#actually it's because i didn't know whether they did actually get exiled or just got threatened

[respectthepetty]

At least with a confession, there can be a farewell

@wen-kexing-apologist pointed out the parallels in episode nine of Qian reading Yuan's goodbye letters with one stating that Yuan would return from his exile to say farewell, and the other admitting he would regret not being able to say farewell as he faced death.

But even in the exhaustion from witnessing each other almost die, Yuan still takes care of Qian by opening his door and giving him a drink to calm his nerves, yet unlike the past were Yuan's constant text message went unanswered, Qian actually responds to Yuan and looks him in his face to tell Yuan exactly why he is upset.

So the choice to have Yuan walk back to his room with the note that carried his last thoughts and confess to Qian that even when faced with the possibility of death, all he thought about was Qian because all he has ever thought about his entire life is Qian . . .

The choice to have Yuan put distance between them in this moment when it was Qian who originally put distance between them by sending Yuan away and shutting him out, something Yuan brought up on the fishing trip . . .

Those choices were all for Qian because Qian's door was closed before Yuan walked in with the drink. Qian could get up and close it again reinforcing the distance he puts between him and Yuan. But Qian almost lost Yuan once and didn't even know. And now Qian almost lost Yuan a second time and couldn't do anything about it. Yet even after both events, Yuan still reaches out to Qian.

The first letter was a plea for Qian to let Yuan love him, but the second was a promise to Qian that Yuan would love him until his last breath whether he let him or not.

And Yuan was ready to fulfill that promise.

Because even though Yuan didn't tell Qian about the car or the avalanche, he has never hidden the fact that he loves Qian.

All Yuan has ever wanted is for Qian to know that he loves him. When Yuan first confessed, he got upset when Qian thought he was joking.

So he made sure Qian heard and understood him this time - I will never stop loving you. That's enough for me. Don't push me away.

The two letters sit in this moment because with a confession, there can be a farewell. The first asked Qian to let Yuan back in and allow Yuan to love him. The second stated Yuan would always love Qian no matter what. But just like the first confession, Qian did not feel the severity of Yuan's words until he was tormented with Yuan's absence.

Qian is not a man of words or emotions. He is a man of actions. And he has now been fully confronted with Yuan's love. Yuan was willing to die for Qian, but Qian already knows that even if Yuan wasn't there, Qian would still feel his love.

Yuan opened the door.

And it started the moment Qian told Yuan he could return to him.

So now it's time for Qian to close the distance.

Bonus: Lili let Yuan in. Lili gave Yuan the cactus. Lili told Qian that Yuan was gay. Just like Qian not realizing he brought Lili and San Pang together, Lili doesn't realize all the ways she helped Qian close the distance.

Maybe she can help him this time too.

[inquisitor-apologist]

Force, I am SO frustrated with the Filonification of popular Star Wars. People keep on trying to make arguments about Star Wars, yet they refuse to actually watch Star Wars and make sensible criticisms about it because they’re literally just parroting whatever weird non-canonical shit Felony spit out in an article last week.

I was looking at this article:

And I was legitimately trying to look at the criticisms and see if I can agree with any of them, but they don’t make any sense and I can just feel Filoni oozing off them.

So imma rant, got it?

Mistake Number 1 that led to the fall of the order: They were too much into politics.

More specifically, the article claims that “they very much had a hand in the flipping the Senate” with reference to the Vote of No Confidence for Valorum in tpm, but it’s been a minute and a half since I saw the prequels, so I read the Wookie summary, and I might’ve missed something but I don’t think there’s any mention of them, like, voting or doing anything significant in the Senate in ep1? I feel like it would’ve been mentioned if it was even vaguely implied that the Jedi mind tricked the senate or lobbied for the vote to go one way or another, but it isn’t mentioned anywhere and it don’t square with what I remember, so I’m guessing they just made this up and convinced themselves it was canon? Tell me if you can figure out what they’re talking about or if there is a canon basis I missed.

Other than that, I do not remember a single scene where we saw the Jedi do anything more political than take orders from politicians or exist in the senate building in the prequels.

Mistake Number 2 that led to the fall of the order: Suppressing Baby Murderer’s emotions.

…A Take, certainly. So this one’s talking about Anakin’s grief over his mother’s death, which I agree would be a fucked-up thing to suppress. That’d suck. If it actually happened because… the Jedi do not know that Anakin’s mom is dead. They do not know that Anakin and Padmé went to Tatooine, since they were ordered to stay on Naboo. They are utterly unaware of everything that happens on Tatooine aside from Yoda feeling the Tusken Massacre in the Force. Yeah, Anakin told Obi-Wan that he’d had dreams about his mom dying, and he didn’t do anything about it, but that wasn’t Obi Wan suppressing Anakin’s emotions—that was just him saying that it sucked that he had a bad dream, since I don’t think Anakin said it could’ve been a vision or anything, so this one doesn’t land at all. Where did they get this idea???

Mistake Number 3 that led to the fall of the order: ‘Allowing’ Maul to take over Mandalore (somehow?)

I can feel my brain cells dying. Maul joined up with a terrorist group and some crime gangs to forcefully take over a neutral system. None of that was ‘allowed’ by the Jedi. They also say that the Jedi ‘sent’ Obi Wan to get rid of Maul when I remember Yoda telling Obi Wan some shit like “Send anyone to Mandalore the Jedi cannot” and then Obi Wan went to Mandalore anyway and it didn’t do shit. Anyway I feel like the author of this article might own a ridiculously annoying cowboy hat. Just a hunch.

Mistake Number 4 that led to the fall of the order: Baselessly Exiling Ahsoka (Baselessly?? There very much was base)

So. Wrong Jedi Arc my beloathed. Here we are again. The article claims that the Jedi “exiled Ahsoka Tano on mere suspicion alone and didn't even confirm whether she was involved in the bombing of the Jedi Temple or not”. Which. Hmm. So, there was a big investigation into the bombing that pretty definitely said that Ahsoka was almost certainly the bomber. It wasn’t ‘mere suspicion’, it was all the fucking evidence very clearly pointing to her. She ran away, she worked with a damn separatist assassin, she was found in a warehouse filled with the bombs. The audience know she was framed, but the characters don’t because the whole point of framing someone is to convince the other people they did it. If the Jedi had exiled her for this, they would’ve been being very reasonable and justified. Will also point out that the Jedi were forced by the Senate to exile her and did not want to. They apologized and let her back in as soon as they possibly could.

Also there’s this weird (actually!) baseless claim that Ahsoka was one of the most powerful Jedi in the Clone Wars. Which has no proof because it’s untrue—she’s a padawan with max 2 years of training. There’s no way she’s more powerful than a fully trained knight, of which there were still quite a few. But of course she is, because she’s Felony’s beloved OC who can do no wrong.

Mistake Number 5 that led to the fall of the order: Not giving Baby Murderer power

I am convinced that no one involved in writing or editing this article has actually watched RotS, and has only ever listened to Felony talk about RotS. They claim that ‘they invited Anakin over to the Council as a pseudo-member and his only task was to spy on the Chancellor. Not only was this political meddling once again, but it was also an insult to Anakin’ oh no, they insulted Anakin, clearly this means he’s justified in murdering them! Also, the Jedi Council apparently wanted to appoint Anakin, they weren’t literally forced into it by Palpatine. You know, that scene where Palpatine is like “yeah, I’ve forced the council to put you on the council even though they don’t want you there. You’re my spy on the council now” that didn’t happen actually. The Jedi were completely evil in not allowing the unstable baby murderer a full seat on their governing body when they were forced to put him there through nepotism. Them asking the only guy who’s close enough with the chancellor to investigate him because he’s overstayed his term and is overreaching with his powers is also completely evil and awful and unjustified. Uh huh.

Mistake Number 6 that led to the fall of the order: Mace Windu Wants To Kill Palpatine Right Away (direct quote from the article)

Yeah, you read that right. I can’t make this shit up, but filoni sure as fuck can. So, Mace Windu learns that the shady Chancellor that’s been overreaching with his authority and has overstated his term is also an evil Sith that has manipulated both sides of the war to gain power, causing the deaths of millions, including a shit ton of Mace’s people and friends, because said chancellor drafted them to fight in the war that he created. This would make Mace pretty damn justified in killing Palpy imo, but Mace specifically goes to arrest him for his crimes. Palpatine then kills three other Jedi Masters in cold blood and attempts to kill Mace, and when Mace beats him he still tries to arrest him—y’know that whole “You are under arrest, my lord” bit?—until the guy tries to fucking electrocute him with his fucking hands and it becomes clear that there is no way to take him in peacefully. Only after palpatine murders 3 people in front of him, attempts to murder Mace in combat, and makes it clear that he cannot be taken in alive does Mace attempt to kill him. No matter how you slice it, that’s not him wanting to kill the bitch right away.

Also the article tries to say that Anakin wanted to bring Palpatine in because he recognized that he should stand trial, which is technically what he says, but he also screams “I need him!” in that same scene so I think we know why he really doesn’t want Palpy to die.

Mistake Number 7 that led to the fall of the order: They didn’t train Luke and Leia

Now this might seem baffling because the article is supposedly talking about things that caused the fall of the order and Luke and Leia weren’t even born until after the fall of the order, but I can assure you that the article does not explain this in any way.

Still, let’s pretend this makes sense with the subject of the article and press on. The article asks what was stopping Obi Wan from training Luke as a Jedi on Tatooine. I feel like the answer might have something to do with the fact that the twins were so powerful that the Jedi were afraid that the emperor could sense them if they were next to each other. Formal training would make them stronger and more likely to be sensed, so they didn’t do it until they had to. This probably would be the most reasonable thing in here if the article wasn’t about what caused the fall of the order.

Mistake Number 8 that led to the fall of the order: Not telling Luke about Vader

Yet another Thing That Lead to the Fall of the Jedi Order that somehow happened after the fall of the order, but if I focus on that I might start screaming, so we move on.

This article leads you to believe that all the problems in ESB could’ve been solved if only Obi Wan had told Luke about Vader. Hmm. Yoda says in RoJ that Luke wasn’t ready for the information when he was told at the end of ESB, which seems very true based on the fact that Luke was unable to accept the information when told, was described by George Lucas as suicidal afterwards, and is suddenly unable to consider killing Mr. Evil Baby Murderer Space Fascist afterwards because of their family connection, and you want Obi-Wan to tell him earlier?

You know that OT Luke would, upon hearing that information before Cloud City, have immediately jumped in his X-Wing and raced to confront Vader. If he found Vader in that state, Luke would’ve been even more unbalanced and unfocused, which would’ve lead to him losing the duel worse and being either killed or captured by Vader, since Leia wouldn’t have been close enough to save him.

Mistake Number 9 that led to the fall of the order: Not believing people who had been dead for 1,000 years were back without proof

I want you to imagine a hypothetical with me: a guy that is somehow vaguely influential in politics walks up to the UN and tells them that Leif Eriksson and the Vikings are back and coming to kill everybody. This man has no proof beyond what he and a couple of people with him say , and there has been no indication of this at all before he shows up. I know in that scenario I’d want the UN to throw him out until he had proof.

That’s the modern day equivalent of Qui Gon telling the Jedi the Sith are back. He’s making a huge claim with no evidence. You can’t expect the Jedi to immediately believe him no questions asked. The instant there’s actual proof of this, we see the two most influential and powerful Jedi, Mace and Yoda, talking about how they need to look out for other Sith. They are taking the threat seriously, they just aren’t omniscient like the audience.

Mistake Number 10 that led to the fall of the order: When they were enemies of the state who would be killed if they didn’t hide, they hid

Truly, a horrible mistake. Now they’re mad at Obi Wan and Yoda for going into hiding, unlike other survivors of Order 66. Other survivors such as Kanan, Ahsoka, Cal, and Quinlan, perhaps. All of these characters went into hiding. Cal and Kanan were forced out of hiding, and Ahsoka helped with the early rebellion while remaining in hiding, but pretty much every order 66 survivor tried to go into hiding.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go cry.

[emperorsfoot]

Oh! You are the author of the fic I keep refreshing my marked for you page for instead of studying for an exam that can make my school longer!

I love omega Kon, and I absolutely adore your omega Kon. I think a lot of omegaverse have a tendency to feminize the omegas and your Kon and in general your omegas don't fall to that. I also feel like instinct/we-are-sentient-human-beings-we-can-think is apropriatly balanced in your fic.

Oh and I am so ready for the "We accidentally bonded" reveal. I think we are very close with Kon in the closet-nest now. I feel it is gonna be trigering to Clark. (Oh will Lex realize? How will he react? Why do I feel like he wanted to break the chain but the moment he perceived as the chain being established he went full berserk instead of trying to repair the relationship as much as he can. Does he actually care about Kon as his pup, or did I just get that because I am hungry for good dad Lex.)

And the Batman knew Clark had a pup and that he left the pup with Lex reveal. How will Clark react to one of his biggest and most well hidden insecurities being known by Bruce. Will he freak out? How will he react once he realizes that if Bruce knew, he didn't care-well, didn't care is the wrong word, that it didn't change how he felt about Clark?

Also the Kon wants to court Tim reveal. My god how will Tim, who has been keeping himself back(as much as he can) because Kon has an alpha, react to being said alpha. How will Kon, whom has been falling for both of Tim's identities even with both trying to keep themselves in check react to both his crushes starting to recipricate.

And then the reveal of Tim Drake is Robin. Will Kon be mortified (yes), will he realize both started acting more into him once Robin learned he liked Drake.

Or Tim is Robin can be revealed before Kon likes Drake. In that case would Kon think that every single drop of kindness he received from Drake, everything that made him have a crush, was because they were mated? Oh boy, you can get a whole 'nother series from that.

Man there are a lot of reveals I am so excited for! It is like identity porn×500.

I am also so excited in a fake-science way. I just love world building and science, I adore stories where 'magic' is seen as science and there is innovation and-(I cut 3 paragraphs of me rambling about how electricity is magic, from here. It ended with "WE HAVE MAGİC ROCKS(magnets)!!!!")

I am always interested in how people handle omegaverse, like whether they use some out there smell like vanillia or pinapple, softer smells like hay and chlor or just alpha/omega that is just slightly different for everyone which I think is more realistic and I have loved how you handled all of that. I kinda wanna hear more about the chemistry+biology behind the mating like

I am very excited-in the fake-science way-for the discussion about the potency of the bite(between Tim and Kon). Unless I imagined it, the amount of veins/longevity of the bite was longer then what that size of a bite waranted. I know it might just be something like the adrenalin of the fight but I dunno, I like "we aperantly are very compatible" stuff, I think that registers in my brain as soulmates in a biological sense even though that doesn't make sense.

And of course Kryptonians or any alien adds another level, weird alien biology is a good tag. And how you handled Kryptonians was also great, i just adored the difference between the nests.

(I have this multiverse Au where a more advenced "human" civilization created kryptonians+others as weapons and then got eredicted and the humanity on earth is like the left overs/exiled ones. And that's why Kryptonians have a fricking kill switch and are human looking. Now if I was creating a species as a wepon I would like to keep them from multiplying with my species and in an omegaverse setting turning which subgender triggers the mating cycle would be a great way)

Also would getting a tranquilizer agent, say one that is airborn, automatically dispensed into the room then get someone to seperate the pair work for the heat triggers rut/rut triggers heat situation. But I guess kryptonians and humans would need different doses/stuff and whoever is awake would fight against someone trying to take their mate away. Maybe an internal insuling pump like thing? I mean, if you do it like once every 6 years to just get a child a small surgery would be fine for me. Or maybe like one of those autometic tranq guns, in that case you can deliever different doses/shit as well. And I mean, either the needle would need kryptonite or they need to be under red sun lamps for a longish while but I think the second one would work if both sides are willing participents.

Having said that, there is also the fact that the mating "bite" between Tim and Kon triggered a kinda heat and rut and I think it would have turned into a real one if they spent it together. So like is that a one time/just got mated thing or like will the same thing happen every time they bite, if it is a mated thing can they like triger it again and again by just leting someone erase the mark and mating again or did they lose their chance (would the same heat triggers rut/rut triggers heat cycle happen). And how did Lex and Clark missed this in their research?

Oh and the reveal of Kon (probably)being able to have children, like, I think he internalized that he can't have children (that he can't give pups to his alpha) but nope, there is nothing wrong with him actually, he just took after his carrier. (I mean if I was him, a hybrid whom is not having a cycle like I think I am supposed to, I would assume I was infertile. Also holy fuck Lex, I know you wanted to keep how he was concieved from Kon but like talk to your child, like "Kryptonians don't get heats regularly, in Krypton a rut triggers a heat, so we triggered mine to have you" wouldn't even be a lie and I personally wouldn't assume rape from that and I am sure Kon never spoke about how he thought he was infertile to fucking Lex Luthor but sex ed my man, you have to give the speach before they ask for it, wtf?)

And also Kon's life is gonna change so bad man. Like, my guy was the heir to Lex corp, he is smart enough to be, clearly, and now? Man, there needs to be a way to get him Lex corp, like, Tim that would make a great courting gift. I just can't find a way, like, Lex probably haven't updated his will, so like... throw him permanantly in jail, like he raped an omega, force mated him, kidnaped said omega, force mated him again, kidnaped(?)his son and like That should be more them enough to throw him into jail right? Ugh, that's the one part I am not ready for.

At this point I just want fluffy nest cuddles man...

(Sorry I rambled A LOT. I am just so fricking excited, also wanna avoid studying for that exam, also english is not my first language, in general sorry)

😳

I am overwhelmed

Here. Have Clark cuddling Conner in the nest, drawn by me

[idontevenknowhowtolife]

Dragons of HotD HCs

Syrax

Mother to Sunfyre, Tyraxes and Aemonds unhatched egg. Also parents Vermax.

She is so tired. Her kids give her so much shit.

Mated with Caraxes. Reason everyone says she cant hunt? Its because Caraxes will not let her. He's just like "relax babe, Ive got this" and will bring her food.

She's actually quite tolerant of kids, mainly because of Rhae introducing her kids to her and taking them flying on her.

She and Seasmoke have a friendly rivalry going on, mainly over how much trouble their hatchlings cause.

Meleys mothered Syrax the way she mothers Sunfyre and Vermax. She is laughing her head of at Syrax's exasperation with her kids antics because this is karma for the shit Syrax pulled on her.

She and Dreamfyre are actually quite close as they were the two she dragons left in a pit of dumbass he dragons for years. They have a standing gossip/complaining appointment every week.

She adores Rhaenyra. They have an exceptionally close bond and Rhaenyra was able to mount her so young because they both really didn't want Caraxes and Daemon to leave so they chased them. When they were in Rhaenyra's teen years, Syrax would sometimes test her and how far she could push with her but as they both matured their bond grew so much that Syrax would feel any emotion or pain from Rhaenyra and vice versa.

Syrax is really fast. She doesn't always like to go top speed all the time but she is competitive, especially against Seasmoke, and if challenged will leave any other dragon in the dust.

She misses the time when she could pin Sunfyre under one claw and Vermax under the other. They were much more peaceful times.

Caraxes

This dragon is so bloody done with his dumbass rider and his stupid habit of pissing off his brother and getting sent into exile.

You know how Syrax pinned down Sunfyre and Vermax when they were younger and being stupid? Well Caraxes does this to Daemon when he decides he needs a break from his dumbass riders shenanigans. It happens at least three times a week.

This guy is so in love with Syrax its not funny. He adores her. Part of the reason he hates exile? It separates him from Syrax.

He gets on with Vhagar really well because their riders have often been companions and flew together. The other dragons of his generation? They think he's weird and ignore him, which makes him upset and was why he was really happy when Seasmoke and Syrax hatched after years of no hatchlings.

He laughed his head off at Syrax about Sunfyre and Vermax until Moondancer was born and started doing the same thing to him. It is a struggle for him and Syrax to have uninterrupted alone time.

Is actually also good mates with Seasmoke because of the whole, bonding over burning people alive thing.

Did eventually bond with Vermithor when Syrax and Silverwing would ditch them to have girl time. Such bonding had consequences.

Meleys

Hugest mother hen to exist. She does not care about whether or not you're older than her or if you can take care of yourself, she will mother the shit out of any dragon.

Mothered Syrax and Seasmoke when they were born and taught them a lot about being a dragon and having a rider.

Super close bond with Rhaenys, often doesn't even have to be asked before she is doing what Rhaenys wants her to do.

Vhagar

Chaotic Grandma who plays favourites and encourages all the drama.

She grumpily adores Arrax who loves to bother her. He often finds himself pinned down under her claw. She will just nap and he will have to wait to move. (I am ignoring canon where she kills him, let me be happy)

Adores all of her riders and is fiercely protective of them. It broke her heart to kill Laena and she is never going to let anything happen to Aemond if she can help it. But she is also so tired of him refusing to bloody just confess to his crush.

She curses Balerion for going and dying on her and leaving her to deal with the shit that the younger generation stirs up.

Vermax

Chaos.

He is the result of Vermithor and Caraxes bonding. The only reason his egg hatched was because he was placed with Jace and it was decided that Jace was the one with the best chance of containing him.

His conception and the consequential chaos that resulted caused Syrax and Silverwing to banish their mates to another lair for months. Syrax especially was not pleased to have to mother another chaotic hatchling.

You know Jace is pissed off at you if he unleashes Vermax towards you. You will not survive.

Sunfyre

Does not know what boundries are because Aegon was never taught them and passed this onto his dragon.

Protective enabler of Aegons chaos, but also the one who drags him back from the edge of self destruction.

Friends with Vermax, which is not good for anyones sanity.

Dreamfyre

Loves her little dreamer rider.

Literally will only stand Syrax or Meleys, anyone else can go the fuck away.

A little traumatised by Rhaena and her own life experiences, which is also partly why it took her and Helaena a while to fly together.

[orbdotexe]

Some context for this: Mara asked Cayde and Crow to seek the Young Wolf out - as she knows the City will need their help soon enough, and to try and rope them into focusing their anger on more specific enemies.

Given that I've decided I'm keeping the thing about Lakshmi getting killed by Wolf, it doesn't go how Mara hoped. They're just too feral to be corralled bby

Anyway, Exiled!Forsaken timeline, and this is Wolf and Crow meeting for the first time, post-Crow reclaiming his memories.

-

It took him some time, clamoring through tight spaces and tightroping over dilapidated railings, but Crow got through. Now he was pleading with the Young Wolf to help the people who had turned on them without question.

While he gets why Cayde couldn't come, he still feels that Sixer would have a better chance at this than him. Cayde was their friend, not him.

It felt surreal, staring the rogue down.

Mostly because they were glaring back at him, without so much as making move on him.

Crow finds he's awfully appreciative of the mask Cayde convinced him to wear, finding it hid his fear quite well. They obviously knew who he was, and he's rather certain they can tell he's afraid, but he'll take small comforts right now.

Though it didn't feel directed at him, it still made him uneasy. The rogue Godslayer, glaring him down, with a gaunt and haunted look.

It then occurred to him, looking into eyes that were far too aged - They're not even a decade old yet. He'd have been lying if he said it didn't spark more resentment in him.

It took them a bit to respond, long enough that he was preparing to ask if they'd heard him, and even enough for their Ghost to look ready to pipe up, before-

"Don’t." It sounded like begging, under the raspy and strained quality of their voice. He realized their lips looked like they'd been bitten to bleed and healed, only to crack open again. Were there Void burns covering their cheekbones..?

Does their Ghost not heal them? Why do they look so...

But then, no. Of course their Ghost heals them. The only thing he ever hears about that Ghost is how much it loves them.

So why...

For once, he stops to actually take inventory of the Young Wolf's state, and it’s... nothing like what he thought.

He'd seen the joke-turned-dire "Where Wolf" VanNet threads, but between the pictures of pre-prison them just looking confused in selfies versus the present far-distance ones of them in combat, taken too far away to capture exacts, they...

They just looked tired, and defeated, in person. Even their tattered armor gave off the feeling of wanting to collapse at so much as a poke.

It only further dug the idea into his mind that they never wanted any of this. Never deserved any of this.

"What?" He hears the one, half-confused, half-concerned word escape his lips before he can consider it.

"I won't," they declared, but not easily. Whether the shakiness was from lack of use, or emotion, Crow couldn't tell. The sound was overly harsh on his heart. "And you shouldn't either."

He... didn't know what to say to that. Hadn't they been spending all their time hunting threats to the City? He found it hard to believe - or did he not want to believe? - that they did all of it out of just anger.

"Shouldn't... help them?" He asked, carefully, trying to pry answers without offending them.

Walking on eggshells... Not his favorite thing to do. And by far not his talent.

"Help the Vanguard."

"But you'd help the City?"

They didn't respond to that, glancing away and holding their new stare at the wall for a few moments, before he cautioned to speak up again, "Why?"

The Guardian squinted at him, and he felt his heart jump into his throat as they spoke even lower than they had before, not moving their head from where they leaned away from him, "Because the Vanguard doesn't deserve it. But those people are owed safety."

By the time they finished the statement, he could just barely hear them, in very nearly a whisper, though it seemed full of warnings and promises - both to him, and to the Vanguard. He took the silence to try and gather his thoughts, only to get cut off as soon as he thought he had his bearing.

"You should get away from them," they say, hoarsely but gentler than before. The mix with weariness surprised him - and he was sure his shock was clearer than his bird theme. "They'll use you, and drop you the moment they think they've lost control."

...and drop you the moment they think they've lost control.

An echo of his own worries. Seemed there was something they shared, at least.

Crow spares a glance at their Ghost, hovering just behind their shoulder, to be met with a... decidedly malicious glare. If it had been the one talking, he figured, this would be a very different experience.

He felt like it was warning him, though. And the glare only intensified the longer he looked, so he focused back on the banished hero before him, who seemed twitchier by the second.

That couldn't be good. And considering he could feel Glint's rising concern in the back of his head, it seems they both shared that sentiment.

"...when was the last time they asked how you were without pity," they questioned. It sounded genuine enough, and it- He wasn't sure whether they knew they said it or not. He wasn't sure how to respond, either. But it pulled taut a rope that finally snapped in that moment, and his shoulders sagged.

He finally processed that they- they winced half way through their sentence. Glint helpfully pointed out that it would make sense, given they sound like they haven't had water in a week.

But then he met their eyes again.

It felt like they were searching more than just his physical face, even through his mask, and it... made him uneasy. Almost like they were flipping through his pages, to the ones still being written and past even that.

His face was covered, with nothing but his eyes and fingers exposed to the air, and yet he felt like glass, and dumbly watched as their Ghost bumped into their head, finally drawing their gaze from him.

Glint's urgency manifested itself as a slight pressure in the back of his head, as he watched the Wolf turn to grab their helmet and shove it over their head.

Crow moved to stop them, hand outstretched and mouth open to say something, but he- He stopped short. There was nothing to say.

He noted, almost as an afterthought as they left, that it had a gash through most of the surface.

A few weeks later, he would note reports of the Young Wolf targeting more specific threats, much more pressing ones, and he can't help but give a small smile.

Maybe they hadn't been pushed too far, yet.

[thegingerjedi]

ok I want to know more about Errant Kingdom, and also if you care to tell us a little about Aoife please ❤️

oh, Errant Kingdom is a... visual novel? Choose your own adventure? It's a game I kickstarted way back in the Before Times, created by Lunaris Games. They also made When the Night Comes, which I enjoyed. We were promised multiple story routes, good queer romances, minigames, and more. Well, the devs got tired of working on it and presented a "finished" game back in the summer of 2023. I played it and got so mad I determined that I was going to take their barebones story outline and characters and make something more robust. I, of course, didn't finish it. But I did create a pretty good outline of what story beats I would change lol.

Here's a snippet of my Ambassador OC, Nora, with Erik Nystrom, the exiled but extremely loyal knight. She is currently playing detective, trying to figure out what actually happened that got him exiled, but is 10000% crushing very hard:

He waited for her to finish her next note, or maybe he waited to compose himself again. He looked at his tankard, considering whether he should take another sip of his beer.  Then Nora did something that surprised even herself: she reached for him. She gently coaxed her hand between his and the stein, urging him to let go of it. She half expected him to recoil at her touch, or gruffly push her away to drown his sorrows some more, but he didn’t. Instead, he laid his hand flat on the table, palm up, and intertwined his fingers with hers. When she looked up to his face, his amber eyes shimmered and looked right at her.  “Take your time,” she soothed, putting down the pen and bringing her other hand to his, enveloping his large, calloused hand in both of hers. Her heart beat so loud she was sure he could hear it, too. If he did, he made no indication of it. He let out a shaky breath and brought his other hand to hers, vaguely pushing the stein out of the way as he did so. He rubbed his thumbs over hers and slowly lowered his head to press it to hers. “Thank you,” he whispered. “Of course,” she replied, squeezing his hands in hers.

And Aoife! Aoife is my extremely good paragon Shepard who's always just one wrong word away from a panic attack. She's a Sentinel in game, but I headcanon her as a field medic turned medical doctor. She's a plant nerd, smuggles greenery into the Normandy any chance she gets, and is studying for her doctoral exams in ME2.

And she romances Thane because I said so.

I love her so much you get a SECOND snippet, but this time from my Mass Effect file:

If he’d thought about it, Thane probably could have sent Aoife a message instead of visiting her quarters in the loft. But he’d been curious to see her space, and hoped that he might be able to see her more relaxed there than in life support. He was honored that she trusted him to see the scared and anxious parts of her, but he wanted to see her relaxed and comfortable, too.  He knocked on the door. “It’s open,” Aoife called from the other side, sounding distracted, but calm. It opened and he stepped inside, hands clasped comfortably behind his back. And what he saw took him aback: dozens of plants adorned every available space. Many of them flowered - vibrant pinks, purples, reds, and yellows showered the room in color. But most of all, the room was green. Green and full of life. And humid. He coughed uncomfortably, “Hello, Aoife.” “Thane!” she replied, voice bright. She popped up from the lower level among a collection of books and datapads scattered on the floor. A pencil rested in her ear, and her hair hung in a loose, messy bun. She walked over to him in her bare feet, and took the three stairs to where he stood, “What brings you here? Is everything alright?”

[official-kenralie-fanbase]

oh and when Sophie tells Oralie about him

Sophie doesn’t tell her why she needs to come right then but she does anyway. she walks into the Black Swan’s healing center. there Kenric is covered in burns incredibly underweight, mind broken. Oralie lets out some horrible strangled sob and runs over to sit beside him. she stays with as often as she can without raising suspicion (and does a horrible job at it).

when Kenric is finally well enough to have his mind healed he panics when he comes out of it, because he can’t see and he doesn’t think it’s real. Oralie tries to hug him but he pushes her away repeatedly saying “this isn’t real, this isn’t real” he panics to the point that he needs to be sedated, Oralie also has to be given some exilers to calm her down. a few days later they try again but with just Sophie he has a similar reaction that he did to Oralie, but they manage to convince them Sophie after some work and Sophie inflicting positive emotions on him and transmiting a memory of her and him, probably the first day they met.

it takes a few days before he’s actually comfortable with the idea of seeing Oralie again, because he was told that she was killed. when he’s still closed off to her she asks him what she needs to do to prove to him that it’s her and then he says “tell me something only you’d know”

another ask from @you-have-been-frizzled that I'm combining with this one:

also i see your “tell me something only you’d know” and raise you

Kenric got Oralie an engagement ring and hid it in his house after she didn’t step down. he left her a note about having something for her where it was hidden in his will. didn’t find it until after his planting and wore it on a string around her neck every single day. when Kenric asks her to tell him something no one else would know, she hands him the ring. while he can barely see he’s turned the ring over in his hand so many times that he recognized the feeling. he knows it’s her because no one else could have found it.

Oralie loses it when she sees Kenric. They debated whether or not to tell her beforehand that he was alive because they wanted her to be aware, but there was also something going on so she couldn't come immediately. Eventually, they didn't get around to telling her but she has to come anyway, not knowing what she's going to see.

And when she sees Kenric, starving and wounded and broken but alive, she loses the resolve and hardened walls she's built up over the past couple of years and breaks. She sobs for an incredibly long time, refusing sedatives because she wants to feel, wants to escape from the numb hole of grief and loss she's been in for such a long time.

If it weren't for Bronte helping her, Kenric's existence would have been immediately discovered. He makes excuses for her and updates her on what happens at the Council meetings she misses. She's in emotional turmoil, knowing that Kenric's alive but not knowing if he'll ever be sane again. She doesn't know if she'll have to watch him suffer forever, never having him back even though he's come back from the dead.

When Elwin and Livvy deem him well enough to have his mind healed, Sophie and Fitz work together, trying to forget their disastrous last healing. In his mind, they find the vision the Neverseen put there of her death and try to bury it deep in his memory, but they can't do that while also repairing his broken memories. During the healing, Oralie is watching anxiously the entire time while Keefe monitors her emotions, making sure her mind isn't going to break.

As soon as Kenric wakes up, Oralie rushes over to him, tears streaming down her face, telling him she's here and everything's okay. But then Kenric pushes her away, screaming at the Neverseen to stop giving him these visions, that he knows she's dead and they can't trick him anymore. Oralie tries to convince him it's really her, but not being able to see, he lashes out. It takes both Sandor and Grizel to restrain him, and Livvy has to pull Oralie away from Kenric so he doesn't hurt her while Elwin sedates him. Oralie herself is so distraught that they have to sedate her too.

A couple of days later, they try with someone whom Kenric would have known but wasn't close enough with that the Neverseen would use to threaten him: Tiergan. It goes relatively well, and Tiergan convinces Kenric that he's safe and not with the Neverseen anymore. He seems to believe him, so they try with Sophie. At first, Kenric gets violent again, but Sophie manages to inflict positive emotions on him, which helps him remember the first time they met. He realizes it's really her, after which they bring in several others: Bronte, Grady, Alden, Keefe, Fitz and Biana. He reacts fine to all of them, beginning to realize that he's actually safe now.

And then they bring in Oralie again. Kenric is so desperately wanting to believe that it's her, that she's not really dead, but he's been tricked and lied to time and time again that he doesn't think he can believe. She doesn't try to touch him, just sits there, talking to him. He tells her that he thought she was dead, and she is desperate to convince him it's really her, so he says, "tell me something only you would know."

At this point, Oralie's forgotten that there's anyone else in the room, and she tells him about how she found the engagement ring when she searched his house. He listens, not reacting, as she tells him about the clues he left for her and how she found it.

Her voice breaking, Oralie whispers, "I would have said yes, Kenric." She slips the ring off of her head and puts it in his hand. Kenric touches it, remembering the feel of it and remembering how often he'd touched it, wishing he could see it on her finger. And even though he knows he'll never see it, he's beginning to believe. Because only Oralie would be able to find it. Only she would still have faith in him, in them, after everything they went through.

Slowly, Kenric reaches out and finds her hand. He touches her hands, her face, her hair, tears slowly slipping down his cheeks as he recognizes her. He leans forward, the movement feeling so natural as he kisses her, gently and slowly, but so, so genuine.

And that's when Kenric truly believes it's her. He laughs out loud and pulls her into his arms, and there they stay for a very long time. Eventually, Elwin has to kick her out because Kenric has to sleep and take his medicine, but Oralie promises that she'll be back as often as possible. The two of them are together again, and though they have been separated and destroyed, both of them thinking they'd lost each other, they've gone through the impossible, and they will not lose each other again.

(I'll definitely continue this tomorrow but for now I have to study for a calc test smh)

[darsynia]

Writing Questions Tag Game!

Belated, but tagged by @asirensrage, thanks!

What is your absolute all-time favourite idea you’ve ever had?

My favorite ever idea is from a HP story where I took my enjoyment of the time travel trope and tried to switch up all the 'typical' beats. Most time travel stories in HP are told in the perspective of the traveler--I wrote it from the love interest in the past's POV. When the character returns, that's usually the end, and the love interest usually remembers them immediately--I had her obscure her identity and the two fell in love again in the present time period, which was the bulk of the story. The way the story was written allows the readers to be the people who know the most about what's going on at any point in time, a thing that's fairly unique to fanfiction, and something I greatly enjoyed. That story is The Longest Distance and I'm very proud of it.'

Is there a question you’ve been asked in the past that really stands out to you and you still think about sometimes?

A story I wrote in 2006 used a middle name written on a napkin. The character didn't have a canonical middle name until 2008--when the author chose a different name than her scribbled napkin one. I got a review that really lit into me for getting the middle name 'wrong,' and I actually think about that moment every so often, because fandom is ALIVE to some people in a way that transcends publishing dates.

What is your favourite part of being a writer? What parts could you take or leave?

I love how it feels to put something in a story just incidentally to flesh it out and then be able to use it later as a major plot point. My FAVORITE of these happened in the story I mention in the first question; I have Hermione choose the name 'Iraja' (which means 'the wind's daughter') as an alias in the past. Later in the story, Remus casts his Patronus, which is a Kingfisher. Canonically, people's emotions and attachments influence their Patronuses, and I remember looking up some sort of connection to Iraja to choose a new Patronus for Remus in that story. I looked up the god of the Wind, and that's when I found out that his daughter Alcyone transforms into a Kingfisher. It looks like I did that on purpose but it was just a gloriously happy accident. As for what I'd leave... I'd love to stop feeling like a low hit count/reaction rate for some of the things I like most means they're not any good.

What is your greatest motivation to write/create?

Cheesy, but it makes me the most happy of anything.

What do you wish you knew when you were first starting out writing?

That what makes you better at doing something is to do it a lot. Even if no one else ever sees it or cares. The rate at which it happens varies person to person, but you WILL be better at writing after you've written X00,000 words.

What is your favourite story you’ve written TO COMPLETION? Link it if you’d like and can!

Exile All the Longer, my Tony Stark/OC Soulmate AU story. I love it because it's rich with metaphor and explores the difference between being surprised by a terrible event and seeing it coming years away. To me, it's a love letter to the concept of being a hero, whether you're born to be one or choose to be one out of love for someone.

What is your favourite out-of-the-box quote?

Both of these are from a chapter of a HP story where the character is speaking about death and grief. A 'glamour' is a spell that changes a person's appearance.

Yes, grief as a Glamour. It’s as if people expect that we put on our grief, we perform it for that short time that we are living through the first weeks. Most never realize we become grief, that we’re wearing our previous selves as a Glamour from that point on, instead.

Our physical presence is only a facet of our personhood. When who we are fades to ‘who we were,’ it just means we stop adding memories. It doesn’t destroy the ones we’ve already made.

Which of your characters would you say has the most controversial mindset? Why do you say so and how do you personally feel about their ideals?

Well, shit. I really have no viable answer to this, but hopefully that doesn't make my writing more boring! Possibly the closest answer is Emory from Trust Fall because she is so readily willing to sacrifice her own happiness and well-being to smooth the way for others. She's learning not to do that anymore though!

If you, when you first started writing, met you now, what would younger you think?

This is exactly everything I always wanted.

Thanks for the tag! I'm going to tag some folks but I know most of you are busy and hopefully know I would never be upset if they don't post anything 💚

@themaradaniels @starryeyes2000 @peyton-warren @ronearoundblindly @adulting-sucks @mischief-and-tea-by-the-sea @nana1000night @caplanbuckybarnes

[jklpopcorn]

I may have jumped on the submas train so have some Uncle Ingo :>

[esther-dot]

I think Jon was supposed to die in the show because he basically had Aegon's storyline but d&d already killed one fan favourite and exiling him was a good ending in their minds because they think that Jon is a wildling lol also how they forgave tyrion killing his own father when westeros already hate tyrion and kinslayer is great crime. You don't get away with this and become hand of the king. I wonder who will be Bran's hand in the books because it won't be tyrion.

(in reference to this ask --I think)

Ah, I see.

Giving Jon the name Aegon certainly was an odd choice, but I didn't think it was because Jon is actually permanently dead so they didn't know what else to do with him (I always refer to him dying in the books, but I actually don't really think he is dead-dead, I think what might be going on is something more like Bran's comatose state after his fall). To me, they gave Cersei the role that Aegon will have (the person on the throne Dany has to fight), but they didn't want to grow the story when they were hoping to wind it down, and they knew that if a non evil person was on the throne people may realize that in the eyes of Westeros, Dany is a baddie. And, if it's a Targaryen on the throne and Dany still tries to take it, it was never about House Targaryen as much as it was about Dany herself. She thinks she must be the one on the throne. Including Aegon would have revealed way too much, so they kept Cersei. Also, audience investment in the character etc. Basically, it was a decision about Dany, not Jon.

I know everyone says that Jon got Aegon's storyline, but (and I know this may make me sound dense), I don't understand that claim?

Aegon will not retake Winterfell.

Aegon will not be KitN.

Aegon will not ally with Dany or bend the knee. (They're going to war.)

Aegon will not sleep with Dany.

Aegon will not fight the Others.

Aegon will not kill Dany.

Those are the storybeats that Jon had post rez, none of which were taken from Aegon. The only thing that show Jon got from Aegon was the name Aegon (wtf!!!) and Aegon's legitimacy which is weird because the big question around Aegon is his legitimacy. I think there's a good chance he's the real deal because it makes sense to me that we have a Targaryen who embraces his Targaryen identity but isn't evil to be in the middle of the Targ who rejects it all (Jon) and the Targ who embraces it all (Dany). Aegon's story seems to be the opportunity to put some more shades of grey on Targs/Targaryen restoration, but show Jon didn't even want people to know his Targ identity. I just don’t see the connection. I mean, Aegon is planning to take the Iron Throne, show Jon wouldn't even keep his Northern crown. To me, show Jon's story had nothing to do with Aegon in spite of the name.

And, I know people hate this, but I think there is a real chance that Jon is not a bastard, that Rhaegar did marry Lyanna (two wives, Targ style). Whether or not that happened (and sometime I’ll write a post about that possibility), even if they took Aegon’s legitimacy and gave it to Jon, there were a number of beats in Jon’s story post rez that we can connect to a likely story for book Jon and were absolutely not taken from Aegon.

All that aside, if Jon was meant to die, I think D&D would have been happy to do that. Either have Drogon burn him, have him kill himself after he kills Dany, have him executed/killed by Grey Worm...Dany was the most popular character and it would have gone a long way to soothe her fans if Jon had died after killing Dany. It’s tropey for both of the tragic lovers to die and seeing as they ended up on that interpretation of J/D, I’m almost surprised they didn’t go for it. His character was folded around what they wanted to do with her s7-8, if he was meant to die, I think D&D would have done it because it would have made it easier for people to accept King Bran and Queen Sansa because since they excluded Aegon, J/D both dying would have been the end of House Targaryen in a doomed love kind of way rather than a “my Targ family sucks so much Ima kill them myself” kind of way. D&D clearly had a lot of anxiety about doing Dark Dany, HBO had Targ spinoffs in the works...I mean, there was a lot of motivation to appease Targ stans and yet they didn’t throw them that bone. I really think they were trying to deliver something like Martin’s endgame, they just did the worst. I've said repeatedly, I accept Martin's words that the show ending would be the endings for the characters he told D&D years prior. Here's someone else's post talking about his quotes (link), I can't find mine at the moment. I’d be happy for different endings, but I am not counting on it.

Anyway, hand Tyrion to King Bran is a real weird thing. I suppose theoretically, it's a nice "People will make peace with their enemies!” ending. Bran will be a different kind of king, so resolving the Stark/Lannister animosity (Tyrion's brother tried to kill him, Joffrey had his father killed, his brother fought a war against Tyrion’s family before they had him killed etc), by them working together for the good of the people ends that. Maybe that’s Martin’s answer to his “the smallfolk suffer when the high lords play” thing and now, the lords will put aside their personal grievances, stop the endless wars, and serve the smallfolk. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Of course, the problem is as you point out, why would Westeros ever accept hand Tyrion? And my, much more simplistic objection, Tyrion is a bad person and unfit for power. Let’s that was a D&D fabrication.

[garblegox]

• Humpty Dumpty Elegy 3 | five books on ☠DEATH🌼 •

The group held a vote on whether to kick Mr. Dumpty out for a year.

Yes won.

I wasn't in on the deliberation, behind the scenes. I'm not a big wig; didn't even get a vote. But I know three big things tipped the scales: Our safety, the perversion, and content violations in chat.

Once we had all taken off our pity goggles, we started to wonder why we overlooked all the murder-suicide commentary. We also thought, in horror, about the reactions of our loved ones, girlfriends, or wives, if we exposed them to Humpty's antics.

A few long-time regulars on the discord were becoming noticeably more absent since he joined. One said a year ago that he wouldn't tolerate Humpty Dumpty's bullshit. He meant it, and he made his point through his actions from the start.

We wanted our other friends back. Friends we'd known for many more years; who actually participate in games with the group; who are gregarious and entertaining; Friends that haven't designated the entire group to be their therapist.

Not everyone had bad memories of Humpty. Because some never logged on when he was in voice chat.

It's officially an elegy.

We all feel gross. Our admin, despite all the negative testimonies, including his own, felt that booting Dumpty was a bitter pill to swallow. He's only ever banned people for egregious, obvious, suicide-by-admin type behavior. But he also felt a bit ashamed for letting people in his group be exposed to such an individual.

In a way, we could hold ourselves responsible for not being more firm in enforcing our boundaries. Five "no"s, and one "yes", means "yes". Five "no"s, a "yes", and a "man, Humpty, you're really a piece of shit, you know that?" also means "yes" just the same. I know how to say "no". And with Humpty, I didn't do my best.

But again, we were never actual therapists, and Humpty rarely acted like a friend. What kind of friend makes you have to consult with books by FBI agents on establishing firm boundaries? Nutty fuckin douchebag friends. I did appreciate him buying me Doom, though. That felt genuinely nice before he cracked a whip at me about it.

This time, I'm gonna try to be far more respectful. He is a human. He is lonely. He does have a lot to learn. And I get no pleasure from his exile. Maybe relief, but no schadenfreude.

Before, I was writing from the perspective of someone at the end of their rope. After experimenting with every level of intensity, trying to get these points across, the only level I hadn't tried was the furious, "Okay fuckhead, you're dead to me. If you don't want to do it the easy way, we'll do it the humiliating way" level of intensity.

It's been fun. But my anger has only one thing left to do, and that's diminish. I got a lot of books for Humpty Dumpty to read, and it's going to be hard to keep the fire hot.

My overall goal is still to share books with people, and to learn from the finest anti-model I've ever met. I told Dump about what I was writing, the reason why, and the fact that I was trying to eviscerate him. He chuckled at me and never got around to reading it, which kind of emboldened me to crank up the spice.

Now that he's cut off, there's a far greater chance he revisits this series. I'll focus on making it actually readable for him too, and not a massive diarrhea cannon aimed at his face. I'll sound like how I spoke to him pre-Twelve Days of Christmas, when I was in investigation mode; When I had hope for him. I got into this mess via sympathy.

"I'm going to kill myself" was Hump's #1 catch phrase. I still reckon he stole it from Wednesday for attention, but whatever, lets just humor him. I don't want that to happen. And if he was ever tempted to really do it, it might be after getting swept off into the goatscape.

So, as we kick off our more namaste-like, Dumpty-free future, let's begin with my favorite books about DEATH. Books a suicidal cat might dig. I know I did.

• #1 Man's Search For Meaning by Viktor Frankl •

Cried like a silly bitch at work, the other day, thanks to this book. I re-listened to it on my phone, and you'd think I spent the whole shift slicing onions.

I'm blessed with coworkers whom I can joke about it with. In the kitchen, we have two types of conversations on line: peep-to-peep chatter; or shouting from one corner of the room to the other, as a sort of performance to make front of house laugh.

Our favorite hits include shouting about: Familial trauma or neglect, sleep disrupting insecurities, suicidal thoughts, political cynicism, nihilistic bile, and the last thing we had a good fuckin cry about. Like a half dozen Statlers and Waldorfs, heckling existence itself.

This one produced some rare tears, though. Tears of awe. This feels like one of those, "Read-every-few-years-for-the-rest-of-my-life" type books.

Known as "the third school of Viennese psychology," Viktor Frankl's "Logotherapy" was first put to the test when he survived three years, in four different Nazi concentration camps. From, "logos" meaning, "meaning" or "reason", logotherapy focusses on the existential meaning of a patient's existence.

Frankl would often ask patients, after they spilled out all their woes, "So, why haven't you killed yourself, yet?" It wasn't rhetorical, he wasn't just trying to be hilarious, the "why" was the point of his entire practice.

"One who has a why to live can bear almost any how" -- Friedrich Nietzsche (aka Frick Nitzels)

Viktor witnessed what happened to a person when their meaning was lost. A man, who lived to see March 31st, the day he prophesized would be his liberation, died two days later when it became clear his dream wouldn't come true. First, he went catatonic, then came typhus. Death by April Fools.

Meanwhile, another man, who prayed to god to transmute all of his suffering into protection for his loved ones in other camps, took every measure of sadism and misery with a steady return of hope. That's not masochism, that's alchemy.

I discussed with Humpty the importance of how he constructs a narrative around his life. That he cultivates nihilism at his own peril. That his big strong brain only has access to half of the truth, if he only focusses on the objective ones. Psychology has a reductionism problem, where mechanical focus on clinical diagnoses reduces people to barely animals.

For some people, their neurology is perfectly sound. Not an imbalance in sight. Their lives? Ship-shape & Bristol; Ivan Ilyich approved; all rites passed; A G R E E A B L E. But how do they feel to be alive? Like the biggest bag of worthless shit.

Why? What makes some people seemingly impervious to psychiatric intervention? Because not all psychiatrists think "the meaning of life" is a scientific topic, and therefore not their role to discuss. Which means you can spend a lot of time learning about psychology, and never learn a single subjective truth.

This is why self-diagnosis is so risky. Where is any of this bullshit I'm writing about on Web MD?

So start here. Evaluate self-help by more logotheraputic standards. Ask, "does this even acknowledge the importance of meaning in my life, or help me pursue it?"

This is my favorite shit to summon tears with. I'm not fully sure why. But if I need tears on queue: "I am here- I am here-..." and I'm away. Same at work, as while I write this now. Makes me wonder what madness even means.

• #2 The Road To Character by David Brooks •

What does Dumpty value?

Not dating fat or ugly women; Getting the negative attention of Japanese videogame developers on Twitter; Being seen as the brother of a girl who isn't his biological sister, or in his family at all; $750 Shadow The Hedgehog statues; Not being a "normie"; and many other purely worthless things.

He's where I started wondering if chronic depression might be a philosophical issue for some people, as opposed to a contextual or neurochemical one. The man will never improve till he wraps his head around the idea of intrinsic values.

There's zero hope of Humpty living a happy life without a moral compass. Sadly for him, he's not a real psychopath, who can easily find all the eudaimonia he wants, just at other people's expense, guilt free. He's a dull narcissist, whose fate is just a crescendo of greater and greater solitude; a deeper and more empty abyss, till annihilation.

This is a book I read early, in my journey to deconfuckulate my brain, and it played a major role in most of my Humpty-scolding, largely without me recognizing it. Upon re-reading, I was surprised to find it influenced my decision to read 4 other books over the years. Including Man's Search For Meaning, and Culture And Anarchy (BANGER) by Matthew Arnold.

Btw Matthew Arnold is the guy who gave us the modern usage of "philistine." I'll be writing more about him, because his book is as applicable today as it was seven generations ago. That book is 2 Yosemite Sam guns/2 Yosemite Sam guns, bang bang bang.

Maybe you're like me, and "moralist" sounds like an insult. Well, Brooks isn't here to scold anyone or be a nerdy little bitch. Don't let anyone fool you, this isn't religious or conservative propaganda, it's another contribution to logotherapy. Take it from a pathologically anti-authoritarian douchebag like myself.

He gives a couple handy binaries to help organize your priorities. "Adam I vs Adam II" virtues, or "Resume vs Eulogy" virtues.

The Adams refer to how in Genesis, Adam displayed two different sets of virtues at different times. Adam I is practical, marketable, flexible, conditional, and Hellenistic. While Adam II is spiritual, self-contained, disciplined, unconditional, and Hebraistic.

Adam I is a great object, but a vacuous subject. Adam II puts little value in the objective world, in favor of a richer subjective one. Not everyone is in a rush to hire Adam II for a job, but everyone's coming to his funeral to pay their respects. Spending time around Adam II is mind expanding, and spiritually enriching.

You see the orange of that cover? That's the yolk I've been trying to get into Humpty's empty fucking shell the whole time. But little did I know I'm just a stupid normie, trying to argue against the axiom that life is meaningless. Am I really that cruel for calling Humpty empty? He's the only motherfucker I know to be like "Yeah, sonder is bliss, but leave me out of it. I'm an ant, not a hill, in this useless head of mine."

We could hold modern psychology responsible for a lot of this. When people dropped faith, and abandoned priests, they created a vacuum in their hearts. I think you can fill it with a multitude of things, without going back to church. But to fill it with psychology exclusively is a disastrous mistake. If you want dogma, just go back to church. Way better chance of turning out friendly.

When Humpty asked for help, what did he have in mind? He claimed he was continuously improving, just by being in our presence. But I know "improve" has nothing to do with eulogy virtues, coming from him. It's why I became convinced he was just looking for attention. The sweetness of a spotlight.

Everyone in the group has got eulogy virtues, and the kind of worries that'd fill Adam II's heart with the warmest sympathy. Wednesday is someone who has exhausted all conventional strategies for fighting depression; all the neurochemical and contextual battlefronts have been braved by him. But the real victories have been existential; A change in philosophy. (Plus, our frontal lobes grew in. If you're under 25 look forward to that shit. It's nice. 👍👍👍👍)

There's no such thing as building character through osmosis. Brooks, like many others in this series, see it as a painful reconstruction project. Parts of you need to be dismantled, examined, and often thrown away. This is why this series is so heinously mean. Humpty is the only one that can humble himself; For me to do it is just humiliating. I tried to lead this horse to this water, and this horse stomped it into a mud puddle.

Another thicc scoop of logotherapy, with a stoic cherry on top. I said that it got me to read four other books, but really it's a bibliography of more than a dozen great authors we should all read before we die. From Mary Ann Evans to Montagne. He makes St Augustine sound like Iceberg Slim. Bestseller for a reason.

• #3 Denial Of Death by Ernest Becker •

Hey, I was just wondering if it'd be cool if I could just be immortal and unforgotten forever? At least for a few millennia. I'm thinking Giza pyramids level longevity. Should be easy. I like a good bite-sized goal.

A lot of people will tell you that the reason they, or anyone else, do anything is to get laid. That at the nucleus of all their heroism, striving, and anxiety, is sex. But why is sex so important? Because we're mortal. The real nucleus is death. The one bone our subconscious chews away on, day and night.

This is where "monkey brain" doesn't apply. Death anxiety is a unique byproduct of human intelligence. It's based on our ability to treat abstract symbols as if they were as concrete as the things they symbolize. A banknote, representing cold hard gold glows in the hand of its owner, like real precious metal; a man wearing a hat, that signifies his leadership over 50 armed men, can be as threatening alone with his hat as he is with his all his men in tow; And looking at the corpse of another human is a glimpse at one's own future. As if your death were mine too.

Every bit of psychological progress is just a wobbly house of cards if you built it before grappling with death. It's the "worm at the core of our pretentions to happiness."

We've all heard the story, someone reaches the tippity-tip-tap-top of the hippity-hip-hap-heap and what do they do? They stoop, put their chin to their fist, furrow their brow, and bum everyone the fuck out with an unsolicited existential crisis.

Because you ain't a pyramid you silly bitch. You a poopy worm.

This book though, in all seriousness, is all seriousness. When I read this I was like "FINALLY! Freudian psychology without all the awkward erections!" See, Freud was 95% right, but his dogmatic obsession with orgasms left his work in need of some decryption.

This book is where we all stop pretending we're any different from Humpty Dumpty. When we act out, we're lashing against our fear of death; fear of heroism; fear of success. When we reach to great heights, we're grasping at immortality.

Lets be straight up, Humpty's not stupid. He can give you a crystal clear description of objective facts, plus secondary and tertiary details. That brain of his is firing on all cinderblocks. The problem is, the neurotic are people who see things with perfect clarity, rather than confusion.

Humpty knows he's mortal. He knows heroism is just a reflex, to either uselessly distract yourself from death, or futilely attempt to negate it. He knows success will just leave him with one last thing to do: die, and be forgotten.

But he doesn't handle those facts, lets say, gracefully. His solipsism has him convinced he came up with all these notions himself. Anyone who appears to grasp them, AND put them towards a happy life, must not grasp them properly.

A little stupidity could do Dumpty some good. Or as Ernest calls it, "legitimate foolishness". The religious call it, "faith". His biggest fears are, making a fool of himself, and buying into comforting lies. He won't talk to women because of course they're going to reject him; He won't join a meatspace community because of course they don't want an autist, or an independent thinker; Of course he won't spend time on self-help, it's either redundant, or futile.

Maybe he's right, because you know, each "of course not" has a long flowchart of if-thens and either-ors behind it, that he spent DAYS ruminating on. Instead of one moment, where he tests his pessimistic hypotheses. Testing would be foolish, when you consider the prior arithmetic.

If Humpty looks even a little foolish, people instantly spot his autism and then he's DOOMED.

He's such a god that he can predict the future, but not withstand it. And such a worm that life is a joke, but too sacred to play with it.

You think "worm" is an insult. But most people don't even live up to a worm's standards; worms leave the world around them a better place. All they do is enrich. I bet if we didn't have worms, plants and fungi would officially cancel this "terrestrial animal" project they've been experimenting with for a while.

For want of a worm, the dirt was lost. For want of a dirt, the food was lost. For want a food, the poop was lost. For want of a poop, life was lost. For want of a life, the Earth was lost. For want of a Earth, God was lost. And all for the want of some shit little worms.

• #4 The Worm At The Core by Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, and Tom Pyszczynski •

Giving myself only a month to discuss this was HUBRIS. Good fuckin JESUS god! Then again, the work has all been done, I'm just trying to waft some air from these books at people's noses. It's gloomy, but this is the bread isle for the existentially starving. Virgin Mary toast, by tha loaf.

All that stuff back there? Ernest Becker? Not a scientist, that guy. It was one of those dirty rotten philosophy books. Eew! If you ask any traditional scientist nowadays, what they think about the importance of philosophy, a heartbreaking percentage think it's obsolete. Which to me, means a heartbreaking percentage of scientists are arrogant brainless fuckin' tumors.

When Denial Of Death dropped in '73, it garnered a ton of hype. It inspired a lot of art. But the scientific community abandoned it like a mamma bird, ditching her nest of chicks because they carry a foreign smell. They felt a little cucked by Kierkegaard, the pre-Freudian post-Freudian. And they'll never be outshone by a theologian. Not willingly.

But there were still scientists looking to bring Becker's work into the realm of the empirical. People like our authors here. Data, studies, models of predictability, nice science shit. The result? TMT, or "Terror Management Theory." Sounds so metal.

It's a treatment lane. Some people are mentally ill due to life circumstances, genetics, physical sickness, etc. For which, there are drugs, CBT, and lifestyle adjustments. One illness can be the result of many different influences, and can thus be treated by many different things.

One drastically overlooked influence however is existential dread. Yes, it can kill you.

Drugs won't change your relationship with mortality. All they can do is take away the physical manifestations of our inner conflict. But they don't answer questions once and for all. With the exception to psychedelics, which I highly recommend. A psychedelic near-death experience is a good time. Try experiencing a little eternity, and tell me you long to live forever.

You're longing for the scariest thing IN THE UNIVERSE!

Cognitive behavioral therapy is great for misbehavior. But behaving like a content person, when you're not, doesn't make you a content person. It's painful, like bone tinnitus. It doesn't answer important subjective questions. Doesn't wipe away the oily film of the absurd.

Lifestyle adjustments are great, but again, it's all extrinsic. Perfect in the meantime, as you're working on coming to terms with your mortality. But your lifestyle will adjust itself anyway, as your fear of death diminishes. It's one way you know its coming along. However I'd never assume I'm over my fear, rather that I'm just artfully dancing around the topic in my head. Once again, an art, not a science.

Do I have a healthy relationship with death? I think I do. Sadly, I think it has a lot to do with my parents, a healthy dosage of dying pets and peers, and most importantly, 3 catastrophic nightmare psilocybin trips. Things I can't share with others; All non-fungible experiences.

The shroom inhibitions were another big reason I gave up on Humpty. You gotta be humbled, you gotta be scared, you need to practice your death before you die. You can't just manage death terror with sarcasm, and catatonic pessimism. He needed to see what the fuck a "monkey brain" can really do.

Our generation has made such a mockery of suicide. All the yapping about it is becoming profane. Whether we play that card for laughs, or just to hear another person beg us to keep on living, we play it as often as we can. Why? Why cry so much god damn wolf?

I think it's a "proximal defense" against terror. We construct what they call proximal and distal defenses against death's effect on our emotions.

Distal defenses are like a roof over your head, and mortal terror is like the rain. Distal defenses do most of the work, keeping subconscious thoughts under control, long before they emerge onto the surface. But when the rain gets through our roof, our proximal defenses play the role of a bucket, catching individual leaks.

Humpty's roof is rusty, corrugated swiss cheese. He thinks the scheme of things is all a sham. Group oriented values are the values of a sheep. He's abandoned all hope of having kids, and has sour-graped on the topic entirely. The rain gets in with full force.

His bucket? He turned it upside down, painted "suicide" on the side, and now wears it on his head. He's soaked up to the neck, shivering, and laughing from the dark. You won't fire him, he'll quit. Everything in his life has been pure fate, except for his death. That'll be his creation.

• #5 The Myth Of Sysyphus by Albert Camus •

Camus and I are perfect examples of the fact that being super handsome and cool doesn't make your life happy or more meaningful. Don't worry 'bout it. 'Sno big deal.

I'm barely smart enough to read shit like this. I re-read everything before I write about it, and I re-re-re-read this one. Felt like an Aesop Rock song, where I'm carried along by isolated little lines and phrases that blow my mind. And only after repeated exposure, do I start to get the thread from start to finish.

The point is, Sisyphus is a bad muthafucka. Don't pity the man, he's a hero. Life is an absurd Sisyphean bunch of goofishness. This book focusses on the question of suicide, in the face of this reality. The rock is going to roll back down hill. Why push it up?

I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure all four of the previous books have referenced sexy ass Albert Camus. That wasn't intentional, but it's pretty neat. If this book feels like it's really tearing your mental asshole open, try easing into it with the other ones. I'm still loosening up for Kierkegaard. The one guy all five books can't stop slobberin' on about.

One thing I liked about Humpty was that he recognized the absurd, and it consumed him too. We shared the same harrowing passion. I think he had a bitchboy response to the issue, but to be engaged with it at all was something I respected deeply within him.

In a way, a "normie" is someone who has either never grappled with absurdity, or lives to avoid it at all costs. We share a disdain for people like that. Especially the avoiders. Humpty wants what Camus calls "living without appeal"

That is, appeal to a god, an ideology, a fiction, or hope. Anything that would insult his genuine gift of lucidity. His atheism, individualism, rationalism, and cynicism are virtues of his. I got no books on abandoning any of those things. But they're a heavy ballast, and they can sink you if you're reckless. An issue that really only effects the smartest people, to toot all our horns. Hey you, give yourself a toot!

Honestly, I've probably spent more time telling Humpty he needs Jesus, than I've said he needs Camus. Because I think he's too Dunning-Kreuger to take him seriously. If something resembles a stupid movie, TV show, or game he likes, he'll consider himself already schooled on the topic. And there's plenty of flippant absurdist media out there to distract him from that good-good shit.

Albert gives 3 examples of living an "absurd life" without appeal. An actor, a seducer (Don Juan), or a conqueror. It should be noted that Humpty is quite deliberately none of these things, and Wednesday is dying to be all three at once. The act of wearing a mask in social settings is extremely degrading, in his opinion; he says women reject him, but he wouldn't dare approach them anyhow, for love is short-lived and exceptional; And he knows everything conquerable is re-conquerable. The point is, you ain't gonna make Humpty look stupid, by fooling him into carrying that rock anywhere.

He also discusses Dostoyevsky's character, Kirilov. A man who committed "logical suicide". After grappling with the absence of god, and his lack of spiritual purpose, Kirilov sought revolt, freedom, and passion through taking his own life. This is the character I think Humpty most resembles.

It's as if Dumpty has the myth backwards in his head. At the top of the hill is death, and at the bottom of the hill is life. Like death is the burden he shoulders, and life is the inevitable retrograde from all his hard work. He can kill himself, or millions of others, and the worms will eat, nutrients will flow. Life will flourish like nothing happened. Fed only sooner in his haste.

This book has drastically improved my attitude at work. Few jobs are more blatantly Sisyphean than cooking food and washing dishes. And I think few cooks handle it with as positive an outlook as me.

Granted, I can't wait to leave. It's also one of the few jobs where you just get burned every day. The palms of my hands are a permanent strawberry bubblegum colour, while the backs are a ghostly pale mick beige; I'll fucking destroy you in a game of hot potato. But in the meantime, I'm proud to carry my daily rock with dignity.

In fact, inspired by the masterpiece, Holes, I like to think of my work like Madam Zeroni's pig. When I'm carrying a 50lb flour bag down four flights of stairs twice a day, or dumping 180lbs of canola oil into their fryers to start the morning (240 if it's dump day), I hear her spooky ass voice in my head. I watch my body get stronger, and I feel some squaring of my debt to the universe. Whatever it takes to be Sisyphus with a smile.

I guess Humpty was looking to be my rock. I was hoping he'd find his own.

• End bit •

(Oops, this was late. Real dickfuck move from someone trying to give life advice. Although I get a free pass thanks to Atomic Habits, so long as I don't fuck up twice in a row. Considering the massive topic, the drastic change in direction, and waiting 15 days to start writing... well I don't have any valid excuses either way. Just gotta not do it again. Okay? Capeesh? Prick?)

It's amazing how quickly the worst memories began to fade the second I didn't have Humpty Dumpty around to resent. It helps that he's a pretty textbook case of himself, and there are countless other people like him to remind me of our time together.

You gotta wonder, "what kind of hyper-demanding asshole friend expects one to read this many books?" honestly I never expected that. I thought Humpty came to Wednesday and I, believing we had knowledge to share, and I spent close to two years, thoughtfully trying to inject lessons from our reading/life into conversations with Humpty. Not only did he breeze by them with zero feedback, he often chose to argue with us directly.

It's not like he's just never been exposed to these things, but would have loved to be. He's always been bent on disproving them.

This series had a different aim, just before I turned on Dumpty. I called it "Books My Dumbass Friends Need To Read." I used the same five books, with 5 different write-ups, posted it, and after all the fun of writing it, it felt completely wrong.

I've been teasing my other friends for a long time, that they all gotta read some of this shit, instead of just getting the sparknotes from me. These books have patched up issues for me that my friends continue to grapple with, and one of the only tools I know of to fix them is a nice book.

(and shrooms)

But my heart wasn't lashing out at them at all. For a number of big reasons. First, they all read books, unlike Humpty. It's what makes book recommendations possible in the first place, and why I don't need to blog at them. They're all bonafide seekers, who are finding happiness at respectable paces. I learn from them just as well. God bless em. Second, none of them use the group as an emotional barf bag. We all expect ourselves to bring something to the table to REWARD people for giving us attention.

I was furious with Humpty Dumpty. I was tired of wasting the group's time, interviewing him about his made up psychoses. Hours on this fucking piece of shit, who'd move the goalpost to a new fantasy dimension of cum and shit and sarcastic scoffs the second you got an eye on his shadow's true form. I needed to put this iceberg of wasted patience far from our boat.

I might replace my anti-model with a role-model. My boy Wednesday. Hump Day, not Humpty Dumpty. He got two different eyes, he seen so much death, and he knows the future. He's Odin. He's Moondog. The Witcher to my Dandelion. The warrior to my poet.

We'll see. I'm gonna be vague about him. Then again I've been super vague about Humpty.

Toning down the venom is a must, though. These aren't books for pieces of shit. They're books so robust even pieces of shit can put them to full use. Albeit, maybe with the help of a jail sentence. Humpty Dumpty is a nauseatingly relatable human being. He's not of a different form from us, but of a different scale.

Oh boy! Next month I bring you 5 more of these dirty little whores! You had better fucking like reading! Oooooh SHIT!

[netheritenugget]

Since you've gotten a couple asks about him (ok only like three but still lol-) and you seem pretty up to date on all the lore and stuff i was wondering if you could tell me why Schlatt is considered canonically dead?

Like i know this happened a looong time ago now but with the possibility that he could be brought back it got me thinking about why he was 'dead' in the first place

Because iirc his only canon death was the heart attack, right?

I've seen people saying his death to Quackity was also canon, but then i think i remember a clip/tweet going around from one of the ccs saying that it wasn't (or maybe i made that bit up idk?)

And then there was that festival death but that's definitely not canon because it's been confirmed multiple times that Tubbo's death was the only one planned and therefore the only canon one

Also I've seen a couple posts saying his ban was treated like a canon death but idk about this one either cause in his first president speech he said something like 'and you know what i said, the day that i got unbanned from the Dream SMP..' which kinda implies he didn't die but was also banned in the lore universe as well (maybe like an exile? or something idk?)

Uhhh yeah anyways so this got kinda long sorry about that aha you just seemed like the best person to ask? Idk, obviously you can ignore this if you wanna it's not gonna matter if he gets brought back soon anyway

And i realize it's probably cause CC!Schlatt didn't want to rp anymore (or at least that's what I've seen around) but i just got curious if there was ever a canon explanation for it? Or if he just speedran through all three of his lives in one go

Anon I have something to confess: one of my greatest flaws as a person is that I absolutely love explaining my hyperfixations to people. The difficult part is stopping me. So you're not bothering me, I'm perfectly happy to explain all about it :3

So the confusion about the number of Schlatt's canon deaths started, I believe, because Game Theory YouTuber Matpat miscounted them in his video about the Dream SMP.

According to the Dream SMP Wiki, cc!Wilbur, and general consensus of the fandom, Schlatt lost his canon lives when:

Technoblade accidentally killed him during the Red Festival, in the blast from the rockets that killed Tubbo.

Quackity deliberately shot him after their argument about the White House being demolished.

He suffered a heart attack in the Camarvan, likely brought on by the alcohol abuse that has been a problem for him throughout the whole story.

In his video Matpat counted his first death at the Red Festival and his third death by heart attack as canon, but did not count his death at the hands of Quackity for some unknown reason. Matpat claimed Schlatt still had a canon life left.

Wilbur reacted on stream to the Game Theory video, and he was momentarily confused by this part. He confirmed that the Red Festival death and heart attack were canon, but went back through the script and realized that, coincidentally, he'd neglected to actually write down in the script that the death took one of Schlatt's canon lives. He questioned whether or not Schlatt could theoretically come back.

But the script is flexible and not the end-all-be-all of canon. If we want to argue that any death that is not explicitly planned or declared canon in writing doesn't count, that's simply not true. There are canon deaths in the story that happen off-script too, the most notable being the lives lost in The Final Conrol Room. Eret's betrayal wasn't in the script, it was a complete surprise to almost everyone. Even Wilbur was unaware that Eret had switched sides. So canon is mostly dictated by what has happened, not what should happen.

And current events support this idea. Schlatt's status as dead was made clearer in subsequent livestreams. He has since re-appeared as a ghost, and he's implied to be present in the afterlife with c!Wilbur. He's definitely dead. At least, for now.

As for cc!Schlatt coming back to the server, he seems like he's willing to do it. c!Schlatt has come back a few times as Glatt to hang out with the other people on a questionably canon level. But there has yet to be an official announcement that he's coming back as a regular member, which is why people are doing the if/when thing.

I think cc!Schlatt will have more fun this time if he chooses to come back, because The Egg seems to be the main antagonist this season. As the main bad guy, c!Schlatt was somewhat limited in what he was capable of doing narratively. He didn't have many opportunities to do goofy fun things like the protagonists and other members of the server, he was there to be evil and scary. Harder to maintain that image by building cuck shacks and laughing with friends. If he comes back as a minor antagonist or character with more freedom from the script, he'll be able to goof off more. So I hope he comes back! I look forward to seeing what kind of chaos he brings to the story :)

Hopefully this explanation wasn't too boring! I try to be clear but sometimes I come off as kind of formal and academic which is why I try not to jump into flat answers right away. If you have other questions don't hesitate to ask. Have a good day :3

[hellsbellschime]

I have been struggling with Jon's ending since the finale aired. I am a Jon stan but I didn't care about him being KitN and the idea of the IT and the Chimera created by the Targs of the Seven Kingdoms didn't sit right with me. Yet Jon end the series exiled by Bran (and fucking Tyrion who gets what he craves) to the Watch again. Yet this time is not a self imposed one but he is sent as a criminal. A traitor (to the North and Starks, to Dany), an oathbreaker, a queenslayer and kinslayer. The show tries to masks this as some what sweet by having his pal Tormund and the free folk waiting for him. Yet that shot of the gate closing as Jon watches speaks to me as Westeros rejecting him and having no place there (to be continued)

Part 2 and when Jon seeks absolution all he gets is Bran vague statement of 'you were where you were supposed to be'. Jon is an outsider in the Stark family as Ned bastard. Being out of place makes him join the Watch at 14 trying to at least prove he has Ned honor. He dreams of being Lord of WF and a trueborn Stark, not out of spite, not out of power seeking. But because he wants to be someone the Starks can take pride and not the shamefull prove that Ned is like the rest. And this causes in him internal shame and pain because he knows his dream comes at the cost of his brothers and sisters rights. Martin presents him in Bran I as the one who bents Ned in keeping the puts and a seven years Bran understands that Jon is sacrificing his chance of getting a pup, how he places the girls and baby Rickon above him. We know that this sacrifice leads to Ghost. But as Jon goes to the Wall with little in s1, he goes back in the finale with less. The only thing that he can hold on is that Sansa, Arya and Bran and safe. Yet he loses everything in exchange. I'm rafting but what the final of Jon Snow keeps ke awake is "where is A Dream of Spring here"? What's the point of his character journey but to be allways doomed as the stain on the Stark name? 

I’m not surprised that you’re struggling with it because it was shit. I think that D&D were aiming for ambiguous but it was really just confusing and empty because it did nothing to address Jon as an individual. It’s not at all bizarre that this happened though, because the moment he met Dany he really ceased to be an individual and the entirety of his character arc was focused on masking the fact that Dany’s dark turn was coming, so his character got no real development and his internal life was nonexistent, and because of the time crunch they forced on themselves it required them to wrap up his entire character arc in half an episode. It was a horrible idea and horrible execution, so having him hand wring over his decision to kill Dany and then being sent to the wall “where he belongs” was the best they could muster in the amount of time that they had.

But for me, I ultimately don’t think Jon’s internal conflict is going to be about killing Dany at all. Once he’s at that point he knows it’s the right thing to do, I think he will be far more conflicted about the part he feels like he played leading up to it and conflicted about whether or not he could have or should have done something earlier. He and Tyrion are making the same mistake in believing that their influence is enough to guide Dany away from dark impulses which obviously isn’t the case, and he’s going to learn that he’s wrong in the most brutal way possible.

I don’t think he’s doomed, but he was sure as hell born under a bad sign, and one of the ultimate bittersweet ironies of his character is that on paper he is nearly everything bad in the eyes of Westeros. He’s a bastard kinslaying queenslaying traitor, except he was right. In a huge sense he’s a foil to Jaime, because Jaime has been awful for his entire life and the only truly heroic thing he had ever done in the first 30 odd years of his life was kill the Mad King, and the entire country derided him and loathed him as a Kingslayer. On the other hand, Jon is someone who has always tried to live up to his ideals and be a truly good and decent person, and the one time where he makes a mistake he essentially becomes Jaime Lannister in the eyes of the world, but instead of his mistake saving King’s Landing it winds up being the reason that it’s destroyed.

I think Jon’s internal conflict will be heavily driven by that, that basically everything that he idealized and wanted to believe in was a false ideal, and the problem isn’t that he never fit into the world, but that the world itself is wrong in so many ways. I think that in the end Jon will likely leave this world behind for quite a while, but I don’t think it will necessarily be forever. I think it’s more a symbolic rejection of the world that he always felt rejected by, and his understanding that people’s desires to take their “rightful place” in the world can be enormously destructive. I also think that one of his great gifts to the world will be not pressing his claim to the Iron Throne and letting all of the insanity that Targaryen rule has brought to Westeros end for good. I think that a big theme for Jon and Arya specifically has been the desire to fit in when they don’t feel like they do, and I think that’s something that GoT swung for and completely missed with the completion of their character arcs. I think that their book endings will be far more in line with that, that instead of feeling rejected they will understand that they can navigate the world in their own way and that’s okay, and they will instead reject the standards that they can’t ever fulfill. The great irony is that after a lifetime of obsessing over the fact that he doesn’t belong, Jon’s origin story both indicates that he DOES belong but that the ruling class of Westeros is fuckin crazy and isn’t really a place where people should want to belong.

In the early years Jon used to be my favorite character but I lost interest in him for exactly this reason, that D&D started using him as the kind of blank slate “chosen one/hidden prince” archetype and didn’t really do jack shit with his character beyond that, and that is undoubtedly why the R+L=J revelation felt so empty. It was meaningless both because it had no impact but because Jon had no reaction to it and quite frankly by the time he found out he was near Bran-levels of non-characterization. It felt like he had no internal characterization left even before he met Dany, but once the two of them came together it was like the show was on a rocket trying to get to the end as quickly as possible with as little explanation as possible. Most of the other characters could get away with their hollow endings because at least some aspect of it rang true, even if I don’t like Sansa’s, Bran’s, Brienne’s or Tyrion’s endings I can still make sense of them, but because Jon’s internal crisis came in literally the last goddamn episode of the series there was no time to fully explain why he was doing what he did or why he felt how he felt, and because it was too complex to explain they basically gave him a vaguely “happy” ending even though it was so shoddy and weird it was hard to even understand what the hell was supposed to be happening. It’s ironic too, GoT really went out of it’s way to make him into the male lead character and then gave him no development or resolution to actually give him a complete character arc.

[mantra4ia]

Trixstar Imagine Fanfiction: "Three Times The Charm"

By mantra4ia. August 1st 2020. Cross posted to AO3.

One of the most aggravating things about hell was that Lucifer could still hear prayers. Like a soundproof room with a squeaky fan. Like a 'no smoking' sign on your cigarette break. Like listening to Alanis Morissette unironically. God's final joke, Lucifer lamented, was that deep in the bowels of exile was just enough awful celestial Wi-Fi to get the spam — prayers to other celestials of which he only caught the static, or pleas to the big man himself — like the bleed-over on an AM/FM radio. Which was why, when Lucifer finally heard a prayer loud and clear with the volume turned up to 11, it nearly knocked him off his thrown. It had been so long since anyone had prayed directly to him, not in jest, or begging for a favor, but earnestly and with fervor that at first it gave him a migraine. He could hardly hear the words let alone distinguish the voice behind them, until at last he was able to tune in to someone achingly familiar.

"Hey Lucifer, it's me."

Trixie, you little hellion, is it really you?!

"it's Trixie. I'm not sure whether you'll remember me. It's been a while."

You have no idea...but of course I remember you mini-Decker, don't be silly.

"Maybe you think I'm still pet sized. Well I'm not anymore."

I promise you, those remarks had nothing to do with your stature and everything to do with your intelligence, and possibly also your penchant to devour snack cakes, small human. But I admit I was wrong Trixie, you're smart and clever. It was then that the epiphany struck Lucifer: why and how was she praying to him at all?

"I bet you're wondering why I called you on the long distance prayer line. At first I thought maybe I would hear your voice answer me back, but I guess this will have to do. You see Lucifer, I may have lied to you, and I know you are not going to like that, but I hope it doesn't keep you away forever."

What? He took flight from his throne and down to lowest depth of hell scape, trying without success to fully find his footing among the chasms, his knees imperceptibly shaking —though he knew not why — while his feet took hold of him though he knew not where to. As if beckoned by the siren sound of her voice, he made his way through the winding onyx labrynth, turning where her voice waned and proceeding again where it renewed in strength.

"Because I didn't lie-outright-lie. I just didn't tell the whole truth. I've always known you were an angel, like your brother Amenadiel. Just that you live in different places. I wrote a whole bunch of letters over the years, but the post office told me Hell wasn't a valid address, and eventually they started making fun of me behind my back for not having enough postage."

Well you should have tried sending it via the DMV. Honestly, Beatrice, I have any number of portals there. A whole network really.

"Anyway, I figure where you are it might be lonely, so I guess this is as good a time as any to catch up."

Out with it then, what's the sitch child?

"I just started driving lessons, although they're not as good as yours." That's my girl. "And Charlie's doing great, he started playing soccer." Please don't tell me Linda had him play keeper to keep an eye out for infant angel powers. "He's the goalie." Christ, I bet she put him in a helmet too. "I was mad at him for a long time, I know he's only little, but I was angry that he couldn't remember you like I remember you. He even asked me if you were my imaginary friend." Does he really not remember his Uncle Lucifer? "I know, kids are dumb. But I'm not mad anymore. I drew him a picture of you in my art class...and my detention after I didn't do the actual assignment in art class, but still-lifes of fruit are boring. It doesn't look like my old drawings on the refrigerator from the last time you were here, if that's what you're worried about. And it's better than Amenadiel's stick figure drawings. If I'm being honest, I wanted to make sure I remembered you too. Maybe one day you can tell me what you think. My teacher Mrs. Fissner says it's very good. Disturbing but good. She may have sent me to see the social worker. Mom misses you. I miss you too. Listen Lucifer, I'm sorry I didn't reach out sooner but...never mind, I guess that's all for now...."

No, Trixie. You're the first human voice I've heard in a thousand years who isn't begging for mercy. Don't, please, Lucifer pleaded.

"It's just that I don't really believe in prayers. I mean, I think they're kind of stupid..."

You're preaching to the choir Trix. I couldn't agree more, this rare instance being a timely exception.

"...because people somehow find a way to make it all about them, and what they want, when they should really be listening."

Oh damnation, don't tell me you've turned into a theological scholar, or did Amenadiel put you up to this? Fess up. Could you sound anymore like your mum, you're the second oldest young person I know. Where is the Beatrice who could extort people for cash, lay waste to my flat in a single pirouette, and inhale chocolate like I inhale controlled substances? A haunting thought ghosted over Lucifer's nostalgia. Did I miss all your formative years?

"And I don't want to do that, because I don't want to torture you."

Lucifer's step faltered as he slid to the ground against the ravine walls, at last overwhelmed by the whole absurd, miraculous encounter. All the days upon days he'd spent torturing souls without missing a beat, and Trixie was worried about torturing him? About how her struggles might affect him? His chin sank to his chest, and Lucifer cried.

"Mom didn't tell me you went back to hell, because she doesn't know that I believe you when you said you're the devil, but she did tell me that it's important and that in your new job a lot depends on you. I didn't want to hurt you by asking you to come back when I know that you can't. But this life is really important too Lucifer, and...it's mom. She's got a new friend."

So that's it, Lucifer thought in resignation, that's why she's praying.

"I feel lost between them. So I asked God to send me an angel, the nicest angel he had."

You've got to be kidding me? Is that what I am now sloppy seconds, I'm not even first on the prayer chain!

"Except I'm pretty sure I already used up that prayer when he sent me you."

Lucifer's din of thoughts fell into silence as he hauled himself up to full stature, trying to pull himself together. I can't help you Trixie, your mom deserves to be happy. Chloe deserves to share her life with someone who makes her feel as special as she really is. And God help me, I can't believe I'm saying this, but it would help if you showed her a little grace.

"So I was hoping Lucifer, that you could please come back and show my mom this isn't the right guy for her. I know you're the only one who can."

Not if it puts you both in harm's way, Lucifer said, knowing that his words would never reach her, and that her prayer like a billion others before would float away unrequited.

"If you can't help me, please help her."

Lucifer stopped cold. Why would the detective need my help?

"I told you, Lucifer. I need you to understand that I've always known what you look like. More than that, I need you to know I've always understood who you are. So that you'll believe me when I say I know that my mom's friend, the one that looks like you, isn't really you."

It was only then that Lucifer realized the wall he'd braced against was not a stone cliff, but a gate. He did not waste a moment eviscerating the lock.

Trixie had searched for Lucifer once, in his mortal abode at Lux.

She'd found him again within his personal den of iniquity without batting an eye.

Little did she realize that even in the lowest depths of hell she could reach him. Dad's blessings, it seems, run in the family.

Third time's the Trix. You're right urchin. It's time to go home.

***21 days of Lucifer Countdown: 21 days until season five. New content daily***

[faejilly]

Not to be suddenly serious on your completely justified salt re: Jace -> my salt was bc s1 Jace was insufferable and frustrating!! Every time I really truly wanted to let it go or maybe cut him some slack bc I'm not entirely unsympathetic to him, he somehow managed to double down on his bs :/ Like I was willing to move on from him acting pissy when werewolves took Clary and the infamous 'maybe your mom..." in 1x05, but he, no, he dropped "yes, you did. you lost her" when Alec said he didn't do

anything Jace hadn't done before. What is worse this shit was followed by his entitled self-righteous behavior in 1x06 like you don't get to treat Alec crappy and then demand his help and act as if he's supposed to simply come around (unpopular opinion but I don't like their scene at the end of 1x06). And this is only one example! Thus, I'm like Alec's punches, verbal and actual ones alike, were lethal and brutal and I'm not unsympathetic to Jace but his stupid dumb ass had it coming

[re: this post]

I mean

I agreed with your salt the first time nonny, but

Like

The show tells us that Jace loves Alec and would die for him. It tells us that he’s a good Shadowhunter, an excellent fighter and a valued soldier. That means that for everyone to believe such things (and they clearly do), historically he gets the job done, values the parabatai bond itself (we see that he was the one who pushed for it, in fact) and regularly protects Alec to the best of his ability. The show explicitly tells us all these things, makes it clear that’s how everyone else views their relationship, that that past is both well-known and well-supported by the other characters’ behavior.

Does the show actually show us any of that beyond a few brief moments in s1? No. But. It’s not, on a technical level, a very good show. It frequently says one thing and shows something else and clearly never notices the disconnect.

SO

This means, if we’re stupidly invested in the characters (like I am, obviously) we need to look at the show and decide what we think canon was trying to say, whether that’s actually what it said or not.

Where does that leave us with Jace?

You can absolutely look at canon and decide Jace is a spoiled asshole who they’d mostly be better off without. (Obviously that’s not where I ended up, but you do you, darlings. It’s ok to hate the fictional character, god knows there are a ton of them I think their assorted media would be better without.)

Is he a con artist who wants to be thought of as a good man and has somehow fooled the entire NY Institute with his charm and ability to kill things? (Jace would say yes, he has several moments where he refers to himself as irredeemable, or monstrous, or dark, or useless. He believes he’s a terrible person.) This is, tbqh, supported by a lot of his behavior towards Alec, he’s lashing out and cruel and dismissive in a way that is very hard to watch, and doesn’t seem to actually have much to do with Clary at all, even though she’s positioned as the reason for this behavior. (I think, instead, she is, as usual, the catalyst for change rather than the cause.)

But Alec and Izzy clearly adore him, and they’re not generally tolerant of cruelty.

So what the fuck is he doing?

Jace was an abused child, who’s still very young, and is aggressively against any sort of self-assessment or self-reflection, because he’s sure if he looks too closely he’s going to see that he’s a monster, that his father broke him, that there’s no coming back from that. (And in some ways, he’s right, he’ll never know what it’s like to be a person who wasn’t abused, and for as long as he tries to pretend it doesn’t matter, he’s never going to be able to set it aside.) So he doesn’t, on any deep level, know who he is. He relies on other people to define himself. (He relies on Alec, and then Izzy, and then the rest of the Lightwoods, and after that maybe everyone else, but clearly they’re not that important.)

I think, based on how angry he is when Simon tries to call out his behavior towards Alec, how confused he is when Alec isn’t just always there at his shoulder for whatever insanity he’s trying to do next, Jace’s entire life is framed around an idealized version of Alec as his center.

He doesn’t really relate to Alec as a person. Alec is his proof of humanity. Alec is his parabatai, they share souls, Alec is the reason Jace isn’t entirely a monster.

Just mostly.

Now, Jace knows Alec is gay. Jace cannot deal with that fact, because Shadowhunters are not allowed to be gay. Jace seems aware of this in a way that Isabelle isn’t, seems aware that if Alec is forced out of the closet that he could lose his brother, his anchor, his soul-bond.

And I like to think it’s because of Michael Wayland.

The show never addresses this, but the books do, and we know everyone making the show read the books, so. We have Jace, who knows his “father” was Robert’s parabatai, (that’s why he got sent to the Lightwoods after his father’s death, after all) and also that, despite being parabatai, they weren’t together anymore. Their bond was so weak Robert didn’t even know when Michael died. (He can’t have, or Valentine’s masquerade never would’ve worked.) It’s not an entirely unreasonable leap to assume Jace would’ve wanted to know why, how such a thing happened to a literal soul-bond... and that he found out that Michael was gay, and that was probably why he’d been “exiled” away to his estate. Whether Michael self-exiled to get away from Robert’s reaction, or Robert discreetly ‘encouraged’ him to get away from The Clave kind of doesn’t matter... the end result was that Jace was alone in the Wayland Estate (with a monstrous father) for the first ten years of his life, and he can’t let that happen again, not to himself, and not to Alec.

(Is this in canon anywhere? No, but it fits, and I like it, so.)

If Alec admits he’s gay, Jace will lose him. So Jace can’t let him do that. Which means he clearly can’t ever address Alec’s infatuation with him, either. Which means a lot of conversations about emotions or friendship or personal beliefs can’t be had, because Jace is always almost as much on guard against Alec’s secrets as Alec is, and every time they don’t talk about any of the things they know about each other, that’s another layer of armor between them and the truth (and a better relationship).

But that’s ok with Jace because he’s doing it for Alec. (Whether it seems like that to Alec himself or not.) Alec is the one who made sure the Lightwoods were Jace’s family, not just a place to stay. Alec saved him, from his father, from his past, from a future where he never did anything right.

There’s a line when they’re outside the City of Bones, when Alec is asking Jace why this girl? and Jace says something about Lightwoods take in strays, don’t they? And he is so clearly trying to be a Lightwood, (not just Jace Wayland), trying to do for Clary what Alec did for him, making that behavior an explicit compliment to Alec. (I am being like you.)

And instead of affirming that, yes you’re a Lightwood, yes you’re doing the right thing, yes you’re saving someone, I’m so proud of you, Alec says you’re nothing like her.

Now, Alec says “you were never a stray” because protecting Jace & Izzy is important enough to him that he’s afraid of protecting Clary, because it’s going to put Jace & Izzy in danger. He’s saying you’re better than her, you’re more important to me.

But what Jace hears is you’re not doing the same thing, you’re not doing the right thing, you’re not like me.

And for all there’d been sniping and aggravation earlier, for all Jace met Clary and went ooooh, shiny, and made a whole slew of reckless decisions, I really believe that that moment outside the City of Bones is when their relationship broke. (Which makes the fact that the physical conflict in their relationship breaks free outside the City of Bones as well several episodes later surprisingly poetic.)

So now, for the first time, Alec disagrees with Jace, and Jace can tell he’s serious about it... and Jace thinks he’s wrong. And Jace doesn’t know what to do with that. (If Alec is an ideal rather than a person, than Alec can’t do anything wrong, and Alec going along with all of Jace & Izzy’s shenanigans must mean they weren’t that wrong either, not that Alec is too over-protective and has massive issues regarding responsibility and self-esteem and personal value.)

When someone falls off the pedestal you’ve put them on, it’s only human nature to blame them for failing you, rather than realize that pedestal wasn’t fair and you’re the one who put them up there, and pushed them off again when they couldn’t meet your impossible expectations. So Jace lashes out, because how dare you, the only person I could trust and respect unconditionally, be wrong!

Which is egregiously unfair, so I agree, he deserved Alec practically trying to kill him, though it’s obviously horrifying that that’s how far it had to go for him to realize what he was doing.

But it’s not surprising, both because of his inability to look at himself and that pedestal he’s got Alec on... it would take something cataclysmic to break through both those mindsets.Which is why it took Clary breaking the entire Shadow World to also break their issues out into the open. They were both too well-guarded to do it themselves.

[aegor-bamfsteel]

So GRRM apparently said Bittersteel and Calla didn't have children, what do you think about this new information? What could be the reason for them to not have any child? Is it possible for either of them to have bastards? How does this information affect Aegon Blackfyre theory?

These are all fantastic questions, anon, and ones that my very patient followers/askers in my inbox have been waiting for me to talk about! I’ve been out of the loop on new asoiaf info due to feeling a little bummed out with fandom for a few months, so GRRM’s Summer 2018 interview actually slipped under my radar. I didn’t find any print transcripts of it when I did a hasty Google Search, so here’s a reddit thread talking about the revealed information; the only part that’s relevant to my answer is that when asked if Bittersteel aka Aegor Rivers had any offspring, GRRM replied with “No, I don’t think so.”

And now, to answer your questions under the very long and probably wanky cut:

Question 1: What do I think about this new information? Well, what GRRM said is a little different than Aegor and Calla not having children; he specifically said he thinks that Aegor probably didn’t have children. We have to consider whether or not GRRM would give out highly plot-relevant information in an interview years before the possible Big Reveal, so he might simply be lying (although I don’t recall whether or not he has directly lied before in an interview). Yet assuming this is the truth, I’m personally rather disappointed that Aegor probably didn’t have children for a few different reasons. Not because I support a theory with a ton of gaping holes in it that nobody else likes to talk about, but because I like Aegor Rivers as a(n idea of) a character and a lack of a close family life is just another personal tragedy of his.

However, the idea that Aegor never had sons (that reached fighting age/were able to fight) is from my point of view pretty clear from the text of twoiaf. I had pointed out to warsofasoiaf prior to making this account that the fact that Aegor’s sons were never mentioned in twoiaf is a strike against the Aegon Blackrivers theory; we don’t know much about Aegor, true, but we do know about his devotion to the Blackfyre cause and how Blackfyre family members personally fought in the rebellions in Westeros, so it would be out of character for Aegor not to have any putative able-bodied sons take the field. While perhaps they were too young to fight in the Third Blackfyre (especially if Aegor’s wife was in fact Calla, at least 13 years his junior), there is no excuse why they were not mentioned fighting alongside Daemon III or Maelys. The way Yandel describes leadership of the Golden Company is another strike against Aegor having sons or even later descendants; he writes that until Maelys the leadership was held by the descendants of Daemon Blackfyre rather than Aegor Rivers, and if the leadership was as nepotistic as Yandel implies, you’d think male descendants of Aegor Rivers would be the among first ones acclaimed captain-general after 241. But all of the known captains-general were Blackfyres rather than Aegor’s descendants (there was no way Aegor’s descendants would’ve been allowed to take the surname Blackfyre given the fear that he was wielding too much power over the cause, as both Daemon II’s failed Rebellion and Aenys’ arrival in Westeros demonstrates). I find it implausible that if Aegor Rivers had descendants the Golden Company would’n’t’ve known and kept them as safe as possible in anticipation of them at least joining the Company, if not fighting for the throne (certainly older exiles like Harry Strickland use their exile ancestry as a form of seniority over others, and a Bittersteel descendant would surely use his ancestry in Company politics).

But I would’ve liked Aegor to have had daughters. I think it could’ve been a bittersweet parallel to the Bracken sisters; that the sexual violence done to them by Aegon IV would give rise to women proud of their female ancestors who sought revenge on the Targaryens. After Aegon IV tortured and executed Bethany and her father and lover, Bethany’s lover Terrence Toyne was avenged by his biological brothers who killed Aemon the Dragonknight, but who was there to avenge her? She had no biological brothers, only a sister who had a son who grew up to spend his life trying to kill and displace Targaryens. It seemed that nobody cared what had happened to Bethany but Aegor. But if Aegor never had children, that lineage is dead and the cruel injuries done to Bethany and Barba can never be avenged by a direct descendant.

It’s just one more horrible thing that happened to Aegor Rivers, a character whom I admire because of his continued survival despite all odds, and it makes his character less interesting: Just like his mother’s, Aegor Rivers’ life was an unending string of tragedies; a permanent exile from 2 weeks old, at age 6 his aunt and grandfather were murdered by his sperm donor without due process, he was raised close to a disputed territory (the Mother’s Teats) that bore the scars of Targaryen cruelty (Daemon Targaryen’s dragon Caraxes had burned Bracken land in 129), and that’s not even getting into what the Targaryens/Brynd3n Riv3rs did to his chosen family the Blackfyres (they essentially slaughtered Daemon and his descendants like they weren’t human). I’d just like some hint that he could’ve been content; that maybe he was more than just an enemy for the Targs/Brynd3n Riv3rs to beat down over and over, but a character with his own life and loving bonds outside of war and tragedy. The idea that he had a wife and daughters introduced a possible different dimension to him; his descendants would’ve been a physical manifestation of his survival to live on in the face of hardship. Yet assuming GRRM speaks the truth, he was just as miserable in his personal life as he was in his dealings with Westeros.

Aegor Rivers having offspring would’ve further made him a foil for Brynd3n Riv3rs. Not because I don’t think Brynd3n Riv3rs didn’t have offspring (although I do believe he was childless), but because BR is very much associated with death and destruction. Every time he’s mentioned in D&E and aDwD, he is compared to a corpse. Each institution the Powers That Be put him in charge of he utterly ruins or dishonors, whether that be as Hand, Lord Commander of the Wall, or the Last Greenseer. By contrast, Aegor Rivers is shown to be a creator of institutions, founding a mercenary Company unusually known for its dedication to discipline, brotherhood, and honor. If he had had children, it would’ve forced the Aegor=life Brynd3n=death symbolism even harder, as Aegor would have physically created a bunch of children who lived beyond his own lifetime.

It just irritates me that GRRM seems to care so little about Aegor that he might not have even thought about him having children. That’s another interpretation to GRRM’s “I don’t think so” answer; that he put so little thought into the life of one of his more influential historical characters that he wasn’t even sure if he’d sired offspring (this is assuming, as I do, that Aegor’s possible descendants aren’t really relevant to the plot of asoiaf). GRRM has answered with “I’m not sure. I need to check my notes” to some questions about his secondary characters, such as where Oberyn Martell was during Robert’s Rebellion; and as of late he seems to have had trouble keeping his facts straight (he endorsed Elio Garcia and Linda Antonsson writing twoiaf because they apparently knew canon better than he did. Which does not make me hopeful for future book releases), but he doesn’t seem to have even had notes on the subject. And either in the same interview or one shortly before/after, GRRM confirmed that in the face of all logic, Brynd3n Riv3rs was allowed to take Dark Sister with him to the Wall despite being a criminal to the Crown with the only Valyrian sword the Targaryens had in their possession. So not only did GRRM flatten and dismiss Bittersteel’s character, but he further nullified one of the few times Bl00draven ever got comeuppance for his atrocities. There’s no sense of balance to their conflict; everything somehow goes BR’s way while BS is condemned to live a life of misery and fade away into nothing. And, contrary to what GRRM likely wanted, this double standard only makes me pity Aegor more and pray for BR’s painful death.

Question 2: What could be the reason for [Aegor and Calla] not to have a child? We know so little about what happened between Aegor and Calla that I think it’s best to look at what we do know—that shortly before the First Blackfyre Rebellion, Daemon I agreed to wed Calla to Aegor—and then examine possible answers to the outcome of Aegor+Calla being childless. Solutions that I can think of, in order of how plausible I think they are:

The marriage was never consummated: Aegor had a Targaryen sperm donor, sure, but he was raised by the Brackens and spent his life fighting against Targaryen supremacy. The idea that incest (one of the most obvious parts of Targaryens believing themselves above others) disgusted him isn’t impossible. That Calla was at least 13 years his junior and knew him since she was a child could’ve disgusted them both further. Also, Aegor was often away fighting in mercenary companies, which decreased the amount of time the two spent together to consummate. Therefore they could’ve had a sham marriage meant only to bind Aegor and the Blackfyres closer together. However, I consider this the least likely answer because 1) Yandel implies that Aegor suggested the marriage in the first place and 2) Aegor is characterized as being very focused on the Blackfyre Cause to the point of losing many of his scruples by the Fourth Rebellion (referring to his ineffectual alliance with Torwyn Greyjoy, a traditional enemy of his Riverlands home), so he’d hardly balk at uncle-niece incest.

Either Aegor or Calla were biologically unable to have children: If this is true, my money is on Aegor, since female fertility in GRRM-land seems to be passed on from mother to daughter. They stayed married until Aegor’s death in 241, and because Calla was 45-56 at the time, she never had any other children.

Calla died before she could have children, perhaps in childbirth: I hate, hate, hate this possibility since it reduces and then fridges a female character for her ability to bear children, but given GRRM’s track record of killing off married female characters in childbirth, it’s a plausible explanation. Aegor never remarried after her death and so also died childless.

Daemon I only agreed to wed the two; he didn’t even officially betrothe them, let alone had a wedding. Thus the marriage never took place at all because…

Calla died before they could wed. I also hate this possibility for creating and killing off a female character to be a cheap red herring, but again I wouldn’t put it past GRRM. In this instance, there’s a historical parallel in the figure of Princess Louisa Stuart, James "the Old Pretender” Stuart’s sister who died unmarried at age 19 from an outbreak of smallpox that struck both siblings. The same results ensued as in part C.

There was no political advantage for it to occur, so Calla married someone else: If you think Aegor was a bad match for a would-be Princess when he was a landless knight dependent on the charity of the Brackens/Blackfyres, think of how much worse he was as a landless exile in a society where knighthood and birth were largely irrelevant, he was geographically and doubtlessly monetarily cut off from the Brackens, and the Blackfyres themselves were desperate for wealthy allies. Although Calla had at least two other sisters (Calla was the eldest rather than elder daughter, implying that she had more than one sister), Rohanne was not going to waste her marriage potential on a penniless sellsword while the Targaryens were trying to curb her influence in Tyrosh via wedding two of their princes to Kiera. No, Calla and her siblings needed to make matches with powerful Tyroshi or other wealthy Essosi families in order to get the funds, ships, and armies to invade Westeros. Remember that Aegor’s chief strength, the Golden Company, didn’t materialize until 212 when Calla was 16-27 and very likely already married to an aforementioned noble.

Calla had children and her descendants still live in Tyrosh: GRRM’s response doesn’t indicate that Calla never had children, especially since it wasn’t made clear that she and Aegor even married. Bear with my tinfoil for a second, but her name indicates that she did have children. We’re supposed to pay attention to Calla’s name because it’s non-Valyrian, unique in book!canon, and above all, a flower name. GRRM loves his flower significance, most famously with Lyanna’s blue roses (unattainable, mysterious, rare beauty) but also with Jonquils (desire, vanity, a happy marriage) and the white water lilies of Maidenpool (purity, peace, spiritual enlightenment). In Calla’s case, the calla lily is a symbol of peace, Christ’s resurrection, and rebirth in the springtime. It’s also known for being able to survive harsh elements and is an odd misnomer (technically neither a calla nor a lily, but its own genus). Considering the strong rebirth connotations calla lilies have, I believe that Calla is the most likely Blackfyre child to have living descendants. That’s not to say that she is the only child of Daemon I to have them (see section 4.4.1 for further speculation on that front), but the implications of her name plus general Nominal Importance (she’s the only Blackfyre descendant we know of not to die horribly and she’s the only named female) indicate that she’s the person through which the Blackfyres survived.

Question 3: Is it possible for either [Aegor or Calla] to have bastards? If 2b is untrue and both Aegor and Calla were fertile, then it’s certainly possible for them to have bastards. After all, we know little about Aegor and even less about Calla. There are rumors that Aegor was in love with Shiera Seastar, and he was so often away from Tyrosh that it’s possible he had an extramarital affair. As for Calla, it is less likely for her to have a bastard (you’d think that if she did, Yandel would’ve mentioned it to discredit Aegor and the Blackfyres even further), but I guess it’s possible for her to have been like her grandmother Daena in that respect. But is it likely? I don’t think so. Maybe it’s just my headcanons firing away, but my idea of Aegor is someone who’s incredibly insecure about sex/sexuality due to what happened with Barba and Bethany; ergo, I don’t believe he would have recreational sex with a woman not his wife. As for Calla, she was part of a family under a lot of pressure to behave appropriately so as to give neither the Tyroshi nor the Blackfyre exiles cause for complaint. I do believe she had legitimate children (see 2.4.2), just apparently not with Aegor.

Question 4: How does this information affect Aegon Blackfyre theory? Compared to GRRM’s answers regarding other fan theories, this one is a pretty direct NO GO. Granted, it’s somewhat cagey (he simply said he probably thinks Aegor he didn’t have offspring, not any other Blackfyres), but think about how he’s responded elsewhere:

Example 1: When asked about Jon Snow’s death, he responded with a dry “You really think he’s dead, do you?” so he’s not afraid of acknowledging a twist most readers already anticipated.

Example 2: On a more important and impactful theory, R+L=J, he refused to confirm or rebut any useful information; specifically, when asked if any Stark other than Ned had children, he said that Benjen was at the Wall, Brandon could’ve sired Snows, and Lyanna died. That non-answer regarding Lyanna was often toted as evidence in favor of R+L=J until the show confirmed it in Season 6.

Example 3: When asked on his blog whether or not those who believe Sansa Stark and Jon Snow will reunite and get married/rule Winterfell together by the end of the series are right, he responded “Not going to say anymore than I have already” which is not the outright dismissal a supposed crackship (or not so crackship, as he’s outright dismissed more popular ships before) would’ve merited.

Thus: GRRM could’ve chosen to avoid or subtly answer the question like he did in these three examples, but he chose to outright confirm that Aegor likely didn’t have children. Up to this point, the most popular subtheory of Aegon VI’s alternate parentage was that he was a descendant of Aegor and Calla, based on Illyrio Mopatis’ claim that Maelys was the last male-line Blackfyre and the fact that Aegon VI has the support of the Bittersteel-founded Golden Company. Now GRRM’s response seems to have brought that theory down; Aegor had no children, so Aegon VI could not be his descendant.

However, rebutting Aegon Blackrivers is not the same as rebutting Aegon Blackfyre. There are several of Daemon’s children who are not confirmed to have died childless: Haegon had at least three sons who may’ve had daughters, Aenys may’ve had daughters, the two youngest sons of Daemon I may’ve had children, Calla may’ve had children by someone other than Aegor, Calla had at least two sisters who could’ve had children, and Captain Daemon Blackfyre and Maelys could’ve had daughters. The potential candidates for female-line Blackfyres is still rather large. The idea that the Golden Company would allow their king’s descendant to grow up apart from them on a poleboat amidst a bunch of Westerosi exiles rather than in Tyrosh actually learning statecraft from his noble family is a strange one, but I leave those explanations to those who actually believe in the theory. (For my part, I believe Illyrio when he said no Blackfyre will take the Golden Company home, but a Targaryen will. He just may not be the Targaryen Westeros or the readers expected.)

In conclusion, I am disappointed that Aegor Rivers was confirmed to not have had children due to character- rather than theory-based reasons; I would’ve preferred that a character that had faced such adversity had a physical representation of his survival in some descendants, but I can live with the Golden Company being his legacy. There are any number of reasons why he never had any legitimate children, but I like to think it was because he remained unwed and devoted to the Blackfyre Cause while Calla had children with someone else. I’ve read some writings by those who subscribe to the Aegon Blackfyre theory, and I can only hope that this new information teaches fandom to speculate a bit more kindly. If someone disagrees with your theory for whatever reason, never call them delusional or say that they are “just fooling themselves.” Never take any theory as obvious, as everything is speculation until confirmed by canon or Word of G-d. Always consider other people’s arguments and try to build your theory based on the text rather than warp the text to fit your theory. And above all, listen with compassion.

Thank you for your interesting set of questions, anon. I hope that I have done them justice in my response.