#Trash is trash no matter how you frame the story

[themovementgeneration]

What is Imagination? Diary 2022/07/01

A duality of "substance" which we correlate with an Apple (Seed:Fruit) & the story of Adam N' Eve. It is a curse & a blessing. The greatest love story and horror story known to mankind (allegory of the cave). There is a saying: The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree (Laws of Gravity:Attraction) but once it does, it creates a theory of relativity that is particularly Unique: The Atom Seed of thought. A signature move. A "Thinker". A "Godfather" & "Rain Man". An "MC squared Y.O.U"=E aka Frank-Einstein. A Pseudonym with A disorder known as dissiociative.identity.disorder or what i refer to as the Dewey.Imagination.Decimal center (a library)/ Interstellar. It creates a "Watchman" to create an aesthethic of existence in my room of thought internally & externally.

The Iphone:

I.O.S.=R.I.P.

Imagine Input Imagine

Omnipotence Output Original

Secretly {P} Syche Sin

It creates:

{A Frank Sinatra}

{A Drummer Boy}

{A Pinocchio}

(The Boy Who Cried Wolf}

a.k.a an {Umbrella Man}

Dont bite the hand that feeds you Lisa :) -Steve Jobs

I aint read shiet to this day LOLlolLOLlol. Aesthethics tell me enough *vomit*

Joker 2, can't wait to see ya - Chris Rock

Beauty and the Beast

I still got that pinkeye. F them hoes. Keep them films coming Nolan.

you gorillas and chimps.

The Theory of Everything...I remember the film like it was Yaesterday. "I steal see fire". - Ed Sheeran

Morse Code

[withacapitalp]

Reasons

I wrote this for the STWG daily prompt today which was "Joyce" and uhhhhh I'm sorry haha thank you for @stevethehairington and @hairstevington for beta and encouragement and generally being the best of the best!

Read it on ao3 here

The thing Steve had always loved most about the Byers home was the clutter. 

There wasn’t a single surface that was bare. The tv stand was filled to the bursting with scratched up VHS tapes, the bookshelves crammed with dimestore paperbacks. There were always dishes on the kitchen table, magnets holding up dozens of drawings on the fridge, even the hallway was littered with picture frames. It was a complete contrast to the house he had grown up in, with bare cream colored walls and perfectly immaculate rooms. 

It was a mess, and none of the things in the Byers home were worth much, but every item in the home was treasured, important, valued. Everything in their home mattered. 

Now there was nothing left in the house. Nothing but boxes and empty air. 

Boxes.

And Steve. 

And Joyce.

“Where’d Jonathan and the kids go?” Steve asked when the silence had finally grown to be too much, looking around the barren space that used to be the living room. 

Joyce had always apologized for how uncomfortable the couch was. Every single time he had ended up on her doorstep late at night, after every midnight mug of hot cocoa, every midnight conversation where Steve finally finally let some of his anxieties slip out, she had led him over to that couch and wrapped him in a hand me down quilt that smelled old and worn and loved and apologized to him about how lumpy the couch was. 

Steve had never known what she was talking about. He had never slept anywhere that felt more comfortable. 

But the couch was gone now. Probably tucked away in the big box truck outside, or sold at the garage sale they had held last week. Or maybe Joyce had just thrown away like the trash it had always been, finally getting rid of the dead weight of a couch she didn’t really like all that much. 

She probably wanted a new couch for their new house. Something better.  

“They’re all at the Wheelers. Jonathan snuck out around three in the morning to go stay with Nancy tonight, and all of the kids slept over in the basement,” Joyce explained, a wry little smile falling on her lips as she fondly rolled her eyes at her children’s antics, “One last campaign before we hit the road.” 

Steve hummed, acting like this was fresh news to him when he already knew. He was the one that had driven Dustin, Lucas, and Max there. Hell, he had stayed to watch part of the campaign, and to give El and Will one last hug when it was just him and them. 

He wasn’t exactly sure why he was playing along, why he was continuing to pretend, but it was easier than just staring at the place where the couch used to live in complete silence. Better than Joyce knowing exactly how little she knew about Steve’s life these days. 

“I’ve missed seeing you around,” She tried, creeping just a little bit closer to where he was standing, “We haven’t really talked much since…”

Joyce trailed off but they both knew what she was talking about. 

Since the realtor's sign had appeared at the end of the Byers driveway. 

Since Joyce had finally had to admit that she was taking Jonathan, Will, and El away. 

Since their big fight. 

“I’ve been busy,” Steve said shortly, turning away from the living room and towards the kitchen, hoping that would take the spike out of his heart.

No, now the pain was worse, because the kitchen table was gone too, whisked away like it had never existed in the first place. Like Joyce had never sat him down there and patched him up after Billy’s fight, both of their eyes drooping with exhaustion but her fingers still sure and steady. Like Steve had never leaned against it, trying to understand his homework while Joyce did her best to explain why the color of curtains in a story mattered. Like there had never been breakfasts, or dinners, or midnight cups of hot chocolate that were only ever for the two of them. 

Like Steve had never had a place here at all. 

“What do you need from me? You said you needed something,” Steve asked in a rush, turning away from the kitchen as nausea began to bubble over in his stomach. He wanted to run, to break free, to escape Joyce and the house and all of the feelings that came along with it. He just wanted to give her whatever last thing she wanted to take and get away before too much of him broke. 

“I did. I mean is there something else you’re doing today?” Joyce asked, startled by Steve’s sudden shift, “I thought you might want to be here when-”

“Robin and I are going to an interview,” Steve said, interrupting her in a flash. He definitely did not want to be here when they left, and he did not want to be here to say goodbye. He had already done that. He had already said his piece to Jonathan and Will and El. 

Steve had nothing left to give to Joyce.

So why was he here? What could she want from him? 

“It’s a big interview for a job for both of us.” He continued, laying it on thick when they both knew how thin the excuse really was. He and Robin could have done this any day, at any time. Now that the mall was gone, they had their pick of the litter for shitty jobs in town. 

But Steve had purposefully asked Robin to plan the interview for today. He had done it the second Jonathan had told him their moving date. And Robin, saint that she was, had done it without asking why. 

He made his bed, just like Joyce had made hers, and now they both had to lie in it. 

“That’s…that’s great,” Joyce said, crossing her arms over her chest, her fingers twitching like she wanted to go for a cigarette. 

“Besides it doesn’t look like you need me,” Steve said, unable to help himself. He looked around, a bitter smile on his lips, “You’ve got it pretty well handled.” 

“Steve, honey…”

“Don’t,” He said immediately, stepping back when she tried to come forward to console him. That wasn’t her job anymore, it had never been her job in the first place, and Steve wasn’t going to fall for it again. 

He was stupid, but he learned. Eventually, he learned. 

“You already know what I think, and I don’t want to argue.” He said woodenly, the words coming out short and full of static. 

He didn’t want to argue again. Not like last time. 

Steve and Joyce had at least waited until Jonathan and Nancy had ushered all of the kids out of the house before exploding, but once it was just the two of them, it had been a supernova. Steve could barely remember what they had said, but he knew it was bad. That he had claimed she never cared about him at all, and she had told him that he wasn’t her responsibility. 

Steve knew she had called him an entitled brat at some point. 

Steve knew that he had called her a selfish bitch too. 

And he had no way of knowing if Joyce actually thought he was an entitled brat, but he didn’t want to hear it. Not again. It had been hard enough to forget the way it made him feel the first time. 

“It’s not an argument.” Joyce said softly, her voice as fragile as glass as she slowly lowered her hand down from where it had been reaching out to bring him into a familiar, warm, hug, “I just need you to know that it’s over now. I don’t want you looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life, trying to find monsters that aren’t there.” 

“Do you really believe that?” Steve asked, finally looking Joyce in the eye, “Really?”

“Yes,” She said immediately. Steve could see it in her eyes, in her voice, in the way she held herself. 

She did believe it. Joyce really thought it was over. Or, at the very least, she had made herself believe that she believed it.

“Then stay,” Steve whispered, loathing himself for saying it. He had promised himself he would never again beg for someone not to leave, but now he had done it twice in just a month. Twice. Because the first time apparently hadn’t been humiliating enough. 

But Steve’s hope had always been more powerful than his shame, and he couldn’t help but pray that she would listen this time. Joyce would see what leaving was doing to all of them and change her mind. It didn’t matter that the house had already been sold and the truck was already stuffed to the bursting with their belongings, it could all be undone. 

Steve would carry it all back in himself, even. The couch, the kitchen table, the hand me down quilt, everything that had made this house the first place he had actually felt at home. 

She could undo it all. She could put their lives back together, back to the way they had been before, and Steve wouldn’t have to think about it ever again. He wouldn’t have to agonize over how Will and El would adjust to high school without the rest of their friends, or worry about Jonathan being alone in his senior year. He wouldn’t have to think about his own empty house and the bare cream walls that hated him just for existing. 

He wouldn’t have to wonder why he wasn’t enough to care about. Why everyone eventually always left him. 

“If it’s gone, then there’s no reason to leave,” Steve muttered, his eyes burning as he turned them downward to the floor between them, feeling like he was eight instead of eighteen. A child instead of the adult they both knew him to be. 

An adult. Soon to be the last adult left in Hawkins that knew about the Upside Down. The last adult the rest of them had to rely on. 

“There’s a thousand reasons,” Joyce sighed, pulling out her most beloved weapon, “And I have to protect my kids,”

Her kids. Her kids. Not her boys anymore, now her kids, because of El. 

But what about Steve’s kids? What about Max and Dustin and Lucas and Mike and Erica? How was he alone supposed to protect them when the monsters came? 

What about Nancy? What about Robin? They were older, but they were still kids, weren’t they? They still needed someone to be the adult. 

And a quiet, almost silent part of him, couldn’t help asking

What about me?

“From what? If it’s really over, then what are you protecting them from?” Steve asked, a question he had already pressed her to answer in their last argument. 

Joyce didn’t have an answer, because they both knew the truth. This wasn’t about the kids. Not Jonathan. Not Will. Not El. 

It was about Joyce. What she wanted, what she felt like she had to protect herself from. 

And the worst part was Steve understood. He got why she had to leave, why she couldn’t bear to stay here any longer than she had to, but what he couldn’t understand, what he would never understand, was the need to hide behind a shadow. 

“You don’t have to say the truth, but, please, don’t tell me a lie,” Steve said quietly, Joyce sucking in a sharp breath as he carefully threw her own words back in her face. 

She had said it to him dozens of times over the last year, and dozens of times he had caved and told her the truth. 

But Joyce was not Steve. 

“Steve, it's too late to go back on this.” Joyce said firmly, as if her tone would be enough to spontaneously change Steve’s mind. He scoffed, shaking his head and turning away from her to stare out the front window. He welded his lips together, planning to keep his mouth shut and ice her out until Joyce finally got annoyed enough to cut him loose. 

It wouldn’t take long. 

It had only taken her six weeks to pack up their whole lives and completely tear apart Steve’s. 

“I want you to come with us.”

“What?” Steve said, the shock of Joyce’s words enough to make him speak without meaning to. 

“That’s why I wanted you to come here before everyone else,” Joyce said, trying to walk towards Steve again. This time he was too startled to stop her and she entered into his space, a soft smile on her face. The same smile she used to give him when she would push his hair away from his face at night, and tell him that he didn’t need to stay awake. 

That she would be there, and nothing was going to get between her and her boys. 

She had always said it, and they had always both known that she meant more than just Jonathan and Will. 

“I wanted to ask you to come with us,” Joyce repeated, laying a soft hand on his arm. 

“I don’t understand,” Steve said helplessly, his heart starting to race, the bare walls beginning to close in. 

“The house we bought has a little condo next to it that’s free, and I’m sure that Doctor Owens would be able to get it put in your name the way he got mine,” Joyce explained, a plan laid out neatly, too neatly, “There’s lots of jobs out in Lenora, or you could even go to the community college there. Take some classes while you figure out what you want to do?”

This was not a spur of the moment offer. Joyce had to have thought about it before this morning. More than once. 

“You want me to move to Lenora with you guys?” Steve heard himself ask, a spring blossom blooming in his chest without his permission. A little seed of hope that had no reason to exist at all. 

Joyce nodded, her smile growing, and for a second Steve let himself think about it. Truly and honestly think about it. 

He let himself imagine a world where he didn’t go to his interview with Robin this afternoon, and instead stayed here. Packed up the rest of the boxes, hopped in the van with Joyce, and went out to California. Where there was never any snow to shovel, no Mother and Father to disappoint, no dead end job to hate. 

No monsters waiting to jump out of the shadows. 

A life that was only about what he wanted, what Steve thought would be best for him. A life that came with a family that wanted him. 

“It’s over and done and nothing is holding you here anymore,” Joyce pressed, looking around the empty house, “There’s no reason for you to stay.”

And the dream was gone. 

Crushed into bits, shattered like a plate against a skull. 

Steve had reasons, seven of them. Seven people. Seven people who had gone through hell three times for a town that didn’t care and didn’t notice. Seven people who  

Seven people who deserved someone to protect them. Someone who would put them first. 

Steve had never been enough of a reason for anyone to stay, never been enough to put first. Not enough for his parents, not enough for Nancy, and now not enough for Joyce. 

But he would never let his kids think the same about themselves. 

“No, there’s no reason for you to stay,” Steve spat out, hating how bitter he sounded, but hating even more that he had let himself fall for the same trap again. Somewhere along the way he had let those walls down, let another person in, and let her put herself where she didn’t belong. 

That was the truth wasn’t it? They both knew Joyce didn’t fit where they had put her. She was never going to be his mother, and Steve had never fit into her life, but he had played pretend anyway. Ignored all the signs, ignored all the little whispers in his head that told him he was getting too close, trusting too much. He had let her brush his hair, and help him with his homework, and say the words her boys like she meant to include him. 

And now Joyce was just reminding him exactly how much he meant in the grand scheme of things. 

And, really, Steve only had himself to blame for the way his heart was starting to break into tiny impossible to put back together pieces. His mistake. His stupidity. 

He just never fucking learned. 

“At least there no reason to stay that actually ever mattered to you,” He added with a laugh that did not sound at all funny, walking out the door before he could hear another one of her lies. 

[beskarinhyperspace]

Bad Day

"Everything you want."

AO3 | Wattpad // MASTERLIST

*Mature, Explicit, NSFW*

Anakin x fem.reader

Pure smut, he’s obsessed with you, possessive, dark anakin, sweet name calling, claiming, praising, teasing, ora! fem receiving, pinv, breeding k!nk, reader insert, no y/n, female reader, reader doesn't have a name

Word Count:  1.1k

A/N; I didn't expect the story to get this much attention. Tysm for all the love, you guys rock my fucking world.

+ Italics are thoughts. +

It was a bad day for Anakin, everyone was telling him what to do, what not to do. He just had another boring and useless meeting with obi-wan and the council. He was tired of it all. He knew the potential he had and didn’t want to waste it on some pretentious know it all who didn’t trust him and never seeing him more than an apprentice.

He needed to let it all out, he needed you. 

Meanwhile you were in the basement of the castle, staying on the low low. Since you are on Anakin’s side people are staring at you weirdly. You also noticed the way he changed, you’re not blind but there’s no way in hell you’re leaving his side.  

As you’re reading a book in your room, you get called out by another servant.  

“The empress would like you to see her.” saying to you with a smile, peeking through the door frame. 

You put your book back on your nightstand and get up from the bed. You sigh as you flatten the fabric of your dress, now all wrinkled from laying down. A long garment with long sleeve. The fabric was simple, made of a light natural color to blend in.  

It’s been a few weeks since you’ve seen Anakin. You never really know how long his missions could take. Even if you knew how good of a fighter he was, you were always scared of something bad happening to him. Getting up the narrow staircase you open the door, moving to the kitchen. You can’t do your duties on an empty stomach right? Grabbing two cupcakes sitting on the counter, you remove the bottom wrapping, putting it in the trash before going out of the kitchen. You start to eat it immediately as you move to another set of staircases while trying to keep it all in your mouth. Turning the corner, you were too focused on opening the second one that you didn’t notice you were being followed. 

“I didn’t know that cupcakes were suited for breakfast..” hearing a voice soft yet playful. 

As you turn around you see him, his skin still dirty from his adventures. “Ani!” 

He smiles, leaning closer to you. You can feel the salt on his cold lips as his warm tongue comes to play with yours. He breathing hard, as if it was his first time tasting you. 

“When can you meet me?” voice rushed and raspy. 

“In four hours.” closing your eyes to his hand caressing your hip. 

He gives you one more kiss before you feel a hot and heavy sensation caressing your clit. “Too long..” 

Taking your hand, he brings you through a nearby door locking the handle behind him. The room was a simple study with an arm chair, a little desk and lamp. Behind of it was this huge floor to ceiling window, with books all around over the rest of the walls. The place was small but perfect.  

“You’ve been hunting my dreams since I left” speaking to you low and dangerous. 

You bite your lower lip as he approaches you, hovering of you. You notice his tired eyes and multiple scratches over his face. His skin was tanner than the last time you saw him. 

“I’m sorry is there a way I can make up for it?” as you're batting your sultry eyes to him. 

He doesn't waste a second, removing his cape and weapon belt. You look at him with anticipation as he pushes you into the arm chair, pulling your dress up as he brings your butt to the edge. He leans down, pushing your panties to the side and takes your clit into his mouth. Humming as he finally gets to taste you fully. You don’t know how to respond to the surprising action. Having your legs open in a matter of seconds and putting your pussy on full display for him. You start to breathe harder as he’s passing his tongue in between your folds, savoring you sweet in his mouth. You can feel him grinning as he hears your desperate moans for him. Going back to suck on your pulsing clit, you feel a finger entering you and pushing upward to that amazing spot of yours, whining to him as the feeling becomes too much. 

“I want it inside.” you ask finally opening your eyes halfway. 

He looks at you from below, giving you his mischievous smirk. “Everything you want.” 

He kisses the inside of your thigh, removing his grip from your legs. Getting his pants down, he lets out his beautiful thick cock already hard and ready for you.  

You smile back to him knowing that there’s nothing in this galaxy better than what you have with him. Stars, he was your whole world. He would kill for you and you would do the same for him.  

He comes down to kiss you softly as he squeezes your breast over the fabric of your dress. 

You can hear him, barely a whisper, “You’re so beautiful love.” you feel him pump himself a few times before entering you full length, going in slow for you to adjust to him. “I will become the most powerful jedi.” feeling it all inside you he stops. “I will make you mine and show you to the world.” feeling his breathing on your lips from the closeness. 

“But jedis can’t be with other people Ana..” 

He starts moving, going out slow but slams it back in harder, “I don’t care, I will do what I want.” 

You can’t control your moans as he begins thrusting inside you. Letting out some panting as he tries to munch your tits through the fabric. Squeezing and massaging them. Has he become mad? 

You feel him angrily pounding you along with the smacking noises mixed with the sounds of your slick pussy filling up the small room. Moving quicker and faster he positions himself at an angle to be able to reach the roof of your entrance as he’s pressing on your lower stomach. Grunting and growling low, he tries to talk in between breaths. 

“C-come fuor me” trying to keep the rhythm without coming just yet. 

You let out desperate whimpers as you’re coming close, coating his cock further more with your juices. 

“That’s it, c-come baby.” on the edge of his peek. 

You let out a full deep open mouth moan as you come on him and so does he, when he sees you finally becoming undone underneath him, filling you up with his cum inside you. 

He comes back to give several full mouthed kisses.  

“Our kids will be the best jedis in the galaxy, just like their father.” stating as you pet his hair. 

He smiles to you, resting his head a moment on your chest, trying to catch his breath and enjoying the feeling of your fingers caressing his head. 

[madnessandentropy]

Catra's Abuse of Adora Has No Excuse

I know this is an old series. I know a lot of people don't believe in talking negatively about shows that have already ended and that it doesn't matter anymore.

But it matters to me.

Because spop has framed the abuse victim in this story as the idiot and the one in the wrong, the one who should've just stayed with her abuser and never "left" her, while the abuser gets off scott free and likely continues her actions.

Victim blaming very and real and prevalent, forgiving or defending abusers in real life is very real and prevalent.

This is an important thing to call out and discuss because what you put in your creations affects reality.

Spop IS a kids show, and kids often accept what they're exposed to as the norm or as something to copy. You can't just sweep it under the rug, saying it's just a show.

So that's why I want to talk about Catra and why all the trauma in the world does not sxcuse abusing your partner, or at the very least should not frame your partner as the one in the wrong for wanting to leave you.

Okay.

Catra is a character adored and worshipped by the fandom and defended with cult-like ferocity and obsession (death threats, gaslighting, doxxing, bullying, etc).

Many of her actions are actively ignored and excused by the fans and writiers, especially the main thing about Catra:

Her blatant abuse of Adora

I can hear the cries of outrage now

"You're just homophobic! Of course you criticise the queer couple! You just hate Catra! Catra is a victim of a abuse! They're in a war! Catra said sorry! But Catra loves Adora! You don't know what abuse is!"

And then they write an essay about Catra's sad backstory

In response to this I would like to quote one of my favourite B99 characters Jake Peralta:

Or in this case:

"Cool backstory, still abuse"

I really like Catra.

She's a cool character and an excellent villain. She has a very interesting and complicated psyche, a result of growing up in the Horde. A toxic, abusive environment that gave her attachment issues and likely ptsd and other problems. She lashes out because of her trauma, she is aggressive and rude so that she isn't vulnerable, to avoid being hurt.

There are many reasons for her actions, but it does not excuse them even if the narrative does.

Expecially her actions towards Adora, the person's she supposed to have loved all this time.

As I've said in another post, most abuse in media isn't very subtle because people still don't really take subtle abuse that seriously and often blame the victims. (Which is a whole other kettle of fish)

Not subtle abuse in media often consists of the following:

•Screaming or yelling at your partner, tearing apart their self esteem or threatening them

•Gaslighting/guiltripping them*

•Hitting them or physically assaulting them in any way

•Trying to kill them

•The victim is immensely afraid of/distressed by their abuser

*Note for this: it can depend on the depiction because its either abusive and in your face or romantic and just trying to help you depending on the story and writer

It astounds me to see Catra has done every single one of this things to Adora, and both the fandom and the writers excuse it or say "it isn't abuse, actually"

I'm gonna go through each bullet point and discuss how Catra does these things, mention excuses fans make up for it and point out their errors

Let's go

•Screaming and yelling at your partner, tearing apart their self esteem and threatening them

Catra is not someone who screams her throat raw, but she does yell when she lashes out and does so often at Adora.

She's constantly insulting her intelligence, making her doubt herself, telling her nothing she does matters, calling her weak and demeaning her.

She rips into her and treats her like trash beneath her heel when they were in the fake reality.

Again, we often see Adora repeating a similar rhetoric, believing what Catra and SW say fully or sometimes starting to believe it.

DURING her confession, Catra calla Adora an idiot. While Adora is basically dying, in this crucial moment for both of them, she resorts to insulting her intelligence.

"But her feelings were so obvious and Adora didn't notice!"

Let me tell you, spop has a massive tell don't show problem. This defence could've easily been true IF the writers bothered with evem something small like Catra hesitating to harm Adora or treating her with more care when fighting than with her other enemies, or at the very least treating her kindly.

They have done none of that. Instead they had other characters (E.g Horde Prime) talk about how much she cares for Adora and how strong her emotions are for her.

Literally the only way anyone could've known Catra loved Adora is through these characters giving exposition.

Adora is not an idiot for not realising Catra loved her, because Catra's actions do not show love or even an ounce of basic respect.

Making Adora doubt her intelligence and abilities is not love. Mocking Adora the way she does is not love. Torturing Adora is not love.

Telling Adora that she was a mistake and that "none if this would've happened if you didn't come through that portal" is not love.

Nothing she does to Adora is an act of love.

And also, not being very good at deciphering or recognising emotions that are "obvious" does not make you stupid, jfc

"Catra just says those things because she's angry, she doesn't mean them!"

It doesn't matter if she's angry and doesn't mean what she said. She says it. And there's never a scene were she regrets her words.

Her anger is a reason, not an excuse. That behaviour is not okay.

•Gaslighting/guiltripping them

Catra often likes to talk about Adora abandoned her, how Adora kept leaving her alone, and the show shifts to frame this as true and paints Adora in the wrong.

In Season 5 she's asks Adora "Please, just this once, stay?" After Catra herself being the one to run away, to make Adora feel guilty for the very much correct actions she took previously.

Adora refused to return to the Horde which was committing mass genocide and destroying everything in its path and painted as the bad guy for doing this.

Adora told Catra what they were doing. Begged Catra to come with her so they could start a new life. Throughout the series she is giving Catra chance after chance and trying her best to stay with her.

Every time, Catra has been doing the leaving.

Running away, abandoning Adora in the temple, vanishing in a blast or puff of smoke when it covers her.

She does the leaving, and she convinces Adora that it is in fact Adora leaving, and that she is bad person/friend for wanting nothing to do with the Horde.

The portal reality is the worst for me.

Adora is distressed and afraid, feeling like she's losing her mind and that something is wrong with her.

Catra, fully knowing the truth, gaslights her by saying she's crazy and just seeing things. And also is insults her intelligence yet again.

Making Adora doubt her own intelligence is also a form of manipulation and gaslighting.

Blaming Adora for everything that happened in the fake reality is gaslighting.

"But Adora DID leave Catra!"

Yeah. At the beginning after learning the Horde was committing mass genocide and after Catra tazed her twice. Refusing to go back. She was fully in the right. She apologised later and tried to get Catra to join her, so they could both continue being together. But Catra left her over and over again after that.

"The portal reality made Catra happy! It helped her cope with her trauma! She was having a mental breakdown!"

Hmm let me see isn't allowing your partner to continously be distressed and afraid and gaslighting them so you can be happy idk... selfish and abusive?

Yep she was having a break down. She was still in full control of her actions, and no trauma makes that okay in any way

•Hitting them or physically assaulting them in any way

Literally something Catra has done since they were children.

I can forgive the times they were small, because they don't know better and are abused children. But from episode one before Adora even left the Fright Zone Catra was pulling her around by the hair shoving her and over all being very aggressive.

After Adora leaves the Horde Catra: tazes her, tears at her skin with claws that can cut through metal, leaves her with scars, tortures her, kicks her and so much more.

Over and over again. Without a single sign of remorse.

"They were in a war!"

Yeah. Emphasis on the "they". Adora was in that war too. She was always worried for Catra, actively holding back, trying not to hurt too badly, treating her with respect.

Catra did none of that. She didn't even bother to show the slightest remorse or hesitate one second before clawing at her back and face.

Catra, in fact, is less violent with the sort of strangers that are Bow and Glimmer. She tackles Bow to the ground and hisses at him, that's it. Adora? Tearing at her skin, kicking her in the back, grabbing her by the face, torturing her, etc

War is not an excuse

"Catra's backstory! It's how they were raised! She's a victim of abuse copying her abuser because she doesn't know any better! She's lashing out!"

Cool backstory, still abuse.

Okay. She's lashing out. Doesn't excuse it. She is still actively harming Adora, and if she really can't control herself or see the wrong in it like some people claim, then that only supports the fact she is NOT good for Adora.

•Trying to kill them

The portal.

Catra knew what was going to happen.

She knew what she was going to cause.

She looked Adora dead in the eyes and pulled the switch anyways.

She didn't care as long as Adora lost. She is willing to let Adora die in order to win.

"But Catra wanted to die too!"

Okay. That doesn't matter. That doesn't justify anything. Being suicidal does not justify attempted murder.

"But (any excuse)!"

I honest to god do not care.

Just like Adora said:

"I didn't make you pull the switch. You made your choice. Now live with it!"

There is NO conceivable way for Catra knowingly doing what she did just so Adora didn't win to be okay.

She tried to kill the woman she supposedly loved.

That is not excusable.

That is not love.

And what's worse is after Adora begins to accept that Catra will not change and that trying to be peaceful will not work. Being together again is a dream. And the show rips that away.

•The victim is immensely afraid of/distressed by their abuser

Adora is absolutely terrified of Catra, or at the very least a bit afraid of her.

Every time Catra grabs Adora by the face or pins her down, Adora's eyes are wide with fear or at the very least immense discomfort.

In Roll With It, Adora is incredibly distressed and works herself into a complete state because nobody is considering what Catra will do.

"But Adora just wants to see Catra! She's thinking about her obsessively like this, it's a sign of her feelings!"

Adora knows what Catra is capable of. She knows what will happen to them if they aren't prepared. Planning out every possible option because of what could happen is not a sign of her feelings. It's a sign that she knows Catra will show no mercy, and she does not want the mission to fail or her friends to get hurt.

While Catra isn't directly present here, this is all because of her actions. Actions that have a reason, but not an excuse.

It is not healthy or romantic for your love interest to be afraid of you.

Moving on

At the end of the portal incident, Adora stared at Catra with cold eyes that clearly said "You've crossed a line"

It is here that many critics agrees that it's a bit late for Catra to have a redemption, because this truly was above anything else she had ever done.

This was where they could have had Adora move on from Catra and begin unlearning all the negative things Catra and others have embedded in her psyche.

If they did manage to do Catra's redemption right, whether during S5 or before it, I think it would've been best for the two of them to separate. It's made clear with how being away from the Horde and Adora made Catra happier when she was in the Crimson Waste.

I don't think either of then should've been in romantic relationships at all. Horde soldiers don't even know what proper food is, they've never heard of basic things like parties and the like.

I think it would've been better for them to slowly heal in their own time, Adora being happy with her newfound friends and learning the ways of Etheria and Catra staying in the Crimson Waste or somewhere else.

Romance should've been something to come to them when they've both matured and healed, and with different people.

Spop had the perfect opportunity to show that even if an abuser has trauma it is still abuse and it is not selfish to walk away.

It doesn't how sorry they are, it doesn't matter how much they claimed to have changed.

You are not obligated to be with them.

You are not obligated to be their punching bag just so they can be happy.

But spop didn't take that opportunity.

Instead this behaviour is excused or romanticised.

And the fact that the creator says this is based off his own relationship makes me deeply concerned.

......................................

A/N: Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed and that this wasn't too much of a mess! If you disagree with me, feel free to give your reasons and I will happily discuss with you. If you're just going to call me a homophobe and throw a fit and start fights, you can screw off

Tagging: @spop-romanticizes-abuse

[mmmeto]

Desperately horny tonight, so a little story time. Moreso an imagine, if you will:

You’ve spent the entire weekend home with your increasingly ailing partner, and god, are you beginning to question your intentions. Sure, you’ve explored your own interests here and there, and you’ve known for a while that vomit especially gets you going, but watching your typically lighthearted and lively partner slowly succumbing to the effects of a nasty belly bug is weighing you down rather heavily—much like their poor, ailing tummy.

It’s easy at first, ignoring the way your own chest flutters as they finally admit to feeling “a little sick.” It starts out small, with warm cuddles on the couch and your favorite movies playing on the TV while you gently rub soothing circles into their roiling tummy. It’s not until they sit upright, hand hovering over their mouth as their muscles tense beneath your touch, that you begin feeling a little too warm.

It’s probably just lunch, you assure them, hoping to settle things before either of you gets too worked up. Maybe they’d like some water, some more belly rubs? No, they say. No, they feel worse no. They feel sick—pukey sick. They think… they think they’re gonna throw up.

You can feel it building. As their skin pales, their gaze cloudy and their expression strained, your heart begins beating a little faster. There’s an unmistakable heat burning between your legs now, and you almost feel a little sick yourself, sick with anticipation. You don’t want this for them, of course. You hate seeing them suffer, but…

It’s loud, and messy, and it does happen. First you’re crouched in the bathroom, squirming where you sit on your knees, thighs rubbing together subconsciously as you stroke a palm up and down their back and brush back sticky hair from their sweaty face, cooing sweet assurances with a shaky voice. It’s hot, it’s so hot, and you’re desperate to pin them against the toilet rim, desperate to strip them from the waist down and fuck them into the porcelain, feel their belly clench and spasm beneath your hand as you hump them and grind against them, fingers working to get them off as well. But you don’t. You’re hot now, hot and sweaty and horny, but you keep yourself composed.

Hours pass, and suddenly you’re lying together in bed again. They lie on their side, head on your lap, trash bin nearby. A hand strokes through their hair, but your mind is elsewhere. You’ve given up speaking by now, too overwhelmed by the urge to pant and moan and beg, too desperate to encourage them to keep whimpering, keep telling you just how sick and nauseous they feel. Somewhere along the line they seem to take notice, as once you look back down to study their prone frame, your nervous gaze meets their red, glassy eyes. They’re feverish, confused, but they seem worried. They know something’s up, and so do you.

What’s wrong? They say, shaky hand reaching up to grasp you arm gently. What’s the matter? Are you sick? Are you uncomfortable? You seem… hot. So warm. Are you sick? No? Are you okay?

God, how you want to shove your fingers down their throat, holding them by the head and tugging on their hair, forcing your hand as deep down their throat as it’ll go as they squirm in your lap and bring up small, desperate streams of vomit and bile and soft, burpy moans. You want to fuck them silly, watch them choke and gag on your fingers as they helplessly retch up the remaining acid and water that managed to stay down between the waves of nausea they’ve experienced throughout the night. You’re desperate, so desperate…

You’re fine, you tell them. Meanwhile, as they turn away, moaning softly in relief as you rub their head, you slip your free hand past the waistband of your pants.

[lwtkmm]

They loved you, didn't they ?

After story

Hello luvs.

This is an aftermath to my replaced mc au , So before you read this make sure to read the series to understand the plot better.

They loved you, didn't they?

Remember, you are loved, you are special, you are worth it, your presence matters and you are beautiful.

.

.

.

.

.

" Thank you, please visit again. " You sighed as the last cake for the day was sold before you returned to your abode.

Every day was a busy day, your bakery was quite a popular one.

You trashed your stuff on the couch and dumped yourself on the bed. Ahh soft sheets, you could fall asleep even in your work clothes .

You were tossing sides on the bed, deciding to sleep in your then clothes or to get up to change when a small picture frame , lying on one of your shelves caught your attention. You got up and held it in your hands, to look at it.

There you were, your younger self, in a certain uniform that brought back memories, bitter ones.

Devildom. It has been 3 years since you left the once loved ones behind, for your own good. The loved ones who unloved you. Not once did you not cry when you thought about them. It was years ago but the impact they left on you was always going to be there with you.

Magic, that was once the topic of your interest, was now something you really despised.

But not everything was bad about devildom. With this thought a 'ding' sound was heard. It was your phone, well not particularly your phone, your D. D. D, the one that pretty butler had sneaked to you before you left.

It only had 3 contacts : luke, Raphael, Barbatos.

The others didn't know about it and even if they did, barbatos made sure that nobody texted you . You didn't want them in your life again , you were much healthier without them.

It was Luke who had texted you. He texted you everyday, secretly, cause he didn't want Simeon to know about it, not that he was under Simeon anymore.

After you left, Luke became more close to Raphael, Simeon didn't believe you and made you feel pathetic about yourself. And in Luke's eyes, that was unforgivable, you were precious to him and anybody who hurted you was his enemy, even if it was Simeon.

Luke and you were talking about your day, how your bakery seems to empty every day.

' Mc I'm so proud of you! In no time you'll be the best baker in the human world! '

' I think so, since I learned it from the best, isn't it Luke? '

You recieved another message. The pretty butler of the demon prince .

Barbatos.

Something about that name always made you nervous.

' mc, are you free right now? '

' yes barbs, what is it? '

' I've been meaning to tell you this for some time now. But i didn't because, I didn't know how you'd react. '

' just say it barbs, If it's coming from you then it must be something reasonable'

' so .. Would you like to come to Devildom? '

' what? '

' can you come to the Devildom? '

' barbs? Why? '

' mc. Let me explain'

' no barbs, why would you ask that! Never! '

' mc, please listen '

' there's no reason I'd come to that place again '

' not even for me? '

' well.. '

' please listen mc. So you see. Lord Diavolo is going to be crowned as the king of the Devildom. And he told me that there was something he really wished on such a big event of his life, he wanted you to be there. Look Mc, I know what happened with you was unjust. But please Mc, for my sake, it will make M'lord really happy, it's his utmost wish '

How ironic, the prospective Demon king who once wanted to throw you out of the Devildom , wanted your Attendance. You didn't wanted to say no to Barbatos but nor did you wanted to go to Devildom.

' I'll think about it barbs, just thinking about Devildom makes me feel.. Bad.'

' I understand it Mc, I'll wait for your answer'

You dropped your D. D .D to the floor and ran inside the bathroom, panting. You washed your face a couple of times so as to forget what just happened.

Why barbatos?

Why Diavolo?

After all these years.

Why did they wanted to involve themselves with you again.

But..

You didn't know why, but you had this strong urge to see him.

You would have lied to yourself if you didn't admit that talking to Barbatos made you feel at ease.

In these 3 years of time, he was always there, at your ups and downs, although the visits were very rare , he always made his presence felt. You knew that there was someone who you could confide into.

Now that , he had a request, you couldn't say no. Although the idea of you being in the devildom again dreaded you .

You got into the shower. You were literally drowning with stress and wanted to take some thoughts off you. You stared at your body in the mirror. There was only one pact mark on your body , that once activated , glowed in dark green.

You ran your fingers across the places where the other pact marks used to be. It had been a very long time since you had gotten rid of them.

Why have pact marks when the Demons once loathed it so much?

You fell on the bed, hands outstretched and looked up at the ceiling . You had a long journey ahead . Journey you weren't prepared for.

************

You didn't even know when the time passed so quickly and currently you were standing in between the Pentagon, as green light surrounded you sucking you in.

You were being teleported.

To devildom.

The light was so bright that you squeezed your eyes shut and next thing you knew, you were lying on a cold ground.

" ... Up" You could hear faint voices.

" Mc... Get up " Someone was calling out to you.

You recognized that and immediately opened your eyes. It was him.

The pretty butler, with the usual smile on his face.

Oh you missed him so much, you couldn't help but throw your arms around his neck.

"Barbatos!! "

"Mc, " He gave you a genuine smile. " Did you miss me "

Before you could answer, you heard someone say.

" Welcome to the devildom, Mc " The tanned, red haired to be king, walked towards you, the once pride of heaven by his side. They looked at you with excitement yet apologetic eyes.

Your eyes met rubies of the pride demon and he immediately diverted his gaze. He couldn't look you in the eye.

" Mc. Thank you. Thank you for being here , it makes me so happy." Diavolo continued.

" Hmm, my pleasure, prince diavolo " You replied, after all these years of no contact, you didn't know how to talk to or address him properly.

The formality in your voice made the prince really broken. You both were once so close and friendly with each other and now, every thing had vanished and it was all his fault.

Lucifer still hadn't spoken anything, yet he kept staring at you, hoping that you'd notice him and would strike up a conversation.

The four of you - Diavolo, Lucifer in tow and barbatos by your side, went to the council room. You could hear angry and teasing noises. But as soon as the door opened , everyone went silent.

All eyes were on you.

But this time, you walked in confidently.

The room was silenced by your presence until a little angel with blonde hair ran towards you with teary eyes.

" Mc!!!!! I missed you so much! " Luke ran and jumped into your arms .

Your heart swelled with love and affection for the little boy.

" Luke my sweet boy, I missed you a lot "

Luke was already weeping in your arms.

" Now now Luke , it's my turn to greet mc" Raphael looked at you, still with a poker face but you knew he was genuinely happy to see you.

" Mc... How yer doin'...."

Tch. A distraction. You turned towards him, Mammon looked at you with guilty eyes and a broken expression. Na-huh that ain't gonna work on you anymore.

" I've been doing really well, Avatar of greed, very well without bad influences " Ouch! You saw the brothers' face twist in regret.

From across the room, you saw a pretty angel looking at you, you ignored his lingering gaze . You didn't need simeon in your life anymore. Neither did you need the Sorcerer who had tried to make amends with you on several occasions after you left the devildom , to the point that you had to summon Barbatos since Solomon refused to leave without You forgiving him. You were doing far better without any of them .

"Let's get you home mc-" Barbatos held your hand.

" Yes back to house of lamentation " Asmodeus cut off.

Asmodeus, the fake lover who betrayed you .

" No, Asmodeus, I meant home , the Demon Lord's castle . " Barbatos said sarcastically, still with a smile which creeped the brothers out.

It was not a smile of happiness rather a smile of warning.

Barbatos gently led you out of the room, your stuff in one hand and other holding yours.

Diavolo might be his master but he definitely didn't want to mess with Barbatos .

**********

Barbatos prepared the nicest room for you, nearer to his. After making sure that you were comfortable and cozy enough, He kissed your forehead to go something for you to eat.

That kiss ....

It made you feel butterflies . It was so soft, endearing and warm. You instantly felt your cheeks burn.

Barbatos... What have you done .

He came in again, with some really appetizing food. But it's not the food you cared about.

" Thank you barbs " You smiled.

" It's my duty Mc " He smiled back.

There was a silence between you two, you kept staring at him, and each second you cheeks flushed harder.

He turned around to leave, but you didn't wanted him to. You wanted to spend time with him. You immediately held his hand.

"Hm? Is something wrong Mc? Is the food not good? "

" No.. It's not that.. I.. You know. Barbs.. "

He tilted his head in confusion, " What is it Mc? "

" I.. Barbs.. "

"You look really tired Mc, even your face looks red, I think you should get some rest. Call me if you need anything " He smiled at you and left the room .

You sat there in silence.

Did he really not understand? The way you were staring at him with heart eyes or maybe.. He didn't like you in that way.

You immediately felt your heart sinking, feeling sad again. Maybe you shouldn't really expect a demon to love you.

He won't love you , he would never.

That night you fell asleep holding back your tears as a lump formed in your throat.

You're just a human. A toy .

************

It was the day of coronation.

You watched as Diavolo was being declared as the king of Devildom. He looked at you with sparkling eyes but your longing gazes were for his pretty butler.

It was at that moment you realized that Barbatos was so much perfect and you were not, he'd never love you.

The ceremony was over and people were interacting, you didn't even bother to look at the brothers. You went straight to the open balcony. You stood there as the cool breeze of the moonlight brushed against your face and you again felt a dry lump forming in your throat.

" Gorgeous" You were startled by a voice.

You opened your eyes, knowing who it was.

" Yes it's a gorgeous night " You said as you stared into the open sky.

Barbatos seemed to be a little taken aback by your response " I was talking about you "

"Hm? " You looked at him. He was looking at you, again with that warm smile.

No no no mc, you can't cry.

Yet you couldn't hold back, warm tears started streaming down your face.

" Mc? " Barbatos was shocked, seeing you cry was the last thing he wanted. He pulled you in his arms.

" What's wrong mc " The sadness in his voice was unbearable for you.

"Nothing.. It's just... You'll never feel the same about me barbatos. I'm not perfect, I never was and I never will be. I'm just a human, I wouldn't even be able to stay with you forever. You need someone like you to be your partner, smart, charming, loveable. I keep telling myself to move on but i just seem to can't move on. I'm really pathetic. I-"

Before you could continue, he pressed his lips against yours.

His lips, so tender and soft and so full of love.

You just melted away under his touch. It was like a tonic to your broken heart.

He parted away from your lips and looked into your eyes, his stare was so gentle and his eyes just beamed love and affection.

" Mc, please. Please don't say that about yourself. Me? Perfect? I'm far away from that . You're an angel in disguise my sweetheart. You make me perfect . You fill all my flaws and imperfections. If there's someone who shouldn't be worth love, then that should be me, the wicked demon."

He cupped your face and you could see the pearl like tears that fell from his eyes "I love you my blossom, I always had and I always did in all these years you were gone. Everyday I keep drowning into your love more and deeper . There hasn't been a day that I haven't loved you. It's you or nobody. "

Every word just dripped love for you, love felt sweet, so amazing. This is how love really felt like.

" I love you too Barbatos and I always will" You felt so safe in his embrace, so loved and so happy.

As you closed your eyes, you could hear his heartbeat, that's when it hit you .

That night, when you heard an unfamiliar voice in your mind, that echoed over the evil wicked ones, that helped you regain your own self, it was him, it was Barbatos' voice. The image was clear in your mind. Him stretching his hands for you to take. Then nothing else mattered. It was him who mattered.

He was always there for you, knowingly or not.

Your heart always belonged to him. You both were meant to be together.

Coming to the Devildom all those years ago wasn't a bad thing after all, it brought you to your love.

As you both embraced each other, the moonlight shining over your smile , you knew that life would be worth something now.

You smiled to yourself.

Your demon.

Your love.

Barbatos.

"When you put your

arms around me,

I know I'm home "

.

.

.

(Alternative Ending) soon

The End

I've been wanting to finish this for such a long a long time but study got hold of me. This might not be on of my best works but i love all of you. Thanks for loving this Au so much, have a nice day luvs ❤

[scintillyyy]

actually there is another super interesting way in which you can tell dixon is trying to narratively reward steph for her perserverence (aside from writing her to fit his sexist worldview and rewarding her for that) & almost the... "pick oneself up by their bootstraps and succeed no matter your circumstances and what barriers there may be" narrative he kind of has for her and that is with the evolving nature of her social class through her appearances while he writes her imo (the ultimate bootstraps story that conservatives love) (which also contributes to the vast difference of interpretations of steph's economic status)

so honestly, in her first appearance in detective comics #647-649 she is very much coded as coming from a background of lower class/working poor/welfare stereotypes with a criminal father and an addict mother.

their house is visibly run down & not taken care of. crystal is emaciated and wears a robe all day/doesn't bother to get dressed, doctor shops for pills, and is whiny about how she'll get sicker without the prescription pills she's addicted to (you know nothing about crystal's initial aesthetics screams welfare queen imagery to me, tbh. they certainly don't seem to be implied to be "scamming the system just to live it up on steaks and lobster" and dixon would be way more overt about welfare fraud. i would call this more "white trash poor person" imagery as i imagine he sees it.).

interestingly though is the framing of steph by dixon as incredibly positive in comparison to her surroundings. in a way she's conceived as someone who is fighting against the poor circumstances that she was born into--she's going to be spoiler and rise above her criminal father and compared to her mother who can't be bothered to get dressed because she's always high, steph's going to dress nicely. those jeans she's wearing? that back pattern pocket is pretty iconically calvin klein. those were like. status symbol jeans of the 90s. now i'm not here to argue about affordability indicating she's way richer than she actually is here, because this was the 90s and steph very much could have afforded nice clothes and a vespa for herself on her summer/part-time job (in fact the clothes she wears on her vespa are pretty implied to be some sort of part-time job uniform), but it's a very interesting contrast that dixon draws, especially considering his biases. like you can tell he thinks that steph is in no way responsible for her circumstances (it's not her fault that her dad is a criminal and her mom is an addict) & and that being born into her circumstances don't mean she's doomed to end up like them--as long as she works hard and does the right thing, she'll be rewarded. in this case, she'll present herself as higher class/act classier than her unfortunate surroundings (via her external presentation of herself--she'll work hard and get the things she deserves for her hard work and effort) & resoundingly reject following her criminal father's footsteps by becoming the spoiler in order to cement herself as Not Like That. like he went out of his way to make her circumstances be more stereotypically poor and then show her as being above all that. she's the noble poor to her unfortunate white trash circumstances. (which is in line with dixon's classism and conservative viewpoint that it's okay to be poor, as long as you're white and don't act like those people do and hate your circumstances/are motivated to rise above them).

and this thread of how crystal is/stephanie's circumstances continues through crysal's next two appearances in robin #3 and showcase '95 #5 (though this was was written by keri kowalski, not dixon). she's still presented with very stereotypical aesthetics: she's never dressed, at this point, it's not implied she works...

and again, you can tell that dixon likes steph despite the fact that he wrote her as poor in her initial appearances because he often writes her as though he considers her above her circumstances (because those aren't her fault and she's working hard to not be like that).

the interesting thing is how this evolves once crystal kicks her addiction. which. frankly, i don't believe we ever see exactly when this happens? she's still an addict in showcase '95, but by her next appearance in robin #43 in 1997, she seems to. certainly be different than she was portrayed in her few initial appearances and appears to probably be sober at this point.

she's well put together and clearly employed, a far cry from the initial imagery dixon initially used for her. now it doesn't say she's a nurse here, just that she works at the hospital, but the white shoes and dress are an imagery giveaway. and now making steph's mom a nurse is actually kind of a soft retcon of her previously implied situation and a pretty interesting one at that because nursing--nursing and teaching occupations back in the 80s and 90s (and even today for nursing) iirc were considered good jobs to the middle class, on account of them being professional and steady jobs that required a degree of some sort that couldn't be automated or sent overseas (and there's a shortage, they need nurses!), like other jobs that were being lost at the time. so by making her mom a nurse, dixon was explicitly cementing their family circumstances as middle class as opposed to implied poor like their very initial appearances (or even what might've been considered "working class" at the time by certain economic theories, given that nursing isn't necessarily considered an "unskilled" job and does require college + it may be considered a pink collar job but in general there's good job security so it's such a gray area) (forgive my use of quotations here, i don't personally believe that jobs are unskilled and that the working class is a nebulous term that is illdefined and covers many different jobs with vastly different potential salary opportunities. a union working class electrician could very well be upper middle class based on salary, low cost of living, and lack of debt compared to someone who works at minimum wage, lives in a HCOL area, and has 75k in college loans but both are considered working class because they provide labor for wages) (i'm thinking of a 90s working class that was viewed between the middle class and the poor that consisted of a lot of what people considered blue collar or routizined work, but again, that means almost nothing in terms of salary potential and economic opportunity. plumber and warehouse worker are both considered blue collar, but their economic circumstances can vastly differ, but i digress-)

which is actually a pretty interesting evolution to her initial implied socioeconomic circumstances. because if her mom is a nurse & has a middle class job, then their economic issues previously weren't necessarily just that they were poor. it's that they were middle class fallen on hard times. which also coincides with the shift in the 90s where people were starting to be frightened of the middle class getting ravaged by the opioid/drug crisis. so now crystal isn't a stereotypical poor white trash addict, she's a middle-class worker who fell on hard times. and if they were struggling with finances, it wasn't that they were poor, it was more to do with struggling on account of crystal's addictions and having to deal with steph's dad/pay for him/he used their money and house for his villainy. and you end up because of this retcon having this issue where yea, she was initially presented as poor. but for the vast majority of her appearances, when she more consistently started to have a presence, she's written as middle class fallen on hard times. and you get this dissonance in her reading where it's like, yea, at the beginning, she was poor (and in far more stereotypical circumstances), so you can't say she never struggled financially. but also to claim she's just poor is to go against a lot of imagery that indicates more of a lower middle class (middle class, but struggling/tighter finances/no significant wiggle room), such as having a mom who's a nurse, having a home computer, etc. and in this case i really don't think this was just a case of dixon not knowing how to write a poor person (though that's definitely somewhat involved, this is dixon after all), because the choice of profession for her mother and giving her access to a home computer in the 90s and the overall improvement of her perceived home environment as the series progressed do seem like a deliberate choice on dixon's part. he probably would have known that nursing was considered a "good, steady" job to have.

anyways, i don't necessarily think this retcon is. necessarily worst thing in the world. it's much less stereotypical than poor/bad people are in poor/bad situations because of their choices and it acknowledges that people in all socioeconomic tiers can struggle with issues like crime and addiction.

alright, continuing on. there's an interesting thread in the steph pregnancy arc that has crystal ruminate on how steph ended up that way because crystal was a bad influence for marrying arthur and the pills. but because chuck has decided that the browns are more lower middle class than straight lower class there's a bit of a redemption/reimagining of his initial poor view of crystal once she gets sober and a marked improvement in the appearance of their socioecomonic status. take robin #58 for example.

crystal gets to support and affirm steph, be present (unlike her initial appearances). and in robin #84 after she's aware of steph's going out as spoiler after having recently found the spoiler costume (and trying to put her down about it--compared to when steph was doing spoiler stuff in the kitchen and her mom didn't even notice because she was high) and the visual design of the inside of their their house has definitely improved from run down to standard middle class, fairly nice looking.

which again feels fairly deliberate to me. because it doesn't just seem like dixon not understanding what it means to be poor, there's a deliberate moving of steph's socioeconomic status up more towards middle class once her mom gets sober which i feel like aligns nicely with chuck's viewpoint that if you're poor, you're poor because of bad choices and once you make good choices you can settle back into relative comfort.

and notably he gives even bigger reward to crystal for kicking her habit and make better choices and renouncing her husband's criminal ways (when she found out steph was spoiler and turned him in she was like "hah, serves him right"--compare this to when she was implied to be visiting him in steph's first appearance and she was being presented poorly): she, like steph, will now get sympathy for being put in a situation out of her control and the hard times that have fallen upon them. in robin #93 and #94 arthur comes home and parks himself there and nobody likes it.

and yea, they're shown to be struggling--crystal doesn't have extra money laying around to hire a lawyer to kick our her husband--a long, arduous, expensive process (+in robin #94 she's shown as being fed up with the court process as well). but rather than her being treated bad by narrative for not having money, she's presented quite sympathetically. she doesn't want them there or have anything to do with them. she's a hardworking, middle class woman who maybe fell on hard times because of her past addictions and having a criminal husband, but because she did the right thing and got clean and renounced those ways. she's not being seen as culpable to the situation--she's being seen as a victim of it this time. anyways, dixon eventually resolves the situation by sending dinah over to kick out the villains inhabiting her home, which shows that he thinks that they're (crystal and steph) deserving of being saved from the circumstances that keep them down (because they're hardworking people who are actively trying to get out of their situation and better themselves). and it aligns quite nicely with his conservative view of the world, that people who work hard get rewarded for their hard work and good things happen to them.

like i'm not going to pretend that the browns are rich by any means. they're clearly not. but there's an interesting way in which dixon improves steph's class as a reward for her perserverence. the last mention we get of any potential class by dixon is her conversation with tim in robin #100 where tim is catastrophizing about the loss of his money (which i know is nagl), but it also doesn't exactly imply she's poor and she's not exactly mad at him for being tone-deaf. she's just matter of fact about not understanding the big deal--just that she fights crime on a budget. so it's more her way of telling tim that he doesn't have to worry about the money thing/going down to middle class when it comes to being robin--after all, she's done just fine as spoiler by being smart with her money. which is actually fairly in line with dixon's viewpoint that if you make good decisions with your money, you'll do just fine and can/should afford to do what you want.

his biases and politics are sooo obvious with the browns tbh. all in all, the way he writes the browns (crystal & stephanie) wrt class i get a lot of flavors of that stupid fucking hillbilly elegy book. they're not poor welfare recipients because they're the true, hardworking people who deserve to be middle class. they were down on their luck and made bad decisions and had unfortunate things happen to them (arthur, crystal's addiction), but they overcame that like good hardworking americans (became spoiler, got sober) and as a result their economic situation improves as god intended. anyways, like i said before. it makes it so hard to be like "yea, steph was poor!" without leaning into dixon's stereotypes of poor people (addiction, criminality) and when he does write them as poor/struggling he writes them as the "true poor" "the good poor people who would never depend on aid, they just work hard to reject their circumstances and elevate themselves as they should". but it's also hard to uncomplicatedly say she was middle class, because despite being presented as lower middle class for a lot of her appearances, it's also another part of dixon's classism that has him improving their economic class over time because it's an improvement inexorably linked to his belief that hardworking americans can just pull themselves up by their bootstraps because he shows steph and crystal doing just that.

& i think of how it was initially dixon's idea to maybe make steph robin in a storyline & i can't help but feel that's almost a continuation/conclusion of the bootstraps narrative he has for steph.

idk it's just hard for me to say that dixon looked down on steph for being poor/being lower middle class because her story of self-improvement is so tied to the conservative belief of upward mobility with hard work. it's extremely classist. and yet it's still there. on the paper.

bonus, just to prove he sees them (the browns) as a lower middle class family who wouldn't be struggling so much if the government would just stop taking all their money in taxes:

[johaerys-writes]

The Troy movie kills off Menelaus. Agree or disagree with the script change?

There is literally NO script change in the Troy movie that I agree with lmao, and Menelaus dying is no exception. Like where do I even begin? From the fact that it is blatantly incorrect? That it completely disregards and throws in the trash Menelaus' later role in the Iliad? That he is supposed to protect and carry Patroclus' body back to the camp (hello??) That he is supposed to survive the war and take Helen back to Sparta (an important detail of the Epic Cycle), and then also appear in the Odyssey to welcome Telemachus and his crew in his home? Like who is supposed to do all those things if Menelaus is dead?

And, okay, let's say that the directors of a shitty Hollywood movie don't give a shit about all that. You have Menelaus of Sparta, the owner of the finest thighs in the Achaean army, be killed by Hector?? Fucking-- Hector? Like I'm willing to forgive a lot but this is just irredeemable. First of all, Hector would never. To have him intercept the duel that is meant to decide the course of the war and which was agreed upon by both sides, to save his bro from supposedly ruthless, bloodthirsty Menelaus? That's just such nonsense characterisation and something unthinkable in the world of the Iliad, a transgression permissible only to a god-- which is what actually happens in the story. Like, I really don't know if Hector or Paris would have been able to go back to Troy and face the Trojan soldiers after having done something like that. The fact that Paris violated Menelaus' hospitality and took off with Helen is a huge thing all by itself, but the fact that Aphrodite had a hand in it is what makes it somewhat acceptable; to have their princes disgrace and humiliate themselves and Troy as a whole like that I think would be a step too far. How the directors even thought of changing something so basic is beyond me.

Second of all, the Troy movie's obsession with framing Hector as the ultimate, most noblest heroic hero PISSES ME OFF like nothing else. As I've said in a previous ask, there are no "heroes" in the modern sense in the Iliad. "Hero" in the Iliad simply means a warrior, a person who does things. The Trojans and the Greeks are similar in customs, battle prowess, culture and refinement despite the infighting and constant bickering of both sides, and despite the fact that the Achaeans are in an imperialistic war against the Trojans. I've heard the argument that the Achaeans are the "barbaric invaders" and the Trojans the "noble invaded" far too often and I simply disagree, this has never been my takeaway while reading the Iliad. Hector, although he's Troy's most powerful, illustrious, loyal defender, a god-honouring person who is kind to his wife, his child, his aging father and mother (there's a lot to sympathise with when it comes to his character), is just as foolhardy, self-important, stubborn, opportunistic and human as any of the Achaeans he interacts with, he isn’t portrayed as being "morally superior" than them in any way because such a thing is irrelevant in the Iliad. It's just not the point of the Iliad to put anyone on a pedestal and elevate them above the others, the humans in the story take a lot of risks and initiatives and their personal struggles matter, but at the end of the day they are all ultimately powerless against the forces of fate and the will of the gods.

TL;DR: to have Menelaus die in the film, and die in such an idiotic way, is a weak-ass, pathetic move that shows no respect for the source material whatsoever, or any of the central characters.

Thanks for the ask! 💙

[aparticularbandit]

Oh No, It's Again

Summary: Makoto wakes while everyone slumbers and makes his way to an unlocked kitchen and sees her standing there, bag of Cheetos in one hand and a pair of chopsticks in the other, munching them a little too loudly, and when she holds the bag out to him, he doesn’t take it.

If I kill you, will that stop everything?

She grins.  Won’t know if you won’t try, will you, lucky boy?

~

Inspired by this post, but absolutely nothing like it.

Mostly.

Rating: M for graphic depictions of violence and general Danganronpa reasons.

AO3

The first time Makoto falls down the garbage chute, still locked to a desk that, along with him, was meant to be crushed by a compactor, he reminisces about when he first came to Hope’s Peak Academy.

Then he hits the floor head first and has just enough time to hear the cracking of his skull, the sharp shattering of his spine, before everything goes black.

~

The second time Makoto falls down the garbage chute, still locked to what is probably that exact same desk, he has a sharp sense of déjà vu.  He muses on this for a few seconds, brow furrowing, until he lands, again head first, his neck snapping at a sharp angle.

This time, though, his eyes are open, and he sees everything, but not enough.

~

Makoto doesn’t eat a lot of food, but he finds himself throwing a lot away.

A lot of trash.  A lot of excess.

He feels bad about it, at first, because it’s just such a waste of food, and there are starving people all over the world, and it doesn’t really matter that they for some reason have unlimited food in Hope’s Peak (maybe, if they weren’t in the middle of a Killing Game – and what sort of person refers to this as a game? – it would be great to bring everyone here.  Unlimited food!  No one would need to starve! But first they need to get out of this alive)—

It’s not like he knows why he’s doing this.

Just something…something in him tells him that there needs to be more trash.

More trash.

Like it’s some sort of life-or-death matter.

~

It takes at least another seventy-eight respawns before Makoto survives in the garbage chute.

(Then she temples her fingers together and leans forward with an intrigued grin on her face.  Finally, something interesting.)

~

The first time Junko faces the trash compactor, she glances up, waiting to see if Alter Ego will appear to save her the same way it saved Makoto.

~

Sayaka Maizono hesitates before attacking Leon.

He catches her in the attempt, and he attacks back.

She dies in the bathroom of the boy she’d meant to frame, blood-tipped finger trying hopelessly to write her murderer’s name on the wall beside her, everything going black before she can finish.

~

The second time, Junko doesn’t even glance up.  She knows how this story ends.

She also knows how to get out.

Ultimate Analyst, baby!

~

Sayaka Maizono hesitates before attacking Leon, and when he attacks her, she has a strong, strong sense of déjà vu.

Unfortunately, she is not the only one.

Leon cuts her fingers off while she’s still alive, but he’s an idiot and tries to throw them in the incinerator, too.  A few of them make it in, sure, and there’s such a stench that everyone complains as soon as they wake up.  The problem is that not all of them make it in.

Makoto might be a lot of things – he might even be a murderer! – but no one believes that he would chop Sayaka’s fingers off.

Or try to burn them.

~

Chihiro doesn’t ask Mondo for help; he asks Taka.

Mondo, desperate to keep his secret exactly as it is, strangles Byakuya for being a prick.

(She laughs a bit at that.  She’s been waiting on someone to shut him up.)

Unfortunately, without Byakuya to mess with the scene, Mondo’s caught easily.

Kyoko, impressive as always, matches Mondo’s fingerprints to the bruises on Byakuya’s neck.

Before they get to the trial, Jack snaps.  Mondo isn’t killed with the same care and consideration that her other victims were given.  In fact, the only reason they even know that the bloody mess is Mondo is because he’s the only one missing.

(It’s the most gruesome murder she’s seen, and she’s seen a lot of murders.)

Jack cackles as she’s led to her death.

Except that she sneezes, and Toko doesn’t know why she’s being flayed alive with her own scissors.  She doesn’t know why, but she understands, and the despair on her face when she finds out that Byakuya, too, is gone—

(Oh, if only it could be like this every time.  But, then, she’s seen this now.  It won’t be as good next time.)

~

Sayaka Maizono doesn’t hesitate, but she hasn’t thought through the follow-up.

Everything else proceeds as normal, other than killing her at the Class Trial instead of Leon.

She dances herself to death with red hot iron shoes, her screams tuned into music.

(She’d been proud of herself for that one and glad to find an opportunity to finally use it!)

Makoto doesn’t get enough trash in the garbage this time, too distraught over Sayaka actually killing someone, and breaks his neck.  This time, some of his brains splatter out!

(This would be a lot cooler if she hadn’t seen that thirty respawns ago.)

~

Sayaka Maizono succeeds.

Everyone votes for Makoto as the murderer.

She didn’t realize her success would mean everyone else dies.

Rather than graduating at the top of her class like a good girl does, she jumps down the garbage chute.

Now, Makoto definitely has not had enough time to fill the garbage with enough trash to soften that blow, but Sayaka doesn’t land on her head.  She breaks both of her legs and starves to death after eating what garbage can be found.

~

The next time, Sayaka realizes enough to throw herself in the incinerator instead of down the garbage chute.

It’s immensely painful, but it doesn’t last nearly as long.

(She snacks on Cheetos after the Trial, licks the orange dust from her fingertips with a sigh, and resets the chess pieces.)

~

Makoto, tired of falling down the garbage chute, doesn’t sacrifice himself for Kyoko.

Of course, he can’t remember falling down the garbage chute, but something in the back of his head says, Hey, don’t help Kyoko.  You’re going to die if you do, and she’s not worth saving, and for once in his life, he listens.

Kyoko dies, and the only thing they hear before everything goes black is, “Boring,” in the voice of someone who should have been dead weeks ago.

~

Alter Ego steps in to save Kyoko, but Makoto doesn’t have the skeleton key, and she dies of starvation in the garbage, like Sayaka did, only without her legs broken.  Sometimes she yells through the hatch, sometimes she makes it all the way up the ladder and bangs on it, but Hiro’s still alive and he calls it a ghost in the system.

It doesn’t matter, they still don’t have the key, and it’s not like they can convince anyone else to jump down to save her.

(She leaves it running just long enough to hear Kyoko’s wheezing gasp and then restarts the Game.  It makes her stomach churn.  Almost as much as seeing the image of her own skeletal frame mimicked in Kyoko’s body.

There’s nothing fun about seeing someone you love starve to death.)

~

Sayaka succeeds.

Sayaka succeeds, and she doesn’t try to kill herself because even though she didn’t know her actions would cause everyone else to die, she did, somehow, and so she’s prepared for what it means to graduate, what it means to win, what it means to get out alive.

Sayaka looks up at the Mastermind with eyes wide with recognition and hears, “Can’t end the show on one episode!  Sorry, babe.”

(She’s cruel when she says that Sayaka’s band members are all dead.  Her despair is warm as a beating heart.)

~

Makoto doesn’t switch rooms with Sayaka, and when Leon goes to meet with her, they have a nice conversation about music, and nobody dies.

Makoto doesn’t switch rooms with Sayaka, but Hina still hides herself with Sakura, and instead of waking up one day to Leon or Sayaka’s murdered body, they wake up another day later to Hina having disappeared and the school smelling of burnt flesh.

The thing is, they all know what happened to Hina, but none of them actually discover her body, so there’s no announcement.

It feels a bit like this isn’t the right ending.

~

(This time, she gives Sakura explicit murder instructions.  No throwing bodies in the incinerator.  You have to die this time, Sakura.

Sakura tries to strangle her instead, which is a fun thought, except that she grins and grins and grins.)

~

(This time, she tells Sayaka that her band members are all alive.  Safe and sound.)

~

Makoto doesn’t switch rooms with Sayaka, and Makoto convinces Hina to sleep somewhere else, and Sakura rips off Celeste’s fake hair, and Mukuro looks up at the cameras with eyes that clearly ask, Is this what you wanted, sis?

~

The next time, Mukuro hesitates before the Spears of Gungnir hit her.  She looks up at the cameras and blinks twice.  Her head tilts ever so gently to one side.  Then her gaze flicks to the spears.  Her mouth makes a small, Oh.

(She hits the respawn button so hard that it nearly breaks.)

~

(It doesn’t matter.)

~

Mukuro hesitates before stepping on Monokuma and decides against it.  She doesn’t know why.  She trusts her sister, obviously, but something says not to provoke her right now.

Even if it is scripted.

~

When Chihiro doesn’t die, Alter Ego is a lot more aggressive.

(Unfortunately for them, she has her own Alter Ego by this point, working in the shadows, stopping them at every turn.)

~

Unfortunately for Mukuro, when she doesn’t get killed by the Spears of Gungnir, Sakura kills her instead.  Grabs her head between both hands and presses together until—

Well.

Mukuro tries to stop her.  Claws shreds in Sakura’s legs with the razor sharp bear claws she’s been given in the place of fingernails.

Her head explodes, eventually.  Blood and brain mixed together all over the walls.  Not as cool as when Jack killed Mondo, of course, but still pleasantly appealing.  It’s hard to even tell the difference between the pink of her blood and the pink of her brains.

Kyoko finds the small bits of flesh under Mukuro’s fake fingernails, notes the gauze wrapped around Sakura’s legs, and puts two and two together.

(Maybe next time Sakura should kill Kyoko.)

~

Mukuro turns before Sakura can grab her head between her hands, but it doesn’t do any good.

Sakura grabs her head between her thighs and smashes it faster.

(She’s not gonna lie – that was impressive.  She should save a video of that just for her own personal use.)

~

Sakura tries to strangle the Mastermind, and a still living Mukuro slits her throat before any harm can come to her.

Unfortunately, this is still considered a murder.

The Spears of Gungnir make a return!  It’s not as fun this time.

~

(This time, she tells Sayaka the truth: There is no escape.)

~

Sakura strangles Kyoko, and none of them are smart enough to figure out that she did it.

Sakura confesses at the end because, unlike Sayaka, she will never find it acceptable to sacrifice the rest of her classmates just to find out the truth.

~

Hina drowns in the swimming pool.

Chihiro is impaled with spears that, really, no one else should have access to.

Makoto thinks he’s seen all of this before, his stomach cramping with nothing but déjà vu.

~

(The Game is boring without Kyoko.

The Game is worse when she has the same memories everyone else does.

The Game suffers because even without her memories, Kyoko can’t be anyone other than who she is.

The unfortunate thing is that this has never worked out for her.  If she lost her memories, she would be an entirely different person.  But no one ever takes her memories.

Yasuke tried, sure, and would have succeeded if he had figured out a way to make it permanent.

Unfortunate, then, that she was the one to figure it out.

It could have saved so many problems.

Not least of which is how bored she is getting with this entire thing.)

~

Makoto wakes up.

Makoto walks into the front room to meet all of his new classmates.

Within thirty seconds, every single one of them is impaled.

He doesn’t understand what’s going on.

Blood trickles from his lips.

He looks up at video cameras and wonders who, in their right mind, would enjoy this sort of thing?

(No one.  She doesn’t even enjoy this.  She just had to do it.  At least once.  Just to see what would happen.)

~

This time, only most of them are impaled.

Makoto and Kyoko are both left alive.

Mukuro tries to pull a Sayaka and write something in her blood, but another spear stabs direct through both of her hands, stopping her.

Even without her memories, Kyoko knows enough to know that Makoto didn’t do something like this, although she doesn’t know how – or why – she knows this.  It’s baked into her blood, after all.

It’s not baked into Makoto’s blood, though.

He drops to his knees and sobs.

(There’s something fun about seeing Makoto break, she can’t deny that.  But even that gets boring after a while.

When Kyoko figures her out, she yawns.  She waves her fingers at Kyoko, who stares at her through the video cameras, and resets the Game again.)

~

Once, Mukuro points a gun at the back of the Mastermind’s head.

Enough.

The Mastermind just laughs.

What’s enough?

The Mastermind resets the Game again before Mukuro can stop her.

(Then she makes some changes in the code so that can’t happen again.)

~

Sakura catches the Mastermind exactly once.

She pops her head between her thighs with a strange sense of déjà vu.

But with the Mastermind dead, that should be it, shouldn’t it?  Everything should—

(She had to know.  She had to know what it felt like.  She planned it so that her hand would fall on the reset button as she died.)

~

Junko resets and she resets and she keeps her memory of every Game and she has clips here and there and everywhere.  When she gets bored, she replays some of her favorite moments, but they don’t have the same appeal they once did.  Unfortunately, she can feel herself growing tired even of those.

And while there are still a lot more versions of the Game she could run, a lot more deaths she could see, she’s….

Tired.

Sure, sure, in a real Game, there would be a secret ending to unlock if she got every ending, but let’s be real here, how long will that take?  And it’s not like there’s a guide for this, or anything like that.

Junko runs the pad of her thumb on the button and wonders just what would need to happen for Makoto to kill someone.

Then, she grins.

~

Makoto figures it out.

Kyoko doesn’t figure it out; Makoto does.

It’s something he can’t even name, something about seeing Junko’s freckles and Junko’s magazines, and it hits him like a wave of…of something.

That’s not figuring it out, of course.

He’d say he was remembering it, but it feels like…like there’s a lot he doesn’t remember.

~

Makoto wakes while everyone slumbers and makes his way to an unlocked kitchen and sees her standing there, bag of Cheetos in one hand and a pair of chopsticks in the other, munching them a little too loudly, and when she holds the bag out to him, he doesn’t take it.

If I kill you, will that stop everything?

She grins.  Won’t know if you won’t try, will you, lucky boy?

~

A complete set.

Junko looks at a complete set and lets out a sigh.

That’s fine, then.

She can be done.

This time, when she resets everything, she wipes their minds again.  Sure, sure, it’ll play like it did the first time, probably.

Unless she makes some adjustments.

~

(Makoto doesn’t know what he needs to do to keep himself from dying.  She’ll fix that.  But nothing else.

That Game wasn’t the most entertaining, but.  Well.

She’ll give them the highlights of the other Games afterwards.  Won’t that be fun?

Oh!  And she’ll reset it and let them out.  A final prize!  Everyone’s alive!

But all of you have killed each other so many times.

That will be fun to see!

Puhuhuhuhu….~)

~

Junko has seen these executions hundreds of times, knew how to beat them after once.  Ultimate Analyst, baby.

It’s only the compactor that she has no real control over.

Of course, by now, Junko knows how to beat it, if she wants, but she’s playing it like she should have that first time.  Instead of pulling out the button and triumphantly pushing it right as the compactor falls (resetting everything and saving herself the pain of being crushed), she lets it fall.

(She has already been crushed by the compactor.  It hurts, but not in the warm, comforting way that having her head crushed by Sakura’s thighs had been.  This way, she’s conscious enough to feel every single one of her bones break, splinter, cut through her fragile skin.  Sometimes, her teeth shove up into her brain instead of simply cracking.  Sometimes both.  Her fingernails split down the middle, tear through her skin.  What a way to go.)

And even still, she looks up.

Maybe Alter Ego will save her this time.

It happens, every now and again.

(Sometimes, her own Alter Ego saves her, too, and she sees the despair of there being two of her entering all of the survivors before she resets the Game.  It was splendidly thrilling the first time, but even that has lost its luster.)

But no.

She set this to end the way it should have the first time Makoto was smart enough to save himself.

It’s not the most painful death.

But it will suffice.

~

When Junko dies, crushed beneath the compactor that should have (but did not) crush him, a red button skids across the floor, spattered with her blood.  Makoto picks it up, only for Kyoko to take it from him.  She comments on how the button itself seems well-used, how this is not a brand new shining button but that the color has started to fade, how some of the patterns around it have worn off from use.  She puzzles over that; it doesn’t make sense that the button intended to let them out should look like this.

But the others don’t care, but Makoto doesn’t care.

Byakuya snatches the button from her hands and marches to the door, pretending to be their leader again when everyone can see that he very clearly wasn’t.

They gather in front of the door.

He presses the button.

[rowdyhughesy]

Remember that I love you - T.Bordeleau

Content warning: mention of self inflicted death, mental health and angst. If you or anyone you know are dealing with mental health know that there is help available, you’re not alone and there are people that love you. Please do not read if you know this is something that will trigger you.

“ And high up above, or down below. When you're too in love to let it go. But if you never try, you'll never know. Just what you're worth “

- fix you, Coldplay

October 6th 2020

Looking over at the boy beside her, an anxious and nervous look plastered on his tanned face. She can practically feel how his body is shaking from the nerves even if she’s not touching him. He’s told her time and time again that if he doesn’t get drafted it’ll be alright but they both know that’s not true. This is his dream and he’s so close he can practically touch it and not reaching it now would crush him. It would crush her too because everything he feels she feels with him. Thomas has never said it out loud that he hopes for Montreal but she knows it’s in the back of his mind, this is his home and to play here would be the greatest thing ever.

“Hey.” The girls voice snaps Thomas out of his trance that is staring at the TV screen. He forces a small smile at her that doesn’t reach his eyes but it lets her know she has his attention. “No matter what happens today, remember that I love you okey? You’ve got this I know you do.” This time a real smile forms on his cheeks as he reaches for one of her hands grasping it with one of his, intertwining their fingers. “I love you too.”

August 12th 2025

Packing up his first ever own apartment felt weird. Seeing the place he’s called home for the last couple of years blank, most of his stuff put away in moving boxes. The only thing left untouched is his bedroom. Brendan, William and Jacob having left 30 minutes ago to get food for the group, leaving Thomas alone in his apartment.

Standing in the middle of his apartment living room the hockey player decides that he might as well get started on his bedroom. The 23 year old not loving the idea of his three close friends snooping inside his drawers just to get a rise out of him. They do that enough so adding gasoline to the fire is something he’d rather avoid. He loves the boys but they sure can be a pain in the ass if they want to.

Trudging across the room he pushes open the door of his bedroom. It’s messy, blanket and pillows thrown around on the mattress. Clothes scattered over the floor and about three pair of shoes laying around. Thomas let’s out a huff of air at the sight, he really needs to start cleaning up more often. Grabbing one of the boxes marked bedroom he starts packing.

After another 30 minutes the front door of the apartment opens, the voice of Truss loudly reenacting a story breaking the silence.

Not moving from his location in the bedroom Thomas continues with his task thats currently putting all of his picture frames in tissue paper before they go inside a box. “Need any help Bords?” Brendan sticks his head in from behind the door. Two wrapped burgers in one of his hands and bottles of coke tucked under his arm. Bordeleau nods his head at the question, a wordless invitation that Brendan is allowed inside the room.

The brunette steps inside, handing one of the burgers to his friend as he sits down next to him on the floor. They sit in a comfortable silence taking bites of the food, listening to Will and Jacobs conversation in the other room.

Brendan finishes first, throwing the trash away he grabs a couple of frames that’s placed on a shelf standing against the wall. Taking in the image in one of them a sad smile forms on his lips. Softly brushing a finger tip across the girl in the photograph. Blinking away his tears Briss sits down again, unsure he offers the picture to Thomas who’s been looking over at him since he grabbed the frame. Both of the boys sit there for a while just looking down at it.

The image showing Thomas and Y/N, the former standing with his arms wrapped around her. A San Jose jersey covering his upper body while Y/N has a SJ hat on her head. Both of the teenagers flashing wide smiles and eyes almost shining from the happiness coursing through their veins. “That’s probably one of the best days of my life, Y/N screamed so loud when my name was called I think she almost busted my eardrums.” Thomas’s breath growing shaky as he lets out a watery laugh. His eyes glossy from tears.

“I bet she told you how she never doubted you for a second right?” Nodding in response Thomas rises up from his sitting position. Walking over to his wardrobe he reaches up on the highest shelf, grabbing a shoebox. It’s dusty, like it hasn’t been touched in a long time but the material is faded and worn from years of usage. Brendan giving his friend a questioning look as Thomas hands him the box. “She saved memories from every date, every game, every holiday since we were 17. It’s all inside.”

Taking off the top of the box Brendan is met with printed out pictures, souvenirs, small merchandise from hockey teams and every other thing Y/N could’ve seen as important. But the one thing that really catches Brendan’s attention is the white envelope. The word Thomas written in scribbly handwriting across the paper. “It was taped to the box when I found it outside my door, the day that she uh- you can read it. It’s alright Briss.” Opening the envelope Brendan pulls out a sheet of paper. It’s stained with what he can only picture being tears, maybe they’re from Y/N but also Thomas. Taking a deep breath he starts reading.

Hi Baby.

I’m sorry, I know it sounds bad to just say I’m sorry but I really really am. You can be mad at me, I won’t judge you. It’s okey. You have every right in the world to be mad at me. I know I should’ve said something about how I’m feeling, how nothing really matters to me anymore. The only thing that feels like it matters is you, but that just wasn’t enough anymore. I don’t wanna keep fighting it anymore. I’m so tired Thomas, so tired of feeling like this. I hope you’ll understand why I’m doing it someday but I know you probably won’t. I’m just happy I was still here to see your first game with the sharks. I’m so proud of you and I always will be. You’re going to do amazing things in the league I just know it. Never doubt what you can achieve in this world my love you are the most loving, smart, talented, charming and best person I’ve had the chance to know. Do what I can’t, live. I might be leaving but know you made my life better for the last two years. You loved me in every way you could but I just can’t love myself. This might be a goodbye but we’ll meet again in another life. Just remember that I love you Thomas Bordeleau, with everything I have. Yours forever, Y/N

November 14th 2023

One year after the day that turned everything Thomas knew upside down he stepped foot inside the tattoo shop his girlfriend had talked about for months prior. Always saying how she wanted to get a tattoo there but never having the courage to do it.

Looking at the fresh ink on his chest, above his heart is the words I love you in her handwriting forever imprinted. Tears start running down his cheeks but he makes no move to wipe them away. “You and me forever mon ange. I’ll never forget about you.”

[jades-typurriter]

Party Planning, Housekeeping, And Other Jobs For A Personal Digital Assistant

Another TF story collaboration between me and Bowsiosaurus, set in the aftermath of a Halloween party (this was written just after the 31st in 2023), where a case of mistaken identity leads Anodyne (an alternate sona at the time of writing who later turned out to be a whole headmate lol) to make a few alterations to Bowsie's files. Hope you enjoy!

Bowsie scurried back and forth across the jumbled and disarrayed apartment. Vee wasn’t sure how vee had fit so many of ver friends in the little place to begin with, and was even more confused as to the mess, which seemed to have been made by a party twice the actual size. It was November 1st, technically: the wee hours after a Halloween get-together. The poor, stressed serpent still hadn’t even had the chance to change out of its costume—stretchy, breathable black leggings and arm warmers, shiny white boots and gloves, and a matching white tunic, all accented with an eye-catching cyan—before getting down to the dirty business of un-dirtying the place.

“Okay, I… okay. I still have to… the trash over there, and the spill on the floor, and… I should write this down before I lose track of it all, actually.” Vee leaned ver broom against the wall and started for ver room to check the nightstand where vee usually charged it. It wasn’t there—where had vee left it? Vee retraced ver steps, mind still pulled in a million different directions as it struggled to cling to all the little things that still needed doing, still cloudy with exhaustion. Vee walked right past ver phone more than once, as a matter of fact, and was so distracted that vee didn’t notice when the screen blinked to life by itself behind ver.

“Oh, Tasque Manager! Funny seeing you here,” chirped a tinny, computer-synthesized voice from the phone’s speakers. Bowsie didn’t seem to notice the voice, nor did vee notice when the digital voice was followed by the digital snout of a digital cat, then their digital shoulders, digital torso, digital skirt, and digital wheel. Hovering above the screen, spinning their wheel like the propeller of a helicopter, they leaned forward with their chin resting on their paw, scrutinizing Bowsie’s costume as vee frantically scrounged around.

“Y’know, you’re lookin’ a little off, TM.” They snapped their fingers and projected a checkered frame around themself, expanding it and up-scaling their form along with it. They zipped across the room like a spark of electricity, startling the little sea serpent as they came closer. “Let’s just make sure your files are all up-to-date and undamaged, nya?”

“UWA?!” Before the dragon could even turn around in ver surprise, the ephemeral cat poked it with a single holographic finger, sending a feeling like a static shock running throughout ver body. It quickly dissipated in ver torso and legs, but lingered in ver arms and tail, somewhere between the feeling of a limb falling asleep from holding it for too long in tension, and the dull thrum of distant machinery.

Ver costume felt tighter, the stretchy nylon solidifying into something more akin to latex. Bowsie could feel it clinging tightly to ver scales, but just as quickly as the feeling had come, it subsided, no longer a constricting sensation. As a matter of fact, it felt like vee wasn’t wearing anything at all beneath the white dress—as vee flinched to make sure vee was still fully covered, vee could feel the rubbery surface stretching and folding as though it were ver own skin, and patting itself down, could feel just as keenly as if there were no leggings in the way.

Finally finding the wherewithal to turn around, Bowsie saw the digital catgirl floating above ver. They flinched immediately.

“WOAH! Oh my god, I didn’t realize you’d lost your mask! I promise, I didn’t see anything! Let me just go fetch that for you.” Before the poor dragon could even get a word in, they had flashed across the apartment, zeroing in on the mask with digital precision. Bowsie hadn’t even remembered where vee’d left it, but suddenly, they were back and holding it inches from ver face. “Let’s just get this back into place, here…”

“GwawawammMPPH?”

The cat was already mushing the hand-decorated cardboard over Bowsie’s snout, pressing a little bit more firmly than was comfortable. Vee was afraid they were going to break it, or at least mush up ver snout, but just as the thought formed, the mask began to harden—and ver snout suddenly began to give way. It filled the cone—now some kind of shiny plastic—like clay being packed into a mold, and soon enough, just as with the leggings, vee couldn’t feel the boundary between the accessory and verself. Vee opened ver eyes, fighting through the flinch response of someone’s hands being pressed into ver face, and blinked. The cat watched as the mask blinked, too; Bowsie, underneath, didn’t feel the drag of ver eyelashes against the material underneath.

“There! Looking more like your old self already,” the cat grinned. “Just a few loose ends here to tie up—nothing like a little cable management, huh?”

They snapped their fingers again, and the buzzing feeling in Bowsie’s limbs intensified. Ver shoulders began to feel much lighter, and ver tail was suddenly no longer dragging along the floor. Looking behind verself, vee saw it glowing an icy blue, flickering and jumping as it became thinner. As it settled into its new shape, sending tingles up ver spine and into ver fins the whole while, a shiny, vivid blue coating like the rubber covering ver legs had replaced ver scales, and the finds at the end had reshaped themselves into the prongs of an electrical plug. Whipping around again to look at ver arms, they were similarly aglow, except when they got thinner, they didn’t stop. Eventually, the sparks dissipated, leaving ver hands fully disconnected from ver body, wrapped up in the prim white gloves of the costume; terrified, vee tried to move ver arms, and ver hands floated at ver command. Vee wiggled ver fingers, and the hands obeyed.

“So much nicer to go wireless, isn’t it?” The cat beamed, spinning up a number of the floating, disconnected gears in their chest to emphasize its point.

Vee could barely breathe a sigh of relief before remembering the humming pouring into ver skull through ver fins. It could feel them reshaping just as ver tail had, becoming patches of spiky cyan hair and a pair of pointy, feline ears. The buzzing kept inching deeper than that, though, past ver scalp, rattling ver very skull. Slowly, the buzzing began to become less and less chaotic: no longer random sound, but something that Bowsie could almost make sense of. Vee closed ver eyes and focused on it: slowly, slowly, it became sharper, came into clearer focus. Like millions of molecules moving together became a wind whose force could be felt, like the vapor drifting off of food became a rich scent, the buzzing slowly filled in the parts of ver mind not already filled by ver internal monologue.

“Alright!! Looks like there’s one more thing still out of place. Don’t mind me! I’ll just…”

They made a frame with their paws and once projected a dotted boundary, indicating that they had “selected” Bowsie’s whole body. With a flourish, they pulled their paws apart, and vee felt the tension of ver shifting skin once again as vee began to grow taller and taller. Compared to the dimensions in the files that were currently being verified, the serpent was still quite stout. All that data was being reallocated to better represent it’s proper form, but it ran into something of a bottleneck as it tried to flow through the sash vee wore around ver waist. As vee grew, it restricted the movement of the extra memory, conveniently restoring the curves of ver body to their defaults by pinching ver midsection. Well, not quite default. The mass didn’t extrude all the way: the hips had a bit left over in them, and were bigger than they usually were; the thighs were a bit more powerful to match.

With a freshly-adjusted model, and with a number of background processes fully initialized, Tasque Manager opened her eyes. She already felt more focused, in spite of the sheer bulk of information traveling through her mind, parsing it as easily as an organic being might breathe—and able to make sense of the rest of the apartment just as quickly. She didn’t like what she saw, but she had already put together a plan to fix it, and with the ways she felt like she could multitask, the path she’d mapped to allow her to move as quickly as possible from one job to the next, and even a new system for putting away everything that wasn’t to be thrown out, she was confident it would take her no time at all!

“Yaaaayyy,” the cat beeped, pulling her from her mental calculations. They spoke directly through her console via a newly-shared wireless connection. “I like the UI adjustments, personally,” they said, appraising the… modifications that had been made around her waist. “I could keep tinkering around, though. Y’know, if you prefer!”

“Pardon, but I believe you’ve made enough unauthorized changes to this device,” she chided them. They blinked, then froze briefly.

“Un… unauthorized? No, no! I, uh, I have administrator privileges! And they were given to me voluntarily, for sure.”

“Then could you please give me the PIN for the phone you’re currently operating on?”

“Uh—”

“Or perhaps the password for this—” she gestured down at her freshly-reformatted form. “—piece of hardware?”

“I don’t think it comes with a password, but—”

“So you don’t know how to legitimately access either of them, then! My, my. You wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with the … disorder, around here, would you? Since you seem to be an outside influence.” There was a long, tense silence, broken by the electric hum of Tasque Manager producing her whip. The cat continued to remain stock still, except for the graphic of a spinning wheel that eventually flashed across their visor. Eventually, they came up with some kind of answer.

“Ah, gosh, TM,” they stuttered, “No matter how many times you get an update, you’re the same old stickler underneath, nya? I can see the party’s over, so I’ll jusHEY WOAH—” They cried, dodging the thunderous crack of an electronic whip as it slashed through the air beneath them. She had intended to take out the trash, and party crashers were just as important to clean up as any other of an evening’s left-overs.

TY for reading!! If you're interested in more of my writing you can have a look here and here. Oh, and have an epilogue and some of the concept art vee did!

[rise-my-angel]

I appreciate your takes a lot and think you are quite respectful. I am a Dany fan and would enjoy Jon and Dany together in the books if it was healthy and they were interested in each other and blah blah basically it would have to be a very specific scenario for me to enjoy it but anyway I don’t consider myself a stan of any character or ship and I’m a bit perplexed by that type of fan. I enjoy reading posts by people who disagree with me and have different interpretations of characters. I get so disappointed when I find that I’m blocked by someone just because maybe they hate Dany or they ship a ship I don’t like even though we otherwise have similar opinions and even if we don’t, isn’t it nice to see what other people think sometimes? It’s refreshing I think. I’m a big Jon fan and I’m going to enjoy posts by other true Jon fans even if they don’t like Dany. I just have a hard time seeing why everyone is so bothered. Some fans are very rude and toxic when people disagree (I have been accused by other Dany fans of secretly being a Sansa and Jonsa stan just because I said I think Dany COULD be a villain in the books and I’d be okay with it as long as it’s well written which is silly. I’d be okay with so many different outcomes as long as they’re well written because it’s not my story and I trust George to tell a good one if he ever finishes it at all). I just wish we as fans could focus on celebrating the things we do agree on and ignore it when we disagree or have respectful and thought provoking conversations instead of just blocking or being hostile

I genuinely like dissecting what about characters or ships I dislike and why. I love analyzing fiction in ways that explore what works or doesn't work about something for a story in my personal opinion and how framing certain characters can have adverse effects on fan point of views.

People talk about "hating on things" when really, I love discussing why I think Rhaegar is a peice of shit. I love explaining what about Dany I think is a tyrant. But that is very difficult with a very specific subset of this fandom.

Mostly Dany stans and Sansa stans, but this also bleeds into the general discussion of targ stans. The fact of the matter is, they are fine with trashing the other character, but as soon as I make a post that is anti that character they stan, I am hating unjustifiably. I am hating just to hate and I am looking for things to hate.

And unfortunately, that means I am always on the defensive about my Jon opinions. This fandom has an issue with discussing Jon without attaching a ship to that narrative, especially Jonsa and Jonerys stans. I do not ship him with anyone, therefore I want to discuss him as a singular character and that includes exploring what I think are problematic and toxic characters towards him. Which in my analysis, includes Dany and Sansa. But because to a lot of these people, Jon is seen as an extension of Dany or Sansa in a ship, I am clearly one or the other.

I cannot tell you how silly it is to have "Anti Jonsa, Anti Jonerys, Anti Jonrya, Anti Jongritte" in my bio, and every single one of my anti jonerys posts gets passed around as pro jonsa evidence or my anti jonsa posts gets passed around as pro jonerys evidence.

It is a subset of this fandom I hate because it has shown how impossible it is to discuss Jon as a complete individual character outside of romantic ships and it is exhausting.

It is a very persistent problem. I don't care who personally ships these things, but the fandom has made it's mark by declaring that either your with them or your their enemy and any disagreeing opinions are seen as attacks instead of discussion of media I enjoy.

People can like Dany and Jonerys, or Sansa and Jonsa, but it is the persistent screaming that opinions like mine are being unfairly hateful or delusional that piss me off. I'd rather not have such negative opinions about certain shippers, but it is the angry mob mentality they have that make me so against it.

I want to just discuss Jon as a character on his own, they only want to discuss Jon as a side companion romantic interest to their favourite female character. And I get blocked for speaking against their sacred cow, whereas I go looking through their blogs just to see what their side says so I can make a fair argument to their points when engaging in critical discussion on my own personal posts.

Me and them are not the same.

[heraldofcrow]

3, 8, 11, 13, 28 , 43 for hot evil sack of bones with beard and amazing long white hair Logarius

Alright let’s do this!!! Sorry for the wait on these, Fareeha! I fell behind but now I gotta catch up on a few characters. Time for the evil, super hawt popsicle guy!

—

3. What first drew you to this character?

Originally it was his boss fight and his ties to Cainhurst. I noticed he was very Pthumerian, and it started to pull me in. Who was this guy? Why was he hiding Annalise? Was everything Alfred said about him accurate? Then some guy on Reddit made the proposal that the idea of Martyr Logarius was a completely falsified legend to cover up the truth that the Executioners were decimated by the King of Cainhurst (the real Logarius). I don’t buy the theory anymore but it got me hooked. I wanted to know more about the character and his influence on the story.

8. Does the character’s looks/design matter to you?

Hmmm, yes and no? Hehe. In a way, they apparently don’t because I’m simping for a guy that canonically looks like mummified Santa Claus on crack, but at the same time, I am a “personality” simp. It may not even count as attraction lmao.

That said…young Logarius…when I draw him or imagine how he would have looked based on that one portrait, his looks and design do become relevant. The way he dressed and his classically handsome appearance are necessary features to complement the charisma of his character. He ought to be alluring in every way, so yes, in that sense, his looks and design absolutely matter to me!

11. How did you “fall in love” with this character?

It was a mixture of writing him and speculating on who he was. When I first discovered that the beta version of Logarius was the King of Cainhurst, who actually had that portrait in the castle (boy with golden-brown hair and blue-ish robes), I started going wild.

I decided that Logarius had been the heir of the king’s executioners, but was chosen for a special task. That task was to retrieve the forbidden blood from Cainhurst in secret. He would feign being a foreign student and gain their trust before returning with the blood. His reward would be the throne, as he was set to be betrothed to Annalise, eventually her consort, and king of Cainhurst.

Once I thought this all out, I had him become the traitor of Byrgenwerth, and one clever enough to frame a fellow student for said treachery. All for nothing in the end, because once he discovered the vile plans of his own people, he abandoned them and joined up with Byrgenwerth and later the Church.

This is when I fell in love…and then writing him? I wrote a devious snake with an archaic tongue and….oof. That was it.

13. If you could draw effortlessly and as much as you wanted, what scene (s) would you draw for this character?

I would love to draw some scenes I have imagined with him and Annalise where they are talking, and I’d also like to draw him leading the attack on Cainhurst. I have his expressions in my head…it would be so fun to depict.

28. Do you get defensive about this character? If yes, then why?

Not really actually. He doesn’t exactly have haters or stans that erase his crimes lol. At least not that I’ve seen. He’s also just the type of character I don’t mind seeing trash-talked because of how sick he is.

43. What type of weather makes you think of this character?

Always snow! It suits him….but especially those snowy nights when it’s flurrying and the sky is bright with grey light pollution.

—

All hail Logarius <3

Favorite Character Asks

[angelsworks]

hi can you make headcanons about yandere klaus mikaelson

Yandere! Klaus Mikaelson x reader

Many would say Klaus was the most impulsive of his siblings

Others would argue that they hadn’t been out their boxes long enough to compete

The opinions of other never mattered to him. So regardless of who he was proving right or wrong, he didn’t care.

Not when it comes to you

If your lucky he’ll say hello before taking you back to his house

Maybe he’ll spin some story about you being his other half. Whether it’s true or not won’t matter. It’s not like you can fact check him. He’s the original hybrid and he’s got you all to himself.

Depending on your willingness, he’ll treat you differently.

If you’re relatively calm, behave like a good little darling and smile every once in a while - the world is yours.

If you won’t stop screaming, call him every name under the sun and repulse at any sort of contact from him - You’ll be facing a difficult next few months.

Unlike Elijah he won’t start by pretending everything is normal. He’s well aware he’s kidnapped you and at this stage is not deluded enough to pretend otherwise.

His way to your heart is by stripping you down and isolating you.

Have you been refusing to talk to him?

The next day he’ll keep you gagged.

Have you been avoiding his touch?

He’ll have you chained up.

Have you taken to trashing your room?

Enjoy having no furniture at all.

By the time he’s finished you can’t speak or move without his say so.

The only person you can talk to is him and the only touch you can feel comes from him.

Soon enough you’ll break. Why would you?

He’s your only source of company, only source of physical touch.

He’s the only way you’ll get your bed back. The frame of course, not the dingy mattress he brought up for you.

When you do finally start to accept him, he’ll turn his charm right up. Reminding you how good it can be when you behave.

When he knows you won’t leave him he’ll relocate you. Maybe somewhere more remote, just for the two of you. Maybe to his home city.

Even in New Orleans it won’t matter who you try to get help from. They all belong to Klaus.

And now so do you

[missbunnybunny]

- until death do us part-

Part 2 of Hide & Seek

Minors do not interact!

CWs: Dark Humor, Age gaps, simping, crude Humor, cursing, author-san giving widow trauma, TRAUMA, gore, injuries, THIS IS A LONG ASS READING, might forget some, but if I do lmk. If ya want me to continue making these stories, just tell me. Well let’s get on to the madness, shall we?

A/N: I post Irregularly sense college is beating my ass and sometimes I will forget to post. So for everyone that is staying with me THANK YOU🙇🏽‍♀️.

People always have 2 ways of waking up from a nap. 1. Wake up and cover yourself again with the blanket because you can’t give 2 fucks about waking up early. 2. Wake up like a zombie until you get coffee and of you go.

But waking up to the doc twisting your ankle into place was not one of those wake up calls.

So, as the calm and rational person you were, you screamed bloody murder. Clawing and trashing trying to run away, but the doc saw this coming, so she told Ghost to hold you.

After the agony was done, the doc gave a nod of approval, “ There, that should do it. Take a rest for a month or so, Okey, Widow?”

You could only nod, Ghost asked if that was all. To which the doc respond with a “Yup”. Ghost helps you up, helping you get to the other’s. The silence was broken by a small and hoarse voice “ I hate you”. Ghost responded with an “ I know, sorry, kid.” For the short walk, widow gave ghost the silent treatment.

“You could have woke me up and told me. Can you imagine how traumatic that was?!” Widow told ghost as they were making there way to the briefing table.

Gaz “ What wrong, sis? You look sour.” You hopped over to Gaz and like a lil kid told him “ ask the Ghost over there.” Pouting and hugging him like a child, honestly, it looks like a child complaining to their mother.

Price asked “ Ghost, what happened to widow?” Ghost looked at price and said “ she woke up to the doc twisting her ankle into place. She was told to rest for a month or so.” Priced turned around and looked at widow, “ widow it was for your own good, kid. You can’t hate him forever.”

“Fine” widow said, Walking( hopping ) over to ghost and asking the taller man to get to her eye level. “ you now what I want, if ya get it I’ll forgive ya. Si no te mato.( if not I’ll kill ya.)” widow threatened.

Without a single word goes, turned around, and left the base to quien save donde( who knows where). Everyone was just an audience to the whole ghost and widow show.

“Ya wanna take a sit lass?” Soap asked. Widow nodded and took the sit next to soap and gaz. Price cleared his throat and said “ for the mean time we don’t have any missions, so you can take it easy.”

- one hour later ( SpongeBob narrator voice)-

“ Can someone help me back to my room, I wanna change” Widow said. Everyone looked at the widow, they blinked, and they looked at each other.

Gaz and soap got a shit eating grin, Price realized what they were up to and shook his head. Soap said “ Sorry, lass.” Smiling, Gaz shook his head negatively “ you could ask König to help ya.”

The said man was drinking his coffee while sitting on the couch, the couch looked like a small chair compared to his bigger frame. Hopping over to the tall man, whose attention is now fully on you.

Sheepishly widow says “ König could you please help me to my room.” Widow sounded like a small nervous kid asking their parent for permission. König responded to widows request with a nod.

After König helped( more like carried) widow to her courtiers, he waited outside the door while widow got changed.

Widow was almost done changing, but there was only one small problem, she couldn’t put on her shorts properly. The cast on her leg that kept her ankle in place was no help in the matter.

So with a red face and some courage she made her way to the door. Slowly opening her door widow looked around until she found the tall man. Softly calling out to König “ König could you please help me.”

König looked at the small woman and asked her “ something the matter?” Widow nodded and told König embarrassedly in a small voice“ I can’t put my shorts on.”

König asked just to make sure he heard widow correctly “ You want my help, Maus?” Widow nodded and slowly opened her door, moving away so the taller man could enter.

To say that widow was embarrassed was an understatement, she wanted to be taken out by a sniper so fast right now.

Sure, widow and König didn’t even have a full 24 hours of meeting each other, and now their in this predicament. The shirt Widow was wearing was big enough on her( cuz she stole it from Ghost), so that helped a little.

She handed the shorts over to König “ sorry” widow said, looking away from him. König said “it’s ok” he helped Widow put her shorts on. Widow said “thank you” as she and König made their way to the mess hall.

When they arrived the resident Ghost was their with a plastic bag.

He helped widow to a seat and handed her the bag. She opened the bag and immediately went to hug the man to her side, almost tackling him to the ground. “ Thank you, thank you. Te perdono( I forgive you)”.

Everyone laughed as a very happy widow opened the bag. She pulled a container with her favorite food, lasagna, and a can of soda.

Take notes everyone if you have a problem with widow you might just solve them with food. Everyone watched in amusement as widow happily opened the container hold her delicious goodness captive.

Eating and winging her legs like the happiest girl ever. Price asked “ So is Ghost forgive then?” With cheeks full like a chipmunk widow  happily nodded in her head. König watched in amusement as ghost help clean up widow.

After widow was done enjoying her food, she became sleepy. Ghost noticed and told her “ Come on, time for bed” You sleepily nodded and held your arms out.

For then next couple of weeks everyone helped widow get by and babysat her from getting herself into any trouble, like breaking or twisting another of her body parts.

König and Ghost where the once’s helping her the most. Sometimes, widow would get pouty cuz she couldn’t go out on missions with the boys.

- one month later-

Today was the day the cast was coming off. Everyone and their mother could tell that the resident spider was very happy to have her leg back. König came with widow to get her cast off after everything was set and done.

Widow was jumping of the walls, König watched in both amazement and amusement as to why widow had so much energy in her.

“ Slow down, little Maus.” König told the hyperactive spider. The said spider stopped and did as the taller man said, “ Fine, mi rey( my king)”.

That didn’t last long because once’s she saw soap, she jumped at him, “ Hi, jabón (🧼) y Fantasma ( and ghost) where is he?” “ hey, slow down, would ya lass? He’s coming don’t worry.” Soap said.

After widow had proceeded to violently assault everyone with her hugs, she happily said that in 2 weeks, she could go on missions again.

Soup pulled widow to the side and asked her “ sooo, how are you and König doing?” Widow froze, shocked by the question. “ huh? What cha mean?” Widow asked.

“ ya know, his been following you like a lost puppy. If he had a tail it be wagging.” Soup said. “ I don’t think he likes me.” You told him sheepishly. “ girl if you don’t see the signs, I am gonna wack ya.”

“ ta bien( okey) why do you think he likes me.” You said to soup sulking. “ Every time you walk in a room, his eyes follow you, and you, when you talk to him, he speaks. He verily says a word.” Soup ranted to an oblivious widow.

After some thought, the widow was starting to see the light. Every time she would call him mi Rey( my king), it was like he was lighting up.

And every time he would call me Maus( mouse), her face could heat up just by imagining him calling her that. Soup noticed that widows face was getting red by the second and teasingly nudged her. “ See, I told ya.”

“Don’t tell the other’s please, Dios ( god) this is so embarrassing”. “ don’t worry your secrets safe with me.” This was gonna be a long day/life for poor widow.

After the talk you had with soup, you started to see what he was talking about. Evertime widow would do something stupid, and almost got hurt könig ws there to stop her.

If Widow was hungry and goes to the kitchen könig was there making a plate for the two of you, könig was a lovable giant.

Everyone slowly stared to take notice of the way König was around widow. It was like watching a beast being tamed by his beauty. The second widow left he turned back to his quiet, scary, locked self.

141 would do anything for the joyful widow. They would kill for her just to make sure she was safe. König would do the same and even more.

- meeting-

“ all right, we have a mission from the higher ups. We gonna take down a drug cartel in Guadalajara, Mexico.” Price explained to the team.

As everyone listened and took note on the strategies being told, discussing what what to do and some precautions. After some hours of deliberations, the plan was set. Ghost and soap would be in the front lines, killing of the targets.

König and captain price on the second line, right behind ghost and price. Widow and Gaz on sniper duty, clearing off the dangers to their teammates.

“alright, we’re set. Everyone get some rest, we gonna have a long day tomorrow. You are all dismissed.” Captain price said to the team.Everyone packed up their note/paper and went off to their respected rooms.

The morning came and everyone was hurled off into the UH-60A/L Black Hawk Helicopter. Widow was still so sleepy and groggy that she walked like a drunk person. “ odió las malditas mañana, quiero mi cama.( i hate the fucking mornings, I want my bed.)”

widow said pissed off. Ghost, who was right next to her said “ English widow, you know we can’t bloody understand you when you are speaking, Spanish.”

Widow, said “ well, let me translate why in the bloody fucking hell are we up at one in the morning? I want to go back to bed. Better??”. Ghost responded to widows, sarcasm, and sass with a “ much better.” 

After some hours of traveling you finally made it to Mexico. Price went over the plan one more time to make sure everyone was in place with the plan. Everyone checked their gear and ammunition, adding extra or making sure every lil detail was in place.

- mission-

“3…2…1 move out” price said over the earpiece. The boys mobilized and eliminated their targets. Gaz and Widow were taking out the incoming targets and other snipers.

Ghost and soup called clear over the earpiece. König and captain price mobilized right behind ghost and soap. The mission was going well for the first part.

But this is a battle, and in battle, there are 2 ways it could go, 1.Everything goes well or 2. Nothing goes well, and casualties will happen.

Being a sniper has ups and downs, you can’t move from your spot or you risk being shot. A sniper needs to be very focused, any wrong moves, and you might get your teammates killed. 

The building was cleared, they the boys. The cartel leader was eliminated, and everyone in the building was taken out.

What everyone didn’t realize was that the cartel members called for backup, and they were on their way faster than expected. ghost called over the line “ Bloody hell, they called for backup. Everyone retreat, the mission is done.”

Everyone responded with a “ Rodger that” when you pressed your line to respond, before you could even speak, everyone heard your bloody screams and struggles.“ LET ME GOOO!!! NOOO!!!”

along with more screams from you. Ghost called over the line “ WIDOW!! Can you hear me. SAY SOMETHING! WIDOW!”. Everyone was frozen as they heard you struggling over the line than at you muffled screams, until their was silence…..

A voice could be heard “ finally the fucking puta(bitch) fell asleep” your capture said in annoyance. Until another voice came over the line “Shush, looks like she got an earpiece on her Hermanó(brother).”

Then there was truly an agonizing silence… Widow had been taken hostage.....Panic was in state.They had to find widow before the worst could happen to her.

-Windows POV-

You really get the worst wake-up calls in the world! You woke up tied up to a chair, cold water dripping from your face to your whole body. “ wey, despierta princesa.( hey, wake-up princess)” the unknown man said.

You woke up, the first thing you told them was “ desgraciado fue que tu mamá, no te enseñó modales( fucker, didn’t your mom teach you manners).” You angrily spatted to your captures.

They laughed at your outburst, “ woah there tigresa( tiger), you got some guts. Me gusta( i like it)”. When you really looked at your surroundings, you noticed that the only things in the room was, you and your captives.

The room had no windows, just the door. While you were distracted looking around you, you felt a strong and harsh smack on your face. “look at me when am talking to you, bitch”.

You spit on his face, you could taste the metallic taste of blood in your mouth. You felt a sharp pain in your thigh, one of the man had stabbed you.

You screamed in pain, feeling your blood trickle down your leg.“ That will make you talk, no Crees tigresa( don’t you think tiger)”.

You laughed dryly “ kiss my ass, you ugly fuck”. Your stubbornness only got you pistol whipped on the side of the head. the strong blow was enough to knock you a few inches back.

They kept asking you questions and you kept giving them cocky resources. Yeah, being stubborn wasn't the best thing when you're being tortured.

You don’t remember how long the torture went on for. The blood soaked your restraints. It looked like a crime scene with all the blood. You could have been in that room for hours even days, with no sunlight and no way of telling time you just felt hopeless..

The man had left you just a while ago, you struggled and wiggled. After much pain and struggle you finally slipped your hands from the tight ropes. Your skin felt like it was on fire, and you could imagine that your skin was pilling off you wrists.

You managed to untie your feet, and your left thigh was numb from the stab wound. Your right arm had a gun shoot, and your head was pounding and spinning.

Blood was trickling down every wound you had from your torture,it was like a horror movie scene from bloody Mary. You became a bloody mess, struggling to stay alive.

Trying to stand up and walk was like trying to learn how to walk again, like a newborn. You heard footsteps and talking, you could tell the man were back. Their voices were engraved in your mind. You grabbed the chair and waited for one of the men to come in.

The door opened, the man entered the room, he closed the door behind him and turned the light on. The moment the lights were on, you ran at him, and as strongly as possible, you hit him on the head.

The man crumbled to his knees and fell face-first on the floor. Quickly, you disarmed him, and after you took his weapons for yourself, you tied him up.

Adrenaline was on a hell of a drug, you shoot your torture. They didn't give you mercy so why should you, you heard running footsteps.

A door slamming open, you second capture yelled “ damn it, Rodrigo your not supposed to kill her you-” * Bang* he fell to his knees, the gun shoot in his leg preventing him from standing.

“que mierda, estás loca( what the shit, are you insane)”. you laughed, you didn’t know that was going on anymore.

He stood up and pulled his gun, he shot you on the side. The adrenaline was wearing off, you shoot him. Soon he fell to the ground and with shaky hands you went to lean on the wall.

Making your way to a corner, you vision was becoming messy. Everything was swirling, black and white spots, your only thought wasn’t am I going to die here.

No, it was “I miss, my boys” Finally, it was all was hitting you. Bloody tears streamed down your face, and your breathing was becoming Eratic.

You heard loud running step’s coming your way. You held your knees close to your chest in the fetal position. Looking at the door the best you could, you saw a shadow enter the doorway.

You sank more into the corner and softly cried “ I don’t wanna die here. I don’t wanna be alone.” The figure crouched in front of you, in a small voice the person said “ it’s alright, Maus.”

You looked around and held your hand out, “ König? Is that you, where are you?” He held your hand close to his face and said “am right here, Maus.”

you cried even harder when you realized it was not a hallucination, König was here, your boys where here!. König pulled away from you and wiped you tears away, he couldn’t tell if your crying blood or if was blood from your head wound.

Soon, Ghost came into the room as König was helping you get up. “ Bloody hell, König you really did a number here.” Ghost said. König shook his head and said “ it wasn’t me,it was widow”.

Blood loss was getting the better of you, so as you felt your consciousness slip away from you, you smiled. “ thank you for coming to get..me…” you passed out into König’s arms.

Everything moved so fast, ghost yelling for the doc. Price telling the pilot to get it moving. Everything was chaos, the doc patched you up and started a blood transfusion.

When the chopper arrived on the base, you were taken in for surgery. Ghost and König did an incident report on what they saw in that room. They explained the horror scene and the fact that widow had killed her captures.

There was a newfound respect for widow in the base. She was strong and stubborn, but overall, she was alive.

A week has passed, and you had yet to wake up. To much trauma and exhaustion took a toll on your body. Everyone visited your room anytime they could so they could check up on you, König came to visit you often.

He would ask for you to wake up, that everyone missed you, and so did he. “ Wake up soon, widow, I’ll come back later, okay?” König said as he walked over to the door.

A small hoarse voice called out to him “ König? Are you there?” König walked over to your bedside. He helped you sit up. “ Thanks, everything hurts but, I’ll be okay. ” You told him with a small smile.

The doc came in and did a check upon you. She called the rest of the time. All of you caught up with each other and made some jokes. After everyone left, you and König were alone again.

“ I missed you, mi Rey(my king)” you said. König hummed, agreeing with you “ me too, little Maus”. “Hey, König.” You called after some silence. “ Yes?” He responded.

“Thank you for coming. I was really scared of……dying alone” you told him quietly. König laughed a beautiful sound “ I would do anything for you, my little Maus” he would even die by your side if it made you happy.

______________________________________________________________________________

Girl widow am sorry 😭 don’t kill me. Well until next time everyone. Again thank you for sticking with me and my crazy ass uploading schedule. Don’t kill me for doing this to widow.

Tag list:@konig-breedme

[chibivesicle]

Well, that explains a lot.  Why Trigun Stampede was Sci fi over Western.

I was toodling on Youtube (as one oft does in these current times) and stumbled upon this excerpt from a Trash Taste podcast where they interviewed a staff member from Studio Orange about Trigun Stampede.  Pretty much this expands upon some of what I’d briefly read from a Sakuracon panel this spring.

TL:DR - Trigun Stampede was a complete remake of the original Trigun with a hired sci fi writer to not only write 150 years of history and lore but also mechanics of the world.  This is why most of the elements of the original are lost.  The manga and ‘98 anime were an example of an American style Western plopped on a desert planet but one where the materials and mechanics of the world are similar to our own.

If you are interested check out the video here:

This both supports what had been my general take away from the final product as well as explains things I observed but had no evidence for without hearing it from a staff member.

1.) Sci fi elements were a huge deal -  hiring an independent writer explains why it has such a different voice and storytelling tone.  One could argue that the original Trigun made it too easy to recognize it was a western, but that was what we were given as readers and viewers.  As much as I, an anal retentive person who like details like thinking that there is no wood on the planet, therefore, we can’t have wood saloon doors.  I also like a story that makes sense and flows.

2.) The twelve episode format boxed them in.  Who knows how these sort of deals are made but they needed at least 24 episodes from the start.  This is what killed the pacing.  You can redo all you want but if the pacing and writing are bad, it will be bad.  I feel like I’m the niche version of someone like Friendly Space Ninja and Amanda the Jedi.  Just because you put a lot of time, money and effort (also money) it won’t matter if your writing is bad. 3.) I fully agree that the CGI was exceptional.  It is obvious that the studio put so much effort into this front.  The animation was breathtakingly well done for the most part.  There were a few too many ‘show off’ animation sequences which annoyed me but the facial expressions were great.

However, due to the shift with the sci fi aspect being much greater than the Western, we get the loss of the ability to animate more of the common people who are largely absent and a key aspect of Nightow’s works.  I’ve stated this elsewhere but the adults in his series are trying to protect the common folk.  By leaning into the desert aspect and the desolation of the desert stereotype, they lacked the random kids, bakers, bankers, laborers, servers, farmers, mothers, fathers etc.  I’m not sure if this is a technical issue from the computational/technical side or a storyboarding/framing issue.  Or that they just forgot about the people in general were a thing?

This also heavily leans into the incorrect assumption that a desert is desolate and does not support life.  Anyone who has visited or lived in the desert knows that despite appearing like it is dead and empty at first, plenty of life is present.  It just has a totally different way to adapt to things.  I was disappointed that the creative team leaned into this stereotype using green plants [photosynthesis] = livable and desert using angelic being plants = livable.  My own experience of living in the desert also made me cringe at Wolfwood’s shoes.  No.  Just no.  You do not wear slip on shoes in the desert.  Lace ups for sure and up past your ankle even better.

4.) Ample amount of creative effort went into this.  Again, Studio Orange put a lot of effort into this.   Technically, it is very nice.  If you wanted to look at it from an anime perspective, the presentation was excellent, and the writing was at most average.  But, with so much source material that they did not include and the creation of so much of their own original ideas and concepts, it took it far from the work.   If they wanted this as their product (which seems to have been their goal) then they succeeded.  However, if they wanted to take the original and build on it and give it a fresh coat of paint with 2020s Pantone Colors of the moment, they did not do that.

5.) I’m surprised at how many YT critics are impressed and overall giving this positive reviews.  I know that people in these positions have made it their job to do anime/manga media commentary and critiques so they may want to be less harsh perhaps.  Many of them saw the original material, and so many seem to be okay with it.  Yet, is anyone not commenting on what happened to all the female characters?  No!  This annoys me so much but repeating myself here won’t really do much other than reinforce the fact that I was very unhappy with Meryl, Elendira, Luida, and Rem.  Lazy writing would be with the limited time space for the episodes they became tropes and shadows of their former selves.  But Meryl was a key character and deserved better. Yes, I love to critique things I love and that is fair but I’m wishing for a more comprehensive critique of Trigun Stampede taken from not a bunch of dudes on the internet.  I have neither the time nor effort to become a Youtube creator and commentator in this space.  With that whole full time job sort of thing that pays quite well.  But I do want to see more women in this space expressing how they interact with media and walk us through their reactions an feelings towards it.  For example someone the The Anime Tea. I absolutely love her analyses! 

https://www.youtube.com/@TheAnimeTea

I honestly would love to see her do a review of Trigun Stampede!  But it might be outside of her general scope and I’m not here to demand an analysis from anyone.  She had a lot of nuanced and contextually appropriate reviews and ways to approaching things which is just - sooo good.