#also like for despair propaganda and mind control but you know

[spittyfishy]

The thh remnants kept social media around even during the Tragedy specifically so they could dunk on the Future Foundation lol

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

MIKAN TSUMIKI (DANGANRONPA 2: GOODBYE DESPAIR) (CW: Mind Control, Bullying)

1.) She is literally the saddest side character I know out of the series. She canonically went through severe abuse and bullying, oversexualizes herself as a defense mechanism, and has really bad anxiety that interferes with her interactions.

Does she get better? No.

Even though the whole theme of Danganronpa is overcoming despair, she never gets the support she needs despite having a lot of supposedly nice classmates. She CONTINUES to get verbally abused by another classmate nobody really bothers to stop, and one of her best friend even ENABLES some of her bad coping mechanisms. She's also the main source of fanservice for the second game.

Then she gets fucking brainwashed into one of the main villain's henchwoman. Yeah, the writers did NOT let her catch a break.

2.) The first two chapters are obsessed with having her do that stupid 'oh nooo all my clothes came off :"( u can see my panties :"(' shit and her free time events especially drift into the 'I'm accidentally saying something that's sexy but I don't know the connotations' brand of jokes. Idk what the spoiler policy is so I won't say much about her actual good points, but when she gets a chance to shine, she's really really interesting! For sure one of my favorite characters in the game! She's got nuance and character and relationships and motivations and interests and all that good stuff! She's even gay! It's just that its almost completely eclipsed by mediocre at best horny jokes for the first 2/3rds of her screentime in game and it drives me actually insane.

3.) You could put nearly all of the dr girls in this bracket, actually. But I picked Mikan because she's such a clear example. They just put her in there to sexualize her and her trauma. There were many ideas that could have been executed well with Mikan (I can relate to the aspect of her sexualizing herself, but the fact that they use it for fanservice is. Wow! And not in a good way) but they use her for fanservice instead. And she had the WORST execution or at least it was somewhere in the top 3. They unceremoniously cut off her development with the "despair disease" (hate that motive btw) and basically made her whole personality in what was supposed to be sorta love her 3rd act villain breakdown into "oooh my beloved ahaha I can't wait to be reunited with my beloved." I don't know shit about the anime but she seems to have been treated just as terribly there if not made worse! If it weren't for the fact that I refuse to acknowledge the animes existence it might have made me dislike her during the time I still actively liked the franchise. All the outfits they give her also feel like they were made just for fanservice shots (most of the outfits themselves aren't really bad at least not the ones I've seen it's that they were made with the intent to sexualize her and not to look good and fit her character) which is super frustrating. Oh and she was treated terribly in the game by Hiyoko but when she killed hiyoko it was just whoops she saw me kill ibuki gotta end her instead of giving her an interesting motive for even one of her kills. Honestly what makes me says she's screwed over by misogyny specifically is the fact that shit like this probably would not have happened if she were a guy. She wouldn't be written perfectly but her writing would be so much better. Like she was reduced to fanservice so so so many times and treated awfully.

OCHETTE (OCTOPATH TRAVELER 2) (CW: Racism, Ableism)

1.) SO. actually she's combod by the heavy anti-pasifika racism in ot2 but one of the strongest elements of that is that ochette herself is infantilized to the point of a 20 year old woman, who is a fully trained adult warrior and ingame stated to be like a week away from replacing her island's ultrabeast white lion guardian, being characterized by cool normal things like "having the white catholic inquisitor character promise to teach her backward people human language(the fantasy pasifika tribe she's from are kemonomimi because of course they are)", "haha ochette no understand human custom and have funny naive misunderstanding", "ochette draws the catholic inquisitor character a cutesy kiddie drawing", and being completely removed from any discussions around sex because octopath has this sexism problem where the only two types of women are innocent babies and femme fatales which is so cool AND normal. so ochette gets actually written to be essentially a "mental child" or sometimes an actual animal and is never, ever, ever allowed to have any dynamic with a human that is not paternal in nature because she is Baby. so she's also fighting the ableism. and despite all odds being stacked against her she manages to fuck super hard in a way that makes it so obvious that if ot2 was just less sexist and less racist and less ableist and someone suplexed the non-pasifika dev team and brought in at least a sensitivity reader, she could have fucked SO much harder. honestly imo the fact that the racism against her is superficially gender neutral is not proof that it's not sexism but proof that it IS, as a major part of racist sexism is treating the womanhood of woc as either unimportant or inferior compared to white womanhood, where pasifika woc specifically are often treated as eternal innocent girls who just can never understand an adult woman's relationship with gender. ochette not being allowed to be a woman and trapped at "child too young to even have a gender" is sickeningly sexist. she should have been allowed to have zest for life and be literally the "my daughter might have autism but god damn she can work a grill" lady and be unsure about taking on a hugely important position without it being used as shorthand for her being a toddler in the body of a notably very skinny girl considering she is canonically jacked enough to carry an iguana the size of a bus but WHATEVER. she should also have been allowed to hunt the white catholic inquisitor whose story climaxes with him killing an indigenous woman who secretly infiltrated the church in order to get revenge for them massacring her entire tribe that confirms ochette's people are kemonomimi because an ancient wizard cursed the brutish natives for their violence. actually fuck it i would put kaldena in too but thinking about her actually makes me depressed im so fucking sorry girl. they should BOTH have gotten a ten minute cutscene of beating hm to death with hammers

[wattpadscapcons]

Okay, so I was looking through the SDRA2 Masterlist and I realized that I requested for Tsurugi 7 times but never requested for general dating Headcanons. So could I get dating HCs for him please? Thanks

Ok ok, moody police officer, got it

Sorry my finals just ended and I just got into the headspace to write again woo.

🛑Hella Spoilers🛑

Also sorry I wrote like an entire fucking book for him instead of simple headcanons I just got on a role and went with it. I honestly really love this character.

=

Tsurugi Dating Headcanons

=

Older Tsurugi

🚓 Tsurugi has a lot of issues he has yet to deal with yet, regardless of when you meet and get into a relationship with him

🚓 He is honestly worse to try to communicate after the events of DRA, but if you somehow get past that and break through those walls of his, you can clearly see just how broken he is emotionally

🚓 If you've been with him since before he was in the "game" and survived, you better believe he's going to be somewhat softer (only with you) despite his "change of heart"

🚓 He will never ask you for help though, not until he's at the point when he's broken down

🚓 Regardless of when you're together, he's awkward, distant, stubborn and protective as hell

🚓 Behind closed doors he'd like nothing more than just to spend some quality time with you, where he can finally relax for a little while and enjoy being able to hold you without fear of losing you

(which is often a very rare occurrence due to his PTSD putting a strain on your relationship)

🚓 Scary dog right? Hell yeah. Y'all got like a scary junk yard dog that barks so loud it sometimes scares itself

-

With him before DRA events?

🚓 He for sure tracked your ass down after he escaped the island, he was one of the only ones with memory fragments left

🚓 Believe me, if Utsuro had the balls to mention you to get him to feel despair, he's going to make sure it isn't just a bluff

🚓 If you happen to be brainwashed by Junko's videos, propaganda, and the riots, you're going straight into rehabilitation

🚓 (Otherwise) You're going to be living with him, there is no debate after he finds you again

🚓 He's got you your own personal security team, it's annoying at times but at least you can understand the sentiment of it

🚓 He honestly worries about him scaring you away sometimes...

🚓 You're one of the only people he allows to get within 3 foot from him without meeting the barrel of his service weapon

🚓 It takes a lot more for him to snap at you than it does for him to yell at others, he simply has learned to control himself better when you're around

🚓 If he's being honest, he'd prefer if you were always in his field of vision, but he knows well that you have your own life besides for him and considering what his job is, you could get hurt

🚓 On the off-chance you get hurt he will deal with whoever or whatever hurt you, god hope he spares them by not dragging it out

🚓 He will never allow you to get into a position where you could become just another casualty of justice

🚓 He's more likely to listen to you when you tell him he needs a break, and that's saying a lot

🚓 You can sometimes catch him staring at you in that lovesick puppy way, it's not quite a common occurrence like it was before back in Hope's Peak (but it's a sign that he's still the same Tsurugi you knew back then)

🚓 Others can clearly see the impact you have on him, to the point where you've become the Kisaragi Foundation's appointed negotiator specifically for him (because he'll actually let you speak and think about what you say before dismissing it)

🚓 He does appreciate the constant concern you show for health, much more than you think he does

🚓 The affection you give him makes him melt, but he prefers that others don't see/hear you

🚓 You are constantly on his mind, almost like a borderline-yandere like obsession, it's caused him to always second-guess his decisions before going through with anything

🚓 Of course, he's worried about how his decisions affect you

🚓 It's almost funny how much he actually cares compared to what he's willing to show others

=

Younger Tsurugi

🚓 His younger self is much easier to talk to, to persuade, and to compromise with

🚓 You attempting to help him with his issues makes a bigger impact on him then he'd ever be able to explain to you

🚓 Modest sweetheart, easier to fluster than you think

🚓 A simple kiss to the cheek has him red in the face, though that's mostly from his embarrassment (man's got zero dating experience and here you are loving on him, you're good for him!)

🚓 Unknowingly touch-starved, (give him affection he deserves it, this is a threat)

🚓 You might not go on very many dates, but the ones you do are special enough to get a picture-perfect moment for

🚓 He always has your back in an argument with someone else

🚓 Got people messing with you? Not anymore, he already made sure of it

🚓 Doesn't really care about what kind of talent you have (if you have one at all) and will still praise you regardless (it's more like an off-handed comment, sometimes he doesn't even realize what he said until you're hugging him)

🚓 Hands down would shoot someone for you, very few questions asked (please teach him not to always resort to violence)

🚓 He constantly worries he's going to screw up, not surprising

🚓 Will you get him to finally see a therapist? Maybe. He's thinking about what you told him

=

=

This post is brought to you by Utsuro.

"What? You asked about him and didn't expect me to answer?"

[whiterosebrian]

Letter To Democrats

I felt the need to do something besides raising awareness of environmental, indigenous, and socio-economic issues. I’ve decided to compose and then mail multiple printed copies of a letter to multiple politicians across the USA. I did wonder if I should copy-and-paste the letter to social media profiles like I did for the one that I wrote to President Biden. Ultimately, I decided that posting the letter would serve two purposes. First, I wanted to let indigenous activists know that they have another willing accomplice. Second, this could provide a decent template for anyone who also feels a need to write to political leaders and put pressure on them to take much-needed action. Without any further ado…

Greetings,

I am writing a generic letter to send to assorted politicians across the United States. For reasons that I will articulate over the course of this letter, I felt a serious need to address as many members of the American political leadership as possible. I do not intend to call you out personally. If you do take it as a personal callout, please consider why you feel that way.

The reports of wildfires, heat waves, and floods have filled many, many observers with existential terror. Some have even expressed utter despair over whether the world will be inhabitable by any form of life. At times I have been tempted to join the despair, to give up hope of ever leaving a beautiful legacy for future generations. For the sake of all the people of the world, I must fight that temptation. I need to do my part to fight for the future.

There are a large number of activists trying to protect the environment. However, they need help from people who have the power to make really concrete changes. That is why I am writing to you and other Democratic politicians. That does sound very partisan, but the sad fact is that the Republican party is almost a lost cause at this point. I wish to be proven wrong about that. The fact is that it already engaged in brutal obstruction during the Obama administration. A sinister side to the base already started emerging during that time as well. With the rise of Donald Trump, the much of its leadership and nearly all of its electoral base have become increasingly unwilling to offer the kind of compromise needed for a functional democracy.

The Democratic party as a whole has been criticized as very weak in opposing the radicalizing Republican Party. The current President has spoken of a desire for restoring national unity. That desire is certainly laudable in itself when Trump blatantly stoked resentment and division. Again, however, the Republican party and its core supporters have shown a complete unwillingness to work with any opponents in any way. They view their opponents as subversive enemies that need to be crushed underfoot. The Republican party has inched towards neo-fascism at a time when neo-fascism is mainstreaming around the world. The Republican party has also already been beholden to the selfish interests of major corporations for decades. It even seeks to magnify the already dire influence of corporations chiefly responsible for pollution. Its propaganda outlets outright deny pollution and mislead millions of people.

Some Democratic politicians have also been criticized as going along with corporate interests and watering down legislation meant to oppose corporate influence. By now it has become clear that corporate elites do not have the safety of the world and its human and nonhuman denizens in mind. By now it has become clear that they must be reined in for the greater good. The only language that major corporations even comprehend is money. Here I arrive at the first main point of this letter: I urge you to work with other Democratic leaders to divest from major corporations and their executives, especially those most directly responsible for polluting the Earth. I’ve also seen proposals that corporations be forced to contribute to removing as much pollution as possible. Quickening the transition away from fossil fuels is crucial.

However, alternate energy sources are not enough. Switching from gas-powered cars to electric cars is not enough. Building solar or wind farms in place of coal-burning power plants is not enough. Extraction and consumption cause their own serious problems. The problem of environmental degradation has roots that are far too deep and complicated to address here, though I will touch upon one later. Going hand-in-hand with corporate influence are the bad social and urban infrastructures that do not encourage sustainable lifestyles. I barely even know where to begin in this regard. Cities are too often built for cars and not people. Most people have to drive carbon-spewing cars to work at jobs that are not well-suited to their needs in order to pay their bills and feed their families. Too many people are left in poverty or near-poverty, some people are more-or-less isolated in suburbs, and a tiny handful are virtually untouchable in their wealth and privilege. Healthy food is not always accessible, and even when it is, it often has to be shipped very far from the source.

My second main point is this: in addition to transitioning to cleaner energy, the very infrastructure of our society needs to reformed. Local communities need to be lifted up so that they can better care for themselves without the need for distant figures constantly having to provide for them through convoluted supply chains. It’s true that right-wingers speak of “small government” with the unspoken agenda of leaving corporate oligarchs and ultra-conservative clergy to rule over ordinary human beings. Nonetheless, I believe that, at this point, government needs to assist in rebuilding communities so that they can eventually leave denizens to stand on their feet and care for each other. The pandemic, along with the poor responses of many local officials, has shown the need for communities to engage in mutual care.

I will confess that this exhortation is the vaguest one in this letter. I lack in-depth education on such matters. I bring it up in order to further nudge you in a direction that would be far better for the Earth and its people. I can offer one example of what must be done that is slightly clearer: helping communities establish gardens and small-scale farms to better feed themselves.

On a very important side note, this nation needs to divest from the military as well. The largest and most powerful military in history is known to be among the largest polluters on earth. Too many politicians seem to ignore how massive the military already is an insist on subsidizing it at the cost of actually building a peaceful and prosperous society.

I further wish to discuss the need to center indigenous peoples in renewing our society. No, I am no indigenous myself. I simply wish to point to their wisdom. Yes, the sagely magical Indian who is one with Mother Earth is a crude stereotype, and I have no intention of reinforcing it. With that said, I follow a number of indigenous writers, activists, spiritualists, and influencers on social media. I learned about how many indigenous people are attempting to reconnect to previously outlawed and hidden heritages. The stereotype could be rooted in reality.

In most cases, those heritages include animistic spiritualities, in which aspects of the natural world, from plants to animals to waters to stones, are seen as having spirits. Furthermore, these aspects of the natural world are seen as relatives to humans. I should note how some well-meaning white people, wishing to bond with the earth instead of submitting to organized religion, appropriate these indigenous spiritualties and associated practices. Indigenous writers will encourage such people to instead delve into their own pre-Christian heritages, which have similar animistic philosophies, however obscured by time they may be. I have actually been doing just that—though I won’t elaborate because I don’t want to center myself.

You may be asking, what is the relevance said common thread of the spiritualities of indigenous peoples? That animism seems to go hand-in-hand with methods of land care that developed over generations of trial and error, along with the principles behind those methods. With the subjugation and expulsion (and worse) of the land’s original caretakers, though, these practices fell into obscurity. The most dramatic example, perhaps, is the suppression of controlled burnings on the western coastline leading to the wildfires that we have seen in recent years. Indeed, the different lands of different indigenous nations need their own subtly distinct approaches, based on ecosystems, geographies, local histories, and general senses of place. Indigenous activists and figureheads are calling upon governments to heed their words on not only conservation but also regeneration.

One of the main demands that indigenous activists make is for the return of their lands, full sovereignty over them, and the facilitation of cultural revival. Yes, that is a very simple manner of justice and righting a historic wrong. It has become evident that their wisdom is a crucial piece of the puzzle of solving environmental problems as well. Simple “colorblind” or “globalized” liberalism won’t suffice when working for social or environmental justice. Indigenous activists argue that colonialism is at the root of so many of our world’s problems. Many of them even outright state that the “colonial state” in itself is a problem. I can see how colonialism has promoted the rise of an all-devouring capitalism and perpetuated it. The grim historical fact of how the enslavement of Black people and the elimination of indigenous peoples contributed to building this nation remains a grim historical fact.

I myself am figuring out the world and learning many truths, but I am sympathetic to people who have borne the brunt of colonialism. I welcome the humanistic achievements of modernity and utterly oppose fundamentalism and fascism, I assure you, but I’ve come to accept that the modern world is broken. Simple progress won’t heal the world. “Big government” certainly has a role to play in mobilizing the needed social changes, such as what I’ve alluded to above, but the “colonial state” needs to ultimately divest its own power.

I’ll try to summarize my points now. Major corporations and economic elites need to be drastically reined in and disempowered (along with the military). The transition to renewable energies needs to be quickened—but also needs to be accompanied by drastic changes to infrastructures and supply chains so as to result in less extraction and consumption. Localized communities need to be empowered so they can better care for themselves without much out faraway aid. Indigenous peoples need to be given their lands back, be elevated to leadership roles in caring for and regenerating said lands, and be empowered so they can rebuild their cultures. Settlers should learn from them as well. In the end, the state and the socio-economic system that it has upheld need to recede—not for billionaires or grand inquisitors or dictators, but for ordinary people and the earth. In truth, humans are meant to be a part of nature, and the generational challenge is for humanity to reconcile with the rest of nature.

This all may sound idealistic or radical. This past summer has shown us that we shouldn’t settle for anything less than radical social change. This nation, which has been a major world power for over a century, needs to be radically reimagined. This all may sound vague as well. I have little education in politics and governance apart from what I’ve tried to learn for myself across the internet. That is all the more reason for people like you—people with more real-world power than I—to push along radical social change. This letter is meant to raise awareness of your duty as a leader. A leader is meant to be a guide, not a dominator. There’s a chance that you could be recorded in history as a leader who did what was necessary to make the world’s healing and renewal possible.

Thank you.

You may call me Brian Solomon Whiterose.

[incorrect-quotes-from-she-ra]

Morning! I hope you don't mind if i give you yet another She-Ra thought I'm too damn lazy to post on my own. Also, it's long again. I WILL find that character limit some day.

So, we know the way Shadow Weaver raised Adora resulted, among other issues, in her being selfless to the point of self-sacrifice, which came to a climax in the Heart's failsafe business.

And it's been suggested that this was basically intentional on Shadow Weaver's part. Basically, selflessness is a very beneficial quality for others to have. My theory is that <b>her plan for Adora had always been specifically for her to someday use the failsafe and release all magic</b>.

(i will admit i am also curious how formatting works in this app. thank you for your help with these experiments)

So, evidence. Let's start with her name. I know this is a remake and they were stuck with the existing names, but there's a scene where Scorpia complains about it ("yeah i GET it, everyone LOVES you"), which constitutes the writers acknowledging its meaning, which makes me think it's fair game to analyze.

First, I'm obviously assuming Shadow Weaver choose it, as part of her ongoing parenting plan. It's also possible it was her original First One-given name, we don't know. Neither quite works because either she or Light Hope should have had some issues knowing what the name was and they clearly knew automatically. Really the entire series is weird in that everyone communicates with everyone else way too easily, and i will definitely rant about that someday.

For now let it stand that Shadow Weaver is the parent figure, it makes the most sense for her to pick the name, both in-universe and narratively, so i shall assume so by default. I have two things to say about that choice.

First, as we all have noticed, most of the princesses have names ending in -a. All of them, if you count "Glimma". It's never said to be intentional, but it would make sense. And then IF such a tradition exists among Etheria's royalty, it's not unreasonable for Shadow Weaver, a notable and moderately respected member of the land of knowledge, to know about it.

And then if she knew, of course she would take it into consideration when looking for names. Admittedly it's a little weird with the anti-Princess propaganda that the Horde has, but she doesn't really need to explain or justify this. Hordak has a very [i]laissez-faire[/i] attitude, and everyone else she clearly doesn't care about.

And if she knew or suspected that the princesses' powers were related to the Heart of Etheria, which i will argue for later, then giving her a princessy name is also adequately ironic.

The second name bit is that Scorpia clearly knows some Latin, but not enough. True, <em>adorare</em> means to worship and/or to love, but Latin verbs are more complex than that. _Adora_ specifically is 3rd person singular present indicative active. The translation would be "she loves".

Names aside, i want to talk about how they (we) learned about the Heart of Etheria. Castaspella doesn't know what to do, Shadow Weaver suggests they take a road trip to research, which she's reticent about but concedes is probably the best use of her time, and they find success. We don't know how long it took them, but i had the distinct impression that it wasn't very long.

Naturally, I'm suggesting Shadow Weaver knew all along, and led Castaspella on the trip to have an excuse for the inevitable "how do you know?". Also tricked her into thinking it was /her/ discovery, and maybe even that she was succeeding where Shadow Weaver had failed before, if necessary.

That's why she's so excited to share their results with everybody, and Shadow Weaver cuts her off, apparently just to antagonize her for fun, but I'm suggesting it was also because for her this is the culmination of a decades-long plan, and she wants to Get On With It.

It's also interesting that there was a mural depicting the Spell of Obtainment in the hallway leading to the failsafe. It was a reminder of Shadow Weaver's past, and an opportunity for her to show she regrets her results but doesn't repent from her choices, which i quite like actually. But I'm also saying that, meta-textually, it was a signal that she'd been there before, literally.

And then there is the potential in-universe connection, since we don't know what exactly the spell was meant to be obtaining. Power, for sure, and from what happened we're probably meant to assume it's tapping into some sort of demonic entity or dimension.

Fair enough, except that it never comes up again. And it's kind of a big plot point that Etheria is isolated from the rest of the cosmos, which may or may not conflict with it having a contactable "hell". Meanwhile there's the Heart of Etheria Project collecting all that magic, which Mara's allies (and their descendants) would know something about, have access to at least one backdoor to, and may well have tried to tap into its power at some point.

And then what went wrong may well be one of the defense mechanisms of the Project, though I'm admittedly veering into unfounded speculation.

So, a rough timeline. Light Spinner was always motivated to excel and craved power. She was probably always envied the princesses, who command greater magic than most sorcerers with apparently none of the study and practice.

She took to researching everything she could that might lead to power, eventually discovering the chamber with the failsafe, and presumably other information left by Mara's Friends, either in other chambers or in documents she's since removed. She would have learned a lot of things from this.

As i suggested, i believe she knew there's some connection between the princesses at large and the Heart of Etheria. Incidentally, i don't know exactly what that connection is, and in particular whether princesses were created by the Project or an existing phenomenon that the First Ones co-opted. But it doesn't matter, exactly.

What's important is that there's clearly a connection, more specifically a control system for the princesses and their magic, which is presumably related to how Shadow Weaver was able to tap into the Black Garnet's power. With Hordak's help, obviously, since she clearly believed it when he claimed he could cut her off at will, but he's later shown to have basically no understanding of First Ones' tech, so the knowledge must have come from her.

For the record, i would guess she thinks princesses are artificial, empowered both magically and politically to keep the planet in check, and that they would be depowered once the failsafe was fired. I also think that may be true, actually, since it almost happened when Entrapta was messing with the system, and if i recall none of them were shown to use any magic after Adora did fire it, while she clearly used Perfuma's power. But anyways!

Back to what Shadow Weaver learned, she would know some of what the failsafe does, namely disrupt the system that's hoarding most of the planet's magic, thereby spreading magic to all (most notably her), and some of how to use it, and the fact that she couldn't do so and hope to live, and some of the criteria for who can. That part is important.

But first, she also learned the Spell of Obtainment, deemed it more likely but didn't think she could do it herself, despaired of getting help until she thought Hordak's rise to fame would give her #casus belli#, lost her patience when the Mystacor leadership disagreed, etc etc etc. Pretty uncontroversial in this part, i think.

After she'd joined the Horde, when Hordak showed up with baby Adora and wanted to lump her with the rest of the orphans they have, Shadow Weaver pleaded to have her get special treatment. She even said that she's special, and it couldn't have been her leadership skills or good heart, since she didn't have either yet. It's heavily implied she could recognize her as a First One, but it's not clear why she would care, since they were known for leaving behind advanced technology, which a baby also doesn't have. Unless, of course, she knew there are devices only a First One could use, and maybe has plans related to that.

So I'm pretty sure she learned the criteria that the failsafe requires, devised some spell or technique to check people for them that she pretty much used all the time, just in case, and was very surprised when a newborn tested positive. She was also surprised when Hordak made her personally responsible for the raising of the kid, but her reaction is pretty much "ok, that could work, i guess".

Also also, i suspect she can read First One script. Not perfectly like Adora, but better than Bow's parents probably. Mostly because when she puts Adora's hand on the crystal and says "i think you know the password", that seems like a very transparent attempt to pretend she knows it too when she doesn't. But that seems irresponsible at such a crucial moment, she and Castaspella should really have researched it earlier. Or at least her line there should have been "you can read this, right?" or somesuch.

So I'm thinking it's a double bluff, hoping everybody assumes she doesn't know so she doesn't have to reveal how and why she knows, again.

And that's all i have, i think? This is not nearly as well laid out as i would like. But then, nothing ever is, right?

Also it's not even close to morning anymore. Thank you if you even got this far, and have a good evening!

hi!!! this took me a while to answer, i'm so sorry about that <3

i'm very low on energy today so i cannot summon up the brain energy to respond properly to this, as much as i want to, i'm really sorry for that as well

i love this theory!! it actually fits in really well with canon and makes, like, a LOT of sense now that i think about it. i definitely wouldn't have thought of this on my own, so thank you for sharing this with me!! :D

[chrysalispen]

Prompt #25 - Wish

aurelia bas laskaris, age 16

AO3 Link HERE

=============

Sometimes it seemed as though the entire span of L'haiya dus Eyahri’s life had been defined by the Empire. It had influenced her path even before she was born. Her mother had been in the city of Rabanastre when it fell to imperial troops, and the Garlean soldier who had sired her--- well, best not to think much on him. Mother had wed a cobbler from the edge of the capitol's market district when L'haiya was four summers old. He had raised her, and to L’haiya’s mind he was her true father.

In the old days she might have attended a primary school before taking on her family's trade, but under imperial occupation such luxuries were not afforded to her or her compeers. L'haiya and her half-sister L'jhutei were sent away to a school in the capitol for "the finest education the Empire can offer" as it was phrased by the viceroy ("propaganda," her father had called it, muttering it so quietly that he must have thought her unable to hear), one which had turned out to be a military school. Both sisters had had a commission into the legions after graduation.

L’haiya had almost taken it, too. But then? Well, then she had met Vittora cen Remianus, and Vittora had met her husband, and…

Perhaps it was for the best. Her service to the Laskaris family had earned her a fast path to imperial citizenship, after all; Mama would have said one was as good as the other, were she here, and the equally practical L'haiya was not one to look too much askance at such a boon. Even if it had left her in the rather troublesome position of raising her friend's child.

She stared at that slumped posture, the bowed golden head. From the porch, she could see her charge's shoulders trembling but could not tell if she was shivering from the night air or if she was still crying.

L’haiya felt a sort of stern and helpless pity for her. Although Julian rem Laskaris’ only child had learned something of the importance of controlling herself and learning which battles to pick (particularly in a place like the Empire, where speaking one’s mind in the wrong ears could have very severe consequences indeed), children would be children. The girl was very young and very sheltered, and she had been friends with the boy since they were small. L’haiya didn’t suppose she would have taken well to the news either were their positions reversed.

Quietly she rapped on the door and stepped over the threshold into the garden. The stars overhead were a diamond spray and the air still carried the day's warmth.

“Aurelia.”

“Go away,” the Garlean girl said in a choked voice. “I don’t want to talk.”

L’haiya made her way down the steps and into the grass, her skirts swishing about her legs, and perched herself upon the edge of the Doman fountain next to her charge. Aurelia’s body went rigid, but she said nothing and remained in place. “Your father-”

“If you’ve come to tell me I was a fool, you needn’t do so. I know I shouldn’t have said what I did. I know.” The girl sniffled and wiped at her eyes, then returned her hands to her lap. “But I just- I don’t understand how Father could do this to me. I didn’t even get to tell him goodbye, or wish him well! If I could have had at least a few more days with him then-”

“I think that would have been quite unwise.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your father had nothing to do with L’sazha’s early departure, Aurelia. He left under my advisement.” The Miqo’te’s voice was steady. Calm. “And 'tis well that he did. You’ve caused trouble enough for the boy as it is.”

“Sazha is an adult by imperial law. As am I,” Aurelia said stiffly. “We’ve hardly any need for my father’s approval to do as we wish.”

“What you did,” she snapped back, her words clipped and cold, “posed a serious risk not just to you, but to L’sazha. The tribunus would have had him swinging from the nearest gibbet did he know the extent of your dalliance.”

"But he didn't know. We were careful and nothing happened until you decided to meddle in our affairs. Father barely cares enough to ask me about my studies, never mind aught else."

L’haiya wanted to shake her. She took a deep, measured breath.

“I was young once myself. And I daresay I was just as selfish and thoughtless,” she said. “I can hardly fault you for your age. But I feel the need to spare you your blushes by explaining the implications of what you did, as you don’t appear to quite understand the magnitude of it.”

“If we were adventurers, no one would have cared who I am, or what we-”

"The fact is that you are not an adventurer, Aurelia,” she snapped. “And this is not Eorzea. For better or worse we live in the Garlean Empire and under imperial jurisdiction. L'sazha is my legal ward and you are a lady of a certain social status. Better that you be angry with me for a time. It would have been not only dangerous to let the two of you continue on as you were, but it would also have been wildly irresponsible on my part.”

Aurelia looked stricken, her face pale. Relentlessly, L’haiya continued on.

“They hang our kind for far lesser offenses, Aurelia. If you care a whit about that boy, even a fraction of what you claim, you’ll go apologize to your father and put a decisive end to this romance of yours.”

“But-”

“But what?”

Aurelia’s chin quivered.

“I love him. I’ve loved him for so long.”

Seven hells, she might have known it was as simple - and as dangerous - as that. She’d assumed the girl’s interest in her Miqo'te companion to be little more than a childish infatuation, but it seemed their feelings had blossomed beneath her nose into something deeper than she had suspected. She had deluded herself it would pass, and in the meantime, they'd fallen in love with each other. Or as close as a pair of children could get to romantic love.

“I know you think you’re in love with him, Aurelia. But you’ll move on. And so will he. That's the way of things, good and bad.”

“No, I won’t,” she choked. “You don’t understand at all. He loves me, and once I’m done with school and my enlistment-”

“Let Sazha move on with his life,” L’haiya said, in a quieter, gentler tone. Better not to let the girl finish that statement. Better not to let her even entertain the notion it might be possible. “Let him find himself. He deserves better than my largesse and your shadow.”

Aurelia's stare was full of incredulous fury- and then her angry expression crumpled into one of despair, and on its heels welled a single sob of broken-hearted anguish. This time L’haiya put an arm about her shoulders and pulled her in for an embrace, and met no resistance. One of the girl's hands dropped into her lap and the other grasped at a handful of L’haiya’s linen shirtwaist as she buried her head under her governess’ chin.

“It’s all right, sunshine,” L'haiya murmured. “All will be well in the end. You'll see.”

“I’ll never love anyone again.”

“Yes, you will.”

“As long as I live,” she vowed, “never.”

She kissed the bright golden crown of hair and nestled her cheek against its softness, this child who she loved as her own, and let her spend her grief without comment. It was what it was. Years abroad on tour with the army would do one of two things to their relationship - either it would strengthen their resolve to be together (in which case, L’haiya thought, they would have little choice but to defect) or it would cool their passions. L’haiya expected the latter; sixteen was very young, and carried with it little foresight or understanding of the way love worked.

But she knew Aurelia would hear none of that. The girl might have the look of her mother but she was every bit as obstinate as Julian rem Laskaris had ever been.

“Elle?” the girl said, in a small and choked voice.

“What?”

“Can I tell you something? A secret?”

“Go on.”

The hand that had gathered in her shirtwaist clenched into a fist.

“Sometimes,” she whispered, “I wish I had never been born.”

“Oh, child, you don’t mean that.”

“I do.” The words were harshly emphatic. “Mama and Father were so happy together. But then I came along and ruined everything.”

“That’s not true at all.”

“It is. I wish I weren’t who I am.”

“Why would you even consider something so dreadful?” L’haiya felt something in her chest twist. “Aurelia, darling-”

“I mean it. Every time Father looks at me, I see it in his eyes,” she choked. “He resents me. If he had the choice between me or Mama, he’d have taken Mama without even thinking about it. Sazha made me happy. I didn’t have to feel guilty about being myself when I was with him, ever. And now he’ll be on the other side of the world and I’ll just- I’ll be here, making everyone unhappy just by existing. If I just hadn’t- I just-"

"Aurelia-"

"I just wish I could be someone else!” she wailed. "I wish I could be somewhere else, I wish I had any kind of purpose, but I don't, I'm just trapped in this cage and I can't-"

L’haiya bowed her head. There was nothing she could say and little more she could do, to speak either to her charge's frustration or her suffocating loneliness. She was a practical woman who had made a promise to a close friend to watch over her family, but nothing in that promise had prepared her for a man so bereft of his wife he could not bear to raise his own child.

Something had to be done, she thought. Or at least said. It was her fault for allowing Julian to continue as he had done for so many years, not wanting to rock the boat and tell him he needed to behave like the father he was. She decided she would speak with him tonight, as soon as she was able.

But in the meantime, she couldn't leave Aurelia alone like this. So she sat with the girl in silence, and let her weep until there were no tears left to shed.

[laughing-with-god]

Pandemonium XI

Words; 3.4k

“I don’t want to repeat my innocence.  I want the pleasure of losing it again.” 

The tension in the room always seemed to follow Namjoon.  

It was as if he carried the marvelous ability to take the thin air around him and bend it into a daunting aura.  The very presence of him screamed alarm to others, an alpha just begging you to fuck with him. One found it a bit of a task to just meet his eye line.  

You must admit, his little dialogue of his prediction of your ‘submissive’ side left a somewhat startled and taken aback feeling for you to process.  

Surprisingly, he did make a point of you aggressive persona being a lot to upkeep.  You weren’t sure if it was a defense mechanism or your personality, but you did feel a bit tired at times from having to keep a constant level of defiance.  Perhaps you did have a problem showing vulnerability, and that’s why you act so bold; especially in the face of men.

You found yourself in a position you rarely were ever in; flabbergasted and strangled by silence as your mind struggled to keep up with what was just said.  

Namjoon looked pleased, aristocratic features twisting up in a witty smile as if your confusion aided his pleasure.  His dimples made an appearance and you felt your own face scrunch up into a scoff. How befitting was it for such an adorable feature to be plopped beside the very same lips that uttered such taboo topics at the dinner table?

His smile sparked some annoyance within you due to it revealing the satisfaction that his plan was working.  

He wanted you to be freaking out right now.

He wanted you to feel exposed.

He wanted to plant a seed in your head.  

You wouldn’t let him.  

You leaned back in your seat and grabbed your glass to take a sip of whatever expensive wine he found necessary to splurge on.  ‘Rich people’, you thought while barely suppressing an eye roll.

“You know Mr. Kim, I think that perhaps your little male ego just needs to feel vital.  That’s why you enjoy the concept of being a girl’s ‘daddy’.”

A snark from his baritone voice.  His olive tone hand reached out to mirror your actions by grasping his own glass of wine.  “Charming analysis, really. Yet this doesn’t stem from a need to be in control and feel important.  Like I stated before nymphet, it works both ways. You’d be just as vital to me as I am to you.”

“Be that as it may, don’t you think that forcing a submissive role onto someone is just manipulative?”  You retorted.

“Not at all.  Tell me babe, exactly when did I force any type of role onto you?  In fact, I quite like you just as you are. I would be very bored if you were a utter doormat.”  

You snorted at this.  “And what exactly was that whole ted talk about your psychological analysis concerning my inner submissive side?”  

“My meer suspicions.  But let me ask you some questions.”  A pause as if to wait for your objection. You stayed quiet.  “Do you find it a negative that your partner would want to take care of your every need?”

You shook your head.

“Is it bad to depend on your partner?”

Another shake of the head.

“And will you admit that in relationships, one usually falls into a more assertive role while the other falls into a submissive role?”

A prolonged response, but you settled for a shrug.  

“And you have a softer side, it’s just hidden under a facade of aggression.”  

You placed your drink down quickly, and stuttered; “W-well, I wouldn’t say-” “No, no.  That wasn’t a question.”  His dark eyes glimmered with a knowing benevolence.  

You face warmed on its’ own accord.  

Logic was also something that was not wasted on this man by any means.  It was like you were debating against a world class lawyer. You felt small and somewhat stupid, trapped by the brilliant diction to escape those plush lips of his.  Of course, your immediate reaction was to yell and spark up another fight. He had tricked you.

Yet, you couldn’t.  You would be proving him right.

Perhaps you were too stubborn.  Maybe you were demonizing the idea of a dom/sub relationship.  As you searched your mind for one valid reason to take a strong stance against it, you couldn’t.  

“Are you two ready to order?”  This broke your trance, causing you to look up and see the anxious waiter, pen and paper in hand.  

You huffed and looked at Namjoon.  “Order for me.”

Namjoon smirked, “No allergies to speak off?”  

“Nope.”

Namjoon turned his attention to the waiter and informed him of the food that he would be expecting.  Meanwhile, you attempted to drown yourself in that alcoholic grape juice that suddenly became all too interesting.  Not noticing the very proud smirk Namjoon held.

--

“Any recent literature to capture my nymphet’s mind?”  

You shoved another fork full into your mouth, not knowing whether or not to be happy that Namjoon did indeed order something you found very delicious.  Not that you would ever tell him that, though.

“I finished Fitzgerald’s ‘This Side Of Paradise.’”  You bluntly responded.

“And your thoughts?”  Namjoon prodded.

“Amory Blaine was a player who got mad when he got played.”  

Namjoon laughed, “Really now?  I thought he was ahead of his time.  When he met a woman who was finally of his wit and standard, she rejected him because she was too clever.  Hell, Amory Blaine wouldn’t have married himself!”

“Sure, she was smart for dodging him and marrying someone rich.  Yet, he didn’t have the right to bitch about it.”

“He got his heart broken.”  Namjoon argued.

“He got his ego broken.”  You disagreed, remembering the protagonists’ self-entitled rants of despair.

“We should have our own book club.”  Namjoon suggested, seeming to enjoy the contrast of beliefs concerning classic novels.  

“No thanks, I would rip your head off if I constantly had to hear your propaganda.”  Chewing harshly on purpose, you glared straight ahead at him.

He smiled, amused by your lack of manners.  “You’re a messy eater.”

You chewed louder, mouth open to get the sound effect as well.  

“You know, you’re only proving me right by acting like a childish brat.”  He smirked before passing you over a napkin. “If it were up to me, you would have gotten something from the kid’s menu and be eating out of kiddie plates and sippy cups.”  

“I think you would find perfect companionship at a daycare if that’s what you would want to see someone eat out of.”  You swallowed loudly, taking in sick satisfaction from Namjoons’ eyebrow twitch,

“Someone needs to teach you manners.”  He stated.

“You’re right.  Maybe Mr. Kim or Yoongi would be up for the job.”  Using his brothers against him was cruel, but you couldn’t deny the opportunity to get under his skin.  

He halted his movement to slice through his steak and looked up to bore his orbs into yours, “Don’t you dare mention those buffoons when you’re with me.”  

“Why?  Does it grind your gears to know that one of your brothers could be a more capable ‘daddy’ than you?”  you couldn’t help but tease, feeling a level of power at finding a weak point at a seemingly powerful man.  

A silence passed and his head bowed to cut through his steak, more precisely and harshly than he was mincing it before.  You paused your consuming, partly startled at his sudden seriousness and lack of banter.

“Tell me something dear, were you spanked as a child?”  

You choked, “What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”

He popped a dice of meat into his mouth to devour, “......because you’re about to be.”

--

Besides the obvious undertones of power-play, the dinner was perfectly adequate.  

Namjoon held qualities that you would’ve liked in a partner; intelligent, gentlemanly, well-read, respectful and clever enough to uphold a repartee with you.  He was one of the few people who you felt stimulated with by debating openly, one of the few people you respected as an equal footing with you. He challenged you. Some men you considered below you, knowing that their intentions were ill moraled and brains not nearly filled enough.  Other men you considered to be of a different world, too out of touch to ever be a match to you. Similar to how you felt when your relationship first bloomed with Jimin, a man who should’ve never collided worlds with you.

But Namjoon was someone you felt rather comfortable with.  After getting past the desperate swaying of dom/sub dynamics, you found yourself enjoying the company of the previously intimidating man.  He entertained your thoughts on culture, music and even absurd analysis on how Oscar wilde was the ‘first gay king’ as you lovingly put it.  

The meal was finished and he refused to beg for more of your time (something Jungkook or Jimin would’ve pulled.)  He paid the bill with the help of a shiny black card, laid a crisp twenty dollar bill on the table and led you out of the restaurant whilst guiding you via an arm around your waist.  

The car ride home was rather silent, the enchanting notes of Chopin played through the radio and draped an air of sophistication into the atmosphere.  Neither of you spoke, yet it was far from awkward. It was more like a mutual agreement to appreciate a stillness after such engaging conversation.

He pulled into your dorm parking lot.  Like an old fashioned bachelor, he exited his side to open the door for you and walk you to your door (or more like the dorm entrance).  

“Was I satisfactory?”  His deep voice rumbled, tone sounding more intimate as you were directly next to him...practically feeling the vibrations from his chest as he said his words.  

You two continued your walk, however you were setting the pace.  It was a slow walk, you had to admit, but you wanted to prolong the time and see how Namjoon would wrap the evening up.  So it was your little secret that you took your time with calculated strides.

“Compared to what I thought was going to happen….yeah, I’m pleased.”  

“And just what was your prediction?”  He chuckled.

“I don’t know.  Maybe you pulling a Cosby and taking me to a playroom or something.”  You laughed.

“Your humor is too satirical love, people overhearing might not get the joke.”  Namjoon pulled your form closer to him as a chilly wind passed through unexpectedly.  You breathed deep and briefly wondered if it would be weird to ask just exactly how much this fucker drops on cologne alone.  

‘He did tip a waiter like 20 dollars though….maybe I don’t wanna know.’

Sadly, you had approached the door and were forced to face him with goodbyes.  

“Well...I’m glad you got to spend a night with a man instead of wasting it on a little boy.”  

You rolled your eyes, and debated with whether or not you should say what has been bothering you on the drive over.

“A-are you going to teach me how a man kisses?”  This indeed was the reason you had agreed to the date in the first place; Namjoon claiming to blow Jungkook’s boyish technique out of the water with a much more experienced mouth.  It was something that was bubbling under the surface for you, making you prone to bursting if it wasn’t addressed.

Namjoon quirked his brow and rubbed the back of his neck, “I suppose, if that’s what the lady wants.”  

You waited, holding your breath subconsciously.  

He smirked and stepped closer to you, invading any realm of personal space.  God, he was tall. You felt vulnerable but surprisingly….you didn’t feel any disgust towards this new feeling.  It felt almost intimate to be so close to such a bigger frame than yours...

“Close your eyes.”  He purred. You obeyed, you didn’t know why you did it without question...but you obeyed.  

You waited for the feeling of his lips to touch yours.  

Would his kisses be rough and alpha-like, like the domineering persona seen before?

Or would it be careful and elaborate, similar to his manners and mindset?

You felt his hand take yours.  

You pursed your lips, not wanting to waste any time and cover the distance quickly.

You felt something warm and soft pucker against the back of your hand.

What?

You opened your eyes to witness something you weren’t expecting; Namjoon’s broad and receding back as he retreated towards the parking lot.  

Rage spurred within you.  

The fucker really just kissed your hand before trying to leave while you had your eyes closed and lips out like a fucking idiot?!  

“What the fuck Namjoon?!”  You called out, not caring how shrill and insane your own voice sounded as it echoed through the parking lot.  

He raised one long arm to wave back, still not turning around to face you.  “A real gentleman doesn’t kiss on the first date babygirl.”

You breathed in.

Your breathed out.  

“YOU MANIAC!  YOU CAN TALK ABOUT BDSM OVER DINNER BUT CAN’T EVEN PECK ME?!  ‘DADDY’ MY ASS! YOUR BROTHERS WOULDN’T TREAT ME LIKE THIS!” You hollered as Namjoon got into his car, not once acknowledging your temper tantrum and starting up the vehicle to drive away.

You heard a window open as a college student poked their head out to see what was going on.  “What the fuck are you yelling for? People are trying to sleep!”

You looked up and flipped the anonymous peer off while taking out your keys to enter the dorm.  

The Kim brothers were an interesting breed, you decided.

--

You laid in bed, scrolling through your phone as you awaited sleep to come.  

When you had got home, Kat was nowhere to be seen and you were left with the dorm to yourself.  She did mention a study dat before so you weren’t too concerned.

You decided to wash up and turn in, knowing how early your first class was tomorrow.  

A notification popped up on the top of your screen, halting your browsing.

It was a text from Namjoon.  

‘I fell in love with her courage,

Her sincerity and her flaming self respect.  

And it’s these things I’d believe in,

Even if the world indulged in wild suspicions

That she wasn’t all that she should be.

I love her and that is the beginning of everything.’ ~F. Scott Fitzgerald’  

Did he really sent you a poem?  

You spent about ten minutes reading the words over and over again, letting it warm your heart as you pictured Namjoon’s long fingers typing it down and thinking of you.  It was easy for you to connect the dots given one of the his favorite topics was your submission to him. However, this poem hinted that he was not at all turned off by your aggression and bratiness. Even if the world didn’t think think you were proper, your flaming self respect earned Namjoon’s fondness of you.  And like the last line said….

This was only the beginning.

You fell asleep with a smile upon your face.

--

Perhaps if you had looked up the horoscope for your astrological sign, it would’ve warned you of just exactly how cursed this day was about to be.  Maybe even told you to stay your ass home.

Sadly, you had to discover this bad fortune the hard way by treading out into the very world itself.  

First, you woke up late and thus had very little time to get pretty.  Not only did you burst into your first class about 15 minutes late, but you also looked like a hot mess.  

Then, you realized that you forgot to charge your laptop last night.  Meaning, all notes were now going to have to painstakingly be taken by hand.  This would have been longer and more carpal-tunnel themed but god decided to strike upon you even harder by making that pen explode on you, ink now staining your shirt.  

And the final nail in the coffin was in your early afternoon class.  Your professor was handing back grades on the most recent paper to be turned in, one that you have worked very hard on and missed sleep over.  

And what did you get?

A big, bright, red ‘F’.

Red was a hideous color, you concluded.  Maybe that’s why teachers used it? To make the letter grade look angry and disappointed.  It worked like a charm given the more you stared at it, the more heavy the guilt and inner-turmoil felt on your chest.  

You had enough of this day.  

You looked like shit.

Felt like shit.

And apparently your quality as a student was utter shit.

There was a silver lining, and in a facade optimism you tried to focus on it and nothing else.  

You only had one more class to suffer through today, after that you were perfectly free to wallow the rest of the 24 hours in bed with whatever items to satisfy a pity party.  

But while walking on campus to your next class, you had caught sight of something.  

A group of guys were lurking by the entrance to your next class.  

The closer you approached, the more clearer their faces became.  

It was a fuck boy pack, about five in total.  They were excitedly talking with one another, some even rough housing with those enlarged limbs of theirs.  You rolled your eyes and continued your stride, not wanting to pause and give them any more inspection. All you had to do was pass them and get into the classroom.  

A boisterous roar that made you jump, the sound coming from the group itself (which now appeared to be like a group of wild hyenas).  

You turned to see what the fuck can be such cause for such foolish hollering.

Only to see one of the guys pointing right at you while the others turned to face the direction.  

And what face was among them?

Jungkook.

--

The scene was reminiscent of ‘Mean Girls’.  

When Lindsey Lohan ate her lunch in the bathroom because she had no one to sit with.  

You were just like her.

Instead, you weren’t eating lunch so much as you were bawling your eyes out.

A girl could only take so much, you know?

After you saw Jungkook among them, you snapped right back around to head to a bathroom.  Not wanting him to bear witness to your now red face and watery eyes.

You promised yourself that you were just heading to the restroom for a second to process what just happened.  Not to mention you also wanted to avoid them. However the more you tried to process it from within the claustrophobic stall of yours, the more unbearable the situation became.  

Paranoia clawed at you and it quickly became apparent that either way, it wasn’t looking good for you.

What the fuck did Jungkook tell them about you?

Did he also tell them about your night together?  

Did he tell them that you were a poor commoner willing to set aside self-respect for the wealth of sugar daddies?

Just how much did he expose of your intimate side to his bros for the sake of a laugh?

Although Jungkook was the proud owner of doe eyes, iron man socks and IU posters….he still hung out with jocks and wore too much axe spray to be allowed.  Foolish it was to place any trust on a man like that. If he wanted to let the whole school know of your dirty little secret, he would have all the proof and popularity on his side.  

You sniffled.

You knew that today in general just wasn’t a good day for you.  Over-sensitivity was a given. But did being aware of your wounded heart make the pain go away any less?  No. Of course not.

You just felt so...small.  Hopeless. Meek. Like prey to anyone and anything that wanted to hurt you today.  

And you craved protection of any sort.  

Your eyes released more tears and another sob broke through your seemingly paper-thin chest.  Just when exactly did you work yourself into a incomprehensive hysteria? You didn’t know.

Working on auto-pilot, you felt your own hand reach for your phone and swiftly click a contact name, tears dropping onto the screen before you put it to your ear.  

A ring as you called the person.  

He picked up on the second one.

“Hello?”  his deep voice greeted.  

“Daddy!   Please get me….I-I’m  scared.” you pleaded, not understanding the words that left your mouth until it was much too late.

Namjoon was taken aback on the other line.

Maybe the submissive side wasn’t so hidden afterall.

(Sorry I haven’t touched this fic in a long time....Im trash.  tbh I hit a writers block and found nam kinda intimidating to write for. Is it obvious I haven’t written this story in a long time lmao? I have an outline though for the next few chapters so we should get back on track.  Im very proud of the other stories I put out tho so if you haven’t yet, please check those out.  Ask my character is available, tell me your thoughts on this chapter and I’ll catch you guys on the flippity flop.)

[ask-thefiftystatesofamerica]

Can we have more background on America's upbringing, his birth, etc?

ohoho anon hope you’re ready for a frickin rant cuz there’s sure is a lot to say! XD 

Without further ado, here’s a pic of the legit infant of the family with summaries of each era under the cut! If you seek more info/drama, pls send in additional asks or fic requests. 💛💛

American Revolution (age 0-5)

July 4th, 1776.

The 13 original colonies gathered in Philadelphia along with their delegates and signed their breakup letter to England. And on that fateful day, they accidentally created America, a representation of the Original 13′s Alliance/Union. 

Baby America played little to no role in the early stages of his life. After all, he was just a fragile newborn who didn’t know how to protect himself. So the Original 13 Colonies fought the American Revolution in his place, leading, spying, negotiating, while baby America fled from the ever approaching frontline with the rest of the Continental Congress. There’s limited to no emotional connection between the states and America during the war, as they’re all too busy not to get killed to sit down and bond.

After the revolution, the original 13, freed from their father nation, are left to govern themselves all while raising a child–a blank canvas of a country they can shape into whatever magnificent and enlightened paradise their mind could dream of. The only problem is, no one could agree on what ‘a great nation’ stood for in terms of specific policies.

The endless chaotic debates and disunity between his semi-autonomous states nearly tore America apart as the boy sat helplessly in growing despair without any power to do anything. Being the literal baby that he was, America’s fate rested entirely in the hands of those who were ‘older’ and ‘wiser.’ 

The Era of Good Feelings (5-8)

With the end of the War of 1812, the divisive nation-building process finally came to a conclusion. 

America and its states entered a time of unity and single-party rule by the Democratic-Republicans. Europe was going up in flames with this dude called Napoleon, so all the foreign superpowers weren’t here to bully America either! 

This was the happy and peaceful section of America’s childhood. 

America lived with (and was raised by) Maryland and Virginia. As their endless bickering drew to a close, baby America finally began to gain love and attention from the rest of his states as well. They taught him about science, history, and enlightenment ideals. They ruffled his hair and filled his head with dreams, reassuring the boy that he’s destined for greatness; while others like Rhode Island took the time to warn the boy about the darker truth of the world and the curse of immortality. 

A lot of problems were swept under the rugs during the Era of Good Feelings, and America himself was still largely powerless compared to the states, but this era is where most emotional bonding happened between the states and America, and where the most fluffy one-shots starring baby America are set.

Civil War (8-12)

The Civil War is when America first learned how to put his foot down and assume his role as the states’ sovereign nation, their rightful leader, instead of a mere child they can push around.

The Civil War Era somewhat resembled the initial nation-building process in many ways. Screaming matches, divisive fights, devastating disasters spiraling out of control. Only this time, America said enough is enough, and he did what it took to make himself heard. He fought uncompromisingly to end slavery and bring the union back together, and to do so America didn’t hesitate to blatantly seize power from the remaining states and people in an almost Machiavellian fashion.

America experienced war for the first time here. Though he didn’t directly fight on the battlefield, the boy’s exposed to the grim toll that came with war and all the hard decisions to be made. America aged rapidly throughout the war and lost a lot of his naivety with each battle, growing into the mold of a cunning superpower by the hour. 

When the war ends, the soft and simple-minded baby America will be gone.

Gilded Age (13-16)

In a lot of ways, the states are Alfred’s moral compass. The more detached he is from his constituents, the more America becomes consumed by his own ambitions and desires.

The Gilded Age is a prime example of this.

Following the Civil War and Reconstruction, America had pretty much solidified his position as the head of his states. And since a majority of the states were still trying to deal with their own heartbreaks and aftermath of the Civil War, no one really kept track of this young nation.

And so, America began to explore and expand his power. Politically, geographically, and economically. He got more land, industries boomed, and waves of migrants entered the borders. America pillaged and annexed like an European Imperial superpower; he allowed monopolies and political machines to run rampant with corruption and exploitation of the working class in the name of laissez-faire; he became wealthy, influential and powerful at the expense of millions. 

This era most certainly lived up to its name. Gilded. Awful and twisted beneath a thin layer of shining golden paint of prosperity.

Progressive Era (14-16)

Like we said on previous posts, America had a dark history that cannot be excused, but he is still capable of changing for the better with the right guidance and discipline. In essence, this era took place after the states and his people alike finally began to slap some sense of reason and morality back into America’s skull. 

A lot of this time frame overlapped with the Gilded Age because change came very slowly. It’s not like this one sunny day America just woke up and declared hmmm I guess I’m not gonna be a bitch today. Nah, dude. It took a lot of time and effort to get America back on the right track. 

During the progressive era, America began to realize how objectively shitty his actions were and tried his best to amend it. He began to break down monopolies and give the working class more political power and bettered their working condition. America fought for women’s rights, preserve the environment, and speak out against imperialism with both passion and remorse.

This is also the time when America and his family finally began to reconcile after the Civil War, and the states gained enough influence in America’s life to keep him on the progressive track.

Roaring 20s & the Great Depression (17)

America got a brief taste of the global stage during WWI and wanted to remain on it through the League of Nations, but the states were like *GASP* NO CHILD U COME HOME RIGHT THIS INSTANT for fear of their baby straying too far from his family again.

So America returned to isolation at the war’s end. 

And it was pleasant, at first. A lot of problems were swept under the rugs, but America and the states enjoyed themselves and indulged in extravagant fashions, new cinematic entertainment, and lavish parties of the 1920s. The bonds between them all tightened, even as everything crashed and burnt to hell in the Great Depression.

But despite their deepened connections, the Great Depression was an incredibly harsh time for America and the states. It’s also when America first manifested his hero complex. The young nation saw his brothers and sisters suffer through poverty and horrid weather, and he wanted to be nothing less than a real-life Superman for his family. America wanted to bring optimism, joy, and laughter back to his family in this terribly grim time of depression and make all their problems disappear. America jokes and laugh loudly in attempts to lift the states’ spirits, even though he was struggling against a gritty reality of his own as well, all while assuming more and more power so he can try and lift them all out of this economic devastation. 

America’s efforts were heartwarming, but he had also unwittingly set the stage for history to repeat itself.

WWII (18)

The world’s descending into chaos again. America had spent months begging his states to let him enter the Second World War, and his elder siblings finally consented their nation’s declaration of war with the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

There’s no stopping their baby chick from traveling far far away from the nest now.

During the war, America found close friends/mentors in foreign nations like Britain and France for the first time during the war, and Canada became nothing less than a brother to him. He fought alongside the allies as a soldier and pulled his economy back into tip-top shape back home. The problem arise when America began to drift further and further away from his states as the war stretched on. The global theatres occupied America’s attention, and the bloody horrors of modern warfare turned him cold. 

America will emerge from the war as a victorious superpower, gaining leadership over not only his states but half of the globe as well. Some states will speak up in alarm as America continued to silence dissenters and crank out propaganda even as the war drew to a close, trying to reconnect with their nation. Unfortunately, America failed to listen as his eyes turned toward a former comrade dressed in red.  

Cold War (19)

There are a lot of similarities to speak of between the Gilded Age and the Cold War Era. However, one significant difference is that America’s motivation is no longer purely out of selfish ambitions, but also extreme paranoia. 

America had tried hard to hide it, but the rise of the USSR made him feel threatened beyond control. The power and wealth he has now were something America had fought vigorously to obtain, and the love & support of his family and friends are what kept America sane through the centuries. The young nation was dreadfully terrified by the mere concept of losing his status as a political and economic superpower or for his states/allies betraying him for the Soviet Union.

It was this irrational but overwhelming fear that blinded America and drove him into acting like an intensely insecure control freak, lending out financial support to Western Europe and installing many domestic welfare programs so no one will feel the need to seek out to Communism. But in the same time, he did not hesitate to resort to coercion should anyone show any signs of dissent. 

It took the states a lot of time and efforts to get this nation blinded by paranoia to come back to his senses, but they were still able to to it. After all, America wasn’t evil. He’s sinful, blinded, insecure, and at his worst, selfish and power-hungry. But in America’s core, he’s still that idealistic young man who loves and respects each and every one of his constituents with all his heart.

America isn’t evil, but he does need guidance and restraints from others to prevent his own ambitions, paranoia, and power from corrupting him. America needs those he loves so deeply to speak out in protest when he’s in the wrong, and he needs several helping hands to keep him on the progressive track. Luckily, that’s exactly what his states are here for!

[the--regenerating--degenerate]

Sol Invictus: A RWBY Sci-Fi

Chapter One: The Dread Pirate Raven

On board Muninn. Wild Space

To say that the Heir Apparent of the Protectorate of Atlas, Weiss Schnee; Lady-Marshal of the March of Mantle, Countess of the planet of Mantle and The Shield of Atlas, was in an uncomfortable position, was to make the grossest of understatements. 

Her prison cell in the brig was dark and cramped. It barely had enough room for even her, as short as she was, to stretch out with even a modicum of comfort. The only light Weiss was afforded was when the door opened, where it would shine through, just ever so briefly, as her ‘generous’ hosts delivered to Weiss her daily bread and water. This was usually some sort of recyke nutrient paste formed into a stiff brick bar and water tinged with the taste of copper from the treatment filters on board. This was also the only human contact she was afforded.

Not that she particularly cared for her guard. 

The guard her captors had chosen, or maybe who had volunteered; Weiss wasn’t exactly sure, was a spiteful and arrogant woman. Her hair was shaved close to her head, tattoos and kill-markings ran up her bare arms. Some of which, Weiss noted dejectedly, were fresh and still raw. No doubt to mark out some of her unfortunate crew.

“Awww what’s the matter, Captain?” The woman smirked, faux concern dripping from her mouth like poison. “Your quarters not to your liking? I assure you it is the best that we can offer you, Milady.” 

Weiss said nothing, she wouldn’t give a pirate wretch like this the satisfaction. 

“Not talkin’ eh? Ah well.” The smirk, if it was possible, grew wider as she held out a tin plate. “Brought you breakfast… nice steaming pile of recyke…” 

The plate fell from her fingers, crashing to the floor with a wet splat and clang of tin on armoured plating. 

“Damn. Sorry about that, just clumsy I guess,” she clucked her tongue, “Well… that’s all you get until dinner.”

Weiss shrugged and turned away, pulling her tattered officer’s coat around her like a blanket. 

The woman outside her cage snorted. “You know… you could end this. All you have to do is tell us who you are. Which House you belong to, Atlassian. You’re worth a few creds. Might as well tell us…”

Weiss knew better than that. If she did, her crew was dead. These pirates needed them alive for the time being. If only just to question them. Once they found out that Weiss was Heir Apparent of the Protectorate, the crew would lose all value and just be a waste of resources. Better off dead then consuming valuable calories and drinking water.    

She leaned in closer, face obscured by shadows, the light behind her giving her a faint artificial glow. Her tone changed from mocking, to cruel and cold. “Then we could stop asking your crew. They’ve been really unhelpful as well, and let’s face it, your nobleness… they aren’t worth it. So what do we care if one, or two, or a dozen decided to go for a cold walk?”

Weiss leapt at her, crashing against the bars straining to wrap her fingers around the other woman’s throat.

The guard barely reacted, a thin cruel smile spreading on her lips.

“Touched a nerve I see. Well… like I said, just tell us who you are. Do that and I will personally see that no more of your crew decide to eat vac.”

“I’m going to kill you,” Weiss hissed, her voice as frozen as the vast ice fields of Atlas.

The woman grinned as she stood up and turned on her heel, leaving Weiss once again in the solitude and darkness of her small prison cage.

Leaving her to her despair, anger, hatred and the constant repeat of the attack replaying in her mind's eye.     

The attack had been unfathomably swift and terrifying in its brutal execution.

It was Weiss’s first command, fresh from the private tutors, career officers and other nobles hired to instruct her and mold her into the picture of a perfect Atlassian. To celebrate, she had been given command of the frigate Tundra March and a patrol to the frontier of Atlas space. 

In reality, her command, her tour, was little more than propaganda. A display to the common people that the House of Schnee was the ruling House. It was a display of family duty to other Houses of the Noble Officer class, that Jaques Schnee was still Lord-Protector of the Protectorate of Atlas and his family would share in that duty.

The patrol was slated to take three months and cover the most stable and uninteresting part of the Protectorate of Atlas’s Frontier. It was to be done in the utmost secrecy. Only her Executive Officer had been informed of who she actually was, with the rest of the crew not told anything of who their Commanding Officer was, until well after Tundra March’s departure from port. Even then it was just rumors amongst the common voidsmen. 

Not that the secrecy had ultimately mattered much. 

Two weeks into the dull, uninteresting patrol, in an uninteresting dead system, a system which only warranted a name simply because it existed, Tundra March struck a mine.

The mine had detonated near the aft of the ship; just before the engine room. The explosion tore a massive hole in Tundra March, knocking her off keel and sending her adrift. Her power fluctuating, two of her engines dead, venting atmosphere and crew into the silent void.

Weiss had only just climbed back to her feet, when, over the cries of the wounded, the calls of damage control and the cacophony of alarms, the sensorius called out two more contacts; both of which had only just been picked up on the barely functioning sensors. 

Assault boats filled with boarders - ‘ticks’ as voidsmen called them.  

Weiss had rushed over to the sensor station and saw they had maybe a minute or two at the most before the ticks would latch onto Tundra March. They would cut and peel their way through her armour. Then the boarders would flood into Weiss’s ship.

Weiss was already reacting; giving orders to the Atlas Marines to entrench themselves, and prepare to repel the attackers. Her crew were disorganized, fighting a dozen fires which had spread through the decks, while yet more tried to seal off the areas ripped open to the void. 

None of that truly mattered.

They were Atlassians. 

They were the definition of discipline. The epitome of calm on the line. 

They would meet these boarders and they would throw them back into space. 

Back out into the cold void.

At least that had been the plan.

Unfortunately, Weiss’s plan died stillborn when Tundra March shook as several high-velocity, solid slug railgun rounds, from what could only be another ship’s main battery slammed into her. Damage was extensive, fires broke out as armour buckled and several more systems failed.  Over the ship-wide comms, Weiss could hear the screams and gunfire as the boarders pushed their way in. No doubt heading to the main power core, or engine room. Or the bridge. The Tundra March shook violently from another round of railgun fire. 

If it wasn’t for the boarders cutting their way into her ship, Weiss would have been forgiven for thinking that these were shots intended to kill, and not cripple further. 

They were done. 

They were beaten. 

Even if boarders were repelled, Tundra March was utterly crippled. She was a sitting wreck, easy prey for the ship that was now racking them with railgun fire.

To resist was to die. 

There would be no honour in dying and achieving nothing.

Weiss did something she never thought she could do. Never thought she would do.  

She asked for terms… and surrendered her ship to the Captain of the black ship Muninn- the Dread Pirate Raven;  the Scourge of Mistral, the Pirate-Queen of Wild Space, the most  infamous pirate to plague the more civilised areas of space, since the Great War 

Soon afterwards she was brought on board, separated from her crew and thrown into this cell.  

Weiss reached out a hand through her bars, fingers stretched and fumbling at the canteen of water just in reach. She needed to think, she needed to plan. 

She would get out of this. Somehow.

Weiss took a deep breath. She was Atlassian. She was a Schnee. It was expected, demanded of her. She had to live up to her family name. 

And by the Gods of the Void, Weiss promised herself, she would be so much more than her family name.

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

Yang winced as she heard the wet, bruising sound of a fist hammering into a gut. The coughing, weak sputter of a man unable to defend himself, as two pairs of burly arms held him up. Tears of pain ran down the man’s face as he slumped in his captors’ arms; His once pristine white uniform now solid in sweat, mucus and blood. 

“Two punches… jus’ two is all it takes te make ye more limp than me grandmum?” the interrogator asked in disgust. He turned and looked over to where Raven Branwen stood tall but disinterested in the casual brutality.

Why Raven had asked - in reality had demanded- that Yang come down to witness this was beyond her. 

Yang felt her fist tighten in the heavily-padded gloves she always wore now; feeling the scales on her rigid knuckles stretching the fabric and rubbing against the built-in heavy shock-plates.  The interrogator had gone back to his work, striking at the man’s face, before switching his aim to the kidneys.   

“This one ain’t worth the effort Cap’in. Might as well send ‘im off fer a little walk outside.” The man sneered as he turned back towards them. 

Raven said nothing and continued to watch. Every now and then, her blood red eyes would slide over to Yang, studying her, gauging her reaction; judging her as Raven always had. 

The interrogator shrugged and pulled the man up by his hair. “So… I’m goin te ask’ ye again lad… who is ye Cap’in? What ‘owse is she from? Jus’ up an tell an I’ll stop ‘ittin’ ye. Trust me boy, I can be doin’ this all day and night.”

The man said nothing, other than groan and mutter small incoherent insults. 

Yang had to admit, she admired the boy’s courage. 

“Is there a point to this, Raven?” Yang finally asked, growing tired of the display. Her tongue running of the tips of her fangs. 

“There is,” her mother replied, not even bothering to turn and look at her daughter. 

Silence once again fell between the two women. The beatings continued unabated at a steady pace. The rhythmic thump of punches wore Yang’s already thin patience down more and more.   

“What? Other than to show that you get off on punching helpless prisoners?” Yang finally spat back. “If that’s all then I’m heading back to my quarters.” 

“You will do no such thing, Yang. You will stay right there.” Raven ordered, finally moving to turn and glare at her, “You need to see this. You need to be a part of this.”

Yang glared back, a silent test of wills between the two women. Finally, Yang huffed and leaned back against the wall. Yang knew Raven, she knew there was something coming, something that she knew she wasn’t going to be able to avoid.

Better to face it head first, instead of pussy-footing around it. That wasn’t her style anyway. 

Raven continued to glare at her daughter, which Yang dutifully ignored, before allowing a self-satisfied smile stretch across her lips.

“Vernal,” Raven spoke into the communication device woven into her collar. “Bring our esteemed guest to the interrogation chamber. I’m growing tired of these games and believe a demonstration has become more than necessary.”

“Right away Raven. We’ll be right up,” came the crackling reply over the com.

Yang barely resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Vernal was a sycophant and Raven’s little attack-dog. 

Gods… She sounds like an arrogant bitch even over the com.

They didn’t have long to wait, the door opened and the white-clad officer was aggressively pushed through and into the small room, Vernal following behind with a confident swagger and that familiar arrogant smirk.

Yang only had the briefest glimpse of the Atlassian officer; she hadn’t been allowed to be part of the boarding party and had been forced to watch the attack on the frigate from the bridge. 

The officer was surprisingly young for someone to be placed in command, her long white hair disheveled, her officer’s uniform rumpled and torn in several places. A long scar over her left eye was the only mar on her which Yang could see. It didn’t take away from her beauty, it added to it. It gave her a ruggedness, made her seem more human than the image of a porcelain doll that her pale flesh and ice blue eyes gave.   

“Well then, so are you still refusing to cooperate with us?” Raven asked as the Atlassian recovered from the push, standing straight and tall despite the restraints around her arms. She glared right into Raven’s amused, red eyes, not bothering to respond. 

"I will admit, your defiance, while at first amusing, has tried my patience. So I will ask you one last time, Atlassian. Who are you? What is your House?"

The officer said nothing, but continued to stare down the three pirate women, breaking eye contact only to take the briefest glance at her subordinate, who was hanging in the arms of his captors, crying and panting in pain.

Seconds passed as the Officer refused to answer, or break further eye contact; she was daring them to do their worst. 

Finally, it was Raven who broke the fragile silence, an almost gentle pulling at her thin lips.  

“I admire resilience. Especially in one so young” 

Yang couldn’t believe the almost serene gentle smile that crossed over Raven’s lips. In the two years since she had known her mother, she had never seen Raven give someone a look that bordered on mercy or even kindness. 

It put her on edge. Yang knew something wholly unpleasant was being dreamt up in Raven’s mind.   

There was only one rule with Raven. The strong live, the strong take, the weak die.    

“Well,” Raven continued, “let’s see how long that resolve can last. Yang. Kill him.”

The officer let out an involuntary gasp. The captive stiffened, then sagged almost acceptingly into his guards’ arms. 

“What?” Yang asked turning to her mother with a look of confusion and horror. 

“I said kill him.” Raven gestured to the man, more of a boy really. “This Noble refuses to cooperate with us. Though I do admire her resolve, it does not come without consequence. Kill him.”

Yang stood there silent. Her hands tightened into fists, shaking with rage. She felt the scales on her forehead crease as her temper began to slip from her control. 

It was a state of being familiar to Yang, one that flooded her system with adrenaline, one that made her faster, stronger and hit harder than any normal human. Even without her gene-tailoring. 

But now… now she needed to be calm. She needed a clear head. She was walking a tightrope, Raven was testing her.    

“No.” She finally spat, getting her anger under control. “I won’t do it.” 

Raven’s grin slowly vanished, her eyes became cold as she regarded her daughter. “No?” 

“No.” Yang spat again, matching her mother’s ruthless stare.

“So you are going to challenge me? Is that it? Take Muninn for your own? Are you strong enough to even dare?” Raven hissed as she drew the short blade at her hip. “Well Yang, are you?” 

For the first time in her life, Yang felt herself hesitate. Her mother had pointed her sword at her, challenging her. Raven was daring her to make a move. 

Yang could feel her temper spike again.

Vernal’s smirk widened. It was clear she had already envisioned the outcome, and was now simply enjoying the show, as she  eagerly awaited the prospect of violence. 

The Atlassian was quiet, eyes darting between the three other women and the men holding her crewmate. 

What was she planning? Yang quickly suppressed the thought. It didn’t matter and being distracted, being hesitant would give Raven every opening she would need.  

Yang could feel her hand inching towards the holster of Ember Celica at her hip. Her fingers flexed almost eagerly, itching to grip it, itching to draw.  

“Remember this, Yang.” Raven’s voice was cold, frigid, but also tinged with the same excitement flooding through Yang right at that very moment. The excitement of the prospect of a battle for supremacy between the two women. “If you draw, and when you lose, you will lose everything. Not just your life, but your sister’s will be forfeit as well.”

Yang’s hand froze above her pistol’s grip. Ice-cold fear quenched the white-hot rage in an instant. 

“She has nothing to do with this,” Yang hissed, choking down the panic at the thought of her little sister Ruby being hurt. 

“Of course she does.” Raven smiled grimly; “If she lives, she’ll try and take revenge. So what is your choice? Draw and lose everything? Or do as I say? His life, or your’s and your sister’s?” 

Yang hesitated, her own life she was more than willing to risk. It was part of who she was, a thrill seeker, an adventurer. But she wouldn’t, she couldn’t risk Ruby’s. Not after they had just been reunited. Not after they were slowly coming together again. 

Yang’s hand fell limp and she took in a deep shuddering breath. “Fine. I’ll do it.” 

Yang turned and walked towards the helpless man, watching as he struggled, as bruised and beaten as he was, to hold himself up. To look her in the eye. 

Yang barely felt her hand move as she slowly pulled the heavy boarding-pistol from its well-oiled holster. She could feel the heavy weight of the ceramic and steel, as it came free. Slowly she raised and pointed the pistol at the boy’s head.

The two stared at each other for several seconds: the condemned and the executioner.  

Yang squeezed the trigger. The pistol bucked in her hand as it roared. 

The boy’s head exploded, splattering apart in a mess of blood, skull fragments, and grey matte,painting the back wall in ghastly portrait.

The pirates let the corpse fall to the floor and laughed as they did. Blood from the headless body pooled quickly and slicked the floor.  

Their job was done. 

“Well, that’s that.” Vernal snickered, “Good to see you actually do have some brains in your head, Yang.”

Yang turned, wanting to strike at the arrogant woman, but stopped herself. 

Now wasn’t the time. Not with Raven standing there.

“Vernal, you are no longer our guest’s guard, Yang, you will take her place. Now see that Weiss Schnee is seen back to her quarters, we have important guest arriving in the next several cycles, I want to be ready for them.” 

“Weiss Schnee? The heir to the Protectorate?” Yang whispered. 

The officer looked stunned as well. 

“You...You know who I am?” The officer, Schnee asked, her already pale face turned even paler if such a thing was at all possible.

“I knew who you were the moment we attacked your ship.” Raven replied, “You really think I would risk attacking an Atlassian frigate for some no-name noble?”

“Then what was that about?” Yang asked, barely containing her rage and loathing. Gesturing at the corpse. “Why did I have to kill him, if you already knew?”

Raven regarded her daughter with little more than contempt. “ You needed this. A point had to be made. You are soft. Weak. You could have refused. You could have tried to kill me, maybe even succeeded. But you are so attached to that thing that you call a sister that I could use her against you. Now see to the Schnee, that’s an order.” 

With that, Raven pushed past them, Vernal following behind, only pausing briefly to send the two of them that arrogant, sickening smile she was so well known for, before following after her captain like the loyal dog she was.

Leaving Yang alone with the Heir apparent, Weiss Schnee.

Leaving Weiss alone with someone who had just murdered one of her crew. 

[emersonmanandnature]

March 13, 2020

How can we be gods children if we don’t know him by his true natural self? Who is god? Is he a figment of our imagination? An imagination scared of the directions presenting themselves, so we look for comfort in an illusive god we made trustworthy without flaws, a perfection we ourselves can’t possible know or be.

And yet aren’t we perfect as well if we seek our own inner journey and express our feeling through our artistic talents.

Some say we know him through ourselves, our internal, necessary dependence on something bigger, more powerful than our meek voices. A vision of a healer that can bring us to his promised land.

But is that really a faithful promise or just a cliche given to sooth the savage beast in us all. For religion is the calming drug we are given because if it wasn’t we would be in constant rebellion, fighting and killing each other, oh wait, we are doing that anyway. So why is religion and a promise of salvation the hook that catches us and won’t let go. I guess you could say faith through religion is a good money maker and the script had already been written. A lot of plagiarism there because it is hard to start your own religion and end up with billions of scared people following the repetitive words necessary for their resurrection.

Why is god hiding his presence from us? Is he a little overweight and his beard a little scraggly perhaps because he has been traveling around this universe saving other planets enjoying their foods but ignoring our despair?

What does he have against us, beside our egotistical self importance and a desire to rule others? Maybe he sees our need to squelch the oligarch’s fatherly corruption, living in their heavenly paradise here on earth, forget about dying and losing their power and dominance over humanity. That is never going to happen unless we all come together as one, not mouthing gods demands but our demands to live a full life without having to fear if our jobs will be shipped overseas and if this planet can withstand for now the absolute looting of our resources for profit by murdering human beings.

They say you can’t take it with you, no shit sherlock, you can’t even take yourself to hell on a sleigh ride. The ending is a darkness in despair. So why not be for now, a glutton for pleasure here on this planet, with frighten adults acting like children afraid of their own shadow. Well, they should be scared for the corruption even for the wealthy is getting too complicated and devoid of reason. Take, take, and take some more seems to be the new scriptures of our earthly presence. We feel the fear and anguish coming as our society of laws break down into street violence amongst the people while the rich will be sheltered in a manger of wealth behind a giant wall protecting their insatiable desires.

For the wealthy this is their heavenly vision, for they derive pleasure in seeing others suffering and their greed is seen everywhere across this speck of dust by jealousy and envy, as the sinners speak our truth.

Their psychopathic mental self-interest impacts the citizens with degradation and criminal intent, for the 1% could careless about humanity, they are only attentive to their own desires first, for the elites with no moral foundation toward other human beings needs, beside those that share their immoral moneyed excessiveness, cherish all self-indulgence as a necessary representation of their smug and self-centeredness, an obnoxious determination to destroy the free spirit in the populace, living not just in the good old usa of debauchery but in corrupted countries worldwide and controlling the populaces behavior as the romans did when god sent his only son to perform an impossible task and allowed christ to suffer for our sins that washed us clean of guilt and made us stronger to systematically attack and dismantle truth with vicious propaganda lies to influence the racists that still believe they are the goodness of this petty earth, better than those poor humans in their repeating excuses of why this earth is in turmoil, not by the military industrial complex, the corrupt corporations, and the bought and sold political stooges claiming to be our buddies as they take more of our hard earned tax dollars and then pass fraudulent laws that are only give aways to the criminals that live fat on the herd expressing how important they are for the world to succeed in destroying itself.

Dissecting a known truth as a scheme to influence the men and women of angered hate toward themselves, outward toward innocent families not knowing the true culprit of their fears and loss of jobs is the wealthy that use our hard earned tax dollars for their own personal pleasure and can’t believe these fools that believe they have their best interests when all the rich want is more and more of what you got until you have no more and are forced to live in the slum streets of cities worldwide.

These one per centers are not like us human beings, they have no morals or empathy for anyone or anything unless there are profits to be made. They are as cold as an ice berg, hold on not any more, these staggering warming temperatures, lets say they are as sinful as hellish evil prospering on our once heavenly paradise.

The politicians smirk and take pride in serving these destructive powers of dark hate. Their swollen heads of self-glorification turn their angry eyes toward anyone different than their own corrupted morals and the criminal minds allow them to gain a little more income but not enough for them to get heady and think they are now part of the elite class that can’t be bothered with the break down of a cohesive society based on love for all for that was never going to be part of the deal when christ sacrificed himself, for he was alone, a forsaken prophet looking to bring mankind together but where is the profit margin in kindness.

We exist in a corrupt world that inflames hate to deflect the true goals of the wealthy, a living hell for everyone whether they toe the line of bigotry or not.

Lets remember god killed guilty and innocent people alike, he murdered easily enough at least in the old days before he decided to send his only son to suffer for our sins, pretty good trick there, are you afraid of a little pain yourself? snuffing out every human on the planet except gods favorite lackey, the boatman, Noe’s ark, who saved the animals and god said, “I will never again curse the ground on account of man, of the inclination of man’s heart is evil from his youth.”

I would think the killing off the people on earth is pretty evil. Was god competing with the Prince of Darkness to see who could claim the most pervasive disregard for human life ever known. Does god have feelings of anger like we do if so wouldn’t he be human? 

Even in today’s violent wars for profit nowhere have we hit that goal, the death of all the human race but we are getting closer to the truth of our predicament, the wealthy trying their best to imitate god. I wonder if we should start making our case for survival, do you think!

But for now we are the leftovers from paradise denied, we do your dirty work for you and you can sit back and condemn us for our murderous nature even though we inherited this from you, our father.

Praise the lord for his brutal killing of his flock just like we are prone to explosive acts of murder in our own unique ways.

We are god’s drones on auto pilot doing his bidding, trying to impress him with our lack of morals for he showed us how murdering is part of being a good servant to his needs.

God’s perfection is an illusion an abstraction of nonsense, the killing of humanity is our own worse fears of hate and malice toward anyone different from our skin color, not gods.

Oh sure, 2,000 years ago he came and performed miracles of love through god’s grace, given to his son to change our dependent minds on the physical nature of this reality.

By conditioning humans to think of their own resurrection to heaven so they would eventually lose interest in this planet earth for the religious zealots condemned anyone that thought this world could be our paradise. For our earthly presence here in this place is for the people to suffer at the hands of the church and others, angry mobs seek vengeance in the name of his holiness, lord and supreme being. It sounds like these religious zealots were practicing their opening act for lucifer, calling their presence on earth a killing field without mercy for those heathens different from our shady truth. For he is our truth and our salvation and we must endure the pain we inflict on other human beings for soon they will be like us and will demand our deaths.

Through the creation of more and more powerful weapons mankind gave religion the go ahead to condemn other faiths as heathen and below their godly standards. And lets face it if you make a weapon that can easily kill another why not go ahead and do it for ultimately aren’t we just animals with a bomb and without a moral compass.  

Was god a ruler with an earthly projected character, just a powerful man made force hidden in our psyche, out of our sight but yet present everywhere, in everything and every one of us, as we became the powerful judge and jury. When we get down to our true behavior we are the criminals our sons and daughters learn from us what true violence and destruction is. Not just the heartless truth of what we are but also what we will never become, a loving community with one goal, freedom and tranquillity for all people no matter their skin color. When you have a commandment, “love they neighbor as thyself,” ignored just to perpetuate violence on others for strategic profits I would say our lords words have been abandoned!

Adam and Eve betrayed his trust through the devils work. And we are also betraying god’s work though our own inner hate and frustration that we have not been saved from ourselves for 1,000s of years.

Did god really expect someone new to this reality, fresh from being nothing to suddenly being a physical presence in the garden of eden, and all of a sudden living in a wealth of exotic foods and of course god himself smiling and giving him orders, this had to be an overwhelming fantasy paradise and to think that not only is there a god above them but also a devil below them, kind of a smorgasbord of good and bad things for our future lives to be blamed for. Damned if we don’t pray to our  almighty god and damned when we act in a devilish fashion out of ignorance.

Lets get real here for just a minute, I don’t think my sins add up to the sins of the wealthy and their investment in killing the planet and other human beings through wars for profit and their deep addiction to power at any cost as long as the cost is put on the backs of the working people for they, the new gods of pain and despair are above the law and especially gods laws and are deeply entrenched in manipulating our behavior through mind altering influences that pits us fighting amongst ourselves as the corrupt oligarchs sit and count their billions just to feed their overgrown ego’s of avarice and vanity. Where is our protective god now, has he come down from the heavens and booted these crooks out of the temple again and sent them on their merry way to live in the fiery pit? In today’s hell hole on this planet we don’t have the excuse of adam and eve for we know the score in life and we see and feel the wealthy’s hatred and greed towards all of us, the little people with no special purpose but to serve their needs.

These rich self-centered ego’s always looking for profits to torture and murder innocent men, women and children. What kind of god would allow this to be the norm where the oligarchs get their money and the people get the shaft through opened eyed murderous evil.

And our lord god allows these killings as a necessary step toward our salvation and if that is the case then god is in for a whole lot of trouble, a lot of soul cleansing, we seek our savior external to our own inner being, usually in a church setting that stigmatizes us as devilish sinners that need to pray morning, noon and night and praise the lord every minute as we abandoned all of our unspoken dreams, we are all sinners even though most of us don’t know any demonic sins we have committed yet we are labeled sinners with no purpose it seems but to hate our inner and outer selves.

I must disagree with this callous obnoxious poser rock of preacher’s lies that speak this garbage because they hate themselves and their hidden actions of lust and addiction to the little power given them from the congregation of his lost lambs ready to be sheered of any hope of salvation. Unless they like his mansion and his bedroom.

If god was so easy to know then we all would be saintly sinners and his pep talk each week would be to live your life to the fullest not in fear and hate but in love of thy neighbor, as I love you and as you should love yourself.

But our absent father, son and the holy ghost have abandoned his children to the voracious appetite of caveman behavior, humans with no moral constraints and no qualms of killing innocence with starvation, war, prison, slavery, no jobs, no hope and hate just for more profit.

Hate is the new marketplace for all of us to shop at. We have any kind of weapon you want. The dealers don’t care what you do with it as long as you lay down the bucks to purchase your inner hatred being fulfilled.  

How are we to praise his image of redemption when mankind is on the verge of insane violence just for material possessions?

Words inspired by ancient minds desperate to believe in something more than this pain of living, sought solace in an imaginary friend, a savior to ease our suffering through a resurrection. A friend that was beyond our understanding, beyond our earthly presence and this figure of love for his children became the religions of the masses passed down through centuries of suffering by the hands of the powerful rulers who praised this new distraction which gave them more power to steal from the populace as a necessary evil, a demand from our lord that these men of wealth were above the law and through the centuries of violence toward the meek, hatred of anothers skin color, a willingness to attack and murder another religion as god’s will, this was all a mental mind game, a society that was and is manipulated into believing that the rich and powerful have the right to place themselves above the law because these diabolical gluttonous predators are in the same category as your god you worship, it was just they didn’t promise anyone would escape this earth, this physical hell.

Why the lonely death amongst the physical presence of others? Wouldn’t it be better to know that a supreme creator is there waiting for you, not in silence but yelling and screaming, you can do it, you can be saved. A mental illusion of comfort for your trials and pain for living a life for others without satisfaction for you and your family.

We the herded children of this false dream of paradise, somewhere up their, some place in the dark starry night maybe a trillion miles away is our foundation for suffering in this astral plane of nonsense and not going insane from the brutality of the powerful, always seeking more than they deserve.

I think we can now agree that our paradise is not exterior to our selves but in us and we now have to focus our intuitive perceptions toward seeking our own salvation through our love for all people’s of this earth.

Yet, you still feel a presence, it is a wordless silence as you interpret your own vision, in your own words hoping what you think and feel is your god’s mercy funneling the holy spirits thoughts into you as an objective witness of his revelation.

The wealthy have no god but themselves. They understand their power with only meager limitations, their fright of retribution for their underhanded manipulation of prices and for taxes that give them more authority over the inferior beings that look to the stars as they are being brutalized from every possible angle by the plutocrats.

Where humans pray for their salvation, the rich pray for the next blockbuster investment with no fears of loss for they will be warned early if the stock they put millions on collapses so they can get out quick and then watch the poor working people lose their shirt and soul to greed.  

Wealth always makes money for the family, if you cut corners so be it, my god will understand the financial side of life, so what if he entered the temple and threw out the money lenders, I am not one of those, yes, I sucked money off the poor but it was a good deal for them as well, I can’t think of anything on top of my empty greedy head but I am sure they were given something for their land and their back breaking work on property they owed mucho bucks on.

We saved them from earthy pain through the hanging tree.

The wealthy will finally break with the gluttonous universe of possessions and their ego will finally be humbled from the obsession to be seen and heard as if this would placate their inner fears and you there! look in my eyes, nothing you do is immortal and you soon will be on the down slope with bodily decay grasping for any hold you can manage, flowing easily into that pitiful need to beg for your liberation from death and never finding the pardon you demanded by showing your goodness so purposefully disguised, giving to others what they never asked for and didn’t need or want.

One cannot refute or excuse the lost opportunities of youth, each seeking her or his own structured becoming, the known entity of your external self one would eventually stop respecting and hoping for a universal change in their life but only beginning to understand what the greedy demanded by creating this appalling wealth on the back breaking work of the many. No last supper here, only a watered down excuses for a life disappearing and being replaced by the same quality of consciousness as before, let the greed attract the amoral deceptions of avarice, those bewildered by the voracious appetite for power move forward until they are systematically robbed of their selfhood and beg for their last meal on this planet knowing there will be no mercy without suffering.

If the church represents god’s voice on earth and the church is seen not as a saintly experiment in thought control but a corrupt and incompetent group of men that have a lustful heart for the weak and use their status of holiness as a facade to dig deep into others lives, to feel their trauma of existence with gleeful proclivity knowing they have an innocent to betray with lies they sold to the congregation, to tweak their hearts to give more and more, for in their robed disguise they rejoice in their saintly hypocrisy and toast those that can’t see the foundation of the church was not god’s will but the lust for power of those present in their false words, giving to the parishioners a truth that one can’t deny for if you do find fault with the logic of obsessive religious power, a god like characteristic, you will be abandoned to the wolves of debauchery, that think of themselves defenders of gods word, love thy money as thyself, a quote someone wrote but to believe it you need confirmation from the holy spirit, coming to you with talons spread for a sacrificial lamb with a bleeding soul repenting in screaming terror of existential nothingness.

We seek the truth of the intellect but not the truth of our intuition, we have incorporated into our thinking this illusion of the past as truthful and as truth it is responsible for all that we feel and see in god’s earthy glory in our present moments, we must believe and accept the truth of others that use this bait and switch to earn vast sums of money from all that god is, (their little puppet on a stick), we are his children and as his children we must live the life he gives us and if we wander away from the path to his glory we will be punished with everlasting hell on this round peanut hole called earth.

A universal symbol of stupidity, a mind caught up in profit over a helping hand, without courage to express and defend the nature of truth by opening your heart to every living person on this planet.

But wait, see we are doing god’s little work by making people suffer for his crucifixion. If he died for us the least we can do is ask all of us to die a slow painful death too, amen, praise the lord!

Centuries ago the believers believed that the son of god came to earth and sacrificed himself for the sins of the working folks at the doors of his church of truth. But with a bait and switch move they switched places with the apostles of faith and they became the custodians of the lies that break the spirits of souls by allowing none to doubt the possibilities of the pleasure palace of sexual delights. We now seek god in many disguises.

Ask yourself if jesus was right to expose the greed and corruption in the temple by driving them from his holy presence then why do we still believe in the greed and corruption christ tried to exterminate. The answer is quite simple human nature. We are an animal persona with a semblance of intelligence but when it comes down to the earthly pleasures we are rutting in the back woods just like any other beast of burden.

Your belief is not an outside force telling you what to believe but an inner belief in your silent god and with prayer you hope to extend your life beyond the demanding years of old age. Your paradise is waiting as long as you don’t contradict the emperors of religion and the corporation living in vatican city. Which amount to the same kind of criminality and lust running rampant in the society of blind ignorance of our real truth.

Your internal force of god is the only way to experience the true revelation of our savior. Can you spread the word of god beyond yourself, for once it enters the mind of another person then their hearing is just an acceptance without internal sight. We believe what we are taught, just as you were as a child, you are told what to believe and how to act, how simple and detrimental to the freedom of our individual souls.

Conditioned beyond self recognition we accept the universal hope of truth but instead we get a commercial of malice expecting all to join in the big extravaganza of shopping on his holy birthday.

We look to him for answers of our trust of exterior values that are never real and are meant to manipulate us into contribution to the chump fund, as if the church doesn’t already have the wealth to help the starving children around this god forsaken planet of mercenaries.

We accept his silence as our truth and we proceed forward not in a loving relationship but in a money transaction between lawyers of equal status centered not on the words of a misfortunate prophet but others that interpreted his demise as a foolish wish and that in order to survive these men and women of the holy flock of voracious selfishness must insist on payment up front before any transaction is completed in the name of god.

[haloud]

“Not as Lost, Violent Souls:” Alex Manes and T.S. Eliot’s “The Hollow Men” -- part 2

- intro - part 1 -

Previously on:

(gif by bisexualalienblast, used with permission)

To recap what we’ve established so far: the epigraph and the first two segments of “The Hollow Men” portray the speaker as a man who has lost a sense of identity or purpose, both among the hollow men and wishing to be more like them, haunted by a vision of “eyes” and wishing to live more completely in the meaningless, liminal space inhabited by the hollow men. If Alex is the speaker, trapped in a sense in the world that makes “hollowness” the only state of being achievable, then the desire to inhabit that distant, liminal space is representative of the defense mechanisms he has developed to navigate the world. He takes control, avoiding vulnerability. He runs away, keeping intimate interactions with the person who makes him most vulnerable on his terms. In sections III-V, the imagery of the eyes grows ever stronger, as the world of the speaker grows more dismal and disconnected, concluding with the breakdown of connections inherent in the Shadow falling between such deeply connected things, and the final statement about the end of the world.

Part III: Lone and level sands

This segment of the poem is one of the shortest, and it shifts the focus from the hollow men themselves, the speaker, and the eyes, and onto the broader landscape the hollow men occupy.

This is the dead land This is cactus land

Of course, we, the writers of Roswell, and the characters of the show would all know that deserts are not dead at all, but instead teeming with life. However, pairing “dead land” with “cactus land” in the segment immediately following the previous lines about the kingdoms of death is meant to communicate a sense of the total bleakness of the landscape, as well as serve as a reminder of the futility of the existence of the hollow men, who are compared to scarecrows, but in this “cactus land” have no real fields to stand in, have no real function.

Here the stone images Are raised, here they receive The supplication of a dead man's hand Under the twinkle of a fading star

In Jeffrey Howard's explication of this poem[1], he identifies these lines and this imagery as being in reference to Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “Ozymandias.” I don’t have a whole lot to say about this in relation to Alex specifically, but it’s certainly an interesting connection in the context of some things I’ve already said regarding him and Jesse. Jesse is very much a “look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”[2] kind of guy. As Howard goes on to say, Shelley’s poem “appears as a cold sarcasm regarding humanity’s aspirations to godhood instead of being an earnest evaluation of humanity’s might, which does not, in reality, exist” (10). This entire discussion brings to my mind again Alex’s speech to Kyle in 1x12, how there exists a constant need to justify atrocities committed by one’s government (the modern American answer to atrocities committed by godhood), and how people generally fail to recognize that what seems like might is more often than not a completely empty concept.

is it like this In death's other kingdom Waking alone At the hour when we are Trembling with tenderness Lips that would kiss Form prayers to broken stone

Here, the speaker is asking if the world is just as bleak for those who have “crossed over,” as said in the first segment, to “death’s other kingdom.” In death’s other kingdom, do the people there have to wake alone, when they are “trembling with tenderness?” Do the people there have the freedom to kiss, when all the speaker/the hollow men can do is “form prayers to broken stone?”[3][4] Previously, the speaker has expressed an inability to come to “death’s other kingdom,” locked in a sort of purgatory with the other hollow men; the speaker has also expressed resistance to “death’s dream kingdom,” wanting to stay far away from the vision of eyes that that dream kingdom brings, knowing that he will always be far away from “that final meeting / In the twilight kingdom.” Here, however, the speaker expresses almost a yearning for things to be different, even if achieving “death’s other kingdom” is impossible.

Part IV: Valley of dying stars

Part IV opens with further bleak imagery and further admission of hopelessness:

The eyes are not here There are no eyes here In this valley of dying stars In this hollow valley This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

The speaker has succeeded, then, for a given value of success; he has avoided the gaze of the eyes, and now they are gone altogether. The stars are dying, the valley is hollow, even the tiny scraps of life that may have existed previously in this landscape are winking out, one by one. The line that stands out in this stanza is that about the “broken jaw” of the lost kingdom, which is a flare of violence or pain, whether by accident or deliberately induced, which stands out among all the numbness that characterizes the rest of the poem.

In this last of meeting places We grope together And avoid speech Gathered on this beach of this tumid river[5]

Sightless, unless The eyes reappear As the perpetual star Multifoliate rose Of death's twilight kingdom The hope only Of empty men.

The hollow men gather together against what separates them from what is, textually, death, but symbolically is more like salvation, paradise, or connection. This segment of the poem has strong religious imagery—strong enough that I’m forced here to talk about it when I’ve avoided it thus far because it’s not terribly relevant to any of my points about Alex. That being said, I will go into greater detail in the Watsonian analysis about what significance the religious imagery in “The Hollow Men” may have to Alex as a person, despite the lack of any religious context for his character in the show thus far. As a continuation of the Doylist analysis, I will say only that the eyes have once again appeared as a signifier of salvation or peace. “The hope only / of empty men.”

Part V: the Shadow

Here is how the fifth and final movement of the poem begins:

Here we go round the prickly pear Prickly pear, prickly pear Here we go round the prickly pear At five o'clock in the morning.

Now, before I get fully into Part V, I just want to let you all know about the deeply, deeply hilarious opinion of Smith[6] about the "prickly pear" parody of the "mulberry bush" children's song, which is that the prickly pear is a phallic symbol while the mulberry bush is all vaginas all the time, apparently[7] Grover. My buddy. My dude. What. Anyway, the remainder of the poem is a long set of dichotomies or intrinsically and existentially paired concepts, interspersed with a line from the Lord’s Prayer, concluding with the famous final lines.

Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception And the creation Between the emotion And the response Falls the Shadow

Life is very long

Between the desire And the spasm Between the potency And the existence Between the essence And the descent Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is Life is For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends Not with a bang but with a whimper.

The abortive lines referencing the Lord’s Prayer indicate a struggle against a father—The Father—and, dispersed as they are among the lines about a Shadow falling between concepts that should never otherwise be separated, themselves become the Shadow. The Shadow is a higher concept, a higher being, with the power to tear apart even logically and naturally inseparable things. In the context of Alex and Roswell, Jesse Manes is, in many ways a literal Shadow obstructing connectedness and growth. However, there is another version of the Shadow which his worldview has caused to transfer to his son. Critic J. Hillis Miller identifies the Shadow as “the paralysis which seizes men who live in a completely subjective world,” and states, “Mind had seemed the medium which binds all things together in the unity of an organic culture. Now [the mind] is revealed to be the Shadow which isolates things from one another, reduces them to abstraction, and makes movement, feeling, and creativity impossible.” Alex’s “subjective reality” is not a traditional one, but rather the result of two worldviews fighting for supremacy within him and forcing him to a standstill—his own, and the one his father has imposed upon him his entire life. A subjective reality forms when he is incapable of making decisions based upon one worldview without the other intruding; there is no objective truth, no objective way of leading his life. An objective sense of purpose is, of course, something that all people strive for regardless of their circumstances, but it is the specific destabilizing outside force which in “The Hollow Men” is referred to as the “Shadow” that makes Alex’s experience resonate with the text of the poem. By the end of the poem, the speaker cannot so much as complete a sentence. The Shadow comes between, among other things, the thought and the speech. In the same way, Alex’s own “Shadow,” being both the imprinted trauma and continuing expectation as well as his father’s physical presence, comes between who he is and who he wants to be; who he can be and what face he shows to the world.

The speaker and Alex end the poem in the same way as they began. Trapped in a role that is part tool, part puppet, part propaganda, caught between wishing for hope or salvation and wishing he could even wish for as much as that. He has companions but feels no companionship; he stands on the banks of a river but has no boat with which to cross, nor any money to pay the ferryman. And all the while he is watched by these eyes which represent a state of being or an ideal which he can never achieve, but just as he scorns those eyes and wishes they would turn away, they do, and he is left sightless and silent.

This is not a happy poem. Nor do I believe that analyzing it in this way will reveal any more hopeful, happier meaning for Eliot’s hollow men or for Alex Manes. The existence of the hollow men is a bleak one, and at the very beginning of Roswell, New Mexico—the inciting events that build upon each other until Alex references the poem—Alex is in a fairly bleak place himself. However. I, unlike Eliot, do not believe in unhappy endings, so I didn’t want to close out this section just with a whimper. So while this essay concerns itself primarily with bleakness, I still want to remind everyone that “the world ends with a whimper” in episode nine of thirteen (and yet to come). Alex has already punched through the end of the world and is in the process of pulling himself through that hole and out the other side, retaking agency, rediscovering himself, relearning what he wants and how he is going to achieve those desires. The hollow men may have only empty hopes, but Alex’s hope is very real, and his character’s journey, as is the case with all characters in Roswell’s first season, has only just begun.

Part three of this essay will reexamine Alex’s character, his relationship to “The Hollow Men” at various points in his life, and his decision to quote the poem in context from a Watsonian perspective.

[1] Howard, Jeffrey G. “T.S. Eliot’s THE HOLLOW MEN.” The Explicator, vol. 70, no. 1, 2012, pp. 8-12, https://doi.org/10.1080/00144940.2012.656736. Accessed 2 Sept. 2019. [2] Howard goes into some detail about this line (line 11 of Shelley’s poem); he points out the capitalization of the word “Mighty,” how that grammatical convention is usually reserved for “proper nouns and deities,” and how it “solidifies just such a correlation” between “Ozymandias” and the “feigned divinity of the hollow men.” [3] I believe I speak for all of us when I say: hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh [4] Continuing the Ozymandias reference; worshipping a ruin of something that used to be grand but was always fallible. I really suggest anyone who wants to read a Romantic poet’s 14-line dunk on Jesse Manes go give Ozymandias a look. [5] According to the Norton anthology’s footnotes as well as scholarship on some of Eliot’s other work, as well as Dante’s, which is a stated inspiration for both “The Waste Land” and “The Hollow Men,” the tumid river refers to the river Acheron, which is both a real river in Greece and a fixture of Greek mythology—the river which one must cross to reach the underworld, the river from which the underworld’s other rivers all spring forth. [6] Same Grover Smith I referenced earlier. He’s a serious scholar! But serious literary scholars are also often very, very silly. And literary scholars and anthropologists share the quirk of educated guessing that demands that, when in doubt, every symbol must be either a deity or a penis. [7] The only story I’m aware about concerning mulberry bushes is the tale of Pyramus and Thisbe, very much a proto-Romeo and Juliet story in which two families hated each other, but their children fell in love by whispering through a crack in the wall between them. The myth/drama ends with a double suicide. It is the blood of the lovers that gives mulberries their color to this day. Thanks, the Greeks, for yet another heartwarming tale about nature, and one that is not particularly, uh, yonic. I think the mulberry bush children’s song might possibly be about washerwomen, hence the idea that it is feminine, but I would hardly consider the prickly pear a masculine version of that. In short: Grover. Man. What.

[obsidianarchives]

Game of Thrones Recap: S8E6 - "The Iron Throne"

After the penultimate episode dropped the bar for plausible writing and character motivations, I was already primed for the finale to be more of the same. Written by men who had an ending in mind without much of an idea of how to get there, “The Iron Throne” is again carried by outstanding performances by the actors who have grown to embody their roles on screen, but hamstrung by the apathy borne through the shortcuts taken to get there. Still, we’re going to get these jokes off and try to make sense of what happened along the way.

King’s Landing

The episode opens with a quiet close up of Tyrion’s disgusted and broken face as he surveys the aftermath of Daenerys’s decision to go full Adele and set fire to the reign. If you didn’t know the finale was going to be Peter Dinklage’s Emmy push, you figured it out soon enough. The charred and still-burning remains of the capital city (with surprisingly walkable debris-clear walkways) daunt the Hand of the Queen as the last Lannister takes on the weight of his failure to convince Dany to be merciful, choosing a solo walk to the Red Keep.

Jon and Davos, after granting Tyrion’s wish of solitude, run into Grey Worm and a platoon of Unsullied soldiers carrying out the Queen’s Justice. The (not-quite) bastard of Winterfell gets on his high horse and objects to further slaughter of defeated Lannister troops but the leader of the Unsullied isn’t trying to hear any of that noise. To his eyes, they are the Queen’s enemies and they’re still breathing, so the job isn’t finished. Being the damned honorable fool he is, Jon tries to grab Grey Worm’s arm to stop him from carrying out his sentencing and the rest of the Unsullied square up to protect their general. The Northmen behind Jon follow suit, quite a bit slower, and we’re stuck in a stand-off until Davos eases tensions and suggests talking to the Queen to gain clarity on that order. Let’s keep it a buck, Jon’s troops would have gotten that WORK from the Unsullied. He knew it, Davos knew it, their mamas knew it, and so Jon lets Grey Worm’s arm go and skips along to see Dany faster than Cersei did avoiding the Cleganebowl.

Making his way into the castle, Tyrion passes the Small Council chambers, Cersei’s painted map of Westeros, and searches the cellars for some sign of hope against all futility that Jaime was successful at escaping with his sister. Digging through the rubble, he comes across a golden hand, and after uncovering his twin siblings’ remarkably well-preserved remains, breaks down in rage and despair. That boy was ACT-ING this episode!

Arya, who was last seen as Death riding a pale horse leaving the city, is for some reason back in the middle of King’s Landing on foot as she spots Jon making his way through Dany’s army celebrating their Queen’s conquest with the Targaryen flag already flying above the city. As Jon slowly summits the steps leading to the burned out Red Keep, we get a flawless rendering of Dany walking out to meet the masses with Drogon’s outstretched wings behind her, the Targaryen every bit the dragon she was born to be. Not ones for subtlety, Benioff and Weiss have the Unsullied and Dothraki (who both seem to have magically repopulated since the Battle of Winterfell) aligned in classic military propaganda formation straight out of the Third Reich, as Daenerys launches into her vision of the new world. Rather than being satisfied with coming home again and reclaiming her ancestral throne, she is now ready to liberate all the people of the world from tyranny wherever she sees fit on every continent, as she finally gives voice to her abstractions of breaking the wheel.

What made last week’s heel turn for Daenerys such an odd choice, was that this was the tyrannical energy the show had been seeding for her all series long. Dany the Conqueror, rather than the Queen, is who she has always been shown to be at the core. Even a character as single-minded as Daario peeped game on that seasons ago. Her needlessly slaughtering citizens of the country she now controlled added nothing to her story when she was already presented as someone who would burn down the old world and anyone standing in the way of her just new one. The fact that the show realized this hadn’t been presented as alarming enough to give Tyrion, Jon, and the others pause until two episodes before the finale — forcing the need to insert implausible character decisions this late into the game — is endemic of the writing so many have been disappointed by.

A Daenerys so convinced of her innate goodness that she sees herself as the only arbiter of justice is terrifying, yet entirely within the scales of an established morality we’ve seen since episode one. Burning your own city to instill fear in those who were only in the capital because they were already afraid of you is maddeningly pointless and logically inconsistent.

Tyrion, who’s as fed up as many of the viewers, confronts his Queen while confessing his latest treason of freeing his brother, and flings off his Hand of the Queen badge in front of the gathered host. Somehow he wasn’t executed on the spot for this (or all his other failures) and is brought to a makeshift prison since the Black Cells are closed for excavation at the moment. He shares a knowing look with Jon as he’s being led away, who turns to probe Dany marching back to her castle, leaving him alone on the platform until Arya ninjas her way up there. She tries to warn Jon that he’s in danger, but you already know he knows nothing.

A picture of inner turmoil, Jon visits Tyrion in his cell, seemingly looking for any way of talking himself into continuing to stand behind Dany after her war crimes. Tyrion however, realizing he played himself after betraying his best friend for inciting treason just last week, pulls a 180 and does everything but get down on one knee to beg Jon to put aside the Ranger and become who he was born to be. The former Hand tries to explain (as a proxy for the writers) how Daenerys’s murder frenzy was foreshadowed all along and compares burning slave masters with non-combatant civilians, showing my man has still lost the thread as he hasn’t been right since he shot his father with a crossbow.

I appreciate the attempt at demonstrating a pattern of violence, and the fact that Daenerys kept killing the right evil people did obscure a creeping tyranny of her own, but these two things are not analogous. It’s the same reason we can tell the difference between Tyrion using wildfire in the Battle of the Blackwater, and Cersei using it to blow up the Sept of Baelor. Tyrion also elides the fact that he was by her side, advising Daenerys through many of these decisions by admitting he loves her, so it's not his fault, nor would it be Jon's for that same reason. After all his other pleas fail, Tyrion echoes Varys trying to convince Ned Stark to confess in season one, and invokes the safety of Sansa and Arya, as it’s all too clear the lengths Daenerys will go to consolidate and maintain her power. He even flips Maester Aemon’s warnings that love is the death of duty into, “sometimes duty is the death of love.”

Still swearing by his Queen, Jon proceeds to the throne room, but not before being sniffed out by Drogon — the three-time defending Hide-and-Seek champion — who managed to bury himself completely in the falling ash. Meanwhile Daenerys, fulfilling her vision from the House of the Undying finally lays her eyes on the prize, and summits the steps to the Iron Throne. She reaches out to claim her victory, but just as in her dream she turns away before getting to sit, becoming distracted by Jon entering the room.

Secure in herself having attained her dream, she greets Jon warmly forgetting she’s disgusted with his betrayal. She begins telling him her origin story, which he interrupts to talk out his angst. As the stupidest man alive, Jon implores her to find some justification for her actions and searches for any shred of the woman he thought she was. Dany unwittingly talks herself out of salvation, describing the world she and Jon will build together as they decide what “good” is, and he realizes she’s too far gone with her convictions. Promising she’ll always be his Queen he finally kisses her like he did by the lake in Naboo, but as he slips the tongue Jon also slips his knife into Daenerys. Just like a man he had to get up in them guts one last time. Cradling Dany’s limp corpse the same way he did Ygritte after she was shot in Castle Black, Jon is a broken man crushed by the weight of his sense of duty to the realm with the genuine love he shared for his now murdered aunt.

The most surprising part of this moment was how boring the whole thing was. Despite genuine performances (Emilia Clarke deserves all her things), and a beautiful score backing it, the whole affair came off as entirely perfunctory. Sure it was the ending most expected, but I never thought I would feel the gaping nothingness watching it all go down. For all the investment I had in both of the characters’ arcs, it was Drogon’s pained screeches of fury that moved me the most as he felt his psychic bond with his mother severed. Watching my young dragon son try to nudge Daenerys back to life like she was Mufasa somehow managed to be far more evocative than the supposed shock of being stabbed to death by her love. Jon didn’t even get Lightbringer for all his troubles.

The dragon in a rage turns towards his cousin, and Jon who it feels like has been looking for a way to die ever since he was resurrected, stands there ready to receive justice. Drogon, First of his name, rightful heir to the Iron Throne and King of the Seven Kingdoms, decides instead to turn his fury on the chair whose corrupting force drove his mother to this end and melts the damn thing. We knew dragons were highly intelligent, but who knew they had such a grasp for symbolism? Taking a final look at Jon, Drogon picks up Daenerys with his claw and flies off into the night as we fade to black.

The scene reopens with Tyrion being awoken in his cell after an unspecified time skip marked only by the shagginess of his beard. Grey Worm leads him out to the Dragon Pit where the lords and ladies of Westeros’ Great Houses have assembled. Sam speaks for the Tarlys despite being disinherited as a member of the Night’s Watch, we have the unnamed Prince of Dorne mentioned two episodes ago, Queen of the Iron Isles Yara Greyjoy, Lord of Storm’s End Gendry Baratheon, a couple of random white men no one even bothers to introduce, and they even dug up Edmure Tully and a Neville Longbottoming Robin Arryn. But the stars of the show are clearly the Starks (Arya, Bran, and Sansa) here to get their brother out of prison. Oh yeah, Jon apparently was arrested off-screen despite there being no body of Daenerys, no dagger to find, and no witnesses to what happened, so you know his dumb ass confessed unprompted. And some people really wanted this dry snitching idiot as King.

As always in these Love & Hip Hop reunion shows, things get off to a contentious start. Yara, whose reign in the Iron Islands was granted by Daenerys, is all for executing Jon for regicide. Arya reminds her to check her tone, and that if she talks about killing Jon again she’ll help her join the rest of the Greyjoys in the afterlife with the quickness. Davos offers to pay off the Unsullied with the Reach (presumably Highgarden) but Grey Worm angrily rejects the bribe in favor of justice. As there is no King or Queen to decide that justice however, Tyrion proposes the assembled crowd decide on a new ruler. There is a perfectly hilarious moment as Edmure Tully really has the unmitigated gall to put himself up for the throne before Sansa — with all the kindness and shade she can muster — tells her uncle to sit his five dollar ass down before she makes change. For a moment, I thought he might have had the good sense to nominate someone else (namely Sansa), but he really tried it. The cackle I let out when I realized he was serious might be my favorite thing this season. Edmure couldn’t even sit down after being shamed into silence without accidentally banging his sword on the pillar of the tent. A clown to the last.

Sam tries to propose the concept of democracy and gets laughed out of the room to the general bemusement of the convened crowd. Tyrion, once again talking himself out of trouble is asked who he thinks should be crowned, and those who thought Jon’s parentage would come into play (at all) in the finale were as bitterly disappointed as #SansaHive when the Lord Lannister put forth Bran Stark. Citing the importance of stories, he decides that Bran has the most electability and as the Three-Eyed Raven knows all the stories. How he decided Bran had the best story when Sansa, Brienne, Arya, or even Davos are sitting right there, no one knows. It remains unclear how much anyone outside of Winterfell is even aware or believes about Bran’s abilities so I’m still not sure how the rest of the nobility went along with it, but after a whole season maintaining he doesn’t want anything anymore, Bran accepts the nomination as King with a sardonic “Why do you think I came all this way?”

Forget the horrible title of “Bran the Broken” as given by Tyrion, he’s Bran the Scammer. This fool really sat there in his chair and finessed his way to the top. Chaos is a ladder indeed! The last time we saw this man in charge he was giving away the two farm hands that Theon burned in place of him and Rickon, and losing his castle to a motley crew of Ironborn. But for some reason, everyone else seems to listen to the twice deposed Hand and Bran carries the day. After a unanimous vote, Sansa demures and asserts the North’s independence from the crown, which King Brandon Stark accepts. Apparently no one told any of the other houses that was an option before the voting. That noise you hear in the background is the internal scream of Dorne and the Iron Islands' regret. Bran then immediately makes Tyrion his Hand, much to Grey Worm’s objection, his punishment for his crimes being to fix the many wrongs he’s made…by doing the same job he already had and screwed up in the first place. Apparently this made sense to everyone but Grey Worm. To keep the peace, Jon, rather than being freed or executed is sent to the Night’s Watch, which their former Lord Commander can’t believe still exists.

Beginning our final goodbyes, we get Jon finally back to his glorious windswept curly hair blowing in freedom as he prepares to head north. He gets stared down by Grey Worm for the last time, who is sailing with the rest of the Unsullied to Naath so that he can honor his word to Missandei to free her people and protect the home she loved so much. The Dothraki are also boarding up, presumably to sail back to Essos as well, but for whatever reason pay no mind to the man who murdered their Khaleesi. On the dock of the bay, the remaining Stark children, after years of being split up by war, finally choose their own fates. Sansa is returning home to rule the North in the Stark name, Bran of course will remain in the capital as King, but the girl who threw away her life as no one to reclaim herself as Arya Stark of Winterfell, decides to make good on a season six promise (made when she thought she had no more family) to sail to the end of the map and find what’s west of Westeros. It’s another moment at odds with the character who had gone through hell to get back to her loved ones, but perhaps more understandable in light of her decision to live for more than just vengeance.

After another uncertain time jump, we find Brienne of Tarth as Lord Commander of the Kingsguard flipping through the Book of Brothers (the White Book) to see Jaime Lannister’s accomplishments, which she fills in with her own hand. Resisting the petty urges in me to turn it into a Burn Book, the most honorable knight in Seven Six Kingdoms restores a bit of dignity to the Kingslayer’s name with Oathkeeper (and possibly Widow’s Wail) hanging on the wall of White Sword Tower. They really could have given it back to the Starks as a sign of goodwill since they were forged from Ice, but I suppose technically it is with the last trueborn son of Ned Stark after they were used to defend his daughters.

Back in the small council room, Tyrion methodically rearranges the deck chairs on the Titanic as we meet King Bran’s court. The new Hand is joined by Bronn, Lord of Highgarden and Lord Paramount of the Reach, as Master of Coin (because a scammer never dies); Ser Davos as the Master of Ships; and Sam Tarly as Grand Maester (despite not having earned any actual links on his chain) because white dudes always fail up. Sam presents Tyrion with the newest work from the Citadel, “A Song of Ice and Fire” detailing the entire series as they lean into the Tolkien. Bran came through dripping in his Kingly raven-themed fit pushed by none other than Ser Podrick, who got himself into the Kingsguard as well. Asking about Drogon’s whereabouts, the best information the council has was that he was flying east (possibly towards Volantis or Valyria) and Bran intones he might have better luck finding the dragon before abruptly being wheeled out of the meeting. Picking up where the series began, we have the small council ruling the country while the King does whatever he feels like, bored with the monotony of ruling.

Speaking of full circle, the series ends mirroring its opening shot from the cold open, with riders leaving Castle Black and setting out beyond the Wall. With the threat of the White Walkers apparently over and the wildlings reaching a peace with the Night’s Watch, the journey is much less perilous. Jon, back in his familiar black as King Crow, and the Stark children now have chosen the people they want to be, as scenes of each of them stepping into their destiny are intercut with their muted victories. Sansa receives the coronation she’s long deserved as Queen in the North, Arya sets sail to Valinor, and Jon — reunited with Ghost and Tormund — sets out with the rest of the Free Folk seemingly forever, choosing to live his life in the real North.

Turn out the lights, the party’s over! In a vacuum, I don’t hate most of the resolutions nearly as much as I thought I would (especially if we end up getting the Arya spinoff that we deserve). But that’s just it, the episode felt exactly like what it was, a mad dash to get to bullet point notes for character journeys. If it weren’t for the previous episodes lowering my expectations, I’d be more disappointed with so many character arcs ending in flat circles, erasing years of growth, but there was no way for them to land planes that had already crashed. In the end, almost none of the plot points that were so interesting had any payoff in the final story and could have been wholly excised, from Jon being Aegon Targaryen, to Arya learning how to be a Faceless Assassin, Daenerys’s fertility or Cersei’s pregnancy, but what’s done is done. Like Dexter, we got four incredible seasons of television, and a few great episodes after that, but now my watch has ended.

It’s been a privilege hopping on these recaps with you all, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts about the finale for good or ill.

[thestuckylibrary]

Hi, I was wondering if there are any fics you can rec that have no smut? I don't mind sex scenes but just looking for popular non-explicit fics that might fit the bill? Thank you for all the work you do!

Tags page 1 has fics sorted by rating. These tags might particularly interest you:

G / PG

T / PG - 13

M / R

Also, here are a few to start out with. I’ve organized them with G rated fics listed first, T rated next, and then M rated. 

But We Can Try by hetrez (complete | 10,567 | G ) 

Bucky said, “These are love letters, Rogers. You’ve been drawing me love letters.”

naturalization status by silentwalrus (complete | 807 | G ) 

The official press briefing on the apprehension of the DC14 assailant draws quite the crowd, and not just because Captain America is there.

Steve, Bucky, and the Tinhat Collective by mypedia (complete | 7,039 | G )

The internet and the Avengers fandom react to the events of Civil War.

***

avengers-daily:

How do they get 200% more attractive when they’re covered in dirt

2554 notes

Mistake on the Part of Nature by idiopathicsmile (complete | 1,274 | T )

Steve takes in Bucky’s betrayed look and Sam’s confusion, follows Sam’s gaze to the pile of mangled fruit in the trash can. Sudden comprehension fills his face.

“Oh,” he says. “Bucky found out about bananas.”

In which an American icon is mourned. But probably not the one you’re thinking of.

tin soldiers by idrilka (complete | 19,743 | T ) 

In his 2009 book on Captain America comic books, war photography, and American propaganda, Everett claims: “There is nothing to suggest that either the graphic novels issued during the war or the photographs taken during Rogers’ stay with the Howling Commandos can serve as a basis for a queer reading of Rogers and Barnes’ relationship. But even more importantly, there is nothing to suggest that such a relationship ever existed in the first place, and as such, those queer readings are not only misguided, but also libelous” (197).

[from: Lynn E. Anderson, Captain America: Behind the Mask. Steve Rogers and the Contemporary Hero Narrative (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), p. 242.]

In the aftermath of Steve’s return to the world of the living and the battle of New York, the academia and the Internet react.

A Precarious, Fragile Thing by Taste_is_Sweet (complete | 6,961 | T )

“I didn’t know he did that,” Tony said. He knew Bucky liked tucking himself so far under Steve’s arm that it was like he was trying to climb into his armpit. But he’d always stayed upright, just kind of plastering himself against Steve’s side. This blanket thing was new.

“Seventy years of skin hunger,” Steve said. His voice was just as soft, but for a moment his eyes flickered hot with anger, bright as the candy-colored screen. “He was always tactile. Now, when things get…well, sometimes it helps. The contact.”

And it looked…nice, the two of them together like that: Comfortable. Familiar. Safe. Tony knew what a precarious, fragile thing it was, to feel safe in the middle of the night.

White (Boi) Wolf by Lasgalendil (complete | 3,323 | T ) 

The one where Shuri sciences the shit out of everything and adopts a puppy—er, sad disgruntled POW in desperate need of a snarky little sister and an upgrade.

(Or, Shuri lends a hand.)

Count the Rings Around My Eyes by caughtinanocean (complete | 2,630 | T ) 

In the wake of his time with Arnim Zola, Bucky doesn’t trust anyone to tend his wounds—Steve, however, is not just anyone.

“I know it ain’t as nice as what you see in the mirror, Cap, but that’s not the sort of reaction a guy likes when he strips,” he quipped, face still covered by fabric that had once been white (before all the dried blood and sweat).

“Sorry, Buck.” Steve tossed the shirt out of the way. “Just, I know I owe you a lot of taking care of, but did you have to get it all outta the way in one go?”

Who Let You In?* by birdbrains (complete | 19,635 | T ) *consent issues due to past brainwashing which are eventually resolved 

“Is he here?” Sam asked.“I don’t know,” said Steve. “I’m—hey, Bucky, are you here? Can you hear me?”“Or whatever you prefer to be called,” Sam put in.“Yeah,” Steve said. “It’s me, that dumb guy with all the problems? Remember me?”

Slow Work by lorata (complete | 81,114 | T ) 

It’s 2011, men are allowed to marry, and Bucky is dead.

The future isn’t all that’s strange. Together in peacetime for the first time since before Steve took the serum, Steve and Bucky struggle to find their place – and each other – in the middle of a new millennium, new bodies, and new dynamics.

Or, just because you wake up in a century where everything you’ve repressed is magically okay, that doesn’t make it easy.

The Diaries of Bucky Barnes by afterlifeoftheparty (complete | 15,208 | T ) 

“This young soldier was writing about war, but not only that. No, the most remarkable extracts from his diaries are the ones about emotions; those passages in which he writes about loss and pain and loyalty and love.”

When Bucky Barnes’ diaries are leaked in the 70s, reactions vary from one thing to another, even decades later.

Blood* by leveragehunters (Monkeygreen) (complete | 45,682 | T ) *fantasy AU

In a world where magic is as commonplace as electricity, HYDRA worships a god who craves order through death. They used His blood to create fierce Soldiers then enslaved them by chaining their souls.

The man who was James Barnes is the last Soldier, the rest having been put down after succumbing to the call of the Blood. One night, out of control after a mission, the increasingly unstable Soldier runs into Steve Rogers. Instead of being turned into a red smear on the ground, Steve successfully talks him down. HYDRA decides to keep him. The Soldier’s the last one they’ve got; if Steve can keep him calm he’s going to do it whether he likes it or not.

Like fractious racehorses have companion goats, they hand Steve off to the Soldier as a kind of pet. But studies have shown pets can ease depression, despair and loneliness, lead to an increased sense of safety and well-being, and provide a source of protection and unconditional love. HYDRA really should have reviewed the literature before they decided to give Steve to the Soldier. Especially since, once Steve Rogers is involved, protectiveness can get slightly out of hand.

United States v. Barnes, 617 F. Supp. 2d 143 (D.D.C. 2015) byfallingvoices, radialarch (complete | 20,605 | T )

The Associated Press @APWinter Soldier set to stand trial for Washington D.C. massacre and treason apne.ws/1og6SWE

the inaccuracy of historical wartime dramas by Mici (noharlembeat) (complete | 3,039 | M ) 

There was nothing wrong with Howling Commandos, not really. It was new and shiny, made only six months before Steve woke up and on the brink of cancellation until it was announced that Captain America was found, at which point ratings skyrocketed. Steve would have heard of the series, except that he was too busy figuring out his phone, handling alien invasions, and battling crippling depression (that he would not admit to anyone, even himself). The result was that 25 episodes later, Howling Commandos was the most popular television shows about the war on the planet, with a loyal following, and Steve was almost totally oblivious.

(or: Steve has feelings, and shouldn’t ever watch television)

i heard love is blind by girl0nfire (complete | 1,159 | M ) 

Steve keeps bringing home guys that look like Bucky; Bucky keeps bringing home guys that look like Steve. Sam just wants to drink his coffee in peace. (Guest appearances by nearly every character Sebastian Stan and Chris Evans have ever played. Really.)

winter wheat, sunflower peat by newsbypostcard (complete | 25,284 | M ) 

In the dead of the night, a man pulls over for a hitchhiker.

i was found and now i don’t roam these streets by hipsterchrist (complete | 15,613 | M )

They’ve decided to start producing Bucky Bears again, now that he’s all shiny and redeemed and fighting for good on this big Avengers misfits team. “He has a little shiny gray arm,” Bucky says, wiggling the stuffed arm in question, one of the tweaks made in the new model. It takes Steve a second to realize that Bucky’s got a small smile on his face, actually looks a little bit proud around the eyes.

Or, Bucky relearns himself and how to be on a team, the rest of the Avengers try to get answers, and everyone watches too much Criminal Minds.

New Tricks by OddityBoddity (complete | 18,520 | M )

The one where Bucky busts up a dog-fighting ring.

Don’t Ask* by AnnaFugazzi (complete | 21,491 | M ) *period typical attitudes ; canonical character “death” 

Captain America and Bucky Barnes were like brothers. Everyone knew that.

[azukibeanghost]

[long post ahead - kind of meta, kind of philosophy; I might rewrite this later but feel free to reblog]

Captain America: The Winter Soldier just... resonates with me on some deeper level, like it’s addressing a hidden part of my subconscious. There’s a tension there, something that has existed under pressure for a long time, and sometimes I forget that exists but other times it feels like it’s just bottled up, boiling over, ready to explode.

.

I think that’s why I love the main suite by Henry Jackman, the “Captain America” theme: it starts out quiet, gradually building, persistent and at times violent, breaking up into the harsh Winter Soldier theme but always keeping that forwards momentum, building up that the deep, theater-rumbling tones of helicarriers crashing into the sea and ideals shattering like shifting cracks in age-old ice, but also bringing in the higher, almost wistful strains of purity and hope, lone notes rising brightly only to die out slowly – and the human voices at the end, falling with achingly numb rawness.

It’s not an uplifting song, but I wouldn’t call it “sad” either. It feels like the rage and despair that I feel simmering under the surface, all the time, but at the same time each note feels drawn-out, allowed to cry out but then be held, suspended, until it fades away under the cries of other notes amid the ever-pressing underlying percussion. Like screaming into a void, without any of the relief.

.

This to me embodies what I love so much about Steve Rogers’ characterization in this film: he is a man out of his time, struggling to adjust to the world around him, and uncertain whether he even belongs there at all.

Before, he had a mission – his whole life in the first movie was dedicated to fighting bullies, becoming a soldier, winning the war. He had ideals, and confidence in his side’s rightness. He had friends.

Coming out of that, and being thrust into the modern era with its high-tech spies and moral complexity, not being able to know for certain that the cause he was fighting for was right, or even respecting of him as an individual and not a pawn – and extending into his personal life, likely not even knowing for certain whether he wanted to continue living in this strange dream-universe of America, isolated from his friends and his sense of identity – that must have caused tremendous mental trauma, and it feels like Steve is still internalizing all of it, still struggling to pick up the pieces and catch up on all of the history and pop culture he’s missed, not really having any time or putting in any effort to make real human connections.

The way he brushes off Nat’s attempts to set him up on a date, the way he can’t trust his own team or his superior, the way he watches Peggy slowly fade away and shies away from Sam’s initial attempts to befriend him – he isn’t really grounded in the world.

He doesn’t have a place.

He seems cool on the outside, but you can hear all of the suppressed rawness at having been ripped out of his world and thrust into a new one through the music of the score.

The Winter Soldier’s theme is much more visceral, with metal screaming at the violation of his bodily autonomy and sense of humanity, at the state of his mind having been wiped and reprogrammed again and again; but Steve’s theme feels numb, drawn out in agonizing quietness, like the ice he was trapped in hasn’t completely thawed.

.

I can empathize with Natasha, as someone watching another person’s struggle from the sidelines, wondering how or even if I can comfort him when I don’t have any of the answers myself. She’s had to come to terms with the nature of her job years before, and understands that the world is too complex to really get attached to a side or hold yourself to a moral standard every time.

I love Sam, who understands this too but chooses to make a difference by building connections with people like Steve, to be better than the system, rather than wallowing in alienation from it.

And I feel that duality of Steve’s numbness and Bucky’s viscerality sharply; they each fight with the instinctual need to survive, to have some sort of autonomy in that moment even though neither of them is really free in their own lives.

That terror that Bucky wears on his face, in his eyes, at not being in control, at being forced to hurt others and do things that he would regret if he could remember them afterwards – the feeling that if he could just remember, there was something important there but it’s floating in and out of view, the tip of an iceberg, and if he gets too close it might gash into his industrially-constructed shell and sink him, drowning under the horror of everything he’s done – although I can’t relate to his physical experiences, that expression of terror embodies the raw mixture of rage, fear, and shame that at times threaten to tear through my conscience, if I spend too much time thinking about the world’s injustices and my role in perpetuating them. I don’t feel in control; the problems are too big.

And even though I’m not actually committing such grave crimes as assassination, sometimes it feels like They are forcing me to drive a knife through the heart of my fellow humans, forcing me to gun down the oppressed people within our society and trigger bombs all over the face of mother earth as I watch from within, trapped inside my own body, not in control.

.

The world is filled with Alexander Pierces and Nick Furys. And like Steve, I really don’t know if we can trust either. There’s a law in social science that states that no matter how good-intentioned people are, all leaders or organizations will inevitably become corrupted into preserving their own power over continuing to prioritize the organization’s goals. I don’t know how true that is, but the reality is that the world today scares me, and sometimes it feels like you really can’t trust anyone.

Sometimes it’s hard to see the people around me, and their good values and kind hearts, when the institutions and stratification loom above us like skyscrapers, casting massive shadows. How do we change all of that, within our lifetimes? How can we stop these deep-rooted problems before they destroy us? Is it even possible?

.

I feel like Steve’s displacement is a metaphor for my mental shift from childhood to adulthood. As a kid, I had lots of stong-held hopes and ideals about how the world worked. I was caught in that “good-old-days” mentality of Steve’s 1940s, aware of some of the ground-level problems but still confident in the idea that we can win the war, and then come home, and at least that will be a victory.

But being thrust into the reality of today, and not just the recent problems but also the realization that these problems have been happening this whole time – like Hydra, present within the very system I thought was pure – and that the people around me, already adults, are numb to these issues and have moved on in accordance with them... that was soul-crushing.

And I started emulating them, building back the walls of my little bubble, alternating between reading the news and then hiding in a shelter of books and dreams: feeling at one moment like the world is beautiful, the ocean and the sun are beautiful, nothing can crush my unbridled happiness – and then feeling the stress of deadlines and my future looming over me the next, and beginning to unpack the problems in society and realize how they work and how they will continue, reeling with the ideas of a journal article still fresh in my head as I walk into a grocery store and am hit with the sheer amount of plastic, the food waste, the low prices that I know come from exploitation but also the pressure to save money in our capitalist society.

And suddenly the thought of the ocean and the sun feels like a distraction, because the ocean is filling with plastic and chemicals and I need to do something to prevent another oil spill, but I can’t, because They’re too powerful and wealthy and I’m still trying to grapple with student loans – and why am I even worrying about this, when we’re bombing the Middle East and no one knows why because they don’t teach us about that in school, because this is America, because our country is founded on that poisonous combination of individuality and go-go-go accumulation, and the way that you win is to exploit the land and the people and anything else that gets in your way, and we all know that deep down but it’s wrapped in that propaganda that says that hey, maybe I can be one of the winners, and we’ve dominated so much of this planet that I don’t know how any alternate system can hope to overcome.

And it’s just one long, drawn-out scream underlying everything I do. Internalized, numb. Like that rawness has been put on ice, hushed, and a glossed-over version has been put on display in an air-conditioned museum: the facts are glorified and the electricity pollutes, but I’m tired of thinking that way so I just embrace the numb Americana of it all. The carpet is muffling, in a comforting sort of way, and the air is cool and smells faintly of cologne. This is not my world, but it’s the ideal that they present to me. I can see through the veil but at the same time I don’t want to... and so I don’t. Until that underlying rage comes back into the picture, and threatens to boil over, and I feel the shriek of metal all over again.

[resonanteye]

via http://resonanteye.net/the-new-american-death-cult/

The New American Death Cult: why your grandpa lost his mind, in 4 chapters.

Yes, we are dealing with a destructive cult. Yes, the people who want to “open up” and who are arguing with you about numbers and validity of studies and all that shit are arguing in bad faith and lying, because they want to die and they want to kill. That’s their goal.

They are not debating you or questioning to learn. They are using your space online to repeat the same propaganda they’ve been handed, and to get you tired out from fighting. Don’t let them do it.

Why now?

I should say, this didn’t start with trump. The roots of this cult are deep in America*. Trump may be the flower on the branch, but that’s all.

being arrested along with other KKK members

It started before I can rightly cover in this post, in any post. I am not a historian. I’ll be speaking only of more recent events, of things I have read and researched personally, of my own experiences and stories and accounts I’ve heard.

Part One: How Grandpa Lost His Sharp Mind

Many people know someone who was a professional, a scientist, a smart person, but who has lost their ability to discern reality from fiction.

  I’ve seen this described as “boomers warned us not to believe anything on the internet, and now they believe everything on the internet” and “my aunt was a FUCKING RN and now she doesn’t believe in bacteria and viruses, what happened to her decades of knowledge” and “it’s like their brain has decayed, they don’t believe in reality, and they have selective dementia, is that a real thing“, among other poetic and despairing descriptions.

it started before ebay, we can’t blame that

I think, from my personal experience, talk radio was the start of the slide for a lot of the (men, in particular) who are now part of the NADC (New American Death Cult). Screaming jocks mocking women, minorities, the poor. I won’t mention the more prominent except to say that trump himself was given a really large audience by Howard Stern for many years, for no real reason at all. There are far worse talk radio hosts. This of course, is all conservative or right wing talk radio, although the “beginner” shows pretend to be centrist.***

Of course then we can throw in the American  history of spite**, racist behavior and systems, misogyny in every imaginable form, and homophobia (trans phobia being more recently brought to attention, but part of all of it). Racism and misogyny are probably the most deeply embedded aspects of spite and hate in our country. The combination of the two is devastating for Black women and always has been. Talk jocks pushed this, hard.

Repetition and an appeal to the lizard brain, the spite, the racism/sexism/general xenophobia- this is where it starts. The more it’s repeated, the more it’s believed. Classic cult indoctrination includes repetitive, loud and affirming messages mixed with abuse. All cults share this. It’s how they get people firmly anchored in the alternative reality of the cult.

mugshots.

  Grannie Too?

And then there’s “churches”. Personally I do not think many of these qualify as religions at all, but only as smaller cults. Certainly, believing that you will be healed of cancer if you watch the right TV show is ridiculous- and when the show in question espouses political beliefs about minority or oppressed groups, it becomes even more questionable.

holy rollers change their brand, not their product

In the USA, there are certain religious/cult groups that are*** really happy to think the End Times might be here. Others that actively want to work to make the End Times.

slick, for the time

Holy Rollers are an older group in the Appalachians, who believe that your behavior doesn’t matter at all, only if you’ve “got the spirit in you” (been chosen). Prosperity cults believe the same thing- except they also believe that being rich means you were chosen. That you can make yourself rich by believing in the cult. That poor people are bad, because (insert any sin you please here) and that cult members can be anything- pedophiles, murderers, doesn’t matter- they must be good, because they are rich, because they were “chosen”. It’s a sick twist, and definitely a cult.

Dominionist cults believe all this and more. There’s also the idea, here, that they, being the chosen, should be in charge of the world and make the laws and enforce them so that everyone is following the rules of their cult.

To be clear these are cults rooted in Christianity, but they are not Christian. They are cults.

The more extreme groups believe in a variety of things- flat earth, young earth, all the anti-science you can imagine. These are the people who are terrified of microchips, of vaccines. These are the people who get in deep, after the time spent listening to repetitive cult propaganda they will go looking online for backup and there are plenty of conmen ready to sell it to them, in bottles or in words.

All of these cults believe women are not equal human beings- they are often violently anti-education, anti-birth control, anti-abortion. The control of women is very important to them.

There are parallels here to Islamic cults, to the Middle Ages and Dark Ages (outdated term, I think).

Next time: What about my cousin Bob?

We have not seen a cult this big in a long time. Probably the moonies and the flagellants (in the dark ages) come closest in number. It is definitely dangerous- destructive cults harm not only the members, but all those around them. And this cult in particular actively wants to kill as many people as possible.

Be safe, and be aware.

  *”American” is used in this essay to describe citizens and residents of the United States, and is not intended to disparage Canada, Mexico or any other American Continental nation. I’m sorry.

**”spite” is being used as a catch-all term in many cases throughout, but generally means “to wish to harm others for no logical reason, simply because they exist as they do”

***I would like to note that many Death Cults are, globally speaking, not right wing. Many have been left wing (jonestown was sold as ‘socialist’) and many are from other religious traditions (isis, am Shinrinkyo, to name a few). cults are a human phenomenon, not an American one.

next time;

Part Two: What About My Cousin Bob?

disclaimer that people didn’t read, apparently.

[yourwanderlustinthaneusbollywood]

Highest Grossing Bollywood Movies Of 2019

It's true, 2019 has been one of the strangest years for Bollywood. We got some great movies like Uri and Article 15. However, it's the ones that we just can't believe which made the top-grossing list of the year. 

Here are the top 10 highest-grossing movies of 2019, from the lowest to highest.

1. WAR

Release Date : 2 October’ 2019

Hrithik vs Tiger, if that is the premise of a Bollywood film, you already know it’s going to be a commercial entertainer with lots of action, dancing, plot twists and good looks. 

War delivers everything it promises and the actors make sure the audience leaves satisfied after the well choreographed action sequences, chases and fight scenes but still misses to strike a chord with a small part of the audience who expects more than just action in a film.

Starring Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff as the teacher-student duo, War is a thriller with unexpected plot twists that keeps you glued to your seats.

Tiger plays a student who is hell bent on getting back his teacher, Hrithik who went rogue after a mission. While the plot may seem simple, it is anything but that. 

War also has the oomph factor of every YRF film with the gorgeous Vaani Kapoor pulling off risky aerial stunts and matching steps with Hrithik through the film.

 While most of the audiences could not stop gushing over how picturesque the film is and how it keeps you hooked, many were disappointed with the climax of the film.

Total Collection : ₹479.79 Cr.

2. KABIR SINGH

Release Date : 21 June’ 2019

Kabir Singh, or Arjun Reddy for that matter, is basically an updated Devdas, a loser in love, with additional anger management issues, who hits the bottle at the drop of the hat. 

There’s even a Chunni babu in his life in the form of bestie Shiva who keeps coming to his rescue and appears to have no life whatsoever of his own. 

In fact not a single character in the apology of a script — from his college principal to the family to the hospital staff — seems to have any raison d’etre other than pandering needlessly to a man, who, instead of any sympathy or indulgence for his “troubled” mind needs some serious treatment and therapy to control the inherent noxiousness he is spreading in the world around him.

 The entire arc of the film is to somehow make his negativity attractive, explain it away as “unconventional” and have him find redemption despite his unforgivable ways. Well, he is a genius at everything after all, even at performing surgeries when he is sloshed and coked out.

Total Collection : ₹390.72 Cr.

3. URI - SURGICAL STRIKE

Release Date : 11 January’ 2019

Uri The Surgical Strike is the first of the several political films this year. The film starring Vicky Kaushal and Yami Gautam is the first big Bollywood release this year. 

The performance by Kaushal makes Uri a decent watch.

Over the years, many Bollywood filmmakers have decided to take the patriotic route and make nationalism-infused dramas. Patriotism is the key to the hearts of the audience and this formula seems to be working fairly well, and box office numbers are proof.

The latest in the slew of nationalist films is Uri: The Surgical Strike, starring Vicky Kaushal, Paresh Rawal, Yami Gautam and Kirti Kulhari. It is based on the September 2016 retaliation surgical strikes carried out by the Indian Army in response to the terror attacks at Uri, the army base camp in Kashmir. Vicky plays the role of a dedicated soldier, Vihaan, who is known for his meticulous strategising and planning in missions. After a successful mission, he wishes to retire from army life, as his mother needs him.

However, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, played by Rajit Kapur sanctimoniously reminds him, "Desh bhi toh humari maa hai." Deshbhakti and veiled propaganda ahead of the 2019 elections reverberate more strongly than the background music sometimes.

Total Collection : ₹342.09 Cr.

4. BHARAT

Release Date : 5 june’ 2019

BHARAT is based on the 2014 Korean flick Ode To My Father (directed by Yoon Je-kyoon; written by Park Su-jin). 

The story has been Indianized very well and the important events of post-Independence India like the death of Jawaharlal Nehru, rise of unemployment, the 1983 Cricket World Cup final, era of liberalisation and globalisation, emerging trend of redevelopment etc are well inserted in the narrative. 

Ali Abbas Zafar and Varun V Sharma’s screenplay is effective and keeps viewers engaged from start to finish. The emotional sequences especially are quite well written. Ali Abbas Zafar and Varun V Sharma’s dialogues are simple and sharp, and even quite funny at places. 

Total Collection : ₹325.58 Cr.

5. Mission Mangal

Release Date : 15 August’ 2019

Mission Mangal, starring Akshay Kumar and Vidya Balan, has hit the screens. Jagan Shakti's directorial venture makes for an interesting Independence Day watch.

This is a recurring line throughout Mission Mangal, and practically every character says it emphatically with an air of despair. But you forget, when you have Akshay Kumar around with a very fiercely determined Vidya Balan, how is anything impossible? 

And so, that's what Mission Mangal is all about, achieving the unthinkable. The film tells the inspiring tale of India's first Mars Mission, Mangalyaan, which was launched in 2013. 

Mission Mangal begins with the failure of GLSV Fat Boy, and Akshay heroically taking the blame for someone else's mistake. And so, he is shunted over to the Mars Mission, which no one expects anything from.

Total Collection : ₹290.46 Cr.