#and also im not denying anyone elses importance for this season

[pinkeoni]

Do you see that. That’s your season baby.

[the-chessboard-is-personal]

i am so normal about PET team hermitcraft10

sO NORMAL

like i KNOW the symbolism is fake and im just incapable of letting go of Do2 as a concept

but whAT IF

you THINK about it

Tango created Do2, Etho won it, and Pearl figured out the secret message. Those are. Special things i thgink

and those three specifically are a group in s10.

and it's obviously because they're friends with each other and just normal reasons !!

but. consider THIS

The Creator, the Winner and the Queen

Surprise Fanfic attack!

Season 9 didn't really... end.

Well, it did, but small pieces of it were still lingering. Clinging to the future in what tiny, subtle ways they could.

Mumbo's title cards were, somehow, one of the things they were latched onto the most. But after a while of living on — or even just Watching the server, you'd know to expect him to be... unorthodox.

<Mumbo walked into the danger zone due to Llama>

But there were other things. There always was. For one, there was Demise. The last little pieces of not only Season 6, but also the Life series, although Grian would deny that if ever asked. It was only fair to give the new guys something they were used to, to adjust them to the new experience.

But there was something else as well.

The postal service was another one of those pieces of the past. Or, at least, its founders were. They never talked about it, the style of the build never reflected it, but as anyone familiar with the server's antics would know, when you create an entity that's true nature is beyond comprehension even to yourself, it follows you.

Tango knew. He knew the other two knew. He knew they knew he knew. Or, at least, he thought they knew.

With the way the postal office was built, wandering its cozy halls on occasion felt like traversing a maze. All three of them knew this. They each thought they were the only one who knew there was a why.

Of course Tango knew. He knew everything about that beast, the presence that had made itself known in the Citadel, that which he himself created, and yet somehow also didn't. He knew it all. Or, at least, that's what he told everyone last season. What he told himself.

Etho knew. He knew the familiarity of what the building made him feel. He knew whenever he held a piece of gold, hesitating just a moment to feel the memories come a little closer. But he only ever allowed himself that moment. It was a gold block, not a trophy.

Pearl knew. She was the one to figure it out, after all. The message wasn't important back then, when that word, that name, had a real owner. But she had to have known why she, ever so subtly, could never stop thinking about that name as she opened the door to the office.

If any of them slept in there, they dreamt of ice and fire, those two distinct roars they knew so well, of ghostly laughs and those tolling bells. It was a chaos they all knew too well. Of running through halls like power running through a circuit like the strange aura running through the River.

They had been here before. They had been to this building they'd never seen and she'd just built, the house was new but the home felt ancient. And they were happy. They were haunted by something that wouldn't ever let go of the server fully, and they welcomed it.

Pearl gave a soft laugh whenever she was walking alone in the building and saw the movement of horns from the edge of her vision, or mistook a satchel on a shelf for a golden crown adorned with eight spikes and four claws. Etho gave a smug but friendly smile, unseen to all but the one it was intended for when he thought he heard the distant whistle of a note block, or the soft clatter of a key from a dropper. Tango was comforted by the darkening of the air, a presence that was ominous but a few months ago now felt more like a reassurance that a friend hadn't left, like a hand placed softly on an uncertain shoulder.

They all knew it was intentional. Fate spun by a place that had played games with them as much as they had with it, yet it brought them together to show its compassion, or perhaps, its gratitude.

[doyouevenshipbr0]

u know what. im in the mood to piss ppl off. heres my ranking of the 10 strongest waterbenders in atla and lok (not including avatars, and im not including anything from kiyoshi or yangchen’s era. i havent read those hehe. sowwy. strictly going off the shows).

now im doing this bc waterbending is by FAR my fav form of bending. and in MY OPINION!!!!!,,, people overlook some pretty important facts and feats and decide based more on who their favs are. this is my opinion anyways so im sure i inevitably did that too! but anyways. here we go.

10 strongest waterbenders:

honorable mentions: kya- listen. she is my GIRL. and also she is very strong, but at the end of the day, shes a healer. she has very little combat experience, and she was up against some real monsters in tlok. and shes known to be a great healer, but we dont even see that much of that. for this reason, she cant be top 10:/. eska and desna- they are GOOD. and their synchronized waterbending is super interesting. unfortunately i just kinda think everyone else in the top 10 is stronger. and i feel like the reason they are so strong is because they’re a unit. if they were separated, i have doubts.

10. tonraq- right off the bat im wondering if im going off biases LOL. but i love him. i love his style of bending. he is arguably my fav waterbender to watch waterbend. but unfortunately, in most of his fights, he’s kindaaaa getting worked (im on s2 of lok rewatch now. so i may be forgetting some stuff. but the big fights that stick out for me are him vs unalaq where he gets worked and him vs zaheer and korra where again, he gets kinda worked.) very clearly strong, but does not have all that much to show for it in the show. but he fights with all the big shots for a reason, and he led the water tribe army or something like that. so. hes good.

9. huu- i honestly don’t remember a whole lot of him, but swamp style of water bending is super interesting, and he clearly does it the best. i know we dont see a whole lot of him, but i cant overlook that he is THEE swamp bender.

8. pakku- obv. hes a member of the white lotus and was the master waterbender of the northern tribe. a slayer for his time but i do think he is outclassed by most waterbenders we see in tlok. cannot deny his strength tho. he was the goat at one time for a reason!

7. hama- as far as we know, she is the first blood bender. aka the strongest aspect of waterbending. she is a LEGEND. but again, i think she was a master for her time, but would have trouble holding her own in modern day bending esp without a fully moon.

6. ming hua- the way she uses waterbending as an extension of herself is clearly masterful. and i feel like we never see anyone utilize waterbending anything like how she does. unfortunately, she cant be any higher bc we dont see any extraordinary sub-water feats (healing… i think???? don’t remember lol. bloodbending, spirit healing). but clearly, she was an insane threat to everyone around her.

5. unalaq- so like. MAYBE he should be 4, but i really hate him lol. but i cannot deny he is an EXCEPTIONAL waterbender and pretty much no other waterbender (that we see in s2) can even TOUCH him. hes got the spirit healing, and hes got the skill. somethin somethin vaatu vaatu. idk. i hate him and i dont rly like this season lol. moving on.

4. katara- ok. she was the best in atla. no ifs and or buts. HOWEVER. she gets outclassed in lok and i think we know why. BUT. she was a complete prodigy as soon as she started training with pakku. there was no extension of waterbending that she could not do. she clearly thrived learning waterbending how she did, in such a fast paced, high pressure, and high stakes situation, and thats not even HER PRIME! she was waterbending for under a year when we see her. and we still got the greatest waterbender of that time. there was no one like her, and no waterbender could hold a candle to her by the end of atla. and once again, was only 14. only waterbending for a year. whos doing it like my sis?!

3. tarrlok- unfortunately for katara, the bloodbending family, without a doubt, outdoes her. bloodbending without a full moon? done and done. sorry! i believe katara COULD bloodbend outside of a full moon given the extensive training tarrlok and noatak were given but unfortunately, we will never know, so i cannot in good conscience put her any higher than 4. tarrlok was a master waterbender in itself and pretty much a master blood bender.

2. yakone- he bloodbent. a whole courtroom. with his mind. we dont see anything else from him, and we really dont need to. sorry. it is what it is.

1. amon- he bloodbends with his mind. and learned to take away someone’s bending ability with blood bending. katara, the best healer in the world, could not restore korras bending. granted, she was probably going about it wrong, but the point is, she couldnt do it. taking away someones bending with bloodbending just takes the cake. that aside, even in a combat setting, when he wasnt even trying he was wooping on all other benders of all kinds bc he was controling their movements w his mind. imagine him openly using waterbending AND having his mind control technique?! he would be unstoppable. im ngl i dont love how lok handles waterbending/bloodbending in general. i kinda think they made it TOO strong with little reasoning). also we do see him do an awesome lil water tornado at the end. so. not that we needed that, but its a cute lil cherry on top to his waterbending. hes the strongest waterbender. sorry!

want to finish this by saying had katara learnt to bloodbend outside of a full moon, she would be number one. and i do believe she could have learned. but she didnt. so she cant be first.

[justalads]

c!niki and c!wilbur enjoyers. pspspspspspsps

alright guys so last night i rewatched pretty much all of the pogtopia arc. and this isn’t meant to be a big, important analysis post (it’s kind of incomprehensible), because my brain is fried from, you know. rewatching pretty much all of pogtopia. but i do have some stuff i’d like to say.

(this also just became a niki meta sorry i love her. i really just got emo about her during the second half of this and it got long. i have a lot of feelings about her and wilbur’s friendship.)

it’s a pretty general conclusion that wilbur’s real “downfall” began on october 8th, during the stream “who are you go away”. of course, his spiral and the process of him losing faith had begun much earlier, more around the end of the first war or during the election. but the big switch, so to say, was definitely here, when as wilbur walks back from schlatt’s announcement, he asks tommy if they’re the bad guys.

this entire scene was so interesting to me. wilbur here is a man who has lost hope, someone who is backed into a corner morally and has nothing left. he points out that they can never really reclaim l’manburg without forever tainting it, and that schlatt knows this. the entire half an hour or so before, schlatt has been taunting wilbur about losing that power. the emphasis of the festival on “democracy” is so clearly a barb thrown at wilbur, and it works.

wilbur’s “nothing left to lose” in this vod is a mirror to niki’s “you know what they say about a woman who has nothing left to lose”. this will not be the first time they mirror each other.

basically, wilbur’s angry. when schlatt announced the festival, wilbur realized that maybe it wasn’t a terrible thing. so once he worked around into the mindset of “we’re the bad guys”, he was able to justify saying he was going to blow up the nation with no remorse. he wants chaos! he wants no survivors!

does he do it? god no.

during the streams leading up to november 16th, wilbur is consistently scared. he goes back and forth on it, and makes multiple “conditions” that determine whether he’s going to do it or not, almost begging someone to stop him. he whispers to himself that he’s scared, that his hands are shaking, that he’s not sure if it’s the right thing to do. because despite what he says about “not caring about any of them”, the instant niki is threatened after tubbo’s death, wilbur walks up to schlatt and tells him that if he’s going to kill anyone it should be him. later, when quackity and tommy talk him down from pressing the button, he can’t press it because they’re there and he can’t bring himself to kill them as well.

but he has no problems with putting his own life at risk. he refuses to wear armor half the time, and actively places himself in harm’s way to save others. he still cares about everyone else, as much as he says he doesn’t. even when he does cause harm to others, during november 16th, he immediately begs phil to kill him. “look, they all want you to.” he can’t live with what he’s done, and how he’s hurt people, but he couldn’t allow manburg to continue.

the man is terrified and angry and he can’t win. and even as he tries to stuff himself into the mind of someone who doesn’t care, he cannot. when he finally does, he cannot live with being that person.

but the reason i rewatched this arc was to see niki’s point of view, especially after her statements during her last stream. i genuinely think that wilbur’s only betrayal of her was pressing the button, because he betrayed everyone. they might have known he was going to do it, but they had faith he wouldn’t.

wilbur cared a lot about niki. her life under schlatt was awful, wilbur hated that she was suffering, and the scene where wilbur plants himself directly in the center of the festival and tells schlatt to kill him instead hits pretty hard. he has the argument with schlatt, and then turns to niki and tells her to run. he then hits people and sprints away, trying to give her time to escape.

this is also when he asks her to join pogtopia, because now that schlatt has said he’d kill her, it’s a safer place for her.

so the man did care about her. niki is angry at the memory of him that she has. it’s been twisted by time and her own grief and paranoia.

in rewatching pogtopia, i realized that a lot of people hate the memory of wilbur. not him, and what he did. they think he didn’t care. and to quote hamilton (apologies):

“history obliteratesit paints me in all my mistakes”

does niki have a right to be mad at him? absolutely. he caused direct harm to her by blowing up l’manburg, once it was reclaimed. but she’s wrong that he never cared.

(an interesting note: wilbur only blows it up after techno starts fighting people outside. he hears it, and says “look, they’re fighting”. he didn’t re-initiate the conflict of the country. the fact that even after peace was won people were fighting just gave evidence to his belief that the entire country was corrupted.)

niki has been hurt a lot, and wilbur has things to answer for. but we as the audience know that her statements are just her perception. she is a character who acts on perceptions. the entire stream was in black and white. during doomsday, upon seeing wilbur log on (as ghostbur), niki has a panic attack and destroys her bakery, trying to rid herself of the pain of the memories. her lines during this stream are chilling, whispered repetitions that are a mirror of wilbur’s end.

(paraphrased, it was long and confusing but there are a few bits and this was the essence of it)

“wilbur is gone. this isn’t happening. he is dead. l’manburg is gone.”“it is real, i am real, he is real and he is dead.”“l’manburg is gone, i am real, i am l’manburg”.

(god. dude i could spend Months analyzing this one stream alone. there’s so much here.)

doesn’t that sound a bit like “my unfinished symphony”? wilbur and niki both attach their own self to the nation they fought for, and can see it as an extension of themself. they both destroy parts of it in acts of fear, attempting to save everyone else from what they’ve made.

what i pulled away from niki’s stream is that she’s not healing. i remember the chamber she locks herself in at night. i remember her refusal to eat. i remember how she was so angry at tommy, and she later realized that anger was misguided. niki genuinely believes that wilbur did not care about her, and that’s not surprising: when he died, she denied the fact that he was gone. she represses the things that she can’t handle, same as lots of other people. it is easier for her to pin her hurt on wilbur, because she needs somewhere to pin it. people feel more in control if they’re angry, not sad.

the song cc!niki said was for her character really emphasizes this. it’s a coping mechanism.

but even condemning wilbur won’t help, because she will still never get closure. niki cares about what others think of her, and so she can’t move on from someone hurting her. she can’t move on because she thinks he hated her. she is angry that he is back, but it is an opportunity for her to heal. she couldn’t heal when he was gone. she’s not the only one with a negative perception of wilbur, after all. he has one too. the two of them really need to talk.

i want niki to be healthy and safe. i want to see her heal so badly, and i do think it will happen. after wilbur died, his betrayal of her stayed with her, and it eventually became her memory of the betrayal that she hated, not the thing itself. it’s been months since it happened. niki wants to find an outlet for her hurt, because she wants to feel better. there’s a pattern i noticed: she only gets mad at people once she hasn’t seen the person themself for a while. and once she sees them and talks to them, and realizes that they care about her and don’t want to hurt her, she stops blaming them for it. she only hates her perception of them. example one? tommy.

man was in exile for a long time, and when he came back he “brought” fighting. that’s how niki saw it. but the fact that after she spent time with tommy (trying to kill him but. details, details) she forgave him because she saw it wasn’t his fault is a really good sign.

i genuinely think that speaking to wilbur will help niki, and it will also help wilbur. after all, they both hate wilbur. the entire perception of wilbur as some heartless, crazy manipulator needs to be shattered for both of their sakes. they both buy into it.

i want niki to know that others care about her, and that she has places she can feel safe. she hates that wilbur is invading the syndicate, because she’s scared of his memory hurting her. i don’t think wilbur will hurt her on purpose, because even though he sees himself as awful, he doesn’t hate her. he never did. usually, with people who have hurt someone else, i want them as far away from the person they hurt as possible. if wilbur does hurt niki i’ll probably cry. but again, it’s not him that hated her, or really him that hurt her in the way she thinks he did. when wilbur was dead, niki didn’t get any better. her memory of him festered and made her feel worse. that’s also why niki killing wilbur or hurting him somehow wouldn’t help her heal. i want wilbur to explain that he didn’t hate her. is wilbur even close to self aware enough to help niki? nah. this is going to take a Long time, and it’s going to hurt.

last thing i swear lol

during niki’s stream, she says that wilbur manipulated her. again, i watched pogtopia last night, and i’ve watched the rest of season one recently as well. i genuinely don’t see it. but i do think i know why she said it.

during season one, wilbur doesn’t manipulate niki. he doesn’t have a chance to later, he’s dead. so then, what is she talking about? of course it’s a perception, same as a lot of her other claims. i think she’s talking about how she cared for l’manburg.

niki joined the server as wilbur’s friend, to join his nation. she grew to care for l’manburg. she devoted herself to it, same as he did. but doomsday showed us that she hates that. in niki’s eyes, l’manburg only brought pain for people, and because she ties herself to it, she hates that she ever cared about it. she can’t allow herself to care for it, because it was used to hurt. so how does she cope with knowing that she once did? she pretends she didn’t.

if she can convince herself that it was wilbur who convinced her to care about l’manburg, she can avoid blaming herself for her own pain. and yeah, she shouldn’t blame herself for it. it’s not her fault. the entire situation is tragic and a little hopeless and once again really makes me hope that she recovers. l’manburg was ruined for her by others. schlatt, techno, dream, wilbur. again another place where she and wilbur are similar: they convince themselves they never cared about l’manburg because of the hurt it caused.

to summarize: wilbur’s going to get a shock soon. don’t know when, but probably the prison visit. something is going to shake his perception, the story is hurtling towards that. once he is able to take responsibility for what he did, and feel safe (because a lot of what he does now is out of fear of being alone or useless), then he and niki need to talk. niki needs something to get her out of her own head. she’s spiraling too. they are essential to each other’s recovery because of how much they meant (and mean) to each other.

anyways i miss early season one niki i liked it when she was happy :(

~ Lad 2

[thomas-the-tank-engene]

Too Late

pairing: heeseung x reader, jay x reader (platonic),

genre: angst :,)

wc: 1.5k

warnings: none hopefully

a/n: this is not based on my life rn im doing so good mhmm ._.

(lmao this is literally me ranting pretty much there is no real fic, but i might write another one depending on what happens within the next week or so, may delete this later anyway sooo...)

summary: you realise your feelings for heeseung are mutual too late

“I didn’t want to be the one to tell you this but someone has to,” Jay spoke, eyes already overflowing with pity. You didn’t like where this was going. Nothing good ever came after a sentence like that. The elder boy glanced around, perhaps waiting to see if anyone else was eavesdropping on their conversation in the small indie cafe, sitting on the outskirts of the city.

“You know, I’m not even supposed to know.” You rolled your eyes, wanting Jay to just get it over with and tell you. He was probably just exaggerating. Jay was definitely a drama queen. It was most likely something small that had nothing to do with you. However, the sincere concern rolling off of him like waves told a different story. He gazed at you like you were a fragile piece of glass. Dread began to build in your stomach. You unconsciously began to play with the sachet of sugar placed on your saucer beside the coffee. Listening as the individual grains danced with each other.

“No one can know I told you this. And you especially can’t do anything. You have to pretend you never heard what I’m about to tell you. Just continue like nothing happened.” Well now you were just tired of waiting, you wanted to know. What information could make Jay this antsy, and why was it so important to you specifically? It seemed as if the noise of the cafe stilled, also interested in Jay’s story of the week.

“Just tell me already Jay, I get the message. It's totally top secret. I won’t tell anyone. My only friends are you guys anyway so who else would I tell besides Hee-ryung.” You crossed your arms, attempting to appear nonchalant, but on the inside, you were far from it. Overactive imagination running wild with possibilities. Jay seemed to cringe at the end of your statement, moving his head around once more. You sighed loudly and finally, he breathed in deep, mouth open ready to let the truth fall from his lips.

“Hee-ryung and heeseung have been dating for three months.”

You tried to show no response, attempting to be unaffected by the news. That was harder than one might imagine. Your heart and mind betrayed you, clearly displaying the negative emotions coursing through your body right now for the older boy to see.

Your very own friend, and the guy you had liked since you were 15, were dating. No matter how many times you had told yourself over the last three years that you were over him, it never seemed to be the case. He’d always find a way to slither back in and make himself at home in your heart.

Was that why Hee-ryung asked if you still liked him a few months ago? Probably. You couldn’t believe she would do such a thing. And why wouldn’t she tell you?

You’d been friends since diapers. But the more you thought about it, the more sense it made.

You’d only decided to tell her less than a year ago. When you finally thought you were close enough friends so that she wouldn’t go run and tell him as soon as she got the chance. She smiled at first, but it felt forced. You didn’t think about it much at the time, knowing it was exam season and she was probably just tired. But she was bubbly and excited before you told her.

And yes, the pair of them were close, people always commenting on the fact that they looked like a couple. However, both denied such claims. Making vomiting sounds at the mere suggestion. But thinking about it now, you remember it was more so him, that would have a negative reaction, while she remained silent. Only giving a reaction if specifically asked. “No he’s like a brother to me, I could never date him.”

Well, that was a fucking lie.

Would it burn less if she told you herself?

You breathed in deep, trying to just listen to what Jay had to say for now. You could think about it later.

“They aren’t telling many people at the moment, but Hee-ryung told me the other day.”

He was silent for a few seconds, causing you to abruptly stand up. The air in the cafe suddenly too suffocating. However, Jay spoke up again.

“That’s not all,” You froze. If there was more, did you really want to know?

Maybe it was best if you didn’t. How were you supposed to act like you didn’t know the first piece of information, let alone more?

Your heart longed to know more. A sick part of you loved torturing yourself with the truth, so, you sat back down, and looked at Jay expectantly.

He bit his lip for a second, sighing loudly as if debating on telling you or sparing your heart.

“Just tell me,” You stated.

“Okay, well apparently, heeseung used to like you too, but he gave up because you're moving soon.”

Well shit.

Clink. Splosh. Slurp. Eeek. Crunch. Crack.

Your head was empty. No thoughts could be formed. But the sounds of the small coffee shop echoed through the void.

“Apparently someone told him that you couldn’t do long distance, so he gave up.”

Clink. Splosh. Slurp. Eeek. Crunch. Crack.

You knew who told him that.

You’d asked her for advice, seeing as she was one of his best friends.

“As much as I love you babes I have, to be honest. I don’t know if it would work. You’re moving away next year, and he’s staying here. I know he could make a long-distance relationship work, but could you?”

“Well, I think that I’d be alrigh-”

“We can't fight what the heart wants, can we? Would you be able to resist your desires while you’re so far apart?”

You didn’t respond after she said that. How could you? What was she accusing you of? Who did she think you were? Unloyal? Certainly not.

“So personally, my guess is that after heeseung decided to get over you, she swooped in and they’ve been dating pretty much ever since.” Jay continued, unaware of the turmoil going on inside.

Clink. Splosh. Slurp. Eeek. Crunch. Crack.

Clink. Splosh. Slurp. Eeek. Crunch. Crack.

Clink. Splosh. Slurp. Eeek. Crunch. Crack.

“Are you okay?” Jay asks hesitantly.

And you decide that you are.

Smiling at the boy, you nod your head. Jay isn’t certain he believes you but attempts to return the smile. In fact, he’s almost put off by your response.

“There’s nothing I can do about it anyway. And they’re both my close friends, so I’m happy for them. Plus, I wouldn’t want to ruin anything. They both mean a lot to me and their happiness should come first.” You felt almost robotic. Like you had to be okay. Like that was a response written by the author in your head.

“You’re allowed to be upset. I would be. She’s your friend.”

Crack.

“Yeah, she was.”

Maybe if you’d been a little bit more observant, you would have noticed. Would you have saved yourself from this heartache?

You recall her bringing him up on one occasion. Jokingly, you had asked for her to tell you his faults, hoping to dull the crush that seemed to burn so bright inside of you.

“If I’m being honest, he really has no faults, he’s just an all-round amazing guy. His only fault is being faultless.”

Well, that was as clear a sign as any.

How could you not see then? That those were not the words of a mere friend but of a fool drunk on love. Too blinded by their obsession for a person to see the truth. Even you weren’t too dumb to ignore the truth.

You knew for a fact he had a crippling addiction to energy drinks, to the point that it was getting concerning. You knew that he wasn’t good at being serious in professional situations. Often goofing around in front of the Senior Headmaster in high school. And you knew that he wasn’t always that nice to his younger brother.

Were you just as much a fool as her for liking him while still knowing his faults?

You’d decided that it was enough torture for today.

“Thank you for telling me. I appreciate it.” You smiled at the older boy, although it most likely appeared as a grimace.

“Hey, any time. And if you need me, or want to rant, or just want some company, I'm only a message away.”

“Thanks Jay,”

Said boy, sensing your need to be alone, slowly got up. He gave your head a small pat before heading off and out of the cafe, into the frost of the evening.

You didn’t want to cry over a boy. That was just sad and pathetic and you were certainly not that desperate. But you couldn’t help the few that escaped.

Maybe if you’d worked up the courage to tell him how you really felt you wouldn’t be here right now.

Sitting at a slightly sticky table in a small cafe, with the sound of teacups chiming and your heart cracking echoing in your ears.

It was all too little, too late.

[alyblacklist]

Hey, I know you are not feeling the most friendly toward Red and TBL in general right now but I can't help but wonder of Red was right. I mean Liz was killed by Van Dyke (was that his name) who worked for Townsend. Townsend wanted Liz dead because of whatever Ivan Stepanov told him. I assume that was Red's big secret. If so, wasn't Red right about not telling Liz the secret. I mean she has a history of trusting people even though she doesn't know them well. Example: she trusted Jennifer after they had just met. Jennifer could have been working for an enemy yet Liz trusted her because of a biological connection (which she had no proof of). Also, blonde Kat, need I say more. She has proved that she has no sense of loyalty whatsoever betraying Red and the task force multiple times:

1.21/ 1.22 (Though, she had just found out that Red killed her father. I think that can be excused)

Season 3- she faked her death- did she not consider what she would be doing to Red, Ressler, Cooper, Aram, Samar and Dembe or did she just not care ? using gifs to make my point

Season 6- She turned Red in, nearly getting him killed and putting the TF, including herself, in danger. What if the government had decided to disavow all of them??

Season 8- She goes on the run, betraying the people who've stood by her for years and dedicates herself to killing the man who's protected her since she was a kid and has literally traded his life for hers. All of this for a woman who claims to be her mother. She values this alleged biological connection so much she ignores all the horrible things she knows blonde Kat has don.

Liz says she values honesty above all else and hates Red for not telling her things, but she constantly lies to, uses and manipulates the people she calls her family.

Opinions?

Thanks!

im posting this on my blog too.

I've gone back and forth on whether I should even answer this ask because I'm like a week late due to life events intervening but maybe I do need to say it:

I categorically and emphatically disagree with the idea that Red was EVER right in not telling Liz his secret because Liz was somehow untrustworthy. Liz resorted to trusting virtual strangers such as Jennifer and the fake Katarina only after Red repeatedly and mercilessly withheld basic information about HER OWN LIFE from her for years, all the while killing her adoptive father, admitting he "hired" her husband, killing Mr. Kaplan, killing her "mother" as far as she knew until the very end, keeping Kirk and Tom and anyone else who ever tried to get her the truth from telling her to the point that Tom died, all the while telling her it was either none of her business but done for her "protection"....I mean, come ON. She was not a child! She was a 35+ mom of a child who deserved to know why she was in all of this nebulous, supposed "danger" her whole life. She deserved to be invested in Red's plans especially when he expected her to take over his empire. What - she was supposed to do that blind to its purpose? To figure it out from that stupid letter?

Red held all the cards from day one. He allowed Dembe, and Dom and Ivan Stepanov - the important MEN in his life to know his secret and yet he couldn't bring himself to ever tell Liz. This is probably my biggest issue with the show right now. It was like everyone BUT Liz got to know "THE TRUTH." Even in the end - even after his SWORN ENEMY Townsend learned "THE TRUTH" he had to condition LIZ learning it on that stupid letter and his requirement that she KILL HIM? Who does that? Why is that in any way acceptable? We don't know. The only reasons we (the audience) were even given were a whole bunch of none of your business and I'm not sure why I can't tell her. Nothing - NOTHING - that Liz ever did supports how Red treated her in the end. Nothing except Red's colossal ego.

If the bones were really her biological father's as we have been told, she had a right to know that and why.

If Red is her biological mother as they hinted, it's even worse. And no, I still don't accept that as canon but I can't deny that's where they've left us with the teasing. Because then there is no larger motive or purpose to protect her mother or innocent third parties. Then, it is exactly as presented in 8.21/8.22 - all of this only to keep her mother (Red) hidden and Liz "safe" (an abject failure in the end). What a whole lot of death and destruction to protect a woman who wanted nothing more than to know WHY she needed to be protected. Who desperately wanted agency over her own life and deserved to have it. Who was an ADULT with a child of her own.

Even if Red is NOT her mother and is still an unrelated third man (as I hope) it's not much better. Maybe then he's at least conflicted between protecting Katarina/others while keeping Liz in the loop but this again begs the question - why enter/re-enter her life at all? Why keep her in the dark on these nebulous threats when the biggest threat ever seemed to be chasing after the mother she wasn't even aware of until AFTER Red entered her life? She was FOUR when her mother died. She was never, ever in danger unless and until the world learned she was leverage to get to Katarina, which they never would have learned had Red not done what he did for his own selfish reasons.

From where I sit, there was never, ever a good reason not to tell her why she was in danger and what her connection was to Red and to let her be a full invested player in her own future, and Agnes's future. I think Liz could have been trusted if Red would have trusted her. Yes, I get we wouldn't have a show if they had chosen to fill her in. It's the premise. But to see any part of audience defend Liz remaining in the dark after eight seasons because they just love Red/Spader so much that he can do no wrong, nope, I'm not ok with that. As things stand now, there was never a reason for Liz not to know "THE TRUTH" beyond Red's ego. And I guess that is why I cannot look forward to S9 because if he gets to prance around and pretend like nothing happened and it wasn't all his fault, and everyone happily claps while he does his thing, I will still be seething and raging. Liz deserved better. We - the audience - deserved better than for Raymond Reddington to be the "strong female character" of the Blacklist (I can't believe I actually have to type that). What a mess.

[shoezuki]

Idk why but the ending of this arc didn't feel at all fulfilling or like an actual end to me? Like I love the acknowledgement that they might have fucked up trying to bring Wilbur back because he doesn't want to come back but like otherwise it just felt kind of cheap? The discs are still around, Dream's still being blamed for all of the server's conflicts (which I won't deny he definitely antagonised and made worse, but he didn't cause and saying he did reduces the culpability of almost everyone else), we still don't know what happened with Ranboo and the community house and Techno's favour never got called in. Tommy and Tubbo are still naive enough to think that Dream and/or Schlatt might be the big bad of the next season, ignoring the other three possible villain arcs and, you know, the egg vines and propaganda literally all over the Prime Path.

Also, if you go all the way back to the fight with Dream, it took Tommy until 7 or 8 on Dream's count to chose Tubbo over the discs, and with Tubbo as his absolute favourite person he'd do anything for there's a chance there that he still subconsciously sees the discs as more important than like, most people on the server. It just felt really off to me and I don't know if anyone else felt the same.

i feel you anon like. i didnt watch the whole stream n i dont care enough to. 

but like in my mind if you jus look at it in terms of tommy’s and tubbo’s characters and Their plotlines, it was a good ending. like it concluded the issues with dream and wrapped around to the exile arc to finish that off. like i feel the disks being destroyed woulda hit So much harder and Really made it feel conclusive. and the open ending with wilbur was interesting altho im hoping that goes into Wilbur having control of an arc of his own yknow

ALTHOUGH. ive seen a lot of like. tommy called it ‘the end of the dream smp’ or something and ive seen a lot of regarding that as like. tying up loose ends or whatever. but it really didnt hsghskghs

like theres soooooooooo much more. like you said it really didnt tie into any of like. niki and jack’s villain plans. techno’s whole favour thing. phil’s take on bringing wilbur back. like tbh i dont know why niki and jack were there when they pulled up to help tommy that was weird to me (i THINK they were there sajklhf;lkshf) 

how im thinking of it is like. less of a conclusion of the whole plot/to this ‘season’ or whatever. im more happy knowing that tommy’s core plot is done.

hes had the ‘main character’ vibes for SO long to the point that like. any alternate plotlines were only majorly important or noticed in reference to tommy, or even built off of him and the ‘wars’ and shit. i feel this conclusion is more like. concluding THAT. and i hope that plot and characterization of niki and like. the Egg stuff in particular will go Off without that kinda constraints or all the focus being around tommy things

but yeahyeah i feel you. i honestly feel this Was kinda anticlimactic but i cant say much i didnt watch all of it lmao. but i dont want schlatt back or dream to be a major villain figure anymore. like i hope this gives the chance for niki and jack to do their villainy Evil thing, and the egg to........ do whatever the fuck is going on over there 

[mrs-nate-humphrey]

aight aight, real shit; let's say you got the chance to rewrite the entirety of gossip girl exactly how you want. make a brief description of what would happen in each season. (you can decide whether there's a fourth season or not)

oh i LOVE this ask, and i am so flattered to be asked this, haha. i have SO many thoughts, i’ve been thinking about this non-stop, but i’ll try to be as brief as possible. also, disclaimer, i don’t remember all the seasons equally clearly. like i barely remember s2. haha, whoops.

season 1: i love this season as is, for the most part. i think the tone of it was actually very serious and involved? like the show was actively trying not to be frivolous with heavy topics, and the way we were getting to see the characters seemed like they were trying to bring out character depth and the complexities of their lives in very deliberate ways. nate’s whole thing with his parents gets so much focus, and it’s not something the show glorifies, it’s something that is meant to make you uncomfortable and worried for him. 

i would have nate be less of a dudebro, jenny & nate’s friendship being a little more solid, dan being a little more involved in jenny’s problems + helping her find her space, vanessa/nate to happen earlier - after nate breaks up w/ blair and realises she looks happier, i would have him not try and get back with her (lol, dude, the fact that she’s happy after breaking up with you means you probably shouldn’t be dating her.) more exploration of eric’s mental health. more dan and blair friendship. i would keep chair the way it is this season. i would not have a derena breakup - i’d have them take a break after the georgina reveal and get back together during the summer after talking about it and deciding to be more honest & open with each other. and, what the hell, i would have lily not blame serena (???) for being taken advantage of in the whole pete fairman situation. serena wasn’t sober, she was 16, that dude was in his 30s, georgina was taping her w/o her consent. how is any of this serena’s fault??? i hate lily’s reaction so much.

season 2: i... don’t remember enough of this season, sadly. it’s been too long since i watched it. i would majorly change jenny’s arc here, though. eleanor stealing her dress was majorly, majorly fucked up, and i think jenny should’ve done something then and there. also the whole thing with ‘lily is a mother to chuck’.... i would’ve loved it if lily had been like that to jenny. the girl needed it, and lily would’ve actually been able to help jenny establish connections in the professional world and whatnot. i think jenny should’ve transferred out of constance - not necessarily homeschooling maybe, but gone somewhere else. unlike dan, she didn’t even want to get into an ivy, she wanted to make it big as a designer. so. that. 

oh nate my love. i’d get this trainwreck of a boy some therapy. while i hate that the catherine thing happened, things like that do happen all the time, and i’d be interested in sort of handling the aftermath of it in a responsible way. i would not have... a lot of serena’s arc and decisions (from what i can remember) were really random in this season. i’d have her break up with dan at some point. and vanessa would need a new subject for her short film, and she’d choose serena.

nate doesn’t really date anyone, this season. but he and jenny open up to each other abt having gay crushes on people who treat you like shit - jenny’s thing with agnes - nate rescues her when they’re taking those pictures in her flat and let’s say she doesn’t go back to agnes. instead of kissing her, nate talks to her instead, and tells her about carter, tells her about chuck. and jenny talks about her feelings for blair, her feelings for agnes. and both of them sort of go... “it sucks, but all we can do is try not to become the kind of people we hate, right?”

dan pines for nate. majorly. massively. obviously. i think the only person who really notices is blair, and this would lead to new hijinks and shenanigans. also!! i do not want chair in s2. maybe it can go there for a bit but definitely not to the extent in canon. i want blair to have the same moment of being unable to deny her cruelty / needing to be accountable that she did in that ‘age of dissonance’ play. and. this sounds fucky but i want the dan/rachel stuff to stay as it is, and later, in s4, for dan & serena to talk about rachel & ben respectively and be like ‘hey, this was a fucked up thing to happen to us, wasn’t it?’ 

i would also like to get to know blair’s “minions” better as people. i mean. they all seemed hella fascinating to me, and the show’s decision to make them superficial and unidimensional was very depressing.

season 3: hot garbage, throw canon away. when chuck goes away to paris or wherever, let him not come back. goodbye, dude! dan, blair & vanessa friendship at nyu is so, so important to me. also im losing my mind always at how vanessa and serena catch dan on that walk of shame and they’re both like ‘college is a time for experimentation!’ and nobody does anything even slightly bisexual (unless you count that threesome later, which, blah.) a serenessa / date dynamic in college would’ve been great. dan transferring to columbia like blair does and rooming with nate and just, the gayness of it all. dan & blair become really, really close, and d&b&v watch movies + go to art exhibits together and are all SO DAMN PRETENTIOUS. serena finds it sexy, nate finds it terrifying. 

the william stuff would be interesting if he were actually held accountable. like that man has no right being a doctor, and medical malpractice needs to be brought up. and jenny’s whole arc this season makes me so sad. i think it would’ve been interesting if she’d been a ‘queen’ and ruled alongside eric, and just, the two of them forcing people to be nice, sort of like they try to do with people who are mean to nelly in s2 i think it is? but also.. jenny out of constance is very good, and i think i mentioned that earlier, haha, whoops.

season 4 : serenessa breakup, for whatever reason, probably to do with the william fuckery, because i think vanessa would react in similar ways to nate (”serena, i know he’s your dad, but we have to do the right thing” / “it still wasn’t your call to make” / “he’s a certified doctor, serena, a man like that has no right -” / “god vanessa, you really don’t get it, do you?” ). uhhh i would actually... if i had to choose i would honestly go blairnessa >>>>> dair. i love how blair & vanessa can keep each other on their toes and hold each other accountable. like? blair’s classist or racist and dan’s just like, *smiles*. vanessa would actively be like ‘hey, stop that.’ (this is one of the few actual criticisms i have about d/b as a relationship, RIP.) 

(edited to add: yeah, i think blairnessa WOULD be a sustainable relationship, more abt that here! )

yes to the milo arc, but dan gets to keep milo (his friends threaten georgina and go all ‘you made him sign the certificate. don’t make us take you to court’ because i love these morally grey assholes but also because g DID trick dan into thinking milo was his and dan was ready to reshape his whole life around that kid which is more than georgina was willing to do. plus endgame: jack/georgina are not parents i want milo to have.) i would also have more of a rufus & dan fallout over the milo thing. i think rufus would be really nasty about it all tbh.

the dair arc for blair and vanessa! let the juliet stuff happen, but let it be less awful + let it be seen as Bad + let serena get help & not forgive her for it. let serena NOT date ben after, what the hell. i want d&s to talk about their shared feelings for high school teachers and to realise, in retrospect, as adults, that what happened was crossing lines. let blair and vanessa suddenly drop dan and do the movies + galleries stuff on their own. and dan’s like ??? but he’s busy being a parent with nate supporting him. dan’s drama is very much parenting things. there would be some nonsense involving nate’s family pushing back, because ‘we stood by while you dated him, nate, we thought it was a phase. but raising a child with another man? this is unacceptable.’ i would like nate to get disowned by the family, and need to find his own feet. and to get a REAL SHOT AT HAPPINESS away from that terrible environment.

season 5: i want this to be a good serena season. let her find her calling doing creative things. let her and carter travel the world. let her just be whoever she wants to be. let her and vanessa patch their friendship up. let her have an open relationship with carter, let her have a lot of sex with a lot of random people and not feel guilty about it. let her really really blossom. i want more eric! maybe he’s in london with jenny, and she’s working on her fashion stuff, and he’s realising that he really wants to be a counsellor. 

some time-skips, maybe. i really want to see dan’s whole thing of being a parent. sending milo to kindergarten and spending the whole time milo’s gone on edge and anxious about everything that could go wrong, while nate comforts him. let nate try to get a job because he no longer has a trust fund, and navigate everything that comes with that. let vanessa be there for him. why the fuck am i phrasing my sentences like this - can you tell that i studied physics once?? oh well.

blair & vanessa handling a lot of things. vanessa meeting harold!! vanessa’s parents being disapproving of blair, but ruby standing up for her. blair & vanessa planning their future properly. blair & vanessa babysitting milo and talking about kids. 

and there can be drama too, there should always be drama. but i would like wholesome stuff at the centre of it too, you know? the ivy/lola nonsense can go on in the background, i don’t actually care that much. as long as ivy doesn’t go around fucking people’s fathers for no understandable or discernable reason, i don’t really care lkdhlfdkhg. (it was just so inexplicable and so random!)

season 6: uh, i don’t know. this was a bad season for everyone in canon, except chuck. i would throw it all away. i would actually love if we had pre-series rufly instead: every time those two bring up their past together i’m like 👀 because it sounds like a dream. or focus entirely on jenny and eric and their life. i am obsessed with jenny and eric being... sort of queerplatonic, sort of like, best friends. there’s no romance and no sex between them (eric’s canonically gay, and jenny’s a lesbian because i said so) but i think the way jenny and eric are is very, very life partners in a way that isn’t romantic OR sexual. so they’d have a little place together and would support each other. and just. what are they up to now? also. kati, iz, penelope, hazel, nelly... what r they doing now? one of the few things i actually liked about s6 as it was was that nelly was that reporter and that she’d found her people in yale. nelly yuki getting a happy and fulfilling ending and being a successful woman was so good and we actually got a little bit of that. i’d like more of that, for the rest of the girls, you know?

[prompt-master]

Would you be willing to share how you might rewrite Yukizome, Sakakura, and Munakata to make them likable characters (if not ppl Bc there’s a big difference)???

ahhhhhhh this ask got me so stupidly excited that I was like wavin my hands around. I think about how to rewrite their characters OFTEN. very often. I’m gonna go with likeable character over likeable people because I think they work better where they’re actually not that likeable people. 

The one I think about the MOST is Munakata. He was SUCH wasted potential and I partially blame the medium for that (a single season anime is too constrained for future, it needed more time and care to be a proper story). But Munakata is actually so close to being a compelling character but they made some MAJOR mistakes with him. This ended up getting really long and more like a 3 page ADHD ramble essay. SO IM VERY SORRY to anyone who cannot read this but TYTYTY if you did because these ideas make me very happy! Oh it’s only about Munakata btw because of how long it got

The thing about Munakata is that he is designed to be a foil to Naegi. In fact a majority of dr3 future FOCUSES on this foil dynamic. It is Naegi’s hope vs Munakata’s hope. The World’s hope vs The FF’s hope. And more importantly it is True Hope vs Corrupted Hope.

This is a fantastic concept...so why didn’t it work in canon? I think that the biggest most glaring issue with Munakata’s hope is his logic. Munakata is meant to be a logical man, although with corrupted morals that lead him astray. Yet in canon his logic is laughably infallible. For example as a major figure in the FF and someone who wants to spread hope....why would he tell Naegi to kill himself? More importantly why does he continue to try and slaughter Naegi? The issue here isn’t from the fact that he wants him dead but from the fact that he is under the IMPRESSION that this entire game is being broadcast to the world.

Think about this for a second. In Munakata’s eyes he is going to kill the Ultimate Hope, an international symbol of a better life, live on TV. He doesn’t just want to kill the Ultimate Hope..he wants to do it BRUTALLY as a MAJOR FIGURE OF THE FF. IMO this should have happened later on as the game furthers the emotional turmoil in Munakata’s head and he eventually snaps and gives in to the desire to kill Naegi despite the fact that this is live. And then there should be CONSEQUENCES for that. I wanted so badly a realization where Munakata realizes that he is hurting the Ultimate Hope in front of what he believes is the entire world. 

Another issue with Munakata’s logic is saying things such as...implying that the HPA KG was...just a game. I mean...people DIED. it's not hard to see how wrong that logic is. you can't say “this is the real world now” when what Naegi experienced WAS the real world. I think that this could be fixed through a bit of world building. DR3 Future is rather isolated from its world. We don’t really know much about the world and its dynamics. I think it would make perfect sense if the general public viewed the HPA KG as a tv show, they got numb to the sight and even those untouched by despair had a hard time connecting that these are REAL people suffering. With this previously established Munakata expressing that the KG was not real would make a lot more sense and play into his corrupted idea of hope. 

There is also Munakata’s connection to his other friends. Now I’ve talked about this before but the game was clearly designed to BREAK Munakata and Naegi. This way the FF would die, both the FF and World’s hope would be broken, and upon seeing this Mitarai would have no choice but to deploy his own forced hope. So it makes perfect sense that Yukizome’s death would break him (in fact if she hadn’t died in that way, her NG code was designed to be Munakata’s fault). But something about it felt...superficial. Again I think this is the mediums fault but it almost feels as though Munakata just forgets about Yukizome until later. I think they should spend more time establishing his pain and what he has lost and why this pushes him to kill. In his eyes if she can die then nothing else matters. It should be THE breaking point, not the first push. I do like the betrayal he feels towards realizing she had despair but it needed more time to fester. 

And his relationship with Sakakura also felt weak. In all honesty it was hard for me to feel as though they were ever friends. Sakakura is written as though he just follows Munakata like a loyal dog and Munakata just orders him around. Establish their relationship more! Why are they such good friends? Why is Sakakura important to him? And more importantly why did Munakata decide to cruelly gut Sakakura knowing he was about to confess? This is because he believed that Sakaura was despair and that his confession was more manipulation, but they didn’t show this well at ALL. Munakata just comes across as a major a-sshole who does not care. I also personally found it distasteful that when changing his heart Munakata only seemed to cry for Yukizome. I understand that was his love interest but Yukizome at the end of the day killed herself. Sakakura however was an unnecessary betrayal he took into his own hands AS HE HIMSELF KILLED HIM. He should have more guilt over that! Not just in that moment where he runs to Sakakura, but ahead of time as well! Maybe even DURING his rampage they could have shown him having moments of guilt but he is so absorbed in the idea that all despairs have to die that he doesn’t even realize he has become despair in the name of hope.

A BIG weakness on Munakata’s part comes with interacting with other characters. He is a man who should know how to take charge, lead, and doesn't know what to do when things are getting too crazy even though he THINKS he does. Munakata is heavily flawed, OBVIOUSLY flawed, but many of the interactions with him are as tho his rampage isnt a big deal. There should be reasons for this! Why do people trust Munakatas guidance so much? I dont know! All ive seen from him is that hes insane! Maybe even pieces where around others hes a lot nicer so you can understand why they follow him, even though hes ready to gut Naegi alive with a flaming katana. His interactions with others feel like the writers just wanted to see the next big evil thing they could think of, but for Munakata’s character this doesn't make sense because he was appointed a high status in the foundation for a reason. Maybe even have people say they disagree with some of his methods but at the end of the day he gets the job done!

There is another major missed opportunity here and it's why Muanakata wants Naegi dead so badly in the first place. The remnants. Hiding terrorists in the apocalypse is a PERFECTLY valid reason to want someone dead and think they're a bad guy! But I think since Naegis initial arrest was already so hostile and violent we get the sense that the FF is simply just...crazy. 

And let’s think about what Munakata WANTS from Naegi. He does not just want Naegi dead he wants something worse. He wants Naegi to suffer first. He thinks that Naegi doesnt understand his own personal pain. He thinks that because Naegi protected the remnants he must also not care about the suffering the remnants caused. He wants Naegi to feel despair and then die. This is important to his corrupted hope. He thinks the suffering must be shared in order to understand who must die, but he is creating a cycle of pain. Tie this back to the broadcasting issue. He wants Naegi to break for everyone to see. I think..and this is just a concept..I think it would have been a great idea for Munkata to force Naegi to watch the despair video so that he has no choice but to understand. 

AND themes are majorly important to Danganronpa. And I don’t think its a stretch to say that there are parallels between Munakata and Naegi. In fact I would say that there are aspects of the og trio in this new trio. I think it would have been really cool if they showed how our favorite trio could have ended up if they had been corrupted as well. But the parrellels dont stick strongly. I think it would have been cool to show a past where Munakata’s idealism lies more strongly than Naegis. As the student council president there was a time where he himself had to use his words to solve problems. Perhaps he learned that sometimes his words made things worse. Munakata does not have Naegi’s talent of emotional intelligence. He is a man of action over words. So he interprets this as WORDS being the problem rather than understanding he does not have these skills. Especially when the apocalypse breaks out, it becomes all action over words. So he sees Naegi who is all talk as a genuine threat who will let everyone die through his “weak ineffective” idea of hope. 

Another parallel could be drawn from the fact that they both have hope based careers. Their job is too keep things hopeful. Maybe Naegi stays safe doing public broadcasted speeches, while Munakata is on the field weeding out despairs. This would cause Munakata to feel as though Naegi is doing no real work yet getting all the credit for being a savior.

Munakata constantly complains that Naegi does not know true pain. But he and we as an audience have followed Naegi through his entire process of trauma. We know he is in the wrong. But what do we as an audience know about Munakata’s suffering? We are shown almost nothing! There are some implications, but for how intense he is implications are not enough. We need to see his suffering. We should see how he has witnessed death. Yukizomes death is not nearly enough for this because he talks as though he has suffered for years. How can we as an audience understand that when we have never seen it? How can we understand Munakata when he is outright denying Naegi’s trauma that we KNOW existed with no proper justification for his reasoning?

I also believe that Munakata should have died. It actually upsets me a bit that he was PLANNED to die but didn't. He should have died protecting Naegi after all that suffering and relentless brutality he offered him. Munakata again is a man of action over word, and protecting Naegi with his last breath is the perfect way to show how in the end he changed. Especially when all he wanted initially was for Naegi to die. I find that much more satisfying than just…...walking off to who knows where.

So lets recap some changes. Munakata needs a proper display of his past traumas and his relationship with Sakakura and Yukizome. Munakata needs a proper display of his work relationships and the respect he has earned. Munakata needs to fall into corruption at a better pace, and have geniune reasons for his illogical attacks on Naegi. Munakata needs to care more for his friends. Munakata needs to deal with the turmoil of wanting to hurt Naegi while he believes the world is watching. Munakata needs to die for Naegi

This has gotten long...and I still have things to say. There is so much to make Munakata a good character. Future had a lot of potential and is amazing for a rewrite concept. As for Sakakura and Yukizome since this has gotten long feel free to ask for another round of this individually when asks are open again! If you read all of this somehow….TYSM

[bellamygateoldblog]

i will never be over the way this show has continuously tried to frame bellamy and clarke as heroes and good people, or the way the fandom has almost completely embraced and supported that narrative

the amount of times i’ve read “[clarke] saved everyone’s ungrateful asses” makes me seriously consider turning evil. like aren’t y’all bored? don’t you have a different sentence you would like to say for a change?

i want to talk about this but i probably don’t remember a lot of the details of this show so if im forgetting something or get something wrong i apologise, but i never have any desire to rewatch past s2.

clarke isn't even the hero of her own side, she took power of them using the military force of the grounders, someone else’s people, she’s forced them into alliances without their knowledge that weren’t in their best interest (while she literally had no idea what they were even going through because she’d abandoned them after upsetting their entire political structure, and this leader she’s bowing to is responsible for the slaughter of their children, has broken an alliance previously with them, has hung the threat of genocide over their heads, and who isn’t even wanted in power by her own people- dragging skaikru into that conflict, too), she’s sacrificed them and what’s best for them in order to cater to/concentrate on the grounders newest demands or pursue her own personal mission, she’s lied to and patronised them, she’s abandoned them and surrendered them to die while they were under her protection and responsibility, and in Book 2 (and these aren’t her people but in canon she’s their leader anyway apparently despite trying to blow them all up a few days before...) she’s abandoned them again, and is speaking for them without consent or any connection to what’s happening with them again,.........her inner circle/her ‘friends’ have to be extremely careful to remain important to her or on her team or they’ll be sacrificed, harmed or become acceptable losses to whatever her newest goal is too (but hey at least she says she cares about them) all while acting very ‘woe is me’ about the whole crushing weight of responsibility she shouldn’t have.

but she’s the hero, she’s beloved, she’s special, she has relationships that were never built, she and only she saved everyone again and has all the lines telling us so no matter how dishonest those statements are.

like this is where i personally see what you said in your ask most: when it concerns clarke.

bellamy on the other hand...i don’t place him at all on the same level as clarke when it comes to this. clarke has privilege that bellamy just never had as a character. and i think that does probably play into why i like him.

him being a hero to the delinquents/the 48 is completely believable to me. he was the original leader, he got them through a tough time, he chose to put himself on the line for them, and he’s the one who stayed. i also think it’s reasonable that fandom might romanticise him this way because he is one who has been shown to value the one life as well as the many of his people, a guy doing his best and making big mistakes along the way, a mixed complex bag of good and bad, i find him very likable and i love the toxic/pained/vulnerable ones lol but more than anything i find him to be one of the more interesting/entertaining characters on the show (Book 1).

we also see him torment himself with his own mistakes instead of just having other people do it for him/remind him like we see happen with clarke- and we all know fandom loves equating that with a “redemption arc” and as much as i personally dislike seeing pity parties i do like self-awareness and responsibility in characters that goes beyond a 3-second-long puppy dog look or straight dismissal of someone else’s pain, and for the most part bellamy’s expressions of this don’t come across as demanding sympathy from others but from genuine self-loathing and an honesty to himself, internalising the effects of his actions/childhood.

i know i personally prefer The Flawed Protector over The Tortured Saviour nobody asked for (same white male hypocritical moral hero in a woman’s body).

i don’t believe in assigning “hero” to any of them though like that’s the whole entire point of the show lol “there are no good guys.” and i also think a major chunk of fandom/shippers have warped bellamy’s character so much that it isn’t even him anymore, so this man they’re celebrating as a hero/good person isn’t even bellamy sometimes.

all of the genuinely “good” and kind people are dead.

i don't think i'd say bellamy was ever framed as a hero. like he was just never important enough to be, he’s just not put into those positions (despite being the male lead), clarke is. as the protagonist ig. bellamy...he’s the protector/knight of the heroes, but not the actual hero himself (applies to octavia too i think, where she acts and he reacts).

like take mount weather, clarke becomes empowered by her “wanheda” status, bellamy’s (and monty’s) part in that is lost...clarke is “bearing it so they don’t have to” (rme) which simultaneously strips the other boys from claiming the ‘victory’ of saving the 48 while still leaving them with the guilt, like it suits how i see clarke perfectly that she’s the only one to refer to the genocide (and shutting down the CoL, i realised) as “i” while monty and bellamy say “we” and it was clarke’s actions that got them to that point in the first place, but this is one of those times she’s clearly The Protagonist. if that makes sense lol.

bellamy is on the opposite side to clarke in s3 and s7 and he needs to be moved to her side in order to be on the ‘right’ one. now i don’t agree with that one bit mind you (when it comes to s3, idc about s7 lol) and i didnt see it that way but imo that’s how the show wrote it, to the point he was either demonized endlessly by fandom or woobified in a way that denied him his own agency. during s5 i don’t i think anyone was framed in a good light. i can see this applying in s6, though- where he was his absolute worst self yet, betraying his own development, failing at every point to “do better” despite claiming it, but still was given that reasurring line that they did better and saved people and was in that “heroic” position i guess? but is that because he was back to being clarke’s “good little knight” tho? (but do we claim s6??? do we really??? do we claim it ladies???)

s6 was 100% dedicated to making clarke look good/like a 'good' or sympathetic person. the bodysnatching plot (and the s6 sheidheda plot because if it was supposed to be about bellamy and address his s5 actions he would’ve been present to experience/observe those consiquences himself but he wasn’t lmaoooo. instead it was to tell the audience ‘actually clarke was right last season and here’s another reason to feel bad for her and how those ungrateful bitches were treating her’) has no other purpose for existing. clarke's character has consistently been elevated at the expense of everyone else's. but im not sure the writing did a very good job convincing me she was a good person if it was trying to do that LMAO like my interpretation of her is so fitted to canon, and no amount of throwaway lines telling me how good she is did anything to change what i saw yk? and in s6, combined with being patronised by the writers, i found her to be at some of her most obnoxious.

i don’t agree with placing bellamy and clarke in the same boat tbh. like they just come from completely different places and come across differently, especially in the way they interact with other characters.

in my experience this fandom (on tumblr) is extremely skewed in favour of clarke, like ive never seen a fandom so obsessed with their protagonist. there’s A LOT of clarke stans who stan her for being one of those “deserves better :(” characters, selfless and heroic, and support that view that she’s the superior character, entitled to other character’s devotion, love and validation yet doesn’t have to reciprocate any of it. the CL/BC ship war was just a bunch of people fighting over clarke, who deserves her more, which character is more toxic to her, which other character would 100% be her bff supportive of that relationship, treating her as a passive whose actions don’t take affect. im not sure how much i blame the writing for that because if so many of us are capable of recieving her character in this way then...why aren’t so many other people? how is there such a massive disconnect between the ways we see her?

and imo a lot of the bellamy love in this fandom comes from shipping him with clarke too rather than being because of who he actually is.

[waynedunlaptheorgandonor]

ok, if i don’t write this im gonna lose my mind -cue dmx ‘party up’-

here is a ridiculously detailed analysis of why i am bordering on near certainty of caryl endgame, and how everything that’s been set up from the start of s9 (yes, even c@rzekiel and d@nnie) has been leading up to this

spoilers and long-winded analysis under the cut

let’s take this step-by-step, okay? starting with:

The Titles:

i have said this about a million times now, but the very first indication of caryl came from the new opening credits, where mmb’s name was very strategically placed above the graphic of daryl’s crossbow, what’s meant to symbolize henry’s pike, and a bunch of cherokee roses. it was foreshadowing, not only of henry’s death, but also how her relationship with daryl was going to unfold, and, bear with me here, the downfall of c@rzekiel. speaking of which, let’s go there

C@rzekiel:

i have also rambled about this, too, but the way that kang designed this relationship between zeke and carol was so brilliant, because it was never supposed to be real, but you weren’t able to fully see how until the whole story was laid out before us. (which goes with my belief that kang tells stories over long, connected archs, and not just “you know what would be fun to toss in here rn for some drama?” 

carol

1. denied zeke’s proposal

2. never once told him she loved him

3. explicitly told those saviors she could have done without her ring (a line that had absolutely no need to be in there)

4. continuously rejected the title of queen

5. regularly visited daryl in the woods

6. said herself that all it was, was a fairytale. something i’ll delve into more when i talk about carol’s ptsd

but let me touch on how daryl plays into this. we know she regularly went out into the woods to be with daryl, and she did it because he was her tether back to reality. she was living a fantasy life, and knew deep down that it wasn’t real, but had to do it, for henry’s sake, and for the sake of her mental health, because at the time of the relationship, she had not remotely begun to deal with any of her grief

the first scene we get with her and zeke is directly after daryl saves zeke’s life, which is telling. and the first time we hear her talk about her feelings about zeke’s proposal she turned down it’s with daryl, and let us not forget that the script notes stated that daryl was experiencing jealousy about it. he never asked her not to, though, because he thought she was happy, and that was more important to him than her being with him. he was willing to give her up if it meant she was happy, like what kind of angst trope suffering is that?? -chefs kiss-

and we can’t forget that zeke canonically views daryl as a threat to his marriage (i mean, rightfully so). he literally tells daryl to back off his wife so that he can fix their marriage, because he knows carol is starting to go back to him

next!

flowers:

flowers have been being used as symbolism between these two across the past two seasons a bunch. flowers are in mmb’s title card. the first scene of carol/daryl in the time jump shows them seeing flowers. daryl brings carol a flower on the dinner tray. one of the upcoming episodes is “look at the flowers”. obviously the cherokee rose scene is iconic between them, and flowers to carol represent this weird dichotomy. on the one hand, they represent daryl comforting her and giving her hope, and on the other hand, they represent her downfall mentally from the grove. interesting that one of the threads throughout this current season is carol grappling between trying to stay grounded with daryl, and her losing herself to her grief

speaking of grief!

Carol’s PTSD:

people have bitched that kang is just telling carol’s same storyline all over again, to which i’m like, tf show are you watching?? here’s what kang has done. gimple dealt with carol by literally just locking her away in a house to mull over how terrible she is a person, while never once actually dealing with her grief, and then handed that over to kang as a boiling slop of diarrhea, and somehow kang managed to take that, perform alchemy, and turn it into delicious loving carol juice.

she had henry killed off to parallel sophia, yes, that’s true, but the /reason/ she did that is because she’s righting the wrongs that were done to carol by essentially rewriting her storyline the way it should have gone. carol has lost So Much. more than most, i think, and kang is like, “that would fuck someone up pretty fucking bad, i think, so let’s see her actually have to grapple with that.” kang stays true to the carol gimple created, in that her instinct is to run away (think boat), but she’s using daryl as a means of forcing her to confront her demons. the two of them, at any given time, are running away from their struggles, but daryl is finally at a place of stability, and so he’s taking carol by the hand and saying, “no. i’m not letting you do this again. you have to stay,” and carol does, because she loves him, but consequently she’s having to actually feel it (something she explicitly stated she “can’t let herself do”), and is now experiencing the consequences of it, and poor daryl is stuck trying to handle it. his entire plotline this season has revolved around trying to help carol heal her wounds so that they can finally be together the way they should have been ten years ago.

they should be together, and daryl shouldn’t be with anyone else? glad you asked, because that brings us to:

D@nnie:

i actually think that kang never meant to make daryl/connie a ship, bc nothing in season 9 really indicated anything more than a mutual respect, and part of me truly believes that she saw the reaction to the two of them, and was like, “you know what? i can work with this.”

carol is pushing daryl towards connie because she wants to take alpha down and knows she might go down with her and she needs to know daryl won’t be alone. that’s it. period. end of sentence.

but okay, let’s extrapolate. she asks him if he’s interested in connie, and daryl very, very bluntly says no. you can’t tell me that his answer was meant to be evasive. he delivered that line like straight up “no.” no room for debate about his feelings. if they wanted to leave room for doubt they would have had norman redo his delivery, because it is too obvious. he is shutting it down completely. and carol is like, “why not?” and /that’s/ when daryl gets evasive. very “don’t worry about it, why are you worrying about it, i’m not in love with you, shut up.” 

fucking kills me, guys.

now the current spoilers about carol telling daryl to get angry at her for (supposedly/probably) killing connie furthers this belief that she wants daryl to pull away from her. because he’s her tether, she loves him, and as long as he still wants her around she can’t leave. she wants him to hate her, and daryl refuses. he’s pissed as all get out about what she did, sure, but he doesn’t hate her. also, the idea that daryl going back to try and save connie and magna means he’s in love with connie is absolutely baffling. have you met daryl? his instinct is to save people at all costs. he wouldn’t leave his friends stuck in a fucking cave, are you serious? just because connie is a woman doesn’t mean daryl wants to fuck her. he’s allowed to care about his friends.

but anyway, the point here is that every “d@nnie” spoiler has been music to my ears, bc not once has it been actually shippy. that first episode with the asl book and them together? it was supposed to juxtapose zeke and carol, and how carol and daryl immediately forgot about connie and zeke in order to be with each other. every other thing with connie has either been very cute and platonic, or has been carol trying to push her on daryl. -chefs kiss- my dudes, you’re worrying about nothing

Misc bc I’m Late for Work:

here are just a handful of other indicators that caryl is on the horizon

-the dream where she dreams she’s MARRIED TO DARYL, and the scenes where she wakes up in bed and looks over and he’s not there. why set that up if the end result isn’t going to be them together in bed?

-the bracelet/the acorns and what they symbolize 

-the use of “we” (”we don’t sleep” “it was like that for us before all of this” “since when have we never been enough?” etc)

-their parallels to alpha/beta (see my other long-winded text post on that one)

-ten years worth of history between them!!! that kang understands and references (carol’s claustrophobic, look at the flowers, etc)

so anyway, i don’t have time to tie this up with a nice bow bc i really have to get to work, but this is all to say that i am very very confident about the caryl endgame. i think it’s being drawn out bc kang needs to right the wrongs done by gimple first, but that caryl is where she’s eventually headed. every spoiler has been 100% caryl positive to me. i am zen af, and i think you should be too.

i’ll add to this if i think of anything i missed, but here you go. caryl is endgame and they gon fuck

the end,

-diz   

[koyurim]

hospital playlist 12 (season 1 finale)

as the 99 crew make their next steps, life chugs along and with that comes the ups and downs that the patients are going through

the season finale provides enough momentum to wrap up some plot lines while still presenting new (or persistent) challenges for season 2 to dive deeper into. for me, all the ups and downs with the patients were the highlight of the episode and had me in an emotional mess. we see how much the patients impact the doctors, but also how much the doctors impacted their patients: 

yun-bok was able to thank song-hwa and cry in her arms when she found out that song-hwa was the doctor who treated her mom. and we got to see song-hwa tell yun-bok that she grew up into a lovely lady. 

right when chi-hong’s dealing with the coma patient who’s not going to make it, the cop patient came back to thank chi-hong for giving him the motivation and understanding that he can return to his job. his life is not over because of what he went through. 

jeong-wan stayed up day and night for the 7-year old girl and all his care was recognized when her family thanked him. also when she came back on christmas eve to thank him personally. jeong-wan always gets a lot of fulfillment from his work and i feel like this is the case that convinced him to remain as a doctor and not a priest. 

seok-hyeong. is just. a Fantastic doctor. he’s so gentle and always provides space for the emotions that come with the medical problems that the patients. when the woman finds out her baby has passed?! and then you see all the moms sitting quietly in the hallway listening to her crying. and the woman who had multiple miscarriages finding out that her baby’s in the clear... the JOY. ugh my emotions are ALL OVER THE PLACE.

jun-wan poured in so much care for the patient with the infected stent and watching him deliver the bad news to the parents was so hard. i was so proud of jae-hak for figuring out a solution! gah! growth.... 

ik-jun learning sign language--IM!!!!!!!! 

now, onto the more personal lives of our doctors. much has been building up all season and our main five must face their problems. sometimes facing your feelings is all it takes to find a fix, but unfortunately more often than not life requires a deeper dive to untangle all the webs and mess (and means we have to WAIT). 

jeong-wan’s plot line feels the most neatly wrapped up in this season finale. he’s made the decision to stay and not becoming a priest. it’s so obvious to those around him that he finds a lot of fulfillment in his work as a doctor helping kids, but it seems like it took him a lot longer to realize that himself. i really appreciated the moments with song-hwa. she can read him so easily, but sometimes you have to wait for your friend to arrive to the conclusion themselves. as for the love line with gyeol-ul, i was really hoping to see WHY he liked her. the show + all of jeong-wan’s friends and family have spent the season saying ‘HE LIKES HER’ but i dont really see why? i wanted some flashbacks about where his love originated from, because the kiss feel too out of the blue. however, i Am glad and proud of jeong-wan for properly facing his feelings and not denying them! you don’t do yourself or anyone around you any good when you don’t face yourself!! anyway, i look forward to rosa doting on gyeol-ul in season 2 even though it makes no sense. 

seok-hyeong’s father may have passed, but his problems are still there. seok-hyeong’s family situation has clearly created many problems in the past. it seems like his divorce with his ex-wife was primarily due to his family and not from a lack of love. as a consequence from his family mess, he’s forced himself to choose a lonely path so as to not hurt anyone else. obviously, that’s no way to live and seok-hyeong has to make peace with the understanding that while his dad is a piece of shit, he himself can still seek out happiness. it’s interesting to me that min-ha is able to approach him in a way that seems to slowly nudge him out of his shell. i hope that she can continue to do so in a respectful way! i feel like in season two we may see a seok-hyeong/min-ha/ex-wife love triangle. overall, im glad that he’s choosing himself in not running his dad’s company. his dad is an asshole, and seok-hyeong doesn’t owe him anything. even tho i think the mistress is shameless, im shocked that he didn’t leave anything to her. anyway, i wanna see a scene where ik-jun’s like hello dad pls redistribute your wealth to me, your son. 

oh, i fear our poor prickly jun-wan has been dumped. i was so pleased with how the finale was developing his and ik-sun’s relationship until he got the returned package! i loved when jae-hak was like ‘dude, just ask her’ because you can’t assume and guess your partner’s intentions. you’ll just be stuck in an endless loop! although i am on pins and needles to find out the reason for the package’s return, i’m not surprised. ik-sun has a lot that she hasn’t unpacked from her previous relationship. she’s worried about being hurt again and keeps anticipating their relationship’s demise. wanting only happy moments in a relationship isn’t realistic and i think she may have gotten cold feet and jumped ship to proactively avoid the ‘bad’ parts to a relationship. im rooting for jun-wan, he’s trying his best to communicate and be a good partner in the relationship; i really hope ik-sun will also do the work and not ghost him. i hope in season 2, the crew finally meets bidulgi!!!! 

even though ik-jun’s basically all but said how he feels towards song-hwa, we finally see him properly face her and be upfront with his feelings. i’d love to have heard him say ‘i like you’ explicitly, but i know that this is a big step for him. despite being the most expressive of the group, ik-jun’s so elusive. he flits around to different departments and loves to give advice, but he struggles much more when it comes to forging a kind of relationship where he needs to be vulnerable. we don’t get song-hwa’s response yet, but the ending with all five of them hanging out before christmas is a reassuring sign to me. regardless of how song-hwa responds, their friendship and the maintenance of the group is something they’ll prioritize and work to maintain. this means regardless, they’ll stay in each other’s life.  

UNFORTUNATELY, we still get very little of song-hwa. im so frustrated! she’s such a great mentor and confidant, but WHO IS SHE! song-hwa! who do you turn to when you want advice? what’s going on in your brain? what are your fears and worries? from the little clues that we’ve gotten, i think song-hwa’s drawn a firm line with chi-hong. she’s no longer wearing the shoes he got her, and she was firm about him not following her/congratulated him for moving up to chief resident in a kind yet professional manner. i really hope season 2 stops making us guess about her inner thoughts and just GIVES it to us. i need All of song-hwa’s thoughts! as an aside it was cute how song-hwa made space for seokmin to confess to sunbin! 

in the end, i rest easy knowing that our OT5 persists. they’ll always have each other to go back to and have a meal with. i love them, but not as much as they love each other. they argue and fight but the way they make space and accommodate each other speaks volumes to how much they mean to one another. the show’s so beautiful in capturing life’s little moments. while there is a (very slow burning) plot, that’s not what captures me about the show. the beautiful moments are small and mundane. the five bickering about song-hwa and jun-wan eating all the food is such a human touch that doesn’t necessarily add to the plot. u-ju eating egg sandwiches and winking isn’t necessarily ~ReLeVaNt~ but it’s so important and damned if i won’t watch u-ju and his dad have fun! 

season 2 will air in 2021 (GAH) and i wonder if we’ll come back to song-hwa returning after 1 year. things will have changed: our interns will be residents, ik-sun will have been abroad for a while. either way, im looking forward to it!!!!!!!!!!! 

[misanthropecopy]

Little Christmas Gratitude

Seasons greetings, everyone! Firstly I like to apologize, if I struggle to get drafts done this week. Family matters and all that, you know? Anyway this post is basically me loving on my mutuals and although there are over a hundred of you guys, I’m gonna keep it pretty small because there are a few mutuals I want to spread specific positivity towards. However if I do not mention you on here and we’re still mutuals note that I still love and appreciate you. <3 With that said: On with the showering of positivity!

@lxngfxrgxtten​​, @frozenmemoriies​ and @chaosworthy​​ thank you guys so much for following this blog. You did not have to, but you did and I love you guys for it. Hopefully I will recover from my old computer being severely jacked up and get back to my other muse, one day. Because I love you guys and miss the relationships my other muse had with some of yours. Until then I hope your holidays will be blessed and awesome. ^v^

@writtenbykaichu​ tagging your multi muse, since you’ve got multiple blogs. But thank you for being mutuals with me and putting up with my trash/mistakes. You are a wonderful person who writes their muses fantastically. I loved that we talked about the Genesect movie, while you watched it. It’s fun having someone else be into gen 5 as well as others, with me. Plus Iris as well as your other muses are wonderful and I will get to the reply/starter soon, because rest assured I love the plots we have planned. 

@bubble-mcw​ Mentioning you cause your muse was the first Mew I interacted with and it’s fun to test Psyche’s reaction towards the pink fetal cat, since we were deprived of seeing such interactions in her featured movie. That being said I love your spin on M01 Mew, combining their Japanese and English portrayal I imagine would be difficult to balance out, but you do it fantastically well.

@telekinetiq​ GREEEYYY, HOW ARE YOU STILL FOLLOWING THIS MEME!?!? //SHOT But no seriously even though our muses haven’t interacted beyond crack yet and we’re still working on a plot, you were and still are a huge inspiration to me. I love your writing and would die for Stein and Myuutsuu even though Stein would probably be like “you will”, if I said such things to his face. I’m sorry you’ve had bad experiences with duplicates in the past and I hope I don’t come off as too overwhelming or clingy by spamming your IMS or notifications at times, I just... love thinking about the shenanigans these two could get into zsfkjxjkbjdjkjfg. Anyway I hope you’re feeling better for the holidays, have good ones and I am eagerly waiting for the day where Psyche officially interacts with the Big Thicc Meanie. 

@itsraiyninmuses​ Girl your Mewtwo is SO SOFT swafhjskdg, but seriously Martyr is a sweetie and you are easy to talk to. I also love your other Pokémon muses as well, and hope to interact with them one day even if Psyche is stubborn as heck.

@legendsbehold​ BWAZE YOU ARE ONE OF THE RULERS OF MULTIMUSES/BLOG-HOPPING. Seriously, I do not know how the heck you maintain so many blogs and each muse’s relationships but you do and it’s freaking incredible. You may be cursed often, but there is no denying that you got freaking SKILLS especially when it comes to handling forth-wall breaking, feral muses like JEEZE LOUISE.

@ketzerhund​ and @littleblaze​ BLUE WTH YOU’RE KILLING ME WITH YOUR WRITING. Seriously though, if I am not laughing my butt off I am sad from 01′s as well as the other units’/ your muse’s suffering. Plus there is the fact that Flicker is BABY and kills me with diabetes despite being also cursed, and yep Psyche would totally die for her at this point.

@armxnia​ GOD I love your N! He can be so collected yet so feral at times, and despite her distance, Psyche would not hesitate to protect him if she felt that he needed it. Anyway both you and N are amazing and I hope that Psyche interacts more with the tree man in the future. ^u^

@rexangelus​ Ah yes, the one Mewtwo Psyche is suspicious of the most even though he’s just attracted to her. Seriously they may not interact much, but rest assured Angelo has a habit of ruining things for Psyche and it’s fun thinking of/writing out her reaction towards it. //SHOT Anyway you have awesome muses and I hope you have a good day.

@rvalserena​ I love your take on Y/Serena! She can be sweet yet sassy and I am laughing my head off, on how she has to deal with her oblivious as HECK boyfriend. Not only that, but I she was also one of the first trainers to entice Psyche with sweets and although she won’t admit it, the legendary does appreciate her efforts.

@spooklyboos​ GHOSTY IS SO CUTE, WTH!?!? But yeah, even if Psyche finds her annoying I love how she is lowkey/sometimes high-key trying to make friends with this stubborn as HECK clone. Like Psyche’s never met anyone so determined to pet her, and I applaud Ghosty for that as well as your writing. 

So yeah, that’s my list of mutuals I want to specifically spread positivity towards. However I promise that all of you mutuals I didn’t mention are equally as important and loved by me as well. Thank you guys for putting up with this meme queen of a Bunny. Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and God bless you all! <3

[cryinggameff]

Seventy-Five

Randi

Cameron’s crying woke me up early in the morning as usual. I started to get up but Cayden mumbled, "I got him," and got up from the bed. I looked over at the clock. It was 8am. Cayden would be leaving for work soon and I'd be going to drop Cam at my moms. I was trying to slowly get back to going to work, a couple of times a week anyways. Cayden worked a normal 9-5 schedule now, the ride share app he had invested in had blown up and now he was a cowener in a big time company which kept him busy. He really loved what he was doing which made me happy. I was co-owner of 2 salons now. After almost 2 years of back and forth, a second location was up. That required me putting in more regular hours though, which meant leaving Cameron. I felt guilty about working for months after He was born, but now a year later, Cayden and Ms. Williams,my therapist, both convinced me that working was good for me and that i wasn't evil for doing so. He was 1 now and I felt better about leaving him with someone else. I wasn’t breastfeeding anymore and he didn’t need 24/7 attention. But i couldn't deny being a mom came first on my list of priorities and consumed most of my time and thoughts, and i was fine with that.

"You going into the salon today?" Cayden asked, coming back in the room with Cam. I smiled reaching out for him. Seeing him in the morning was the best part of my day because after sleeping for a few hours I missed him. His face lit up when he saw me and he giggled, bringing out his cute dimples. When I looked at him I thought about the fact that I almost missed out on this because I was set on not having kids. I also thought about everything I went through to give birth to him and the fact that I’d do it all over again.

"Good morning mommy's baby," i cooed, nuzzling his face. "Yeah, i'm going in. I have so much to do for tax season," I said.

"My mom taking him this week?" he asked. I nodded. Our parents switched who would watch him. It was perfect because they all didn't work anymore. God knows i couldn't leave Cam with strangers. Cayden took his shirt off to go shower, revealing his perfect chest, well perfect except the gunshot wound under his right peck. He leaned down to kiss me and i met him. He kissed me for a long time and Cam started crying.

"You need to get ready, and i gotta get him some food," i said. We went separate ways and went about our morning routines.

At the door Cayden gave Cameron some last cuddles then handed him to me. He kissed my forehead.

"Imma see you tonight beautiful," he said. I smiled and nodded. I watched him get in his car and go. Then i had to get Cam and myself in my car and drove to Cay's mom's house. On the way there I thought about how normal life was now, Cayden going to work in the morning, to a legit job, m dropping of our kid, and going to work. Life was so different now.

I got to the salon later in the morning and went back to my office. I sat down and immediately checked my phone. It was habit now whenever someone else was watching Cam. I checked for texts or calls about him. When i saw nothing i reluctantly got my computer on and started pulling up my files. I worked for about 2 hours before i cracked and checked grabbed my phone to call Cay's mom. She didn't answer my call and i put my phone down angrily.

"He's fine Randi," i said to myself, turning back to my computer. The separation anxiety i felt with him was hard to explain. It was different than with Cayden. When he wasn't with me i got that feeling like when you think you're forgetting something really important, but constant. It was weird not hearing him cry or laugh for so long, it put me on edge. I wasn't sure how Cayden was able to just go to work like it was nothing.

Jada came in then.

"Hey, I put all those receipts on your desk, did you see them?" She asked.

"yeah," i said with a sigh. I glanced at my phone again.

"Whats up with you?" She asked.

"It's Cameron," i said.

"Why is he sick?" she asked with a frown.

"No. But Cayden's mom won't answer my calls. I just want a picture of him so i know he's ok," i said.

"She's probably busy watching him, it's a good thing she not on her phone," she said. She had a good point. "You worry too much," she said, leaving the office. I knew i worried too much, i didnt wanna be like this. It just came with the whole mom thing.

Later a knock came at my door and i looked up. It was a delivery guy.

"Mrs. Jones?" he asked.

"yeah, thats me,"i said. He gave me the clipboard and i signed it, looking around for the package.

"Package is out front," he said. I thanked him and went out to the front desk to check what is was. China turned to look at me.

"I hate you," she said. I was confused, then i saw the huge bouquet of flowers. I smiled like an idiot, jumping up and down a little. I picked up the card.

--->To my beautiful wife, because i can't stop thinking about you. Im sure you're thinking about Cam not me but that's ok. P.S he's fine, stop worrying. From: Cay and Cam

I teared up and held the card to my chest. I loved how thoughtful Cayden could be. That gave me the motivation i needed to get through the day.

I picked Cam up around 3 and made my way back home. Cole called me on my way saying that he was coming over. He beat me home and was waiting in the drive way when i got there. He helped me get Cam out of the car.

“My little man!” He said, taking him from his car seat.

“He just put on a show on the way home, cried the whole ride. He's so tired.” We went inside.

“You on your own?” He asked.

“Yeah, Cayden still at work.”

“Damn, he really taking this CEO shit serious. You can always leave him with me if you need a break,” he said.

“I’m seriously gonna take you up on that, but anyways, so bachelor party. I have everything set, just need to know what time you want the limo.”

“Like 10 probably. I plan on being drunk by then so it don’t really matter,” he chuckled, letting Cam play with his fingers.

“Ok. I still need an outfit, I’m always scared to be out dressed by the strippers,” I said. I was gonna be the only girl at the bachelor party, I wasn’t planning on staying too long anyways, I knew I’d be missing Cameron and I wanted to let Cole hang with his buddies.

"Aint that weird? Going to a strip club with your man?" He asked, putting Cam's pacifier back in his mouth.

"Not really. Im used to it," i said, "but he doesn't even go anymore. This will be the first time he's gone since Cam was born. But why are you going to a female strip club when you don't like girls is the real question?"

"Male strip clubs aint the same," he shrugged. "Only thing is i know Ty attracted to females so that's gonna be a bit weird." I went around the kitchen making something to eat for all of us. I started cutting stuff up for a salad and warming a bottle for Cameron. Cole came to sit at the island.

"Im sure he'll behave himself," i said. "He's marrying you, so clearly he's not checking for anyone else, male or female" i assured him. He nodded.

“Did you get nervous before your wedding?” He asked. I nodded.

“Hell yeah. You know i was a mess leading up to it. I had a panic attack day of too," i laughed remembering. "You getting nervous bout it?"

"A little," he shrugged. It was odd to see Cole unsure or worried about anything. He was always so care free, go with the flow type of guy.

"It'll go away once you see him on the day," i assured him. He nodded in agreement.

"One more week to go," he said.

Cayden

I was in meetings all day today which was tiring. Sometimes this job was more tiring than drug dealing, which i ever expected. I really liked doing something different though. When i thought about it, i kind of did the same thing when i was in charge of the warehouses, i handled all the business behind the dealing. Negotiated with cartels, contracted people, allocated supplies. That's pretty much what i did now, just not with drugs. I was really into the whole tech thing too, the dudes i worked with were crazy smart, inventing apps and shit.

After my meetings i went to my office to check my emails. I checked my phone too and saw the message from Randi thanking me for the flowers.

There was also a message from Keisha which I opened.  It was a photo of her son after a basketball game. Yes, i had stayed in touch with her, because that was my nephew, and the circumstances didn’t change that. Randi was all for it and we’d even have him over sometimes. So I’d see him here and there and she kept me up to date on what he was doing. I chuckled a little at his big gap smile, he looked so much like Trey it scared me at times. The more I was getting to know him the more I saw Trey in him, and that made me feel like my brother was still here.

After replying some emails I finally made my way home. It was an hour past Cameron’s bed time which meant I wouldn’t get to hang with him before he slept. I walked around downstairs and when I didn’t see Randi I went upstairs. I could hear her in the nursery. I walked over quietly and stood by the door. Randi was bouncing Cameron in her arms while he was fussing. She was so small he took up her whole torso now and he was only 1.

“Shhh, Mommy’s got you Cam ” she said softly,rubbing his back in circles. He finally got quiet and she went to put him back in his crib. She turned on the rain machine for him because he loved that shit and couldn't sleep without it. She finally turned towards the door and she jumped when she saw me, putting her hand to her chest.

“Jesus Cay, how long you been standing there?”

“Not long, but I can watch you with him all day,” i said, going up to wrap my arms around her waist.Her hair was all messed up, coming out of the bun she had, and she was wearing sweats, but she still looked fine. I looked over her head to Cam in his crib. “I tried to get home before he went to sleep," i said. I had stayed at the office later than usual.

“You just missed him. He woke up from a bad dream,” she frowned.

“I know what you’re thinking. We didn’t give him bad dreams Ran, he’s a baby, probably just wanted some attention” i could read her mind. Randi had this theory that Cameron inherited bad dreams from us because sometimes he would wake up crying or screaming. We both had a history of bad dreams so maybe it was possible but I still assured her that wasn’t the case.

“You don’t know that,” she mumbled. I tugged a piece of her hair.

"Come on, you gonna wake him up," i said, pulling her out of the room. I dragged her into our room so i could change. "I talked to Ty today, the suit is ready. Can you pick it up tomorrow for me?"

"Yeah, i have to go pick up my dress anyways," she said. "I'm so excited, I can’t believe this is finally happening" she smiled, folding her legs.

"Im just surprised neither one of them backed out yet, i thought for sure Ty would have wigged out by now," i said, taking my shirt off.

"Cole is the one I was worried about. He came over earlier, he was freaking out a little," she said, grabbing my shirt and straightening it out. "But i told him that was normal. I was loosing my shit before our wedding, but if i made it down the aisle, he can."

"True. I deadass thought you weren't gonna show up to our wedding,"i laughed remembering.

"Thought about running, my dad dragged me out of that room though," she laughed as well.

"Your ass lucky i still married you after making a nigga self conscious and shit," i mumbled. It was easy trying to lock her down. She grabbed my arm.

"I been lucky since the night you drove me home from the club," she said, referring to the first time we met. I thought back to that night and where we were now. "Even though you didn't say one word to me that whole car ride."

"I was having a bad day," i chuckled, "it wasn't personal. And i showed up to your house the next day didn't i. And day after that, and pretty much everyday after."

"You were,” she nodded. I sat down beside her and pulled her in to me. “I think that’s why I liked you. You were consistent, and I needed that,” she said like she was deep in thought. “Who would have thought back then that we'd be married and have a kid together?"

"I thought so," i said with a loud laugh. She looked at me like i was crazy. "Dead ass. I knew after that first day, that was it, you was the one. I never just wanted to be around someone all the time before,” I played with her hair.

“Why do you say all the right things?” She said softly, looking back at me.

“I also say the wrong things sometimes,” I reminded her. “You was just mad at me yesterday.”

“That’s true,” she gave me a  side eye remembering the petty argument we had gotten into. We didn’t really fight like that anymore. Having a kid together made other things seem irrelevant, and we had a different level of respect for each other now as his parents.

“You know what’s weird? Like a year ago we probably would have been sorting through duffle bags of coke right now,”I said randomly. She laughed.

“Yup, I’d be counting, estimating profits,” she shook her head, “that feels like a life time ago.”

“You was really ride or die for a nigga,” I said, “even when shit was hot,” I looked at the scar on my rib and thought about how she had taken care of me.

“I knew what I signed up for. It was hard for me after the shooting though, I can’t lie. After that day...I knew I was done. Then I got pregnant, and that just pushed me to say what had been in my mind for a long time, it was all about Cam from that moment on,” she played with my hand in hers. “Do you miss all that?”

“Nah. I was done with that part of my life. I was already starting my plan to get out before you told me, but that just made it that much more important to do it. I knew the life you wanted and I wanted to give it to you, and to our kid” I looked over her face. She nodded and we sat in silence for a little bit. After some time she looked down and put a hand to her stomach.

“Sometimes I miss having him inside of me,” she smiled. I raised a brow.

“Does that mean you ready for a second one?” I said excited, pulling her closer in to me.

“Hey don’t get excited. We talked about this, we said next year,”  she reminded me, pushing me away.

“We gotta start now if we gonna get 5 out the way before we old,” I said. She leaned back and looked at me like i was insane. I tried to kiss her and she was trying to run away.

“Cayyyyy” she complained as I planted my lips on her neck.

Cole

***a week later***

Today was the day, and to say I was nervous was an understatement. I had never been this nervous to step out on the football field, or even when I came out to my family. This was different. I knew I wanted to be with Ty forever, but it was the idea of ‘marriage’ that made it all so fucking scary.

It was funny to me because this was all Ty’s idea. He had asked me to marry him. It had crossed my mind too but I wasn’t sure he wanted all that. I was happy to just be whatever we were. Living together was the main thing I had wanted and I got that.

Our families now loved each other and we were both in good places with them. My mom and I were the closest we had ever been, which I wouldn’t have expected 3 years ago after all the family drama. But this wedding was a big part of why we came together. She wanted to be there for me and was happy to see me happy. She was helping me tie my bow tie, and crying while doing it.

“I’m really happy for you Cole” she said, “I can tell Ty is in love with you, and it’s clear you love him.”

“I do,” I said.

“All I’ve ever wanted was this for you. I know it may not always have seemed like it. I just hate that we weren’t on good terms for so long,” she wiped a tear, “when you’re my only son. I know now that I was wrong,” she said.

“I was wrong too mama. I was so angry I couldn’t put my pride aside and fix things with you,” I admitted.

“Well, that’s all in the past now. The important thing is everything is how it should be now. Just me and my baby,” she said with a smile.

“I love you mama” I said, kissing her cheek.

“I love you too baby,” she patted my cheek. “There, you look handsome as ever. That Ty is so lucky he scored you.”

“You ready to walk me down the aisle?” I asked, holding my arm out. Both of our mothers were walking us down. Ty was supposed to go first and I knew he was already there and waiting for me. That made me excited. The music started playing then and my stomach flipped.

“That’s our cue,” my mom said, opened the doors to the ceremony room.  

I could see Ty standing there on a suit, something I hadn’t seen since Cayden and Randi’s wedding, anxiously waiting. He was touching the cuffs on his shirt but then looked up and made eye contact with me. We both smiled and the nerves and anxiety melted away.

The reception was lit. We had a DJ and all our friends and family were on the dance floor. A slow song came on and Ty grabbed me to dance with him. I had been separated from him for a while talking to people.

“I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever,” he said. I smirked.

“Awe you missed me?” I said. He rolled his eyes.

“Maybe,” He said.

“Well you bout to be stuck with me for a real long time now if that makes you feel any better.”

“I still can’t believe we’re married, that’s kind of lame,” he said, looking at the ring on his hand.

“Yeah but it’s cute. We still gonna be the same so,” i shrugged.

“Yeah, I’m glad we did it. For our families too,” he looked around at the people around us and I did the same. There was a lot of people happy to see us happy, and that touched both of us since not everyone was ok with our life style. I spotted Randi then, standing just off the dance floor holding Cameron on her hip. Cayden had his arm around her. I winked at her and she winked back. Both our lives had turned around in a matter of a couple years, and we were happier than ever. It made a nigga a bit emotional. I had been at her wedding and now she was at mine, that was some movie shit.

“I hope your winking at your mother, or else I’m throwing hands,” Ty said, following my gaze. “Oh it’s Randi.”

“You jealous?” I teased.

“Y’all petty niggas deserve each other,” he said, shrugging. “The friendship still confuses me though,” he said.

“Me too. But I just know she been there for me like nobody else, other than you. She was my family when I wasn’t on good terms with mine,” I explained.

“I get that,” he nodded.

“Now i have it all, my family,my friends, and you,” i smirked. He smiled back at me and pulled me in to kiss me.We kissed like it wasn’t a room full of people.

Randi

I was standing watching Cole and Ty be cute when my mom came and took Cam from me.

“You two go dance,” she said, nodding at the dance floor. Cayden took my hand and pulled me in that direction. He put his arms around my waist and I put mine over his shoulders.

“This reminds me of our first dance,” I said, grinning like a little kid. “I’m just missing the dress, and I have an extra 30 pounds on me now but other than that,” I laughed. He slipped his hands to my butt as if we weren’t in public.

“I like the way you look now,” he said, “you sexy as hell to me,” sliding his hands around to my hips, “Shit, i been thinking about taking that dress off all night,”

“Thank you Baby,” I said, “you make me feel sexy.” He really did, even when I was pregnant and blowing up, or now when my body was still not the way it used to be.

When we got home I wanted to take off my makeup and shower so Cay signed up to put Cameron to sleep. I took a quick shower and then went to peak in the nursery wondering what was taking him so long. Cayden was sitting in the rocking chair with Cameron in his lap and a book in his hands. I stood outside listening for a while and i laughed quietly at the voices he gave all the characters. Creating a human with someone changed the relationship forever. Yes i loved him even before i had his baby, but loving Cameron together on top of loving each other was a strange and powerful thing.Plus him being caring and protective was such a turn on and made me wanna give him 5 more kids. He was such a hands on dad too, which i knew he would be. When Cam was first born all I really did was breastfeed or pump, Cayden changed all the diapers, got him cleaned and dressed, and took him when I needed sleep. That’s the kind of husband and dad he was.

"Randi I know you eavesdropping" he said once he was finished the book.

"What?! how did you know?" I moved into view and then walked inside the room.

"I could hear your ass laughing," he said, "You just salty he likes my reading better."

"You are really good at story time," i smiled, sitting on his lap beside Cameron. I looked at his adorable face and took him in like i did several times a day in disbelief at how perfect he was. The best part was he now had freckles coming in slowly just like Cayden’s. I touched his cheek and then Cayden's, comparing.

"Why you not in bed?" Cayden asked.

"Well, I had to tell you something really important," i said seriously like i was gonna drop some big news. His brows came together in confusion.

"What?"

"I been wanting to say this for a while..." i said, dragging it out. "But i wasn't sure how."

"You can tell me anything," he said, rubbing my arm. I sighed then paused.

"Ok, here it goes," i said, "Cayden, i...love you" i grinned. He kissed his teeth and tried to push me off him. I laughed and grabbed on to his neck to stay on. "Babe!" i pleaded, fighting to stay on while he was pushing me.

"Why you waste my time like you was gonna say something important," he said annoyed. He was really mad. I giggled and cupped his cheek.

"Im sorry," i said. "But i really have been wanting to tell you how much i love you," i said. His face changed to a little less mad. “I know I don’t always show my appreciation for you, and I’m not good at the romantic stuff like you, but I just wanted you to know that i do thank God everyday for you. You keep me grounded, and you're my rock” I finished. His cheeks were pink which was so adorable. He hated being complimented and never knew how to respond. He closed the space between us and kissed me tenderly.

“I told you i always got you, and I love you too." Cam grabbed my shirt then and i smiled down at him and picked him up. I held him close to me and he immediately closed his eyes. I looked from him to Cayden, and then back at him and i felt everything I couldn’t years ago during the darkest period of my life. I was filled with hope, and joy, and a fierce love for life.

[a-baleful-howl]

Let's talk about Sansa and Littlefinger

Im rewatching season 1-6 slowly lately, and Ive just finished S4.

Ok, I wanna talk about Sansa and Littlefinger. A lot of people confuse this story line or flat out twist it to fit their “I hate Sansa” narrative. The scenes are there, so lets go through them.

I think LF has always given Sansa the creeps. The first thing he ever says to her is a creepy, gory story about The Hound and The Mountain. She looks frightened, and LF looks so goddamn pleased to have freaked her out. He wanted her to feel scared. Paraphrasing - “Don’t tell anyone I just told you that or you’ll be a dead little girl.”

Is this him starting to groom her to keep secrets? To listen to him? To desensitize her to horrible acts?

While shes stuck as a hostage in KL, LF offers her a way out. Going with him on his boat. Their conversation is off screen so we don’t know what was said or how Sansa reacted. She has to politefully let him down later when she decides to marry Loras instead. Petyr knows about the marriage plot, and he *punishes her* for choosing someone else over him.

Think about it - Sansa has two options: go on a ship out of KL with Petyr, who she barely knows and gives her the creeps, or marry Loras, who is the handsome knight shes always dreamed of but means she cant go back home right away. She chooses marriage over Petyr. And it angers him, because its not what he wants, and he punishes her by ruining her plan.

He sets it up to make sure she *regrets* not going with him. When she hears shes to marry Tyrion, she cries and watches Petyr leave, regretting turning him down and watching her chance for escape float away.

When she flees The Purple Wedding, she doesn’t know where shes going. She just knows that this once-a-knight wants to help her because she saved his life. When someone you think “owes you” offers you safety and a chance to escape - you take it. Especially after you have seen chance after chance slip through your fingers because you made the wrong choices. She wasn’t about to let another chance slip through her fingers. So she went with him - not even knowing what was on the other side.

When she finally sees who was behind her escape, shes confused - not elated. And the very first thing LF does when shes on his boat is KILL Dontos right in front of her. And shes horrified. Shes seen death dozens of times, and she still screams.

Not only did this once-a-knight trick her and betray her *for money*, not loyalty, shes see what kind of person LF is. Petyrs very first act is one to cement in Sansa’s mind that he would lie to and kill anyone he pleases if it benefitted him. This is NOT a man she would “admire”. This is an act of intimidation and control.

So I want to make a few points here before continuing. 1 - Sansa has never fully trusted LF. 2 - Sansa didn’t even know she was going with LF when she escaped with Dontos. 3 - LF *does not* have her best interest at heart and doesn’t even try to hide his ruthlessness anymore.

Petyr full on *framed* Sansa for Joffreys murder. This was premeditated and fully zoned in on Sansa after she turned down his first offer at escaping. He has her now only by intimidation, manipulation and blackmail. She cant go anywhere else or with anyone else because LF has all the cards. If she were to go back to KL, she would die. Everyone in Westeros is looking for her. Her husband is on trial about to die. And no one would believe she was innocent.

Sansa is no less a hostage than when Arya is passed between hands, all hoping to get a reward for bringing her home or to relatives. Shes not with him by choice, unless her choice is “whelp, if I go anywhere else I’ll surely die. Might as well sit here and wait this out.”

Her discussions with Petyr are very guarded. She asks questions, tries to find answers. And when she asks him what he wants, theres always this little unspoken question behind her tone. All her life shes heard about raping and danger, been told shes so beautiful every man would love to have her, Joffrey threatened to rape her, she was nearly raped by peasants in KL… She is wary of LF true intentions. Surely, this older man who owns a brothel, wants *her*. He doesn’t even deny this.

She has lots of time to think about her situation, and think about Petyrs answers to her questions. Shes becoming more observant just to survive.

I think Sansa genuinely thought she was going to be safe and happy in The Vale. She had her mothers sister, she was in an impenetrable tower, she didn’t have to lie and hide anymore…she was really happy and felt safe for the first time in a long time. It looked like Petyr *really had* done her a huge favor. He saved her from KL. She must have been a fool to doubt him.

Until she realized “yo this bitch cray”. And then Petyr pretty much confessing his love/lust for Sansa.

Important lines here, me thinks. “What do we do to those who hurt the ones we love?” This would sound so lovely to hear after your entire family is murdered and you’ve been held captive and tortured. It sounds like he’s on her side. He will protect her. His loyalty is just because he loved her mother. Aw, thats so sweet. And refreshing to hear after years of being in KL having to say her father was a traitor.

When in reality, Petyrs responsible for her fathers death, for her misery, framing her for murder and conspiring against her family. He definitely has not protected the one he loves, or even protected Catelyn. Ever see a tear shed for Catelyns death? Nope. Not a one. This line is utter horse shit said only to make Sansa trust him more. Even if he *believes* he means it - its so so so not true and he’s deluding himself.

“You’re more beautiful than she ever was.” Is basically LFs way of saying “I love you”. Because he values pretty things, the finest things. He confesses his love/lust for her here. No doubt. Whats odd is that Sansa kind of *returns* his kiss for a moment before she pulls away. Whether this was a mistake by Sophie or actually meant to happen, I don’t know. He says he wants to protect her because he loved her mother, basically says he loves/wants her and then takes a kiss. Sansa thinks he pretty much just laid all of his cards on the table. She finally knows what he wants and why.

The “what do we do to those who hurt the ones we love line” IS KEY to what happens next. When Petyr kills Lysa, Sansa thinks its because Lysa was threatening Sansa’s life. She thinks Petyr is protecting her because he loves her. To a girl, this is also a form of power. “he’ll never hurt me, because he loves me.” or “he only did it because he loves me so much.” When in reality, Petyr was probably planning on killing Lysa the entire time.

Actually, he only agreed to marry Lysa ASAP when she started spouting off about how she killed Jon Arryn for him. She started talking and Petyr was like “oh this bitch is going to blab everything to everyone if I dont shut her up soon” so he marries her ASAP to confirm his claim on The Vale and to get rid of her before she opens her crazy mouth again. Her threatening Sansa was only icing on the cake to make Sansa more indebted to him.

People always yell about why she lied for LF at the trial. Why didn’t she just tell the whole story and stay with these people who loved her father in The Vale?

So why does Sansa lie to save LF? Because she thinks she owes him one. He just saved her life, so she will save his. And maybe she is started to return his feelings - maybe she thinks she can use his lust for her against him, too. Theres nothing for her in The Vale anymore - no more family except gross little Robin, no more friends, no real reason to stay. Sansa wants to continue down the path LF has started. She wants to go home. She wants revenge against those who hurt her family - and she likes what LF is cooking.

She thinks shes on to him. This scene plainly lays it out. She doesn’t trust strangers - and why should she after all shes been through? - and she thinks she knows what Petyr really wants. He wants her, he loves her. So he would NEVER hurt her, and only protect her. Shes making a bet against his feelings for her. Love is the death of duty, and men die protecting the ones they love. Staying with a rich and powerful Lord who is hopelessly in love with you is actually not a bad idea. Shes been fully manipulated at this point.

And Petyrs last words “Do you?” plant a HUGE seed of doubt. She was sure he wanted her - but oh shit, what if shes wrong? Shes already saved him, theres no turning back now.

IMHO, this isnt where Sansa starts playing the game, like many think. Sansa started playing the game when KotV rode in on BotB.

Petyrs creepy boner is now only raging after she lied to save him and went with him out of The Vale. He’s more brave about taking kisses and speaking openly. He has her under his thumb completely. But she still never fully trusts him. She notices when he hides letters. She questions him when it looks like he’s ready to leave at a moments notice. She freaks out when it finally dawns on her that LF is marrying her to Ramsay. But… LF loves her, right? He would never intentionally put her in danger. He must have a plan. So she actually trusts him and married Ramsay.

When Petyr mentions that he was a penniless boy from nowhere amongst kings and lords - she smiles. Because Petyr started from nothing and has built himself up to a rich man in KL. This is another line told to Sansa to reinforce this idea that Petyr knows what hes doing. Hes smarter than her, more powerful and more cunning. And if he did it for himself, he can help her do it, too. With his help he can take her from a traitors daughter with no name or family to a powerful lady just like him.

Petyr promises her its only temporary, and he will return soon and Stannis will save her and soon she will be Wardeness of the North and have her home back to herself. Notice how she doesn’t smile at the idea of being Wardeness - she actually seems fearful of it. She doesn’t want to be Wardeness - its almost like shes about to say “I cant”. People think Sansa wants power and to be Queen. This reaction to Petyr telling her to be Wardeness says the exact opposite - it wasn’t on her mind and she doesn’t want it. Petyr plants that seed - Petyr wants it for her. Not the other way around.

Then, LF leaves her to Ramsay and fucks off. She escapes because its way WAY worse than she could have imagined. Stannis failed - how stupid was she for listening to LF - and Petyr is nowhere to be found.

When LF shows up in Moles Town to offer her KotV she is fully and completely enraged with him. She is angry that she trusted him. She sees him now for what he is - a liar and only out for himself. He hurt he. He must not truly love her. She was wrong to trust him.

And Ive spoken a lot about WHY Sansa goes to him for aid for BotB and, frankly, I dont have enough space or time to explain why here. Lets just say, Petyr is that toxic boyfriend you run back to when times get tough because you know them. It wasnt because she didnt trust Jon and she did trust LF - it was because she didnt trust FATE and she took her safety and Jons safety into her own hands since no one listened to her.

So, remember when Sansa said “I know what you want” to LF after the trial and LF made her doubt it? Everything he did since made her doubt it. Now, directly mirror it with this scene.

“You know what I want”

“I was wrong.”

“No. You weren’t.”

Maybe we’ll see Sansa use Petyr’s affection toward her even more so in Season 7. I sure hope so.

[nickireadstfc]

The Raven King, Chapter 13 – The Birth of Responsible Neil Josten

In which our favourite angsty runaway finally starts being useful, Andreil engage in some hot ab-touching, Wymack Knows™ things and I sense yet more Hufflepuffs dawning on the horizon.

Sounds good? Then it’s time for Nicki to read The Raven King.

The enw chapter starts and already we have to witness shit that I am decidedly not liking:

Nicky being super fucking miserable.

           “We shouldn’t have come here,” Nicky said, sounding as wretched as he looked. (…) “What have I done?”

NOOOOOOOOO MY SUNSHINE SON

On the long, long list of why I fucking hate Drake’s guts, “He made Nicky sad” is one point I am especially angry about having to add.

You know, apart from all the obvious fuckery.

Thankfully, I can trust my man Josten to stop Nicky from sinking down further into the Guilt Depression Pit:

           “You didn’t do anything,” Neil said. (…) “You didn’t know this was going to happen. None of us did. If we’d known, we wouldn’t have come.”

That’s what I was bloody saying. Thank you, Sir Runaway Angst Lord, for finally agreeing with me on something.

Also where’s this sudden rush of being the voice of reason coming from?

           “It doesn’t make sense that Drake would come here. Higgins was here a month ago. Why wait so long, and why risk it? The police can track a cross-country plane ticket easily.”

That’s……. actually a very good point I had not considered before.

Why was Drake there? To “””make amends””” with his “””little brother””” (my toenails are rolling just typing that word), sure – but why now?

There’s more to this. WHAT IS IT.

No time to deal with this now – for now, we are dealing with Andrew getting sent on a nice lil vacation to Fun Anti-Mania Rehab.

           Kevin fixed Betsy with a stunned look. “It’s too early. What do you think you’re doing?”

           “The right thing,” Betsy said.

HELL YEAH SHE IS.

Bless Betsy Dobson for turning cliché action movie lines into lines that make me actually emotional.

           “Who will take care of Kevin if I’m gone? I can’t trust him wandering around here by himself, and Coach can’t be with him all the time. Kevin’s kind of a full-time job.” (…)

           “I’ll watch him,” Neil said.

BITCH WHAT.

           “What do you think you are saying? What are you trying to do?”

           “Take responsibility,” Neil said in German.

BITCH WHAT.

“VERANTWORTUNG ÜBERNEHMEN”, DIGGAH WAS.

I did not know you vocabulary even included that word.

Our boy??? Is finally starting to be responsible, adult and useful??? WHAT IS THIS CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT I AM WITNESSING.

           “If I was going to leave I would have done so at the banquet when Riko called me by my name,” Neil said. “I won’t lie and say I didn’t think about it, but I decided to stay. I trusted you more than I was scared of him. So trust me now if you can. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll take care of Kevin until you return.”

Cause of death: This.

Responsible Neil, where did you suddenly come from?? And most importantly, how can we make sure you don’t transform back into Angsty and Dramatic Neil??

           “You lie, and lie, and lie, and you think I’ll trust you with his life?”

           “Then don’t tust ‘Neil’”, Neil said. “Trust me.”

           “Oh, but who are you? Do you have a name?”

           “If you need one, call me Abram.”

Oh my goooood.

Neil giving out his birth name (or parts of it) to Andrew just adds a whole ‘nother level of intimacy, rawness and seriousness to this exchange.

It also adds another level of I can’t fucking deal with this.

           With so many people watching them Neil couldn’t life his shirt. He did the next best thing and dragged one of Andrew’s hands under the hem. He pressed Andrew’s palm to the ugly scarring across his abdomen.

Touching!!!!!!!!! On his scars!!!!! Which no one has ever even seen!!!!! And Andrew gets to motherfucking touch them!!!! TOUCHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My Andreil heart is having a fucking rave, you guys.

           “Do you understand?” Neil asked. “Nothing Riko does will make me leave him. We will both be here when you get back.”

IM FUCKNG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Remember when I had huge Kevandreil feels way back in the beginning/middle of the first book? Remember that?? REMEMBER????

I’m still not set on whether I ship it romantically, sexually or just hardcore-platonically (although I’m leaning to the latter), but just – THE DYNAMICS, YOU GUYS.

You can always sign me the fuck up for a good triumvirate.

And of course, not even Andrew can say no to an offer when it comes in the form of some good ab-touching, and just like that, he leaves for rehab.

Godspeed, my manic murder kitten – please come back happier, healthier, yet hopefully just as full of sass. <3

There’s a little thing at the end of this exchange, though, that is quickly glossed over but that caught my attention, and that is Wymack being a perceptive bastard:

           “Hopefully hearing about all of this (…) will get [Aaron] moving, but who knows when it comes to those two? Speaking of unpredictable assholes, when did that happen?”

           “When did what?” Neil asked.

           Wymack eyes him. “Forget it.”

Is he……….. already hinting at Neil and Andrew having A Thing………….. Wymack Knows™.

Did I mention I love that guy recently? #dicksoutforperceptivebastards

           “What about the season?” Kevin asked. “What about Riko?”

           “What about Andrew? Attempt to think about someone and something else for just a moment there.”

DID I MENTION I LOVE THAT GUY RECENTLY. #dicksoutforcaringaboutandrew

           “Look,” Wymack said. “I know I’ve always told you all to take your personal problems up with Betsy or Abby. I’ve said it’s not my place to get into anything outside the court. I hope you’ve figured out by now that I’m just blowing hot air.”

Grumpy Fox Dad ily <33

Guess who’s back now – Aaron, fresh outta custody.

Guess who’s really emo and angry about the Andrew Situation – Aaron, back to being bitter and broody as per usual.

Guess who’s finally done taking his shit and starts dishing out some reason and sensibility in this mess – RESPONSIBLE NEIL FUCKING JOSTEN.

           “Are you at all sorry?” Neil asked. “You took his family away from him. (…) Do you think Cass will ever forgive Andrew?”

Fair point – I’m all for Drake being Not A Thing anymore, of course (although imo prison would have done the job better than, you know, murder), but there is no denying that Aaron made sure the only woman that ever came close to a mum for Andrew now hates him till forever, probably.

           “I don’t care about Cass or Drake or anyone. What Drake did – no. If I could bring him back from the dead and kill him again I would.”

           “Good,” Neil said quietly. “So now you understand why Andrew killed your mother.”

HOLY SHIT.

Holy shit he’s fucking RIGHT oh my god. I did not see this coming at all (and neither did Aaron) and I am SHITTING MYSELF.

           “You don’t know anything,” Aaron said.

           “I know you’ve got a couple weeks to think about it,” Neil said. “When Andrew comes back sober you’ll have to talk about this. You won’t get anywhere if you start with Drake, so you might as well start with your mother.”

Neil, I am just honestly so, so impressed with you right now.

Just – this. This exchange right there so, so fucking important. I can already see that this will help the twins greatly in finally becoming real siblings, and Neil was the one who made that happen.

It’s been said time and time again how Neil will be the one bringing the Foxes together, and every time I see it actually happening now I leap out of my skin in happiness.

And the key to all of that happening is the birth of Responsible Neil we are witnessing right now.

I want you guys to really, really get how amazing I find this new development. One thing that, in hindsight, really annoyed me about Neil in the first book was how fucking Dramatic, Angsty and Extra™ he was – and I know this made for some good jokes, but it honestly also annoyed me a lot. He was just so whiny. And I know it’s for good reason, but still – I just kept hoping he would one day pull his head out of his ass.

Breaking news: Our boy Neil’s head has now left his ass.

This scene, all these scenes are so amazing because: TFC-Neil wouldn’t have done this. TFC-Neil would have stood there uncomfortably, saying nothing and staring, dramatically contemplating his own angst and his own trauma and why he should run away now and how oh so fucking tragic his own life is.

TRK-Neil does not. TRK-Neil deals with problems other than his own, starts taking responsibility and gets out of his own fucking head for once.

TLDR: FUCK. YEAH.

The monsters (minus one) and the Fox Parents get back to Palmetto, where they’re all reunited with the rest of the team – which is not as uncomfortable as I thought it would be, since apparently the story is all over the news and no dramatic retellings are in order.

Also, apparently Matt’s mom bailed Aaron out of jail, as a ‘thank you’ for him helping Matt get clean. Neat!

           “We’re all Foxes. We are a team. What happens to one of us happens to all of us, and we’re going to get each other through this.” (…)

           If it wasn’t so terrible, it’d be brilliant. This was what Dan and Matt had been waiting for all semester: a catalyst to finally unite the team.

Have I mentioned how much I’m feels-nutting every time the Foxy Team Spirit gains some bonus points? Have I?? HAVE I????????

However, it’s not all fun and games (not that it ever was fun and games), as there is Serious Exy Trouble resulting from Andrew being gone:

           “If the ERC decides Andrew isn’t part of our line-up anymore, we’re beneath size regulations. They’ll strike us from the roster and our year is over. (…) Kevin is afraid.”

Dun dun dun duuuuuuuun. That’s a pretty shit situation you got there, mate.

           Neil fixed Kevin with a stony look. “Maybe if you’d stuck around a moment longer you’d understand why I don’t care anymore. When you came upstairs, did you hear mim laughing, Kevin? (…) So yes, even I would give up on this season. And after everything he’s done and every risk he’s taken for you, you’d better feel the same.”

MIKE FUCKING DROP.

With Neil gone, Kevin currently takes the top spot on the List of People Who Need To get Their Heads Out Of Their Own Angsty Ass.

           “Rhemann has taken our side. He offered to speak on our behalf if need be, and he’s helped reach out to the others.”

James Rhemann, apparently, is the coach for the USC Trojans – a team that is so fair and kind they never, ever got a single red card in their entire existence.

I am DELIGHTED. When do we meet those USC cinnamon puffs, give them to me NOW.

           “As of this morning, the vote across the Class I teams is almost unanimous,” Wymack said. “They want us to finish the season.”

HELL FUCKIN YEAH.

           “I want one lap for every time you’ve ever said the NCAA’s never had your back.”

           “Oh, Jesus,” Nicky said. “We’ll be running all day.”

BAHAHAHAHA. I actually had to laugh so hard at that. Possibly because it’s the first time there is a reason for laughter in, like, three chapters.

But also possibly because it’s just unexpectedly really funny.

In summary: The Foxes get to play on, Andrew finally gets the help he needs and deserves, and Neil’s head gets a serious applause from me for being finally free of his ass.

If you like what I do here and you want to help me continue writing, please consider buying me a coffee! Thank you so much <3 

 One last note: New update will be out on Monday instead of Sunday because I’m gone all weekend – I’ll be at a cheerleading event with my friends! I can already hear myself going “That’s Katelyn” at every single cheerleader wearing orange. Wheee!