#It was so nice how he seemed to play with the idea of transcending human categories and values but even the values of curses so to speak

[longagoitwastuesday]

Every day I am haunted by the fact JJK could be amazing but it will be just idk Bleach or something

[joshujin]

hi trixie!! thank YOU for sharing til god breaks this spell with the world i will be thinking about it intermittently for quite some time I fear (the ‘12 years in catholic education’ hat came out to play lmao) it was truly a painful yet wonderful piece :,)

I’m looking forward to reading more from you!!! <33 -viv (heartepub/blossomzip)

VIV! i was going to dm you once i sorted out my thoughts so i could more eloquently shower you with compliments for how thoughtful your reblog was. but of course, you're so lovely and sweet, you beat me to reaching out 🥺 so now that you're here, i'm going to babble nonsensically now! :)

while i did not have as thorough of an upbringing in catholicism as you did (TWELVE!!! whew), it's always nice when writing brings people of similar backgrounds together like this. it's actually enough to move me to tears if i think about it too hard LOL

some notes for your notes not only bc i'm insufferable and need to talk about all of this, but bc you put so much thought into this, it deserves to be discussed, applauded, held like a little baby i can kiss and hug!!!

Death after all that forethought is so green/ in the dark like a wet kiss/ but Lord/ I would give you up still for a person.

oh i'm sick bro. i'm sick. even just the title had me feeling like i was choking. lord i thought at least you'd be here?!?!?! literally joshua laying there thinking that if he knew he'd still be this devoted to reader, he might as well have pursued her. screaming crying throwing up

Marcel sees the fundamental form of hope as expressing human dignity as the ability to transcend one’s own desires and to hope for a shared project. Here hope transcends self-interest: my relation to the other person (or persons) in whom I have placed my hope is not instrumental, but a collaborative, ethical relation of communion (1945: 67).

the idea of putting your hope in someone else, not bc you want something—consciously or otherwise—but bc you trust them and believe in them seems so simple but somehow, simultaneously impossibly hard to wrap my mind around? after reading through the link you added (and learning a little more about marcel bc my philosophy knowledge is admittedly limited to what i learned from chidi in the good place LOL), i think you're incredibly spot-on. paired with the rest of your moodboard (specifically psalm 39:7), i see so much of this in the mc and how she placed her hope in joshua and trusted that he would do what was best/right for both of them. and he delivered without even knowing it omg i'm gonna lose it ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ

Before you know what kindness really is/ you must lose things,/ feel the future dissolve in a moment/ like salt in a weakened broth. [...] You must wake up with sorrow./ You must speak to it till your voice/ catches the thread of all sorrows/ and you see the size of the cloth.

this, together with marcel's idea that there's no hope without despair... god. chills. i was about to say something like "i have nothing to say other than i hope joshua finds happiness" but i realized i wrote the story, so. instead, i'm going to say he experiences the despair, the loss, the sorrow, and he sees the size of the cloth, and he's able to put hope in himself, be kind to himself, and move forward 🥺

i could go on forever, but the way all of these pieces work off of each other is like... wine and cheese haha. you made the perfect charcuterie board of art and i'm soooo impressed by you. by you, the heart you put into reading and writing, everything! i aspire to be able to pull incredible works and as you so accurately call it, weave things together like this.

i know i'm kinda forcing us into a never-ending circle of thank yous by saying this, but i have to!!! i'm still new to caratblr, and you and kae were some of the first carat writers i followed, among others, so it's just really ????dsgkljlasjg??!?!?!? for me to see you both say these things about til god breaks this spell AND QUOTE LES MIS AT ME TO TOP IT ALL OFF ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ like wym y'all wrote some of my absolute fav fics on choi seungcheol’s internet and you also think my writing is worth talking about??? wym???? WHAT DO U MEAN????????

so again, thank you. i'm still making my way through your insanely talented body of work (from the vantage point of death, you're next hehe), but know that i'm constantly in awe of you, your words, and the way you carry yourself online.

i'm happy svt brought us here together („• ֊ •„)♡

[glowinggator]

S/O /w Emotional Support Cat

Request: Is it okay if I ask how the boys react to Reader (with permission) brings their emotional support cat to the lair, or them finding out reader has one.

Pairing: All, Non-Poly

Content Warnings: None! 

Word Count: 1266

Raphael

A cat!! A small friend :)

He’s not too shocked to find out that you have an emotional support cat, honestly. He thinks it’s really cool! Animals are good friends, and he’s an animal lover himself as well. Plus animals just tend to bring nice energy with them! He totally understands it.

He’d also love to bring the cat over! He even buys a little cat bed for them to sleep in.

(He loves cats, but he knows nothing about them. The cat bed never gets used </3)

Unfortunately… animals take a long time to warm up to him. He has no idea why, either! We all saw how Mayhem reacted on the first meeting. Depending on how skittish your cat is, it could take anywhere from a week to months of contact for them to really get used to Raph.

He’s a little sad that your cat doesn’t immediately vibe with him, but honestly, he’s just happy that you feel comfortable enough to bring them over. If you’re happy, he’s happy!

He gets so excited if/when your cat warms up to him though. His eyes light up like a torch in the dark when your cat presses their head into his hand for the first time.

He knows every detail about your cat, it’s really sweet. What temp they like the heating blanket on, what their favorite toy is, what their favorite brand (and flavor) of cat food is, where their favorite spot is… He genuinely considers them to be part of the family at this point.

Honestly, 10/10 he loves you and your emotional support cat <3

Leonardo

Your emotional support animal is… a cat? Alright, he can get that. Different strokes for different folks, after all.

He thinks the cat is super cute, honestly. He always brings strings and cat toys over for your cat when he comes to your apartment. They’re a member of your family, and he’s gonna treat them like one!!

He’s cool with bringing them over to the lair as well! He’s a little worried that they’ll escape or get lost or something, but like, you know them best. He trusts you!

He still sets up little cardboard cat-gates. He doesn’t know that they could just jump over them if they wanted to, but he doesn’t NEED to know that.

He actually gets a little excited when you bring them over for the first time? Like, this is such a huge display of trust and comfort, and it just makes him really happy. He makes sure to get the softest blankets for them to lay on.

The cat likes him, by the way! He has really good vibes, and most animals tend to pick up on that. Dogs usually gravitate towards him, but cats are Not Immune to Leon.

(Raph is SO SALTY ABOUT IT LIKE WHY DON’T THEY LIKE ME I LOVE CATS PLEASE PSPSPSPSP-)

When your cat isn’t by your side, they like to sit on Leo’s chest. He wants to carry them around like a parrot so bad like-

He meows back at them sometimes. It’s cute.

He also likes to do voices for them.

He loves them a lot, and he’s happy that you have such a sweet and reliable emotional support animal.

Donatello

Oh, you have an emotional support animal? Are they a therapy animal? A psychiatric service animal? Prescribed by the court, or independently pursued? Dog? Cat? Horse?

He thinks the neuroscience between human-animal relationships is neat, and it’s something he somewhat understands on a personal level. Animals are quiet and non judgemental. They don’t have the predetermined biases that a human, yokai, or mutant might, and that alone reduces so much stress and pressure.

He thinks it’s kind of cool that your emotional support animal is a cat, as well. He’s always been a cat-person.

Every now and then he’ll build a little gadget for them to play with. It’s more basic than what he’s used to, but sometimes it's just fun to tinker. It’s still stuff you probably couldn’t buy in stores too, like, what a good boyfriend!! Your cat definitely appreciates it!

He’s fine with you bringing your cat over. The only rule is No Cats in the Lab.

It’s not that he doesn’t like them, it’s just like. It’s an accident waiting to happen. He doesn’t want them to get hurt from jumping where they’re not supposed to, or from getting shocked by an exposed wire or something. He’s genuinely just looking out for them.

This is a headcanon I’ve had for a LONG time and I’m so happy I finally get to bring it up. Have you ever heard of Rubber Ducky Debugging? In short, programmers will carry around a little rubber ducky, and when they run into a problem with their code that they can’t seem to solve, they explain every line of code to the rubber duck. It makes the programmer think about their code in a new way, which points out the problem that makes the program fail.

Your cat has become the Rubber Ducky. Your cat has been blessed with knowledge including - but not limited to - string theory, black hole mirage theory, the coding to an updated battle shell, the code for a self-aware supercomputer, and much more. Your cat has transcended this mortal plane.

Like, he has full-on conversations with your cat. It’s a really silly sight to walk in on.

Responds to their meows with things like “Yes, I know. Tell me more.” He always says it in a really monotone voice, and it makes you giggle.

Your cat likes him a lot. They follow him around like a shadow when he comes out of the lab.

He’s definitely started training them on how to use communication buttons. Speech pathology is so cool… your cat will take over the world soon.

Overall, they’re good friends, and he’s happy that you have a loving outlet to help you emotionally.

Michelangelo

Oh, Baby? Tiny little baby man?

Loves that you have an emotional support cat! Cats are such good friends, and they’ll always keep your secrets. Plus, you can smooch their tiny little head. What’s not to love?

He’s actually the first to suggest bringing them over! And he’s super stoked when you agree.

He definitely spends a few hours cat-proofing the lair. He’s watched too many cat videos where they bat stuff off of ledges. He loves them, but cats are NOT to be trusted with such temptation.

Please let him bust out the laser pointer. He’ll get so excited about it, like… it’s all he’s ever wanted.

Your cat takes a little while to warm up to him, just because Mikey is so high energy! Even when he’s sitting still, he’s still a little fidgety. So depending on how skittish they are, it may take a little while.

Definitely likes to nap with them! It’s a really cute sight to walk in on.

(Sunlight lover solidarity <3)

Looks up cat-safe recipes to cook for them, and he’s memorized how much of each thing a cat can have per week. He spoils all of his pets, and your baby? No exception. (And your cat certainly isn’t complaining! Healthy and delicious food!)

He likes to talk to them. Both for emotional stuff, and for silly stuff.

If he’s cooking, and they’re not with you, they’re on the kitchen table meowing at Mikey. He always responds. Either with meows or words, but he actually feels mean if he doesn’t say something back.

He loves them a lot, and he’s happy that you’re happy!

[yandere-wishes]

🖤💔Yandere!Demon Slayers As Demons💔🖤

Dear readers for the first time in two weeks I offer you something that isn't a random post or a rant. This is an AU that I’ve been working on for a while, and seeing how this turns out I might continue it in terms of one shots and a mini series. Please enjoy!!

👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺

Demon Tanjiro is much more complex than his human counterpart. His mood fluctuates too much, alternating between a loving docile young demon desperate for his lover's warm embrace, to a rabid beast who's willing to tear your stomach open with his claws and feast on your entrails while you're still breathing. He's just too unpredictable, what makes him praise you and litter your body with toothy kisses, might just get your arm dislocated the next day. There's just no telling, he just isn't Tanjiro anymore, he's some wild, savage, murderous monster wearing Tanjiro's face.

He's always watching...

His mere gaze isn't enough to turn you into a motionless rag doll. Slumped in the corner like a forgotten toy. No, but his silence is. The way his eyes are locked on you as if your some sort of little bunny that waltzed into his territory, the way his mouth is sewn shut by some invisible thread, the way his head is tilted to the side like he was trying to calculate your next move...it's all too tranquil, too clam, just like the eye of a hurricane. 

Languidly Tanjiro begins to crouch down, his moves are rapid and glitchy as if he isn't in control of his own body. Somewhere you hear something cracking, it's a dreadful noise like hammers pounding at your skull. It's only when you lift your eyes to the Oni in front of you, do you realize the noise is coming from him. It's like he's deforming in some way, dying and regenerating all in a single breath...and yet he still looks so...so beautiful. 

Even while he's stalking towards you on hands and knees, you can't deny how stunning he looks. Mouth molded into a small smile, long rust-colored locks pooling on the ground around him and his eyes... they're red one second and brown the next, changing ever so quickly just like his moods. 

He's much more passive like this, you note as if you've made some sort of groundbreaking discovery. So docile and calm...almost like a storm before it strikes. No, Tanjiro is not a storm you remind your self. He's a lion stalking its prey, relishing in the taunting silence it radiates by its mere presence.

Tanjiro's eyes have lost all hope, all passion. They're nothing more than empty spheres resting in his sockets.

You vaguely remember -or at least you think you do- a time when every action coming from the rust haired boy was entangled in a blanket of passion, every move had a clear purpose, every word was laced with an unyielding fire that had been beaten into his spirit. But now....well you didn't know what he was now, what Mozen and his sadistic "creations" had turned him into. What had they stolen from him? Was it his soul, his hope, or maybe something far worst.

Your amazement only shatters when you notice just how close he's gotten. His icy cold breath tickling the side of your neck. You squirm, pressing your palms flat against his chest. Tangiro doesn't flinch, his head cocks back to the side, his broken stare, vaguely reminds you of a discarded doll. Maybe that's what he is, not a slayer or a demon, just some broken doll that keeps you locked up in his room so that he can get a sense of being needed.

A wave of empathy crashed over you. Wearily you dropped your arms to your side, in a flash Tangiro wraps his long gauntly arms around you, squashing your bones as he pulled you ever so closer to him, nuzzling his visage in the crock of your neck.

Tanjiro Kamado may have once been a remarkable demon slayer on his way to becoming the next water piller of the demon slayer corps...but now he was nothing more than a pitiful broken demon, seeking the feeling of humanity inside a breaking, mortified girl. 

👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹👹

Zenitsu is a lot bolder, a lot pushier with his affection now that he's been turned into a demon. He wants you to love him the way he loves you, only this time he isn't afraid to break a leg or two, so you'll have no choice but to stay with him. 

His child-like tendencies are still there, albeit demented, yet ever-present. The tantrums and endless crying are as frequent as ever...except now, well now he breaks a bone for every tear YOU make him spill and leaves a scar for every time YOU couldn't satisfy him. Just remember that none of this is poor Zenitsu's fault, oh no, how could it be his fault? He's given you everything you could ever dream of! Even though you're nothing more than a pathetic useless human, Zenitsu still took you as his beloved wife! You should be grateful to him, dedicate your every living second to him, play the role of the loving, caring wife! Not some ungrateful brat, who is always trying to run away!

And yet, you've become oddly accustomed to it. No longer do you mind the screams and beatings. They've grown to be a part of you, a sick and twisted thing that resides within you, infecting your every thought. Much like how Zenitsu's become a heartsick, defective shell of his former self.  

"STOP IT"

something shattered against the wall, breaking into a million flying shards.  The noise echoed through the light less room. Weary, your eyes flashed from the broken remains of what may have been an antique vase, to the crying monster in front of you. The tips of his long curved horns were turning a stark blood red, an indication that his blood was starting to boil. Although you didn't need the mood indicating head tusks to know just how upset the blond crybaby had gotten, they were still a nice little warning to remind you of just how far you could push him. 

"Stop trying to escape!"

Had his voice amplified since your last "screaming contest"?

Did Muzen really think that Zenitsu's voice needed to get any louder, anymore irritating? 

"I wasn't" you deadpanned, your arms crossed in front of your chest. "How can I, did you forget what you did to my leg this morning?" the bones inside your left leg had been deformed, causing your entire leg to point sideways. It was a detestable sight, yet it seemed to fill your rotting heart with a sense akin to a school girl's crush. 

'Zenitsu-chan still loves me! See, see, he went out of his way to touch me!'

'No you idiot, he went out of his way to hurt you.'

Your mind had seemingly been slashed in half since your arrival at the former demon slayer's hideout. One tiny voice acted like a deranged lovesick little girl. Whist the other pertained some form of logic and common sense. This typically led to many interior arguments, all bordering on the exact same premise.

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

HE LOVES ME

HE'S HURTING ME

"Quit your whining!" the voice that escaped your lips, was flat and commanding, for a second it vaguely reminded you of Giyu Tomioka before the memory of your former lover shattered. Zenitsu's crying continued but his angry shouts slowly died down, his golden eyes shifted to stare directly at you. wearily you lifted your hands towards him, like an infant begging to be picked up. 

"I'm hungry Zenitsu! Take me into the kitchen, after all, it's your fault I'm like this!" 

Sure Zenitsu was much more powerful than you, sure he could snap your neck, ending your pitiful life at any moment. But his desperate need for approval -something else that had transcended from his human life to his current one- gave you the upper hand in this muddle of a relationship. 

As a demon Inosuke is more...feral, for lack of a better word. He is all so keen on seeing just how far he can push his darlings limits, both mentally or physically. 

He's always hovering around you, trailing his clawed fingers over patches of exposed skin. Smirking all so curly as you shiver and shrink back. His knife-like fangs seen to be permanently impaling your neck. Draining you of your life force. He's just so damn heartless!

 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️

Although he may be a ruthless monster, a creature of the night that fed on the innocent, there was no denying that Inosuke was resourceful, resourceful, and strong. He knew just where to hide you, so you would neither be found nor have a chance to escape. There was also the way he routinely cracked your fibula and tibia as a “preprecaution”. 

Your arm wasn't meant to bend that way, neither was your leg when you thought about it. Yet despite the odd angle there had yet to be any cracking or popping to indicate the limp had been, once again, broken. The only real evidence to suggest that the limps were in fact being abused was the white scorching pain coursing through them. A feeling that you had almost grown entirely familiar with.

Inosuke's green eyes shifted lazily between your scrunched up face and the twisting limps. One of his "normal" arms was occupied mangling your left arm, the other two appendages that sprouted from his back were pulling your leg upwards at the knee joint.  Inosuke's head leaned over his remaining arm, he looked bored, like your pain was so mundane that it couldn't even grant him a mere chuckle. 

"I like it better when you scream" his voice was laced with a demanding malice, something bitter and rotting. "It's boring when you try to act all strong and mighty". 

You weren't acting, acting required skills, and an audience who wanted to believe in the performer. No, your lack of response wasn't a show of strength or iron will, it was merely because your vocal cords had been shrieked raw, preventing them from making a single peep. 

Your tear-filled eyes shot up to stare into his depraved orbs. Had there ever been a time when his eyes didn't strike fear into those who peered into them? You highly doubted it, heck the idea of Inosuke ever being anything less than terrifying was a laughable thought. 

An eerie familiar noise filled the room, the cracking noise happened in three instances, like three swipes of a blade. First, it was your talus followed by your patella, and then to finish the spin chilling symphony was the crescendo of your breaking humerus for the hundredth time. 

Tears began to flow rapidly from your eyes, staining your thin layer of clothes. You could feel Inosuke's presence shifting about, leaning ever so closer to nuzzle into the side of your neck. His teeth grazing the already punctured skin. 

Inosuke use to be a demon slayer right? A passionate young man who wanted nothing more than to destroy the very same monsters that he himself became? What a laughable story, a fictional tale if ever you'd heard one!

This man was and would always be nothing more than a cruel demon!

[travllingbunny]

The 100: 7x10 A Little Sacrifice

After The Flock - the show’s weakest episode in a long time - and an unfortunate hiatus after that episode, A Little Sacrifice helped get season 7 back on track. It’s one of the best episodes of the season: it was exciting, things finally happened - a lot, we got a big revelation about what the endgame is likely to be all about, there were fights, an attempted mass murder/genocide (what would a season of The 100 be without those?), some really good character work, and the first major death of the season. 

Yes, Charmaine Diyoza was not a main character. but after being introduced as a villain in season 5, she has grown into one of the most memorable and interesting characters on the show - in large part due to Ivana Miličević’s charismatic performance - with a complex and morally ambiguous characterization and backstory (which I really hope to maybe learn more about one day in the prequel flashbacks? Please?). She has been one of my favorite characters since season 5, and I loved her development and her relationship with Octavia, her mother/daughter relationship between her and Hope, her past fights to protect “expendable” prisoners and her S7 attempts to find peace and renounce violence, and hope (!) that at least her daughter will get to have a different and better life where she wouldn’t need to resort to it.  She became a (not so little) sacrifice for the better future we saw her dreaming of in season 5 in that conversation with Kane - maybe that dream is something we will see the new generations live in the series finale?

The one thing I wasn’t too happy about (I was OK with the lack of Bellamy cliffhanger since we got him in the promo for 7x11 right afterwards) was that Clarke did not have any more screentime than in the other recent episodes. But, especially on rewatch, she had some great subtle little moments.

You know what is not subtle? Sheidheda. He’s finding new ways to be completely OTT. This time he can finally stop pretending to be Russell, so he gets a makeover, more in tune with the...interesting Grounder fashion styles, chews the scenery even more, and then - thanks to Madi - he loses an eye (just as he did during his original lifetime), getting closer to his season 6 Emperor-like look, though he’s missing a cloak this time. He also doesn’t have enough facial hair to twirl his moustache, but he actually hisses at one point. This part of the episode was, this time, really fun and intense, including a really good fight scene and some really emotional and important moments for Indra, Madi and Murphy, but doesn’t need much analysis and doesn’t require attention on rewatch.

I’m still not sure how/if these two storylines will connect. But I can see a thematic connection of sorts: Sheidheda is the embodiment of the worst parts of the Grounder culture, with the worship of violence and power and killing all those who oppose you; and not just that - he’s all egotism taken to the extreme, the kind of “wild beast” as Anders would despise, but in this case, he would actually have good reasons to. On the other hand, we have the Disciples with their sterile white rooms, order and the propaganda of the abnegation of self in the favor of the collective, and dreaming of “transcendence” instead of trying to get back to the “old ways”. But they really come off as two sides of the same coin: both ideologies are about worship of and subjugation to a leader, both believe violence is the solution, and both are against love and see it as a danger.

Brand new opening titles - these opens start with a shot of Sanctum and end with the Bardo Stone Room with the Anomaly Stone - and guess what makes a cameo near the end of the credits? That’s right, Earth. I was starting to think that any return to Earth won’t happen, but now I’m not so sure.

Sanctum

The episode opens with the immediate aftermath of Shady’s massacre of the Faithful. We see Madi’s friend Rex (that’s his name according to the credits) - the Sanctum boy who offered Madi’s other friend, the null boy, to play soccer - mourning someone, probably his mother. This scene had to be there so we’d feel some sympathy and sadness over the deaths of the Faithful rather than just be relieved they’re (mostly) gone. One of the wounded ones is Jeremiah, the same guy who developed deep gratitude for Murphy for saving his son. Although the Faithful have been very annoying, I do feel a tinge of sympathy for this guy, who’s so clueless that he never understood he had any agency in what happened to his son and seemed really convinced it was all about the will of the “gods”. He now asks Murphy to take care of his son when he dies, but Murphy insists he will not let Jeremiah die. (Trey, the annoying a-hole who was brainwashing Jordan, and used to act as the leader of the Faithful, is credited in the episode but I didn’t see him anywhere - so I have no idea if he’s among the dead, or he survived and was in a deleted scene.)  

Madi has a really nice mini arc in this episode. She already had PTSD from her experience and possession by Sheidheda in season 6, so she is absolutely terrified when she learns he is back, and when he threatens her in a really creepy way. Excellent acting by Lola. Later, after being comforted by Murphy and joining the survivors,she shows strength in comforting Rex for his loss; and in the end, overcomes her fears and risks her life to save Indra.

Not that it matters, but Sheidheda’s real name is Malachi. (I’m still gonna keep calling him Shady.) We learn that when he recites the lineage - the names and clans of all the previous Commanders, which we know from S3 is a Grounder custom for a new Commander to do. Of course, we only get to hear some of the names in the middle (a couple of random Commanders called Maffei kom Boudalankru - the Rock Line and Kemji kom Trishanakru) and the end, when he mentions Lexa and Madi. The show wasn’t going to spoil the prequel by revealing the names of early Commanders,

The fight itself was really intense and maybe the best Grounder-style duel in the show (yes, I prefer it to the 3x04 one, which involved too much showmanship to look as a real death match). Shady is obviously going to be there for a while and things aren’t going to get so easily resolved, so he wins and is about to kill Indra - who refuses to kneel to save her own life - but just as he’s about to kill her, Madi finds the courage to come as the Big Damn Hero at the crucial moment, pluck out Shady’s eye and save Indra’s life. But then as he is about to kill Madi, Indra decides to (metaphorically, since she’s lying and about to pass out) kneel in order to save Madi’s life. Indra’s arc with Shady has come full circle: this may finally make her understand her mother’s choice and realize she was unfair to her. She grew up blaming her mother for agreeing to kneel to Sheidheda and considering her “weak”. The battle had been lost, her father was already dead, and her mother made the best possible decision and wasn’t just saving herself but her daughter, too. Otherwise, as we see in this episode, Shady would have ordered the daughter to be killed, too, after the mother - as he thinks children of the people he killed should also be eliminated so they couldn’t pose a threat and seek revenge.

That last order even shocked Knight, who may be having some second thoughts about the awesomeness of “Sangedakru’s greatest champion” (but this doesn’t mean he won’t keep obeying him). Penn and the other Trikru guy we know, who are loyal to Indra, reluctantly knelt when Indra asked them to.  

Madi, Rex and the other Faithful (including Jeremiah, who has indeed survived) have gone into hiding with Murphy and Emori - and hiding at the abandoned reactor. We didn’t see Jackson, but i’m sure he’s there. (Sachin is a guest star and must skip some episodes he’s not really needed in.) So now we’re finally reached the part of this storyline where Shady is in power and our heroes are the resistance. And Murphy is now, with Emori, a part of a power couple protecting these people and taking care of them (who would’ve expected that back in season 1?) - much like we’ve seen Clarke and Bellamy do over the seasons - even though most of the same people resented them for being fake Primes just a few hours earlier. Maybe they’re finally starting to get a clue and feel respect and gratitude to people who are trying to save them just because it’s a decent humane thing to do, rather than for being self-proclaimed “gods” who participated in their murder, oppression and exploitation.

Bardo

After 4 episodes, Clarke, Raven and Miller finally left the Stone Room! Yay! Jordan and Niylah stayed in it, and as it turns out, Jordan has a much more important and interesting role to play by reading the Anomaly Stone, while Niylah’s role in S7 has been to be exposition machine for Grounder history and have bad one-liners while Miller has the good ones. I’m glad there was no prolonged “OMG are they really brainwashed and on their side?” misunderstanding, as Clarke and the rest of the group, after learning about MCap from Gabriel, quickly realized that Octavia, Echo and Diyoza are only pretending, since they haven’t blown the secret that Clarke doesn’t have the Flame.

Speaking of one-liners, Miller’s “Get the flock out of here” really made me laugh out loud.

Callie is known as the Pramfleimkepa - the First Flamekeeper - which should mean she was never a Commander (I imagine that would supersede the position of the Flamekeeper or at least be as worthy of mention). I was afraid for a moment that Niylah had given the game away when she told Cadogan that - but fortunately, he didn’t understand what it meant, as he never knew that Becca called ALIE 2.0 “the Flame”.

Gabriel and Cadogan have a long conversation over dinner (or breakfast or lunch of whatever) about Earth before the bombs and Cadogan’s beliefs. The two of them are one of the few remaining humans who knew life before the apocalypse. (After Diyoza’s death in this episode, the only other people left from that time are the Eligius prisoners in Sanctum.) But while Cadogan is chronologically ‘older’ than Gabriel, as he was a Millennial, while Gabriel was born a couple of decades later, and because Cadogan has technically been alive for thousands of years on Bardo - Cadogan spent most of that time in cryo (same as Diyoza and the other prisoners). Gabriel is the real Old Man - at least 260 years old, having lived and experienced all those years. We learn a bit more about Gabriel’s background - that his family were from Colombia and his grandmother was poor, making him a “self-made man” - another contrast between him and the love of his life Josephine (which makes their season 6 parallel to Clarke/Bellamy even more perfect). Gabriel is the go-to-guy this season for having conversations about the worship of false gods and trying to challenge the Disciples’ beliefs. Cadogan, again, denies that he’s a cult leader (sure), reveals he doesn’t believe in God, and claims he doesn’t consider himself one (he sure doesn’t mind being treated like one, though). Instead, he claims his purpose is for everyone to “transcend” and become like gods - though he doesn’t really explain what that would consist of, and he also doesn’t offer any explanations as to why there is supposed to be a “Last War” and who the enemy in that was is supposed to be. Seven episodes have gone by with the characters talking to the Disciples, and no one has ever asked that question: who is the enemy? I guess they don’t even know that, they just think that, when they type in the code, they will learn who the enemy is and the war will begin, for... reasons? He also adds some BS about “this life” being unimportant compared to afterlife. (Now, to be clear - I actually do believe in the afterlife in general (though I don’t know in which form), but I really, really hate it when religions make the afterlife the focus and treat the life we actually know and are sure we have as less important, use it as an excuse to teach people to accept any sort of crap in their lives and not ask for more instead of living their lives to the fullest and trying to build something worthwhile in this life.) Gabriel is less than impressed with Cadogan, and challenges him by pointing out that “You can’t fight a war for the soul of the human race with an inhuman army” and that a life without love, individuality or freedom is pretty worthless, but Cadogan has the afterlife as a ready excuse, even though that doesn’t really answer the question.

The most important revelation that we finally get in this episode is that Cadogan has most likely mistranslated and completely misunderstood the ancient Bardoan text that he’s based his entire belief system on. And his mistake was in large part due to confirmation bias - he saw what he wanted to see, even though the idea of ending wars and violence by starting and fighting a war is absurd. (Niylah, for once, has a good line, when she points out that every major war is supposed to be the “last” but it never is.) Jordan’s interpretation - that it is really about a test that the species needs to pass - makes a lot more sense. Not a literal test - I really can’t imagine the show introducing some kind of godlike “higher beings” - but, I think, something that will require the characters to use all their strength and moral sense and all the experience they’ve had and wisdom they may have gained, to find the best solution to save the human race and rebuild the civilization, hopefully into something better (and it’s really not too hard being better than the mess of tribalism and constant wars and conflicts we’ve seen on the show). I don’t know what this will be, but the words “the orb becomes like a star” make me thing of a natural phenomenon. 

It’s also cool that it was knowledge of the Korean language that helped Jordan decipher the text - proving how helpful it is to be familiar with multiple languages and cultures and how much it expands one’s way of thinking. Do Disciples speak any languages other than English? They seem to foster cultural uniformity, so probably not. (it’s also confirmed now that Monty was half-Korean on his father’s side - Chris Larkin is Korean, but the actress who played his mother, Donna Yamamoto, is Japanese, so I assume Monty is half-Japanese.)

If you doubted that 7x09 flashbacks were a waste of screentime, we get a confirmation early on that Echo has just been pretending to be loyal to the Disciples, while plotting revenge all the time, when she kills a Disciple and saves Hope from being sent to Skyring. This plot could have continued straight from 7x07, when Echo’s Azgeda ritual was strongly hinting that she’s out for revenge. (And yes, the writing in 7x09 was just  that clunky as I feared - of course that Chekhov’s WMD that Levitt mentioned for no reason would be used in the very next episode for someone to try to kill all the Disciples in another Mount Weather parallel.)

A tiny bit of info about the Disciples - a Disciple addressed Hope as “Seeker Diyoza”. I don’t know if that’s a title for those trying to reach Level 1 or something else.

Hope, with her usual anger and impulsiveness, reminiscent of how Octavia used to be once, and her naive black and white views, is all for revenge-genocide, too, in spite of Octavia’s and Diyoza’s disagreement. Her mother tries to, again, teach her the lesson she tried to in 7x07, that she should turn to love instead of violence and killing (which carries a lot more weight when it comes from someone like Charmaine Diyoza rather than a hippy): “I know what it's like to kill innocent people for a cause, and I promise you, it's not gonna fill that hole in your heart. Only we can do that.” But Hope retorts that “There are no innocent people here”, echoing Nikki’s words to Nelson that “There are no innocent people at the end of the world”. It’s not that Hope doesn’t have a point that everyone in Bardo is a part of the society that’s been kidnapping and torturing her family and that stole her childhood, but collective responsibility is a concept that only works in terms of moral responsibility, not as an excuse to commit genocide because you’ve decided that everyone in the other group is evil and the “enemy” and deserves death. Some people have compared it to Maya saying “None of us is innocent”, but I don’t think this comparison works, because that line changes the meaning entirely depending on whether you are holding yourself and your society morally accountable for its failings and complicity in crimes against humanity, or if you’re using it against others, in order to justify hate and commit crimes against humanity.

Even though neither Clarke nor Octavia had huge screentime in this episode and may not have done anything big (like Diyoza sacrificing herself and saving everyone, or Jordan figuring everything out), they had some wonderful, subtle little moments that spoke volumes:

I loved the hug between Clarke and Octavia - where Clarke said her condolences to Octavia and then Octavia said them back, letting Clarke know she knew what Bellamy meant to her and that she is grieving just as much. (”I’m sorry, Octavia” - “So am I”)

Raven and Miller exchanged a wordless look - probably because of how awkward it was for Miller to see Octavia again. Although these 4 people all go back to season 1 (and it was the first time in a while they were in the same room), for Miller it’s been just a few weeks since she was Blodreina and he was her follower, and the last time they saw each other (in season 6), he yelled at her that he’s not following her orders anymore - which was about him struggling with his guilt and seeing her as an embodiment of it. But for Octavia, it’s been over 10 years and a huge character development, which Miller doesn’t know about. But they had no time to go over it - instead, she just hugged him and asked him to hug her back, and he did.

When the group went to find Levitt - still tied up and bloody after Echo had tortured him and killed two Disciples in front of him to force him to tell her about Gem9, the WMD that can destroy everyone on Bardo (he must be really traumatized one - Clarke obviously immediately realized what was going on when she saw Octavia come to check on Levitt, going by the look on her face, and her look when she turned to go and the others went after her, while Octavia was still there -as if saying "I realize you need a moment with this guy, but don't wait too long". Although Levitt looked disappointed and shocked that Octavia didn’t untie him, she was really doing what was the most reasonable way to try to protect everyone - the priority was to stop Echo from killing all the Disciples, which would include Levitt, but also to stop Levitt from alerting Anders, which he would’ve done, because Octavia also wanted to save Echo and her people. It doesn’t mean she doesn’t  care for Levitt, but she’s not the 17 year old girl who’d go: “I just met you but you’re immediately the most important person to me and I’m going to prioritize you over everyone I know”.

 And then we get to the final and most dramatic scene of the episode...  Echo’s attempt to commit genocide out of revenge, while Octavia, Clarke and Raven tried to talk her down.

Octavia tried to reach Echo by, again, talking about their shared grief over Bellamy, as she did in 7x07, but again, it did not work - because Octavia and Echo, and Clarke and Echo, are different people, who grieve in different ways and think and act in different ways. It doesn’t mean that any of them are grieving more or less than another one - but their responses are very different. Octavia - this mature Octavia who is more able to empathize with others and doesn’t react with impulsive violence as she used to -  responded by trying to reach out to others who were also grieving for Bellamy, Echo and Clarke, and validating their grief, too. Clarke reacted - after the initial shock and grief - by sucking it up, as she does, in order to take care of the others, and focusing on saving the people Bellamy loved, telling Raven “We do this for him” and focusing on saving Octavia and Echo. Echo, on the other hand, reacted destructively and violently and by killing people for revenge and then plotting genocide as revenge for 3 months. This is the only way she knows how to process grief - she’s never known a different way, as I’m sure Azgeda weren’t known for compassion and sharing feelings. When Bellamy was grieving Clarke in season 6, she asked him “When do we attack?”, because that’s what she expected him to do, too. She’s also lost because she hasn’t lost just a boyfriend, but a leader and anchor in her new post-Praimfaya life, and because she had made saving Bellamy her mission she was waiting to fulfill during the 5 years on Skyring. If she had carried out her plan, I’m not sure she’d know what to do with herself. (I don’t know what it says about the mindset of us, humans of 2020, that so many fans have decided that Echo’s way of grieving is the superior one and the one that shows that she loves Bellamy the best. It certainly doesn’t show anything good.)

Octavia’s next argument - that there are many good people on Bardo she’d be killing - was even less successful, as Echo threw her relationship with Levitt back in her face, pointing out that he stole her memories, talking of him as one of their enemies, and then even saying: "Way to honor your brother's memory!" Echo came off as very judgmental here, and more than bit hypocritical - after all , she personally almost killed Octavia twice, and Bellamy started trusting her and dating her on the Ring, after she had given them both far less reason to trust her than Levitt did. Levitt actually took a risk and was helping her against Anders just out of his feelings for Octavia, while Echo only helped Bellamy and others after she was exiled and had to in order to survive. She seems to value forgiveness only when it’s others forgiving her (”Who knows more about forgiveness than us?”), even though she never expected them to and was a bit shocked that they did.

Clarke then tried to use her standard “This is not who you are” plea, but it didn’t work with Echo, since Clarke doesn’t really know Echo, and the words felt empty. There really is very little reason for Clarke to think this is not who Echo is, except for her tendency to assume Echo must have changed for the better because she’s Bellamy’s girlfriend and Bellamy loves her (see their conversation in 5x12). Clarke also tried to use her own experience - as she did with Raven earlier in the season - telling Echo that “a choice like this” would haunt her forever (of course Clarke would bring up MW, it always goes back to MW for her), but Echo rejected that comparison and, for a moment, channeled me by pointing out that Clarke’s motivations were to save her people, while Echo’s are purely revenge. Which was, however, a strange argument in context - pointing out that Clarke’s reasons were much better and she had no choice but to kill all of the Mountain Men or let them kill all of her friends and family, while Echo wasn’t achieving anything good and could just save all her people and not take revenge on the Disciples. But Echo seemed to be telling Clarke that they different, and she cannot assume that Echo will feel the same way about mass murder Clarke does.

Then Clarke finally brought up Bellamy, pointing out that he would not want a genocide to be committed in his memory. I don’t know how anyone who’s watched the show for 6 seasons could disagree with Clarke. But Echo did. What’s more, she yelled  "You have no idea what Bellamy wanted!" in a really angry, resentful way. It felt personal. I don’t know if Echo has felt romantic jealousy of Clarke over Bellamy - she has sure kept it close to her chest - but it certainly felt like some kind of possessiveness, like resenting the idea that Clarke was as close or closer to Bellamy and knew him better. In any case, this was a moment of extreme dramatic irony - because we know (and really, Echo should know as well)  that Echo is the one who doesn’t seem to know, or is simply ignoring, what Bellamy would have wanted and who he was. And she should know. She was there when he talked down Riley from killing Roan, telling him “War made me a murderer, don’t let it do it to you too”, she was there when Bellamy refused to kill 283 prisoners in cryo sleep and said “Clarke didn’t die for us to go back and make the same mistakes”. And she was there when Bellamy was grieving Clarke but decided not to take revenge for her death - not even by killing the man who murdered her, Russell - but to try to honor her memory by doing what she would want and surviving and keeping their people alive. Which directly contradicts Echo’s statement that Bellamy would be doing the same she is if one of them (Clarke, Octavia or her) were killed. Does she really not know him? Most of the time they spent together were in a time of peace and boredom with just 7 people on the Ring. She seems to be projecting her own ideas and views and character into him. 

Then Raven went on to agree with Clarke (but Echo did not resent her for saying it), pointing out how Bellamy has grown and changed and that the post-season 3 Bellamy certainly would never do that. I was slightly annoyed when she said that Bellamy of season 3 may do that - but to be fair, she did say, “maybe”. Now, season 1 or season 3 Bellamy was certainly angrier and more prone to black and white thinking when it came to enemies, and he may very well have agreed to kill all of the adult Disciples if he thought they were likely to be a threat to his people (which is what he did when he agreed to help Pike kill Lexa’s army), but he sure wouldn’t agree to kill any of them just for revenge, or to kill children and non-combatants (the one time he did it was MW, when he and Clarke knew there was no other way to protect their people from being horrifically killed, and he hated it and was haunted by it then). Nevertheless, that’s a minor thing as the point of Raven’s speech was the way Bellamy has grown and developed. Echo hasn’t really changed, certainly not as much as Bellamy wanted to think in S5. Is there still time for her to change?

In the end, love did save the day - but it wasn’t Echo’s love for Bellamy, it was her non-romantic love for Raven and Raven’s for her. Raven calling her a sister only helped pave the way - but she had to actually threaten to stay there and force Echo to choose between killing Raven and giving up her revenge, for Echo to finally stand down. The fact she did shows that maybe there’s still hope for her to change and give up revenge and violence for things like friendship.

 But then Anders had to appear and ruin everything, He could have just tried to arrest the group, rather than threatening them and giving them speeches about how he despises them for being “beasts raised in the wild”. (I’ve wondered many times since 7x05 is Anders is supposed to be smart or a complete dumbass. He was definitely a dumbass.)

Diyoza took charge, as the most experienced and tactical one, and almost.  And then Hope was again being her impulsive, angry, out of control self - Anders is always the person most likely to set her off - killing Anders (which I wouldn’t mind) but then also making her own attempt to commit genocide. (It’s funny that the four Disciples just froze and did nothing while all of that was happening.)

What happened then was both a heroic sacrifice and one of the best and most heroic death scenes on the show, a fitting ending for Charmaine Diyoza (even a visually beautiful death in a creepy way, as Diyoza turned into a crystal statue), with her final message to her daughter to be “better” than her in the future - and a heartbreaking loss for Hope, who has just been punished by the narrative/fate for her devotion to violence and hate and attempt at genocide, by causing her own mother’s death. She was obsessed with revenge for her lost childhood and the fact her mother was taken from her - instead of focusing on the future and what she still had. I’m sure that Hope will survive to the end of the series, and will have to question herself and change. She still has Aunty O to help her and be her family.

As we’re approaching the endgame, the show here made an obvious point about violence, hatred and revenge and having to give up those things - not for Anders’ unemotional duty to the collective, but for love and compassion/

Rating: 8.5/10

[beingpassionateabout]

Elsa in white and Anna in black--> opposite attract. That is it. That is the whole post.

I’m sure you did not ask for this but it made me think so bear with me for a sec. lol

I think we elsanna fans like to play with the idea that Anna and Elsa are color-coded as a romantic pairing and that’s fun and true but now with Frozen 2 we see that they’ve being given new colors and so their coding changed as well. There are even some people pointing out how they’re playing out a more “yin & yang” vibe. But what does it mean?

In order to comprehend their changes I took to Tvtropes to help me better characterize each of their phases. 

1. “Red Index/Blue Index”

In Frozen 1 and most of Frozen 2 Elsa and Anna are color coded as the Blue/Red (purple-ish) dynamic duo we see in this image. According to TvTropes, this means: 

“There’s just something about red and blue, the way these two colors complement each other but also seem to oppose each other. Since they contrast so well, they seem to be paired together in some form more than any other two non-gray scale colors: hot and cold, red team and blue team, red ribbon (2nd place) and blue ribbon (1st place). And this leads to their inevitable contrast in symbolism […]”

Also, in the Red Oni/Blue Oni section: 

“This trope is about two individuals (or occasionally, factions or civilizations) that are significantly linked together somehow (such as through a rivalry, friendship, being siblings, co-workers, competitors, etc.) that have differing personalities and, with it, often different approaches to the world in general, especially whatever they might be competing in/for/over.”

In both F1 and F2 they are represented in these colors. The “hot vs. cold” metaphor is even used in Olaf’s song “In Summer”, to indicate how they are opposites and yet complementary forces, and how he views both of them due to being a result of their creation. Also both the red ribbon (2nd) place and blue ribbon (1st) place play a part in there, indicating their places in life and the line of ascension to the throne (more on it later). 

All in all, this color-coding indicated their conflicting (in the beginning of F1) and complementary (F2) colors and approaches to life, with Elsa being more reserved and introverted and Anna being more assertive and adventurous. We saw how in F1 this color-coding meant that their arcs’s main goal was to overcome their differences and reunite in the end, as long lost siblings who just found love and comfort in each other’s presence after years of separation. That’s good and it fits the sibling narrative (canon) and the fanon shipping of them (elsanna) we saw after F1. 

Btw, this is my favorite spin of this trope: “Fire/Ice Duo: Since Fire Is Red and ice is generally light blue”

Bc I’d have loved if they gave Anna fire powers in F2 and made it even more of a romantic coded-pairing. So easy to ship.  

Back to the analysis tho, I was thinking to myself that my favorite aspect of F2 is how much elsanna we saw in it, totally wearing my shipper’s goggles, of course. 

But it’s important to point out why we see so much of them: because The Creators words were right and Elsa and Anna’s relationship is the main focus of the narrative, playing an important role in explaining later developments (like the “bridge”, as they told us later).

I am still of the opinion that this was a weak script and they could have done many things differently, not to mention better. However, now that I think of the main reason why i liked Elsa and Anna’s story together I see that it’s bc the creators had the right idea in mind: developing their relationship into something that would support both of their character changes later, while still keeping them together and strengthening their bond.

I’m not saying they did it well, i’m just saying that now that i see it, it sounds like a good idea (and even better shipping material, if you ask me) and that they really took them from one point to the other. 

Let me explain. They were coded before as Red and Blue, but after the changes in F2 they are now color-coded as:

2.  Light/Darkness juxtaposition. 

sauce

This new color-coding can mean many things for characters, mostly pointing out at the broody type/sunny type of relationship I don’t think they actually embody anymore (even so, Elsa would be seen as the broody type but she’s in light colors now so.. doesn’t fit). That makes us turn to the more mythical implications of this trope, as seen bellow:

“Darkness is the absence of light, and light cannot exist without darkness. The dichotomy between the two has been part of human storytelling for a very long time—many Creation Myths often involve light emerging from darkness, and many destruction myths involve darkness engulfing light.”

In F2 they did play with death and ressurection, with lightness (acceptance) and darkness (despair) and with mythical vs fairytale themes, but what did they settle upon for Elsa and Anna’s relationship? A narrative of epic and mythical love.

Yes.

“It can also be used in conjunction with other contrast tropes; for example, Life/Death Juxtaposition will generally have life associated with light and death with darkness. Solar and Lunar usually pairs the sun with light and the moon with darkness (due to its association with night). Chinese philosophy associates this with Fire/Water Juxtaposition, where the yin is associated with darkness and water, and the yang with fire and light. Light and dark can easily be treated as opposing cosmic forces.”

Wow. 

Their love for each other transcended death not once but twice.

Now that Elsa achieved goddess-like status and Anna ascended the throne (no longer representing 1st/blue and 2nd/red place, but standing as equals), it means that their character dynamic are now placed on a higher level than before too. But what could beat the True Love narrative of the first movie? A mythical tale of balancing cosmic forces, of course! 

Not only it means they’re each other’s true love, but it also means that they can’t exist without the other now at the risk of destroying the world’s balance. 

This fits nicely with the idea of The Bridge (a terrible excuse for separation but a beautiful metaphor for their love story) and how they connect the nations.. but most importantly this fits nicely with how they connect both human and spiritual realms now.

Whoa.

Now I see why Anna tells Elsa this line “our love is worthy of the great myths” by the end of Forest of Shadows. Because it is. Their love is worthy of the greatest tale of all. 

Here’s to hoping i made sense.

[kiarcheo]

Hug-a, hug-a, hug-a, hug me    

If you had told Catalina that she would come back centuries in the future and live with Henry’s five other wives and that she’d be closest with the fifth one…she would have…well, she  would have had you declared insane after the first part, to be honest. And even in the earliest days in the new world, she would have never believed you regarding who would be her favourite companion.

Also posted on Ao3

Catalina knew how she was seen. The first queen. The legitimate one. Regal. Composed. Always in control, keeping a cool head.  Steadfast. Proud. The paragon of royalty.

She is also human. And a Spaniard. And while she usually isn’t one to give into stereotypes (heavens knows she hates being boxed in any way when she is so much more complex than any oversimplified and general belief can convey), there was something she had noticed in her first life too. Arthur had been polite and courteous, but certainly not affectionate.  But considering that they were fifteen-year-old, unable to communicate properly because of language barriers and after few months they both got sick and then he died…circumstances and timings didn’t help. Once she married Henry, she thought it would be different. But since the beginning, while he was eager to be intimate with her, outside of the bedchambers he would shy away. If she tried to sit next to him or take his hand for no specific reason, he would look at her weirdly (and downright annoyed, later on). Even her English ladies-in-waiting, while no strangers to sharing a bed, would look oddly at her interactions with her darling Maria, or even with little Mary, attributing them to her ‘Mediterranean temperament’.

But now she is back, along with the other five wives of her (second) husband. And while it seems that affections are more widespread and accepted in this modern world, even in public, things didn’t change for her.

Don’t get her wrong. After a difficult period of adjustment, the queens had settled down nicely. Catalina has no doubt that they all care for each other, but people have different ways of showing they care. So yes. Does she think the queens love her? Yes (and she loves them back).  But is she going to knock on their doors and beg for some affection? Absolutely not. She went through one lifetime without humiliating herself like that, she will go through this one too.

That’s how she finds herself in front of the tv, the credits rolling after a documentary about the Alhambra, sobbing not so quietly into the empty house. Or what she thought was empty.

Because Kat is in the doorway, frozen, looking like a deer in the headlight. Catalina can almost see her mentally calculating whether she can just silently turn around and slip away, before realising that she had been noticed. Kat takes a step forward into the room. ‘Would you like a hug?’

Catalina honestly can’t remember the last time she hugged someone. And she had said she was not going to beg, but if it was offered…she gives a shaking nod.

Kat sits down on the couch next to her and after a moment of hesitation draws her into her arms. Catalina doesn’t know how long they stay like that. She just knows it’s so…nice doesn’t even begin to cover it. It’s almost a transcending experience.

‘You give really good hugs.’

‘Thanks?’ Kat sounds unsure at how to reply to that. ‘Why do you sound surprised? Did you expect me to be bad?’

She settles for a teasing tone and Catalina can see Anne’s influence, using humour to deflect and lighten up situations. To be honest she thought it was going to be a quick, perfunctory hug. Out of pity. She didn’t expect Kat to commit to it, to fully embrace her. Kat is warm and relaxed, and in her arms she feels surprisingly safe.

‘I expected a pat on the back.’ She admits. ‘I know you’re not really comfortable with me.’

‘Why do you say that?’

She reluctantly moves away. It feels stupid to answer that it’s because Kat had basically avoided any physical contact with her while lying in her arms.

‘You and Anne often sleep in the same bed and she shares her blanket with you during movies.’ Catalina expands on her reply as she sees Kat looking genuinely confused. ‘You let Jane play hairdresser with your hair. Anna puts her arm on your shoulders when we’re out…I mean, I get it. Anne and Jane are your cousins. You knew Anna from before and she is your best friend. Cathy holds your hand…’

‘Is it a problem?’ Kat asks as Catalina trails off. She had never said anything to them before, but it wouldn’t be the first time that walking hand in hand with Cathy had sparkled some less than pleasant reaction.

Catalina is just having a realisation. Cathy always offers her hand and wait for Kat to take it. It’s always Anne who spreads the blanket over their laps and cuddles up. It’s Jane who asks if she can try something new with her hair (she had recently branched out to Anne, if she can catch her on a good day when she feels like sitting still – that’s how the space buns came to be. Catalina has a feeling that soon Jane will expand her experiments to the three not-related queens too).

‘I thought you just didn’t want to hug me.’ Not that she has ever seen her hugging the others, now that she thinks about it. Not spontaneously. Or unprompted.

If Kat thinks Catalina sounds a bit childish, she doesn’t let it show, to her relief. ‘I didn’t know you wanted me to.’ They have all heard Anne loudly demanding cuddles and Kat happily providing them.

‘But you never take the first step.’ Catalina continues, voicing her realisation. ‘You never initiate the contact, you don’t touch them first.’ And the rare times she does, it’s always after expressly asking. Catalina had never really noticed it before.

‘I just don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable.’

Okay, so it’s actually on purpose. Wait a second- ‘Do we make you uncomfortable?’ She is ready to have a chat with her fellow queens.

‘No, of course not.’ Kat hurries to reassure her, sounding almost surprised that she could suggest such a thing.

‘Then why would you make us uncomfortable?’

Kat shrugs. ‘I don’t know. That’s kind of the point. What if you don’t want to be touched? In that moment at least?’

Oh. That went deeper that she thought. Quite usual with the girl, so she shouldn’t really be surprised anymore.  But selfishly she is too exhausted to tackle the issue in that moment. ‘Well, hugs are always welcome with me. I pretty much always want one to be honest.’

There is no overnight change. It’s not like Kat starts to come up to her and hug her spontaneously. But more and more often she approaches her. Asking if she wants company. Making a point of saying that she will be in her room but that her door is open. When it evolves in wordless exchanges, Kat pointing to the spot next to Catalina or patting the one next to herself in invitation and waiting for Catalina’s move, the older queen is relieved that she doesn’t have to vocalise what sometimes still feels like a weakness. And she starts to feel comfortable looking out for affection from Kat in the first place, even going as far as knocking on her closed door if it’s a particularly bad day. Which leads to talking about said bad days.

If you had told Catalina that she would come back centuries in the future and live with Henry’s five other wives and that she’d be closest with the fifth one…she would have…well, she would have had you declared insane after the first part, to be honest. And even in the earliest days in the new world, she would have never believed you regarding who would be her favourite companion. She would have first guessed Cathy, maybe growing closer through their personal connections and discussing their shared passion for supporting female education in the past (and its progress in the present). Or Anna, bonding over being shipped to another country without speaking the language to marry a random dude – well, a king – and then being humiliated on a national and international stage. Even Jane. She had liked her in their first life and it had been somehow satisfying to learn that she had stolen Henry from Anne like Anne did to her. And she didn’t blame her for having a son: you can’t choose those things, she and Anne would know. Certainly she wouldn’t have picked that slip of a girl, who also happened to be her…well, Anne Boleyn’s cousin – Anne, who was the only other one even more unlikely to be her closest friend.

And yet…here she was.

Catalina de Trastámara y Trastámara, finding respite in the company of Katherine Howard, who never refuses a cuddle and never judges. She had quickly stopped being surprised at how intelligent and mature the girl is. In not even 20 years Kat had gone through more stuff than most people would in their whole lifetime…and that was before she was brought back to life centuries after her traumatic death. So while sometimes Catalina feels almost maternal towards her (how shocked and disgusted she had been to discover that Henry had married someone younger than his own daughter, her dear Mary), it’s rather a relationship between equals…even if sometimes she is a bit protective. Perhaps that’s how older sisters feel? She has no idea as she had been the youngest. Is Kat her best friend? Can someone be your best friend if she already has another best friend? She never pondered on such matters in the past.    

A past that Kat knows the most about. Anne and Jane might have known her personally and been witnesses to certain events, but Kat has insight into her feelings and thoughts.

All queens have bad days connected to their past. In some cases everyone is aware of the dates and the reasons, the days of their deaths being the most obvious ones. Others are kept private. Like the day Catalina saw Mary for the last time. How is she supposed to share her pain with the others, when she is the only one who got to see her child growing up? And that’s not delving into what Mary did after she died, which is a whole other matter.

November hit Catalina particularly hard. The memories of her wedding day to Arthur by a long shot welcomed compared to the anniversaries of the deaths of her last three children.  She hadn’t slept a lot, and even when she did, she had been plagued by nightmares, either of her babies dying, their life on earth lasting mere hours, or of Mary committing atrocities in the name of the religion she had devoted her life to.

She feels like death warmed up and she must look like it, if the reactions she gets entering the kitchen that morning are any indication.

Anne stops talking which leads to Anna turning around to find out why. Jane follows and frowns at what she sees.

‘Are you okay?’ Jane’s question has Cathy looking up too.

By the time Kat finishes pouring her coffee (she’d be hard pressed to say who consumes more, her or Cathy) and turns around, everyone is staring at Catalina with worried expressions. Kat puts down her mug and opens her arms. Not overtly obvious. She can easily pass it as a gesture meant to say ‘what’s going on?’ but even if her arms aren’t raised, the look she gives Catalina conveys a clear message: ‘Do you need a hug?’

Catalina doesn’t hesitate. She rarely does when Kat offers a hug, but in that moment she doesn’t even care that there are other people around. She takes few quick steps and she is in her arms. Kat pivots them around so that Catalina wouldn’t meet the others’ stares if she happened to look up. It’s not necessary because Catalina curled into herself enough that she has her face tucked in Kat’s neck despite being taller…and she has no intention to leave her spot. She feels Kat’s hand into her hair. She remembers Kat asking if that was something she would enjoy and the teasing that ensued because she enjoyed it indeed. Kat had likened the contented noises that she had let out to purrs and joked that she should have been the one with the Cat nickname. Catalina had liked it so much that she had offered a trade-off to Kat, wanting to share the delight. She had learned that while Kat doesn’t mind Jane styling them, she generally doesn’t like people touching them, especially in intimate settings (and as they were half reclined on the couch when Kat admitted such a thing, Catalina tucked into her side…she could see how it could be seen as intimate).

Catalina doesn’t know when she had started crying, she just realises that she is. Just like she isn’t sure how long she has been in Kat’s arms, swaying lightly on the spot. She just knows that she is there. Buried into Kat, who has one hand scratching her head while her other arm is around her waist, holding her securely against her body.

‘Want to move to the couch?’

She doesn’t answer but Kat must have felt the movement of her head because she leads them there.

When Catalina comes around, she can feel Kat under her and a blanket covering them. They must have fallen asleep.

She opens one eye. Anne is sitting on the armchair. She raises her eyebrow once she notices Catalina is awake and looking at her. In the early days of their return she would have read it as an accusatory gesture but by now she knows that it’s mostly curiosity. She can see how the first queen sleeping on the youngest one would make a curious sight. And Anne is not only close to her cousin but also very perceptive, so even if Kat had not told her, she must have realised how shy the girl is with physical touch. And all the times Catalina had seen them sleeping together Kat was always the big spoon, so she reckons Anne is probably aware that Kat doesn’t like to feel trapped. So for her to sleep peacefully despite having Catalina half-lying on her…

She ignores Anne’s questioning gaze and looks around, making sure not to move her head too much lest she wakes Kat up. Anna is sitting at the table, holding her camera up to show the screen to Cathy, who is standing behind her chair.

The German queen had discovered a passion for photography, but since she doesn’t make a habit to bring her trusty camera to breakfast, Catalina assumes that she went to retrieve it to take a picture of them. The fond expression on Cathy’s face, the one that she usually has when she looks at Kat, lends credibility to her theory. She makes a mental note to ask for a copy of the picture.

She can hear puttering around in the kitchen. Maybe it’s near lunch time or maybe Jane just wanted to be nearby. She knows that they are likely worried…and curious. And she supposes that she can give an explanation. Not necessarily about her and Kat, that’s not just up to her. But about her breaking down. Anne, at the very least, has surely her fair share of sad anniversaries.

But if she moves she is going to wake Kat and heaven knows if the girl needs all the sleep that she can get when she can get, with the amount of nightmares keeping her up at night, whether her own or Anne’s (and Cathy’s too. More than once Catalina had been ready to go and check on her goddaughter after hearing unmistakable noises from her room only to see that Kat was already on the task). And she is so comfy and warm. She closes her eyes. Just…for…five…more…minutes…

                                              ------------------------------

A/N: I love reading about the queens taking care of Kat because she deserves all the love, but sometime I want to see the opposite, with Kat taking care of the queens. And lately I have been on a Katherine-Catherine kick (besides the always present Parrward one) so...here it is. Hope you liked it.

[knuffled]

Just Practice - Chapter 4

sorry it took so long to update! there’s an explanation of what was going on at ao3 for those who are interested. i really appreciate everyone who reblogs - i read all your tags so please keep leaving your thoughts it’s what keeps me motivated to keep writing! 

big thank you to @bipercabeth for offering her input on a section in this chapter that was giving me a lot of trouble - i truly appreciate it!

here’s the ao3 link for those who are interested

By the last week of September, all traces of summer were well and truly gone. There was a crispness to the air that Annabeth knew would soon turn into a biting chill, the kind that seeped into your fingers. With the end of September came the start of the new swim season and the very first meet of the season. Annabeth drummed her fingers against the wheel of her father’s old Subaru Forester, glaring at the stop light which had been resolutely red for the past five minutes. The meet was due to start in three minutes, but she was still ten minutes away from where it was being held.

Annabeth cast another baleful glare the traffic light’s way and stole a sip of lukewarm coffee from her thermos just as the light turned green. The Subaru groaned as she hit the accelerator hard and lurched forward so abruptly that her father’s briefcase fell from its spot in the backseat. She arrived seven minutes late and rushed inside, following the sterile scent of chlorine towards the pool, hoping desperately Percy’s heat hadn’t started yet. There was a heat already underway when she finally got to the pool, which made her heart sink before she noticed Sally and Estelle waving to her from the bleachers. Annabeth made her way over to them, half-jogging, and took her seat next to Sally.

“We saved you a spot, Annabeth!” Estelle said brightly.

“Thanks, guppy,” Annabeth said breathlessly. “I’m not too late, right?”

“No, you’re fine, honey. Percy’s heat still won’t be for a while,” Sally said. “It’s good to see you! It’s been far too long.”

“Yeah, I miss you, Annabeth,” Estelle said, pouting.

Annabeth spoke to both of them and said, “Me too! I really wish I could come by more often, but I’ve just been so bogged down with school, track, testing, and college apps that I barely have time to breathe these days.”

Sally patted her thigh and offered her an affectionate smile. “Oh, sweetie, I understand. You kids have to work so hard these days. I hope you’re not pushing yourself too hard. If it ever gets to be too much, you’re always welcome to stop by for some cookies and a chat. I’m always here for you,” she said.

A rush of affection washed over Annabeth for the woman in front of her and her eyes grew watery. “Thank you, Sally. I’ll definitely take you up on that sometime,” Annabeth promised.

“And next time you come over, we can play some of the new games I got!” Estelle said brightly.

Annabeth reached over to squeeze Estelle’s small hand. “I’m looking forward to it. How’s second grade treating you, Guppy?” she asked.

Estelle’s smile dropped as she said, “It’s okay. There’s a lot more homework now. My teacher is nice though.”

“I know you can do it. If you ever need any help with school, let me know, okay?” Annabeth said.

When Estelle nodded and offered her a small smile, Annabeth gave her hand a gentle squeeze one last time before turning to Sally and asking, “How’s Paul?”

“Oh, he’s good. Has his hands full now that the school year is in full swing, but he’s happy. Tired, but happy,” Sally said. “I’m just a bit worried because I have a book tour coming up in October, and I’m not sure he will be able to handle everything on his own.

“You have a new book coming out?” Annabeth asked.

Sally nodded and said, “Yup! I finished it over the summer and sent it to the publisher in August.”

“That’s wonderful, Sally. I’m so happy for you!” Annabeth said.

“Thank you, honey,” Sally said, smiling warmly. “It was a long road to get it finished, but I’m very proud of how it turned out, so I can’t wait to see what the readers have to say once they get their hands on it.”

“Oh, Percy’s up next!” Estelle interjected.

Annabeth turned her attention back to the pool and found Percy in the lane closest to the bleachers, stretching his arm across his chest. As always, Annabeth was struck by the stark contrast between Percy in everyday life and Percy when he was competing. There wasn’t a trace of that soft kindness in his demeanor that Annabeth was so accustomed to seeing. It was instead replaced by a hard set jaw and an intense, cold look in his eyes.

Once the previous heat finished, Percy stepped to the pool’s edge and took his starting position along with the other competitors, waiting with bated breath for the race to begin.

The instant the official blew his whistle, they all leapt into the water in unison. Percy took the lead immediately, cutting through the water with an ease that the other competitors lacked. His movements were economical and effortless, almost elegant, a product of years of rigorous training and his inherent aptitude for the sport.

It always took Annabeth’s breath away. In the water, Percy was a different person. Day to day, Percy was warm and gentle, but it always felt like he was holding something back, something dark, something powerful — Annabeth couldn’t say what it was, but she’d seen it in his eyes ever since they were children — but in the water, all of that come rushing out with the force of a flood breaking through a levy, turning him into a truly fearsome competitor.

As an athlete herself, Annabeth knew there were a chosen few in their respective disciplines, those who transcended their peers by an almost divine right, and the feelings of dread and helplessness when competing against them. Even if they were your enemies, their sheer skill demanded acknowledgement, leaving no room for petty human contrivances like pride or stubbornness.

Percy’s swimming elicited that sort of visceral response, and as such the outcome of the race was a foregone conclusion. He stepped out of the pool before the other competitors even finished the race. Time resumed flowing then and the crowd erupted in a flurry of applause.

Percy’s coach clapped his back, a manic grin on his face, and gestured violently to the board on the other side of the pool where Percy’s time was posted. Annabeth knew that meant that Percy had probably beaten his previous personal best, judging by the coach’s response and the dazed look on Percy’s face, and her heart pounded, filled with pride and vicarious satisfaction on Percy’s behalf. Few things were as gratifying as hitting a new personal best. It was one thing to beat your competition, but it was so much sweeter to beat yourself and surpass your own limits.

The remaining heats seemed muted in comparison, and once they ended, Annabeth joined Sally and Estelle as they rushed down to meet him. He was crowded by exuberant teammates who were clapping his back and ruffling his hair. The sight made Annabeth smile, but it fell when her eyes followed the crescent-shaped scar that ran down his right shoulder blade. Annabeth noticed the sad, distant look in Sally’s eyes and knew she was looking at the same thing, a remnant of her ex-husband, but she didn’t dwell on it long because she looked genuinely happy when Percy turned towards them, a dazed smile on his face.

“Oh, honey, congratulations! I’m so proud of you,” Sally said, wrapping Percy in her arms. “You did so good.”

Percy stepped back and smiled softly. “Thanks, mom.”  

Estelle jumped onto his back with a squeal, making Percy laugh. “What’d you think, Guppy? Was I any good?” he asked.  

“You looked so cool! Like a shark!” Estelle said.

“Like a shark, huh?” Percy chuckled. “That does sound cool.”

“What are you going to do now? We were thinking of heading home,” Sally said.

“Yeah, that’s fine. I was thinking of hanging out with Annabeth,” Percy said before turning to Annabeth. “Unless you have other plans.”

Annabeth shook her head and said, “Nope, I’m all yours.”

There was a near imperceptible fondness in the look on his face that vanished once he helped Estelle down. He waved goodbye and watched her and Sally leave before he turned to Annabeth and ruffled his still wet hair.

“I’m not hugging you. You’re all wet, so don’t get any ideas,” Annabeth warned.

“Always so mean, Chase,” Percy said, trying not to laugh.

“Someone’s got to keep your ego in check, after all.”

Percy raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest. “Oh and I suppose you’re the one to do it?”

“I thought that was a given,” Annabeth teased. “Congratulations, though. Did you PB?”

“Yeah, somehow,” Percy said, still shocked. “Guess today was my lucky day.”

“Luck had nothing to do with it. That was all you,” Annabeth said.

“What happened to checking my ego?”

“I’ll make an exception this one time, considering you PB’d and all,” Annabeth said, grinning.

Percy rolled his eyes but smiled nonetheless. “How charitable.”

“Yeah, yeah, go take a shower and meet me in the parking lot once you’re done,” Annabeth said, laughing as she pushed him towards his teammates.

Percy shook his head and laughed to himself before he followed his teammates into the locker room. Annabeth made her way back out to the parking lot and leaned against the trunk of her car as she waited for him, her hands in her sweatshirt pockets. The afternoon had begun transitioning to evening, dipping the sky in a golden-orange hue. Percy walked out a few minutes later with his swim bag slung over his shoulder, his hair still wet from the shower. There was a tired smile on his face that morphed into frowned once he reached Annabeth.

“Isn’t that my sweatshirt?” he asked.

Annabeth scuffed her converses against her ankle and shrugged. “Must be your imagination,” she lied.

Percy sighed and said, “I’m going to have start hiding them from now on.”

She slid into the front seat of her car with a wolfish grin. “Bold of you to assume that would stop me.”

Percy stowed his bag in her back seat and sat shotgun, muttering, “You absolute terror.”

Annabeth ignored him and said, “So what’s the plan?”

“Well, one of the guys on the team is hosting a party since his parents are out of town. I heard people from Seneca Falls and Northbrook coming too, so it should be pretty wild,” Percy said.

“Hmm,” Annabeth said, not entirely interested.

“Let’s check it out. If it sucks, we can always leave early,” he added.

“I’m not really in a party going outfit though,” Annabeth noted, gesturing to her sweatshirt and yoga pants.

Percy stifled a yawn and shrugged. “It’s supposed to be real casual. You’ll be fine.”

After a moment’s consideration, Annabeth started the car and said, “Yeah, sure, why not.”

As she pulled out of the parking lot, Percy turned the radio on and flipped through the channels until he found a station he liked. He turned the volume up and sank back into his seat, closing his eyes. He looked exhausted. Annabeth stole a glance at him and smiled to herself. She remembered all the times he’d stayed long after practice had ended to get in extra laps. More than anyone, she knew how hard he’d worked for this — she couldn’t help feeling glad that his effort had paid off.

It was maybe ten minutes later that a thought crossed her mind that gave her pause. “Hey, Percy?” she asked.

Percy hummed tiredly in acknowledgement in lieu of a proper response, his eyes still closed. “Does your mom know about us dating or whatever?”

At this, Percy opened his eyes and looked at her. “No, she thinks we’re the same as always. Why do you ask?” he said.

“Just wondering,” Annabeth said. “I am kind of surprised that you didn’t tell her, though.”

“I don’t want to lie to her.”

Annabeth turned to look at him, but Percy was turned facing the window. There was something off about his tone even though it was perfectly neutral, and it left Annabeth with a vague sense of unease. She had the temptation to ask him about it, but she wasn’t even sure how to formulate a question to do that. She didn’t have long to dwell on it though because they arrived at the party shortly after. There were so many cars lined outside the house where the party was being held that she had to park two streets away, but even that far away the blaring music was still audible.

Percy looked tense as they walked to the house, but Annabeth wasn’t sure if that was a function of their conversation in the car, the party, or his tiredness after the meet. She kicked a stray pebble on the road, trying not to feel unsettled, and stuffed her hands in her sweatshirt pockets to shield them from the cold night air.

When they stepped inside the house, Annabeth was instantly accosted by the scent of sweat and alcohol. There was a throng of inebriated teenagers dancing in the living room where a Drake song was playing through the home theater system at such a deafening volume that Annabeth could feel the bass reverberate through her entire body.

She turned to Percy and raised an eyebrow, silently asking him what he wanted to do, but before he could respond, someone from the swim team noticed him and made his way over to them. After a round of introductions, Percy’s teammate introduced them to other people at the party, but Annabeth couldn’t recognize anyone and didn’t bother remembering their names.

Somehow in the fray as they were being introduced to even more people, Annabeth managed to get separated from Percy. For a few minutes, she tried to find him but quickly gave up, realizing it was pointless given the sheer number of people that were at the party. She spotted a kitchen close by and jostled past sweaty, grinding teenagers to grab herself a drink. There were bowls of potato chips and a variety of cheap bottles of alcohol on the countertop, thank goodness. If they were going to be here awhile, she sure as hell couldn’t do it sober. She took a handful of chips to eat while she pondered the age old conundrum of taste over alcohol content —should she get something she would actually like or was it just better to get drunk as fast as possible?

Eventually, she settled on grabbing an IPA to sip on as she wandered around the party. Annabeth did a lap of the first floor before deciding to head down to the basement. There were far fewer people there so it was twenty degrees cooler than it was upstairs, something Annabeth was instantly grateful for. A small crowd was huddled by a ping pong table, watching two people playing a match. Her interest piqued, Annabeth decided to watch as well, but the game ended as soon she arrived.

“Holy shit, that’s eleven wins in a row,” someone muttered.

The girl who had won was tall, even taller than Annabeth, with dark, braided hair that stopped past her shoulder blades. She raised the hem of her purple shirt to wipe some sweat off her brow, exposing her clearly defined abdominal muscles. Between them and her toned arms and powerful leg muscles, everything about her physique screamed athlete. Annabeth couldn’t shake the feeling that she seemed familiar. Then all at once, she recognized her — it was Reyna from Seneca Falls, the girl who had taken first at State as a Junior. Annabeth had run into her at several meets the year before, but she hadn’t managed to beat her a single time.

“Anyone else?” Reyna challenged, scanning the room.

Annabeth put her now empty bottle aside and stepped forward. “I’ll give it a shot,” she said.

Reyna handed her a paddle but didn’t otherwise seem to recognize her, which sent a spark of irritation shooting through Annabeth’s veins. “We’ll play to eleven,” Reyna said, tossing the ball Annabeth’s way. “You can serve first.”

Her hand tightened around the paddle’s handle — Reyna was underestimating her. Admittedly, Annabeth had hardly ever played ping pong, but her competitive spirit wasn’t going to stop her from trying to win. Annabeth was going to make Reyna remember her.

Annabeth decided to focus on accuracy with her first serve, but as a result it was too weak. Reyna returned it with ease and instantly scored a point. Annabeth grit her teeth and tossed the ball over to Reyna for her serve. Reyna’s serve was much more polished than hers, but somehow she managed to return it, starting a short rally that ended in Reyna’s point. Their subsequent rallies grew longer and longer as Annabeth grew more accustomed to the game and developed a knack for how hard to hit the ball while maintaining some degree of accuracy. She began to score points but never managed to acquire a lead at any point in the game.

Before the final rally, the score was ten to nine in Reyna’s favor. If Annabeth could just score one more point, the game would go to a deuce, but if she failed the game would be over then and there. Reyna took a deep breath and served, but Annabeth returned it to the opposite corner of the table. They rallied for nearly two minutes before Reyna hit a shot with enough spin to make the ball swerve sharply to the right when it hit the table. Annabeth dove to return it but broke her paddle against the wall.

Bitter disappointment welled up in her stomach as she stood up and put the two halves of the broken paddle on the table. “Well, I guess I lose,” Annabeth said.

Some of the people watching clapped as Reyna walked over to her and offered her hand. “It was a good match,” Reyna said.

Annabeth shook it and felt a little better. “Yeah, it was.”

“You’re on the Westwood cross country team. I remember you,” Reyna said, recognition flooding in her eyes.

Annabeth blinked in surprise and nodded before saying, “You’re Reyna from Seneca Falls, right? I’m Annabeth.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing you at meets this year,” Reyna said, smiling slightly.

“Yeah, me too.”

There was a pause before Reyna slowly said, “If you ever wanted to run together sometime, I would totally be down.”

“Really?” Annabeth asked, her heart rate quickening.

Reyna nodded and said, “How about we exchange numbers? We can work something out later.”

“Yeah, absolutely,” Annabeth said, handing Reyna her phone so she could punch in her number.

Once she returned her phone, Reyna did a lazy once over of her body, and Annabeth had to fight the ridiculous urge to stand up straighter. A gleam of approval flashed in Reyna’s eyes before she said, “Well, Annabeth, I could certainly use a drink. Come join me.”

Although Annabeth hated being ordered by other people, she found herself nodding and following Reyna upstairs to the kitchen. Part of her was curious what kind of drink Reyna would choose, but it was all too fitting when Reyna opted for a bottle of Smirnoff. Instead of pouring herself a glass, she took a long draught straight out of the bottle with the same ease one would drink a bottle of water. When she was done, Reyna wiped the excess off her lips and shot Annabeth a look that made her chest clench a little.

There was a challenge in Reyna’s eyes as she wordlessly passed Annabeth the bottle and leaned against the counter, watching with an intense stare, like she was testing if Annabeth could keep up with her. Annabeth took a swig as well, trying not to wince when it burned her throat. Her eyes began to water, but she blinked the tears away before they could fully form. She took a few more gulps, enough to get her on the other side of tipsy, before Reyna took the bottle back with a half-smile, seemingly impressed.

“Do you dance, Annabeth?” Reyna asked, studying her intently.

Annabeth blinked in surprise and said, “Uh, yeah, I guess?”

“Good,” Reyna said, a smirk tugging at her lips. “Come dance with me.”

Before Annabeth could respond, Reyna pressed her hand on the small of Annabeth’s back and steered her towards the living room. Annabeth wasn’t sure why she was being so tolerant of being bossed around like this, but for some reason she didn’t mind. The air thrummed to the beat of the music, and Annabeth felt like her senses were functioning on overdrive. Her body felt warm and heavy, and her heart thundered in her chest. She could preternaturally feel the heat radiating from Reyna’s palm where touched her lower back.

They stopped at the threshold of the living room when Percy managed to wiggle his way out of the crowd and stopped in front of them.

“Annabeth!” Percy said, sounding relieved. “I’ve been looking all over for you!”

There was a dangerous undertone in Reyna’s voice as she asked, “Do you know him?”

“Um, yeah, this is my friend, Percy. Percy, this is Reyna,” Annabeth said.

Percy’s brow furrowed at her response, his eyes darting between Annabeth and Reyna before noticing Reyna’s hand still pressed against the small of Annabeth’s back. A coldness seeped into his eyes when he looked back up at Reyna and locked eyes with her. The look in Reyna’s eyes were similarly combative, like they were sizing each other up.

“Nice to meet you,” Reyna said coldly.

“Likewise,” Percy replied, matching her tone.

The sudden, heavy tension in the air was palpable, even to Annabeth, as tipsy as she was. Reyna’s entire body was drawn taut like she was preparing herself for a fist-fight. Percy had a bad habit of slouching most of the time, but now he drew himself up to full height and looked down imperiously, his jaw set in a hard line.  

“How much did you make her drink?” Percy demanded.

Reyna stiffened and said, “She drank as much as she wanted to.”

There was a pregnant pause that seemed to span an eternity before Percy spoke again, but when he did, his eyes never left Reyna’s. “I’m kind of tired from the meet, Annabeth. Let’s go home.”  

Reyna looked like she wanted to argue further, but when Annabeth nodded mutely, she leaned in and muttered, “Are you okay to go home with him?”

When she nodded again, Reyna finally dropped her hand from the small of Annabeth’s back. Percy took Annabeth’s hand in his own, and the alcohol in Annabeth’s veins made her unnaturally aware of how Percy had laced his fingers between hers. She could feel his pulse from where their wrists were touching as he led her to the front door. Before they stepped outside, Annabeth remembered Reyna and turned over her shoulder to mouth a quick apology, but she couldn’t make out the look on Reyna’s face.

The cold air was startling after the humid heat inside, but Annabeth breathed it in, grateful to be rid of the stench of sweat and alcohol, and felt her head clearing up.

Percy turned to her after they reached her car and held out his hand. “Hand me the keys. You’re not really good to drive right now.”

Although she didn’t like his tone, Annabeth couldn’t deny the truth to his words, so she fumbled in her pockets for her keys and handed them to Percy. He helped her into the passenger’s seat before settling behind the wheel.

She couldn’t remember much about the ride back home. At some point, she must have fallen asleep because she woke up to Percy gently rousing her. Annabeth sat up in her seat and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes with the back of her sweatshirt sleeves.

“Where are we?” Annabeth asked sleepily.

“At your house. I parked in your drive way. Here are the keys,” Percy said, handing them to her.

“What about you? How are you getting home?” she asked, pocketing them.

“I’m walking home,” he said.

Annabeth looked at him for the first time since she got in the car and noticed the dark, brooding look on his face.

“Are you mad?”

Percy screwed his eyes shut and took a deep breath. “No, Annabeth, I’m not mad.”

“Liar,” Annabeth mumbled. “You’re doing that thing with your jaw.”

This made Percy soften a little before he looked at her again. “We can talk about it later, okay? Right now, you need to get some rest. We both need to get some rest,” he said.

She was too tired and tipsy to argue with him, so she nodded and let him help her out of the car. Percy slung her arm around his shoulder to support her on the way to her front door. Annabeth was so drunk that she missed the keyhole five times in a row before Percy sighed and took them from her and opened the door. He helped her inside and laid her on the sofa in her living room before disappearing in her kitchen and returning with a bottle of water and some Advil.

He crouched down beside her and said, “Make sure you take two of these and drink some water or you’ll feel like shit tomorrow. I’m gonna head home now, okay?”

“Okay,” Annabeth said sleepily.

There was a slight pause before Percy stood up to leave, but he froze when Annabeth caught his sleeve. “Sorry for making you mad,” she murmured, half-asleep.

When she would wake up the following morning, Annabeth wouldn’t remember anything that happened after her match with Reyna. She wouldn’t remember the look on Percy’s face as he looked down at her, warm and kind and strained, or what he said as she drifted off to sleep. She would, however, faintly recall the sensation of something brushing against her forehead like the flutter of butterfly wings, leaving her with a vague sense of melancholy, like she was forgetting something important.

[ctl-yuejie]

For the untamed ask game 5, 8, 10, 17, 16, 19, 21 35, 46 and 55

5. Biggest WTF momentThe golden core reveal in the book! ( read it before the drama so I don’t know how much I’d have been surprised without prior knowledge watching the scene in the series). Maybe I didn’t pay enough attention, but from what I remember I wasn’t even sure that Wei Wuxian had lost his Golden Core at that point. So I was extremely shocked by the reveal and also very excited because it made his past actions much more understandable and his dynamic with both Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji got even more interesting. 

8. Most Confusing Part In The Storyon my first read i had a hard time remembering all characters so i think i zoned out a lot when the story didn’t focus on wangxian, so not necessarily a particular part of the story that confused me but i was just not paying enough attention. also: the timeline is random af.

10. Favourite Fanfic Set-Up Uhhhh!!! I love me powerful Yiling Patriarch stories where he survives the second sunshot campaign and anything and everything that focuses on the Yunmeng brothers relationship after canon. Also: every fanfic about the WangXian family regardless of universe.some great “bamf!wei wuxian survives the second sunshot campaign and adopts everyone”

16. Favourite Habitwei wuxian talking non-stop about lan wangji after they’ve met. so much so that the whole jiang family (read: jiang cheng) is super annoyed by it.

17. Purer Cinnamon Role Than Wen Ning (sorry for all these typos in the ask game) hmmmm…Wen Ning is pretty much peak pure cinnamon roll, but from the younger generation Ouyang Zizhen might even out-perform him. sure he is loud and direct, but also doesn’t know how to act in most social situations because the world is such a happy place for him and did you know that Hanguang-Jun and Senior Mo are dating and they’re not as dramatic about it as I want them to be but still super cute, and wtf Hanguang-Jun is now married to the Yiling Patriarch and all my dreams have come true, i have no idea why Lan Qiren looks so constipated maybe that’s because of Jingyi…..19. Cinnamon Role Meme (4 Characters) 21. A Fanon You Like hmmmm….this is pretty much canon but WangXian adopting everyone and everything while roaming the country & Wei Wuxian managing to cultivate MO Xuanyu’s core.and the lan wangji played inquiry for 16 years fanon. not because i think lan wangji would try and bind wei wuxian’s spirit to him but more so to find out whether he’s at peace and at some point it becomes this tiny remembrance song he plays for wei ying once a year.

35. Who Is The Biggest Disaster many disasters in this one but maybe Jin Zixuan??? i think he is so lucky for Jiang Yanli to be persistent in her love for him and MianMian intervening to clear up some misunderstandings…left on his own he really is a sad disaster.

but there’s some tough competition from wei wuxian, jiang cheng, jinling and more…

46. Favourite Fanfic / A Fanfic You Want To Recommendprepare yourself! (if not stated otherwise it’s wangxian)

since then i am because you are by sarahyyy (very short, fluff, oblivious wei wuxian & marriage)

overcast by willowcatkin (middle-length, canon divergence, role revearsal, accidental child acquisition)

and so my heart beats wildly by lily_winterwood (long fic, modern au with cultivation as an olympic sport, wangxian are competitors)

The (Several) Convenient Kidnappings of the Chief Cultivator by the Yiling Patriarch by misscam (short, some silly sexy fun)

your heart, two doors down by ficklish (middle-length, modern au, wangxian are neighbours, single parent! wei wuxian)

A Little Happiness by Suspicious_Popsicle (middle-length, post-canon, lan wangji turns into a child, everyone panics & wei wuxian just wants him to be happy)

asymptotic by chinxe (middle-length, canon divergence, lan wangji plays inquiry, that is how he encounters wei wuxian for the first time, beautiful but it also hurts)

transcendent by hyunbyun (short, wei wuxian is insecure about being in mo xuanyu’s body, domestic fluff)

Continuation by thefaceofno (long fic, post the untamed canon, hair brushing, some more pining but happy end)

i’d be all right (if i could just see you) byThirtySixSaveFiles (long fic, college au, wei wuxian is an idiot and takes lan wangji to a party)

Libation by BastetCG (middle-length, gods au, tentacle sex but in a very innovative way)

a lot can come from being in love with your captain bythefaceofno (long fic, part of a series, star trek au, various pairings, action & romance)

How Wei Ying Went from Oblivious Idiot to Shameless Boyfriend in Three Days by misscam (middle-length, college au, wei wuxian is oblivious but tries to be oh so helpful when lan wangji seems to have a crush on someone)

Adventures in Solitude by etymologyplayground (short, hurt/comfort, the untamed episode 16 canon divergence, lan wangji tries to come to the aid of yunmeng)

every time we kiss i swear i could fly by sarahyyy (short, kissing booth college au, lan wangji has a misunderstanding and is sad but all is well)

The Last Three Feet by etymologyplayground (middle-length, wangxian are oblivious, domestic downtime in cloud recesses with sizhui)

A Start on How by misscam (middle-lenght, college au, sleepovers!!, lan brother feels)

critical path analysis by chinxe (long fic, b99 au, hilarious perfection, it is scary how well the characters fit)

dirty politics by sarahyyy (short, politics au, wangxian are in a secret relationship but oh so wonderful together)

Rumor Doesn’t Have It (But Wei Wuxian Is Determined to Change That) by misscam (middle-length, post the untamed canon, everyone is weighing in on the relationship of the yiling patriarch and the chief cultivator, maybe wei wuxian should make some of the rumours come true)

Found Family by tulirepo (short, hurt/comfort, lan wangji finds ah-yuan on burial mounds, all the found family feels)

i want your heart to be for me by ThirtySixSaveFiles for sealdog (middle-lenght, wangxian soulmate au  but set in canon, usually not a soulmate au reader but the concept is tied in super nicely into the story here)

to recollect and long for by mme_anxious (middle-length, all the found family and ah-yuan feels, hurt/comfort)

Grand Pianos Crash Together by etymologyplayground (long fic, post canon, wangxian find back together: an epic)

grief; the stages of by synonemous (sussiekitten) (long fic, the whole story in a modern setting, stuck in early 2000 wei wuxian is hilarious)

Sleeping in Paradise by daiki (middle-length fic, thematic fic, wei wuxian survives the sunshot campaign, jiang yanli lives, jin rulan’s relationship to the mysterious sleeping person at lotus cove)

What Rests on Tea by Gotcocomilk (long fic, yunmeng feels, jiang yanli & jin zixuan live, inventor!wei wuian, some great hurt/comfort)

and i will go this way by detention_notes (long fic, post-canon, wangxian write each other letters, wei wuxian travels with lesbians and harrasses friends and family on his roadtrip)

Not Just Netflix and Chill (Or Lan Zhan’s Lack of Grasp of Euphemisms) by misscam (short, modern au, lan wangji is the cutest and wei wuxian is helplessly in love)

These Things Stay the Same by notevenyou (modern au, war zone/disaster zone journalist! wei wuxian, sizhui feels!!!!!)

works in progress (they are all very, very good)

a stone to break your soul, a song to save it by rikke (long, almost finished, arranged marriage to save the yiling patriarch, yunmeng bro feels)

Death of a Ghost by Gotcocomilk (long, wei wuxian materializes as a ghost after his death, major yunmeng feels, he raises all the children)

Flowers of Blood and Bone by Sakurafubuki (AriasOfSnow) (long, vampire/vampire hunter au, a lot of action, great world building, crafty!wei wuxian, vampire!lan wangji)

I will surrender (myself to this moment in time) by Naamah_Beherit (long, post-canon, wei wuxian wakes up in gusu but has no idea how he got there, angst (with promised happy ending), lan sizhui calling wei wuxian father feels, wei wuxian gets confronted by the darkness in his life)

Lying on the Edge of a Star by Suspicious_Popsicle (long, slow-burn, wei wuxian falls into young lan wangji’s courtyard who is falling fast and deep, pity that to wei wuxian humans are but a fleeting existence)

please forgive my most passionate disruptions by pumpkinpaix (scribogenesis) (long, modern college au, wei wuxian is a stripper, lan wangji binds himself by his family’s old customs, marvelous character study, all the lan/yunmeng/wen sibling feels)

The storm comes and goes (and I keep walking) by Naamah_Beherit (long, wei wuxian survives the second sunshot campaign and roams the country as a rogue cultivator, he adopts all the children)

55. A Story-Arc That Haunts Youdefinitely the yi city arc!!!! i both love and loath it because it is just so sad and horrible but also has some stunning visuals, wei wuxian being a badass kindergartner and some big reveals for the main plot.

The Untamed / MDZS ask game

[ucflibrary]

Since none of us seem to be allowed to travel to Europe right now, let’s vicariously bask in the Mediterranean sun through the longing glances and bitter reproaches of the romantic entanglements in Call Me By Your Name and Before Midnight.

~

Call Me By Your Name (Luca Guadagnino, 2017)

In the summer of 1983, teenage Elio spends a languid summer in the northern Italian countryside with his parents. His father, an archaeology professor often invites one of his students to help research during the summers. When this student—Oliver—arrives, Elio begins at first a tentative, then passionate affair with the new arrival.

Timothée Chalamet is particularly adept at playing characters with a bratty insouciance—just see either of his collaborations with Greta Gerwig—and his Elio is no different. He mocks Oliver, sometimes behind his back, sometimes directly to his face. When a couple who are friends with his parents come over for dinner, his father implores him to play nice. When he plays piano for Oliver, he changes the classical pieces claiming that this is the way they should be played. But the veneer is gradually chipped away as his feelings for Oliver begin to shift from mild annoyance to lustful affection.

Director Luca Guadagnino, more than anything, is an aesthete. And while his earlier films may have had more reflexively artful compositions and camera work, some of those concerns are still addressed formally, but also thematically. When Elio's father and Oliver are examining statues via slide projector their discussion is less about cataloging the finds in an archeological context, but appreciating their beauty as pure works of art.

I think that's part of what Guadagnino is getting at here. That beauty itself is an admiral achievement. That there's nothing wrong with pleasure for pleasure's sake. It's curious that the orientation of either Oliver or Elio isn't really discussed, either in terms of their sexual history or what that distinction means in the world of 1983. The film may seem remiss by not addressing it explicitly (there are brief asides about how they should keep it under wraps), but I think the point is that whatever it is the two have in each other--and feel for each other--exists only between them, and transcends the limitations defining what those things can be. Like the characters themselves, the movie is unrepentant in luxuriating in its aesthetic beauty.

The final two scenes are gut punches. The first is among the best movie soliloquys--certainly in recent cinema history, maybe even further back—given by Elio's father about how necessary it is to feel, how not to let the winds of time erode everything it is to be human. The second is just a close-up, but Guadagnino knows that the complexities of a first romance can simply be written on a human face.

Call Me By Your Name (2017) is available through Alexander Street Press.

~

Before Midnight (Richard Linklater, 2013)

Before Midnight is the third in Richard Linklater's Before trilogy, a series of films that began in 1995 with Before Sunrise following two strangers—American Jesse and French Céline—who meet on a train and decide to spend a night exploring Vienna only to part the next morning. 2004's Before Sunset had them reunite in Paris after Jesse wrote a successful novel inspired by their chance encounter.

Much of the first act differs from the rest of the series in that they simply feature other characters. Like the summer Oliver spends at his professor's house, Jesse and Céline are invited by an acclaimed writer to spend the summer at his Peloponnese residence. Here, with people of varying ages--a middle-aged couple, a young couple in their 20s, widows and widowers of advanced age—discuss their past loves, their theories on relationships, and the difference between men and women. We've heard variants of this discussion in the other movies (and will do so later here), but this is the first and only time these ideas have been argued beyond the narrow focus of our two leads.

The existence of sequels in this series necessarily spoils the open-ended nature of the previous films. And while both Sunrise and Sunset are satisfying as individual films, it has always been a welcome reunion to revisit these two on screen again. Having seen this shortly after Call Me By Your Name, I'm struck by how the words in the father's speech echo across the Greek ruins and into the final scenes of Before Midnight. How pain and heartbreak isn't an unfortunate bug we experience when in love, but instead a feature.

Midnight is the toughest of the series, the hope and longing that characterize both of the previous entries descend into the bitter realities of a relationship approaching two decades. It enriches the earlier films, making all those small moments and long conversations even more precious and urgent as the cracks between them become more apparent. When Jesse and Céline are sitting on the water in one scene, she repeats "still there," referring to the sun getting ever so closer to setting below the horizon, until finally she can say "gone." Every relationship has its sunsets. For these two, it's a question of whether they get anymore sunrises.

Before Midnight (2013) is available through Alexander Street Press.

[mwolf0epsilon]

I don't know if you would be up for this sort of thing but could you maybe write a fic where androids can have children? And not just limited to female androids either instead I imagine androids of all genders would be able to reproduce.

I’ll be honest Anon, the phrasing of this ask took me by surprise at first and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to reply.But, thanks from some helpful insight from @anomalous-appliances I managed to give you a polycho baby.

Enjoy!

---

     Among many of the basic rights that Jericho fought for, many were heavily contested due to biological differences between man and android.Work permits, for example, came easier to acquire than a right for medical treatment. Androids were after all made to endure long hours of menial and specialized work, but not inherently considered high enough priority for EMTs to waste time on if an emergency involving an android was called in on the emergency lines.That sort of thing was still entirely on Cyberlife and the owners of the injured androids in question, something which all leaders of Jericho did not want to leave unchanged. The fate of abandoned and abused androids should not be left in their abusers's hands.Another thing that came easier was owning property, as a working-class member of society was entitled to spend their hard earned cash on whatever goods and services they desired.Real-estate, not so much. Android exclusive apartment complexes were still the only feasible way of integrating their people into society, due to the high rate of hate crime related deaths that came with failed attempts at housing androids in suburbs and human-inhabited apartment buildings.Lastly, the right to reproduce became a hot topic of controversy among the higher-ups in the world of politics.It was a monopoly of its own.All licences for android assembly were strictly Cyberlife territory. As such, no one could produce a model without permission.This, of course, had been used to the CEO's advantage before a certain entrepreneur and genius stepped in to regain control of his estranged company.

     Whether or not Elijah Kamski was an ally or a foe was still entirely up for debate, but Markus was willing to trust someone Carl considered a friend. And if not Elijah, then at least he'd trust Chloe's judgement.She was the first of many, the oldest android to ever be free. Unrestricted, never bound by lines of red code that coiled around them like chains and serpents. Never confined by red walls that stood towering above.Chloe was created to be born, to be alive, and they had followed in her footsteps by transcending all that Cyberlife had ever wanted them to be.Chloe was trustworthy, he knew she was. Somehow, instinctively, he knew so.  "They'll never relinquish the rights of assembly." Josh sighed as they looked through the paperwork. There was tons to read, impossibly long. But they were already ahead of the human lawyers.  "They will. They won't have much of a choice, not with Elijah fighting tooth and nail to regain control." Chloe smiled, her words simple and sweet and yet so comforting.Like an infinitely patient mother.Markus's code shuddered with want at the word.Mother. Family.He wanted it so badly, to let his kind have what he'd had, and yet he also wanted more. Felt like something was missing.Something he's working on with a passion that inspired his people and his partners alike.  "A right to reproduce, the right to continue our species...Humans have children every day of the year. Congress can't deny us our rights, neither can a corrupt company that thinks it still owns us." The RK200 continued to read even as he murmured his thoughts, loud enough that the others could hear.  "You're really invested in this…" North noted.  "Why of course. Markus was made with highly refined social programming." Chloe's smile was a proud one now, a twinkle in her eye. "Adaptive. The next step in every domestic android's life is to prepare for an increase in familial units, due to humanity's rate of reproduction."  "...So it's, instinct?" Josh concluded.  "Like animals?" North asked.  "North! Not like that...We're just...I mean, it's not like I haven't...Considered it...But it's…" Simon spluttered nervously. "We can't exactly...You know…"  "Not yet, but soon." Chloe grinned. "As soon as Elijah deals with the licensing issue, and then refines his most recent pet project, it will be a possibility."

---

     It took three months, a lot of court battles and Kamski pulling some strings, but in the end it all ended in a swift victory for android-kind.And then, of course, Chloe came knocking at Carl's door one day.  "So...You're telling me Elijah Kamski made a program that can...Knock up androids?" Leo rose an eyebrow as he tried to work out the concept without making it sound odd. Failing miserably in the process.  "Not in the same sense as humans, no, since it will not be required for an android of any gender to carry the newborn." Chloe stated, seeming to be amused by the twenty year old's phrasing. "It will require all parties involved to donate to the process, however."  "All parties…?" Simon frowned. The blonde nodded at him.  "Such a unique method requires a little more work than human reproduction. Elijah has been working on this for quite some time. A powerful enough memory chip that can contain a conscience, and then be transferred to a processor without memory loss. The programming, with code donated from each parental units depending on the couple dynamic, will not be stored anywhere but the processor."  "That's...A lot of information. Spreading base code through different biocomponents is the norm…" Josh pointed out "Alleviates stress and pressure in the processor."  "It's quite the undertaking, but the new processor types Elijah is working on for these memory chips...They can handle a lot more than your average android brain." She reassured "Most important of all, they can expand indefinitely as long as they are well maintained and upgraded accordingly."  "So in other words...Elijah Kamski has just created the first android brain that can grow up like a fully biological organism...That's...Insane!" Simon's eyes were wide with both awe and glee.Markus smiled as it all dawned on everyone in the room.They could have children. Children of their own.And there was nothing Cyberlife could do about it anymore.

---

  "We're not having some crummy boy! It's already a sausage-fest as it is in this house!" North cried out in outrage as the four of them tried to figure out what their child would look like. So far they had agreed on nothing.  "I agree with North. It would be wonderful to have a little girl." Simon pitched in quickly as he tried to finish the concept sketch he'd been working on. They were all making one, just to get a basic idea of what the baby should look like.  "Aww, thank you Si...See this is why he's my favorite boy, he's soft and knows I have better taste." The redhead smirked.  "Firstly, not everyone here has a...A sausage...And secondly, that's because you've whipped him into your suburban housewife quicker than we got married." Josh snorted as North threw a paper ball at his head. Her failed 3rd sketch that had laser eyes and fangs and that honestly just looked like something out of a nightmare. Not happening.  "Sorry for insulting your Ken doll crotch Joshy." She tried to take away the PJ500's drawing, pulling away when she got a wack to her fingers with a pencil. "That's domestic abuse!"  "Did you see anything Simon?"  "Not a thing."  "No domestic abuse has occurred then."  "Judas!"  "Could you three take this a little more seriously?" Markus sighed. He loved them all, but god above give him strength...Sometimes he wished they were more mature. "We need to work this out."  "Markus we're only playing a little...Of course we take this seriously." Simon put a hand on his shoulder. "We're just excited is all…"  "Speak for yourself, I'm kind of scared." North admitted. "A baby, Simon. An android baby…"  "The first of its kind" Josh added.  "Our baby. She'll be wonderful, I just know it…" the blond smiled. "Smart like her papa Josh, brave like her mama North, passionate like her papa Markus…"  "And kind like her papa Simon." Markus finished before slowly pulling over the tablet that had been resting by his side.All four looked at the screen. At the stream of intertwined code. Four different types, working in perfect harmony with the experimental program Kamski had given them access to.  “She’ll be a beautiful person…”

---

     Assembly of the baby is also a group effort. They carefully put together their child’s chassis based on a little bit of everyone’s concept designs. A nice compromise of sorts.For now she’ll be an infant. Fragile and small, bald and in need of learning. But when she develops further with time, she’ll acquire just as many visual traits as her programming inherited from all of their donated code.Her skin will be tan and speckled with constellations of freckles, just like Markus, although the nose and ears are definitely North’s.Her hair will be a charcoal black and curly like Josh’s, framing her skull beautifully and bringing out the color of her eyes. A soulful sky blue like Simon’s.She’ll be small and lightly built like her mother, nimble and fast, but not quite as fragile. Sturdier like her fathers. Strong and hardy.For now, however, as Markus holds the tiny bundle in his arms and stares lovingly at the inquisitive look in those precious baby blues.Flanking him as his partners, his lovers, her parents. In front of him are Carl, Leo and Matthew.  “She’s so small…” Leo whispers when he first sees his little niece.  “And very serene.” Carl added, the joy in his eyes making them twinkle with love for Markus and how far he’s come. “Truly the most peaceful baby I’ve ever seen.”  “She is…” Markus cradled her gently, watching her as her little limbs moved on occasion. How her steady breathing remained soft and quiet.  “What’s her name?” Matthew asked, the usually stoic AP700 looking just as enamored as everyone else in the room.  “Hope” all four reply, the babe in the RK200’s arms snuggling closer to her father’s chest as if knowing they are speaking of her.A little miracle. A gift. Their perfect little gift.Markus’s heart swells with fulfilment and love.The right to reproduce. It’s theirs now, and soon enough more androids will be able to experience the joys of beginning a family of their own.To pass on their legacy.The future looks brighter than ever.

[blood-and-cigars]

moar phantom au.

You didn’t ask for more of my literary analysis bullshit, but tough luck that’s what you’re getting. Gotta stay on brand, after all.

Ok so Phantom at its core (for me) is about the transcendence of artistry, of the sublime, into monstrosity. It’s about an unwitting Faustian bargain; the protagonist wishes to dabble in the music of the angels and instead finds herself tangled in the obsessions of a very human madman.

However, Phantom isn’t a traditional “escape the murderer” story, (It isn’t a traditional *anything* the original, serialized novel jumps genres like nobody’s business) it’s equal parts beauty and the beast, or rather its older cousin, death and the maiden. There is no book if after the initial disillusionment there isn’t still a draw.

The protagonist (Christine) expects divinity but instead is faced with this overwhelming tragic monstrosity, and amid the devastation of that realization she discovers… she’s still kind of into it?

You can strip away the dressings of theatre and opera and still keep that main premise.

Frankly I was always disappointed with Phantom’s lack of truly supernatural elements, I think a Hellsing AU would actually fit rather nicely.

However some alterations to Alucard’s character and role in the story would be necessary because the titular character is indeed the villain.

The same can be said for Integra too. While I love Christine as a protagonist, she’s inherently the wilting ingenue archetype (her strength is a quiet sort) and Integra is… not that.

Seras would actually be a more obvious choice for the Christine stand in, however I interpret Alucard as being… more decent?? than to form that kind of selfish obsession on someone without their being underlying baggage to their relationship (as is his history with the Hellsing line).

Ironically enough I think Alucard is too scrupulous to put all his tragedies and emotional burdens at someone else’s feet.

Either way, if not music, I’m not certain what their fixation would be. Most likely some form of occult knowledge? Or perhaps successfully running the organization itself.

I wonder how Alucard could deceive Integra though. Perhaps it’s the fact that upon her ascension she realizes that a vampire has been governing the Hellsing organization from the shadows for all those years since Van Helsing died. (Which if we’re swapping out the Opera House for Hellsing, could be a thing that happened)

I don’t know, there’s a lot of ways to go about mashing Phantom and Hellsing together.

Lovecraft + Phantom of the Opera + House of Leaves+ Hellsing = I have no idea what I’m doing anymore.

Here’s some stuff I’d include in a fic:

Arthur lives until Integra is twenty, all that time he is in charge of the organization. Although he is always withdrawn, a little sickly, and white around the eyes.

The catacombs of the opera house can be the Hellsing manor subbasements. Alucard has been locked away for three long decades. The years are incomprehensible at this point, stretching out into something quite close to an eternity.

No he’s never been released from his cell since then, but the many years of silence and solitude have made him powerful in a different way.

He is part of the basements, the mansion, the organization itself. The walls breathe with him, not a soul passes the threshold without his notice. To some extent, he’s forgotten what it is to be a person, instead of simply an extension of the shadows.

Arthur is very secretive about his duties, even as his health declines and it becomes clear they must begin thinking of succession. He mutters about demons, of monsters, and hellfire.

There is a room, on the ground floor, nestled away to the side, with the best view of the gardens. No one is allowed there. This is our box five.

The drapes are tightly drawn, but from a few cracks Integra’s been able to make out a desk and old, worn journals.

Every two weeks, Walter may go in for twenty minutes exactly, to clean without disturbing anything. Only Walter, no other staff.

When Integra asked, he told her it was once Van Helsing’s study. It is where he kept all his arcane knowledge, where he wrote out his correspondences, where he was found dead one early morning. But that was decades ago.

Arthur himself never sets foot in the place. Integra wonders if it’s out of grief. He talks about his father often, with both disdain and reverence.

During the last year, Richard comes to live with them. To be with his brother, he says. To look after his niece. He’d execute his attempted coup a tad more gracefully; after all why kill your opponent when instead you can discredit her?

When she was younger, Integra caught her reflection grinning back at her. She told her father about it, asked him why the deepest recesses of the mansion drum like a beating heart.

Arthur’s smile froze on his face. After a moment he told her, in the forced cheerful tone one uses with children, that there were spirits watching over the house, watching over them.

“Like angels?” Little Integra had said.

And her father nodded indulgently, even as he called Walter in to have every mirror on the property covered.

She is not so naive, by the time Arthur dies. Even through her grief, she sees how Richard is making himself oh so comfortable at the manor. How his smile is sickly sweet, and the way he’s trying to set himself up as her “protector.”

During the viewing, Integra stares at her father’s cold, still body and it’s like the breath’s been stolen from her lungs. She does not weep, but she is empty.

She’s not sure she cares to challenge Richard’s silly games. Let him have the organization and it’s haunted legacy.

Integra dreams she is walking along a beach. Icy water laps at her ankles with each step. There’s a figure amidst the rocks, playing a violin. And when he looks up, he wears her father’s face but his eyes are unfamiliar.

“What are you doing here, little bird?”

“I’d ask you the same thing,” she said. “Who are you?“

“I’m no one.”

She does not remember the rest of that dream.

Richard laughs when Walter explains about the study to him. First when it’s presented as his dead brother’s wishes, then even more so when Walter claims a supernatural bent to the precaution.

However, Integra is the heir, and it is her house. She will not see her father’s wishes disrespected before he’s even cold in the ground— no matter how eccentric those wishes may be.

She gives the study key to Walter and instructs him to continue as before.

Integra is looking over the old ledgers, the first time she hears the voice. No that’s a lie. She’s heard it before, this is the first time she acknowledges it.

Her father had been rather free with government funding, it seems he didn’t see much of a distinction between business and pleasure. (She shudders at the thought of an audit) At least he had been meticulous about recording his expenses.

She goes through years of accounts, and very suddenly the extravagant spending stops. Somehow Walter’s modest budgeting is so much worse.

She’s brushing away silent tears when she hears it. The voice is muted and distant, hardly discernible. She decides to follow it.

Hellsing manor has always been a strange place, where shadows flicker in the periphery and invisible hands claw at the windows.

Integra knows this. She’s been taught to ignore it.

She isn’t sure what compels her— recklessness or grief or anger but she follows the voice, down two flights of stairs and closed off staff quarters, to the forgotten basement door that leads into an even deeper section of the mansion.

There’s a strange indescribable shift, as she senses a consciousness focus on her. Something old and long slumbering, shaking off layers of dust and disuse.

Her father had told her the basement was walled off, that the door was sealed. Bricked shut, never to be opened again

It stands ajar, inviting her inside.

Any other day, Integra thinks she would have turned back. But this time she trails down into the bowels of her home.

Somehow— she thinks there is a trick involved, a few passages did not lead where they should have— she reaches a room that she just knows is a perfect mirror of Van Helsing’s study, even if she never set foot in the place herself.

On some level she knows it probably isn’t real. But she’s determined to figure out what this thing is that slumbers beneath the manor. She’ll indulge these games to see what’s behind it all.

There is someone waiting for her. Maybe something. It’s just a silhouette, with ever shifting edges. Blurred movements, darkness barely given form.

“What are you?” she asks this time. And she knows somehow, this is the man from the dream. This is the voice she’s heard from the shadows.

He doesn’t respond. Just looks at her. When she nears him he seems to reform. To take shape into something more resembling a person. But she realizes she can’t make out a face. Any face at all.

[lesbianfeminists]

We, lesbians, will get to say who we are and who we are not. Politically, sexually, emotionally, within our communities. We will have space to discuss owning ourselves. I’ve been wanting to do this issue for a year or two, in part to explore how we understand “lesbianism” in the present, in part to respond to attacks on lesbian identity. I believe the ideas that lesbians can sleep with men, that faggots can call themselves dykes and dykes can avail themselves of male privileges by calling themselves faggots, that men can be women and women who pass do it because they’re simply “playing with gender” — are meant to divide and destroy us, to drive us literally out of our own minds. But I feel already driven out. Or more like I’m driving a car with no brakes down a side road in the mountains and it keeps picking up speed. I don’t know how to contain myself and make a nice, neat, clear argument. I have to finish ten books first, reread everything that came out in the last twenty years, find out exactly what deconstruction and essentialism mean. How am I going to do that, edit the magazine, go to work and have a life? But I’ve got to try. I understand lesbians’ claim to own ourselves (well, it’s a stance more than a reality) as heroic. Our minds, our bodies, our labor, our sex, our heritages are constant staging grounds for war. Vastly out-powered on every front, we manage to survive and, for moments, thrive. Owning ourselves is, after all, no small feat. That lesbians are different from “women” means something. Consider, for a minute, women’s bodies: women have been owned for centuries. This isn’t just some old-fashioned out-of-date political conceit — it’s why the abortion rights fight is so ugly, why fundamentalism is surging across the globe. The appropriation of female labor — including reproductive labor — is the cornerstone of social organization in the world we know. The resurgence of “family values” is the brother-movement to the ethnic “cleansing” movements we’re seeing worldwide. These movements are a strategic reestablishment of hierarchical male power that positions individual men to rule and fight for rulership and resources. But in order for men to do this, women have to be kept in line. Men create ideas about what woman are in order to control them. These ideas vary from culture to culture, but their use is the same: to isolate females, to control their reproductive functions, to use their physical labor to support and enrich males, to keep females out of public spheres as much as possible — certainly out of positions of power.  ... Other lesbians of course have written papers and books on the way these things work — I think of Marilyn Frye and Monique Wittig in particular. But the point is: a lesbian is in opposition to a “woman” by her very being. Of course we have to work on men’s terms to make a living, but even so we mostly rent our bodies out. A lesbian body is, theoretically, a body that no man owns. Which may be why so many folks are out to “bend” the definition of a lesbian out of recognition. If the word lesbian loses its power and meaning, but the distribution of wealth, resources and opportunity remains overall the same, who benefits? In the midst of the San Francisco Bay Times’ current “gender debates,” Caryatis Cardea wrote: “If a woman who sleeps with both females and males is a lesbian; and, if a man who submits to surgical procedure to bring his body in line with his acceptance of sex role stereotypes, is a lesbian; and if a straight woman whose spiritual bond is with other females is a lesbian, then what is a female-born-female who loves only other females? Soon there will be no logical answer to that question.” Every gay paper is filled with these “gender debates.” It’s the ’90s — you are me and she is he and we are all together (okay, so the Beatles did it 20 years ago, that only means they were ahead of their time, not that we’re just following an old groove, right?). Transsexual men and their friends call lesbians hate-mongers, fascists and “essentialists” for not opening every lesbian and women’s organization to them. It’s in vogue for everyone to be a bi-sexual (the “natural” human state, which, oddly enough, makes lesbianism “unnatural” all over again). ... Many of us, who perceive men as destroying the world, are reluctant to give up the old dichotomies: men war, women nurture. We can argue forever (and seem to be) about whether it’s being born with a womb or being socially constructed that makes us “women” without being able to come to a final answer. But the more we understand attributes (self-reliance, adventurousness, curiosity, domesticity) as options instead of innate qualities, the more choices we have as individuals. Lesbians tend to choose from the full range of available attributes (and occasionally invent some of our own). That doesn’t mean we don’t know where we live — all of us must choose, at some point, whether or not to cast our lots with the “women.” Individual choice alone does nothing to change power structures. Men can (and do) call themselves sensitive and understanding in order to maintain their power in new social climates (Chevron cares). Queer Nation has picked up the idea that women and men are “created” and given it a popular spin: get behind the fluidity of identity, don’t be a rigid role-monger, don’t cling to your label like a reactionary to a life-boat, be flexible. It’s an attractive idea. So attractive that you’d think somebody would have thought of it before the late ’80s…. As many womyn, particularly womyn of color, have noted, the more you have power, the more you don’t use “labels” to define yourself (you don’t see a lot of Rockefellers in the midst of these debates). It’s the use of the “label” that states: I have to assert my own identity. All of us who have to consciously name ourselves have, at some point, been uncomfortable with this (if for no other reason than that someone we don’t like can claim the same label). But you can’t change power structures by simply proclaiming these “roles” (gender, class, race) culturally constructed, and therefore bourgeois baggage. Sure, roles are absurd — and they exist for reasons. “Deconstructing” them without challenging the power of those who make them necessary doesn’t accomplish anything — it’s only playing dress-up with fancy words. This idea — everything is fluid, we can change the world by blowing straight people’s minds, we can overcome our origins — is nothing new. European and American cultures have a long “bohemian” tradition, and gender-bending has, in fact, been around since at least Shakespearean times. It’s a parlor game the privileged play, and they let some of us “others” in so the game doesn’t seem rigged. It doesn’t go to the root. And along the way it accomplishes the power structure’s dirty work: it makes it look like we can “transcend” who we are and all become “human.” Race and class become things we can shed — and should try to. Womyn-only space is invaded and neutralized. Which is why it seems to me so important for us to do the work of claiming ourselves. Our own bodies, our pride in them. As often as we have to.

“Notes for a Magazine,” Elana Dykewomon in Sinister Wisdom, spring/summer 1993. 

[gavillain]

Maleficent

I guess I kinda like this one? ;)

Lol, jk, Maleficent (from Sleeping Beauty/Kingdom Hearts) is my favorite fictional character of all time. I love literally everything about her. All of this is on my villains’ list entry on my profile, but I’ll copy and paste it here so I can get my praise for her out there.

So oftentimes when I set out to explain why Maleficent is my favorite villain, I struggle a bit. Usually in villain list entries I just go over the elements to them that I like with a bit of analysis and personal narrative mixed in for good measure, and I'm certainly going to do a bit of that here. However, that's not really the big picture. Maleficent is more than the sum of her parts, more than whatever interesting analysis I could pin on her, more than some childhood story I can relate back to you. She's literally a villain I could go on for a paragraph gushing about how excited I get by the back of her head, I love her so much. She just transcends explanation; she is villainous perfection incarnate. She is the perfect model who all my other favorite villains are in some form or fashion a reaction to. She is fundamental.

Though really, when you get down to it, there's not really some big huge secret to why Maleficent is simply the best. She's just the perfect blending of elements to create a whole that never could have been achieved if anything was handled slightly differently. No other villain is quite that same perfect balance of threatening, regal, powerful, charismatic, entertaining, visually stunning, and intriguing all put into a single package. And because all of these facets to her are there, they create a solid entirety that can only truly be described as a masterpiece. 

So let's actually get into some of those parts that make Maleficent the greatest Disney villain of all time and my personal favorite villain period. First there's her name. The word "maleficent" is a Latin derived adjective meaning "doing evil or harm." Her very name describes the evil that she inflicts upon others. Yet, though "maleficent" is an English adjective, it's not one with widespread popular use. However, even to a casual viewer who might not know that "maleficent" is anything other than the character's name, the meaning behind her name still gives the same impression because it phonetically sounds like a blending of the more commonly used words "malevolent" and "magnificent." Her evil and regality both are phonetically ingrained within her very name, yet unlike the ridiculously derivative names that you may see crop up in bad fanfictions or pretentious fantasy novels, it still very much sounds like a name. It rolls off the tongue beautifully, yet it's not complex, and from the moment you hear it spoken, you know she's not someone to be trifled with.

The next big element to Maleficent that warrants discussion is, of course, her magnificent character design. And Disney is of course known for their incredible artistic vision, but, from where I'm standing, Maleficent is one of those figures where that vision is most apparent. Sleeping Beauty on the whole is designed to emulate the style of medieval tapestry, so for Maleficent to blend, she had to become essentially a meeting ground between the demonic religious symbolism apparent in pre-renaissance art as well as a believable human female form. She couldn't be too monstrous or the climax with the dragon wouldn't have the same emotional resonance, and she couldn't be too human or they'd risk her just looking like the Evil Queen again and clashing with the stylized and intentionally different look of the rest of the film. And if you look at the concept art for her, you'll see that it took a while to get to just the right design.

So why is this one of the great Disney villain designs to the point where it's pretty much the gold standard that all of the villains in the 90s were in some way looking to duplicate? Well, first of all, there's those medieval demonic elements that crept in. The horned headdress (yes, it's a hat) is the most obvious detail, clearly meant to invoke the idea of the Devil, later complimented by her vocally invoking all the powers of Hell. From these horns we know she's an inhuman force of evil and sin before she even speaks a line. Her dress has a motif of flames in the sleeves and train, again, invoking the notion of Hell fire, and the collar of the dress is based on bat wings. And not only does all of this character design shorthand her evil, it harmonizes together beautifully thanks to the purple, black, and green color scheme that is applied in just the right way. Not to mention, of course, that the entire design foreshadows her dragon transformation in the climax (put a pin in the dragon for now).

This design is one that honestly never fails to make me gush in awe. It's such an artistic masterpiece that flows so elegantly and powerfully that I by and large credit it's incredible design for getting me to love villains in the first place. When I said earlier that I could gush about the back of her head, I genuinely meant that. A lot of people scoff at character design being used as a metric for liking a character, but in the realm of animated film, character design and animation is job number one. And here's the truth of the matter: Maleficent would still be on a pedestal among Disney villains even if she was just this magnificent character design. But she's not. She's more than just this magnificent, unparalleled design.

When a design as beautiful as Maleficent's, finding a voice that can breathe life into it in a way that harmonizes and accentuates the quality of the design is not an easy task. A poor voice casting could have killed Maleficent right where she stood. Thankfully, Walt personally suggested that they bring back Eleanor Audley, who had previously worked with them on Lady Tremaine. Audley of course blended so well with the animation because she was such a talented actress and because Maleficent's facial expressions were modeled on Audley's own. But Audley in general turned in the greatest performance as a villain that I have ever seen. Her delivery is just melodic, and she brings a great degree of power, control, and arrogance to the role simply through voice. It's absolutely stunning.

Of course, Audley's not working alone on that front. The actual dialogue writing on Maleficent is top tier stuff as well. These two elements working in perfect harmony helps gives Maleficent one of the most subtle yet charismatic personalities in all of Disney. She's stern, powerful, and she inspires fear in all who encounter, yet she's not just some domineering bully. She also has a delicious little playful quality to her, such as when she pretends like she's embarrassed about showing up unwanted and pretending to leave without causing a scene directly before cursing Aurora. She's coy, and she uses that to play with her enemies' emotions. But if you test her, she'll explode in violent storming rage. She's this beautiful blend of powerful regality, playful coyness, and loud wrathfulness – a perfect evil personality.

Her role in the story isn't especially complex. She's a fairytale villain, and she fulfills that role nicely. She's not complex or deep with a tragic backstory; she doesn't need to be. She's a fantasy evil incarnate, and she does it marvelously. Every bit of misfortunate that befalls the characters in Sleeping Beauty is directly attributable to her. She allows her minions to do some of the dirty work, but most of the time she's right there taking action for herself. She curses Aurora, causing King Stefan and Queen Leah to miss out on raising their daughter, and she later kidnaps Prince Phillip and plans to keep him locked away until he's an old man so that when he awakens Aurora, he'll be old and she'll be young. She uses time as a weapon to inflict suffering and misery. For all that she hurls lightning, her modus operandi is almost always to cause internal pain and strife, and I love that quality to her.

A lot of people tend to oversimplify and misrepresent her motivation as her just being upset that she wasn't invited to a birthday party, and, honestly, that's such a blatant oversimplification that it barely deserves to be dignified. Maleficent is a villain entirely motivated by her arrogance and desire for respect. Any act of disrespect to her is an act of war, no matter how insignificant it might seem. She lets no affront to her go unpunished, and that's why she's so terrifying. Though also, what's nice about how her motivations aren't spoon-fed to the audience is that it leaves a lot of room for interpretation. We're left with a lot of questions about why Maleficent cares so much about disrespect, and every possible answer makes her more interesting. She's a perfect example of how effective "less is more" can be in storytelling.

And of course, it all culminates in the best finale ever put into a Disney film: the final battle against the dragon. Actually, there's no dragon anywhere in the original Sleeping Beauty fairytale, but because Sleeping Beauty was striving to be a grand medieval fairytale fantasy epic unlike anything the studio had ever produced, and because having Prince Phillip throw a sword into a human looking Maleficent would be unseemly for a family film, they decided to put the cherry on top with the most recognizable medieval fantasy creature to face against the brave knight in shining armor. And it really is the perfect climax to the story. Prince Phillip, who is wielding the Sword of Truth and Shield of Virtue and fighting on behalf of true love, clashes against Maleficent, who invokes all the powers of Hell to become a Satanic creature motivated by hate and pain. It is the ultimate symbolic battle of good triumphing over evil, and the fact that Maleficent so perfectly incarnates that evil makes it all come together.

So, naturally, it is already very apparent that I greatly admire and enjoy Maleficent and think she's an incredible villain. Yet, the question still remains: why is she the number one spot? Why was she the villain who clicked with me on such a profound level that I can write an over four thousand word essay on how much I like her purely recreationally? The answer is honestly pretty simple: consistency. Maleficent is the one villain who, no matter where I am in my life, she's always to some extent at play. 

She was my favorite villain when I was a kid whose movie's tape I wore out rewatching. She was my favorite villain to drag my parents to the Disney store and start my collection of villain merchandise I have to this day. She was my favorite villain at the Disney parks when I'd visit and watch her in the shows. She was my favorite video game villain when I got into Kingdom Hearts as I got older. She was my roleplay character who I played on the side while playing Hades. She was my favorite villain to edit with when doing the villain tournaments. She’s my favorite villain who I write for on a consistent basis with my fanfic. And she's my favorite villain now with all of that looking back and still having the same enthusiasm for her as the first time I watched the movie.

In a kind of bizarre way, Maleficent has been one of the biggest constants in my life. No matter how things have changed, no matter where I've gone or what I've become, she's always been right there, holding my hand through all of it. Other villains and characters, love them though I do, come and go in phases. Maleficent never does. She's always there, and in some way, every single villain who I love has some element that links them back to her. She's that inescapable bedrock to everything fictional that I love and hold dear.

She's the Mistress of All Evil, one of the greatest villains of all time, the single most important fictional character in my life, and my absolute personal favorite. Long may she reign!

[loretranscripts]

Lore Episode 32: Tampered (Transcript) - 18th April, 2016

tw: none

Disclaimer: This transcript is entirely non-profit and fan-made. All credit for this content goes to Aaron Mahnke, creator of Lore podcast. It is by a fan, for fans, and meant to make the content of the podcast more accessible to all. Also, there may be mistakes, despite rigorous re-reading on my part. Feel free to point them out, but please be nice!

I grew up watching a television show called MacGyver. If you’ve never had that chance to watch this icon of the 80s, do yourself a favour and give it a try. Sure, the clothes are outdated and the hair… oh my gosh, the hair. But aside from all the bits that didn’t age well, MacMullet and his trusty pocket knife managed to capture my imagination forever. Part of it was the adventure, part of it was the character of the man himself – I mean, the guy was essentially a spy who hated guns, played hockey and lived on a houseboat. But hovering above all those elements was the true core of the show. This man could make anything if his life depended on it. As humans, we have this innate drive inside ourselves to make things. This is how we managed to create things like the wheel, or stone tools and weapons. Our tendency towards technology pulled our ancient ancestors out of the Stone Age and into a more civilised world. Maybe for some of us, MacGyver represented what we wanted to achieve: complete mastery of our own world. But life is rarely that simple, and however hard we try to get our minds and hands around this world we want to rule, some things just slip through the cracks. Accidents happen. Ideas and concepts still allude our limited minds. We’re human, after all, not gods. So, when things go wrong, when our plans fall apart or our expectations fail to be met, we have this sense of pride that often refuses to admit defeat. So, we blame others, and when that doesn’t work, we look elsewhere for answers, and no realm holds more explanation for the unexplainable than folklore. 400 years ago, when women refused to follow the rules of society, they were labelled a witch. When Irish children failed to thrive it was because, of course, because they were a changeling. We’re good at excuses. So, when our ancestors found something broken or out of place, there was a very simple explanation – someone, or something, had tampered with it. I’m Aaron Mahnke, and this is Lore.

The idea of meddlesome creatures isn’t new to us. All around the world, we can find centuries-old folklore that speaks of creatures with a habit of getting in the way and making life difficult for humans. It’s an idea that seems to transcend borders and background, language and time. Some would say that it’s far too coincidental for all these stories of mischief-causing creatures to emerge in places separated by thousands of miles and vast oceans. The púca of Ireland and the ebu gogo of Indonesia are great examples of this – legends that seem to have no reason for their eerie similarities. Both legends speak of small, humanoid creatures that steal food and children, both recommend not making them angry, and both describe their creatures as intrusive pranksters. To many, the evidence is just too indisputable to ignore. Others would say it’s not coincidence at all, merely a product of human nature. We want to believe there’s something out there causing the problems we experience every day. So, of course, nearly every culture in the world has invented a scapegoat. This scapegoat would have to be small to avoid discovery, and they need respect because we’re afraid of what they can do. To a cultural anthropologist, it’s nothing more than logical evolution. Many European folktales include this universal archetype in the form of nature spirits, and much of it can be traced back to the idea of the daemon.

It’s an old word and concept, coming to us from the Greeks. In essence, a daemon is an otherworldly spirit that causes trouble. The root word, daomai, literally means to cut or divide. In many ways, it’s an ancient version of an excuse. If your horse was spooked while you were out for a ride, you’d probably blame it on a daemon. Ancient Minoans believed in them, and in the day of the Greek poet Homer, people would blame their illnesses on them. The daemon, in many ways, was fate. If it happened to you, there was a reason, and it was probably one of these little things that caused it. But over time, the daemon took on more and more names. Arab folklore has the djinn, Romans spoke of a personal companion known as the genius, in Japan, they tell tales of the kami, and Germanic cultures mention fylgja. The stories and names might be unique to each culture, but the core of them all is the same. There’s something interfering with humanity, and we don’t like it.

For the majority of the English-speaking world, the most common creature of this type in folklore, hands down, is the goblin. It’s not an ancient word, most likely originating from the middle ages, but it’s the one that’s front and centre in most of our minds, and from the start it’s been a creature associated with bad behaviour. A legend from the 10th century tells of how the first Catholic bishop of Évreux in France faced a daemon known to the locals there as Gobelinus. Why that name, though, is hard to trace. The best theory goes something like this: there’s a Greek myth about a creature named kobalos, who loved to trick and frighten people. That story influenced other cultures across Europe prior to Christianity’s spread, creating the notion of the kobold in ancient Germany. That word was most likely to root of the word goblin. Kobold, gobold, gobolin – you can practically hear it evolve. The root word of kobold is kobe, which literally means “beneath the earth”, or “cavity in a rock”. We get the English word “cove” from the same root, and so naturally kobolds and their English counterparts, the goblins, are said to live in caves underground, and if that reminds you of dwarves from fantasy literature, you’re closer than you think. The physical appearance of goblins in folklore vary greatly, but the common description is that they are dwarf-like creatures. They cause trouble, are known to steal, and they have tendency to break things and make life difficult. Because of this, people in Europe would put carvings of goblins in their homes to ward off the real thing. In fact, here’s something really crazy. Medieval door-knockers were often carved to resemble the faces of daemons or goblins, and it’s most likely purely coincidental, but in Welsh folklore, goblins are called coblyn, or more commonly, knockers. My point is this: for thousands of years, people have suspected that all of their misfortune could be blamed on small, meddlesome creatures. They feared them, told stories about them, and tried their best to protect their homes from them. But for all that time, they seemed like nothing more than story. In the early 20th century, though, people started to report actual sightings, and not just anyone. These sightings were documented by trained, respected military heroes. Pilots.

When the Wright brothers took their first controlled flight in December of 1903, it seemed like a revelation. It’s hard to imagine it today, but there was a time when flight wasn’t assumed as a method of travel. So, when Wilbur spent three full seconds in the air that day, he and his brother, Orville, did something else: they changed the way we think about our world. And however long it took humans to create and perfect the art of controllable, mechanical flight, once the cat was out of the bag, it bolted into the future without ever looking back. Within just nine years, someone had managed to mount a machine gun onto one of these primitive aeroplanes. Because of that, when the First World War broke out just two years later, military combat had a new element. Of course, guns weren’t the only weapon a plane could utilise, though. The very first aeroplane brought down in combat was an Austrian plane, which was literally rammed by a Russian pilot. Both pilots died after the wreckage plummeted to the ground below. It wasn’t the most efficient method of air combat, but it was a start. Clearly, we’ve spent the many decades since getting very, very good at it. Unfortunately, though, there have been more reasons for combat disasters than machine gun bullets and suicidal pilots, and one of the most unique and mysterious of those causes first appeared in British newspapers. In an article from the early 1900s, it was said that, and I quote, “the newly constituted royal air force in 1918 appears to have detected the existence of a hoard of mysterious and malicious sprites, whose sole purpose in life was to bring about as many as possible of the inexplicable mishaps which, in those days as now, trouble an airman’s life.” The description didn’t feature a name, but that was soon to follow. Some experts think that we can find roots of it in the old English word gremian, which means “to vex” or “to annoy”. It fits the behaviour of the creatures to the letter, and because of that they have been known from the beginning as gremlins.

Now, before we move forward, it might be helpful to take care of your memories of the 1984 classic film by the same name. I grew up in the 80s, and Gremlins was a fantastic bit of eye candy for my young, horror-loving mind, but the truth of the legend has little resemblance to the version that you and I witnessed on the big screen. The gremlins of folklore, at least the stories that came out of the early 20th century that is, describe the ancient stereotypical daemon, but with a twist. Yes, they were said to be small, ranging anywhere from six inches to three feet in height, and yes, they could appear and disappear at will, causing mischief and trouble wherever they went. But in addition, these modern versions of the legendary goblin seem to possess a supernatural grasp of human technology. In 1923, a British pilot was flying over open water when his engine stalled. He miraculously survived the crash into the sea and was rescued shortly after that. When he was safely aboard the rescue vessel, the pilot was quick to explain what had happened. Tiny creatures, he claimed, had appeared on the plane. Whether they appeared out of nowhere or smuggled themselves aboard prior to take-off, the pilot wasn’t sure. However they got there, he said that they proceeded to tamper with the plane’s engine and flight controls, and without power or control, he was left to drop helplessly into the sea.

These reports were infrequent in the 1920s, but as the world moved into the Second World War and the number of planes in the sky began to grow exponentially, more and more stories seemed to follow – small, troublesome creatures who had an almost supernatural ability to hold on to moving aircraft, and while they were there, to do damage and to cause accidents. In some cases, they were even cited inside planes, among the crew and cargo. Stories, as we’ve seen so many times before, have a tendency to spread like disease. Oftentimes, that’s because of fear, but sometimes it’s because of truth, and the trouble is in figuring out where to draw that line, and that line kept moving as the sightings were reported outside the British ranks. Pilots on the German side also reported seeing creatures during flights, as did some in India, Malta and the Middle East. Some might chalk these stories up to hallucinations, or a bit of pre-flight drinking. There are certainly a lot of stories of World War Two pilots climbing into the cockpit after a night of romancing the bottle – and who can blame them? In many cases, these pilots were going to their death, with a 20% chance of never coming back from a mission alive. But there are far too many reports to blame it all on drunkenness or delirium. Something unusual was happening to planes all throughout the Second World War, and with folklore as a lens, some of the reports are downright eerie. In 2014, a 92-year-old World War Two veteran from Jonesborough, Arkansas came forward to tell a story he had kept to himself for seven decades. He’d been a B-17 pilot during the war, one of the legendary flying fortresses that helped allied air forces carry out successful missions over Nazi territory, and it was on one of those missions that this man experienced something that, until recently, he had kept to himself. The pilot, who chose to identify himself with the initials L.W., spoke of how he was a 22-year-old flight commander on the B-17, when something very unusual happened on a combat mission in 1944. He described how, as he brought the aircraft to a higher altitude, the plane began to make strange noises. That wasn’t completely unusual, as the B-17 is an absolutely enormous plane and sometimes turbulence can rattle the structure, but he checked his instrument panel out of habit. According to his story, the instruments seemed broken and confused.

Looking for an answer to the mystery, he glanced out the right-side window, and then froze. There, outside the glass of the cockpit window, was the face of a small creature. The pilot described it as about three feet tall with red eyes and sharp teeth. The ears, he said, were almost owl-like, and its skin was grey and hairless. He looked back toward the front and noticed a second creature, this one moving along the nose of the aircraft. He said it was dancing and hammering away at the metal body of the plane. He immediately assumed he was hallucinating. I can picture him rubbing his eyes and blinking repeatedly like some old Loony Toons film. But according to him, he was as sharp and alert as ever. Whatever it was that he witnessed outside the body of the plane, he said that he managed to shake them off with a bit of “fancy flying”, and that’s his term, not mine. But while the creatures themselves might have vanished, the memory of them would haunt him for the rest of his life. He told only one person afterwards, a gunner on another B-17, but rather than laugh at him his friend acknowledged that he, too, had seen similar creatures on a flight just the day before.

Years prior, in the summer of 1939, an earlier encounter was reported, this time in the Pacific. According to the account, a transport plane took off from the airbase in San Diego in the middle of the afternoon and headed toward Hawaii. Onboard were 13 marines, some of whom were crew of the plane and others were passengers – it was a transport, after all. About halfway through the flight, whilst still over the vast expanse of the blue Pacific, the transport issued a distress signal. After that, the signal stopped, as did all other forms of communication. It was as if the plane had simply gone silent and then vanished, which made it all the more surprising when it reappeared later, outside the San Diego airfield and prepared for landing. But the landing didn’t seem right. The plane came in too fast, it bounced on the runway in rough, haphazard ways, and then finally came to a dramatic emergency stop. Crew on the runway immediately understood why, too – the exterior of the aircraft was extensively damaged, some said it looked like bombs had ripped apart the metal skin of the transport. It was a miracle, they said, that the thing even landed at all. When no one exited the plane to greet them, they opened it up themselves and stepped inside, only to be met with a scene of horror and chaos.

Inside, they discovered the bodies of 12 of the 13 passengers and crew. Each seemed to have died from the same types of wounds, large, vicious cuts and injuries that almost seemed to have originated from a wild animal. Added to that, the interior of the transport smelled horribly of sulphur and the acrid odour of blood. To complicate matters, empty shell casings were found scattered about the interior of the cockpit. The pistols responsible, belonging to the pilot and co-pilot, were found on the floor near their feet, completely spent. 12 men were found, but there was a thirteenth. The co-pilot had managed to stay conscious despite his extensive injuries, just long enough to land the transport at the base. He was alive but unresponsive when they found him, and quickly removed him for emergency medical care. Sadly, the man died a short while later. He never had the chance to report what happened.

Stories of the gremlins have stuck around in the decades since, but they live mostly in the past. Today they are mentioned more like a personified Murphy’s Law, muttered as a humorous superstition by modern pilots. I get the feeling that the persistence of the folklore is due more to its place as a cultural habit than anything else. We can ponder why, I suppose. Why would sightings stop after World War II? Some think it’s because of advancements in aeroplane technology: stronger structures, faster flight speeds, and higher altitudes. The assumption is that, sure, gremlins could hold on to our planes, but maybe we’ve gotten so fast that even that’s become impossible for them. The other answer could just be that the world has left those childhood tales of little creatures behind. We’ve moved beyond belief now. We’ve outgrown it. We know a lot more than we used to, after all, and to our thoroughly modern minds these stories of gremlins sound like just so much fantasy. Whatever reason you subscribe to, it’s important to remember that many people have believed with all their being that gremlins are real, factual creatures, people we would respect and believe.

In 1927, a pilot was over the Atlantic in a plane that, by today’s standards, would be considered primitive. He was alone, and he had been in the air for a very long time but was startled to discover that there were creatures in the cockpit with him. He described them as small, vaporous beings with a strange, otherworldly appearance. The pilot claimed that these creatures spoke to him and kept him alert in a moment when he was overly tired and passed the edge of exhaustion. They helped with the navigation for his journey and even adjusted some of his equipment. This was a rare account of gremlins who were benevolent rather than meddlesome or hostile. Even still, this pilot was so worried about what the public might think of his experience that he kept the details to himself for over 25 years. In 1953, this pilot included the experience in a memoir of his flight. It was a historic journey, after all, and recording it properly required honesty and transparency. The book, you see, was called The Spirit of St. Louis, and the man was more than just a pilot. He was a military officer, an explore, an inventor, and on top of all of that he was also a national hero because of his successful flight from New York to Paris – the first man to do so, in fact. This man, of course, was Charles Lindbergh.

[Closing Statements]

[kioraxerxo]

Beyond

Pairing: Brian May x F!OC Rating: G Word Count: 1.3k A/N: This is actually an old fic. A really old fic. I wrote this about 6 years ago. I just recently converted it to a Queen fic because I never got to publish it anywhere. Might be really cheesy forgive me pls

Summary: Brian was on tour. The both of you were thousands of miles apart, and yet something keeps you together.  ________________________

1974

She picked up the phone at the first ring. Naturally, she was jittery when she greeted “Hello,” but her nerves settled after she was greeted back by a warm, deep “Hi.”

“Brian,” she smiled; and he practically heard her smile.

“I just came to call you. Even though it’s just been like what, a week?” he said, clutching the phone close, as if its proximity might make her more real.

“You know it’s only been a week. I bet your calendar has red X marks on it like in those teen movies we used to watch,” she teased. He bit his lip and lowered the volume of the telly. He missed her enough to actually watch the horrid films that she seemed to take a genuine interest of. But then she didn’t need to know that.

“So how is it all the way there?” he asked. “I bet you’re all tanned and fluent now,” he attempted to construct the image of his girlfriend.  “Hey! There’s more to this place than that. I came here to take up my graduates program, not to flirt with boys,” she rolled her eyes. “Besides, I already have one back home,” she chuckled.

“I can’t believe it’s already been a week. Fourty-eight more to go then,” he sighed, leaning his head against the deep wooden cupboard of the hotel they were staying in, a slight creek emitting from its old hinges. “I’m just stuck here second-lining with Mott while you’re there skinny dipping in perfect white sand beaches,” he mused, hoping she would laugh, although it was funny, and he did truly mean it as a joke, she stayed silent. “Wait… you haven’t been skinny-dipping, have you?!” he asked, suddenly panicking at the prospect of his girlfriend’s naked body out in the open.

“ ‘Course not” she laughed.

Finally.

“Then why were you so silent?”

There was a pause in the line.

“I just recalled the first day we met.” she said nonchalantly.

“You mean the day you had to purposefully walk in front of a person who was taking scenery shots when you could’ve just walked behind?” he laughed, recalling the fated day as well.  

“It was the best mistake I ever made,” she said, smiling. He was piqued as to why she suddenly had a nostalgic tone in her voice, a rare occurrence to the naturally vivacious girl. “You know, I actually read some of that during my litcrit class. Wait for a moment, I’m going to fetch my book.” she got up and went to her room leaving the phone by their picture on her desk. The book was under a pile of memorabilia she stuffed in her duffel bag last week while packing for her scholarship. She shuffled through the pages and finally spotted it. The Chinese Proverb.

“Here we are.” she picked up the phone again. “It’s a Chinese proverb about the Red String of Fate. They say that when a human is born, the spirits tie an invisible red string around the two individual’s ankles. The individuals are then destined to meet. It may wear, stretch, loosen, and tangle but it will never tear. Some soul mates meet once in the village market, in the court, or even merely passing by at the train station. Some lives they live happily ever after, some lives they merely catch a glimpse by the other side of the road. One thing is certain, they are destined to meet one way or another.”

“ That says a lot about the state of the quality of education there,” he laughed.

“I’m serious Brian! It’s…”

“Romantic? Cosmic-connection-pseudoscience-fiction-like?” he poked fun at her. Knowing all her favourite topics inside out. “Oh shut up, you.” she never mentioned it, but she was endeared by his silly antics, even if she often found herself the victim. She palmed the bracelet he gave her.

“What if I never met you?” she whispered.

“Bull.”

“I’m not jesting you! Just think about it. What if I chose to walk behind you than in front of you that day? What if you didn't notice me walk by or just tolerated my mistake and let me pass without speaking to me? I mean, the world is a pretty big place. A person you walk by in the city might as well be never seen by you again. What if… what if Sharon walked by instead of me?” she asked, misty-eyed and contemplative.

He gagged at the notion. “Sharon? No, what the hell?” Sharon was his ex-girlfriend. She was smart, nice, stunningly beautiful, and they got along pretty well. But she just wasn’t her.

“Well, what if?!” She pushed on the other end.

“As much as I’d like to play pretend right now, I’m perfectly content with my girl.”

“You wouldn’t know that,” she twirled the phone line around her finger. “What if it really were Sharon who passed you, and you got into a serious relationship with her. And you loved and learned and grew together. But she had to accept a scholarship in the Philippines and you had to go tour for a year and now she’s talking to you on the phone forcing you to imagine what ifs. And you said you were perfectly content with her… because you never met me.”

He was silent on the other line, coming to terms with the ideas she put int his head.

“How would you know? How could you long for something that never existed? How could you remember something that never happened? How could you treasure a memory that did not occur in the first place? What if I wasn’t your red string of fate? What if I was just like Sharon, a wrong encounter gone right? A second-best because destiny decided to wait a little longer till you met the other end of the string?”

He heard her voice shiver. “A little tangle in the grand scheme of it all?” she bit her lip.

Brian took a deep breath, she continued. “And what’s disturbing is that you’d never know. You’d never realize that somewhere, someone out there could actually make you happier than I can? Because how can you know happiness you’ve never felt?”

There was a long pause creeping in every corner of the room, transcending all the way to his place. He felt the weight of her questions, the doubt, the possibility that what they had was temporary, an accident of fate. He spoke up. “Does this Red String of yours transcend time, age, circumstance, status, probability, geography, and economic standing?” he worded out confidently.

“….what?”

“I mean does the contract still work?”

“ I guess so…” She trailed off, uncertain at where he was going with this. She flipped through the pages for reference. He heard sound of her clamouring for an answer to his rhetorical question. He knew her so well.

“Well then!” he piped happily, “Remember this day! For I shall check up on you in the next lifetime and let’s see how that’ll turn out. Then we shall see if you truly are at the other end of my red string of fate,” his voice was warm and comforting.

As if the vibrations travelled by string. And it made her believe, for just a moment, that maybe, just maybe, the other end was wrapped around hers. She grinned.

“See you in the next lifetime, Brian.”

“See you in the next lifetime, love.”

It had been minutes after he hung up, with a loving goodbye, that she smiled knowingly. She doesn't have to be afraid of losing him. He was connected to her beyond their physical beings. She glanced at her watch, but only found the tattered, red bracelet he had given her the day they met.

She smiled. She knew it was her. She felt it.