#any my all time favorite: Caleb is Here to... Save... the Day...?

[sea-buns]

I was rewatching the marisharaygun highlight vid of the m9's flawless heist (y'know for old times sake) and the moment I saw Travis' face when the first gravity sinkhole gets cast, I had to pause to fully process the realization that THISSS WILL BE ANIMATED!

IN ALL ITS DISASTEROUS GLORY!!!

he's so real for this reaction and I'll be using it at every opportunity

[queseraone]

Alright, time for a new question: what are your favorite Tim Bradford quotes/lines of dialogue?

So this is actually insanely difficult, so thanks for that.

I've left this simmering in my mind for the last few days, and I've come up with a super random assortment—lines that make me laugh, lines that make me swoon, lines that are just so iconic...

I'm sure I could list out dozens of these, but here are the ones that came to mind (in no particular order)—

"What's a BTS?" (2x11) I don't know why, but this one just lives rent-free in my head. It's a much-needed moment of levity in a potentially very heavy scene, there's just something so adorable about it, and it's just a great portrayal of Tim's grumpy old man persona.

"You deserve someone who's worth the effort." (5x08) Pretty sure the scream I let out over this still echoes in my head.

"You're going into labor?" / "You text me '911' on my day off to ask me if a dress makes you look fat?" / "What are you doing? Sit back down." (3x10) I don't think there's a single thing I don't love about Tim in his Man of Honor era. And the way he just bursts in there assuming Angela's in labor is perfect.

"Tim Bradford finishes what he starts." (2x13) I-fucking-conic.

"Uh -- Eh -- First of all... I-I just, like -- Thank you. Um...you're... Look, Lucy, I'm -- I'm flattered. I am. You're a great girl. Woman. Woman. And I... Um... Crap." (3x09) The poor man was having an existential crisis, and his entire mess of a response is fantastic.

"You don't let anyone ever tell you you can't do something. Not even me." (3x09) This line!?!?!? Ughhhhhhh aelakglaekglaek

"I'm who I am in spite of you." (4x09) I couldn't find a gif of this specific line, but this one always destroys me. I'm so proud of him and so happy he got to say his piece to his father.

"Call me crazy, but it just doesn't feel like pretend." (5x01) This was such a moment for him, being vulnerable enough with her to give voice to what he's feeling...

"You know what? No—I don't have anything." (4x22) He's so adorably flustered and I just love this.

"You could never disappoint me." (6x03) I mean... do I even need to explain this???? *faints*

"You can choose to see that tattoo as your greatest failure. But I see it as proof that you're a survivor. It wasn't your day of death, Officer Chen. It was the first day, of the rest of your life. And no one can take that away from you." (2x12) So powerful, a forever fave.

"No!" (5x01) I live for how fucking obvious he is in this scene.

"The last time I gave you romantic advice, I-I pushed you towards Caleb, and... you almost died." (2x17) I'm obsessed with this scene, so I can't make a list of favourite lines without including it. The raw vulnerability is just fantastic.

"I am responsible for a life that is in jeopardy, and I will do whatever I have to to save her." (2x11) It's so good ahhh

"If you get dispatched to a loud party, make sure they know you're not the stripper." (4x05) This will never not be funny.

"I am unwilling to let fear make me do something I'll be ashamed of in the light of day." (1x15) This was great the first time, but knowing what we know now??? Yes.

I'm sure I've missed so many great ones, and so I reserve the right to amend this list at any time haha.

This was fun though!

[feuerwizard]

do you have any unpopular opinions about caleb?

to clarify: no one in the rpc is guilty of what i am about to explain, more of the general c/ritical r/ole fandom as a whole!

i wouldn't say this is an unpopular opinion necessarily as much as i do find it a bit frustrating that the c/ritical r/ole fandom as a whole sometimes tends to overlook or ignore what a bad person early campaign caleb really was. they sort of just simplify him to sad quirky boy who likes cats and by the end, he's less sad quirky boy who likes cats.

a bit of caleb meta under the cut because i am obsessed with him.

this is not exclusive to the critical role fandom of course, but fandom, in general, can sometimes ignore a character arc starting from a less-than-ideal place if they have deemed that particular character as a favorite boy who can do no wrong. this absolutely happens in discussions surrounding caleb and his character arc because he ends up in such a positive (or positive for him) place by the end of the campaign. it's very easy to ignore the low if you can choose instead to focus on the high.

as a writer, this is something i feel very passionate about not doing. caleb is such an interesting character to me because of where he came from and the growth he overcomes throughout his character arc. is caleb as bad as trent? absolutely not, but he was still a pretty shitty person and extremely single-minded in his pursuits. even if his motivations were noble (saving his parents from himself) i think we have seen from a lot of popular media that even the best of villains start from noble pursuits. not saying caleb is a villain, not at all, but you get my point. he was clearly struggling with his worst instincts and it's his friends that caused him to start looking inwards.

don't believe me? ask liam o'brien!

i've been watching a lot of old liam interviews where he talks about early campaign caleb and this one stood out to me as the most direct example of the demons caleb was fighting with every day and how he sometimes allowed them to win. when asked why caleb chose to do the blood pact with fjord, this is what he said.

“…he saw fjord become tempted by power and in that moment, he’s very much like trent, the man who molded him, saw a split second in time where he [fjord] had hunger in his eyes and thought that it could be molded or bent for caleb’s use. and thought, I could take a risk here….and use him and pull a favor out of this.” 

this is very crappy and manipulative behavior towards a friend! liam then follows it up by expressing how guilty caleb felt over it due to his increasing care of the nein.

"caleb was disgusted with himself at that moment...i think that he was a product of his schooling in that moment. and part of him was like 'yes' but most of him went you fucking piece of filth. look at you."

was caleb, as a child, a victim of abuse grooming? absolutely. did this mold caleb into someone not super great? also yes. both things can be true and it doesn't minimize the abuse that caleb suffered. he's a product of his environment and that's what makes his growth so powerful. love saves people. he is genuinely changed by the friends in his life who chose to look past his mistakes and the man that trent molded him into and instead saw him for the person he could choose to be now. caleb is extremely kind and painstakingly earnest. he just needed the right people in his life to allow that to come out again. to allow the softness.

when caleb is talking to essek in the infamous forehead kiss scene, he is not talking just talking about the mistakes he made as a young teenager in killing his family, but he is also referring to the person he was when he met the nein. that is the fool in caleb's mind. not a manipulated child bren. he sees a lot of himself in essek because i think he sees how easily he could have become essek if not for the nein. and also why essek's redemption is so meaningful to him. if essek can do it, maybe he can too.

trauma doesn't define either of them.

i feel so passionate about this because i think caleb's character arc is genuinely one of the most powerful explorations of trauma and healing i've ever seen in a fictional property and overlooking the person he was at the beginning is a disservice to how far he comes by the end. the genuinely good person he grows into becoming.

"pain doesn’t make people. it’s love that makes people. the pain is inconsequential. it’s love that saves them."

[makeste]

BnHA Episode 122, a.k.a. NOBUHIKO YOU'VE DONE IT AGAIN

THEY CAN'T KEEP LETTING HIM GET AWAY WITH IT!

oh my god.

so first off, let's just get the one big major criticism out of the way: this episode was definitely not up to the same high quality standards as the first third of this season. and hey, I get it! you're doing 24 episodes in all, you're on a time crunch, and you've only got so many animators to go around. and the quality of some of these earlier season 6 eps (118 and 119 especially) was seriously some of the best this series has ever had. by contrast, chapters 284 and 285, while still easily ranking among my favorite chapters of all time, definitely do not go as hard with the visuals as some of the other War arc chapters (that very last 285 page being the one standout exception).

anyway so yeah, it was still a slight disappointment, but I'm fine with it. it does mean Deku vs Kacchan 2 will still retain its crown as my all time fave, but the real meat of this episode was never going to be about the flashy visuals -- it's all about that sweet, sweet character development.

two more very minor criticisms before I get to the OMG nonstop gushing part of this post! one, they did cut out this scene from ch 282 where Tomura originally had TWO quirk-be-gone bullets in his possession and Kacchan actually destroyed the second one.

YOU THOUGHT WE WOULDN'T REMEMBER, BONES. BUT WE DID. so for everyone who is giving Kacchan his well-earned love, praise, and admiration today, don't forget to also give him props for saving Aizawa's other leg, or whichever other appendage this doubtless would have hit. my boy out here lowkey saving his sensei from being ReDestro'd.

and then one final nitpicky little quibble, which is that the anime subtitlers declined to use the "Catch-A-Kacchan" translation, despite it being the single cleverest translation of all time, and by far Caleb Cook's biggest and most important contribution to the BnHA canon. alas, twas not meant to be. BUT ANYWAY NOW ON TO THE GUSHING.

okay so first off, we all know that Aizawa is an absolute badass and the most metal motherfucker in this entire series, and that Shouto has by this point all but perfected the art of swooping in to save the day at pivotal moments, and that the U.A. kids all need ALL OF THE THERAPY GODDAMMIT, and that Deku is a COMPLETE LUNATIC who thinks that HAVING FUNCTIONAL ARMS IS OVERRATED ANYWAYS. yes and yes and yes and yes. and if you wish, you can read all about my thoughts on these things and more, here and here and here and here.

but you already know what I actually came here to talk about today.

first of all, YOU GUYS. the music. THIS FUCKING MUSIC, THOUGH. they used the exact same OST track that was used for the "why was I the one who ended All Might?" speech all the way back in DvK2. THIS IS OFFICIALLY THE "TIME FOR NOBUHIKO TO FLEX HIS VOICE ACTING CHOPS" MUSIC. A TRADITION HAS BEEN BORN.

anyway so if anyone needs me I'll just be sitting here playing this scene on repeat until the end of time. no big deal though. I can quit at any time. not like I'm obsessed with it or anything. I definitely love this scene and this character a perfectly normal amount.

All Might talking about how Katsuki understood from the get-go about how OFA was a secret that could put other people at great risk really hits hard in hindsight. especially when you realize that Katsuki really did know right from the start, and he willingly accepted that risk with no hesitation, and he absolutely did suffer consequences for it (it was his knowledge of OFA that led to him following Deku and subsequently getting involved in this battle). and I don't doubt that he has absolutely zero regrets.

okay but can we seriously just talk for a sec about the way Kacchan's anxiety is practically boiling over when he starts to ask All Might about the Fourth's cause of death?? I feel like this is one thing that kind of got overlooked at the time in the manga because we were so completely distracted by EVERY SINGLE OTHER DAMN THING IN THAT CHAPTER lol. but hearing it again here, you feel how worried he actually is about Deku, and idk why but it all of a sudden just hit me so damn hard.

"I'm worried about him. you are, too." because that truly is what this whole conversation is really about. or at least that's the driving force behind it. behind this whole episode, in fact. it's simple, when you get right down to it: Kacchan is afraid that Deku is going to die. it's literally been the biggest fear on his mind ever since Deku unlocked SIXQUIRKS. right from the start, his mind was immediately going to the worst case scenarios. he immediately deduced that OFA might have a deeper connection to AFO than any of them realized (shoutout to Kacchan for being the original "Deku is a horcrux" truther lol. ONE DAY HORIKOSHI WILL FINALLY REVEAL THE TRUTH AND PROVE US RIGHT). he instantly zeroed in on the sobering fact that all of the previous OFA users died young. and as he reveals here, he took particular notice of the fact that All Might seems to be hiding something about OFA IV's death, and he is goddamn PRESSED about it.

and I absolutely LOVE the way that Nobu voiced this part of the conversation. when he starts to question All Might, his breathing starts to pick up a little, and his voice starts to get louder, and the words start to spill out faster and faster almost like he's in a rush to get it all out, and his voice starts to crack just a little, and he goes from not looking at All Might to hesitantly, almost fearfully glancing at him from the side, and then finally turning to face him head on with his eyes all wary and his teeth gritted like he's bracing himself for the very worst (because he is).

and then he finally just asks him, "was it because you realized something?" and then he takes in this achingly hesitant little breath before finishing with, "...about One for All?" and just. the whole scene is just SO well done. like, he's seriously so fucking scared about this, though. but at the same time he just needs to know, and just. oh my god. and Nobuhiko manages to emote all of this so clearly, and that is such a difficult line to walk when you're dealing with a character like Katsuki who's always so hesitant to show his vulnerability. he has to portray these two separate layers of Bakugou at the same time -- the part of him that is trying his hardest to be nonchalant and matter-of-fact in order to hide his fears and emotions; while at the same time also portraying said emotions which are clearly seeping through anyway, regardless of his efforts.

anyway so yeah. I could talk about this for eighty years and never get sick of it honestly but let's move on.

let me tell you guys, I've been bracing myself for this scene for two full years, and it still kicked my ass. THIS SCENE HAD NO REGARD FOR HUMAN LIFE. literally RIGHT IN the feels. direct hit.

"he's always been that way." no, but guys. the regret when he says that. the way he states it with such simplicity and clarity. almost profound. this is just a truth of the world. this is just how Deku is. this is something that took him so long to understand, but now that he does, he can't fathom how he was never able to see it before. and then that ever-so-slight bitterness that creeps into his voice as he goes on to describe how he fucked it all up. ;_;

and then last but not least!!

"ijimeta." one word, in Japanese. it all comes down to that. and his voice gets so quiet. this whole last part of his speech is so quiet and so soft. but when he says this very last part, his voice wavers perfectly on that last word, and it just. sounds so resigned, somehow, but also just... almost faltering, for just a moment. you can hear the regret as clear as day, but you also hear the fear once again as he finally reveals this fact -- literally his biggest shame; the worst thing that he's ever done -- to All Might. his hero. just, damn.

anyway. so needless to say, despite my expectations being SKY HIGH, this scene absolutely met all of them and blew me away. as expected from the best fucking voice actor in Japan, according to me, a single lone person, whose subjective opinion is absolutely definitely not biased in any possible way.

back to the action! and Nobu getting to do his very best Deku impression lol.

can you believe this kid. one single nerdy analysis speech was all it took for him to start emitting such powerful Main Character Energy that even Endeavor got taken in and was just automatically following orders lol.

awesome choice of music here while Deku and Tomura continued to battle and Bakugou laid out his plan. you know it's good when they still manage to make you feel the tension even though this is basically just a generic action scene, and you additionally already know exactly what's going to happen.

I have no idea why, but that part with Deku's "Kacchan... my 'Deku' means 'you can do it!'" speech juxtaposed against the image of him going all out against Tomura with such fierce determination hit me like 100x harder than it did in the manga. I was NOT expecting that to be as powerful as it was. damn near gave me chills.

literally the only time I've ever been on board with the whole "FUCK YEAH, I'LL JUST BREAK ALL MY BONES AT YOU!!" deal lol. it literally makes no goddamn sense but this scene is just so raw.

THEN WE YEET THE ENDEAVOR!!!!

SO ON-BRAND. NO DEKU-INSPIRED PLAN IS EVER TRULY COMPLETE WITHOUT A GOOD YEETING.

and then the next few moments are some of the most legitimately unsettling of the entire series, as we have Tomura screaming at the top of his lungs while being burnt to cinders (and I mean, I love Tomura dearly, but I get it; he literally just Thanos'd tens of thousands of innocent people), followed by AFO's creepy fucking ghost hand reaching out all "LEND ME YOUR BODY~~~" which is a scene that absolutely NO ONE ASKED FOR but okay.

but then right afterwards though! when AFO finally did take over, and you hear that "TV shutting down" sound effect all of a sudden? and then the next few scenes with all the BKDK flashbacks are also weirdly TV-themed? I could not for the life of me figure this out at first, but now I'm actually thinking it could be a reference to the chapter 306 color page?

OR MAYBE NOT? I actually have no idea. anyway though it may have been random af but it worked for me, what can I say.

AND THEN THE MOMENT OF TRUTH AT LONG LAST.

THIS ACTUALLY IS SO PRETTY THOUGH?? LIKE I WAS NOT EXPECTING THAT COLOR COMBINATION AT ALL?

AND IT HAPPENS SO QUICKLY!!!!??? YOU BARELY EVEN HAVE TIME TO BLINK?!?!!

oh. my. god.

THE WAY THE MUSIC SUDDENLY GOT QUIET. THE WAY HIS NARRATING VOICE CAME ON AND, PRAISE EVERYTHING, IT REALLY WAS DEEPER. THAT REALLY WAS THE ADULT HIM. SAME AS DEKU. MY FEELINGS ABOUT THIS ARE SO FUCKING MUCH RIGHT NOW.

AND THEN THE FLASHBACKS!! THE SCENES OF THEM IN MIDDLE SCHOOL!! AND GROUND ZERO!! AND THEN CUTTING TO THE TWO OF THEM AS LITTLE BABIES, AND THE TV SCREEN ALL OF A SUDDEN SWITCHING TO COLOR??? AND THE HANDS??? THE REACHING?!?!

AND THEN?!?!?!

"HEY MAKESTE, IF WE GO AHEAD AND ACTUALLY MAKE THE VOLUME 29 COVER CANON, WILL YOU FINALLY FORGIVE US FOR ALL OF THE HALF-BAKED PAINFULLY OOC FILLER EPISODES AND OVAS?" WELL, STUDIO BONES, YOU DRIVE A HARD BARGAIN, BUT HOW CAN I POSSIBLY REFUSE.

AND THEN THEY FULL ON MURDERED ME!!!!!

that's right bitches. DREAD IT. RUN FROM IT. THE CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT ARRIVES ALL THE SAME.

holy shit. and then THE END CREDITS oh my freaking heart. words can't even describe.

Studio Bones out here not resting until they've succeeded in making EVERY SINGLE PERSON feel the MAXIMUM AMOUNT OF SADNESS THAT A HUMAN BEING CAN SUSTAIN. their callousness truly knows no bounds.

anyway so there we have it! part one of the spectacular season 6 Bakugou Katsuki Redemption Saga. I laughed, I cried, I cried, I cried, I cried a little bit more, and then I cried a little bit more after that. final verdict: yeah, it was pretty good.

[astriiformes]

Throwing meta thoughts at the wall here because I was musing on the fact that a lot of my favorite stories these days (TOH, Pentiment, the Locked Tomb series) are all at least a little bit about grief. But one interesting thing The Owl House specifically did with Luz and Belos was make both their stories about grief and mourning, but in the opposite directions.

I love stories where the protagonist and the antagonist are both grappling with the same question or difficult experience but differ drastically from each other in their answers to it. And in both Luz and Philip's/Belos' cases, that experience is the loss of a family member, and their relationship to the Boiling Isles is defined by that grief.

Belos sees the Boiling Isles as a corrupting force that needs to be eliminated because in his eyes, they're the thing that lead his brother astray. He probably would have had a problem with them regardless, since his fervently held religious beliefs are the other source of his antagonism towards witches -- and of course, the real source of the rift between him and Caleb. But they clearly became a scapegoat for his brother's running away and abandoning their world, as well as the reason he decided the Isles had to be destroyed at any cost.

And he never processes that grief. He creates the grimwalkers instead, killing them when they echo that original loss and trapping himself in a cycle where he never actually mourns, just tells himself he'll get it right the next time and finally have his brother back -- all the while projecting that same loss onto the Boiling Isles and letting it fester into an even worse bitterness towards everyone there in his attempts at genocide.

Luz, meanwhile, associates the Boiling Isles with her dad, who encouraged her interest in fantasy and even left her the Azura books, which were one of the primary reasons she decided to stay and learn how to be a witch. To her the Isles represent someone she loved, and now almost has a piece of back. Her wonder at everything there -- and her finding belonging and other people who love her, which she was clearly longing for after her dad's death -- is in part a wonder at rediscovering a happiness that had shattered when Manny died. Of course she ends up wanting to do anything to protect them.

We even see Luz try to suppress her own grief, which is probably part of why she worries she's too much like Belos -- she can see echoes of her own fears in his, even if they both have different relationships with them. But ultimately his story is one about going insane and destroying himself with unprocessed grief -- and an unwillingness to admit his own part in his pain -- whereas hers is about coming to terms with it, as well as with the guilt that comes from not always being able to protect the people you love from harm. It's one reason her conversation with the Titan is so lovely, because it's her simultaneously talking to a dad who never got to have a relationship with his own child and her talking to the Isles that gave her back some of the same joy as her own dad, as well as the courage to remember him the way he would have wanted.

And of course, both their mourning narratives are accentuated by the Collector, who has no real concept of grief and ends up learning about loss as a result of Belos' attempt to destroy the Boiling Isles clashing with Luz's attempts to save it. His confusion about death ties both their narratives together at the end, which works perfectly for an antagonist-turned-protagonist -- something that's really driven home by Luz and Philip's first "chronological" interaction occurring in large part because Luz offered to help him find the Collector in the first place.

I just!!!! It's about loss it's about grief it's about spying someone in the mirror that's almost-you-but-not-quite it's about learning to tell the difference and to be better than them even if you still understand something of the shape of what made them the way they are, about how misery is easy and hope is hard, especially when the world has taken something load-bearing away from you, but one is poison and the other is ultimately healing.

It's about grief and about how it can be the end of you or the beginning of a whole new story.

[2-d-rogue]

My thoughts after completing my first playthrough of Eiyuden Chronicle

A few days ago, I finally finished my first playthrough of EC. Because I backed the project, I had an early start before release day. Nonetheless, I make it a habit to take my time with games and take in as much as possible, leading to me finishing them a bit slower than most.

This isn't really a review per se, but more a cliff notes of my current thoughts after my first completion. I feel I can't fully decide on my thoughts until I've replayed the game, and have seen the DLC (mostly because it seems a lot of story in this game is being saved for DLC. More on that later). Currently, I'm in the process of platinuming it, and I am planning a second playthrough in the near future. Maybe then, I'll have a more concrete opinion of this game.

One thing I am going to be upfront about right from the get-go is that I am disappointed with this game. That isn't to say it's a terrible game, or that I hated it. Far from it, in fact. I had loads of fun playing it, and enjoyed many things about it. But even so, there was more I expected from this title that it simply did not deliver on. And I don't know how much of that is because they're sitting on things that won't be revealed until the DLC is out, or the sequel. Regardless, the game on its own really needed more than what was given, and I fear that because so much was held back, it really hurt the potential.

I'll break things down into things I liked, and things I didn't like.

Things I like:

*The characters, especially the side characters. I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed the side characters. Especially ones like Yusuke, Falward, Francesca, Momo, etc. There's too many to mention here because a lot of them are so fun. Not just to use in battle, but also possessing entertaining personalities.

My favorite has to be Yusuke, though. Not only is he a beast in battle, having ended many boss monsters' lives with his double charge, he also just has your back on anything (just see his comments if he's around for beigoma). I loved him so much, I even started calling him "kyoudai." He's a bro, and he's hilarious in theater roles, too! Seriously, Caleb Yen did such a fantastic job with this yankii character.

Really curious about his relationship with Falward, though. Going by Falward's comments when Yusuke's in the party, it implies he cares about him a great deal, but as far as I'm aware, there's no interactions between them, and Yusuke doesn't appear to pay him any mind. It's fascinating to think about what might be going on there, is all…

*Beautiful art and graphics This game is gorgeous. The detailed spritework, animations, the backgrounds and environments, the art… All of it is a smorgasbord of candy for the eyes. I thought Rising looked beautiful, but this was beyond what I was expecting after that. Everything is so painstakingly detailed.

*Most of the English voice acting As I mentioned above, I enjoyed Caleb Yen as Yusuke, but I also enjoyed a great many others, too. Most of the cast chosen suited their characters well, and delivered on them spectacularly. Some of the best were Seign's, Nowa's, Garr's, Francesca's, and many, many others. I was pleasantly surprised at how good most of the cast was, but also just how much everything is voice acted. This being on a budget, I was expecting the usual in JRPGs where only the more pivotal scenes are voice acted, but to see (hear?) that at least 90% of the script got voice acting was really nice, especially when the voices are actually good.

That being said, there were some scenes, particularly towards the end, that I felt were a bit more off, and there were some characters that were certainly miscasted. This being a game with as many characters as it has, I knew not all of them were going to land, but I can at least be grateful it's only a couple who feel off, while the majority were more than qualified enough for the job.

*The music Okay, so I'll admit that the OST isn't the most groundbreaking I've ever heard, but there are many tracks that I'm really fond of. "The Greatwood" is a mysterious track that reminds me of music from Donkey Kong Country and Oddworld, which I really like. The "Dappled Forest" theme sounds straight out of Tales of Symphonia, and some of the boss tracks are so metal it's awesome (especially the one where you're fighting a bunch of creatures Narungarde sends after you on the bridge in Seign's scenario).

I find the Treefolk Village theme and the Village themes soothing as well. Having Naruke and Sakuraba, as well as Yanagawa was definitely something nice to have for this game.

*Some of the mini games are really fun A bit divided since I did sour on beigoma a little once I realized strategy has very little in winning matches, and you're more pushed to grind for stronger ones to win. (Also have no clue why there's three games per match you have to get through, even if victory is guaranteed winning the first two.) But I do enjoy Glen's card game, and the Eggfoot races can get a little addicting.

*The theater

Nuff said.

Things I didn't like:

*The story It's not a terrible story, but it is lacking, taking until the end of the game to really start raising the stakes.

One thing I noticed really quick, and this is shown quite early, is that this game really seems to shy away from tragedy. When Nowa's village is burnt to the ground, it has to be one of the most impactless village burnings I've ever seen. No one is killed, and right after all is said and done, the villagers are just rolling with it and set to work on rebuilding immediately.

Then there's when Eltisweiss falls. The gate/wall gets destroyed, yet outside of the war battle, there is no evidence of destruction at all throughout the city, the townspeople are just going about their lives, and despite being occupied, you're still allowed to freely enter and exit without fear of consequence. And this remains true for any other place that gets taken over, thoroughly killing the immersion of anything truly getting bad.

The tension, the tragedy, the stakes, etc., are just not present, making you wonder what exactly are we doing any of this for. It isn't until the second-to-last arc of the game that they finally start having real things happen, but by then, it's too late to really appreciate most of it, making me almost want to call this game "Suikoden for babies".

This also effects Nowa. It's a shame because I actually do like his character. He's not like the typical overly energetic shounen hero I feared him to be, and he comes off a bit more grounded. It's established he's a "meddler", which basically means he's a natural do-gooder, but it's not the only thing about him, which makes him have a fairly interesting personality. The problem is that they do almost nothing with it. He never suffers any personal tragedy of his own, gets barely any character development, and the only reason he becomes the leader is because: countess Perielle is "a good judge of character" and thinks he's "handsome", which was a total cop-out and more or less the game admitting they have no legit reasons why he's such a big deal.

The game also implies he's got something special about him. In Chandra's recruitment scene and if you get her as your companion with the highest affection, there's a voice that speaks to him, calling him the "the third begotten", then makes vague statements like "now isn't the time for this talk", but then leaves Nowa with the words "saldio raum". This sounds like something is being set up for him, yet nothing about it is explored or ever brought up in the grand scheme of things. I have no idea if they have any intention of exploring this in any of the DLCs, or a future sequel, but it didn't sit well with me to just randomly mention these things, then leave it hanging.

*Seign and Nowa's relationship One of the main draws to this game was the conflict between Nowa and Seign; as two men who had become fond of each other, but are on two opposite sides of the fence, and have to face each other in war against their will. Many people compare them to the likes of Riou and Jowy, but for me, I think of them more like their predecessors Han and Genkaku. Riou and Jowy were childhood friends, whereas Han and Genkaku met during the war and happened to form a friendship inbetween battles, and also hated fighting each other, striving to end the conflict. That fits the story of Nowa and Seign more in my opinion.

I was looking forward to how their relationship unfolds, thinking it would be close to how Han and Genkaku would have been if they got something showing their story. In the beginning, it starts off very promising. They clearly like each other and get along well. Enough to start protecting one another and grow from being around each other. Nowa defrosts Seign's cold visage, and Seign helps Nowa mature and become more grounded. It sets up that the inevitable tear is going to be extremely painful when it happens, and it is…until they start rushing through it all.

Look, there was never any doubt that Seign was eventually going to come over to Nowa's side. Especially when several screenshots prior to the game's release spoiled Seign being around the castle and involved in things like the cooking mini-game. Still, I was waiting for all the drama and angst to happen between them before that pivotal moment. The buildup to Seign realizing this war was pointless/wrong, damn what is expected of him, then change sides.

Imagine how disappointed I was when their conflict is resolved very quickly, and without much strife at all. The scene on the bridge felt like that should have come much later, after all that's happened. In my opinion, that's when Seign should have switched sides. But the fated painful duel happens far too early, and then Seign joining not too long after made the whole arc feel underwhelming in the end.

What makes it worse is Seign and Nowa don't get to interact much after that until nearing the end of the game. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy what they did get well enough, but there really should have been more. One of the draws to this game was the agony of war tearing apart two friends. Doesn't mean much when that gets wrapped up all too quickly.

*Nowa and Perrielle I haven't the faintest idea what they were trying to do with this one. It's implied early on that Nowa is developing feelings for Perry, and she feels the same, but they kinda don't really do anything with it. At least, not unless you got her scene on the roof towards the end. Personally, I would have been on board with it. The times they do interact are cute, Nowa giving her a cute nickname was adorable, and they have good chemistry, but they kinda leave it underdeveloped and it's really unfortunate.

Like with Seign, there should have been much more if they did want to have a romance between them. I can only guess they purposely left it open in case people wanted to ship Nowa with others.

I will say I am of the opinion she's the closest thing to a canon love interest for Nowa, however.

*Lian A lesser Nanami essentially. Had no problem with her in the beginning, but she quickly becomes annoying when she keeps treating this war like it's a game and never develops her character beyond that. Also irritating how she clings to Nowa like he's her property sometimes. Literally Nanami without anything that made her interesting and likeable. Her catchphrases were annoying, too.

*The Watch group (Garr, Mio, and Lian) They do not get developed at all, leading to them becoming forgettable unless you staunchly use them throughout the game. Again, highly disappointing. (But less Lian is fine with me.)

*Marisa gets very little to work with I get the feeling Marisa's entire story is being saved for her DLC, but because of that, she comes off as having little to do with this story, making me question why she's considered a main. I don't dislike her, but given how little time we get with her (at least until the end), I found her the least interesting of the three.

*The cooking mini-game I was so happy to have this back. It was one of my favorite features in Suikoden II. Unfortunately, this time around it had almost none of the charm as it did before. All it ended up being was, essentially, a rehash of SuikoII's cook-off story. Only less well-written and lacking substance. Just ended up not really caring for it. Not helped that the mechanics are broken and most of the duels can be won cooking fried eggs over and over. (I was even joking to my bestie that this army is made up of anorexics by how much they seemed to just hate any food I gave them, including the stuff they supposedly liked!)

The story, music, presentation, the animations… None of them were as memorable as SuikoII's version, and that's a terrible shame.

That being said, I love Kurtz. The brooding cooking dweeb that he is.

*The duels I'm…really not a fan of how they handled these. It feels as though they wanted to make them more challenging, but instead, they made them irritating as hell to grasp. I got the gist of it, but I just don't know why they had to have it that you need to a fill a bar in order to use break (wild attack). I'm guessing it's to reward you with the epic animations of the fight (which are actually really well-done, I'll give it that), but when it feels tedious to get to it, it makes it feel very unsatisfying. I think it's possible to make something better of this, but until then, please don't do it this way again.

Well, those are some of my current thoughts as of finishing my first playthrough. There's more I can mention, but I feel this will do for now. My thoughts may change on a replay, and with some time when the DLCs are all out. Again, I will repeat, I did not hate this game at all, but I did want something more mature and grounded than what was provided. I do feel this was a decent step up, but I encourage Rabbit & Bear to take chances and actually remember we're dealing with war. There will be death and other horrible things that happen. Do not be afraid to embrace this.

And please, develop the main cast a little better next time.

[ariadne-mouse]

ao3 wrapped: 3 & 29!

Hallo!! :)

[Ao3 Wrapped ask meme]

3. What work are you most proud of (regardless of kudos/hits)?

Works I finished in 2022 (for my own reference in this meme lol, time is fake and a blur):

the fire kept closest (burns most of all)

small works of cosmic scale

reverse learning

Everything in Aeor Is Fine

a man by any other face

till human voices wake us (technically started in 2021 and finished writing mid 2022, though it's not finished posting to Ao3 yet)

It's very hard to pick a "most" but I think the work I am most proud of is a man by any other face, specifically because it took so much old fashioned hair-pulling, grimace-making, hard work to finish it. I had a 25k draft sitting for months and months before I finally got down to business and attempted serious editing. And it needed serious editing! The first draft had been written in separate fits and starts, and so messages and themes in the text often repeated instead of evolving. I could see the potential for nuance and refinement, but it took a lot of heavy lifting to get there - possibly the most deep editing work I have done on a story, and on one of my longest as well. So many times I pulled faces at it and wished it would just write itself when I picked it up and started to edit, then got exhausted and put it down again. But I got there in the end! I learned some new tricks for myself on editing longer works that I will use in the future. So yeah, proud of that one.

29. Favorite line/passage you wrote this year?

I am quickly learning a challenge with this meme is I have to remember what i have written 😂 and as mentioned above I find it hard to pick an absolute "best" of anything. But for impact, evocativeness, and efficiency, I am very pleased with this passage from the emotional climax of the fire kept closest (big fat spoilers below the cut):

“Caleb?” Essek called, his vocal chords ragged after the day’s shouting, the heat, the soot and ash.  “Caleb!” There was no reply. Nothing, nothing, nothing. “CALEB!” Essek yelled as loud as he could. The hot wind took the sound and tore it to shreds. The mountain’s bleeding wound continued to flow into the sea, hissing steam. “Give him back!” Essek shouted at the lava river, at the volcano, at the night. “GIVE HIM BACK!” Nothing.  The FLIR readings were unremarkable. No one was there. Tears choked him from further speech, and with all his might he flung the FLIR camera away into the lava, where it hit the crusted surface, burst into flames, and was drawn out of sight. Essek sank to his knees, wracked with grief.  The hot surface singed him through his clothes. He was alone in the devastation. And then: “Essek!” A voice.  Distant, growing louder.  Familiar. “Essek!” Another voice.  “Fuck, there he is. Fuck!” It was Jester and Beau.  Hands grabbed his shoulders and hauled him up. “He’s not here,” Essek sobbed, when they wrapped him in their arms and held him tight. “He’s not here.” “Shh, shh, it’s okay.” Jester soothed, sounding tearful herself. “It’s going to be okay, I promise.”  She rocked him side to side. “We saved everyone.  We did what Caleb wanted, and it worked!  It’s going to be okay.” “Essek, we need to take you home,” Beau said, her gruffness softened more than he’d ever heard it, except for with Yasha, or friends when they were hurt. “It’s not safe here.” “We’ll come back with you tomorrow,” Jester promised. A marionette with strings cut, Essek let them take him away.  And for the first time in a long time, when later he slept, he did not dream.

[ejzah]

A/N: After much anticipation, here’s the next chapter. Sorry it took so long and I hope you enjoy it. I know the direction I want this story to go, but sometimes putting it into action is a struggle.

***

In Miss Blye’s Class Part 11

Kensi groaned, smacking at her phone in the futile belief that it would make the incessant beeping stop. Whatever part of her had thought it would be a good idea to get up at 5 to work out before work had long since passed.

She let herself lay in bed a few minutes, recalling the night before.

It turned out that Caleb had needed batteries for the TV remote and once that minor calamity was sorted out, Deeks asked, half teasing, if she wanted to watch an episode of Avengers Assemble with them. Kensi was tempted, but she wasn’t sure she could handle sitting next to Deeks for an entire show, the memory of their almost kiss simmering between them.

“You know what, I would love to, but I really need to go. So many assessments to grade this time of year,” she’d given as her excuse. “But you guys could come over for dinner next Tuesday,” she added, making her way to the doorway as she collected her purse. “You know, as repayment for tonight.”

“Uh, not to be rude, but you’ve mentioned multiple times that cooking isn’t your favorite extracurricular,” Deeks had reminded her. “Are you trying to poison me?”

“Haha. I’ll be ordering Mexican.” She’d jabbed a finger at his chest, making contact with the hard muscle beneath. “And please don’t tell me you don’t like Mexican, because I will never speak to you again.”

Deeks had laughed outright at that. “Don’t worry, I love tacos, burritos, and a good corona any time,” he’d assured her. “Probably more than is healthy. In fact, I know a place along the beach that sells the best fish tacos.”

“Well, then we’ll have to go sometime. Make a day of it.”

“I’d like that.”

They’d chatted for a few more minutes before Kensi finally left.

Kensi rolled over in bed now and scrubbed her hands over her face. Somehow, they kept knocking down the barriers (admittedly very flimsy barriers) every time they saw each other. What made it worse was that she was less bothered by it every day.

Sighing, she finally pushed herself up and stalked to the bathroom before she gave up completely and just went for donuts instead.

***

The next few weeks were busy for both of them, each having several late meetings that prevented meeting up outside of Kensi’s promised dinner on Tuesday. Thankfully, Deeks readily agreed eat out which saved her the trouble of cleaning her apartment to a guest-worthy state.

There were only about 6 weeks left to the school year, which meant everyone was scrambling to get final field trips, presentations, and the oh-so dreaded testing and assessment completed in time.

Throughout it all, they kept up a steady conversation and she saw Deeks occasionally in the car line. But otherwise, they didn’t seem much of each other.

One Wednesday, Kensi and Nell stayed late to power through their remaining reports and organize their rooms. By 8, Kensi had lost her steam and felt just a little defeated, surrounded by what seemed like the entire contents of her classroom closet.

Nell had finished her own work and moved on to showing Kensi pictures of the costume she was sewing for a convention in the summer.

“That’s going to be gorgeous,” Kensi complimented her, staring at the elaborate design in awe. “But don’t you think it’s going to get a little warm?”

“Eh, can’t be as bad as the latex catsuit I wore two years ago.” She waved off Kensi’s concern. “Anyway, finishing this is my weekend plan. What about you, Kens? Any big plans?” She wiggled her eyes mischievously, and then as if Kensi didn’t understand her meaning. “With the charming and unfairly attractive Mr. Deeks.”

“No, no plans, we’ve both been pretty busy,” Kensi said.

“Oh come on, Kens, you have to give me something,” Nell moaned. “I’m dying here.”

“You have a boyfriend you adore. You shouldn’t need to live vicariously through me.”

“Yeah, but he’s at an IT seminar so I need something to distract me. And as we’ve already established, Marty Deeks is hot, smart, and charming and you are clearly crazy about him.”

“I am not crazy about him and like I keep telling you—”

“You’re just friends,” Nell interrupted in a singsong voice, swaying her head back and forth. “Yeah, I know what you said. And you can deny it all you want but everyone who’s seen you and the good lawyer around each other knows you have a thing.”

“We do not have a thing,” Kensi protested.

“Yes, you do. And you know it. Come on Kensi, why are you lying to me and yourself about this? You’re usually not this hesitant.”

“I’m just using a normal amount of caution.” Nell gave her an unimpressed look.

“I’ve know you for 6 years and last time you showed an ounce of caution was when you decided that eating 4 day old sushi might be a bad idea,” she said. “Why are you still hesitating when this is clearly something that you want?”

“I do really like him,” Kensi admitted softly. “You know my track record with guys isn’t exactly fantastic and Deeks is…you’re right he’s charming, and funny, and a really amazing guy. I don’t want to destroy things by pushing too hard too fast.”

Which was the exactly reason she’d been on maybe three dates the last year that didn’t go beyond one date.

“We almost kissed a couple weeks ago.” Kensi saw Nell’s eyes widen and watched her visibly tamp down any reaction. Her forced neutral expression was pretty hilarious. “We got interrupted and at first I was disappointed, but then the more I thought about it, I was relieved.”

“Ok, definitely confused now,” Nell commented.

“Every time I think about taking the next step, I start imagining Deeks telling me that he’s not ready or breaking up with me in a couple months when he finds out what I’m really like. I don’t think I could handle it.”

Nell squeezed her hand, eyes turning sympathetic.

“Oh Kens, that’s the problem. You’re not even at that stage and you’re imagining the worst case scenario. Maybe you and Marty Deeks won’t be star crossed lovers, but you’ll never know if you don’t give it a chance.”

“Deeks doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to move things forward either,” Kensi reminded her.

“I’m not saying you need to jump him in the hallway,” Nell drawled with a roll of her eyes.

“Nell!” Kensi gasped, as always, shocked when her seemingly demure friends said something outrageous. Nell just continued with a devious smile.

“But giving those muscles a feel after Caleb goes to sleep…”

“You are shameless,” Kensi retorted. Like she hadn’t daydreamed about the way he looked with his sleeves rolled up. The sound of Nell’s phone ringing brought her back to the present and Nell jumped up with a little smile.

“Ooh, that’s Eric. He said he’d call when the seminar was over for today,” she said, gesturing to Kensi as she made a beeline for the door. “I need to go home so I can flirt with my boyfriend in peace, but when I see you tomorrow, I expect an update on the Deeks situation.”

Shaking her head, Kensi rubbed her hands over her eyes. Nell made it sound so easy. She spent the rest of the evening shoving everything back into her closet and debating Nell’s advice.

[sgtbradfords]

Lips like Licorice

A little drabble inspired by this post made by the amazing @inthemovingcastle. What if our favorite officer had a bit of a sweet tooth? 

If you happen to think of Candyman by Christina Aguilera and get it stuck in your head, I am not at all sorry. Any mistakes are my own. Enjoy!

At Mid-Wilshire, it was no secret that Tim Bradford had a sweet tooth. On any given day, you could always find some kind of sugary sweetness within reaching distance of the officer.

Ever since Angela and Tim were both recruits in the academy, Angela had long since kept a variety of candy in her duffle bag and soon, when they became boots at the Mid-Wilshire, there was a stash on the top shelf of her locker, making sure to keep a thorough stock of Skittles and Butterfingers (which were a favorite) for something quick and easy.

Though, he would not turn down most candies, he tends to stay away from Reese’s (eighth grade proved the cups do not taste as good the second time) and regular M&Ms (squished colorful pods of chocolate are difficult to clean out of uniform pockets in the desert).

Halloween was one of his favorite times of the year, not the 31st Day of October specifically, more so the day after. Every year, without fail, Tim could walk into the break room on November 1st and find the countertops littered with baggies of goodies that his co-workers had left from their children’s trick-or-treating festivities.

Angela keeps a small ziplock baggie of Jolly Ranchers, peppermints, Fireballs and Lemonheads stocked in Tim’s war bag. This was at first Isabel’s job, but when she went undercover it fell to Talia. Then Isabel went too far off the deep end and Bishop left. ‘Everyone deserves to be happy.’ She thought when she decisively made the task her own.

Sometimes the more challenging calls get to him, though he would never let it show on the outside, on the inside he was an emotional mess. More than once, had Tim walk back to his shop to find a small red bag of Peanut Butter M&Ms sitting in the driver’s seat, the sweet treat putting a smile on his face during the toughest of calls.

There were times when he questioned his friend’s methods, opening his locker after shift to find a full-sized Snickers bar, a sticky note attached to the top telling him “You’re not you when you’re hungry Timothy.” written in a familiar script.  He rolled his eyes, leaving the candy sitting until his next shift where he would give it to one of the officers coming in off shift. That was, until Lucy Chen came along.

It took some time since Tim was shot on her second day, but Lucy soon figured out about Tim’s sweet tooth within his first days back as her Training Officer.

Lucy covered her smile with her hand as she watched the city pass by out her passenger window, glancing out of the corner of her eye, watching as Tim fought to open the wrapper containing the Butterfinger.

“Need a utility knife sir?” She asked him with a smirk.

Tim glared at the latest thorn in his side (though he does have to give her credit, she did save his life) as the shop came to a stop at the red light in front of them. “You think this is funny boot?”

Lucy’s smirk turned into a frown as the light turned green and he signaled right, pulling the vehicle past a brick building and into an empty parking lot. Thirty burpees later, Lucy was thankful when they were dispatched to the report of an assault across the district.

Lucy had Tim’s sugar intake doubling which left Angela scrambling to keep her stashes thoroughly stocked. One night as they were getting off shift, Tim ran into Angela who pointedly handed the candy bar over, pushing it into his chest before she brushed past him, leaving a stunned Tim standing in the hallway.  

“Is that a Snickers?” Lucy asked as she stepped out of the women’s locker room. “I love those.”

Tim looked at the candy bar in his hand before looking up at his boot. “Here.” He said as he tossed the wrapped candy over, shoving a hand into his pants pocket as he walked away. From that moment on, anytime Angela felt the need to leave the caramel and nougat filled candy for Tim, the popular candy would end up in Lucy’s hands. And every time it was handed over the woman would glance around, giving a little happy dance when she thought no one was looking (she never noticed her training officer peeking around the corner) before making a detour towards the break room.

She thought no one knew about her secret stash of candy that was kept within arm’s reach (the baggie is taped to the back of the refrigerator) but the fact was, everyone knew. And after the events with Caleb and Rosalind, Lucy may have teared up when she came back to her secret stash overfilled with sweet new additions, not that she would ever tell anyone.

Though, during Lucy’s year of riding shotgun, there was one thing that she always wondered…

“You know, I don’t think I know what your favorite kind of candy is.” Lucy thought aloud during their last week of riding together. “Over the past year you’ve ate a lot of candy but never something consistently.”

Tim shook his head as he steered the shop down the busy street. “I’m not telling you, you’re going to think it’s weird and I don’t want you psychoanalyzing me Chen.”

Lucy scoffed. “It’s Candy Tim.”

The cab of the shop became quiet, save for the voices on the other end of the radio as they both watched the hustle and bustle of the city around them.  

“Caramel Apple Pops.” He said, breaking the silence.

“What?”

“My favorite candy, it’s Caramel Apple Pops.”

“Caramel Apple Pops.” She repeated back. “Are those the ones that comes in the green wrappers and are like, half brown half green? I think the last time I had one of those was in middle school.”

Tim sighed. “When I was in elementary school, I would have to stay after school for tutoring because they thought I had a learning disability. So once a week after my tutoring sessions had ended, I would walk home but not before stopping at the store across the street. My mom would give me a few dollars for helping around the house and I would use the money to buy a bag of Caramel Apple Pops.”

“You would eat a whole bag of lollipops by yourself?” She asked in amusement. “I bet your mother loved that.”

“I never said I ate them by myself Lucy,” He scoffed as the dispatcher on the other end addressed their unit, Lucy reaching for the radio. “I shared them with my sister.”

And if on her last day as his boot, she hid a bag of Caramel Apple Pops in his locker, who was she to tell?

[tactiletelekonesis]

yet another yj98 inspired playlist (+explanations for why i picked the songs i did)

Ayyyy, I love making playlists for my favorite superhero team, so here's another one!

Song list (+reasoning):

The Archer by Taylor Swift

OK so this song reminds me of Cissie King Jones for SO many reasons but like, "Dark side, I search for your dark side" - she started showing a dark side before she quit heroing, "And all of my heroes die all alone, help me hold on to you" - so many of her friends have died, and then just the fact that she's an archer, and AHHHH I could gush about this song but I'll spare you.

Asthma Attack by NOAHFINNCE

This song reminds me of Tim as he slowly realizes how alike he is to Bruce despite not wanting to be Batman ("I am the physical embodiment of everything I never wanted to be") and how much he lies to people in his life because of his double life ("If lying was a crime, then I'd be doing time. I don't mean to whine but just imagine having to lie to friends, foes, all of those people that should matter most, living a double life just as obvious as Pinocchio")

Battle Scars by Paradise Fears

I don't have strong feelings on this song yet, but it's very much a feel good, don't-give-up, type song that I feel fits with YJ

Born Ready by Dove Cameron

Yes this was originally for some Marvel thing but like superheroes are superheroes, it's free game. "So if it takes forever, we'll save the world together" is SUCH a YJ thing

Comeback Kid by New Politics

Also not a song that I have strong feelings about yet, but I think the idea of bouncing back, being a comeback kid is very fitting for YJ cos they face adversary together but keep getting back up (even if there are times that some of them need to quit heroing for a bit)

Could Have Been Me by The Struts

The whole song is about not wanting to live with regret and living in the moment and that's very much YJ

Good Times by All Time Low

"I won't forget the good times" is just... self explanatory imo. YJ 98 as full of good times and they helped shape the members into who they are (regardless of what DC won't acknowledge)

Holding Out for a Hero by Caleb Hyles

Ok this one is probably self explanatory, but I love this cover cos I just picture the team singing it and replacing Superman in "it's gonna take a Superman to sweep me off my feet" with Wonder Girl and teasing Cassie cos she's the team leader

I'd Rather Be Me by Barrett Wilbert Weed (from Mean Girls the musical)

Yes, I'm a former theatre kid, you're gonna get musical songs. Anyway, "raise your right finger and solemnly swear whatever they say about me I don't care" is a big mood and reminds me of how YJ just did their own thing and tried to be different from their mentors and predecessors

If We Have Each Other by Alec Benjamin

They stick together!!!! "The world's not perfect but it's not that bad. If we got each other and that's all we have, I will be your brother and I'll hold your hand. You should know I'll be there for you" Listen these kids love each other and will stick together through thick and thin

The Kids Aren't Alright by Fall Out Boy

"And in the end, I'd do it all again - I think you're my best friend" is the main reason for this song being in here, though you could argue for "former heroes that quit too late" being poignant. But like... Maybe the world is tough and the kids aren't alright but in the end they'd do it again cos they're friends

Kill Your Heroes by AWOLNATION

I don't know how to explain this one? But the vibes, I guess?

King Of The World by Young Rising Sons

For this song it's the line "We'll rule the world together forever. With hearts of gold, who needs any treasure? We'll take out time just living our lives" and just... yeah. I'm running out of brain power to keep explaining these songs lol

Long Live by Taylor Swift

It's all about remembering the feeling of being at the top of the world and being remembered and being heroes. "Cos for a moment a band of thieves in ripped up jeans got to rule the world" and "One day, we will be remembered" because yeah YJ had it's ups and downs but they were SO important to each other and to the world around them

Louder Than Words by Andrew Garfield, Vanessa Hudgens, and Joshua Henry (from the musical tick, tick... BOOM!)

This song is about things like why do we stay in situations that aren't good for us until push comes to shove and reminds us that we should act before the push. "Cages or wings, which do you prefer? Ask the birds. Fear or love, baby, don't say the answer - actions speak louder than words" reminds me of YJ because they act! The prefer wings! And love!

Man by Relient K

This song reminds me of Kon and all the pressure to be like Superman that he felt before he learned he could be his own person cos like "I'll be every bit the person we already know I'll be" and "I made a mess out of the life that lay ahead of me" and "Wave goodbye as I outgrow the shadow of Peter Pan, it's time to be a man" all remind me of his feelings about who he is

More Than Useless by Relient K

Admittedly, I added this song cos I saw a post comparing it to YJ and I was like ohhhh true true. But it works very well! The kids all have doubts and insecurities, but they reassure each other :) "You promise me that I'll get through this and do something right, do something right for once"

One More Light by Linkin Park

This song is what I think of when I think of all the losses and death that heroes see. Like... "Who cares if one more light goes out? Well, I do." It's SUCH a sad song and it's so moving because there's always someone who cares.

The Reckless And The Brave by All Time Low

I mean, they are reckless and brave, you know. But also the sentiment of "long live us" is good too.

Some Kind of Hero by Felix Hagan & the Family

"Cos if you love me I will dance in the firing line, cackle at the storm each and every time, catch a bullet in my heart - I won't even mind, cos I'm some kind of hero" they really would do this and not even for love! Just because they're heroes!

We Are Golden by MIKA

"Teenage dreams in a teenage circus - running around like a clown on purpose. Who gives a damn about the family you come from? No giving up when you're young and you want some" is the line that gets me because like! They're just teens! And they're like a family to each other! I love them, your honor

Also, these songs aren't on Spotify so I can't add them to the playlist, but definitely check out Best Friend by 5 Seconds of Summer and Forest by Twenty-One Pilots on YouTube! They both add to the vibes.

[jaskiers-sweetkiss]

Ghosts Still Have Souls

Pairings: Luke x Reader, mentions of Willex

Word Count: 2.1k

Warnings: none? 

Summary: For his whole life Luke Patterson had anxiously awaited the day he’d meet his soulmate, and then he died. 25 years later he and his bandmates are mysteriously resurrected and Luke’s hopes return. Could he find his soulmate in death? After all, Willie says ghosts still have souls. 

A/N: it took me all day but here is my submission for Day 2 - AU for @jatp-week JATP appreciation celebration. I’m such a sucker for soulmate aus and I haven’t written any in the JATP universe yet so this was the perfect opportunity! Send me an ask if you’d like to be tagged in any future works and as always, let me know what you think!

Masterlist

___

Luke Patterson had always loved the idea of soulmates. When he was a little boy his parents would regale him with the story of how they met. They ran into each other on the quad at their university, his mom knocked to the ground and his dad dropping his books. In her flustered state Emily had combined “Hey, watch where you’re going!” with “Are you okay?” and ended up crying out “Hey, watch where you’re okay!” while his dad had cursed “Shitfuck, are you okay?” When Mitch offered his hand to help her up they noticed each others’ tattoos and the rest was history.

It was Luke’s favorite story in the whole world and he grew up daydreaming about the day he’d meet his soulmate. He couldn’t wait to see what words would appear on his skin when he or she said their first words to him. He wondered if he’d feel the tingle that some reported feeling when the mark formed on their skin, or what the handwriting of his soulmate would look like permanently inked onto this skin. No matter what he knew he’d cherish the mark, it would be from his soulmate, after all, his other half, the person he was destined to spend the rest of his life with.

Dying before he could hear the words that would change his life forever kinda threw a wrench in his plans.

The thought of his soulmate out there, having grown up without him, never to meet each other because of his untimely death had plagued him for days after Julie “resurrected” them. Then Alex had met Willie. The skater ghost had died more nearly a decade before they had and yet he and Alex were soulmates, “You dinged my board.” proudly displayed on the blond’s wrist.  

The knowledge that soulmates existed even in death had brought hope back into his life and he started spending his free time daydreaming about them again.

He’d been channeling his daydreams into songwriting one afternoon when Julie had walked into the garage with Flynn and another friend. He assumed you hadn’t been informed about the ghosts as neither Flynn nor Julie made any remarks towards the guitarist despite typically doing so. He wished that wasn’t the case as you were quite cute. You were absolutely the type of girl Luke would’ve crushed on hard back when he was alive, soulmates or not.  

“Oh, and who is this?” Luke asked, employing his teasing tone as he spoke to the newcomer as you set down your backpack though he knew only Julie could hear him.

He had expected a quiet laugh or at the very least a dramatic eye roll from the girl but when he turned to look at her she was staring at her friend’s wrist. Luke turned to look as well and his stomach immediately sank.

There inked on your wrist in his chicken-scratch handwriting were the words he had just spoken to you.

“Oh my gosh,” Julie gasped aloud, drawing everyone’s attention as she opened her mouth to announce what she had just observed.

Before he even had time to think about it, he was stopping her. “No! Julie don’t!”

She stared at him puzzled for a moment but closed her mouth anyway.

“What?” Her friend asked, looking at her perplexed.

“I just… forgot to tell my dad you guys were coming over,” Julie saved. “I’ll just text him real quick.”

You and Flynn nodded, unfazed by the excuse, and plopped down onto the available seating. Luke sighed, pulling his eyes away from you and poofing out of the garage.

He reappeared at his parent’s house. He had hoped to vent to his mom but she wasn’t home so he plopped down on his old bed. His parents hadn’t done much to the room since his death and as he laid there in silence it almost felt like it was still ’95. That pit that had started to form in his stomach continued to grow as he laid there, his thoughts swirling as his hopes thrashed around him once more.

He’d finally found his soulmate but she was- what had Alex called them?- a lifer. She couldn’t even see him. How were they supposed to meet and fall in love and build a life together when she couldn’t even see him and he couldn’t even touch her? How were they supposed to pass their story on to their future kids when she hadn’t even been able to hear the words that were now permanently etched into her skin? As he thought more about it he realized that he hadn’t received a mark of his own. His heart sank as he ran his thumb over the bare skin of his wrist. He’d stopped Julie before she could tell her he was even there so she’d never had a chance to say her first words to him.

It was worth it, he decided after a while. It was worth never hearing the words, never having the tattoo and knowing for certain that his perfect match was out there. It was worth it if he could spare you from the pain of knowing that your soulmate was there but he was dead and invisible.

___

Luke was almost grateful for the distraction of the Hollywood Ghost Club. The last few weeks had been torture, him constantly trying to avoid being in the same room with you and Julie. She had told you about them being ghosts not long after the appearance of your soulmark and had even invited you to meet the band which you had readily accepted. Luke, however, had run away before you could come that day. It killed him that you had met Alex and Reggie and not him, but he figured it would kill him more to have your first words to him appear on his wrist.

They talked about you sometimes, about how funny and adorable you were. It made his blood boil but he had to restrain himself, what right did he have to be jealous when he refused to even meet you.

Still, the rush to book the Orpheum was a welcome distraction from his internal turmoil. It was even enough to distract him from the fact that no matter what happened at the end of the night, he’d never see you again.

He’d miss you. That much was obvious. He’d miss hiding in the loft when you came over to work on homework with Julie, just out of sight so Julie wouldn’t see him but he could still watch you. He’d learned a lot about you that way, how your smile could light up a room, how gorgeous your laugh was but he could tell you hated it by the way you covered your mouth when you did it, how you fidgeted with the hair ties on your wrist whenever you were thinking (he noticed you always had at least two), and that you were almost always cold. He wished he could give you his flannels, you’d look so cute wrapped up in them and they’d certainly keep you warm.

He was thinking of you as he and the guys gathered around the piano in the studio. Julie had just left to head to the Orpheum with her dad and the mood in the garage had immediately grown somber. Their heads filled with worries of what would come next, what was on the other side? Luke’s only comfort was the thought that maybe if he crossed over you’d get a second chance at a soulmate, one who was alive. You’d never even spoken to him and yet he’d do anything for you.

It was that dedication to you that had pulled him out of the Hollywood Ghost Club and onto the Orpheum stage.

It was that dedication that kept him from running straight to Caleb to save his soul when they didn’t cross over. He’d let his soul be destroyed if it meant your happiness.

He never could’ve anticipated what had happened that night nor the repercussions.

He’d spent the next day journaling, writing down all his thoughts- and there were a lot seeing as he had expected to die yesterday, again. He was alone in the studio, Alex out celebrating with Willie and Reggie was who knows where (probably showing Ray like usual), then you walked in.

He sighed, getting ready to poof up to his hiding spot in the loft before Julie showed up when he was stopped.

“Am I dead?” You asked, staring at him in alarm.

“What do you mean?” Luke asked warily, not understanding the premise of your question.

“Well, you’re dead, and with the exception of Julie, you’re only visible to other dead people and I can see you,” you explained carefully, eyes wide.

Luke nodded at your train of thought before it hit him.

“Wait, you can see me?” He gasped, and you nodded. “You can see me! You talked to me!”

His head snapped down to stare at his wrist, sure enough, “Am I Dead?” was scrawled across his skin in the most beautiful handwriting he’d ever seen. Sure, some might say it was a little messy but to him it was perfect.

Before he could even think about his actions, he was rushing towards you and pulling you into his chest. You stiffened, shocked by the sudden action.

“What’re you-“ started to ask but you were cut off by him violently throwing himself away from you.

“I just touched you,” he gasped, once again stating the obvious. “Why can I touch you? Are you dead?”

“No! At least… I didn’t think I was but now I’m really not sure.” You shook your hands anxiously before reaching for one of your hair ties as you started pacing.

“Sorry for taking so long Y/N, I got caught up with Reggie in the house- what on earth is going on in here?” Julie paused in the doorway as she observed your pacing and Luke’s panicked look.

“Oh thank god, you can see me,” You breathe out before turning to Luke, “Julie can see me, so I must not be dead.”

“What?”

“Y/N and I thought maybe she was dead since she can see me and I could touch her,” Luke explained and you nodded.

“What?!” Julie repeated, more shocked than the last time. “You can see him? And you, you can touch her?”

“Yeah, look!” Luke exclaimed, reaching his arm out to tap your arm but it just went right through you. “Huh, why…?”

“Maybe the first time was a fluke?” You supplied before something caught your eye.

You reached out to grab his arm as it fell back to his side. This time it worked, and you pulled his limb closer to you, turning it over to examine what you had seen.

“Woah, see?” Luke said pointedly to Julie, though you weren’t listening.

“That’s- how? You’re-“ you sputtered as you stared at the mark on his wrist. “Soulmates.” You whispered finally.

“Um, I’m gonna give you guys some time,” Julie said, eyes wide as she walked backward out of the garage.

You didn’t let go of his wrist, your eyes flitting between your words and his eyes.

“That’s why I didn’t hear them,” you muttered, bringing your own wrist next to his.

It had been puzzling you for weeks, how you couldn’t remember hearing the words the day they had appeared on your wrist. It made sense now, you couldn’t hear them because Luke had said them.

“I’m sorry,” Luke said, dropping his wrist from your grasp. “I thought maybe if you didn’t know you could find happiness somewhere else. With someone who wasn’t invisible and intangible.”

Your gaze softened as you looked up at him, his face was tilted down, unable to look you in the eye. You sighed, taking a deep breath before reaching your hand up to cup the side of his face. It took a couple of tries but you were finally able to place your hand on his cheek, tilting his face to look up at you.

“Luke,” you said softly, “How could I want anyone else?”

He shook his head at your words, though his hand came up to rest over your own. “How could you know that? This is the first time we’ve ever spoken.”

“Because the universe put us together,” you answered surely, bringing your wrists together again in the space between you. “I have no idea how this is going to work but I know it’ll be worth it because these mean we’re meant for each other.”

“You are better than I could ever imagine,” Luke confessed softly, and you smiled shyly. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Well you’re stuck with me now,” you joked lightly, before pulling him to the couch. “Now c’mon soulmate, we’ve got some catching up to do.”

[primrose-path-of-dalliance]

on bren and feeblemind.

(cw: lots of caleb backstory. self-explanatory, i think?)

.

.

this isn’t something i’ve talked about on my blog yet, but since the campaign has begun drawing to a close, i want to make sure i say my piece on the popular theory that bren/caleb was institutionalized because trent ikithon feebleminded him to disable him.

my piece being that it’s exceptionally unlikely he did—at least as a premeditated plan. this kind of theory also falls prey to the exact beliefs ikithon has tried to exploit in caleb.

for our mutual reference, i’ll quote the spell description of feeblemind.

FEEBLEMIND (PHB) 8th level enchantment

Casting time: 1 action Range: 150 feet Components: VSM (a handful of clay, crystal, glass, or mineral spheres) Duration: Instantaneous

You blast the mind of a creature that you can see within range, attempting to shatter its intellect and personality. The target takes 4d6 psychic damage and must make an Intelligence saving throw.

On a failed save, the creature’s Intelligence and Charisma scores become 1. The creature can’t cast spells, activate magic items, understand language, or communicate in any intelligible way. The creature can, however, identify its friends, follow them, and even protect them.

At the end of every 30 days, the creature can repeat its saving throw against this spell. If it succeeds on its saving throw, the spell ends. The spell can also be ended by Greater Restoration, Heal, or Wish.

considering the characteristics described and implied by actors other than ikithon—caleb and astrid prominently—who are not motivated to deceive on ikithon’s behalf, feeblemind is not consistent with caleb’s mental break.

fact the first: when bren broke, he became violent and spellcasted.

when astrid describes the circumstances in which he was taken to the vergessen sanatorium (e89, 1:49:30), she refers to his lashing out as “creat[ing] a lot of sparks everywhere else” and rubs at burn scars across her neck. she says that they had to subdue him because he was too dangerous. all of these statements add up to a bren who was viciously spellcasting at his friends and mentor when he broke down.

this wouldn’t have been possible if he’d been feebleminded. feeblemind explicitly prevents the affected creature from casting spells or activating magic items. in that scenario, the only thing bren would’ve been capable of is throwing hands. from him? not very dangerous at all.

how do we know astrid wasn’t lying or intentionally deceptive? because she (and eadwulf) still cares so much for caleb that she risked her life multiple times to aid him. no one who would give caleb a map to a secret volstrucker vault with her own handwriting on it (e127, 29:29; and 30:57)—or intentionally fail to counterspell him when ikithon could’ve seen her do so—would lie to caleb about ikithon attempting to permanently feeblemind him if she knew.

to preempt the idea that astrid had set the m9 up: it’s very obvious she didn’t, since trent ikithon had clearly had no forewarning of a break-in. he would’ve at least been waiting in the vault, already prepared to subdue them quickly, if he’d known.

so it’s fair to determine that astrid would either be honest to the extent of her knowledge to caleb or make it clear that she couldn’t answer him. since she didn’t imply the latter, we can assume she was being honest. and because of astrid’s competence, it’s highly probable she would’ve noticed if his behavior was symptomatic of feeblemind over the years.

fact the second: bren’s mental condition repeatedly improved and regressed while he was institutionalized.

astrid states this in the same conversation about their subduing him after his breakdown (e89, 1:50:50). considering this with the context of their romantic relationship prior to his breakdown, her genuine care for him, and her rise to power that included accompanying ikithon frequently to the sanatorium (e127, 31:07)—astrid would’ve had the motivation and the opportunities to visit bren in person. she could’ve also kept well-abreast of his condition.

actual times of improvement and decline in the mental state that astrid first observed during his breakdown wouldn’t be consistent with feeblemind. although it reduces the victim’s intelligence score to 1, they still retain thought and their sense of identity without problems.

this is a maintenance of consistency and (relative) reason. feeblemind does not actually damage a person’s basic perception of reality. but the health of bren’s behavior throughout the years was instead very unstable.

fact the third: caleb doesn’t remember anything from the burning of his home up to his healing by the unknown cleric.

in the conversation with astrid in e89, he asks her what happened when he broke and explicitly says, “the last thing i remember is my home” (1:46:58). when he first tells beau and nott about his past, he explains that he doesn’t remember much of what happened to him there (e18, 2:51:54).

beyond the reduction to their intelligence, feeblemind doesn’t affect the victim’s ability to form memories. caleb’s keen mind feat and established narrative element of his eidetic memory would’ve still been present as well. therefore, feeblemind alone can’t explain such a significant, near-empty gap in his memory. he would still remember something.

even the possibility of trent ikithon altering them directly is precluded by the fact that the cleric’s healing removed the alterations to caleb’s memory. if all those years had been magically blocked away, they’d have returned when he was healed of everything else.

fact the fourth: sometimes, people really do just break.

nothing about caleb’s backstory is inconsistent with just... being a person living their life, even a terrible one. he was a young man that believed so zealously in his country and his purpose, abused by a powerful older man, that he did many horrible things and believed they were right. until finally he did something that he couldn’t process and broke down.

there’s two reoccurring, underlying assumptions i’ve noticed behind why this theory seems to be so compelling and popular:

caleb just seems so remorseful and traumatized by his double patricide. there’s no way he would’ve willingly murdered his parents. ikithon must have known and decided to preempt his inevitable betrayal.

everything we know about bren, especially from the horse’s own mouth, suggests that he had been willing (at least up until his mental break) to murder his parents. he was literally an extreme nationalist—a fascist, if you will. he was lawful evil (twitter source). he gratefully executed many “criminals” put in front of him, more than likely by burning them to death based on his ptsd. victims whom we now understand may not have been guilty of anything at all.

he was glad to do what he thought was best for the dwendalian empire, and he truly thought being volstrucker was the correct path. trent ikithon, his abuser, treated him as his favorite (e110, 3:30:58). because he believed.

that fervent faith, in fact, is the key to something like his breakdown in the first place. hearing the dying screams of his parents, bren was forced to confront a violent dissonance between his radical beliefs that condemned traitors (as he believed until the cleric’s healing) and the intuitive horror of murdering his parents that he couldn’t reconcile. this fathomless sense of betrayal is why caleb so deeply despised ikithon and himself.

a young evocation wizard who didn’t want his parents dead would’ve run into that burning house, feebleminded or not. someone magically compelled to set that fire would’ve understood what happened as soon as the charm left him and would definitely remember every detail once the cleric healed him.

caleb is remorseful and traumatized because he willingly murdered his parents. as well as many others.

it can’t be that simple. caleb was institutionalized for eleven years just because his abuser pushed him too far? there must be a more nefarious reason. ikithon even said he basically stored him for later.

putting aside the fact that bren having a breakdown in the way he did makes complete sense for his situation, ikithon’s “claim” that he orchestrated all of caleb’s subsequent years is not only something he never actually says (e110, 3:16:34)—it is a claim that’s patently absurd.

i’ve written meta that discusses this in the past (link here). essentially though, the number of moving pieces and assumptions that would be needed for such a series of events is ridiculously improbable. even assuming that ikithon feebleminded him—so that caleb’s mind would be intact when he ‘woke up’—even assuming that ikithon somehow procured the service of a cleric of the archeart—a banned deity in the empire that would oppose ikithon...

why in the world would he ever reasonably believe that caleb widogast, the man he viciously betrayed and lied to and abused, would do anything to benefit ikithon?

trent ikithon is a mortal man. he has power, yes; enchantment magic, authority, and a history of abuse and manipulation over caleb’s head, yes. but ikithon is a mortal man. not a puppeteer in the sky piloting people’s bodies.

he certainly wouldn’t have led caleb to a whole new family that would change everything about his life for the better. a family that would love him, truly—a family that would help him heal, bear the weight of his guilt, and find a real future waiting for him again instead of a self-destructive end. a family that would fight tooth and nail for caleb’s sake against ikithon.

abusers lie. their biggest lie, the one they always circle back to in the end, is that their victim is unique: that there is something which makes them deserving of abuse, and that their abuser is both right and inescapable.

ikithon is read as honest because he chooses his words carefully and has the self-confidence to believe it. everything he’s claimed about caleb and his past have either been implications that he encouraged others to reach for him or platitudes empty of everything except gaslighting intent.

caleb has escaped. and everything ikithon wants is to convince caleb and his friends that he continues to control caleb’s life, that caleb is special, so he can regain some influence over a man who’s come to command so much power.

the idea that caleb must’ve been feebleminded—that he couldn’t have just had a mental breakdown like so many other prospective volstrucker before miraculously, then strenuously, recovering to create a hopeful future for himself—falls into the trap of validating ikithon’s lies.

trent ikithon didn’t see and believe in caleb’s ‘full potential’ before anyone else did. he didn’t foresee a single ounce of the man’s struggle to put himself back together after what he suffered. caleb was not institutionalized to serve as a toy to one day pull back out of the closet. there was no feeblemind or other secretive plan that could only serve to obfuscate the brutal truth:

ikithon abused a boy until he shattered, and tried to hide the evidence. a crime that he’s committed against countless other children. plain and simple.

so that’s my piece.

caleb widogast—bren ermendrud—was not the victim of a premeditated feeblemind from ikithon, based on the mechanics of the spell. even more importantly, the narrative of his and ikithon’s stories would suffer if he was.

now,

A LOGICAL POSSIBILITY I WON’T DENY.

what if ikithon feebleminded him as a method to subdue him after the breakdown?

this is more or less an alternate theory that’s irrelevant to the points i actually wanted to make. but i want to talk about it anyway because it’s kind of fun.

fact the bonus: bren spent eleven years in the sanatorium.

eleven years is a long time. he would’ve been able to save every 30 days after the initial failed save. the exandrian calendar has about eleven 30-day periods every year. assuming a feeblemind spell cast on him just prior to his institutionalization, that’s somewhere around 121 possible save attempts, give or take a few.

what’s the likelihood of him actually saving? to go through the mechanics:

normally, feeblemind reduces a person’s intelligence score to 1, modifier -5. caleb, as a variant human, possessed the feat keen mind from the beginning both mechanically and story-wise. this would make his intelligence score 2, modifier -4, even after feeblemind.

as a level 1-2 wizard, he would’ve had proficiency in intelligence saves. this would be +2 to his save.

in total, the modifier to bren’s intelligence saves would be -2.

in order to cast feeblemind, trent ikithon would have to have been a minimum level 15 wizard. this leaves two possible proficiency bonuses to determine his spell save dc: +5 or +6.

it’s probably safe to assume that his intelligence score is at least 18–20, likely 20. this would be a modifier of +4 or +5. (his intelligence could be 22+ if matt wanted to be a real dick, but let’s assume otherwise.)

spell save dc = 8 + spellcasting score mod (for wizards, this is intelligence) + proficiency bonus.

this means trent ikithon’s possible spell save dc is somewhere from 17–19.

therefore:

at minimum—17 being ikithon as a level 15–16 wizard with an intelligence score of 18–19 at the time of casting—bren would have to roll a 19 or nat 20 to make the save with his -2 save modifier.

at a dc of 18—ikithon either being level 17–20 or having an intelligence score of 20, but not both—bren would have to roll a nat 20.

at a dc of 19(+), it would be impossible for bren to save without additional bonuses such as bless.

i don’t have the brainpower to calculate some real statistical probabilities, but depending on your opinion of trent ikithon’s probable capabilities at the time of bren’s mental break, he may have been able to save against feeblemind sometime during the eleven years he spent at the sanatorium.

naturally, this has the earlier-mentioned conundrum of remembering that return of clarity once he was healed by the cleric, should ikithon have been retrieved to recast the feeblemind and altered his memories. nevertheless, it may or may not be a fun thought to play around with.

[illbeyourreasonwhy]

Hi I’m so late but here’s my participation for day 1 of Willex Week 2!!

The prompt for Day 1 was favorite moment(s) in the canonverse, so this takes place during Alex and Willie’s talk at the Orpheum in 1x08

~

The thing is, Willie thinks as he sits there next to Alex, is that it really never could have gone any other way.

From the moment he pancaked Alex and they both landed on the ground, Willie was screwed. First because he had no chance but to fall for him, almost instantly - Willie’s never fallen for someone so fast, and definitely not so much. But he did. He fell for Alex and his breezy laugh and his nervous pacing and his bouncy energy and his pure kindness. He is so good, and it’s so obvious in everything he does, in his passion for music, his smile - god, his smile - when he talks about his friends, his enthusiasm to try new things, his willingness to follow Willie anywhere.

And he’s hot, so. Willie never stood a chance.

The problem is Alex never did either - because Willie was stupid enough to bring him and his friends to Caleb.

Here’s the thing: did Willie know what Caleb was capable of? Well, yes. Technically. 

He’d heard stories. About the lengths Caleb might go to get what he wants and to protect his club, about the stamps. He’d seen people get on Caleb’s bad side. But he’d never actually borne the brunt of that anger, so it hadn’t really seemed real. 

So, yes. He knew. Technically, he knew.

But he’d never - not in a million years - envisioned Caleb would ever hurt Alex, Luke and Reggie. The possibility hadn’t even crossed his mind when he’d invited them. He’d just - fuck, he’d just wanted to impress Alex. He had seen how disappointed all three of them were when he said he couldn’t help, and he hadn’t been able to bear it, to bear the thought that maybe Alex might lose interest. (Stupid, stupid, stupid.) He’d been so eager to help that he had rushed to find a solution, to find a way to get that disappointed look off Alex’s face, that he hadn’t paused to think when he brought up Caleb.

And now here they are.

Sitting in the Orpheum, Alex with a ticking clock in the form of the stamp on his wrist, Willie with guilt crawling up his throat as he thinks about what he’s done.

He wants -

He wants to scream. He wants to cry. He wants to demand Caleb release the boys. He wants to go back in time and change everything. He wants to take the pain Alex is feeling with each jolt and put it on himself. He wants to find a solution to the mess he created.

He wants to save Alex.

But he has no idea how.

But for now, just sitting next to Alex… Maybe that can be enough. 

Maybe it has to be.

[khadij-al-kubra]

Storytelling, Fate & Happy Endings

I’m still processing last nights episode (CR C2 Ep140), and much like every critter I’m SUPER emotional about it. But something about last night’s events and how they played out really got to me, not just as a fan but also as a storyteller. And even the day after, i was actually crying (still am crying in fact) more than i did last night watching it happen. At first i thought it was because i’m a fairly new critter and this is my first time watching a campaign come to an end. But the more i think about it and process, the more i realize that’s not just it. This effected me as someone who deeply believes in the power of storytelling and how it can not only effect but reflect the world around us. And because I have to get them out of my head, here are my thoughts on why last nights episode was so important, not just for CR fans but also as a an important narrative for right now.

...Yeah that’s a bit vague, isn’t it? Okay, let me explain. If you’re willing to take the time to read fellow Critters, I greatly appreciate it in advance. ^__^

WARNING: Major spoilers for CR Campaign 2 Episode 140 ahead. Also it’s gonna get kind of meta. And long. Because i have a lot of thoughts & feels.

So I think it’s fair to say that, as much as we would’ve been devastated by any of the M9 perma-dying in the last battle, part of us wasn’t expecting them all to make it out of there alive. Not even the players, I think, despite how much they likely didn’t want that to happen. Just look at the half-resigned way Liam talks about Caleb in the last few Talks Machina episodes. Or how, in game, Jester was fully prepare to die trying to stop the city from coming back. And for a while there, it seemed like some of them might not survive.

But then they did. Despite so many crappy rolls throughout the night they stopped Lucien, set free all the souls trapped in Aeor, saved Exandria, and brought each other back from the dead. Not only that, but they also did the impossible: They saved Mollymauk. Their lost friend who had such a deep impact on all of them even after his death. The delightfully charming asshole who was so full of joy and life and who, despite how the world treated him, was happily determined to leave every place better than he found it. Moreover, they almost didn’t succeed! But then they did, all because of teamwork, love and one last minute ditch effort ‘what-the-hell-have-i-got-to-lose’ dice role that none of them saw coming. And now they get to go home together, truly as The Mighty NINE.

Just this once, everybody lived! We got a happy ending!

And that’s HUGE in game...but also think for a second how that reflects outside of game too. Do you realize what a story like that means to people, especially given the year from Hell we’ve all had?

Think about it. This past year the world has suffered. We’ve all been impacted by the pandemic in some way shape or form, either on small levels or large. Our world has been at war with a virus that effected everyone and everything: Our sense of safety. Our health. Our economy. Our families & friends. Our freedom. (in the sense of our ability to travel & just be in close proximity to people without fear, but i digress) Deeply imbedded social and systematic diseases have been brought further to light in the past year and a half largely because of this virus. Some of us have lost people we love. Hell, the pandemic even effected the way that the latter half of Campaign 2 played out because of social distancing protocols. If you further compare this to Campaign 2, the world of Exandria was caught in the middle of a war that started because of social & systematic corruptions that had been rooted in two opposing kingdoms for years. And so many suffered and died because of it.

Then the Mighty Nein comes in. This ragtag group of delightful assholes with nothing to lose; these flawed but inherently good at heart and deeply human adventurers, broken and lost in their own ways, trying to make a home and family for themselves in a world that took advantage of them or left them alone or said they weren’t good enough...and they changed things. 

They grew. They fought back. They found moments of silliness and peace and joy and fun amidst all the strife and sometimes grief. Most of all, they tried. Sometimes out of necessity, sometimes out of spite, sometimes even out of compassion, but mostly just out of love. And in the end, not only did they help people and stop a war for the sake of their loved ones, but they also saved their world from being destroyed by a rotted perversion of life from the past that threatened to consume everything they cared about. AND they STILL managed to bring everyone in their found family back to life. Does it erase the bad and sad things that happened to them? Hell no! But those things don’t negate the fact that in that moment, they made it out okay. That this was a victory and they won!

Think of what a story like that means to people right now.

I’m personally a pretty spiritual person, and much like our favorite clerics, I also believe in a higher power. But whether or not you also believe in a Divine being, the Universe or whatever, every D&D player believes in one thing: Fate. Luck. Call it what you will. But it was fate that made those dice rolls that saved everyone happen. It was fate that not only stopped Cognoza from returning, but also brought Jester and Caleb and Molly back to life, even when it seemed like it wouldn’t work. (and holy shit that gave me emotional whiplash!) 

After everything they went through, both individually and together, the Mighty Nein defied the odd and demanded that Fate let them save their loved ones. They demanded that the world give them back their friend; That they deserved to have their happy ending & get to go home alive together. Just. This. Once.

As a writer, I know firsthand that there are some stories we find and create ourselves, but then there are stories that have a way of finding us. Sometimes a story or world or character from somewhere in the Aether will pop into our minds one day and say, ‘I need your voice to tell my story.’ Maybe this is just me getting carried away with the meta brain again. And like i said, i’m a spiritually inclined person, so I believe in things like Fate and a Divine Higher power writing out the stories of the Multiverse. If you’re reading this (and thank you for taking the time to do so) maybe you do too. Or maybe you don’t. Either way, if you’re a fellow critter, then you’re clearly a fan of good stories and/or playing Dungeons & Dragons. So you know how fate/dice roles have a big impact on the outcome of a story, regardless of how tightly written a setup the dungeon master makes. Given all that and how organically stories tend to play out in D&D, I genuinely believe that Matt Mercer and the whole CR Team were meant to be conduits for a story where the flawed heroes save the world AND all make it home alive.

And I think Fate knew that we needed last nights battle to end like this. After all the crap we’ve been through this past year, we needed this happy ending, deserved it even! Not just us critters, the CR team too. As much as we all like to joke that Campaign 2 was secretly scripted, we all know that’s not true. Yes, the setup storyline and world were brilliantly crafted by Matt, and the character roleplaying is beautifully acted out by the team. But the twists and turns, the direction it goes, and how the game plays out is all up to fated dice rolls just like any other game. And something, some kind of force of luck, some force of fate, some Universal Divine DM out there made the roles happen the way they did last night.

It gave us a happy ending.

I believe that this was meant to happen; now of all times with everything else going on in the world. Amidst all this darkness and rot, both in game and in the real world, in the end of it all there was light and life. A reminder that sometimes people do live. They do get second chances. They do find a new family or reunite with old ones. That sometimes the world can be saved for a time, and happy ending do still exist. Even if it’s not broadcasted on the daily news amidst tragedy reports, or even tragedies that don’t get reported (which sadly are a lot, but again i digress).

Because the thing is, like Beau said, no one else will probably know they were heroes. No one will know what the Mighty Nein sacrificed to save all of Exandria. But they don’t need to know that for it to still be true, for life to happen again, and for a found family of nine broken people who love each other to go home together safe. It doesn’t invalidate that the good things happened. That at least for today everyone was saved. That flawed people were still able to do good because they tried. That they left the world better than they found it and got their own small but satisfying happy ending. Even if only for now, because we don’t know what’s gonna happen next Thursday. We don’t know what the future will hold for the Nein or Exandria when the Campaign ends or even when (hopefully) some loose ends will be tied up in later oneshots. But neither that nor the bad and sad stuff that happened beforehand in the game and in the character’s lives invalidates the fact that tonight they won. They lived.

So why can’t that be true for us in the real world?

I said earlier that, as a writer, I believe in the power stories have to not only reflect but also shape our world. This story is an example of why, but especially this episode, and that’s why i was so euphoric about the outcome. It wasn’t just a game for me, and i’m sure for others too. It was a much needed reminder that happy endings can still happen in real life, just as much as they can in stories. Even when everything seems dark and corrupt and rotten and hopeless, we can still keep fighting. We can keep trying. We can make new families and start over and be heroes in our on little lives in small ways. 

We can leave the world better than we found it. 

And maybe, with hard work, imagination, luck and a little Divine intervention...we can also get the happy endings we deserve.

[salamoonder]

alright so i was talking about this the other day in the groupchat and i cannot get over how good for each other caleb and beau are?? like there’s something...i don’t know there is something absolutely next level about empire siblings. like. okay. (under a cut bc this got so FUCKING long, what the fuck. also i talk about essek for a bit and how i think he will change their relationship.)

i’ve said it a million times but i think beau had the best possible reaction to caleb’s backstory reveal. she didn’t discount it; she didn’t treat it like nothing. she basically went “that’s fucked up, man, but you can and will do better” which i think is exactly what he needed to hear. caleb has this tendency to wallow in guilt and when you wallow in guilt it’s very easy to fall into a trap of inaction or only wanting to focus on things that will make that guilt quiet down (i.e., working on the very dangerous and perhaps impossible task of going back in time to save his parents. it’s kind of like people who are intent on doing relief work in far off countries where “real” poverty exists but who don’t wanna help the homeless people living in their own city.) beau pushes him to take his focus off the guilt quieting plans and put his focus on things that will actually be doing good for the sake of doing good. i think that’s sometimes a very difficult distinction to make and tbh beau has a very good grasp on it.

i also think this plays into part of the reason caleb still hasn’t told jester (or cad?) like okay number one, he’s scared. number two, i literally don’t think he can handle the easy forgiveness he would get from them (especially jester) and i think it would send him into a spiral of “no you don’t get it i did a bad bad thing i’m a terrible person” that might be hard to pull out of. and beau is extremely critical in general. she sees a thing she doesn’t like, you don’t have to wonder about it. “well that’s fucked up” are going to be the first words out of her mouth. caleb doesn’t have to worry about her misunderstanding the heaviness of what he’s done the way i suspect he does with the others. beau is never going to diminish how bad he feels about doing a thing; all she’s going to do is say “okay, and what are you gonna do about it?” which is THE BEST. THING. action is the best thing for depressed people oh my god. anyway.

honestly like. ok my favorite thing about beau is that despite the social awkwardness/prickliness she is genuinely *really good at people*. she understands people. i literally still cannot get over how good she is at handling caleb’s panic attacks. i think a lot of people’s first instinct w handling panic attacks is to smother, or, worse, to get just as worked up as the person panicking trying to calm them down. beau is very detached, calm, and levelheaded. she provides physical comfort/stimulus, water, and someone to talk to, and she waits. ( @thedarklordsnicklefritz pointed out recently that she’d be a very good nurse.)

now, caleb to beau: he so clearly, so obviously values her opinions and what she has to say. for all that he is “the smart one”--for all that the wheels in his head are constantly turning and for all that he has a plan for everything--he sits quietly and listens to her whenever she has something to say. he asks her about herself. he wants to know her plans and her goals. not only does he treat her like an adult with agency and ambition and ideas worth hearing, he treats her as a colleage. as a fellow scholar. and i think that beau was sorely lacking that kind of respect, especially under zeenoth. i think it’s something that she craves. even when they are at each other’s throats, he doesn’t interrupt her arguments. he listens till she’s done, and then he speaks. even if he’s growling at her through clenched teeth. he still gives her that respect.

another thing about caleb is that he mirrors the kind of love that beau shows him right back at her. leaving molly’s grave? the shit in kamordah? hand on her shoulder. here is frumpkin. here is frumpkin again. and again. and again--here is some quiet show of support, some small comfort. nothing to embarrass her or cause undue awkwardness. just, there, always. they are each other’s constants and i will literally never be over this oh my god--

okay another thing is, and this is going to be a bit touchy and i might word wrong so please be patient with me and ask questions if you have them, there is something to be said about the friendship of two people who are fundamentally romantically and sexually incompatible. like there’s a reason why “gay best friend” is a trope and there is some not great stuff surrounding it. but i also think that there is a kind of value in a friendship where you never have to worry about romantic or sexual shit coming up. there’s a certain security there, a kind of...safety. there is a safety in "i have no interest in your sex life." there is a safety in beau being a lesbian. both of them have some real baggage/struggles surrounding relationships, and this is not to say that they will never have a meaningful or secure or safe romantic/sexual relationship again. it’s just that there are unique problems that both of those will bring to them--unique problems that i think may bring them each a unique beauty and growth in working through--but nevertheless, unique problems that neither of them have to worry about with each other. their friendship is safe from that.

alright, now onto essek: i am really worried/intrigued for what he will mean for their friendship when they get back to xhorhas and have to deal with him. i think they both see him very differently, and i can’t see them getting through...*waves hand* “punishment” and whatever that means, without another blowup fight and serious hurt feelings.

i think caleb quite clearly sees himself in essek; i don’t think i need to lay that comparison out for anyone, honestly the whole 97 speech sums it up pretty well. what i would like to say is i think caleb has found hope in essek, for essek, in a way that i don’t quite think he’s managed to do for himself yet. like he’s gotten a lot better, but i think a symptom of getting better is that you see your flaws more clearly, and i think that’s very much happening to him right now. i think he sees himself as the same (or possibly even worse), regardless of how far he’s come. (see “i am ruined” to fjord.) i think essek is a mirror for him in which he sees himself more clearly without even realizing that that’s what he’s doing. he sees a selfish person who has done selfish things and hurt people in the process. and he also sees someone with a conscience and empathy who is extremely capable of doing real good. he sees someone with potential. someone with kindness in his soul. someone who could take his guilt and turn it into action, maybe to soothe some of that guilt the way caleb started, and maybe to eventually leave that behind, and do good for the sake of doing good. he sees someone in pain who is in need of support and a friend like beau to nudge him in the right direction.

and beau sees someone who has done selfish things for selfish reasons and does not show nearly enough remorse for it. she sees someone who has caused death and pain out of carelessness and pride and misplaced judgement. she sees someone who values his own gains over the lives of others and justifies that to make himself feel better, and i think that’s exactly the kind of authority figure that beau hates most. she sees someone who better fucking prove that this remorse is real or so help me god i’ll show you what remorse is.

and i think caleb (unfortunately like so much of this fandom with various characters) has latched onto essek as this mirror of himself, and i think at this point any judgement that beau passes on essek will reflect unfortunately on caleb. and the worst part is, beau isn’t going to see that. she wasn’t there for the razor speech. i think to her it’s obvious what she thinks of caleb: he’s a person who’s done some fucked up shit, sure, but he is someone who cares deeply about getting better and has proven himself to be a kind, unwavering person over and over again. he’s more than alright in her book. whereas essek hasn’t really done anything to win him anywhere near the same kind of rapport with her. clearly, in her mind, they are different. why should they be otherwise?

but caleb is going to hear any criticism and, i think, just apply it straight on to himself. i think he thinks that he and essek are so similar that any cut towards essek is a cut towards him. i think he is going to be deeply hurt, i think it’s going to feel like a betrayal--like a revocation of the trust that beau has in him--and i think beau is going to have no idea.

[saphirered]

Lovely Caleb fic! Could I get a confession of love fix that involved Caleb kissing the hands of a bewildered reader?

Thank you for the request! I hope this is to your liking!

It’s rather late. Well, you think it is. It’s kind of difficult to tell in Rosohna’s eternal darkness. At least you were sure it’s been a long day. You find yourself wandering the halls of the Xhorhaus. The last few months have been crazy, hectic and you’d have to admit your life has been turned upside down but you wouldn’t change if for the world. You found friends, family even. Reminiscing you find your mind gravitate towards fond memories of your favourite wizard. Dragging him along on a little shopping spree for spell components, the excited rants he goes on when you ask for his advise on this new spell you found, the talks about nothing when you shared a watch, holding his hand while Yasha shaved his beard with her sword, giggling about a little prank you played on a very grumpy looking halfling shopkeeper in Zadash, drunken nights sharing a bottle after a successful job completed, him falling asleep with his head on your shoulder, caring for each other’s injuries, the rare dance in the tavern…

Not as insightful as Caduceus may be but you weren’t blind either. It’s clear Caleb seems more comfortable around you than anyone save for Nott maybe, a different kind of comfort still. You’ve been consciously picking up on a shift in his behaviour for a while now. Your favorite wizard has been getting closer and more affectionate towards you but you’ve known him for a while now and you can’t help but pick up on this. His recent shift in behavior gave you butterflies in your stomach, something more than friendship but you didn’t feel it was the right time to tell him how you feel. Besides, what his feelings don’t extend beyond care right? This is no different than his relationship with Beau or Nott. Love is a strong term and one you may not hand out so freely but you know yourself well enough these feelings you’re experiencing are love. You just don’t want to ruin your friendship because he’s not ready, not comfortable or doesn’t reciprocate your feelings in the same way after all. Caleb has come out of his shell and made so much progress, growing more comfortable and open around you and that’s extending to those around him too. You don’t want him to crawl back into that shell again. You value him more than that.

Quietly you get some dried herbs from a sleeping Caduceus’ stash and wander into the kitchen to make some tea. You’re pretty sure you’re the only one still awake as everyone was quite exhausted after your return. Trying to start a flame to boil the water proved more difficult than you had hoped. Growing frustrated with the flint and steel you slam them on the counter a little too hard. You cringe squeezing your eyes tight shut and listen. Okay… seems like no one woke up from that. You glare at the kettle half the mind to toss it out of the window. Stupid tea. Stupid fire. You take a breather leaning your head against one of the shelves above the counter.

“It looks like we had the same idea.” You almost jump out of your skin quickly covering your mouth to prevent a scream to escape from your lips. You see a bleary eyed Caleb looking about as disheveled as expected standing in the doorway of the kitchen. 

“Don’t scare me like that you idiot!” You toss a towel at him. It hits, draping over one shoulder and he just gives you a ‘really?’ expression as you feel the blood rush from the scare fade. 

“You’re having trouble, ja?” He says more than asks referring to the still cold kettle. 

“You have to make me feel worse about not being able to get a flame going to brew some tea?” You say in jest as you grab another cup for him. Caleb walks over taking your spot and with a snap of the fingers the flame is lit. 

“It is not that difficult.” He jokes back fully aware that your expertise lays not with fire magic. You have many other talents, he’s told you so himself many times praising you for them. You grab the towel draped over his shoulder, fold it neatly and put it back on the counter. 

“Your help is appreciated oh grand master magician.” You give him a side hug which he returns wrapping his arm around your shoulders as you wait for the water to boil. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” You ask watching drops of condensation build up on the outside of the kettle. 

“Ah, no. Uh, wandering thoughts.” Caleb sounds like he’s only half paying attention. Wandering thoughts indeed. 

“Wanna talk about it?” You offer as the kettle starts whistling and you remove it from the heat before it gets too loud and begin preparing the teapot. You take a step closer to the counter, Caleb’s hand falling from your shoulder to your lower back. 

“I… uh-“ He hesitates and you swear when you look over your shoulder for just a second you can see a slight blush creep up his cheeks. 

“Caleb, you know you can tell me anything, right?” He manages to get out a ‘yes’ under his breath so you grab a tray, put the teacups and saucers, the teapot and grab some biscuits from a jar hidden behind the vast array of herbs and spices to avoid a certain Tiefling from claiming them all. Balancing the tray on one hand you turn around and grab his hand, guiding him along into the living room. You put the tray on the table and make Caleb sit down on the couch as you sit down next to him. You can see him take a deep breath and he refuses to meet your eye. Though, that’s not entirely out of character for the wizard so you give him time and space as you pour the tea in each of your cups. With a wave of your hand you cool the hot water to a less scalding but still warm level. 

“I know. But in this case I don’t know if that makes this any easier.” You frown and grab his hands in yours. Almost absentmindedly he begins drawing circles on the back of your palms with this thumbs. While he won’t look at you you can see he’s trying to find the words.

“Should I be worried?” Many questions rush through your head. Was everything alright? Did something happen? 

“No. No. No need to worry.” He musters a quick half smile before it disappears. You hated seeing him like this. So much conflict and inner turmoil. You give his hands a soft squeeze. Whatever this is it must bother him a lot if he’s so affected by it!

“It’s alright. Take however long you need. I’m here for you no matter what.” He takes a deep breath as you finish your sentence. 

“I’ve had some revelations lately and I’ve tried so hard to push them away, deny them or hoping that maybe I was interpreting them wrong but I can no longer just brush them aside. I don’t think it’s fair…” Another deep breath.

“What’s not fair to who?” 

“This. All of it. What I’m doing. It’s not fair to you.” He has trouble forming a sentence. 

“Slowly. Just keep breathing.” You try to calm him down.

“It’s not fair that I freely take your comfort, affection, kindness and even companionship. I’m afraid my actions in return, they do not come from friendship but selfish motives instead. I don’t want this to end but I cannot treat my own actions as rooted from friendship when they are not.” He scrambles on stumbling every few words and you try to make sense of his words but you’ve known him longer than today so you get where he’s going. 

“Caleb…” You begin but he cuts you off.

“No, no I need you to hear this before I cower back and lose the courage to do this. You are heaven sent. You are patient and kind and every time you smile at me I feel my heart skip a beat. Every hug, touch or kiss feels like the warmth of the sun after endless winter. I thought perhaps I felt this way because this is who you are and what you do; making the lives of those you care about brighter where you can. I know you care about me as you’ve reminded me many a time, and I care about you a lot, but I do not think it ends with just care. My realisation showed me that you’ve brought about a feeling I thought myself no longer capable off; love.” He pulls your hands close to his chest. You’re bewilder, confused at this open confession but above all surprised he so openly confides in you. You think hard taking in every word.

“So I think it’s unfair to you when for me this kindness and affection from my side will always be out of love and I cannot in good conscious give you my love when you do not want it. I cannot ask you to feel the same but I also don’t think me returning your kindness and affection can ever be anything other than love. So please, I don’t want what we have, our friendship to end but I don’t want to take what you don’t have to give me…” 

“Caleb, I need you to listen to me very carefully.” You watch as his shoulders slump. So insecure when it comes to other’s feelings and opinions of him it hurts you every time he sells himself short. You look for the right words yourself. If he can muster up the courage then so can you!

“You can be so blinded by your own thoughts and insecurities you don’t even consider the fact that I feel the same.” He finally looks at you wide eyed freezing in place for a second.

“You underestimate your ability to be loved and if I can prove you different, if you will let me prove you different I will.” Caleb scans your face for any sense of insincerity, deceit or even jest but he finds none. He takes a minute but eventually pulls your hands to his lips pressing a long soft kiss to the backs. 

“Thank you. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve this but you truly are a light in the darkness.” He kisses the backs of your hands again. 

“You were you; all you ever need to be.” You shift leaning into his side, head against his shoulder and his arm wrapping around you. Intertwining your fingers with his at your waist you grasp his other hand and bring it to your lips. That small kiss right where his wrist meets his palm makes him melt. He leans back on the couch pulling you with in a slouched relaxed position. If only the rest of the Nein could see you now. They’d go crazy…