moving you off of him. You’re about to protest but begin to understand once he pushes the covers off the both you to make room for himself between your legs.

“Trust me,” he tells you, leaving kisses on your skin between every few words. “You’ll love this a lot more than any old champagne.”

And, of course, he was right.

The next day, you meet with your closest adversaries. While you two wait in the conference room in the building Bucky took over after it was condemned a couple years back, you can feel your heart ram into your ribcage. It’s less from anxiety and more from anticipation, knowing you might face major backlash from the people you trust the most.

The first to arrive is the woman you trust the most in this world: Natasha. She doesn’t move towards the table, simply stands just inside the doorway while staring you down. She doesn’t recognize Bucky, but doesn’t enjoy being below the eyeline of a man she’s never seen before.

“Natasha,” you say, desperate to remain calm. “This is Bucky. We’ve been together for five years. And he’s the leader of the Pack.”

In a fashion much atypical for Natasha Romanoff, her eyes widen slightly. “Oh…” she says after a long while. “Okay then.”

She promptly sits down with no further questions.

As with many business, heads and second-in-commands of mobs rarely come face to face. They have goons, messengers that do their footwork. Descriptions of the faces belonging those in charge pass around akin to rumors, only whispered quieter.

Which is why, when Steve comes in, he has no idea what to think until Bucky introduces you and Natasha.

By the time Bucky’s finished talking, Steve’s beat red. “Buck, what the fuck is this.”

“Just,” Bucky sighs, worried about his phrasing and angering his best friend on the face of the planet (whether that be Steve, for reasons that feel obvious, or you, for reasons that feel even more obvious). “Sit down. We’ll explain-“

“’We’ll!’” Steve nearly screams.

Bucky is the only one who flinches at the sudden loud noise. You finish his sentence for him. “Yes. Bucky and I will explain.”

Steve doesn’t like it, doesn’t like taking orders from a rival. Still, he sits at the large, oval conference table opposite Natasha.

The last two people to come in are the head of you and Bucky’s legal departments. Wanda gives you a single nod before sitting next to Natasha, a man Bucky addresses as “Tony” sits next to Steve.

You exhale deeply once the metaphorical dust settles, encouraging Bucky to begin the spiel he had prepared last night been orgasms four and five.

“Alright. We have,” he sighs. “We have decided to combine our two…”  Bucky struggles to find the right word. He worries for bugs and secret agents and misunderstandings, brain always struggling to remember that this is sacred, secret business. Any crack in any of the numerous protective facades could mean its downfall, along with the loss of billions of dollars and his life.

“Entrepreneurial endeavors,” you finish for him.

You hear Natasha snort, amused by the avoidance of saying gang and mob and illegal distributor of goods. The rest of your cohort are silent, unsure of what to say next.

Each beat of verbal inaction leaves you more fearful than the last, your heart getting louder and louder in your ears.

For what feels like forever, no one says anything.

Though, with the pounding of blood in your ears, they could be screaming obscenities at you and you wouldn’t be able to hear them.

The only thing that seems able to quiet the noise is Bucky’s fingers intertwining with yours.

Only then do you hear Wanda speak, her accent tinging each word. It’s comforting, to hear something so familiar.

“I assume you both have drawn up something that,” she eyes the man across from her with a look dusted with disdain. “Tony and I can look at.”

Bucky slides the thick document, held together in a beat-up binder you found under a bookshelf, across the table. Wanda is the one who stops it and looks into it first.

She says nothing, holding her tongue as she allows Tony to eye the document. He’s wearing dark sunglasses and pushes them to the corner of his nose as thumbs through it, looking bored and tired.

“Yeah, this shit looks good,” Tony says quickly, shoving the dark glasses back over his eyes. “Can we leave now?”

The resounding silence continues until you break it yourself, attempting to detail for Steve and Natasha what it all means. They listen diligently and sign where needed, Natasha being decided on as the most likely to type it up into an official document and send it to the necessary parties.

Once it’s all over, you and Bucky ride down in the big, glass elevator together – excitement electric in the air.

“How’re you feeling?” Bucky asks. It doesn’t seem to be out of concern, even if tears of happiness are pricking at your eyes.

“God,” you tell him, voice breathy and ecstatic. “I don’t even know how to describe it. I just, I don’t know. I’ve been so terrified I’d have to hide this forever – or that you’d find out, or that someone would figure out who you were. And now…I just,” you wipe at your eyes, and Bucky pulls you into his chest. “I don’t have to worry about that anymore. I know you’re protected. And I don’t have to hide this from you. And I’m so fucking happy about it.”

Bucky kisses the top of your head, tucking you under his chin. “Oh, baby. Darling I’m so sorry you had to go through all that.”

The two of you stand in silence, holding each other until you have to exit. Neither of you say anything until you’re both in the car, safely on your way back to your shared home.

“We’re in this together right?” you ask, looking at Bucky as he keeps his dark eyes on the road.

Regardless he smiles, moving his right hand from the wheel to rest on your knee. “Always, baby. Always.”

[booksbookssomemoviesandbooks]

Book Recs

Hello! so for my first post, I'll recommend some books, so y'all can have a closer look at some fandoms I'll post about! enjoy!!

1.  

Harry Potter By J.K. Rowling is definitely an interesting, well-written series! there are 7 books however, and the books get bigger as the series progresses. It's sometimes difficult to know the exact order, so I'll list it below:

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Although the movies are great, they don't include all the amazing details, as with all movies. A short summary:

Harry Potter, a young boy who’s being constantly abused by his uncle Vernon and aunt Petunia, gets a peculiar letter from the magical school of Hogwarts, where he spends most of his time, becoming his home.

Quotes:

“To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure." ― Albus Dumbledore

“You’re just as sane as I am" - Luna Lovegood

“Mischief managed" - Fred and George Weasley

It is Important to know that j*r is a huge transphobe, along with other things, and is currently being erased by the fandom itself.

2.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians, along with the other series by Rick Riordan, is a definite must-read. With each book, you can really notice the character developments and a lot more! There is loads of representation in this one, with lgbtqia+ characters, black characters, Muslim characters and more. It's very action-packed and addicting, sucking you into the magnificent world of Half-Bloods and Demigods within the first page. The first series consists of 5 books, in the following order:

Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief

Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters

Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse

Percy Jackson and the Battle of The Labyrinth

Percy Jackson and the Last Olympian

THE MOVIES ARE TRASH SO I DEFINITELY DO NOT RECOMMEND WATCHING THEM BEFORE READING THE BOOKS!!! There were many changes and the movies aren't nearly as good as the books. A short summary:

Percy Jackson, a 12 year-old who lives with his mother, Sally, and step-father, Gabe, attends the private boarding school Yancy Academy. While on a school trip, his teacher, Mrs. Dodds, turns into a fury and attacks him. This, in turn, triggers a series of other problems and adventures.

Quotes:

“If my life is going to mean anything, I have to live it myself.” - Percy Jackson

“With great power, comes great need to nap. Wake me up later." - Nico Di Angelo

“Even strength has to bow down to wisdom sometimes." - Annabeth Chase

3.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins is one of my most recommended series! With everything it deals with, from the Capitol to the districts to the champions, the books are amazing! 

Order:

The Hunger Games

Catching Fire

Mockingjay

Starring the movies is the amazing Jennifer Lawrence, but with all books, the movies have slight differences, although I definitely recommend watching them when you're done with the books.

A Short Summary:

In what was once North America, the Capitol of Panem maintains its hold on its 12 districts by forcing them each to select a boy and a girl, called Tributes, to compete in a nationally televised event called the Hunger Games. Every citizen must watch as the youths fight to the death until only one remains. District 12 Tribute Katniss Everdeen has little to rely on, other than her hunting skills and sharp instincts, in an arena where she must weigh survival against love.

(FILM SYNOPSIS)

Quotes:

"May the odds be ever in your favor." - Effie Trinket

"Fire is catching, and if we burn, you burn with us!" - Katniss Everdeen

“Hope is the only thing stronger than fear.” - President Snow

4.

Divergent is another book with a huge fandom, and rightfully so. This book is amazing, and you honestly can't live without having read it!

Order:

Divergent

Insurgent

Allegiant 

Surprisingly, I haven't watched the movies yet, but I hear that they aren’t that bad, so you should give them a go!

Summary:

In a world run by fictional classes known as factions, children who reach the age of 16 begin to choose which factions they wish to call home for the rest of their lives. Each faction comes with its own ups and downs, so it's definitely a hard choice, especially for someone as unique as Beatrice.

Quotes:

“Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it“ - Four

“We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.” - Dauntless Motto

"We are not the same. But we are, somehow, one." - Tris

5. 

You might have heard of this series, and it's really addictive, trust me! The Mortal Instruments is one of the most astonishing books I've ever read, and it's most definitely my go-to when recommending a book series!

Order:

City of Bones

City of Ashes

City of Glass

City of Fallen Angels

City of Lost Souls

City of Heavenly Fire

Again, (I know this is rather disappointing) I haven't watched the movies, but do check them out!

Summary:

Clary Fray's search for her missing mother leads her into an alternate New York called Downworld, filled with mysterious faeries, hard-partying warlocks, not-what-they-seem vampires, an army of werewolves, and the demons who want to destroy it all.

via: https://shadowhunters.com/shadowhunters-novels/the-mortal-instruments/#:~:text=Clary%20Fray's%20search%20for%20her,want%20to%20destroy%20it%20all.

Quotes:

“Heroes aren't always the ones who win. They're the ones who lose, sometimes. But they keep fighting, they keep coming back. They don't give up. That's what makes them heroes.” - Clary Fairchild

“If I cannot move Heaven, I will raise Hell.” - Sebastion Morgenstern

“The descent into Hell is easy.” - Motto of the Nephilim

6.

Gay. What more needs to be said?

SADLY, there isn't a movie yet, but I think they're working on one, or sure though

Summary:

Set in a world in which a female Democrat from Texas wins the presidency in 2016, Red, White & Royal Blue chronicles the illicit romance between the president's son, Georgetown senior Alex Claremont-Diaz (Dad is a Mexican-American senator), and Prince Henry of Wales, his childhood nemesis.

Via: https://www.wsj.com/articles/red-white-royal-blue-book-summer-beach-read-11565285001#:~:text=Set%20in%20a%20world%20in,of%20Wales%2C%20his%20childhood%20nemesis.

Also, classic enemies-friends-lovers arc and honestly it's amazing

Quotes:

“As your mother, I can appreciate that maybe this isn’t your fault, but as the president, all I want is to have the CIA fake your death and ride the dead-kid sympathy into a second term.” - Ellen Claremont 

" 'that’s because you can’t hear all the menacing gobbling.' 'Yes, famously the most sinister of all animal sounds, the gobble.' " - Harry and Alex

"History, huh? Bet we could make some." - Alex

7.

I’m sure you've heard at least a little bit about this book. While not nearly as famous as ones mentioned above, it's still just as good, of not better. I'd say this book is one of my favorites, to be honest. It speaks about a lot of topics people usually find disturbing, and it makes me so happy that it's there, it's written, it's amazing. PTSD, coming out issues, abusive relationships and more, this book is truly awesome.

TRIGGER WARNING 

Summary:

A young boy named Charlie usually dissociates, and pushes other people away. He’s afraid of beginning high school, until he meets two other students who show him how bizarre and amazing the world is.

Quotes:

“And in that moment, I swear we were infinite” - Charlie

“We accept the love we think we deserve” - Mr. Anderson

“You can't just sit there and put everybody's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love" - Sam

8. 

This book is honestly pro-feminist and I think that's much more than enough

Summary:

Kaur explores the true impact of sexual abuse and harassment, as well as the difficulties of immigrating, being a female, and depression.

It's also a poem

TRIGGER WARNING

Quotes:

“what is stronger

than the human heart

which shatters over and over

and still lives”

“you do not just wake up and become the butterfly 

- growth is a process”

“on the last day of love

my heart cracked inside my body"

9.

This book isn't very well-known, which really sucks because I really love how it speaks about the consequences of WWII from the German point of view. And about the Germans who did not believe in Hitler's ways. It's also based on a real story, and it's so cool

Summary: 

A nurse working in a nursing home meets a peculiar old lady who decides to tell her her story when she meets the nurse's younger son, Karl, who reminded her of her brother. Lizzie (the old lady) speaks about life in Dresden before the war, and even after it. She also tells them the story about the strange, magnificent elephant in her garden.

Quotes:

“That was the only way of keeping our hopes alive, by looking beyond all we were seeing around us, and the shadow of disaster that hung over us.” - 

“I think I have always had a strong sense of justice, of fair play, of what is right and what is wrong.” - 

“Our home should be an oasis of peace and harmony for us in a troubled world.” - Lizzie (Quoting Papi)

10.

This book is pro-blm and it's ahead of its time (by like 2 years but still). 

Summary:

Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. via: https://socialjusticebooks.org/the-hate-u-give/#:~:text=Sixteen%2Dyear%2Dold%20Starr%20Carter,hands%20of%20a%20police%20officer.

Quotes:

“Sometimes you can do everything right and things will still go wrong. The key is to never stop doing right.” - Lisa

“Daddy once told me there’s a rage passed down to every black man from his ancestors, born the moment they couldn’t stop the slave masters from hurting their families. Daddy also said there’s nothing more dangerous than when that rage is activated.” - Starr

“Everybody wants to talk about how Khalil died,” I say. “But this isn’t about how Khalil died. It’s about the fact that he lived. His life mattered. Khalil lived!” I look at the cops again. “You hear me? Khalil lived!” - Starr

[daphne-fandom-writing]

The Jedi and the Sith

Sith!Obi-Wan Kenobi x Reader

Words: 3167

Warnings: Smut, questionable loyalty to the Jedi, Sith!Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Summary:  Reader is a Jedi on a mission on Tatooine, Obi-Wan is a Sith lord trying to make that mission fail. A mutual attraction is discovered and smut ensues.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`

The air around you felt warm and suffocating. You felt the hot sun scorching your skin as you walked across the, seemingly, never ending desert. Tatooine was your least favourite planet in the entire universe, and yet this is where you were sent by the Council. A simple protecting assignment was your mission. One of the senators of the Republic had business on this godforsaken sand globe, and you had the pleasure of keeping an eye on his surroundings. Normally affairs like this would be done without much fuss for safety, but with the war and the threat of a new Sith Lord, the Chancellor would not compromise the safety of his senators.

It seemed as if there would not be any threats. Your surroundings were bleak and uneventful, save for the occasional gust of wind that blew sand in your eyes and your ship. The Force around you felt calm and at peace and from your position your could see the senator in question calmly conversing with the man he had business with. Even though you were not allowed to pry, part of you wondered what the meeting was about. A voice in the back of your mind wanted you to eavesdrop or gather even the smallest bit of information to quench your curiosity. That voice was quickly silenced by the feeling of a presence.

The, just now so balanced, Force felt uneasy. There was someone here, someone that was associated with the dark side of the force. They were strong and dangerous, but you couldn't quite see anyone in your surroundings yet. That is, until you saw a black hooded figure rise from behind a sand dune. You couldn't see his face yet but you felt him and it was very clear to you now, he was a Sith. So much for an uneventful meeting.

You let your cloak fall to the floor and ignited your lightsaber and a green hue made it's way all over your white robes. When the Sith was close enough he spoke up. "Hello, there."

"What is your business here, Sith." You demanded from them. They kept quiet as they took the hood of their cloak off. The hood revealed a man. He looked not a year over thirty-five, he had short dirty blonde hair and his bangs moved as the wind flowed. His beard was thick and well kept. His eyes were signature Sith yellow and held curiosity and cockyness. He smirked at your words.

"Are you expecting me to answer that?" He cocked his head to the right with the smirk still plastered on his face. "I expect nothing from a monster like you." The man squinted his eyes at your words and let them roam up and down over your body. You felt uneasy under his stare but couldn't help your eyes sneaking another glance at the appearance of the man too. The man spoke up.

"Look, this can go two ways. One, you let me take the senator and you live another day to be an insufferable Jedi. Two, you try to stop me and you die." He held up both his hands as if he did not even threaten you with death.

"Option three seems more appealing to me, I stop you and you die." The man gave a dark chuckle. He slipped of his black cloak to reveal dark brown robes. He took his lightsaber and an eerie red hue covered his face as he ignited it. "I'd like to see you try."

Both you and him got into a fighting position, you bent your knees and mentally prepared yourself. You were observing the Sith as he came closer, he moved gracefully and trained. You could see that he was an experienced fighter just by the way his feet seemed to move effortlessly in the sand. The air grew silent as the suspense of an upcoming battle seared through your bones. You waited for him to make the first move, this way you would have more time to analyse his offensive fighting style so you could match your own. As you walked around each other it almost seemed as if he was too waiting for you to make the first move, but just as the thought entered you brain the Sith leaped your way and tried to strike a blow with his weapon.

You put your weight on your left foot that was a little behind you and put your lightsaber in the air to block his attack, he quickly retreated and tried to swipe at your legs. You used the force to propel you upwards and over the Sith, using his bent position to kick his back. The yellow-eyed man fell over and turned on his back. In his eyes now a determined look as he jumped up on his feet again. He swiped at the sand now covering his robes. "Impressive. For a jedi." He smirked at you again and went in for the next attack. He striked left and right and you tried to block all his attempts. He was fast. You felt yourself moving closer and closer backwards to your ship as you dodged his blows. You didn't see the small rock on the floor behind you and you tripped. You fell on you back, the Sith jumped up and tried to strike you face. You were fast enough to block him. Your lightsabers were pressed together, sending sparks all over the place, he was strong too. His face came closer to yours and you could see the reflection of green and red in them. You put all your might into your muscles and pushed the man backwards so you could scramble back up your feet. The ship was now a few feet behind you.

"Are you gonna give up the theatrics now?" The man started. You got back into a sparring position to get ready for the next blow. "I'm not even halfway done with you." The man laughed at your words, you felt confused and conflicted. How could such a monster have such a pretty laugh? You quickly turned away from that thought and focussed on the task at hand. Kill the Sith.

"It's cute you know." You furrowed your brows, there was a presence in your mind. He was reading your thoughts, you used every fiber in your mind to push him out. "What are you talking about, Sith." You spat.

His expression changed from smiling to determination again, he looked more dangerous than ever. "You truly think that you can defeat me." With a swipe of his hand an invisible force pushed you against the landing gear of your ship. The muscles in your whole body refused to work with you, as hard as you tried to move them. The Sith sauntered your way, his arm still stretched toward you body. "You're no match for me, my dear. Try as you might, you won't break free unless I want you too." He was now right in front of you, his face so very close to yours that you could see little specks of red in his yellow irises. He raised one of his hands and moved it toward your cheek, you tried to move your face away but failed to do so. His gloved hand caressed your cheeks as his eyes seemed to bore into your very soul, and as scared as you were supposed to be, you weren't.

"Such a peculiar one aren't you, your head is filled with doubt." the hand on your cheek moved down to your neck. "You won't admit it to yourself but you've felt it, the pull of the darkness." His thumb grazed your throat, gentler that you could have imagined.

You wanted to tell him it wasn't so, but deep down you knew that the little voice in the back of your mind was that pull he meant. And that voice grew louder by the second. You cast your eyes downward and focussed on the fabric of his robe. "You know I'm right don't you?" You still felt his stare.

"What do you want me to say? Yes? Are you enjoying my inner struggle with myself? Because yes I'm trying my hardest not to give in into that damned voice." You looked at him and was surprised by the look on his face, it wasn't hate or satisfaction, he looked compassionate. When he spoke again his voice was barely more than a whisper and his hand was back on your cheek. "I know exactly what you mean darling, I have felt the feelings you feel now." He smiled at you. "Let me show you what the dark side can really be like, you don't have to stay forever. I will not kill you and you are free to leave whenever you want. Just let me show you." You felt his mental wall fall down, and you could sense that he was telling the truth.

You felt disgusted by the thoughts you were having and the words you were going to say. "Alright, show me." And with those words he let you go. And as the invisible binds left your body you fell against him, faces inches apart. You gave in to the pull, you kissed him. His lips were soft and his hand were now both on your cheeks as your moved into his hair. Your lips moved in a frenzy but in sync at the same time. His beard scratched your face in the best was possible. As your kiss lasted you could feel your mental walls crumble more. You felt different, alive. Not to mention that the man, of which you did not know the name yet, was a fabulous kisser. He took his time, he didn't try to slip in his tongue yet, and he was skilled. You have had your fair share of kisses, meaningless flings since you're not allowed to grow attachments.

When the two of you broke apart the man spoke up with a new sort of glimmer in his eye. "That was not so bad was it?" You had to fight a smile. "It was fine, for a Sith." The man laughed at that.

"It's about time that we learn each others names don't you think? Obi-Wan Kenobi, and I have to say you are a phenomenal kisser." Your cheeks flared up at the compliment. "Daphne L/N, and you're not half bad yourself." You let your head rest on the landing gear that was still behind you. "I should feel disgusting but, I- I feel the exact opposite. I feel great, free and alive. How can this be?" You ask him.

"Well dear, you have been doubting yourself and your mind for so long that you just don't remember how it feels to be certain of something. Certain of a choice or action." Obi-Wan closed in on your face again, "Certain of someone." He whispered. His lips connected with yours again and before you had time to react they were gone.

"Darling, we might need to move this inside. Because the things I'm going to do, do not require sand." You felt your heart rate pick up in speed at the idea of being even closer to this man. So you nodded. Your hand found his and you pulled him along, leading him up the ramp toward your ship. When inside you pushed the button that closed the ramp with a hiss, a bit of sand falling onto the floor.

As soon as the doors closed Obi-Wan had his lips connected to your neck as your back leaned against the walls of your ship. His hands caressed your waist and then moved down towards your hips before resting on your bum. He squeezed your cheeks with little force which made you jump into him. As your body was now even closer to his you could feel his arousal through his thin clothes. You moved your hands to the hem of his robes and tried to slip them underneath.

Obi-Wan got one of his hands to your hair and pulled your head back with just enough force to sting but not enough to seriously hurt you.

"Not so fast." You retracted your hands and he let go of your hair. Moving them instead to your own robes. He undid the belt that rested on your waist which loosened the shirt you had on. His hands moved to your shoulders and gently slipped off the shirt, dragging his fingers with a feather light touch along your arms. Goosebumps appeared on your skin, both from the sudden bare-ness and from the look in Obi-Wan's eyes as you looked into them. The yellow eyes held a wanting, which also radiated from him into the Force. The Force felt exciting, just how you yourself felt.

Both your belt and shirt fell to the floor which left your top totally bare. The man knelt to the floor and undid the zippers on your boots. He signalled for you to lift your right foot by tapping it. You did and he slipped off your boot, after which followed your right boot. His hands slipped up, from your knees to the waistline of your pants. The soft caresses and sensations were sending signals to your core. You felt yourself getting worked up and almost unable to wait until he took off your pants. Obi-Wan looked up and you made eye contact, a question hanging in the air.

"Obi-Wan," you sighed. "please continue." He smiled at your words, making little crinkles form next to his eyes. "Your wish is my command." He gave you a kiss right above your pants. He slipped his fingers underneath the waistband and started pulling your pants, and underwear, down. When your pants left your last foot he grabbed your right leg and started kissing the inner part of your knee. He placed little kisses all over your inner thigh as he worked his way upwards. He diverted between kisses, licks and sucking bits of skin as he moved higher and almost reached your core. He positioned you leg over his left shoulder and started kissing just around your slit. You were squirming and trying your hardest to stand still. That is until his mouth finally connected to your inner lips. Your hips thrust forward and he retracted his mouth almost instantly.

"No moving." He demanded, his voice sent shivers down your spine and to your already dripping core. You nodded and Obi-Wan connected his lips to you again. His tongue found your clit and started flicking it. You let your head fall back against the wall and let out a whine of pleasure. The man kept flicking your clit, alternating the pressure he put on it, and eventually sucked. As he kept sucking your moans increased in volume. His beard scratched against your thighs and left a delicious burn. You felt your stomach tightening and pleasure building up. "Obi-Wan- please- I- I I'm going to-." You looked down at him and immediately connected with his yellow eyes. He was looking up at you as he was eating you out, as a reaction to your moans and pleas he simply hummed. The vibrations his mouth made against you sent your right over the edge with a loud moan. Your hand moved to his hair to keep steady as you were glad your leg was resting on his shoulder.

Obi-Wan gently put your leg down on the ground as he got up again. You were a sweaty panting mess and glad that the walls of your ship kept relatively cool. The man had a smirk on his face as he wiped his mouth. His beard was glistening with your juices. Filled with a new sense of determination you put your hand in his hair and pulled him towards you, crashing your lips together in a needy kiss. Obi-Wan pulled back and held a glint in his eyes. "Bed, now."

You looked up at him through your lashes, trying your best to look alluring. "Don't you want me to return the favour?" You asked. The always present smirk on his face fell as he stared at you intently. "Now." The look on his face told you that he was very serious and you were once again reminded that this man was a powerful and dangerous Sith lord. Instead of frightening you, though, this turned you on even more than you already were. Without further delay you swiftly made your way to the small bed in the back of the ship. As you reached it you felt Obi-Wan grab your wrist and turn you around, once again pulling you into a bruising kiss before pushing you on the bed. He pulled away and you let out a small whine.

That whine died down as soon as you saw what he was doing. Obi-Wan was undoing his own belt, pulling off his shirt, boots and pants. In no time we was standing before you, fully naked, with his cock standing tall. He was lean and tan, with fairly broad shoulders. He didn't have fully carved abs but you could see a small outline of them. His V-line led down to his cock. He was very well endowed and had a bit of fuzzy hair at the base. When your eyes moved up to his face again he was looking at you intently. He was about to say something when you beat him to it. "Yes, I like what I see. A lot." Obi-Wan got an amused smile on his face at your words and started to walk towards you. He kneeled on the bed and crawled over you. You could feel his cock at your entrance when he reached your face.

Obi-Wan kissed you as he slowly pushed in, stretching you in the best way possible. You moaned into the kiss and he started slipping in and out of you, using your own juices as lubrication. Your hands moved from his hair to his shoulders, nails digging into his skin. His lips moved to your neck and started kissing and sucking, leaving hickeys in it's trail. His thrusts started picking up in speed and before you knew it he was pounding into you. He was grunting together with your moans and as you felt yourself start getting closer to your release he slipped on of his hands between you and rubbed your clit. The stimulation of both his finger rubbing your clit and the ever present pounding released the knot in your stomach and had you cumming with loud moans. Obi-Wan's thrusts became frenzied moments before he came himself, emptying his hot seed inside of you. He pulled out and collapsed beside you, pulling you into him. Both of you were a panting mess.

You looked up to him and locked eyes. You kissed him again, this time slow and passionate. You pulled away. "I might just start liking the Dark side if this is what it's like."

[lastsonlost]

GET THE FUCK OUT?  Creepy Uncle Joe Biden is a creepy ass motherfucker?

No shit.

In 2014, I was the 35-year-old Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor in Nevada. The landscape wasn’t looking good for my party that year. There were no high-profile national races to help boost turnout, and after the top candidate bowed out of the governor’s race, “None of the Above” ended up winning the Democratic primary.

So when my campaign heard from Vice-President Joe Biden’s office that he was looking to help me and other Democrats in the state, I was grateful and flattered. His team offered to bring him to a campaign rally in an effort to help boost voter turnout. We set the date for November 1, just three days before election day.

In a state as large but sparsely populated as Nevada, it takes nonstop travel to connect with all its residents. You’re lucky to get properly fed, much less look properly coiffed as female candidates are often required to do. I was exhausted and short on time, so decided to not to wash my hair the morning of the rally. I sprayed some dry shampoo in my hair, raced off to the Reno airport, and flew back to Las Vegas.

The event proceeded as most political events do: coordinated chaos with random problems that no one can predict. I found Eva Longoria, co-founder of the Latino Victory Project, roaming the parking lot trying to figure out how to get inside the union hall. My staff was running around town trying to purchase ferns because according to Biden’s team, no other vegetation was acceptable for the stage.

I found my way to the holding room for the speakers, where everyone was chatting, taking photos, and getting ready to speak to the hundreds of voters in the audience. Just before the speeches, we were ushered to the side of the stage where we were lined up by order of introduction. As I was taking deep breaths and preparing myself to make my case to the crowd, I felt two hands on my shoulders. I froze. “Why is the vice-president of the United States touching me?”

I felt him get closer to me from behind. He leaned further in and inhaled my hair. I was mortified. I thought to myself, “I didn’t wash my hair today and the vice-president of the United States is smelling it. And also, what in the actual fuck? Why is the vice-president of the United States smelling my hair?” He proceeded to plant a big slow kiss on the back of my head. My brain couldn’t process what was happening. I was embarrassed. I was shocked. I was confused. There is a Spanish saying, “tragame tierra,” it means, “earth, swallow me whole.” I couldn’t move and I couldn’t say anything. I wanted nothing more than to get Biden away from me. My name was called and I was never happier to get on stage in front of an audience.

By then, as a young Latina in politics, I had gotten used to feeling like an outsider in rooms dominated by white men. But I had never experienced anything so blatantly inappropriate and unnerving before. Biden was the second-most powerful man in the country and, arguably, one of the most powerful men in the world. He was there to promote me as the right person for the lieutenant governor job. Instead, he made me feel uneasy, gross, and confused. The vice-president of the United States of America had just touched me in an intimate way reserved for close friends, family, or romantic partners — and I felt powerless to do anything about it.

Our strange interaction happened during a pivotal moment in my political career. I’d spent months raising money, talking to voters, and securing endorsements. Biden came to Nevada to speak to my leadership and my potential to be second-in-command — an important role he knew firsthand. But he stopped treating me like a peer the moment he touched me. Even if his behavior wasn’t violent or sexual, it was demeaning and disrespectful. I wasn’t attending the rally as his mentee or even his friend; I was there as the most qualified person for the job.

Imagine you’re at work and a male colleague who you have no personal relationship with approaches you from behind, smells your hair, and kisses you on the head. Now imagine it’s the CEO of the company. If Biden and I worked together in a traditional office, I would have complained to the HR department, but on the campaign trail, there’s no clear path for what to do when a powerful man crosses the line. In politics, you shrug it off, smile for the cameras, and get back to the task of trying to win your race.

After the event, I told a few of my staff what happened. We all talked about the inexplicable weirdness of what he did, but I didn’t plan on telling anyone else. I didn’t have the language or the outlet to talk about what happened. Who do you tell? What do you say? Is it enough of a transgression if a man touches and kisses you without consent, but doesn’t rise to the level of what most people consider sexual assault? I did what most women do, and moved on with my life and my work.

Time passed and pictures started to surface of Vice-President Biden getting uncomfortably close with women and young girls. Biden nuzzling the neckof the Defense secretary’s wife; Biden kissing a senator’s wife on the lips; Biden whispering in women’s ears; Biden snuggling female constituents. I saw obvious discomfort in the women’s faces, and Biden, I’m sure, never thought twice about how it made them feel. I knew I couldn’t say anything publicly about what those pictures surfaced for me; my anger and my resentment grew.

Had I never seen those pictures, I may have been able to give Biden the benefit of the doubt. Had there not been multiple articles written over theyears about the exact same thing — calling his creepy behavior an “open secret” — perhaps it would feel less offensive. And yet despite the steady stream of pictures and the occasional article, Biden retained his title of America’s Favorite Uncle. On occasion that title was downgraded to America’s Creepy Uncle but that in and of itself implied a certain level of acceptance. After all, how many families just tolerate or keep their young children away from the creepy uncle without ever acknowledging that there should be zero tolerance for a man who persistently invades others’ personal space and makes people feel uneasy and gross? In this case, it shows a lack of empathy for the women and young girls whose space he is invading, and ignores the power imbalance that exists between Biden and the women he chooses to get cozy with.

For years I feared my experience would be dismissed. Biden will be Biden. Boys will be boys. I worried about the doubts, the threats, the insults, and the minimization. “It’s not that big of a deal. He touched her, so what?” The immediate passing of judgement and the questioning of motives. “Why now? Why so long after? She just wants attention.” Or: “It’s politically motivated.” I would be lying if I said I didn’t carefully consider all of this before deciding to speak. But hearing Biden’s potential candidacy for president discussed without much talk about his troubling past as it relates to women became too much to keep bottled up any longer.

When I spoke to a male friend who is also a political operative in Biden’s orbit — the first man who had heard the story outside of my staff and close friends years ago — he did what no one else had and made me question myself and wonder if I was doing the right thing. He reminded me that Biden has significant resources and argued points that made me question my memory, even though I’ve replayed that scene in my mind a thousand times. He reminded me that my credibility would be attacked and that I should be prepared for the type of “back and forth” that could occur. (When reached by New York Magazine, a representative for Vice-President Joe Biden declined to comment.)

I’m not suggesting that Biden broke any laws, but the transgressions that society deems minor (or doesn’t even see as transgressions) often feel considerable to the person on the receiving end. That imbalance of power and attention is the whole point — and the whole problem.

 Now all of you who follow me know that I am a firm believer of innocent until proven guilty. So I’m genuinely asking out of curiosity. How much evidence is there and how much more is needed? If I’m being perfectly honest Lucy Flores  for the most part isn’t telling us anything that we haven’t already known for years.

But I wonder if we’re just going to continue to ignore it because he’s not wearing a Maga hat. I’m sure the guardian or Huffington Post will make some excuse right?

[bigskydreaming]

Biden does not have the nomination yet. It is not yet a matter of “a vote for Biden is a vote against Trump, anything else is a vote for Trump.”

And until it is, until either Sanders or Biden has all the delegates they need, peoples’ criticisms of Biden are absolutely relevant. And even should Biden GET the nomination, c’mon guys, there is STILL room to be aware of everything Biden IS and everything about him that needs OPPOSING, even WHILE still opposing Trump. This is not counter-intuitive....if you are against most of what Trump has done, because it is WRONG rather than it is just Trump who did it, and did it in obvious ways, then this is vital, I’d argue, because Biden isn’t going to address a lot of it once in the White House unless people DO keep in mind what is and isn’t likely to still be an issue in a Biden presidency.

This isn’t divisive, this is NECESSARY. If you can’t find a way to hold both truths in your mind: “Trump absolutely needs to be ousted, and opposed, and his works undone,” as well as “Biden has a long history of doing harm in his various seats, and he is the lesser of two evils ONLY in some respects and its important to know what those are because evil is still evil”....that’s something to WORK on, not just “Biden or bust.”

And to be clear, I’m not advocating for “Bernie or bust” either. I’m simply saying: This is all more complicated than accusing people of having brain worms for thinking “Guy who won’t expand health care as much” is the same as “Guy who is killing people.”

Let me be perfectly, 100% clear: If Biden gets the nomination, if it comes down to him or Trump, I am voting for Biden, hands down. But I will be doing so not thinking that Biden is in any way a more moral choice, but because I think the true danger of Trump is in him serving these past years as a rallying point for all the most vocal white supremacist and homophobic and misogynistic elements within our society, allowing them to feel emboldened and having no shame about expressing their hate openly. I think the true danger of Trump’s presidency is how little of it is actually Trump doing anything other than acting as a magnet that draws all focus and trains all eyes on him, even as his cabinet stocked to over-flowing with white-supremacists, antisemitic, homophobic and transphobic and eugenics-advocating assholes go about ACTIVELY advancing agendas of hate behind him while he serves as the catch-all for all opposition.

That absolutely needs to be opposed, and defeated, but fuck this self-defeating nonsense that this means the work will be OVER the second Trump is gone, whenever and however that happens. And I think for as much as people accuse some of us of doing the enemy’s work for them by sowing division and dividing our efforts and how this is doomed to be self-sabotaging and backfire on all of us, I think the same is true of saying things like the only real drawback to Biden is ‘doesn’t want to expand Health Care as much as Sanders whereas he’s otherwise not remotely comparable to Guy Who Is Killing People.”

Because BOTH ARE SELF-DEFEATING. Both set up only ONE THING as a goal or a focus that needs tackling and carries the implicit “and then we can rest” instead of holding up as a goal or focus that both need defeating or plenty of people are still going to die, as they’ve been dying all along.

If you’re going to go with the Devil You Know because he’s also the Lesser Evil of the two Devils You Know....

You still need to know who he is, and who he is is not just guy who won’t expand health care as much and claiming him to be such and nothing more is DANGEROUS.

Vote for Biden if it comes down to him and Trump, yes! But do so in a way that will let you get right back to work opposing all the shit HE prioritizes and stands for, every bit as much as you claim to oppose all the same with Trump!

Stop treating this as an impossible ask. It is not as simple as evil or not evil. It is as simple as making the choice that ensures most people survive....and then from there, actually ensuring that means that the most people survive. 

Which can only happen when you keep in mind how Biden will still be dangerous even once Trump is gone, and who will still need protection from him and his administration and policies, even once Trump’s are gone....and especially because there are a number of those policies that Biden, based on his own policies of the past, is not likely to prioritize or even be helpful in getting dismantled.

Any posts responding to this with anything remotely on the lines of “you’re encouraging people not to vote for Biden and thus helping Trump win” will be ignored the same way they ignore that THAT IS NOT WHAT THIS POST IS, OR SAYS, OR WANTS. I am not responsible for your inability to read what this post actually says, or your unwillingness to hold two not actually opposing viewpoints and priorities in your head at the same time. I am being as clear as I possibly can be on what I will be doing if Biden is the nominee, and why, and how none of that makes Biden’s worst flaws or history irrelevant or a distraction from Trump.

First off:

“Won’t expand healthcare that much” IS actively letting people die. GoFundMe’s biggest usage is trying to raise money for people whose health care isn’t keeping them alive and most of those goals are never actually met, and that’s literally killing people. 

Please be cognizant of what kind of people are most being killed this way. Ones who have the most trouble MEETING (often) impossible goals. The most marginalized members of society. 

If anyone is still framing the health care issue in their own heads as a matter of whether or not they can always pay for their own medical expenses, or will always be able to, please understand this disregards the many people who flat out can’t, and die every day as a result. Homeless people, people kicked out of their homes for being gay or trans or neurodivergent, not having access to quality health care for those reasons or turned away by the specialists they desperately need because the specialists’ only concerns are they can’t afford to pay. Ex-cons who are largely barred access to jobs with good medical benefits, and are largely barred access to the goodwill of random internet strangers willing to shell out some money of their own for their gofundme campaigns. And so on, and so on.

Absolutely the camps and detention facilities are a huge ongoing issue, but its a huge ongoing issue MOST being talked about throughout these entire past four years by a lot of the exact same leftists being accused of taking focus away from the very issues they are doing the most to highlight.

Now onto Biden specifically:

Are Biden’s positions on everything identical to Trump? No, but for starters, Biden wrote the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, responsible for building more prisons, increasing prison sentences, deploying more cops, and increasing and furthering the exploitation of prison labor, etc.

He’s long been a major proponent of capital punishment, directly leading to the creation of over 60 new capital offenses including murder of federal law enforcement officers. And oh yeah, Biden also voted against limiting appeals and rejecting racial statistics in death penalty appeals.....which would be great if the vast majority of the new death penalty offenses he had a hand in creating - like the murder of police - haven’t been massively disproportionate in who they end up targeting and who ends up charged with and convicted of them: 

Like carjackings, acts of terrorism (just hardly ever acts of domestic terrorism aka the mass shootings of white supremacists, antisemites and disgruntled white guys), and the many drug-related offenses that stem from him being known for decades as a ‘drug warrior’ behind many leading efforts in the war on drugs.

Such as how in the 80s he was the head of the Senate Committee responsible for passing most of the most punitive measures against drug users, during the crack epidemic that was largely created to target and make scapegoats of lower class drug users and PoC, whom were at the time denoted as statistically more likely to use crack cocaine than powder cocaine....

And given that Biden himself sponsored and co-wrote the Anti-Drug Abuse Act which specifically and deliberately laid out hugely harsher penalties for crack cocaine use than were received for being convicted of using power cocaine.....aka a particular favorite past-time of rich white guys (including politicians and political staffers)....all during and throughout the crack epidemic Biden and his cohorts happily whipped up public moral outrage about....

This directly makes him and his political career an inciting element in the huge disparities in prison populations, all stemming from this drug warrior’s leading role in a war on drugs he helped get underway and become what it eventually became in the first place. (Please keep in mind he was famously critical of REAGAN for not being strongly enough anti-drug, as well as George H. W. Bush.)

Granted, Biden admitted his role in crafting and enforcing legislation that led to such huge disparities, at least by the time he was asked about such things in the debates of the 2007 Democratic primaries.

But to my knowledge, to this day he has yet to ever similarly walk back his role in things like oh, the Comprehensive Forfeiture Act in 1983. Which directly empowered and has steadily more and more further increased the power of drug enforcement agencies to seize assets of even just those charged with anything from drug possession to intent to distribute. Which in turn, almost always directly affects the ability of defendants to pay for their own defense instead of being limited to the representation of overworked and underpaid public defenders. Not to mention limits their ability to repeatedly avail themselves to the unlimited appeals Biden nominally has always been in favor for. 

Or there’s the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Bill which was a bit of shady shitmanship that squeezed through thanks to being attached to an unvetted, unrelated and super fucking vague child protection bill that has often been criticized as overreaching in scope. And this IDAP Bill, despite its superficially stated intentions, has historically most often been used by DEA agents as an intimidation tactic wielded against drug-reform protestors at rallies and other such events.

Biden might never have openly had his support base chanting Build the Wall, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t vote for the Secure Fence Act of 2006, which partially funded the construction of 700 miles of fencing along the Mexican border. 

And his stance for over ten years about whether he’d allow sanctuary cities to ignore federal law has been a clear and concise NO, which y’know, given that’s kinda the whole point of sanctuary cities....and given that sanctuary cities have been absolutely CRUCIAL to even attempting to stave off the worst of Trump’s anti-immigration efforts, travel bans, etc.....this may not make him worse than Trump, but I fail to see that particular stance helping all that much even after Trump is gone. 

Because Biden might not have put the same efforts into motion as Trump has, had he been the one in office, but I do not for a second believe he will in ANY way make reversing or undoing some of them his priority. All of that is just as likely to be an uphill battle in a Biden presidency. His track record speaks to itself as to how much he’s likely to make anything like abolishing ICE or getting rid of the detention facilities his first order of business - or even second, third, or even tenth....UNLESS PEOPLE FORCE HIM TO MAKE IT THAT, INSTEAD OF JUST TRUSTING THAT HE WILL BECAUSE HE’S NOT TRUMP.

The caveat I have here is that Biden and his inner circle and support base are unlikely to ever be that visibly resistant to repealing Trump’s anti-immigration efforts, or that visibly in favor of what’s happened there, and he isn’t going to campaign on a platform of overt racism.....but that’s kinda the point. He’s never needed to, in order to still do a huge amount of damage to an untold number of lives over the decades, all while being able to claim to be nominally or superficially progressive and use that to advance his own career. 

Trump doesn’t care about hiding his racism....and Biden doesn’t try all that hard to either. But he’s always known he doesn’t really have to try all that hard....just to hide it just enough to claim it isn’t there and its nothing worth anyone worrying about or pushing back against. Plausible deniability - made all the easier and all the more plausible by having someone like Trump to point to and know just by doing so people will breathe a sigh of relief because whew, at least he’s not Trump. Not that this is likely a huge comfort to the people killed long before now, due to his prison policies, capital offense expansion, and war on drugs that happen to not be the right kind of drugs, or being snorted in the right form of those drugs, or snorted by the right people.

And putting a face and a claim to things that absolutely none of his actual efforts back up or are even aimed in the same direction as....this is something that extends to pretty much everything else about him. 

Yeah, he reversed his stance on voting for DADT and DOMA in years prior, when as Vice President he said he was totally fine with the idea of men marrying men and women marrying women and each enjoying all the same benefits and civil rights and liberties as anyone else. Course, that doesn’t actually reverse how he voted, nor did he actually have anything to do with striking down the results of his and others’ votes as unconstitutional.

And yeah, Biden drafted the Violence Against Women Act, which he’s famously called the most significant piece of legislation he’s crafted throughout his political career and the one he’s most proud of, citing it as the beginning of a ‘historic commitment to women and children victimized by domestic violence and sexual assault.’ Not that it helped Anita Hill that much, nor that he ever seemed all that interested in helping, believing or supporting her, despite whatever he may have claimed a couple years ago at the start of the #MeToo movement or around the Kavanaugh proceedings, when he stated he’d always believed Anita Hill and voted against Clarence Thomas.

(With Thomas of course still a member of the Supreme Court, alongside Kavanaugh now, thanks to Trump. And Thomas still being famously considered one of its most conservative justices. And still someone whose appointment to the Court might not ever have happened had not Biden - the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee overseeing Thomas’ nomination to the court -  made the choice to never call forward four female witnesses who’d been waiting in the wings the whole time to testify on Hill’s behalf and speak to her credibility. With this decision of Biden’s only ever being described as the result of a ‘private, compromise deal between Republicans and then-Judiciary Committee Chair Joe Biden,’ after which all four other women’s testimony was deemed irrelevant, and thus a waste of the court’s time.

And sure, Biden as of just last year supports repealing the Hyde Amendment, that he’s only supported since as far back as ‘76. The Hyde Amendment, of course, blocks federal funding from being used to pay for an abortion except in the specific provision of an abortion being needed to save the woman’s life, or when the pregnancy is the result of incest or rape. Of course, even through all those decades that Biden did support the Hyde Amendment, he pretty famously never felt it went far enough, and thought it shouldn’t include a provision allowing for federal funds to be used to pay for an abortion that stemmed from incest or rape. But that doesn’t speak to his personality or priorities either, obviously, since he took it back (while preparing to hopefully run against pussy-grabbing Trump).

And Biden’s not as interested in giving billionaires tax cuts as Trump is, for instance, since he was always against even George W. Bush’s tax cuts for Americans who made more than one million dollars a year. He was always of the belief that this money should then be put in a dedicated Homeland Security and Public Safety Trust Fund, to invest specifically in increased law enforcement. Joey does love him some cops.

And Biden’s not quite as likely to go to war compared to how often Trump seems to have us poised on the brink of it. Biden only favored sending American troops to Darfur, is a self-described Zionist who has defended various acts of aggression by the Israeli army against Palestinians, and was of the opinion that the biggest problem with our involvement in the Syrian Civil War was that Europe didn’t trust we had a plan there.  

Of course, much like with numerous other stances, its not like there’s not plenty to point to as proof Biden’s invested in keeping us out of any international conflicts. For instance, he’s been a longterm advocate for ‘hard-headed diplomacy’ against Iran that included pushing for coordinated international sanctions against them...except then he voted against a measure to declare the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization, said war with Iran wouldn’t just be a mistake, it’d be a disaster, and threatened to personally begin impeachment proceedings against George W. Bush if he attempted to start a war with Iran. This was in December of 2007. Course, then in September 2008, he said that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps was a terrorist organization and that the Bush administration already had the power and right to declare them as such, soooo......hmm.

And Biden did vote against the first Gulf War in 1990. Then supported the use of force against Iraq in 1998 and expressed a commitment to taking down Hussein, even if it meant being in it for the long haul....which as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2002, he ratified by voting to authorize war against Iraq, going on record as firmly believing that Hussein possessed chemical and biological weapons and was seeking nuclear weapons. 

Then again, in 2006, Biden did go on to say that the original authorization for going to war with Iraq had been a mistake that was due to Bush “using his congressional authority unwisely” (and that Biden had no role in unwisely helping him obtain), and that there were no stockpiled weapons in Iraq and likely never had been. 

Which Biden then followed up in 2008 by saying in his opinion the real mistake had been in labeling Iraq the focus of the War on Terror, instead of Afghanistan, which he believed was really the focus all along, and that we should leave Iraq....and shift our focus fully back there. Because see, the problem was the war in Iraq was a war of choice, whereas the war in Afghanistan was a war of necessity.

And he did have this to say in 2011 about getting involved in the conflict in Libya: "NATO got it right. In this case, America spent $2 billion and didn't lose a single life. This is more the prescription for how to deal with the world as we go forward than it has in the past."

Course, five years later in 2016, in an interview with Charlie Rose, Biden stated he was "strongly against going to Libya" due to the instability it would cause within the country. He said, "My question was, 'OK, tell me what happens.' He's gone. What happens? Doesn't the country disintegrate? What happens then? Doesn't it become a place where it becomes a petri dish for the growth of extremism? And it has."

And then there’s his stances on North Korea...and Russia...and Central America....and Cuba.....all of which can be summed up as “that’s Joe Biden’s hot take on this issue, tune back in next week where he plays devil’s advocate with himself and argues the exact opposite.”

So yeah, all of that and more is who Biden is and always has been. Do not buy into him being someone who has grown and changed, because he’s more recently said the right things - especially as opposed to Trump. Biden has ALWAYS said the right things for the time he’s saying them at.....and history has always shown him willing to say the exact opposite, as soon as its more to his advantage to change his tune to that instead.

He is not the lesser of two evils, IMO, he is just the less overt of two evils. But make no mistake.....I can not tell anyone what to do, nor am I trying to, ultimately, beyond just asking people to BE AWARE of things like this. I can only really tell you what I’m going to do, and if Biden gets the nomination, I AM going to vote for him, not just to get rid of Trump....but everyone Trump brought with him, and the way Trump’s spent four years assuring every hateful piece of shit in America that they are not alone in their hate, and they have presidential approval.

I am simply ALSO saying, at the same time, that I do believe that even a Biden presidency can help push back against this, by virtue of at least being the American people saying We Do Not Support Trump or Want Him Back in enough quantities as to shame at least some of the more hateful and cowardly elements of our society back into silence.....

But that even while doing so, it IMO will remain MORE CRUCIAL THAN EVER to keep in mind.....none of those people or their hate simply sprang into being when Trump took office. They were here all along, and just because BEFORE Trump many of them weren’t brave enough to be seen out of the shadows, doesn’t mean that politicians like Joe Biden haven’t seen them and been fine with them and even agreeing with them and catering to them in various ways all along. Its just, unlike Trump, Biden cares too much about being seen as doing and saying the right things, the progressive things, to do any of those dealings openly, speak to any of those elements directly. But that’s never meant he’s above dealing with them, or profiting from their support.

So elect Biden if that’s what we have to do, even if only because his desire to be seen as progressive is at least a lever to ply between him and such elements of our society, where no such lever exists between Trump and them at all.

But it needs to be remembered that such a lever is only as effective as WE MAKE USE OF IT, AND FORCE HIM TO CATER MORE TO ACTUAL PROGRESSIVE PUBLIC OPINION RATHER THAN ALLOW HIM THE TIME AND ENERGY TO BE TWO-FACED THE MOMENTS OUR BACKS ARE TURNED.

And that if we do not keep this in mind, the latter is very much something Biden will do, just as he has done it countless times before.

AND ALSO PLEASE KEEP IN MIND:

HE STILL IS NOT THE NOMINEE YET, AND UNTIL HE IS STOP TAKING IT FOR GRANTED.

There is a marked difference between preparing for less than your preferred scenarios, and taking for granted that you might as well go ahead and settle for them already.

Too much of the latter has too much to do with the current state of our country, SO WHAT IF WE STOPPED DOING IT.

[soccialcreature]

Why you (I) did not like Rise of Skywalker

I’i wish i cud just tell ppl that i simply did not vibe with rise of skywalker but everyone just says “oh, youre just a hater” or “youre so cynical” so im going to put into words Exactly what i didnt like about tros so ppl cant say that i just hate it for fun? i guess? or to b cool? idk. under the break so that i dont annoy casual scrollers. and of course u can like it if u want i rly do not care.

The stakes were too high

If our characters failed, then we would see essentially the destruction of the entire galaxy. Or at least, that’s what they made it seem like. Because of this, you knew that the characters were going to succeed, but it was lowkey really stressful, and NOT in the fun, tension-y way. I felt like I was just sitting there thinking “get this done already!” And I just felt annoyed (again, not in the fun way) at every setback. 

I know this is lowkey how every story works, so I’ll give an example of a piece of media that DOESNT do that and it’s going to be clone wars because I’m always thinking about clone wars and im such a clone wars hoe im sorry.

In The Clone Wars, the stakes were much lower. It was always something like, keep this planet from Separatist control, or win this battle, or make this political step. And sometimes, our characters failed. Deathwatch burned down the village, or they just lost a battle to the Separatists and had to retreat, but it was never such a crushing defeat that there was no hope afterward. Watching the show, you didn’t know if they were going to win or not, and you wanted to see what was going to happen and HOW it was going to happen. It made it really fun to watch. Another example is the Mandalorian. Low stakes, but we still care (do not TOUCH baby Yoda or I will LOSE IT).

We didn’t get any time to get to know our characters

This one’s pretty self-explanatory. There was so much going on in the movie and so much that needed to happen to reach the climax that there was no time for character development. This is where the “I wish there was more sitting and talking” comes in. The characters stayed stagnant the whole time. Their views on things didn’t change, and they learned nothing. This was one of the biggest issues with Force Awakens, too (which I liked a lot! Who didn't?), that the characters were essentially being dragged around by the plot with no agency of their own. It was just them moving on to the next plot point and then the next, etc. What’s supposed to happen is that the characters are put in a situation and then they get something out of it that they didn’t expect to. Instead, we didn’t have time for any of that and just moved on to the next plot point.

Again, I’m gonna use the prequels as an anti-example. The whole trilogy was about Anakin’s character arc and his fall to the dark side. What came with that was his relationship with Obi-wan, and Obi-wan’s character arc, etc. The clones in TCW are also perfect examples of good characters.

No themes or morals

Frankly, it was just kind of a bummer. For a happy ending, I walked out of the theater feeling pretty defeated. It may have been because Ben died, but I’ve never really been a fan of Kylo Ren. I know this is so so contradictory because I’m a prequel hoe and the prequels had the most depressing ending ever and no one was happy, but I mean let's be real. It kind of had to for the original trilogy to happen. And it showed a lot about being human and love and anger and corruption etc etc. The issue with this trilogy’s ending, though, is that there was really no reason for it to be sad. It didn’t show anything, and there were no underlying themes of the film at all.

I’ve really had enough of Palpy

Sorry, but we did not need to bring him back. There was no reason for him to come back. It just ruined Anakin’s sacrifice in Return of the Jedi and honestly, this is the worst of Palpatine. What made him interesting was watching the way he would manipulate Anakin and the rest of the senators and the Jedi as a secret Sith Lord. And I didn’t need to see him do the exact same thing that he did to Luke in Return of the Jedi to Rey. Villains where the description is just “the most powerful being in the galaxy: impossible to defeat” don’t really interest me.  

I’d rather be at home watching Clone Wars

I know this is essentially what happened with people who grew up watching the original trilogy and why they didn’t like the prequels, and it’s really not fair for me to judge this piece of Star Wars media based of off how it holds up to this other part that I’ve held so dear for so long, but hey. I think that’s perfectly valid. It’s fine if you don’t like the prequels because they’re not as good as the originals. That’s just how it happens. Sorry sequels, it’s really not your fault. It’s my fault for watching TCW and the prequels first. Don’t get me wrong, the prequels had their issues. There were some annoying characters, bad dialogue, weird choices for who the movies would focus on (Obi-wan should not have been such a side character in Phantom Menace), but the goal and ideas of the prequels were really good. I didn’t get any of that in Rise of Skywalker.

In conclusion, you can totally like the movie if you want. I really wish I did like it. And I didn’t hate it, really. There were a lot of cool parts like the scene of Luke training Leia to become a Jedi which I think was super fun. And Kylo Ren/Ben Solo at the end using a blue lightsaber was cool and again, fun. But ya. I doubt you read this if you liked TROS but. People should let people like what they like, and also let people not like something just because they don’t like it. We shouldn’t make people have to justify or argue everything, but I’m just doing it because my family’s been calling me a hater because I immediately went home and turned on Clone Wars. And also I’m majoring in Screenwriting at college next year so I feel like I should sort of know how to write good stories and characters. Or at least try to figure out what works and what doesn’t. Thanks! <3

[padawansuggest]

I have about a million and a half reasons for HATING the fact that ‘child stealers’ is a literal canon thing in the SW universe, most of which amount to the fact that stealing children and giving them to ‘better’ (usually whiter) families is literally a form of genocide and even if it’s not for the sake of child assimilation and genocide, you can’t deny that that’s absolutely terrible. Murder isn’t any less terrible if it’s only one person compared to a thousand, and stealing only one child is also bad compared to those thousands.

Now, here’s another reason that this should get everyone’s blood boiling (and by ‘get your blood boiling’ I mean ‘a million reasons to absolutely ignore this canon and refuse to ever put it in a fic ever but also acknowledge that it exists and we need to call it out for the racism/classism that it is), you know, other than the fact that Jedi are CHILD ABUSERS and should never have access to a SINGLE child let alone any force sensitive child they feel like, is the idea that by this logic, the majority of the children they kidnap and force into emotional abuse, are likely wanted by their parents.

Imagine that, though. Imagine being a couple with a surrogate. Maybe you don’t have the reproductive parts, maybe you won’t risk it because of bad health, maybe you have a specific issue you don’t want to pass down to your kids. Either way, you went out of your way to have this child. You’re paying astronomical fees just to see this child into the world and give them a happy and healthy life.

All that goes down the tube when they take your child’s midichlorian count in the hospital. The number is too high. You now know that your time with that child is limited before a Jedi shows up to claim them. The courts won’t rule in your favor if you’re in the republic.

First of all: I fucking understand why so many planets wanted to leave the republic. Fuck I’d be pissed, like damn.

Second of all: if the senate didn’t have so much oversight in the Jedi order, the Jedi wouldn’t be authorized to do this because if they were neutral, they wouldn’t have authority anywhere but where it’s given.

Third of all: imagine how those parents feel. It wasn’t ONLY Shmi Skywalker who lost a child to the Jedi order. Imagine how many grief counselors out there are specifically trained to help parents who’ve faced a loss from the Jedi order. They are going through the EXACT same grief as parents who’s children have died, because the Jedi REFUSE to tell them about their families and won’t even tell the parents if their child is ALIVE and well or not.

Fuck I’m so angry, I have a million reasons to hate this, half of them are because it’s a form of genocide, and half of them are because it’s going to hurt the parents just as much as it’s going to hurt these emotionally abused babies.

Jedi are child abusers. You’re allowed to like and love aspects of their culture and characters, but don’t forget that they are child abusers. Both emotionally and physically (yes, sending 13 year old padawans on missions to highly dangerous planets where they might, oh I don’t know, starve or end up in a fucking child war, that’s abuse) these children are abused, and then if they don’t ‘make the cut’ they’re forced out of the only home they’ve ever known (without even giving them the option to go back to their birth family) and made into laborers.

It’s delightful isn’t it.

[motheatenscarf]

ANYWAY, before I got, uh, COMPLETELY DISTRACTED by the return of a certain character (also Kira, hi, I missed you too, you’re great, my Jedi literally named her son after you but that was the son she had with Scourge SO... I’m sorry) I was gonna talk about how much I fucking love the little posse you’ve got developing in the Republic faction?

I mean, let’s start off strong here with Tau and Arn. I already fucking loved Tau from Ossus and she only continued to endear me with what a great teacher she is and how much she already clearly adores her padawan. She’s fantastic with him and props to Gnost Durall for having the smarts to bring two wounded, questioning people together to help heal each other and build on one another, goddamn I love them so much. Individually they’re great on their own too, I’ve talked about how much I love Tau’s conflicted feelings about a Jedi’s role in conflict and her own use as anything other than a killer. And now Arn is just a SWEET BABY BOY, I’m so glad we get an actually decent depiction of trauma through him for once. Yeah, I could do without the whole “cybernetic character is MAYBE GONNA GO DARKSIDE” cliche AGAIN but it’s nowhere near as egregious as I thought it was gonna be. He’s not some bitter, broken, hate fueled “morally gray” character, he’s sweet and thoughtful and unsure of himself and even timid- he just has hella PTSD and lashes out in his trauma when he’s literally triggered like a war veteran. So to put him under Tau’s tutelage, where she knows that EXACT feeling and can help him through it, is brilliant. 

And I LOVE how good she is with him, I cannot stress that enough! When he fucks up she doesn’t yell at him or talk down to him or lecture him, she helps him through it and you as the player get to do the same. It’s absolutely pulling on my goddamn heartstrings. She’s SO KIND, I love a Tau, I love the her so much. I want to romance her so badly. If my track record post-Scourge holds true, I just have to wait until about 2026 for that Tau Romance. I specifically made Vane to romance Tau. Sometimes a family can be a beat up old Colonel, a sad wise beautiful statue of a Jedi, and their fully grown baby boy son.

Also Arn sends a message about how he immediately spotted how he could ease some of Jakarro’s discomfort but didn’t want to presume to tell him his business when he doesn’t know him so he passes the message onto you and asks if you can tell him. He’s such a good!! What a sweetie. I love this boy, I want to protect him.

I continue to love Gnost Durall and even his interactions with Lana were surprisingly endearing. I hate to see how much happier Lana is in the Republic than Theron is with me even pretending to still be loyal to the Sith as a saboteur. 

Also I really like the new Chancelor! And that Senator on Onderon. And honestly, even the 3 new Dark Council Members (well, they’re not NEW, they’ve been established, they’re just new to their seats of power). Bioware, writing a sensible woman in power who isn’t power hungry or “insane”????? What universe did I walk into?????

And of course Daerun continues to be an absolute fucking delight, I like his odd little friendship with Gnost Durall and he’s the perfect flamboyant, devastatingly tactical foil to Vowrawn. Jake compared him to Iroh earlier and that’s exactly the kinda vibes I get from him, it was a spot on comparison.

They did a fantastic job with making all of these characters likable and memorable, I am genuinely fond of all of them and their interactions only make them seem like stronger and even more endearing characters. I know everyone keeps talking about how “The Sith have changed, the Sith have changed” but they don’t seem to show any real change except that maybe they aren’t actively committing resources to screwing each other over the way they were the last time they invaded Corellia. Meanwhile, the Republic has somehow gotten its fucking shit together and created not only a functional government with a competent military structure (the SIS aside, Jesus fucking Christ Jonas why did you call my Warrior IN THE DARK COUNCIL CHAMBERS?) and a Jedi order committed to supporting each other through their darkest times without fear or judgement???????????

So yeah, Aerasuni went back to the Republic. I was actually very surprised that they were willing to grant full citizenship and ignore the criminal records and wartime activities of my underworld and formerly Imperial characters which... holy shit? Just makes me honestly that much angrier about the Saboteur route.

Having played both, the only thing I liked better about the Imperial Story was that it starts the player out as an active protagonist, you’re sent to Onderon on the mission that starts the fucking plot. Republic faction, you go there just because Arn needed someone to drive him to meet Tau and you know Tau and are nice, so why not let it be you, I guess, and then plot happens around you and you just sort of fall into it. 

I was okay with the KotFE/KotET/Iokath/Traitor arc stuff because it was all stuff that was very relevant to Tallia, who is my main and whom I adore, but I think going forward I’m just kinda gonna have to handwave uh, everything, if the Republic stuff continues to just run laps around the Imperial content. And the Empire stuff wasn’t even bad! It was just sort of okay. I imagine if you’re playing a loyalist it’s immensely satisfying but that’s not my jam, I’ve been playing lightside weenie reformists since 2013 (I say, even as they lop the heads off of slave trading Sith on the Dark Council jesus FUCKING christ that was intense). Ain’t gonna change now.

I’m gonna think on how this might affect Tallia’s story, I’ve been toying with the idea of her defecting for realsies and just saying she does the Republic story stuff with Aerasuni, but wasn’t sure how I’d even handle that. Because I mean, no way in hell they’d ever welcome all these ex-Imperials into the Republic, not without some heavy strings, and oh wait, they did. They did... exactly that. Huh. Welp. I guess that’s that then.

I’ll have to think on this next week though because we have a Halloween one-shot in D&D this week where the theme is undead maffia so I’m obviously going to be playing a shambling charismatic zombie with cinderblock boots named Jimmy Coffin.

[whitehotharlots]

Handicapping the 2020 Dem primary

Tier Four

The Tom Vilsack Memorial “No Chance in Hell” Tier

These are the candidates whose family members won’t even vote for them. They will drop out either before or immediately after Iowa. Some of them will be working specifically to plant the seeds of a 2024 run, while others are auditioning for an MSNBC gig.

Joe Kennedy

Any person who is simultaneously old enough and illiterate enough to have any fondness for the Kennedys is 100% in the Trump camp. Joe has zero appeal outside of this voting bloc, which literally does not exist. He won’t even win Massachusetts--won’t even be in the top five in Massachusetts.

Michael Avenatti

My man ain’t even announced his run and he’s already facing domestic assault charges. A potential Avenatti run had a mystical WWF vibe to it. I will admit, I was excited, the same as I’d be excited to finally pull alongside the accident that caused the pile up. No one has any idea what his policies are, because neither does he. He might honestly beat Trump in the general, as he is far and away the most likely candidate to physically assault Trump if the two ever share a stage (any Dem who punches Trump will be automatically 100% guaranteed to win the election). But he probably won’t even run.

Mitch Landrieu

Mitch will appeal to that small demographic of erstwhile independent voters who were drawn to Trump solely because he is an openly corrupt grifter. By May he will be a panel participant on a new MSNBC show that’s like Shark Tank but but all the contestants are trying to get the panel to fund their medical gofundme’s.

Eric Holder

Like every other member of the Obama administration, his faults are glaring and the relatively good stuff he did takes way too much context for most voters to understand. Under his leadership, the DoJ began began to litigate hate crimes, which had been almost completely neglected under Bush. That’s good. Also, under his leadership, the DoJ stalwartly refused to prosecute the war criminals who lied us into Iraq or the bankers who tanked the world economy. That’s bad. Politically, he has the platform of a Republican circa 1992. Personally, he has the charisma of a very dry snail.

Steve Bullock

He looks and sounds like the dumb guy sidekick of an old cartoon villain. He is therefore the Bebop/Rocksteady of the field. His policies are indistinguishable from any other civil moderate/fiscal conservative candidate, and his moistness will drive away both donors and media . (NOTE: With Bullock, the Avenatti Rule applies: if he threatens to physically assault Trump or any member of Trump’s family--especially including Baron--he will rocket to the top of the pack. If he actually assaults them, he will win the general election and usher in a glorious Centrist Utopia)

Kristen Gillibrand

She was once considered a front-runner for the same reason Corey Booker kinda sorta still is a frontrunner--because she looks similar to a previous Dem nominee, and many liberal strategists and commentators cannot conceive of a politics beyond identity markers. Trouble is, unlike Booker, Gillibrand pissed off her donor base by leading the the charge against Al Franken. I don’t for a second think that Gillibrand’s efforts had anything to do with principles. She just leaned into the wrong direction of the skid of cynicism: if there’s one thing Democrat donors hate, it’s a candidate who appears to adhere to any kind of moral framework. And Gillibrand is not the sort of candidate who stands a chance without full institutional support.

Tier Three

The “Gormless Dweebs” Tier

These people might stick around until late in the game for the same reason they’d stay at a house party until well after they were no longer welcome. Each also possesses a very particular strain of weirdness that might resonate with voters in New Hampshire enough that they’d finish in the top 3, but none has a realistic chance to live past Super Tuesday.

Martin O’Malley

O’Malley is the Democrat John Kasich. He’s mostly running because he wants to have people to talk to. Several New Hampshire people will nod at him and that will be it. 

Terry McAuliffe

Imagine if Joe Lieberman were a governor and slightly less physically repulsive. He is still a very moist man, and his only moments of attention will come when he criticizes one of the more left-leaning candidates after they point out that the Iraq war didn’t go so good. (Let me ask Senator Sanders a question. We he says that global warming is the biggest threat we face... has he ever heard of ISLAM?” *Tufts University crowd goes wild*)  Terry might come in top 3 in Virginia, and he also might stick around if a frontrunner is facing some kind of big scandal. But his main effect on this debate will be that of a zebra mussel on the side of a leaky rowboat, hoping it fills with just enough water that he’ll be able to slither aboard for the last few minutes before it sinks.

Elizabeth Warren

Warren is one of small handful of Dem candidates whose economic politics fall to the left of Margaret Thatcher. That doesn’t really work for her, though, because it’s hard for a quiet dweeb to project any sense of populism. She’d be a significantly less horrible president than most on this list, probably. But there’s no way she would beat Trump head to head. He can bait her with literally any claim and her response will always be “golly gee I will refute this man with logic and evidence and then those who repeated his taunts will surely see the error of their ways.” By August, it would get to the point where she’d be sending out topless pics to prove she really doesn’t have several teats and therefore is not a pregnant dog, as Trump suggested. But thankfully she will have flamed out long before that.

Tier 2

The “Viable Candidates Who Are Gonna Get Rat Fucked Really Hard” Tier

Sherrod Brown

Same general platform as Bernie, only without the voting record, name recognition, or widespread appeal. We are also living in an age where crudity is now taken for a sign of sincerity, and while he does kinda give off a “disheveled history teacher” vibe, that’s not enough to really combat Trump. Trump can only really be beaten by a platform, not a personality, so Brown might have a chance. But he’ll also almost certainly bow out before Super Tuesday. My guess he won’t be able to take the heat nearly as well as Bernie and he’s gone before Iowa.

Bernie

Bernie will win New Hampshire. He will win for the same reason he won it in 2016: he’s well-known there, he will be the only believable candidate running on a civil libertarian platform. He will win it by a bigger margin, because the Establishment field will be more split. He will win Iowa for the same reasons: much more name recognition now. Pledged delegates-wise, he will be far and away the frontrunner after the first two contests, although on-screen graphics will continue to present him as a longshot, due to superdelegates. He will then square off in a contest between 1-2 of the following candidates, whom the establishment will rally behind. He could win the nomination, but you and I literally cannot imagine the absurdity of the smears he will face. If he wins the nomination he wins the general Reagan vs. Mondale-style, and we might narrowly avoid civilization collapse. There’s only about a 25% of that happening, though.

Tier 1

The “If the Establishment Unites Behind Any One of These People They Will Beat Bernie for the Nom Then Get Stomped by Trump” Tier

None of these candidates would have a realistic chance against Trump, but each of them is well positioned to take advantage of the unique corruption of the Democratic Party. Our only real hope--as a society and a species--is that they manage to split the vote between themselves.

Kamela Harris

Did you watch HBO’s The Jinx? It’s about a weird, repulsive millionaire serial killer who keeps evading justice. She was the prosecutor who tried to convict him. To stress: she could not convict Robert Derst. She’s running in the right direction, though, (disingenuously) espousing some populist positions while hoovering up donor cash. She could very well wait this thing out and then see the donors line up behind her enough so that he "victory” is called by the AP right before the California primary.

Beto

Centrism couldn’t win in Texas, even with a candidate who was immensely more appealing than his opponent. That’s exactly what Centrism is designed to do, and it didn’t do it. It failed. It will always fail. Still, Beto is very handsome and very shameless and not Republican-level evil, which means he will make some money and also sway some idiots. But he’s not nearly connected enough, yet, to win the nom. He will come close however, and bow out at the right time so as to not burn any bridges. Beto will be the nominee in 2024, when he will narrowly win the popular vote but lose the electoral college to Immortum Joe.

Corey Booker

Laugh if you must, but Booker appeals strongly to the exact strain of idiocy that controls the strategy within the Democratic Party: He is a black male...  like Obama! That means he will win, since Obama did. Yes, anyone who spends a few minutes studying Booker will realize he lacks Obama’s intelligence, wit, and oratorical ability. But that’s not how the Democratic establishment understands politics: they believe, genuinely, that the way to win is to raise the most money while being in possession of the correct identity markers. Should a candidate do this and lose, as Hillary did, it was the inevitable result of machinations outside of their control. Ergo, we must appoint the anointed one and see if he pleases the gods. Plus, if you mute the TV and squint, Booker totally looks like Obama!

Hillary

The main benefits of wokeness--why it has so many adherents, so far as I can tell--is that it allows certain people to skirt all responsibility for everything they say and do, even as it forces others to attempt to adhere to literally impossible programmatics of speech and comportment. And so Hillary’s recent nativist turn will be forgiven (it will most likely go unmentioned), while Bernie’s wardrobe and posture will be used as evidence of his sexism. She can continue making jokes about Colored People Time, while any of her competitors will be crucified for not using the exact right terms in describing whatever happen to be the Woke Cause of the Day. This insulation from criticism is Hillary’s biggest strength with the Democrat electorate, while her fiscal conservatism will continue to help her with donors. She will get beaten horribly in the general, but still stands a strong chance in the primary.

Joe Biden

I have no idea how this man is leading in some polls other than name recognition. Which--don’t get me wrong, name recognition is huge, especially in early goings within a crowded primary field. But what does Biden bring to the table, policy-wise or personality-wise? I realize the people who bleat about how they don’t want any more OLD. WHITE. MALES. running for president are just trying to make their cruel centrist politics appear radical--but could they be shameless enough to actually throw their support to Biden? Biden, the dude who most certainly would have been MeToo’d were he still in a position of power? Biden, the pro-war economic conservative who repeatedly says that young people just need to stop whining? That’s the guy you’re gonna run against Trump? Probably. I would take a 50/50 bet on him winning the nomination.

Final odds:

Biden: 1:1

Hillary 1.5:1

Bernie 4:1

Booker 8:1

Beto 10:1

Harris 12:1

Field (including only aforementioned candidates): 30:1