#also a ship being in a certain category does not determine if i like it or not. sometimes two characters just feel like exes to me

[hevanderson]

i have many opinions. many of which are not based in canon

[majorxmaggiexboy]

The Terror Shipping Nonsensical Babbling - Jopson edition

first of all full disclosure while i am happy to ship this cat with anyone and everyone in this show (except, y’know) Jopson is my designated character per media i get to claim for the aroaces so technically in my world it’s canon that he’s just married to being the best steward on the planet like someone back home will be like “So have you ever thought of marriage?” and he’ll be like “No i’m good” “But Don’t You Want A Wife?” “Nah” “A Lover???” “Wouldn’t have time” “what” *rolls out to-do list* “Okay first of all you need Jesus but second of all-” 

BUT HYPOTHETICALLY 

there’s exactly one of two ways a Jopship could go

1. This is a guy who needs a PROJECT okay this man is a mama duck in the body of a cursed victorian 20-something if he isn’t actively caring for and nurturing something 24/7 he fades into the ether like if he doesn’t have an object of ceaseless loyalty and devotion you HAVE to give him like, an egg or something to take care of until that situation is rectified. Which means ideal candidates will be the poor little meow meows of life the pathetic soggy waffles of men (if women were an option in The Terror he’d go for like, an ex-maid turned weird victorian vigilante she totally killed her last three bosses and probably lives in a trashcan he would love her) okay he needs somebody he can take care of and hype up and enable i mean

2. ALTERNATIVELY and he would HATE this option initially he should be with someone who will be like “Wow, damn, he does everything. I better step it UP” and pulls an uno reverse on him and shows the same level of care and dedication and he’s like “wtf is THIS? NO??? That’s my job!” if he isn’t furious and wriggling like the cat in the pepe le pew cartoons they’re not doing it right. Unfortunately Jopson is tall so ideal candidates for this scenario are absolutely lacking but even shorties can make it work if they’re determined. Get somebody who will either out-soft him by sheer goodness of nature or who will run on spite and red bull and take it as a personal challenge to be as gentle and loving as possible and create a continual cycle of one-upping each other like that

THE CANDIDATES THEN

Luckily for us almost the entire cast of The Terror falls into one or the other of those two categories. So does Catwoman. So,

1. Catwoman - I was joking at first but actually i can see it. It could work. 19th Century Catwoman would be a weirdly ideal candidate. I hate myself

2. I won’t lie the Jopzier shippers know a category 1 when they see it. It ain’t my favorite but i also can’t argue with them

3. Lieutenant Nedward Little is unique in that he fits both categories like, on the one hand we’d get Jopson going “Oh my god I have to fix him,,,,” and trying to kind of lowkey hype him up, especially to Crozier, being like “that’s an interesting point lieutenant the captain would like to hear that he’s actually v fond of u u know” and Little would be like, you know, in tears by this point going “man i gotta step the hell up and be a damn good man” and then he wouldn’t but it’d be a solid effort and Jopson would appreciate it except for the times when Little’s on him to take a break or smthn. They definitely argue a lot but they’re a pretty cute option.

4. Lieutenant Irving is actually also a fit for both categories so Lieutenant Nedward once again knows the sting of not being special, that’s awful. Anyway, Irving is a flaming dumpster fire of a gay man, it’s downright tragic, Jopson would feel compelled to intervene. He’d sit through so many crisis of religion conversations and be so nice about it while also fully calling Irving out on his stupidass opinion so after a certain point Irving would actually be working on himself and would be like “wow I should do something nice” and would do a hard swerve in the opposite direction so he goes from Gay And Angry About It to like, Aggressively Bumbling Yet Well-Meaning Boyfriend like after a certain point Jopson would legitimately have to be like “please let me do what’s left of my job it’s all i have, also we have to improve your sewing” it’s a potentially cute option, they get into little tiffs too but at the end of the day they’re also in fact having an ongoing competition as to who can be the sweetest softest most gentle yet semi-feral bf

5. Henry FOSTER Collins oh my god it’s another category 12 HE STARTS OUT as a 1 like Jopson’s like “This man is on DRUGS?????” and drags him to Dr. Goodsir which starts a chain of events that saves all their lives but hear me out hear me out Collins is reminded that life is worth living and Collins is able to return to being the absolute soft semi-feral teddybear we all know and love he’s like “i will take care of you i will somehow bring flowers i will cuddle for warmth you don’t even have to ask i will build us a goddamn house i will punch tuunbaq in the face if it even looks at you what do you need what can i do for you” and Jopson is probably like “that’s very sweet but nO ACTUALLY” so he’s doing everything in his power to take care of Collins and make him feel loved but Collins is doing everything in his power to take care of Jopson and they’re both kind of stressed out but Collins is hug-shaped, and that is important. Jopson needs a hug that cracks his spine like a glow-stick it’d be so good for him, Collins is the man for the job. Collins also has rly big coat which is super important for purposes i’m sure you can discern

6. DOCTOR GOODSIR CATEGORY 2 codifier. Do y’all understand that if Goodsir falls in love with you you’re set for life? Like you literally never have to worry about anything ever again, that bear could be looking you dead in the eyes going “you’re next” and you’ll still die feeling safe and warm in the knowledge that Goodsir loves you SO GENTLY ngl Jopson would be horrified. He’d probably go through a bluescreen moment of just, “what is happening” just, straight up sheer confusion but eventually he’d be like “Oh. Alright” and would immediately make it his mission in life to be such a ray of sunshine that Goodsir would be like “I thought it was starting to be horrible here but Actually,,,” also it would be cute bc Goodsir would be like “You’re probably fluent in Inuktitut by now, you eavesdropped so much” cue playful argument over whether being in the room to serve tea and happening to be highly observant counts as eavesdropping

7. Ngl i don’t really see it aside from potentially bonding over a mutual appreciation for propriety and shampoo but on the other hand it’s the contrast between the man who will do amazing things to be seen and the one who’s willfully invisible but desperate to be seen by just one person it’s the fact that if Jopson ever caught on that Fitzjames is a Category 1 it’d be like “I Can Fix Him” senses ACTIVATE here comes Validation here comes Unconditional Love here comes Devotion Like You Never Seen Before those piercing slightly cursed knowing victorian eyes are locked on, man, Fitz would be shaking in his boots like Holy Shit and then Fitz would go Category 2 so fast the world would start spinning the other direction

8. Silna stop blocking me they would not get romantically involved per-say but at the end of all things Jop could be a suitable roaming the wild companion for her bc on the one hand he’s respectfully distant on the other hand he literally has to be ride or die in order to live, kind of like a shark if he stops he’ll die so he would absolutely give it 100% into helping her out however possible and she’d be like “If I Have To Be Stuck With A Haunted White Boy Who Isn’t That Doctor I Suppose This One Will Do. They’re not bf/gf, they are Partners. Silna would also clock Jopson as no less than 10% Unhinged and be like “Oh. Okay.” and occasionally side-eye him like *nods to herself* “Ghosts* and not elaborate

9. Hartnell - they would date for like one week bc Hartnell is a category 2 who’s just getting his Bi wings. They’re mutually v soft and adorable but after a certain point they’re both like “Oh okay turns out we’re actually just rly close friends” and it’s like the most peaceful breakup in the history of breakups

10. im including Hickey just to make the note that he is a 1 but even Jopson isn’t that good. He can’t fix that. No one can. It doesn’t even occur to Hickey to look at Jopson and go “I could make him worse” until it’s too late. A REAL contender would’ve figured out Jopson’s slightly insane well before the tent scene. If Hickey can’t figure it out before “I’ve shot smaller hawks than you” he can’t make Jopson worse, he wouldn’t even know where to start. Instead i’m proposing that they’re like, exes who never dated. They were never attracted to each other but Jopson went “I’ve shot smaller hawks than you” and Hickey went *EYES EMOJI* they have a beautiful arc of “strangers-to-can’t-be-in-the-same-room-without-trying-to-skin-each-other” 

11. i’m serious about 19th-century catwoman tho

[nightswithkookmin]

I hate it here

Why does he get to appropriate people's race and still have so much access??

I thought impersonation was a crime.

I thought stealing someone's identity was a crime. How is he walking around Freely and taking pictures with hot chicks?😒

THAT SHOULD BE ME😭😭😭

If he is profiting off of his looks he needs to be sued by Hybe IMMEDIATELY.

HYBE SHOULD HIRE ME - If they can over look my gossipy nature and the fact they really can't trust me with any company secrets plus I'll spend all my time staring at Jikook and simping for YoonminhopeJoon🙂

Bapsae aaahhhhh 😏😏😏

To answer your question Barbara, you are not the only confused one when it comes to these labels. We all are.

A lot of people use Bi these days instead of Pan because people find the term Pansexuality confusing and offensive so....

Strange times.

Offensive because some people in the Bi community feel it's a redundant term as to them it means the same as Bisexuality. As such they feel the use of Pansexuality is erasure and invalidating of their own identity.

From what I understand of this ongoing label wars in the community, those who get offended by Pansexuality do so mostly because they do not view trans identity as a seperate unique gender in of it's own but merely as an adjective.

To such, there is no thing as cis boy or trans boy and that a boy is a boy. So being Bi to them means they are attracted to boys( cis or trans) and girls (regardless of whether they are cis or trans)- which is what Pansexuality actually is💀

Here in lies the conflict. Cis women and some people, myself included, see trans identity as a seperate gender identity from cis identity and differentiates between a biological Male or female and a trans Male or female.

As such a boy is not a boy, a boy is either cis boy or trans boy and both are valid.

This distinction is what mostly sets bisexuality from pan sexuality from my point of view.

It's disheartening. Not to mention anxiety inducing and confusing as hell when we can't even agree on basic terms to describe ourselves.

I don't know how conscious BTS are of these conversations and so I've always viewed their use of labels such as boy/girl in their lyrics with utmost fascination given as there are trans genders within their community.

I often find myself wondering what Joonie means when he talks of girls- does he mean cis girls or trans girls? Would he date either or both?

Personally, I view Trans identity as a valid, separate unique form of identity, unique from Cis identity and not just as an epithet.

I date and definitely find trans girls romantically and sexually attractive especially if there's minimum trace of their cis masculinity in them.

But I have friends who identify as lesbians but wouldn't date trans girls regardless of how they present. Yet they wouldn't mind dating a stud or Masculine presenting females as long as they are Cis girls. Talk of transphobia💀

Some girls call me Bi because I like cis and other fems and I'm perfectly fine with it. However embracing that label in Male spaces gives me a lot of headaches because they just assume I'd date any man too.

I have dated fem tops (girly girls who like to be the dominant one in relationships and also prefer to penetrate other girls during sex) who identify as lesbians but have threesomes with gay men💀

I mean as long as they get to fuck those men or penetrate/ top them or so they say and yes I've seen it happen with my two eyes- I have gay threesomes don't judge or tell my pastor😥

I'm going to hell as it is no need to compound it🤧

My ex was like that. She dated a gay guy she was topping and was gonna marry him because her family was pressuring her to get married. The dude was closeted and their relationship was convenient until he came out and lowkey outed her in the process.

When I asked her if she was bisexual she said she didn't have a label because none suited her at the time and that she likes girls regardless of how those girls identify as. So a femboi, andro, trans girls, cis girls, straight girls, gay girls, as long as you feminine she likes.

I'm a bit like that too... minus the topping fembois and gays part💀

If I had a dick it would be useless 🤣

I say all this to say, labels are a bit tricky and a lot of people struggle to find the right fit.

Gay or queer is our go to label.

For the sake of the conversation we having, I'd define being Bi as liking your own gender plus the opposite of your gender but in an exclusive way. Being Bi also means the gender of a person matters to you in your determination of what you find attractive.

However being Pan means you place less emphasis on the gender of the person you are attracted to and more emphasis on the qualities those people possess- really doesn't matter what the other person is if you like em you like em. Which means a person don't gotta be cis or trans boy or girl or other for you to like them. They just have to have a certain quality you find attractive.

Just like you said, you being a girl find gurls attractive too but I don't think you'd be willing to date a girl- cis or trans- a person has to be Male for you to date them. Right?

That exclusivity is what makes you straight. You like one gender to the exclusion of others.

Gays and lesbians like one gender, the same gender, to the exclusion of others.

Bisexuals may like multiple genders, different genders, to the exclusion of others.

Pansexuals like multiple genders but not to the exclusion of others.

If Gender is important to you in determining who a suitable romantic partner is you are either Straight or Bi. If gender is not important to your determination of who a suitable partner is then you're pansexual.

Pansexuals are gender blind🤣

If Pansexuals are bisexuals, there should be a label for the category currently viewed as bisexuals.

When Suga says " I look at personality and it's not limited to girls" I believe he's talking about the qualities he finds attractive in PEOPLE.

When he sings boy or girl my tongue technology will send you to hongkong it carries a similar sentiment. He's saying basically it doesn't matter what you identify as he can make you orgasm under his- rap?

That's pan energy to me. You go pan Suga! BAPSAE AAAHHH🤭

IF he were queer then I'd assume he's more likely to be pan not bi- hypocritically speaking.

But he is NOT QUEER.

SOPE YOONMIN AND ANYSHIP INVOLVING SUGA IS NOT REAL or even likely to be.

Since we are both men, how can my heart throb for a man. This implies he believes his heart only has to throb for the opposite sex. Yea no he is definitely not bi.

Straight as an arrow this one.

He doesn't find men sexually or romantically attractive. He is not gay or bi and I don't think he wants to be.

I assume he's straight. I do.

And as a straight dude, he's certainly intriguing and I can see how certain actions of his make people queer read him especially in his dominant ships Sope and Yoonmin and Taegi.

But I don't think he goes out of his way to queer code himself.

And I see what you mean by the exaggerated speech. Rappers do trash talk, boast and talk shit in their music but they are also notoriously homophobic with the exception of a few. References of queerness in their lyrics are usually often used pejoratively to slur other rappers etc.

May be I'm too black, gay, and a woman to overlook the misogyny and homophobia that's traveled through Black American hip pop to elsewhere even if it takes on new family friendly labels such as Kpop or BTS.

I don't tend to read hiphop lyrics through non cis non straight non male lens. Unless of course it's from a queer artist but even that there's almost always something internalized.

It's fascinating how people look at a hip hop artist and glean their sexuality from their lyrics....

I'm dozing off. Will read over this tomorrow and add anything I might have missed.

GOLDY

[whumpster-fire]

Extremely Hot His Dark Materials Take:

The conventional wisdom that daemons’ settled forms represent who you truly are as a person and are a unique, symbolic representation of it is what’s said in-universe but it isn’t true, or at the very least isn’t the whole truth. IDC what Philip Pullman’s said is actually canon, stuff like “Servants usually have dog demons because they have a submissive/servile nature” is really not plausible fite me.

Animal symbolism is a social construct and is not universal among cultures, and just like the alethiometer symbols, an animal species can have many meanings. As a result, for any one person there are usually many species which are a “valid” representation of their soul, and which one their daemon actually settles as is not set in stone from birth. Daemons don’t consciously choose their settled form - and humans certainly don’t - but it reflects a variety of influences, including symbolic “nature” but also cultural influences, social pressures, what animals the daemon actually knows about, the nature of the relationship between the human and daemon, and what forms are physically comfortable or practical. But the common uniting factor in all of those is that a daemon’s form reflects what you want and need as much as what you are. Not superficial wants, but deep deep psychological needs and what’s important to you. And sometimes fears as well.

Factor #1: Societal Bias

Strong cultural predispositions toward settled form, combined with form stereotyping. I think it was said in the books that “most servants had dog daemons because deep down they wanted to be told what to do.” Think about this: is this likely to be true? Given that people generally wind up in jobs by luck of the draw and by what’s available, and most people even in the most socially mobile modern societies usually don’t end up in their “true calling,” and in Lyra’s world your occupation seems to very often be determined by your birth. Do you really think all the kids like Roger Parslow, who’s working as a kitchen boy because his aunt who was a servant at Jordan College raised him, are naturally subservient? Well, is everyone who works in a service industry job IRL naturally subservient? Hell no! However, this is a very, very convenient lie for a classist society that teaches people that they were born into a “station” in society to tell. If your daemon settles as a dog, obviously you were meant to be a servant all along, and you and your daemon spending your entire childhood being told that because this is the station you’re being born and raised into your daemon should be a dog or some other “appropriate” form and couldn’t possibly cause them to be biased towards canine forms by this.

But if a daemon takes a form that’s obviously unfit for their station, clearly your true calling is elsewhere and it was never truly meant to be. It’s hard to falsify as long as most daemons are settling in “expected” forms. And most do, at least to an extent. A daemon’s form is influenced by drives and desires, and while most people don’t necessarily want to be bossed around and told what to do, most people do want to fit in.

And having fairly broad categories of “expected” can help that, because that gives room for daemons to find a form within that category that genuinely fits their nature. Someone extremely independent and strong-willed but growing up always expected to be a servant might end up with a husky daemon. Someone with a leading (or even controlling) personality might have a herding breed. The same goes for Gyptians and Witches being expected to usually have bird daemons.

On the other hand people with certain daemon forms might also be actively recruited for certain jobs, based on both symbolism and the physical abilities of that form - e.g. the Tartar mercenaries and other soldiers seem to almost all have wolf daemons. These may be very common in their culture to begin with, and then there’s further selection based on the symbolism of “You’re a wolf, you’re powerful, noble, and a natural killer but you’re a loyal pack animal, you’d make a great soldier.” But then in addition to that, because of the no touching rules, people in jobs where they fight other people are at an advantage if their daemon can fight other daemons.

Factor #2: Age

Settling age is... around early-to-mid puberty it seems like. I’ve seen speculation that it would be later in more modern societies as the age of maturity drifts over, but it seems like 12-14 is fairly common. But brain development continues until around 25. Like... seriously. Daemons are settling when their humans would be middle-schoolers in our world. People mature and change a huge amount in that decade of “settled but not fully mature.” Unless daemons can presciently predict how they’ll change over time - or if the soul’s nature is fixed and people tend to change in away that approaches that over time - your daemon’s form may be based on what you were like at settling age.

Factor #3: Knowledge and Familiarity

His Dark Materials is mostly based in Europe / Northern Eurasia, and the vast, vast majority of the settled daemon forms in the novels are native to that region. Off the top of my head the exceptions are Stelmaria (a snow leopard, native to the Himalayas but that’s still an animal she and Lord Asriel could have encountered / read about as a child), Mrs. Coulter’s daemon (a monkey, I don’t think we’re ever told what species. Not native to Europe but again Marisa had the resources to travel, read about exotic species, visit zoos, etc and everything about them is weird, IIRC the African soldiers in Amber Spyglass had various african daemon forms (so, where they’re actually from), and Hester. Hester’s the most important because while she took the form of an arctic hare, which is native to North America where Lee’s from, her form is native to a completely different part of North America, that she and Lee probably wouldn’t have been familiar with, and it took years for anyone including her to even notice.

This suggests daemons may be able to take forms that are unknown to them, but we never see a raccoon or an oppossum or a bobcat or some australian animal as a daemon as far as I know, so my best guess is that they had some secondhand knowledge of the arctic and had at least seen what an Arctic Hare looked like but forgot how to tell one apart from a jackrabbit, Hester had an unconscious longing for the North that neither of them were aware of, and she had a strong and possibly less-unconscious desire to get the hell out of Texas at sometime around settling age. And they assumed she was a jackrabbit because daemons usually don’t take forms they’re not familiar with.

Factor #4: Physical Preference

A daemon is not a shadow or a heraldic crest - they’re not just an insubstantial symbolic reflection. A daemon is an integral part of a person’s being, and they are one, but at the same time the daemon are a living, breathing creature even if their physical body is unstable. One soul, two bodies, two minds, two personalities. Their form subjects them to some - although not all - of the physical abilities and limitations that animal would have, and the same sensations.

Again, a daemon’s form is often influenced by what’s important to them, and to the pair. Most daemons take on a huge number of forms throughout childhood, and there are some things about those forms that are important to them. For some daemons the freedom of movement of flight is a fun, childish thing to play around with, and perhaps tactically useful, but it isn’t torture to give it up. For others, flight and the freedom it represents are their very heart and to be bound to a grounded form forever would be unbearable. Some can’t give up the ability to take small forms that can hide and go unnoticed, but some hate the vulnerability and helplessness of small size and could never be happy in a form that can’t walk alongside their human without fear of being kicked or stepped on. Some can’t give up the joy of swimming, or climbing, and for some their humans can’t. The daemon of someone who is a mountaineer and climber in their soul won’t be a snapping turtle. And... this is complicated, because part of it’s the human’s nature, but part of it is tied up in experiences which the human can feel too, and that are important to them, but they don’t experience in quite the same way.

Sometimes it’s just too convenient. Witches’ daemons are nearly always birds because witches spend much of their time in the air and can separate from their daemons, and only with flight of their own can a daemon take advantage of this power; in a flightless form they would take far longer to travel any distance, and their witches would have to land every time they separated or reunited. Another animal, like a fox or a mink or a rabbit, might fit with a witch’s nature too, but a witch’s daemon will become a hawk or a heron or a dove instead.

And sometimes a certain from is just comfortable and it just feels right even though the symbolism might not fit the stereotypes.

Factor #5: Human-Daemon Relationships

This is something I talked about a bit in my post about autism and daemons: the form a daemon settles as is often affected by the nature of their relationship with their human.

First of all: barring severe internal conflict or mental illness, while a daemon’s settled form is not chosen by the human and does not follow their whims, they don’t take a form that makes their shared life inconvenient and miserable. Out of how many sailors, John Faa and Farder Corram knew what, one guy with a dolphin daemon? Usually sailors’ daemons would be seabirds or otters, or animals like cats and rats that aren’t technically aquatic but are well-adapted to living on a boat. Does this mean that the sea isn’t their true love? No: it means no matter how much you love the sea being trapped on a ship for their entire life (and not even the entire ship: how high in the rigging can you climb without going too far from your daemon who can’t leave the water?) sucks and is actively dangerous. Imagine your ship is wrecked and your daemon carries you to shore through the storm (because humans die of hypothermia if left in the water too long in many parts of the oceans)... except you’re literally unable to get out of reach of the crashing waves that will drown you, sweep you away, or batter you to death, without dragging your daemon up the beach and then they’re stranding and dying, and you can’t go get fresh water which your body needs because your soul is an anchor binding you to the water. How many things that are a sailor’s job are you unable to do because you can’t go more than like ten yards from water deep enough to swim in?

Daemons do not consciously choose their forms, but their subconscious is not stupid. Taking a form like a dolphin doesn’t mean the daemon is symbolically expressing their nature, it means the human is denying it to the point where their own daemon is afraid of being torn away from it and cannot trust their human. But again, this event is happening at middle-school age, so what’s likely happening is something like a 14-year-old cabin boy falling in love with a girl in town and wanting to marry her and move inland and abandon the sea forever, and his daemon being horrified by the idea and wanting to make sure it can. not. happen. ever. And then both of their lives are ruined. Meanwhile the other cabin boy on the boat had a non-dysfunctional relationship with his daemon, who settled as a seagull and trusts that when he goes to visit family a little ways inland for a couple days it won’t be permanent.

Anyway: disregarding dysfunctional people like Mrs. Coulter, some humans and daemons are more physically affectionate with their counterparts than others, and in different ways.

Some pairs are happy spending most of their time at the edge of their not-painful range. Some pairs are perfectly comfortable with the daemon taking a tiny form and hiding in their human’s coat pocket most of the time and sneaking around the rest, and with the daemon hardly ever speaking to other humans, and that closeness and the moments of being held in the palm of their human’s hand and being stroked gently with one or two fingers is perfect for them. Some pairs are content with the distance a form like a bird of prey imposes, where the daemon must perch near their human because their claws would injure them if they landed on their shoulder or arm without protective clothing.

But many people and daemons are more “touchy” with each other, for whom the physical nature of the bond between human and daemon cannot possibly be given up. Some daemons settle in the forms they took to fly, or to hide, or spy, or fight, but many settle in the forms they took to rest, to soothe and comfort, to lick wounds and let their fur or feathers be stroked, to share body heat, and sometimes to help hold their humans upright or drag them to safety. Some pairs are content with the daemon sleeping on windowsills or perched on bedposts or on nightstands, or under beds or at the feet of them, but some curl up under the covers together whenever they can.

In less poetic terms, daemons settling in fluffy, huggable forms because they and their humans have a deep-seated need to cuddle with each other is just as valid as daemons settling as birds because they need the freedom of flight.

This is often the case for children whose need for touch is not met properly by others, or those for whom it is too much, or it cannot be trusted. Parents, friends, and lovers aren’t always there, but they are always there for each other. But there’s not always trauma or neglect involved, and it’s not always people who have few or no close and intimate bounds outside themselves. Plenty of content, well-adjusted people still have relationships like this with their daemons because we’re human beings and touch is important to us, and it doesn’t really matter if you share a soul.

[spiders-hth-is-an-outlier]

Today in Strongly Worded Opinions (That You Didn't Ask For), I'm going to assert that there are too objective ways to measure whether or not a relationship is strong in story terms – by which I mean, unrelated to whether or not readers/viewers personally like the dynamic or the chemistry of the actors (in such cases as there are actors involved).

So for the sake of clarity, be ye advised: this isn't about shipping, fuck it, ship whatever you want idc.  Shipping a strong relationship isn't inherently better than shipping a weak one – heck, you could just as easily argue that it's the lazier, less creative route.  Also, I don't care?  I don't care, it's just fandom.  Follow your arrow.  This is about ways to discuss whether or not a relationship introduced into a text succeeds or fails as an element of the story – or really as I'm going to prefer calling it, if a given relationship forms a strong or weak story element.

For this I'm presuming that you're creating a relationship between a protagonist and a secondary character introduced as a piece of the protagonist's overall story – protagonist/protagonist relationships aren't really a different situation, but they do have more moving parts, so for simplicity's sake, let's   stick with a Main Character (we'll call that M) and a Significant Other (S for short).  Also, these relationships by no means have to be romantic; any relationship can be measured as weak or strong in story terms.

Also, I'm going to say everything here as though it were factually true, even though it's just my opinion, which is correct, but if you disagree then it's only my opinion, but I am correct.  Ready?  Okay!

Strong relationships have story functions; in reality nothing means anything and people just like each other because they do, but fuck reality, it's a huge narrative mess.  And my basic premise here is that the story function of a strong relationship falls under one (or more, if you wanna get real fancy) of these three categories:

The relationship can unlock under-explored elements of M's story or character through mirroring or intimacy (often shows up as “friends to lovers”).  There is backstory that hasn't been unearthed yet, or some reaction or experience in M's life that could advance the story, and S can serve as a means to get at it.  Maybe M and S share a similar trauma or life story; maybe S is the first person M feels able to open up to about something profound and relevant.  Maybe part of M's story is a conflict between how they seem to others and how they see themselves or their own potential; maybe S is the person who sees them the way they see themselves...or sees M as the person they're afraid they'll never be.  The story goal being met here is giving M a boost toward successful completion of their story arc, so even though there could be conflict, S is fundamentally pulling on the same side as M in the major story conflicts, in such a way that by the end, the reader should feel like M's success is at least in part because of what they gain from their relationship with S.

The relationship can function as a piece of the story's overall conflict, or as a secondary subplot conflict (often shows up as “enemies to lovers”). Traditional romance novel plotting effectively slots the love interest into the role of “antagonist,” because the romance's conflict is generally driven by people not getting what they want from each other until certain win conditions are met.  In this kind of relationship, M and S might be actual-facts competitors, or be divided by ideological concerns, or they might be forced into proximity by the plot but clash on some personality level.  The arc of this relationship is typically going to be about the M softening up as the relationship develops – if M starts out ruthlessly single-minded, maybe realizing that they're running roughshod over S in the process is part of their character breakthrough; if the story is about M realizing that they've underestimated the complexity of the world around them, maybe coming to recognize S as an equal is how that gets concretized for the reader.  Basically this is a story where S presents a problem that M has to solve, and the more central to the narrative solving that problem is, the stronger the relationship is.

The relationship can serve to divide M's goals (often shows up as “love versus duty”).  This is a story where M has to accomplish two separate things in order to fulfill their arc, but those two things aren't easily integrated. One of M's goals might be fulfilling a vow, or filial duty, or seeking revenge, and the other goal is some form of protecting or obtaining S.  If the story puts M in a position of having to choose, then the relationship is inherently strong; it's providing narrative drive, whether or not S is especially well-developed as an individual character.  This one can be tricky, because a very weak relationship can serve a superficially similar purpose, by demonstrating M's devotion to duty or obsessive pursuit of whatever when M rebuffs S to keep them out of harm's way or to avoid distraction or whatever. The difference is that in those superficial cases, the audience is meant to recognize that aw, that's sad, M has really had to Make Sacrifices – but there's really no dramatic tension involved; we know all along that M is going to Make Sacrifices in purusit of the real goal.  When this is done seriously with a strong relationship, the audience is meant to feel divided as well; Romeo and Juliet just doesn't work as a story unless the audience likes Juliet and Mercutio, unless they fully identify with the dilemma that Romeo is in when he has to either avenge Mercutio's death or spare Tybalt for Juliet's sake and the sake of their future together. That's a big fucking story moment, and it only works because the audience buys both relationships – Romeo's with Mercutio and with Juliet – as narratively strong, to the point where Romeo's choice is not a forgone conclusion.  This one is much easier to get wrong, I think, than the other two are!

What I'm saying here is that a strong relationship isn't really determined by how personally compatible two characters seem to be; a lot of movies that fridge a character's wife, for example, rely on actors convincingly portraying, in a brief window of time, two compatible people who care for each other – I'm thinking of, like, Richard Kimble and his wife in The Fugitive, who I think do sell the idea of a loving and happy marriage, but the relationship itself is a weak one.  The story only really needs the bare fact of it – “Kimble had a wife that he loved and then this happened” – to kick off the actual story; the relationship between Kimble and Gerard is a stronger one narratively, because much of the emotional tension of the movie, what makes it more effective than just a series of chase scenes, is the way their mutual respect evolves as they compete against each other, and the story question of “Kimble really needs an ally, is this the right person for him to trust?”  It's such a strong relationship that it comes as a huge relief of tension when he does make that gesture of trust and it turns out to be the right choice.  The audience is happy that Kimble will be exonerated, but the audience is equally happy that the conflict between these two charcters is over – we didn't like them being at odds because we didn't want either of them to lose!  Now, would these two people ever be close friends, let alone come to love each other?  No? Yes? Who cares?  Kimble loves his wife more, but has a stronger relationship in this story with Gerard. From a writing perspective, it's trivially easy to introduce an S and say “M loves this person,” but it means relatively little.  It's harder to introduce an S and say “some part of this story now hinges on how M navigates knowing this person,” but that's kind of what has to happen in order to create a payoff that's worth the effort.  A strong relationship provides skeletal structure for the story; it can't be stitched on at the margins.

This is an even tougher sell in something like a television series, where the introduction of S may come in well after the story is underway and the bulk of M's characterization is already in place.  That's why introducing a late-season love interest is a notoriously dodgy proposition!  To demonstrate weak vs strong relationship in action, I'm going to take an example of what I think was a failed attempt and pitch some ways to doctor it up into a strong relationship: Sam Winchester and Eileen Leahy.

This is objectively a weak relationship.  She doesn't materially affect the metaplot of the series, or drive any major choices, or reveal anything about Sam's character.  She's just, you know, generally nice and attractive and Sam likes her, which is a fine start, but then the writers just leave her idling in the garage forever.  But it didn't have to be that way! Say we wanted to make it a Type 1 relationship: super easy, barely an inconvenience!  Eileen is very like Sam, actually, in that she lost her parents as an infant and then had the entire rest of her life shaped by the trauma and the pursuit of revenge.  That's amazing.  How many other people, even hunters, share that specific experience with Sam Winchester?  Sam was physically changed by drinking demon blood in infancy; Eileen was physically changed by being deafened by the banshee or whatever it was in infancy.  Even just allowing them to talk about that would have made the relationship stronger.  Sam is affected by the fact that there is no Before Time for him; even now that they've long since had their revenge on ol' Yellow Eyes himself, he grapples with the fact that he's forever robbed of any memories of innocence or safety or a life that wasn't lived in the shadow of this killing.  Eileen also has had her life's quest for revenge fulfilled, and also has to reckon with the fact that it doesn't actually give her access to the innocence that was stolen from her.  Maybe she struggles with that.  Maybe Sam can open up to her because she knows what it's like to look back on your child self and feel that however strong you've made yourself, you're never strong enough to protect that child.

What if you want to write something spicier than Sam and Eileen talking about their sad feelings?  Okay, let's take a Type 2 story.  Eileen has been a lone hunter with a disability all her life; it's fair to guess that even if she can't match Sam's physical strength, the fact that she's survived at all means that she's pretty indomitable.  Maybe she's had to be ruthless, even brutal in her hunting style; maybe she has a shoot-first-ask-questions-never approach to hunting that she credits with her very survival, but that Sam finds excessively rash and bloody.  Maybe they fight about it.  Have her kill some ambiguous, maybe-not-dangerous monstery types, a werewolf or something, and Sam's like, hey, we really can't just-- and Eileen is like, look, I hunt how I hunt, come with me or don't.  I mean, this is a retread in some ways of early season conflicts about who to kill and when, but everything in the latter seasons is a retread anyway, so whatever, and it provides something interesting to have Sam deal with this whiplash of how there seem to be two Eileens, the smiley, jocular sweetheart who eats pancakes with him and the one who kills like she's swatting flies.  What if he wants one but not the other?  It doesn't really work that way, does it?  Is this something he can dismiss as a foible, or is this a dealbreaker? The dude is almost forty, if he distances himself from Eileen, how many more hunters does he think he has a chance to meet and marry?  If she won't even listen to his concerns seriously, is it really a good relationship anyway, or will Sam's needs always end up taking a backseat to Eileen's?

A Type 3 fix could just come down quite plainly to, what if Eileen is ready to retire?  She's had her revenge.  She's lived her life on the hunt.  Maybe she's done, and maybe she wants Sam to be done with her.  Doing this in season 15 would circle Sam back to his season 1 story conflicts in a nice way, I think – why does Sam do this at all, if it's not for revenge any longer?  Does he feel personally responsible for every dead person he could've saved but didn't – is that a reasonable boundary, or lack thereof, to set?  Is a compromise possible – could he continue to coordinate hunts while also getting out of the field and starting a family, or is that still putting his family in the shadow of too much violence and danger to tolerate?  What's Dean going to say?  He's pitched a fit in the past when Sam said he wanted out, but he's mellowed with age, hasn't he?  Maybe he'll get it now?  But maybe Sam also feels guilty and fearful, because he knows Dean will hunt without him, so now he's in more danger because of Sam's choices, if Sam makes this choice.  It's a little heteronormative, as story conflicts go, but it's thematically appropriate to Supernatural, and the fact that Eileen isn't speaking out of timidity but out of the same weariness that Sam has so often felt about the whole endless cycle makes it feel a little less “the little lady won't let me go on adventures anymore.”  This might not be my pick of the three, but the point is that it makes for a strong conflict, a legitimate divided loyalty for Sam to wrestle with, and one that doesn't have a clear right answer.

Anyway, hopefully that helps illustrate what I mean when I say that the narrative strength of a relationship doesn't have anything to do with how likeable an S character is – Eileen is very likeable! But that doesn't substitute for building her into the fabric of the story in some way.  My expectation is that a serious protagonist relationship should bend the story arc in a way that requires response, and if it doesn't, I don't take that relationship particularly seriously.  Canon can declare a relationship real by fiat, but it can't automatically declare a relationship meaningful without, you know, making meaning of it.

Oh, and there's not anything really wrong with weak relationships – most M's are going to have several in the story.  My point is just that the difference between a weak relationship and a strong one isn't really a matter of taste or preference, but has a functional meaning that can be tested and measured, and if there's argument to be had about it, the argument can take place on evidentiary grounds.  Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

[equivalentexchangeanthology]

About / FAQs

The Equivalent Exchange Anthology will be a ship-friendly project open to Fullmetal Alchemist creators of all types. Content about any and all FMA characters and ships will be allowed (with appropriate ratings and warnings). Hate, harassment, or disparagement of contributors will not be tolerated.

The project will have multiple parts*:

A printed zine of gen fanwork and meta**

A printed zine of SFW ship-based fanwork

A digital zine of NSFW content (including a section for ship-based content and a section for gen)

A digital zine of NSFW ship content, including trigger-heavy content

 (*This general project structure is provisional and open to change, as the final scope of the project will depend on contributions. Under no circumstances will an alteration of the structure result in SFW and NSFW content being mixed into the same project.)

(**Meta can be personal essays about what makes FMA meaningful to you, analyses of characters, themes, or details from canon, stories about your experience with FMA, or another type of non-fiction)

What is a zine? A zine is an unofficial fan-made publication compiling textual and visual contributions from fan creators.

What is the theme of this project? We want to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Fullmetal Alchemist by letting creators express their love for FMA however they like! We are leaving this very open-ended on purpose. This fandom is full of creative people with varying perspectives – to us, the most important thing about FMA is the message that all of us coming together despite our differences is what gives us strength. The name “Equivalent Exchange” was selected to highlight the way that being a part of the fandom has given us so much in return for what we’ve put in, which is another element that we’d love to incorporate into the project.

What do you mean by “meta”? “Meta” in the context of this project can be any non-fictional content that someone wants to create: character analysis; thematic analysis; extended commentary on a scene or plot point; a short essay about your personal experiences with and/or your discovery of FMA; what FMA has meant to you. A description of the work or process that went into a cosplay or another type of fan creation could also fall into this category. You can find more information on what could qualify as “meta” here!

Will there be merchandise? Yes! We will have merch bundles available, and it will be possible to purchase them together with the zine parts of the project, or on their own.

What is the schedule? The full schedule is available here! Pre-orders will open August 1st and remain open until October 3rd.

Will the project have a Discord server? Yes! The Discord server, as well as periodic emails, will be the primary methods used for communication with contributors. The Discord server is carefully organized by project, so that contributors will only have access to content for the project they are contributing to. The server will be SFW by default, except for the project-specific spaces for the NSFW projects, and all server spaces will be moderated. All of the general “chat” channels will be strictly SFW.

Who can apply? Anyone who loves FMA, wants to create for it, and respects others in the fandom regardless of differences in fictional preferences (character interpretations, ships, etc.). Contributors must be prepared to collaborate with others despite differences of opinion, and should not have a history of shaming, belittling, or attacking others based on what they enjoy in fanwork. In short, applicants’ philosophy should be “Ship and let ship”!

Can people under 18 apply? As long as an applicant under 18 is legally old enough to work in their country of origin, their application will be reviewed. (Contributors under 18 will only be permitted to apply to, contribute, and view SFW content.)

How many contributors will be accepted? We don’t have a maximum number of contributors as of yet. For the two SFW physical zines, we will determine the number of contributors based on page limitations, but each SFW zine will have an extended digital PDF version to include contributors whose work or full work won’t fit into the printed zine. The all-digital NSFW PDF components will be able to accommodate more contributors. We’ve designed the project in the hopes of including as many creators as possible.

What will be required for an application? We will ask for a few samples of work similar to what you would be contributing (this does not necessarily have to be FMA fanwork), as well as your social media accounts and email address.

I haven’t created for FMA in a while… all my FMA work is old. In my application, can I submit more recent sample works from other fandoms instead? Yes, that’s fine! Having at least one FMA sample in your application (regardless of the application type) is great, but not required. We would mostly just like to get an idea of your style, so please feel free to submit samples that you think represent you well, regardless of the fandom!

Are all ships accepted in the ship-oriented parts of the project? Yes. As long as you are willing to tag and warn as appropriate, all ships are welcome. We will expect contributors to tag and warn diligently, to be mindful of others’ sensitivities, and to keep ship-related discussion in the appropriate parts of the server.

Can I contribute adult and/or controversial content? Yes. As above, all contributors will be required to tag and warn carefully with their submissions and when interacting with other contributors, to use the appropriate channels on the server at all times, and to respect others’ boundaries. The NSFW projects will only be open to contributors who are 18 or older.

I’d like to apply, but I don’t like certain ships and have some triggers. Will I have to see this content in the Discord server? While we can’t guarantee that you won’t encounter content that you would prefer to avoid, we will be compartmentalizing ship content, NSFW content, and potentially triggering content as much as possible in the Discord server. We are counting on all contributors to help us with this, and will do our best to facilitate a safe and friendly collaborative environment!

Do podfic recorders have to edit their own podfics as well as recording them? How many recordings will be expected, and how will work be assigned? Anyone who is accepted to record podfics for the Anthology is welcome to edit their own podfics, or to submit unedited podfics to our moderator team. We have a few mods who have volunteered to help others edit their audio.

Applicants accepted to record podfics would be able to choose which works they wanted to record for, so that everyone can edit an amount and specific content that they’re comfortable with. The total amount will depend somewhat on the amount of textual contributions that we end up accepting. Several of our mods will be helping to record any works not selected by applicants, in the hopes of making as complete a collection as possible (including descriptions of visual content). Depending on the amount of effort that we’re able to recruit, we hope to record podfics at least for every submission in the two SFW zines (fanfics for which will have a wordcount limit of 3,000 words, whereas PDF-only fics may be slightly longer).

Applications for podfic recorders are due by March 7, 2021, but the acutal recordings will be done between July and September (after text and art are finalized, while pre-orders and layout work take place).

Are AU (Alternate Universe) works allowed? Yes! AU works (canon-divergence, alternate universes, crossovers, etc.) will be accepted, both for application samples and for final contributor submissions if desired. Any AU works in the final Anthology will be tagged and described clearly.

Is this a 20-year anniversary project? Yes! We are hoping to open pre-orders in July to celebrate 20 years of Fullmetal Alchemist. It is not required that this theme is represented in any of the contributions, but it would certainly be welcome!

I am a recent pro-shipper. Some people may remember things that I did and said in the past that were not pro-ship, but I have changed my stance. Can I apply? As mentioned above and in the Contributor Protection Policy, our first priority is the safety and comfort of all of our contributors. Each application and applicant will be reviewed by our team, and decisions will be made on a case-by-case basis as to whether we anticipate that an applicant would be able to work well and interact positively with other contributors.

Is this project for-profit, or for charity? We are currently planning to donate half of the proceeds to the Archive of Our Own (AO3), and divide the remaining half evenly among all contributors to compensate them for their work.

I’m a little confused about the different parts of the zine. Could it all be combined into one zine? Our intention with this project is to provide space to as many creators, and as many different types of content, as possible – specifically including NSFW content and/or ships that are often not permitted – but to also make it easy for purchasers to choose only the content they are interested in or comfortable with. So you can think of it as four separate projects, with different “ratings” but with the same goal of inclusion. Dividing the project into subsections will allow us to accept more contributors overall!

In addition to making it more difficult to delineate types of content, ratings, and warnings, combining the projects into one zine would likely result in an extremely long volume. This would raise shipping costs for physical copies, and also make the digital version into a very large file! Our goal is to make it possible for people to buy a single project that they will enjoy every page of; or to bundle multiple projects together if they’re interested in several or all of them.

A lot of zines fail or turn out to be scams. Is your mod team experienced and prepared to see this through? We kept our moderator bios a bit more personal, but many of our mods have prior experience with multiple zines from start to finish. Mai is the lead mod on another zine that is currently open for pre-orders, as well as the finance mod on three others in progress; Feo has been a mod on ten zines, one of which she headed and several of which have reached completion; and Noct has headed two zines, been a mod on four others, and contributed to six more. Kari has also modded and contributed to over a dozen zines; and Getti has been the lead mod for a completed zine and has contributed to numerous others. Many of our other mods have real-world and/or paid work experience relevant to the project: Grace has extensive editorial experience and a background in print and online journalism, and also runs events for work in the RL sphere; and Tierfal regularly runs ship weeks and fandom events, and has been coordinating events as part of her day job for many years. Some of our moderators have not participated in a zine before, but are longtime fandom contributors, organizers, beta-readers, and more; or have additional relevant experience and skills, which they are excited to dive in and apply!

Since the full scope of the project will be determined in part by the number of applications that we receive for each section, we wanted to have a lot of hands on deck to make sure that we can divide the work fairly without anyone getting overwhelmed.

To make a long story short: we trust our team, and we're passionate about this project. We hope that you will be, too!

[caroloftheshells]

nsforwork discussion about sexuality

i’ve said it before and i will say it again. “kink” is an incoherent category and having a suspicious attitude toward “kink” specifically (but not “sex” generally) does not make people seem very trustworthy 2 me, because often i feel like it indicates a lack of interrogation wrt everything outside of that category, ie things construed as “vanilla.” i feel like everybody repulsed/triggered by “normal” things such as myself throws a big wrench into that whole method of categorization, bc it’s seen as uncool / socially awkward / redundant to view sex in terms of like value-neutral mechanics and choices made that you could also not make. there’s always an implicit script (“common sense”) and with that an imperative to show love, attraction, or respect to one’s partner(s) in a way that’s determined socially outside of that partnership and through specific acts. ykwim?? like as two random examples, making eye contact and removing a partner’s clothes are treated like pretty universal elements of sex or intensifiers thereof, but they don’t necessarily operate that way for everyone, and it’s ok for them to be negotiable or no-goes either in specific instances or all the time. and i think there’s kind of a ship-of-theseus thing that happens where at some point along the way enough “weird” stuff / absence of “normal” stuff may happen to cross the line from vanilla to something that is not vanilla, but that divide isn’t nearly as clear as people want to make it out to be. 

“kink” also seems indicative of specificity of desire in a way that seems to threaten some people on the basis of its specificity alone, but idk how exactly to formulate my thoughts there. or i guess... the idea of having thought it through enough to enjoy certain sex acts as sex acts, potentially organized and premeditated ones (esp if requiring gear or whatever), and not as like spontaneous “natural” consequences of being with a person when there’s mutual attraction, seems distasteful to people. i don’t agree with that, though; i think intentionality is awesome. and moreover, i think anxieties that this kind of premeditation re: specific sex acts is “killing the emotional sex industry” (to borrow the millennials are killing x industry phrase bc it’s a similar kind of goofy entitlement / intrusiveness / non-issue combo imo) are both totally baseless given the care & attention that such premeditation entails and also a case of so fucking what, yk, because at the end of the day it isn’t Your sex life and you aren’t entitled to emotional legibility from its participants.

(obligatory shoutout to every conversation about sexuality i’ve had with ace and/or aromantic friends that assisted in my formulation of these thoughts)

[embarrassingresultofmyfreetime]

2020 Masterlist

Here’s a list of all the fics I’ve posted this year! (Listed by category, then chronologically:)

Link to my ao3 where you can read all of these: embarrassingresultofmyfreetime

~

Currents wips:

And They Were Quarantine Mates

An old disease has resurfaced on Earth- one which most humans recover from but is permanently lethal to Time Lords.

Because of this, the Doctor stays on Earth to make sure her humans make it through okay.

And because of the Doctor, the Master- against his better judgement- also chooses to stay.

Reluctant to leave the safety of the Doctor's Tardis, the Doctor and the Master find plenty of ways to pass the time but it can be difficult to enjoy each other's company with so many things left unsaid.

Good thing they have plenty of time in isolation to work it out.

Word Count: Currently 88,172

-

Spyfall: Battle For Humanity

This is a little number I like to call: Roleswap AU with Dhawan!Doctor and Whittaker!Master

It's sort of a rewrite of Spyfall p2 but it's better.

Word Count: Currently 5,688 (will be about 12k when finished)

~~~

-

Main fics (completed):

Please Tell Me Why Do We Worry

Summary: After learning about the final loss of Gallifrey, the Doctor takes some time to grieve and finds herself with surprisingly mixed feelings about the whole ordeal.

To her surprise, a knock at her Tardis door soon reveals the Master not only alive, but in uncontrollable mental agony as he reveals that the Doctor's suffering has been amplifying his own emotions via their telepathic bond.

Note: (After so many kind and positive comments on this fic, I finally gained the confidence to start posting more! A huge thank you to so many people it means so, so much to me!)

Word Count: 5,068

-

Second Chances

When Graham finds a teleportation cube offering an all-expenses-paid vacation, he, Ryan, and Yaz take up the offer and give the seemingly-distant Doctor some time to herself.

After the events of Skyfall 1&2, the trust between the trio and a certain timelord is shaken. However, when their vacation quickly becomes a nightmare, it's up to the Doctor to bring about peace on an upsettingly familiar planet.

Note: (A rewrite/fix it of S11 episode Orphan 55)

Word Count: 7,130

-

All’s Fair In Love And War

Having escaped alive and alone, the Master dwells on his failure and uncertainty at what to do next.

Purely by accident, he runs into a version of the Doctor he's never met before and she gives him a much needed perspective on their relationship.

Word Count: 4,653

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Truth and Reconciliation

“I... I destroyed a lot of things, but not this... trove of secrets. This is what started it all.”

Missing Scene where the Master goes to Gallifrey and discovers the truth of the timeless child for the first time + alternate ending to The Timeless Children episode

Word Count: 7,563

-

The Doctor Finally Gets Some Rest

(Ch2 update Missy pov)

The Doctor promised to guard Missy for 1000 years, but Missy doesn't mind returning the favor.

Word Count: 5,671

-

I Wouldn’t Wish It On My Best Enemy

"Just deserts appeared to finally be served for the Doctor. All her running had come to an end, all the lives she's taken or caused had finally been assigned a numerical value, and all the morals she had once believed in seemed to crumble to dust right before her eyes.

A life sentence.

She had JUST BEEN TOLD she would never die, and the first thing the universe does is give her a life sentence.

What kind of cruel joke is that?"

Basically: The Doctor reflects on herself while in prison, the Master rescues the Doctor and actually helps her, and idk read the tags

Word Count: 4,629

-

Brand New Reality

In an alternate timeline: The Master is killed in the Time War but the Doctor finds a way to salvage his oldest friend's mind by binding it to his Tardis and building him an android vessel as a way to interact with the physical world.

The Doctor also manages to save the Time Lords from their war- but he is still a renegade in their eyes. As punishment, the High Council uses the Doctor- and by extension the Master- as their personal diplomats/field agents.

The Master isn't too happy about being trapped on the Doctor's Tardis, the Doctor is fed up with being the equivalent of a dog on a leash to the Time Lords, so in a moment of anger and also pure luck- they break out from their world and end up on a parallel one with a very different version of their universe and very different versions of themselves.

(Shalka!Universe Doctor and Master meet their modern counterparts- the Thirteenth Doctor and Dhawan!Master)

Word Count: 10,148

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The Imposter(s) Among Us

The Doctor has been searching the universe for the Master, but it's only when she takes a break to help a damaged space vessel that she runs directly into him!

The Doctor has a hundred and one things to ask him, but there's no time for any of that now. The ship is barely functional and if the mysterious murderer doesn't get to the Doctor first, then the trigger-happy crewmates might throw her out the airlock before the killer gets a chance.

Word Count: 12,655

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My Dear, Doctor…

The Doctor investigates an anomaly to find that her previous self has stood up their oldest friend for the umpteenth time.

Confused as to why the Doctor can't recall ever receiving Missy's invitation in the first place, the Doctor goes searching for answers and ends up finding far more letters than just one…

Word Count: 6,657

~~~

-

Series:

And They Were Happy Au Parts 1-4:

Part 1: Dinner and a Show

All his lives, the Master had always believed that he and the Doctor could hold on for about the same amount of time. He always imagined that when they reached their last lives, they would both give all this up and spend their retirement years bickering and raising bees or whatever. The Master didn't particularly like bees, but he had always imagined that the Doctor did and as long as they were together, that was enough to satisfy him.

What he had discovered in the Matrix had proved his ideal endgame impossible.

The revelation that the Doctor was The Timeless Child meant that the Doctor would always live on. They would always evolve and survive no matter what happened. The Doctor would always race to people in need; and now, they would never have any reason to stop.

(AU where the reason the Master wanted the Doctor to kill them both in The Timeless Child is bc he's on his last life)

Word Count: 5,120

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Part 2: Dinner and a Show One-Offs

"The Doctor did her best to space out her visits with O. For every couple adventures she had with her 'fam', she would stop by his home once or so. Sometimes she let months slip by, because she knew that the longer she waited, the less of O's limited time she used up.

She felt guilty to calculate it, but if O was already in his mid-thirties and he lived a full human life...

Suffice it to say, she wanted it to last for as long as possible. She had never had a situation as stable nor as safe as she now had with O. After everything they had both been through to get to this point, she refused to jeopardize a single moment.

For all the pain the Master had caused her, O was well worth the wait."

(By popular demand, a continuation of 'Dinner and a Show')

Word Count: 10,926

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Part 3: Unjustifiable

O- having no recollection of his actions as 'The Master'- returns to being Earth's Horizon Watcher.

O is proud of his work and he cherishes the Doctor's frequent visits, but it's becoming increasingly apparent that she's been keeping more secrets about his past than he had theorized.

To make matters worse, the arrival of an advanced species of aliens on his doorstep brings with it a whole new plethora of problems. Something terrifying resurfaces when O hears they're searching for a Tardis and things go terribly wrong.

Word Count: 23,870

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Part 4: Found Family

The Master finally gets around to seeing the universe in a more peaceful way and runs into a young woman looking for her father.

Word Count: 3,663 (Will possibly be updated at a later date, but complete for now)

~~~

-

Oneshots Inspired by others (specific inspiration in the beginning notes of each):

All Alone In The Dark

While heading back to Earth, the Doctor hears someone calling for her help.

She tracks it back to the Master- injured yet alive- and finds him trapped in his own head, reliving his last confrontation with The Time Lord Council before the destruction of Gallifrey.

Word Count: 1,926

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You Again

The 10th Doctor and Missy each escape their last canon appearances believing that the other is dead for good.

So imagine their surprise when they run into each other at a party in the 1920's.

Word Count: 6,943

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Sick Day

The Master has everything set up for his latest evil scheme but when he tracks down the Doctor, he realizes his best enemy is in no condition to fight. So the Master does what any good nemesis does and takes care of him.

Desperate Times, Desperate Measures

Word Count: 2,807

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Prompt: "Right now, I don't know if I want to kiss you or shove you off a bridge!" "Can I pick?"

The Master’s Tardis had traced the call seven minutes in advance to this exact time and location. He pushed open his Tardis door to find himself in front of some no name bar with graffiti scrawled on the side, situated in front of an empty ravine. He was on Earth, and there was probably a similarly ramshackled city around him, but he didn’t so much as spare it a glance.

The Master’s steps were determined, his jaw clenched, and his hands shaking despite his signature device in hand.

He had been on the other side of the universe, licking his wounds like any old villain would when disappointed by their latest nemesis showdown. It all made his blood boil to have caved so soon. To come back and HELP the Doctor.

The Doctor still had O’s number and her call was scheduled to be made in exactly seven minutes. A hysterical, agonizing call that begged the Master to intervene. He wasn’t sure what was worse, hearing the Doctor in so much despair, or the disappointment that hearing her in such agony somehow didn’t lessen his own.

Word Count: 2,410

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The Beginning and The End

Prompt: First Doctor, Dhawan!Master, Gallifrey, and the dialogue: "I know my words mean close to nothing for you. But I do, in fact, love you very much."

Basically Theta (Academy Era Doctor) accidentally runs into the Master on a burning Gallifrey

Word Count: 4,499

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Kisses Like That

The Doctor's never understood why humans enjoy kissing so much- but a certain, somewhat familiar woman piques his interest.

(Missy goes back in time to give 10 a lil kiss)

Word Count: 1,885

Spyvember 2020

Collection of short fics I did inspired by Spyvember prompts (from Tumblr)

Word Count: 15,506 (6 separate chapters)

~~~

Thank you to everyone who has inspired me, commented on my work, read any of my writing, and overall has just supported me in any way this year!! Thank you for keeping me motivated and helping me improve as a writer!

My best wishes to you in the new year! <3

[loudflowerbouquetme]

Beginning a Successful Dropshipping Business

Dropshipping is like any business and also the most important thing when beginning out on any kind of venture is to do your market research FIRST ...

When you open a store in your townCommunity you wouldn't would not it without doing your market researchInitially The very same point applies if you are mosting likely to sell something on the internet as a dropshipper. Not only are there billions of website around that could be selling competitive items, the web changes so quick that you are out-of-date as soon as you have begun. If you are mosting likely to establish a dropshipping business you want ensure that the product that you choose can be easily offered. As well as you need to know how many competitors you have. And also you want to remain as much as day as feasible. Selling items on the net is simple. Hundreds of hundreds of individuals do it each day online on auction websites such as eBay. One of the most hard part of internet sales is getting the products supplied to the client, otherwise known as order satisfaction.

One of the reasons that brick-and-mortar stores are so slow-moving on the uptake when it comes to on the internet business, is that providing retail shops is done with pallet-sized orders usually. Selling on the net is essentially mail order, with deliveries going out in small parcels to end customers. Few brick-and-mortar stores have a thriving mail order business to draw from. An ineffective satisfaction system can shed for you the advantages in excellent customer service that holding the inventory got for you. As well as running a satisfaction system is a full-time and trying work.

One of the most basic order gratification models to utilize is the decline ship design. Decline delivery does have its advantages and also negative aspects. The most important being you don't need to pay for anything till after you sell it. You additionally do not have stock prices. Needing to buy stock to deliver to your clients can be pricey and also dangerous. Along with the out-of-pocket prices, you need a location to keep the supply. You have to pick, draw, pack, and ship the products once the order is put. Having the supplier or manufacturer take all these costs and responsibilities lifts an actual concern off your shoulders.

Preferably a drop-shipper needs to be clear. With most of your drop shippers, especially those with whom you do a normal business, you can send them tags as well as forms so their package looks like it is from you. Your consumer probably will not know that your hands never ever touched the item. The consumer will certainly think that you have a storehouse.

If you had to get and store them yourself, you can offer numerous even more items than you might. Decline shippers provide you a wide option of items so you can offer a lot more.On the Internet some categories of items are extremely price-sensitive. If you are marketing computer, for instance, and also making use of the drop delivery design, you may discover it tough to be affordable price-wise and still make a profit. The distinction between earning money and losing it might be just a few percent. Be certain to choose an item that makes sense to go down ship.

Decline delivery is actually outsourcing your order fulfillment services to a 3rd event. You will be reliant on your decrease shipper to have the products in stock, to supply on time, and also to correctly load as well as ship your products.

There are tools that you can use as a dropshipping store owner that help alleviate the stress and hastle of managing a store, one of which is AliDropship, which manages orders/product inventory management.

At the end of the day, nonetheless, drop shipping exists due to the fact that it works. Drop delivery is simply a setup between you and the producer or distributor of the product you offer wherein the producer or supplier-- NOT YOU-- ships the item to your consumers.

If you're like a lot of individuals starting a tiny business, you don't have much funding with which to play with. The last point you desire to do is link up your money in stock that you might or may not be able to offer. Not having supply likewise means no leftovers. If the item you sell suddenly ends up being out-of-date, outdated, or simply plain un-trendy, you aren't the one with a residence loaded with stock that no one will certainly purchase. Many on the internet merchants find themselves having to supply deep price cuts-- and taking big losses-- on old products simply to get them out of their houses to make room for more stock!

You'll additionally do not have to deal with shipping your products. Unless you have actually currently established a shipping account with someone like FedEx or UPS, you'll be heading to the post office every day to buy stamps as well as mail out your items. As well as you'll be able to INCLUDE NEW PRODUCTS ALMOST INSTANTLY. Considering that you don't need to worry about purchasing inventory, you can add products to your internet site within a couple of hours.

If you find that your consumers aspire to buy a specific item, you can have that thing up on your site in nearly no time. Invest time investigating different kinds of items that you may want to offer. The items you choose ought to be in need but not widely readily available online. As usual, I highly recommend targeting a particular niche market as opposed to looking for a product that EVERYBODY wishes to get.

When you've located an item that you think may be the best one for your business, you'll need to do a little "competitive evaluation." This just indicates finding out what potential rivals are billing for the products you want to sell and determining just how much of an earnings you'll be able to make. When it comes down to it ... its everything about 'Screening, Screening, Screening!' All the best! If you are going to establish up a dropshipping business then take a read of TheMarketingVibe.com and learn as much as you can about how to drive organis search traffic to your business’ website, through SEO, etc.

Decline shippers give you a vast option of items so you can offer a great deal more.On the Web some classifications of items are really price-sensitive. You will certainly be reliant on your drop shipper to have the items in stock, to provide on time, and to properly load and also deliver your products. Drop shipping is simply an arrangement between you and the supplier or distributor of the product you sell whereby the maker or distributor-- NOT YOU-- ships the product to your clients. Invest time looking into various kinds of items that you could want to offer.

[caracaramba]

How to Begin an Effective Dropshipping Business

Dropshipping is like any business and also the most vital point when starting out on any kind of endeavor is to do your market research study FIRST ... When you open up store shop your town, you wouldn't would not it without doing your market research.

Initially If you are going to offer something on the internet as a dropshipper, the very same point uses. Not only exist billions of website around that could be offering affordable items, the net adjustments so quickly that you are out-of-date as soon as you have actually gotten going.

If you are mosting likely to establish a dropshipping business you want ensure that the product that you choose can be conveniently offered. And you need to know the number of rivals you have. As well as you wish to stay as up to date as feasible. Offering items on the web is very easy. Hundreds of thousands of individuals do it everyday online on auction sites such as eBay. The most challenging part of internet sales is getting the items provided to the consumer, otherwise referred to as order satisfaction.

Additionally, you want to make sure that you’re running your store efficiently. We personally use AliDropship, which is a online dropshipping store management system that is compatible with Wordpress... You can find a full review of it here, and can even have the company ‘AliDropship’ create you a custom-made store.

You may even decide to use Shopify and Oberlo, and you can use guides to find the best products.

One of the reasons that brick-and-mortar stores are so slow-moving on the uptake when it comes to on the internet business, is that supplying retail shops is done with pallet-sized orders normally. Offering on the web is essentially mail order, with deliveries going out in little parcels to end individuals.

Couple of brick-and-mortar merchants have a successful mail order business to draw from. An inefficient gratification system can lose for you the benefits in excellent customer service that holding the inventory gained for you. And also running a satisfaction system is a full-time as well as attempting work.

Among the simplest order satisfaction versions to use is the decrease ship model. Decline delivery does have its advantages as well as downsides. The most important being you do not need to spend for anything till after you sell it. You additionally do not have inventory costs. Having to purchase inventory to deliver to your consumers can be costly as well as high-risk. In addition to the out-of-pocket costs, you require a place to save the inventory.

Ultimately you have to pick, pull, pack, as well as ship the items once the order is put. Having the representative or maker take all these responsibilities and also prices lifts a real worry off your shoulders.

With most of your drop carriers, especially those with whom you do a regular business, you can send them tags as well as kinds so their package looks like it is from you. Your customer probably won't understand that your hands never touched the product.

You can sell many even more products than you can if you had to buy as well as store them on your own. Decrease shippers offer you a vast choice of products so you can offer a great deal more.On the Net some categories of items are extremely price-sensitive.

You will be utilizing 3rd party customer service so you will not have full control. Decrease delivery is truly outsourcing your order gratification solutions to a 3rd party. You will certainly be dependent on your decline shipper to have the products in stock, to deliver in a timely manner, and to appropriately load and deliver your items. Pick your drop carrier very carefully.

At the end of the day, nevertheless, decrease delivery exists since it functions. Decrease delivery is just an arrangement in between you and the supplier or representative of the product you sell whereby the supplier or supplier-- NOT YOU-- ships the item to your customers.

If you're like the majority of individuals beginning a tiny business, you don't have much resources with which to play with. The last point you desire to do is connect up your cash in stock that you might or might not be able to offer. Not having supply also indicates no leftovers.

If the product you sell suddenly becomes obsolete, out-of-date, or just simple un-trendy, you aren't the one with a house filled with supply that no one will certainly acquire. Lots of online retailers find themselves needing to provide deep discounts-- as well as taking big losses-- on old products simply to get them out of their residences to make room for more stock!

Unless you've already established up a shipping account with someone like FedEx or UPS, you'll be heading down to the blog post workplace every day to buy stamps and also mail out your items. Because you do not have to worry concerning ordering supply, you can include products to your internet website within a couple of hrs.

If you discover that your clients are eager to get a particular item, you can have that product up on your site in virtually no time at all. Invest time investigating various kinds of items that you may want to market. The items you select need to remain in demand yet not widely offered online. As usual, I very advise targeting a particular niche market rather than searching for a product that EVERYBODY wishes to acquire.

Once you've found an item that you believe might be the ideal one for your business, you'll need to do a little "affordable evaluation." This just indicates learning what prospective rivals are billing for the products you intend to sell and also determining just how much of an earnings you'll be able to make. When it boils down to it ... its all about 'Screening, Testing, Screening!' All the best! If you are going to establish up a dropshipping business you want make certain that the item that you select can be conveniently marketed. Decrease carriers give you a vast selection of products so you can sell a lot more.On the Net some categories of items are very price-sensitive. You will be dependent on your decrease carrier to have the items in stock, to provide on time, and to properly load and also deliver your items. Decline delivery is merely an arrangement between you and the manufacturer or distributor of the product you market whereby the manufacturer or supplier-- NOT YOU-- ships the item to your customers.

Invest time looking into various kinds of items that you may want to market.

[seidrborn-a]

PRIVATE + HIGHLY SELECTIVE + LOW ACTIVITY + MATURE ROLEPLAY BLOG FOR    𝑳𝑶𝑲𝑰  𝑳𝑨𝑼𝑭𝑬𝒀𝑺𝑶𝑵  ����𝑫𝑰𝑵𝑺𝑶𝑵    FROM  MARVEL  COMICS,  THE  MCU,  &  MYTHOLOGY.     FOUR  different lokis currently reside herein: mcu,  kid,  agent of asgard,  & 616 / king of jötunheim. PRIVATE?     i will only interact & write with mutuals.     inbox / ims are open to anyone. SELECTIVE?     i won’t respond to everything that’s sent my way,  & do not write threads in any particular order.     in short,  i write what inspires me. LOW ACTIVITY?     i have a life & plenty to do outside of tumblr.     this is my hobby!      if i'm not answering your ims or asks,  i am probably not around.

𝑩𝑨𝑺𝑰𝑪𝑺.

FOLLOWING.     i am incredibly choosy about who i follow ;   please do not take any sort of offense if i don't follow you back!     to increase the likelihood of me doing so, please  have  your  age  clearly  visible  on  your  theme  or  in  your  rules ;   failure to do so will result in me unfollowing or passing you by.     i do not  generally  like following underage roleplayers,  but i am willing to make some exceptions. CONTAINS NSFW CONTENT.     triggering or otherwise.     anything that falls into this category   (  gore,  sexual content,  violence,  otherwise mature themes  )   will be tagged with  ` ✦ ᴘʟᴇᴀsᴇ ʏᴏᴜʀ ɢᴏᴅ༄⋆.◦◝ ( lime time. ).     please blacklist that phrase if you don’t want to or are too young to see any of it. NO PERSONALS.     don’t follow or try to interact with me.     don’t like / reblog my roleplays.     all personals are blocked on sight,  as are any blogs that cannot be determined to be roleplay blogs. NO ANON HATE OR DRAMA.     this includes vaguing.      it’s 2020,  guys.     i’ve rewritten my rules three times & still people don’t seem to get it.     this  blog  does  not  send  or  participate  in  anon  hate,   burn  books,   or  anything  of  that  nature,    & i expect my followers to comport themselves in a similar manner.     if i find that you have been engaging in these behaviors or your blog contains vague posting or too much ooc complaining or drama,  i will promptly softblock you. TRIGGERS.     i do not have any triggers that you need to worry about; however if you need me to tag certain things that could trigger you, please send me a message about it! 

𝑺𝑯𝑰𝑷𝑷𝑰𝑵𝑮.

I  WILL  NEVER  HATE  ON  YOU  OR  UNFOLLOW  YOU  FOR  YOUR  SHIPS.     you do you booboo! MULTISHIP.     i will not tolerate flack or jealousy. CHEMISTRY BASED.     i’ve no plans to write something simply because it is a popular ship for loki ;   all ships are to be previously discussed if the muses seem to be interested in one another. SMUT.     will occur,  but mostly on discord.     any that is written on here will be tagged, but i do not use the read more cuts.     we’re all adults here. 

𝑨𝑫𝑴𝑰𝑵.

ARLO.     27.     MST.     aries.     hiddlestoner.     proud supporter of the survey corps & team instinct & loki’s army ;   horror connoisseur of medical intrigue & a mythology nut. SCHEDULE.     i work part time for amazon from 2 - 6pm sun - thurs. DISCORD.     will only be given to people i have threaded with before for personal reasons ;   i love writing on discord, though!!

𝑪𝑹𝑬𝑫𝑰𝑻𝑺.

THEME.     winter  made it using base codes from  hollywhood.     floating blob effect is from  here. GRAPHICS.     main psd is  the  whole  being  dead  thing  by jaynedits with a few tweaks by me.     secondary psd for 616 / king of jötunheim icons is  ghost  hunting,   also by jaynedits.     they also made my icon frame. IMAGES.     all images of loki are screencaps or comic panels from the mcu & marvel comics.     faceclaim is obviously  tom  hiddleston ;   don't like,  don't follow.

[victorluvsalice]

AU Thursday: Tell Me Where To Find Shelter – Converting Alice's VTMB Stats To Fallout Ones

So! I'm on a kick of combining Vampire: the Masquerade – Bloodlines and Fallout 4 into one universe, for the purposes of shipping my Sole Survivor!Victor with my Malkavian!Alice. And since the story takes place in the Fallout 4 nuclear apocalypse, we have to do a few things to get our Alice properly settled in this verse. One of them? Convert her Bloodlines character sheet into something that can fit with the Fallout 4 system!

Now Fallout as a whole uses the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system to stat up characters – everyone has the seven core attributes of Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck, ranked from 1 to 10. How Perks and Skills are handled varies from game to game, but in Fallout 4 we have a Perk "tree" of sorts that is linked to your special stats – each stat has various perks that can be accessed as you level it up, and those perks often have levels of their own (for example, the "Locksmith" perk is available at Perception 4, and it has 4 levels, allowing you to pick harder and harder locks, and eventually stopping your bobby pins from breaking). You earn XP doing various things in the world (completing quests gives the most, but you also earn plenty from just crafting stuff, building things in settlements, finding new locations, being charismatic, and killing enemies) to level up, and at each level up, you earn a "Perk Point," where you can choose a new Perk (so long as you have the appropriate stats), upgrade an existing Perk (again, as long as you meet requirements), or even just boost the seven core raw stats (opening up more Perks).

Bloodlines, on the other hand, uses a variation on the standard World of Darkness TTRPG character sheet, where characters have nine Attributes (the raw power of the character, subdivided into three categories – Physical has Strength, Dexterity, and Stamina; Social has Charisma, Manipulation, and Appearance; and Mental has Perception, Intelligence, Wits) and twelve Abilities (learned skills, also subdivided into three categories – Talents has Brawl, Dodge, Intimidation, and Subterfuge; Skills has Firearms, Melee, Security, Stealth; and Knowledges has Computers, Finance, Investigation, and Scholarship). Attributes are ranked 1 to 5; Abilities 0 to 5. These combine to form Feats, which cover things like how good you are at various kinds of combat, if you're good at sneaking around and lockpicking, if you're good at persuading or seducing people, etc. There's also three Disciplines each clan gets as magical abilities – Malkavians have Auspex (see auras, get bonuses to certain stats), Obfuscate (turn invisible), and Dementation (inflict debilitating mental effects on others). You don't level up, but just earn straight XP for each quest you complete, which is spent on increasing Attributes, Abilities, or Disciplines at increasing costs.

Okay, so how do we bash these together into something that makes sense for Alice? Well, let's start by looking at her Attributes, Abilities, and Feats from Bloodlines. Since she's supposed to have gone through the whole game by the time she meets Victor, we'll use her stats from the end of my playthrough. We'll also use the "raw" stats – that is, not boosted by special items she picked up through the course of the game. That gives us:

Attributes:

Physical: Strength 4, Dexterity 4, Stamina 4

Social: Charisma 3, Manipulation 1, Appearance 2

Mental: Perception 4, Intelligence 4, Wits 3

Abilities:

Talents: Brawl 3, Dodge 3, Intimidation 1, Subterfuge 0

Skills: Firearms 5, Melee 5, Security 4, Stealth 4

Knowledges: Computers 5, Finance 3, Investigation 2, Scholarship 5

Feats:

Combat: Unarmed 7, Melee 9, Ranged 9, Defense 6

Covert: Lockpicking 8, Sneaking 8, Hacking 8, Inspection 8, Research 9

Public: Haggle 4, Intimidate 5, Persuasion 8, Seduction 2

Soak: Bashing 4, Lethal 0, Aggravated 0

So there's a couple of Attributes that can be immediately slotted into the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system – Strength, Charisma, Perception, and Intelligence appear in both. However, we can't just put in the raw numbers – remember, S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats rank from 1 to 10, while WoD Attributes only rank from 1 to 5. In order to get a more accurate picture, we'll need to double Alice's Bloodlines stats in those four categories (so Strength goes from 4 in the Bloodlines stats to 8 in the Fallout 4 ones). As for the stats that don't have an immediate match:

Dexterity covers the same sort of stuff Agility does, so Alice's score in the former can be transferred to the latter

Similarly, Stamina can map onto Endurance

Manipulation is used mainly for the "haggle" feat in Bloodlines – this is probably best covered by the "Cap Collector" perk in Fallout 4, which similarly improves vendor prices

Appearance, like the above, is used for the "seduction" feat in Bloodlines – that's best translated into the "Black Widow/Ladykiller" perk (since Alice is cis-female, "Black Widow" would be used for her)

Wits, to continue the trend, is used for upping defense in combat and the "hacking" feat – seems like it would grant one the "Hacker" perk in response

Luck has no direct counterpart in the Bloodlines Attributes – but given that the Bloodlines Fledgling starts out lucky enough to survive their illegal embrace, and generally ends lucky enough to become a powerful player in Los Angeles vampire politics, or powerful enough to strike out on their own without a faction's help (as Alice did), I think it's safe to assume it's high!

So let's say that, as of her appearance in "Tell Me Where To Find Shelter," Alice's S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats are:

Strength: 8

Perception: 8

Endurance: 8

Charisma: 6

Intelligence: 8

Agility: 8

Luck: 10

Yes, this is not something you could get in the character creator at the beginning of the game – but this is Alice after the end of Bloodlines, I think we can assume she's leveled up quite a bit! And yes, I'm giving her Luck 10 because – well, let's face it, she survived a LOT of shit and got REALLY powerful REALLY fast. Safe to assume Luck is currently on her side!

So we've got her S.P.E.C.I.A.L. – now, what about Perks? Well, from the Bloodlines Attributes that didn't map onto anything in the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. categories, we already have three: "Black Widow" (makes it easier to charm and kill men); "Cap Collector" (makes prices more favorable in buying and selling with vendors); and "Hacker" (allows you to hack terminals). Looking at her Bloodlines Feats seems to be the best way to determine which other Perks she should have, since they're what she knows combined with her raw base power. By category:

Combat: Alice is really good at both melee and ranged (aka gun) combat, with decent unarmed and defense. Making things slightly more difficult, though, is that Fallout 4 has different perks for different kinds of guns. Making things slightly easier is the fact that I played Alice as primarily a melee build – she knows how to use guns, and I certainly made good use of them in certain fights, but she and I both felt more comfortable with a good sledgehammer or sword. Give her "Iron Fist" for her potential as a good unarmed combatant, the strongest version of "Big Leagues" for her ability with a good melee weapon, and "Steady Aim" for her gunplay. "Gunslinger" covers non-automatic pistols, which I believe are the kind I ended up using most often for her; "Rifleman" covers things like rifles and shotguns – and she was using that Dragon's Breath shotgun a LOT in her final boss fights, so pop those on for her too!

Covert: Alice is great at lockpicking, sneaking, hacking, finding things (though admittedly this is artificially bumped due to her being a Malkavian), and looking things up. We've already determined she'd have the "Hacker" trait, so we can now assume she has it at the highest level. She also gets "Locksmith" at the highest level. "Sneak" – well, this is an interesting one, as she's good at it, but she also has the Obfuscate ability, which I used a LOT, so. . . We'll give it to her at Rank 2 for now. "Fortune Finder" and "Scrounger" both feel appropriate as well, as does "Awareness" for figuring out what people are weak to (this overlaps with her ability to see auras using Auspex – think of it as her version of V.A.T.S.!).

Public: Alice is okay at haggling and intimidating, surprisingly good at persuading, and pretty crap at seducing. We've given her "Black Widow" as it's the only perk Appearance was good for that I could see, but we'll keep it at the lowest level as seduction isn't really her style. (She's just pretty enough to distract people!) The same applies to "Cap Collector." Weirdly enough, her base Charisma stat locks her out of stuff like "Intimidation" and "Wasteland Whisperer" – but she's also been staked in a basement for about as long as Victor's been frozen, so probably she needs time to come to grip with the post-apocalyptic world! Rather than any specific Charisma-based perk, she's probably just got a background higher chance of winning speech checks.

Soak: This is an interesting category, because this one primarily relies on the armor you have. However, having good Stamina helps defend against Bashing, which is bullet and blunt melee weapon damage. Alice has a bit of that, so a level or two in "Toughness" seems appropriate.

In addition, I think she should have "Strong Back" (being a video game character with an invisible inventory that allows her to carry a decent amount of stuff; there are some pretty strict limits, though, so I'd only give her level one); "Lifegiver" (vampires and video game characters are both harder to kill than normal humans, and vampires DO auto-mend themselves in the original game); "Night Person" (. . .she's a vampire); and "Aquagirl" (again, vampire – no need to breathe!). So the final stats and perks would be:

Strength: 8 – Perks "Iron Fist" (Rank 1), "Big Leagues" (Rank 5), "Strong Back" (Rank 1), "Steady Aim" (Rank 2)

Perception: 8 – Perks "Rifleman" (Rank 2), "Awareness" (Rank 1), "Locksmith" (Rank 4), "Night Person" (Rank 3)

Endurance: 8 – Perks "Toughness" (Rank 2), "Lifegiver" (Rank 3), "Aquagirl" (Rank 1)

Charisma: 6 – Perks "Cap Collector" (Rank 1), "Black Widow" (Rank 1)

Intelligence: 8 – Perks "Hacker" (Rank 4)

Agility: 8 – Perks "Gunslinger" (Rank 2), "Sneak" (Rank 2)

Luck: 10 – Perks "Fortune Finder" (Rank 3), "Scrounger" (Rank 3)

That just leaves Alice's Discplines, which – being magical effects – are kind of hard to quantify in Fallout 4's soft sci-fi setting. However:

Auspex is pretty much covered by the "Awareness" perk – Alice never leveled it far, and as I stated, seeing the auras of various creatures to determine what they are is not that dissimilar from V.A.T.S.

Obfuscate is the ability to turn invisible to the human eye – Alice mastered this. We can treat this as if Alice always has a Stealth Boy on her, but she has to be above a certain HP threshold to use it, and it gradually drains HP as it’s used.

Dementation is the ability to inflict various hallucinations and delusions on people – Alice was always iffy about this, but got as good as "Vision of Death," which can actually kill a single person from fear. Lesser effects can temporarily distract a person with uncontrollable laughing or crying, or inflict hallucinations on a group that decreases their combat abilities. It also gives you special dialogue options to get people to do what you want, which is the one effect I think I could put into the game. We'd need to code up a special Perk for the other stuff!

And that about does it! How I think my endgame Malkavian!Alice would look under the Fallout 4 stats! Whew, that took longer than I thought. . . (And I still want to go ahead and steal a certain "Bloodsucker" Perk from Fallout 76. . . "Cannibal" just doesn't really fit with Alice's physiology.)

[suits-of-woe]

Hi! Multiples of 4 for Edmund on the headcanon ask??? Thank you so much!❤️

Thank you!!! I know I never shut up about my boy, thank you for continuing to enable me. This is gonna be really, really long I can’t wait…

I’ll tag @princess-of-france too :)

4. What would they do if they needed to make dinner but the kitchen was busy?

I don’t really feel like Edmund cooks. He’s practical but he’s also rich and has better things to do, so I imagine his diet is like 50% black coffee and energy bars he keeps stashed around the house and 50% super expensive meals he manages to make other people pay for. So in that case he’d probably just eat one of the aforementioned energy bars (or ask some even-richer woman out to dinner for the night, cause he’s like that).

8. Favorite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging

Oh man. Sex. SO much sex. To the point where it’s a legitimate problem, even though he doesn’t see it as one. The thing is, I don’t think he’s super pro-indulgence as a rule – in fact, he probably looks down on people who don’t have good self-control, especially when it comes to things that are proven to be bad, like over-eating or smoking or things like that. But sex doesn’t fall into that category for him, all the reasons he’s been told to avoid it he sees as moralist bullshit, and it’s fun and it’s not hurting anyone so fuck you, why shouldn’t he do it? The issue is deep down sex is also a huge coping mechanism for him, and the only way he knows how to deal with his intense obsession with affection without just 100% repressing it all the time or, worse, being emotionally vulnerable. But I don’t think he realizes how much it’s become a psychological need for him, and how hard it would be to stop. It’s not that he couldn’t stop, he’d say. It’s just that stopping is exactly what all those moralist assholes he hates would want him to do, so why should he?

12. Favorite book genre?

Edgy social commentary probs. I don’t picture Edmund really being the type to read much fiction, but at the same time, I think certain books mean a lot to him. He’s spent his whole life concealing his controversial views on religion, fate, society, sex, basically everything from Gloucester (and to a lesser extent Edgar) in favor of putting on the guise of a perfect traditionally moral son so I think being able to deal with all those hidden ideas through reading about then would really help. He’s probably got a whole hidden stash somewhere in his room he knows his father will never find.

16. Biggest and smallest long term goal?

His biggest long term goal is just to rise to the top as much as he can. I don’t think he’s the kind of person who likes to set limits on his own ambition – he looks at opportunities one step at a time, but if the doors keep opening, who is he to stop? If he can be Gloucester’s heir? Great. If he can overthrow Gloucester entirely? Better. If he can become king? Best of all, but hell, even then he might not stop. Smallest? Ummm idk maybe get his space totally organized. I feel like he’s the kind of person whose organization never quite catches up with his work, and he always says he’s got better things to do than shuffle papers around, but it secretly kind of drives him crazy so he’d like to be totally neat someday.

20. Childhood illnesses? Any interesting stories behind them?

I imagine Edmund has always been pretty robust and healthy (unlike Edgar, probably) and never really got sick that often, even as a kid. That said, on the rare occasion that he did, I think it was a really bad time for him. Cause like I’ve talked about a million times I think Edmund is very driven by his constant deep need for affection, but it’s the kind of thing he can usually repress on a day-to-day basis as long as all his inhibitions are intact. When they aren’t intact, 9 times out of 10 it’s because he’s drunk/high, which is almost always in some kind of party setting, which means he’s pretty much guaranteed to be able to find someone to at least make out with for a bit to make those feelings go away. But if he’s sick enough to be feverish, it’s pretty much the only time he’s both emotionally uninhibited and unable to use sex as a coping mechanism, and it doesn’t go well. Plus with Edgar being more fragile (and, in my headcanon, his mother dying from sickness at an early age too) Gloucester pretty much keeps all members of the family away from him for fear of anything spreading, so he’s pretty much all alone and left with all that unadulterated loneliness he’s not used to feeling half this much and it’s bad. It’s really bad. He tries not to think about it.

24. Is there one subject of study that they excel at? Or do they even care about intellectual pursuits at all?

He’s honestly ahead of the curve in pretty much every subject. He’s a brilliant silver-tongued wordsmith, he’s a super logic and evidence-driven thinker which I think would make him great at math and science, he’s athletic too, and just generally sharp and good at picking up new things. The only thing I think he’d be bad at is any interpretation of art (and to a lesser extent literature) because I think he’d get too frustratingly literal about it – it’s just lines on a page, dammit, it doesn’t mean anything, people will try to find patterns out of anything but the real world is meaningless and there’s nothing really there. In terms of what interests him the most though, it’s politics, which is what drives him insane because that’s the one thing he’ll never be allowed to pursue.

28. Who do they see as their best friend? Their worst enemy?

Depends on the era of his life. I don’t think he has anyone he considers even a real friend, let alone a best friend, when we see him in the play. When he was younger he would have said Edgar, but that ship sailed a long time ago. Now, he doesn’t really do genuine friendship. There are people he likes, but no one he wouldn’t throw under the bus in a heartbeat if that’s what it took. Similarly, I think he tries not to see anyone as his worst enemy. It’s the world that’s his enemy, and society, and it’s a matter of a lot more than taking down one person to beat that. But really, I think it’s Gloucester he hates more than anyone. That part of the plan is more personal than he’d probably admit.

32. Thoughts on material possessions in general?

He’s not big on them…until they become something he can’t have. Like he’s certainly not the overly-sentimental type to hang onto things he doesn’t need, and I think he sees a lot of material wealth and status symbols as really inherently shallow. But the second those shallow wealth and status symbols are denied him, or used to mark him as lesser, then he’ll be damned if he’s not getting his hands on them if it’s the last thing he does.

36. What makes them feel guilty?

People actually loving and respecting him on their own, not because he manipulated them or did them favors or somehow cheated to get their approval. So much of how he justifies everything he does is the fact that, as a bastard, he thinks he’ll never have half a shot at the advantages everyone else gets, so if he wants anyone to approve of him or admire him or show him affection he has to manipulate the hell out of them (or the situation in general) to get it. He’s convinced himself it’s the only way, so when that’s proven wrong, it rocks his world. There’s a reason “Yet Edmund was belov’d” comes the line before finally changes his mind and tries to do something good.

40. Would you say that they have a superiority-complex? Inferiority-complex? Neither?

Both? One? Or neither? Neither can be en- just kidding it’s BOTH and it’s a problem. He’s been looked down on his entire life for being a bastard and that cuts deep, it always has, no matter how hard he tries to shrug it off. He’ll never really get rid of the idea that he’s lesser, or at least everyone considers him lesser, so he has to claw his way to every bit of advantage and approval he can get. But he also really believes that birth means nothing, that merit and intelligence and survival of the fittest should determine who rises to the top, and in that respect…he maybe overcompensated. Because he also manages to be a raging narcissist who thinks he’s smarter than everyone around him (to be fair, he mostly is) and is entitled to anything he can win for himself.

44. Religion?

MY EDGY ATHEIST KING. I think he’s super anti-religion, and anti-spirituality even more so – just anything that involves people blaming their fates or their decisions on forces out of their control or pretending like anything is just “meant to be” makes him incredibly angry. That does fall under the category of things he won’t admit to preserve his image though, he’ll grit his teeth through whatever religious proceedings are required of him if it’s to his advantage.

48. How do they express love?

Ummm badly? He craves other people’s love constantly, but him actually being the one feeling Real Love isn’t something he’s really prepared to deal with, and it kind of makes him freak out. By the time he’s really headed down the road of executing his plans, I think the main way he expresses love is by trying to get the people he loves far, far away from him and this world and his path of destruction. On a more general note though like I said in that post I made a while ago I think his main love language is physical touch, so when he’s not in such a dark place that either results in lots of hugs or lots of sex depending on the person.

[anearthstruckalien]

In the past, I’ve described Psion technology as highly-advanced and in fact, the most (if not among the most) advanced in the known universe.  Simply-put, beyond their exceedingly high level of comprehension of and skill in PSI, Psions are also dangerous precisely because of the technology that they possess, both on a more standardized level (i.e something that’s accessible to the general public) and in the ways of projects that are kept a little more secret for one reason or another.  And while it’s a bit much to elaborate on every single technology out there, I felt like it would be nonetheless worthwhile to give a general impression of it by noting a few of the many technological advancements of Psions, albeit mainly under broader categories of things:

○ Psion production machine:  as (more extensively) covered in THIS POST, this machine is responsible for producing Psions that are ‘customized’ for specific and predetermined purposes hence why there are certain ‘types’ or classes of Psions at all.  In a few words, the way that this machine produces Psions involves a conversion of energy in response to their coded physical traits and selves (or rather the ‘barebones’ of the self which later grows, develops, and changes based off the environment).

In other words, this machine alters the external world through the code input into it and the intermediary that connects the machine to whatever it is meant to alter; ‘blank’ energy in this case whereby the primary purpose is the creation of new Psions.  It’s almost like an alteration of reality itself, and because this principle can be adopted and applied in a more general sense, there are several other noteworthy Psion technologies that either alter certain parts of the external world via code input (i.e specific-use tools) or apply this idea on a broader and more general-use basis.

○ Repurposing:  it goes without saying that Psions (as far as their ideology goes) hate to let anything go to waste.  They want to pull whatever use and benefits they can out of something until there is nothing left to accomplish such a thing before then classifying it as ‘useless’ and discarding it.  As such, they have quite a bit of technologies that are dedicated to either efficiently converting one thing into another (for example, the energy from a discarded Psion into ‘purified’ and totally ‘blank’ energy again) or for efficiently breaking given substances (ranging from items to the corpses of life-forms) down into their consistuent elements and storing these elements away for later use as resources.  On a broader scale, an extremely noteworthy application of repurposing technologies is that of a kind of resource extracter that gets implemented on conquered worlds and basically sucks them dry of all viable resources… albeit in a way that takes time (compared to most other technologies that fall under this category) because it’s on a planet-wide scale for one thing and for another, it needs to be very carefully extracted as to keep the planet from falling apart before the process is complete.

○ Time travel:  Psions have fully developed time travel such that they can harmlessly (i.e without any negative effects on the individual travelling or to time-space itself) transport any entity through time based on some very specific coordinates input into the related machine.  And in addition to this, the ones that are utilizing this technology can use it to communicate with other versions of themselves at different points in time or a time-divergent self (provided that said variant has this technology as well) and in the case of Psions, can enable a ‘synchronization’ of information across these differing selves provided that they all originate from the same self source.

That is, self A can become the exact same person as self B (and vice versa simultaneously) because whatever experiences either one is missing from the other can be shared and thus filled-in as though that self had gone through it.  During his whole M2 plan, Giegue did this quite a bit.  That is, he had information synced across himself and time-divergent selves to better coordinate his insane and rather complex plan aaaaand to uphold the timeline he had created in an attempt to secure victory this time.  And so, apart from the 10,000 years he spent in his Magicant following M2’s outcome, he can be said to have even more ‘years’ added onto his overall age by virtue of the extra experiences he received through this syncing.

○ Psion home-planet:  as stated on this blog some time ago, the Psion home-planet itself is a greyscale and highly modular world with this dull yet distinctive gleam to it and this angular, simplistic, and very ordered (in a way that seems to suggest an obsession with it) design as far as its surface and underground features go. To elaborate, when I say ‘modular’ I mean that every single parameter as it pertains to the planet’s conditions can be altered using a super complicated control panel at its core.  These alterations can range from choosing to have certain weather phenomena (rather than being totally stagnant and void of it as is the norm) at specific points on the planet to determining its air composition (i.e what it contains + how ‘breathable’ it is for other species) to even distorting its physical features such as its shape and where it contains certain structures—which are either morphed out of it to begin with or connected to its surface after being externally built—as is necessary for their given purposes at a time.

And so, much like Psions themselves, the Psion home-planet is customizable due to the way hyper-advanced technology has been embedded into it and as a matter of fact, can be moved like a ship to warp out of one place and into another once the nearby star systems are all depleted of available resources. And while I’m still on the topic of the home-planet, I believe that it’s worth re-iterating that the Psion home-planet itself is always inside of a pocket dimension which is ‘locked’ in a way such that not just anyone can get through… and even when someone (unauthorized) does get through, the pocket dimension itself is structured in a way that gives the Psions every single relevant advantage possible in that space by both the ‘laws’ of that space itself and the very fact that the planetary weapons systems are both integrated into the very fabric of that space itself (i.e essentially every part of that space can be used to kill someone) and in the home-planet itself though its ordinary kept folded away in the planet itself.

○ Psion ships:  I won’t get into the deeper details of every single ship that Psions have available for use, but I will say that there are specific ships designed and optimized to perform certain ranges of tasks thereby making some ships better at doing something than others.  Beyond these differences however, each Psion ship is capable of three key functions: traversing through space across a broad variety of conditions be they extreme or not, warping its own form both in a strictly external (i.e maintaining its internal integrity as is) and an internal sense such that functions that range from fitting through otherwise inaccessible areas in space to simply creating more seating and control panels can be applied, and capable of traveling at insane speeds through space such that it’s possible to get from one extreeeeeeeeeeeeeeemely distant point to another almost instantaneously once the systems are ready to jump into that speed.

In other words, these ships are highly versatile (even when they’re optimized for a specific set of tasks), durable, and travel very fast through space. And in addition to all of this, it’s worth noting that as is the case with several other technologies (i.e the Psion production machine and the home-planet itself), only Psions can operate these ships in that these ships will not respond to anyone else attempting to control them unless their systems are hijacked in some way or a non-Psion is manually granted permission by the systems.  As such, ‘lower’ life-forms that are sent to accomplish tasks outside of the home-planet frequently tend to either be under the leadership of a Psion or have a ‘non-Psion’ (though still produced by Psion construction worlds) ship allotted to them which can more or less be regarded as a less advanced (though still potent) variant of Psion ships.

○ Enhancements:  although it is really ‘lower’ life-forms (i.e non-Psions) that get altered and thus ‘enhanced’ by technology… it’s not restricted to said life-forms.  Rather to be more specific, non-Psions get these kinds of enhancements in ways that are very invasive and integrate into their very physiology because it is believed that these life-forms are so ‘flawed’ that true ‘usefulness’ and ‘improvements’ can only be brought about in this manner. And while Psions are rarely (if ever at all) subjected to these enhancements, they do use some form of them albeit in a more ‘wearable’ way whereby it’s something that can be attached and removed with ease aka not truly melded to them at all.

These external enhancements tend to be extremely lightweight (due to being rather thin up to being outright paper-thin at times), need no special application other than just manually sticking them onto the exoskeleton and smoothing it down into it, and often tend to be invisible once applied to a Psion until they are removed again or otherwise damaged.  In turn, the primary reasons behind using external enhancements at all is to account for situations whereas Psions are in need of an additional function or boost to their current functions (if not made that way from the start) and to broadly make life easier in an equivalent way that things like watches, electronic schedules, etc do.  In a sense, given the general format that enhancements for Psions tend to take on as a kind of standard? these enhancements can be thought of as more so akin to function-bestowing patches than anything else.

○ Other:  this is more or less a re-iteration of things I’ve mentioned before… but other noteworthy bits of technology include: the general Psion surveillance system whereby time-space anomalies are (on a continuous basis) being recorded by a machine on the home-planet which itself in turn means that Psions know whenever entities or objects enter in and out of the universe –the main reason why you don’t often see them addressing it is because (most of the time) it isn’t considered to be important enough to devote their time and resources towards for one thing and for another, things entering in and out of the universe are actually common occurences; a goop-like substance which actually consists of microscopic machines designed to heal exoskeleton injuries that a given Psion may not be capable of healing themself via analyzing the injury and reconstructing the required component; and a kind of known universe-wide access to electronically-stored information (i.e like the Internet but, spanning beyond a single planet) with especially strong access to points more situated in space under Psion control.

[beneaththetangles]

BtT Light Novel Club Chapter 7: True Tenchi Muyo! Volume 2 (Yosho)

Welcome to another edition of the Beneath the Tangles Light Novel Club! With it being the holiday season, I gave our club a break and decided to approach a novel on my own (which gave me the chance to read a book that probably no one else on staff wanted to read anyway!). Having read volume one of the True Tenchi Muyo! novels for our fourth session, we’re jumping into volume two, titled “Yosho,” for this one!

Since a discussion format won’t do with just one club member being involved, I’m changing up the format as well. Today, I’m giving you Five Questions We Had (and Five We Didn’t) That True Tenchi Muyo! Volume 2 Answers!

Question We Didn’t Have #1: Why is Ayeka’s hair purple?

The assumption, of course, is that it just matches her father, Azusa’s hair, but as we find out, in-born genetics is not the case for the shade of purple. The prologue to the novel starts with an unexpected scene, with Washu reverting Ayeka’s hair color to its original BLUE. Yep, in the category of things we didn’t know we didn’t know is that Ayeka and Sasami both share their mother’s hair color.

But this isn’t just some trivial information—the reason that Ayeka’s hair is digitally edited when she is young is because of Yosho. As a child, Yosho has an unrequited love toward his step-mother, Misaki, whose hair is of course blue. That presents a problem—not because of incest, which is a continual theme in Tenchi Muyo, but because Misaki is the emperor’s wife. So Seto, ever the meddler/thinker/strategist, seeks to find ways for Yosho to forget his feelings for Misaki. Yosho becomes betrothed to his step-sister, now with hair that matches her father’s color, not her mom’s. He is is also sent away to the Galaxy Police Academy to keep him far away from Misaki.

Question We Had #1: Is Yosho interesting enough to carry an entire light novel?

Let’s face it: other than Tenchi himself, Yosho is probably the least interesting major character from the original OVAs. So how could we read an entire novel with him as the central character? Well, as with volume one, the answer is partly given by looking at Yosho as a child and young man, before he’s set in his ways, which helps to make him more intriguing. But he’s also surrounded by other interesting characters (reminiscent of Tenchi’s situation) and royal intrigue. So the answer is both yes and no—Yosho is interesting, though he doesn’t carry the light novel himself.

Question We Didn’t #2: What was Yosho like as a child?

In anime and anime-related works, children are often developed out of archetypes—they play a role, but except for a few notable exceptions, there’s not much too them. It’s a bold choice, then, to focus a large portion of a light novel on a boy, even one entering adolescence. But it works very well, especially when relating it to volume one where the wild and bold Azusa is center stage. Yosho is confident but well-mannered and respectful. But there is a little Azusa in him, too, especially when it comes to a desire to take action—and that helps keep things interesting.

Question We Had #2: What was Yosho like as a young man?

One of the most shocking disclosures of the original OVAs was when Yosho removes his disguise, revealing himself to be Katsuhito, a handsome man appearing to be in his twenties. Kept young by his tree/ship, Funaho, it now looked like he—not rat-tailed Tenchi—was the true lead of this series! My assumption would have been that this Yosho would be the primary character of the book bearing his name. Alas, we don’t get much of the young-man version of Yosho. We do see a teen version fighting Ryoko, but it’s only in the last portion of the book. Though he’s engaging—it’s like the responsible young Yosho I mentioned above meets a determined, strong, and freedom-seeking adolescent—it’s probably for the best that he doesn’t fit into the story for long. We get just a taste of him as he fights Ryoko—more on that later.

Question We Didn’t #3: How did Yosho meet his wife?

The family drama that is Jurai is complicated. I’ve absorbed it in clumps and pieces over the last couple of decades, and so I’m forever forgetting and remembering and learning the connections all over again. One thing I’d forgotten was about Yosho’s wife—the story does a nice job of introducing her, developing the couple’s relationship, and even making suitable excuses for their distance between them. Plus, TWO FOR ONE: we get to meeting Yosho’s first wife as well, who is of course also related to him.

Question We Had #3: How could Yosho be stronger than Ryoko with the three jewels?

He’s not, but the book, which describes the fight between the two, explains how Yosho is able to defeat Ryoko. It takes some assistance, tenacity, and strategy. Ryoko is already harmed when she fights Yosho, handicapped by her meeting with Tsunami. Yosho is able to counter Ryoko, also, with help from his ship, Funaho, and his Light Hawk Wings, which he uses to take two of Ryoko’s jewels away. And still, even with one jewel left, Ryoko proved to be a formidable foe.

Question We Didn’t #4: What role does religion play in Tenchi Muyo?

Religion in Tenchi Muyo always surrounds the ideas of the Chusin (the three goddesses) and the Juraian trees, though none of this is religious in any typical sense of the word. However, religion unexpectedly takes on a stronger meaning in this second light novel. A conflict occurs when Yosho becomes close to Airi, who is the daughter of the head priest / leader of a world with a theocratic government which has a lot of tension with Jurai, and later we discover, is hatching a plot involving Tsunami. Airi’s people want Tsunami for her power, an object of veneration that will help the government consolidate their grip on the people, a nice analogy to how some governments and leaders use religion today.

Question We Had #4: How did Yosho seal Ryoko away?

A desperate Ryoko takes a familiar-looking hostage

As I mentioned before, Tenchi Muyo! isn’t known for it action scenes, but the light novels paint their action better than how such scenes are animated in the OVAs. The chapter involving Ryoko is engaging and exciting, as Yosho must find a way to calm her power and rid her of her jewels before he can defeat her. The excitement is also heightened because the entire last chapter feels like fanservice—it details events of which we already know and features a beloved character at her maximum strength. In that way, I was reminded of The Phantom Menace, which introduced us to some of the major players as young people, and also of Rogue One, whose ending connect directly to A New Hope, as the end of Yosho connects to the first OVA.

Question We Didn’t #5: How strong is Funaho anyway?

In the second OVA, Funaho is introduced as a woman of calm and gentle demeanor, though with a hidden fiery side. The light novel explores that part of her more. Enhanced somehow through her time in Jurai, Funaho has become a warrior in her own right (though only through a certain condition—I won’t spoil that for those who haven’t yet read), one so strong that she can take down fearsome warriors and challenge even the strongest members of Jurain royalty. No wonder her son and grandson are so powerful!

Question We Had #5: Why did Yosho stay on earth?

I had long assumed that Yosho stayed on earth for reasons of its peaceful existence, to keep an eye on Ryoko, and because he simply couldn’t return home. Those do all apply (though perhaps he could have made contact with Jurai through Funaho), but there are other conditions, too—less significant is that he took the fall for Ryoko’s attack, and more importantly is that the decision was the culmination of the entire novel, which could be described as Yosho’s search to determine what he wants to do with his life. And what he wants is the freedom to make his own decisions.

And so concludes this meeting of the Beneath the Tangles light novel club! I hope you enjoyed exploring some questions about Tenchi Muyo! that volume two answered, and I hope you’ll pick up the series if you haven’t read it (it’s really very good). In the meantime, stay tuned as we make some changes to the club in the coming year, though as always, we hope you’ll join along and become part!

[sethnakht]

thoughts on aphra #25

spoilers beneath the cut.

[writing this with a bad headache and in prescription sunglasses (broke my glasses during the work-rush of the past few days). so this won’t be comprehensive or possibly even coherent.]

Thoughts in no particular order:

Tolvan literally sacrificing her mental integrity so Vader would think Aphra dead fit the dynamic of their relationship to a T - Tolvan had been doing precisely this all along. As Tolvan hates when things are “sloppy”, I could almost imagine the thought of wiping Aphra from her memory being a relief. Alas, she was dealing with Aphra. Aphra using the Bor to manipulate her memories such that her love for Aphra remained intact but the details of their parting turned bloody was so very Aphra - saving herself meant more than showing Tolvan some kindness, than giving her new memories she could live with. On the plus side, although Tolvan now thinks she murdered Aphra for breaking her heart, she was rescued by Sana. So she’s escaped interrogation and murder, escaped Vader - and renewed heartbreak in the form of Aphra. Better yet, Sana’s presence suggests she might recover her memories and be able to get a fresh start, since Sana also saw the Bor and knows how Aphra thinks, and since we know from Rogue One that memories can be returned through proper jostling. In that sense, things might finally be looking up for her.

Sana saved so many lives in this one issue alone - not just Tolvan, the Rebels on the planet as well. And of course she salvaged the Volt Cobra on the way. She’s amazing.

Lopset returning to put his proximity bomb in Triple-Zero and create the conditions for #26 had been set up several issues ago - those lines  about being an “electrician” and “multidisciplinary”, his strangely specific knowledge of murderous bio-fauna, the way he kept carrying Dek-Nil/the hub-droid around as though planning blackmail, the fact that he had worked for Cornelius Evazan and yet emerged without any sort of visible bodily transformation - and it was sort of a relief to learn that he’d simply been Evazan all along. Not only does this contextualize the cover of #28, it means an end to the name-dropping - it’s been hinted since the beginning of Remastered that we would eventually run into the man himself, now we finally have - and an end to Tam Posla (thanks, Trip). [EDIT: the solicits for #28 suggest that Posla survives, bleh!] As for his disguise, it was fittingly disgusting - reminiscent of the Bor. Presumably it also explains why "Lopset”’s eyes always changed color - a detail that had been bothering me, since other shape-shifters don’t do that. The reveal also helped reframe some of the details on Posla’s ship. If you go back and look at Posla on his ship in #22, you’ll see a severed arm in a jar on prominent display, an arm that could only have been sliced from Evazan’s partner-in-crime during their encounter with Obi-Wan on Tatooine. While the arm-in-a-jar certainly works an Easter Egg, evoking the depths of Posla’s obsession, the way it’s drawn also suggested greater importance. Now we know why it was featured - so that Evazan can take the arm with him when he jumps ship with his arm-less partner-in-crime. (That entire page in 22 is also full of clues about the Evazan twist.)

EDIT: looking back at #20 is also pretty illuminating:

Evazan had some nice thoughts on monstrosity, art, and science. More on that when feeling less like bricks have been thrown at the brain.

Vader’s role in this comic had been telegraphed from miles away: it was clear from the covers that he was going to destroy Beetee, from Tolvan’s summons that he would question her, and from the nature of the spores themselves that he would interact with them. The interaction with the spores was possibly for that reason a tad disappointing - in the end, they were little more than a way to keep him distracted so Sana could rescue Tolvan. After having seen the spores project images of beloved dead people from the minds of its potential victims, one might have expected a Padmé-shaped variation on that trick - but nope, the spores unwisely tried to kill him, only to be repelled by his suit as one might expect, then destroyed with the Dark Side and a bunch of his characteristic burns, as one might also expect. His final line, “You bore it [it = the darkness]”, is kind of savage if he meant “you bore me” in the sense of “you are boring and not worth my time”, but I was left wondering whether he instead meant “you bore the darkness” in the sense of “to suffer, endure” or “to create, bring forth”. I do think it’s interesting that he spoke of the “darkness” as of himself, that he spoke so impersonally.

Vader’s interaction with the spores was also interesting in another sense - it gave him room to claim that the spores represented mere biological “urge” whereas he by implication represented control, control of the Force (life) with his “will” - that’s free will discourse right there. And it contrasts notably with the very first panel of the comic, where Aphra tells Tolvan that Vader “won’t stop. You have to understand that. He won’t tire. He won’t forgive. He won’t forget. He doesn’t know how.” That “he doesn’t know” suggests compulsion, determinism, at very least a lack. One could unpack that in cool ways.

EDIT: Vader’s decision not to murder Tolvan but have her sent to the Executor for further interrogation has been beautifully analyzed by @glompcat - I very much like the reading that it represents the very opposite of mercy, the best form of torture at his disposal - possibly also a form of paranoia, a desire to make certain that only Tolvan was ever told, that Aphra has no other lovers out there he should be tracking

Another notable Vader moment: while he considers it “likely” that Tolvan is telling the truth, that Aphra is dead, he isn’t convinced (because he knows her too well? because he senses her?), and thus sends the jail back onto its collision course with the planet. “Let it fall”, he says, which is very meta for him. Aphra being knocked out / unconscious when the collision takes place, he seems convinced that she dies in that moment, telling his RA-7 droid (I think?) to mark her as deceased - I don’t know if that’s what they’re called, but it’s the same sort of droid sent to Lyra Erso in the DV Annual, warning her that the Death Star would create a terrible world for her daughter. 

Final minor detail: Vader wanted Tolvan sent to his “chambers” for interrogation, probably because she knows too much - still, I loved it as a character moment, because doesn’t it tell you everything about Vader that he would consider his personal rooms an appropriate location for an interrogation?

Triple-Zero and Aphra referred to as “lovebirds” may just reflect Evazan’s sick sense of humor - “you deserve each other” - but it also calls back to #19 in a striking way, where Trip tells Aphra that “love is murder”. The coming arc certainly seems to be shaping up into Evazan’s (lbr, Evazan is the stand-in for Spurrier) experiment to measure degrees of evil by twisting Lona’s mantra - “evil’s just a measure of how much your choices take away other people’s” - from something figurative, regulative, aimed towards guiding future actions to something literal, reductive, aimed at classifying the past. If Triple-Zero represents “programmed evil”, Aphra has yet to reveal whether her worst behavior is “intrinsic” (biological) or something she “picks up” (cultural). But Triple-Zero’s line about love confuses such neat categories, and I hope that what lies ahead is messy indeed.