#at least its implied that things are Not Good with his Dad rn | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

shwarmii · 1 year ago

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'i dont think Ares physically abuses his kids, mostly because i dont think he is present enough in any of his kids' lives to find a fucked up "reason" to hit them (i would not be surprised if the flinch and whatnot was from a sparring match gone too rough the last time they met tho)' Ares as that 'coach' dad who realizes their kid's failing at something and makes them do it over and over again while yelling until they 'finally get it right' makes a lot of sense.

The dad who's not abusive he's helping his kid succeed, he's teaching them what they need to know in this world, doing his job to train them up right.

Even if he's had them running wind sprints til they throw up because they lost a foot race to one of the unclaimed demigods.

this ask is referencing this post

lmao close, but that would imply that he was present in his kids' lives, which he wasnt (also, what youre describing is abuse. that is considered an abusive practice for coaches/drill sergeants/whatnot to do, that is considered an abusive punishment. its just also not Ares hitting his own kids, which i understand is what you meant, no worries lmao) but i do think you have the right idea! like Book!Ares would probably be upset about losing "battles" he percieves as important enough that a child of his losing would be considered a slight against him personally. my intent had been to imply "something affectionate of Book!Ares, like a friendly spar, probably would not have felt friendly". bc i dont think Ares would have let his kids win or gone easy on them (which can be a good thing and a bad thing. his kids are at constant risk of death through virtue of just... being a demigod, so giving them false confidence is bad. but also tearing their confidence apart would also be bad. i think for this Ares, the idea of letting his kids win would hurt his pride so he wont allow it. which makes it a lose-lose no matter what. i mean. this is the guy willing to fully square up against 12 year-old Percy Jackson afterall. again, age and relationship dynamics dont mean much to Book!Ares at any rate)

if i could have my own ideal Ares depiction in a book series, he'd be a good dad, at least a decent one. for reasons that would be a huge tangent for me to get into rn. but, alas, i did not write "Percy Jackson". so, we have what we have in Book!Ares and we will have what we have with Show!Ares. which, again, i do think is fine. all the gods have to be p shit people/parents in order for Kronos to convince so many kids (claimed and unclaimed) to come to his side, like they have to be inattentive if nothing else (which is why i resent a bit that Apollo is being backpedaled into a good dad. like. nah, Dionysus makes sense to make into a good/decent dad due to his exile demanding he be present in his kids' lives; and the Big Three, primarily Hades and Poseidon, being attentive makes sense because they barely have any kids these days; and the minor gods being good parents now thay they can openly claim their kids without fear of consequences for themselves/said kids also makes sense. but the remaining gods of the main 12 (so 12 minus the Big Three minus Hera, minus Aretmis = 7 remaining gods) have to ALL not be good in order to perptuate that whole toxic mindset of "glory = godly parental attention". i could understand the godly parents becoming better parents if they were in similar situations as Dionysus, like if Percy forced the gods to be more present in their kids' lives. which would, as i assume, change their personalities some as, like with the whole "our personalities change because we moved from Greece to the USA" enviromental bit would also imply the people they surround themselves with change who they are

(tho. uh. Greece was very famously bad to women. like. it legitimately sucked to be a woman in Ancient Greece, with the exception of MAYBE Sparta. theres a reason why people joke "yeah, the Ancient Greeks were cool with gay sex, not bc they were progressive, but bc they hated women that much". like their politics didnt allow women v many rights, if any, the most rights given being to women in Sparta but still. also they had a fucked up idea of "love" as a type of "uncontrollable insanity", it was legitimately described like an illness, which in retrospect explains all the SA in their legends (tho i am glad we do have some healthy depictions of love here and there). so. toxic masculinity did definitely exist there. i could talk ad nauseam about the debatability of how much toxic masculinity was in Greece and how much is it us projecting tho. think of Dr Emily Wilson. anyway, i digress. my point here has been "toxic masculinity/sexism existed there in sizable amounts, why should it change Ares so much now that he's in the USA"? to which the answer is: Riordan was an English teacher who was a hobbyist of Ancient Greek lore that went with what was in the public's pop culture osmosis knowledge of Ares at the time. its very recently that we have begun to question if that osmosis was correct. anyway.)

so, in the sense that who they are around will apparently change their personality: being consistently around their kids who just want good parents could force the godly parents to become good parents? its a stretch but i would accept it, personally, for the cathartsis wish-fulfillment of kids in shitty situations getting at least one good parent. which, many kids dont get to have at least one good parent (much less two or more good parents). think "Turning Red" and how it reflects a realistic mother/daughter dynamic that is unhealthy but morphs into a moment of reconciliation and cathartsis; giving us an example to strive for on what is healthy/how you should be treated and look up to for both child and parent's references. lots of kids will never get to have what Mei did, but it is so nice to feel that cathartic wish-fulfillment. and i would be so down for same that kind of cathartic wish-fulfillment to happen in "Percy Jackson" with its godly parents to the point that i truly would not mind that aforementioned stretch of logic it would take to get there. alas. (but that doesnt happen sO, RIORDAN, STOP BACKPEDALING AND TRYING TO MAKE APOLLO A LOVING FATHER, HE'S ONE OF THE SEVEN GODS THAT HAVE TO BE P SHITTY AND APOLLO WAS NOT INITIALLY INTRODUCED AS A VERY GREAT FATHER ANYWAY. but i digress). so i can accept Ares having to be a bad dad in order for the plot/war to make sense, in order to have representation that abused kids can grow/be happy in spite of their trauma, in order to show the problems with toxic masculinity in a father figure as well as shining a light on "hey, this is so prevelant in America that it became part of at least one of the gods' personalities", and so on. but i do want to make it clear that i dont like it. but one of the first things drilled into me in college-level English critiques is "it's not about what YOU would do if this was your story, its about the story in front of you and what the author wanted to achieve. have your criticisms be based on that, not on something that wasn't going to happen". so like, for Riordan's purposes? making each of those 7 godly parents bad parents in a different way is good writing that makes sense for his plot to work, and Ares being a bad godly parent in a rough and tough way makes sense. like, Athena is patronizing and thinks she is always right, meaning she doesn't listen to her kids. Aphrodite is emotionally manipulative to the point of being abusive and scary to her kids. and Hermes is so busy that he can't really be present for his kids, no matter what he feels personally, and then additionally feels like he is not allowed to interact with them directly when he does have free time. and Dionysus, the most present parent due to his exile, is shitty to all his kids' camp-friends by proxy, at minimum, which is very alienating if nothing else (again, we dont get to directly see him parent at all so far into the series that ive read. so idk how else he is a bad parent. probably is overprotective after having buried so many of his own kids this whole time? who knows). all of them are/have to be bad parents in their own ways (again, for the plot to work if nothing else) and it makes sense of Ares to be bad in THIS way

but yeah! that was just a very long-winded way of saying "if Book!Ares was more present to care about smaller things like foot-races or if this was something he cared about that was bigger than a regular foot-race, then yeah! youre right, he would be like that. because he kind of has to be". im just waffling about Ares' characterization bc i do agree with you but i just also wish Book!Ares didnt HAVE to be this way in order for the plot to work (and i am mentally slapping Riordan's hand anytime he tries to backpedal on what i distinctly remember as his original characterization of Apollo in the first series. bc if those 7 gods all have be different types of bad parents for the war plotline to work, then Apollo does not get special treatment to get to retroactively have been a good dad the whole time afterall). i am not excited to see show!Ares, but i am excited the whole thing about "Clarisse will never be enough because she is not his son" thing implies Clarisse will be on-screen more. and, again, i do super respect the decision to do this to Book!Ares' character. the representation aspect of a child of fatherly abuse still being able to grow/find happiness is also important (tho im personally just not excited to see as the "abuse" part of the representation as someone who is a child of fatherly abuse. but i will admit it is important! and it is good representation to have!)

and i do just LOVE Clarisse and will gobble up any crumbs of her im given. i really hope the show gives her (and Chris too! bc that is her future boyfriend lol) more screentime ♡

but yeah, to circle back, youre right on your chatacterization of him! and im glad you like how i understand and interpret Book!Ares to be like ♡♡♡ thanks for the Ask ♡

#percy jackson show #pjo ares #ares pjo #percy jackon and the olympians #i will never ever stay fully on topic. i am a babbler. such is my curse. i tried tho lmao

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demadogs · 3 years ago

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What's your least favorite byler "proof"? Like when someone shows somebody it in an argument/interaction/whatever and it makes you go "noo wtf not that please" 😭 I think for me it's that one part in the infamous byler slides where there's a koala/bear in between mike and El and that represents will.

oh my god youre gonna get me canceled theres so so many i think are insane and dont believe in at all lmao. the masterdoc is fun but theres so much i think wasnt intentional. and so much of what i see here i think is a stretch.

bouta break my silence and come out as an anti believer in so many popular theories on here… no one be mad at me

dont think mike had a letter for will in his pocket in s4 (im SORRY but that wouldve been addressed)

dont think the tracks being different and youre the heart are connected in any way or supposed to be played together they dont sound good or seamless together at all

dont think mike walking into the school newspaper room for nancy and looking around was him looking at guys and gay panicking at all

hate the sauna test theory. they walked in on a bunch of gross naked wrinkly old men theyre not gay panicking?? maybe if they were conventionally attractive young guys but no. i think the masterdoc argues that mike looks down in shame bc hes thinking about his future self as a gay man but i dont believe in that at all tbh. i also dont think that zoom in on the men sign had anything to do with byler it was just an establishing shot of where they were.

not sold on lucas’ new coke speech being related to byler (the seating arrangement in that scene tho was definitely intentional)

i dont think at alll that mikes break down on hopper in s2 yelling “liar liar liar” had anything to do with internalized homophobia. i dont think he ever thought about his sexuality before s3

i think a lot of the times we’ve seen the colors of a certain sexualitys flag has been unintentional. something specifically pointed out like the rainbow ship for will probably was but a background character somewhat close to mike wearing colors that vaguely resemble the bi flag? or the lighting on his shirt kinda looking like the mlm flag? i dont think thats intentional at all. when they do symbolism shit like that its much more obvious (framing mike in the closet)

this one im actually on the fence about because it would be really cool, theres just one word that makes me second guess it. the idea that the girl fake choking at suzie’s house and the dad freaking out was foreshadowing of mikes monologue. on some levels it makes sense but the way the kid said “your terror it looked genuine” kinda makes it seem like it would be implying that mike wasnt actually scared for els life in that moment which i dont like at all. if he had said “your performance” instead i would be 100% sold

i dont believe in most the s1 byler theories. i do think they had the idea of byler in mind from the beginning but at that point they didnt even know if theyd be renewed so i dont think they prioritized anything that could foreshadow byler. i think the lack of romantic tension with mike and el in comparison to jonathan and nancy is telling, but i dont think there was anything in that season relating to mikes sexuality or feelings for will, both because of logistics and prioritizing mlvn for the first season, and because they had TWO SCENES TOGETHER

also dont believe in flickergate as much as i love the idea of it it would break the rules of the universe that theyve already established. the upside down isnt actually in the past its a place frozen in time. things happening there dont affect the past.

theres definitely more but those are the ones i can think of rn.

#also not byler but THE DUFFERS JUST FORGOT WILLS BIRTHDAY OK IT WAS AN ACCIDENT #byler #eden answers

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voidcat · 3 years ago

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no attachment (scaramouche/reader modern au fic)

(right after the events of ch4)

a/n: posting this rn bc ive not been going thru a writers block? tbh its so hot and humid here even sleeping feels like a chore so i spend the day just idly existing. ik this series had some ppl on the taglist so i'll post this little "chapter synopsises" thing of sorts, hope u enjoy

after this spending more time outside classes, sharing lunch etc. one day after class he sees u leaving instead of staying for library, u say u will join a gig. he invites himself to it basically. it's a gig of kazu and his band. kazu is... shocked to say the least when he sees scara next to u right at the front row. u introduce scara to kazu and the rest of the band (xiao, venti, aether)...

(implied time skip) scara joins u more often to ur friends outings. one day u straight walk behind the scene n he's confused. u explain normally u help them w makeup etc before gigs. cue a not so obviously jealous scara when you do xiao's eyeshadow.

xiao and scara bonding over their irritation at childe (scara just dislikes the guy, xiao hates that he keeps flrting w his dad/older brother. i ddint decide if zhongli will be a father figure or older brother, leaning towards the latter)

venti organizes a party, scara joining as well. he insists on drinking games, to which everyone ignores until alte hours. u explain to scara thats how it always goes. he makes a comment abt the tense air as u both r in the kitchen preparing drinks, u say "probably because we are the only single people here." it may b at the end of this chapter that u two share a kiss at the end of the night, then fr the followng week, u avoid him

implied more parties/going out. u "crying over" the news of yanfei "the elle woods wannabe???" (venti laughing in th bg: ehehe yeah they were crshing on her hard). going out to a pub w venti hu tao and yanfei, scara goes for a breath of fresh air. as hu tao and yanfei buy drinks, u mumble about wishing a love like theirs, venti says smt along the lines of u already having that and "havent you seen how that puppet looks at you" before u can ask what he meant, scara comes back, swinging an arm over the back of the cushions/ur shoulders, youre tense bc of ventis comment, "hey you alright?" "were you smoking?" "last i checked, i didnt need your permission for what to do." (he excuses himself, and comes back a minute later smelling of perfume, supressing the scent of smoke lmao)

u receive an untitled email w no attachment whatsoever to ur personal email address saying "he's not who he says he is" (or "who he acts he is") u drop the topic tho it unnerves u.

during one of the friend getaways u were leaving in a hurry, refusing to give a clear answer to what it was, scara offered to drive u, u only allowed him til a certain point. kazuha is worried bc u two always shared ur lives w the other. anyways theres nt much of a mystery u are seeing a therapsit but dont wanna explain why u started in the first place, only ningguang knows.

i think another party or beach house type of getaway but w ur friendgroup. esp u and venti get drunk on the night of arrival, waking up w a hangover, meanwhile kazu urges everyone to join him for a morning scretching/sport to freshen. scara rolls his eyes yet is the only one to keep up to kazu, until ur voice draws his attention. "you traitor! i cannot believe you didnt even tell me" snatching a thermos from ventis hands, u start drinking it, kazuha just groans: "mother was right, you are a bad influence" he says abt venti "um excuse me! give credit where its due, he only thought of that bc i yelled it to his face and suggested a good thermos." you say. (unless its clear, the thermos contains of a cold alcoholic drink) scara snatches the thermos from ur hands basically and u have to join the rest w morning jogging. the beachhouse thingy ends w u and scara walking side by side by the shore, u psuhing him tot he water and he grabs ur wrist, pulling u with him. cue simp mode scara pov when u both reemerge and he thinks under the full moonlight youre the mst beaut,ful thing he ever sees.

scara shows up to kazu one day asking advice regarding u, while holding a cat. kazu sighs, seeing scara wont leave, he opens the door n lets him in. some muttering abt how he's awful if he is trying to learn abt u to change how he acts bc a relationship based on a faked identity is no-no then he mumbles "well lucky for you you dont need to o much as their type seems to include [idr what exact phrase i had for this srry but he was basically insulting scara]", then beaten to curiosity, kazu asks whats up w the cat and scara holds the cat out to kazu "dont you think it looks like him (tomo)" (the cat is sand colored) "it followed me all the way to ur place"

some event for children of big names, for the first time (in years?) you and kazu will attend. scara is basically ur partner for it. at the beginning u push away the wine served (catered by dawn winery) (again a line i dont rmr but u insult the wine, claiming dandelion wine isnt even real wine or smt??) at one point interviwerers snatch u and scara away separetely, u get away a lot sooner, as u wait by the window, u can see the reflection of red hair, turning your back, u walk to his direction (away) and whisper "i hope you have found the closure you were desperately looking for" before diluc can say a thing, scara shows up w a hand on your waist "darling, there you are. what a bore it is here, why dont we go to that place you've been wanting to check out?" idk probs gonna spend the night w scara and sleep tgt, he gets... lowkeyish possesive during it lol... (just basking in the knowledge that he has u more than the other 'sore losers' ever did? or smt like that. idk could make more sense if in ur past 'relationship' w diluc u both always used a condom type of protection while w scara its penetrative sex basically.)

the beginning of conflict/reveal of it (from this bit on it is less planned as ive had this idea more recently. og plan was to have the event w diluc as final followed w more or less makin things official w scara. the beach house ch was supposed to have u refuse him, saying u "dont do love" and him going onthis rant abt how ur fear is illogical bc u wont be the only one vulnerable in a relationship...)

probably that night or the next, still at scaras, as it gets darker one drink afteranother u bth r more or less drunk, him more than u. then bfore realizing, he starts going on this weird rampant, his words making no sense: "u know i hate(d) you right? never got why ppl love u or ur brother so much. perfect children of perfect beidou and ningguang, beloved by everyone, beloved by their mothers, their friends" basically slurring speech and kinda revealing he first 'befriended' u w the intentions of having fun/messing w u since despite being 'perfect' u looked so lonely (and that 'im nt doing that' commen got him pissed. "who goes around calling people 'that' huh) scara rant goes on abt how he had to go fall for both perfect siblings "wow what a joke huh" and a little "i dont even get why im like this nowadays. idek why i rushed that way to get those notes and drove at 200kph to get back to the library for u" (basically drunk scara more or less jealous of u and kazu, emotional management problems, problems of realizing he has emotions, also it clicks to u that the guy kazu hated in his hs is scara)

scara wakes up to an empty bed, unable to contact u. it was at the end of the term so any excuse he uses to see u, they fail. rumors of u joiing ning for an internship, he tries to see u, only to be met w security. (he may or may not throw rpcks at the door like that cat tiktok. security dialing u/ning, scara in the bg "open the door or ill throw rocks at ur window" "u already are!" "i mean ur bedroom window" "wh-HOW DO U KNOW WHERE I LIVE". scara tries to reach out to kazu bc he is clueless why he is being ignored (he was VERY drunk, while his words sobered u up like a slap) kazu: politely tells him to fuck off.

scara finds a way in bc ei and ning wll have a meeting n scara pulls the elder child/shareholder card to insert himslf to the meeting, lil sister raiden is Not happy "i can become ceo long before you can so suck it up already". scara and u staring down at one anıther during the meeting, "talking" at the end, basically having to pull the curtains down bc the offices may be soundproof but theyre still made of glass n everyone can se eu two fight. then scara says to at least allow him to help u, sayng he knows abt the weird email u got and someone might b trying to frighten or corner u to give up ur shares.

idk basically working tgt w scara to find out who did it. he suspects one of the "harbingers". "arent you a harbinger as well?" "i keep my shares as a powermove, i dont want anything to do w their stupid company." so idk either dottore or childe gonna b the one who was mpre or less creeping u w the emails (u did receive more after ur breakapart w scara).

as i said the bits from drunk past confessions forward r fairly new so i dont have everything planned but basically u... more or elss tolerate scara (dont forgive him entirely) and he gotta work thru his issues basically (aka accepts that he has issues aaand hes kind of a simp, hes desperate to be loved lmao)

#📎 no attachment #scaramouche #kunikuzushi #genshin impact #this is logner than i rmred lol but #also hope no one thinks of this as spoiling the upcoming chapters bc despite my detailed way of sumamrizing things i end up going overboard #while wriitng the ful stuff.... so yea... also i may add new stuff or change things up a bit as i write more idk im just unmotivated to #write this series as of late which is dumb bc I STARTED THIS ONE TO BE A FUN SERIES W A SIMPLE LANGUAGE ugh #scaramouche x reader #long live the queue

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babygirldennis · 4 years ago

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This shit is fake bby!!!

Here she is.. My masterpost of all the dumb, illogical bits of info contained within these s15 “leaks” that make me fairly confident they are complete bullshit. It also includes my little tinhat theories that have absolutely no evidence.

I will be putting it all under a Readmore in case you don't want to risk it or if you simply Do Not Care

First up, I'd like to point out that these call sheets repeatedly give very detailed backstories to characters that have few lines which conveniently paints a picture of each episode's plot. And I'm not an expert so correct me if I'm wrong, but after looking at other similar casting calls, they only ever include the demographic and necessary skills.

Basically who in their right mind would write up casting calls that give away so many spoilers? Seems like that could cause and issue if they were leaked lol. But anyway that's my 1st point. But onto the actual content

So the conceit of this episode as a whole is that during the pandemic, the gang "gamed the system" and received three (3!) Loans to start businesses that went bankrupt. One of these businesses is implied to be the one started by dee and charlie who end up selling to Qanon shaman. Already this is so impossible baby.

1. We've already seen the gang try to get a loan and it didn't work. They don't have good ideas. Ur telling me, they managed to finagle 3 separate loans for 3 separate business ideas from an actual bank?

2. Maybe I just have bad reading comprehension but how does one have a business that is both fictitious and bankrupt?

3. If the customer is supposed to be Qanon shaman, an actual real life guy, why are the only descriptors white and male? They say he's shirtless so are they going to paint on all of the tattoos he has? And if so, doesn't that kind of ruin the dramatic reveal when charlie "throws in" the viking helmet? Why would he do that anyways? Sus.

Moving on

Alright this episode would fucking blow for obvious reasons but im going to refrain from looking at this through my gay dennis thruther lens because im biased.

Purely from a narrative standpoint, a woman hasn't been shown to be interested in dennis in nearly 5 years during the wade boggs episode. Ever since, every single woman he approaches has been actively creeped out by him. And now I'm supposed to believe that 3 "smart, passionate woman" (In Their Twenties!!!!!!) agreed to go on a date with him? And Anna even slept with him! Just because he what? Agreed with her? I'm not buyin it.

Plus the concept of this scenario lacks any potential for comedy. When iasip gets political, they always discuss a very specific topic using hyperbolic situations and flawed metaphors. If this is supposed to be a political episode, what ultimately lukewarm point would rob be trying to make here? So far we know they're ranting about

The patriarchy

Privilege

Socialism

No more personal responsibility(?)

The... nature of power in society(??)

How on earth would an episode like get approved? This shit sounds like a Ted talk. It sounds like it was written specifically to sound like a political episode so boring and pointless it would generate outrage and mile long essay posts from Tumblr users and reddit users alike. Almost like this one lol.

On a completely unrelated note, do not try and convince me that Frank "casual cock ring wearer" Reynolds is unable to perform.

Jeez this is getting out of hand fast. Let's move on

Ok now we're starting to getting into the Ireland of it all. Let me go on a bit of a tangent here about all this.. Now I thinq there are just 3 possibilities. Either this is all a publicity stunt and there is some truth to the Ireland rumors, the entire thing could be bogus from some weirdo fan (ps, if a fan did write this I want you to know I fucking hate you. You did this to me), or it is a publicity stunt but Ireland is just more bullshit.

I am going to assume it was a publicity stunt, otherwise I just wasted my entire evening and I can't have that kind of mentality rn. Additionally, I'm Going to tinhat here for a second and say that the Ireland rumors are true, but the details are different.

I say this because if they were going to do filming in Ireland, they probably figured that that information would be impossible to hide. In essence, my completely unfounded hypothesis is that this leak was their fucked up little way of controlling the situation while simultaneously messing with us.

Ok tangent is over, returning to the casting calls. From the looks of it, dee starts a "scam" acting class and has some very devoted students (Note that Tony was also the name of the porn shop owner. Seems weird!) Presumably after the gang replaces her with a monkey as the title suggests.

Honestly, there isn't too much here that's a red flag to me... seems like a nice little dee-centric episode that is the link to the Dublin angle. Assuming I am At All right, this could be a genuine plotline for Dee. However, the monkey could be a red herring and there could be a whole different side plot with the guys. who's to say. Next one!

Ah yes this is the dennis we all know and despise.. no red flags for me here really, I'm also running out of steam because idk if it shows, but I am majorly sleep deprived atm. Anyway I'm going to the next one

Okay this is where things start getting weird again ough a migraine just hit, anyway back to my earlier point about how casting calls would never contains major spoilers bc the people who see these wont be under any kind of NDA..

These ones reveal that bonnie dies. Again, that info wouldn't be in a casting call.

But also they suggest charlie has a irish penpal named Shelley who is his biological father. First off charlie is illiterate, although as pointed out by @undeadbreeze shelley could also be communicating in symbols. However, this scenario is still unbelievable to me for a couple reasons:

1. Bonnie's last name is Kelly obviously, and we know it's her maiden name because Jack's last name is also Kelly. But Shelley's last name is... also Kelly? In the context of this big ol hoax, it feels like it was written to show that look! his last name is the same as charlie's! That's how you know that's his dad! But It would be way too big of a coincidence if charlie's dad happened to have the same last name bonnie.

And 2. There's the whole mystery of charlie's long-lost sister from 'charlie got molested' but never any mention of a brother which according to this, shelley has been pretending to be his brother for years. And we all know how much rcg loves their continuity, it seems uncharacteristically lazy to just tack this on without any prior buildup.

And finally let me talk about mac for a second and specifically the line in gus's summary "both are gay men who are attracted to the priesthood for all the wrong reasons"

Iasip has commented on pedophilia in the priesthood many times in the past which leads me to believe that they are implying that mac is a pedophile? Please let me know if I completely misread the implications of that statement, but if not, then that is completely insane and one of the biggest indictators that this is fake. Mac is awful, just like everyone in the gang but he is definitely not a pedophile.

However even if i did completely misread that, it's still proof this is fake.. For all his faults, Rob put a surprising amount of care and effort into mac's coming-out. It hasn't been perfect, but Mfhp in particular firmly established that mac's faith is integral to his identity so Its unlikely that rob would throw all of that away for a cheap shot at priests.

Ok my brain is irradiated sludge at this point, but in conclusion. I hope that 1. I'm right, at least about it being fake (Otherwise damb that'll be so humiliating for me) And 2. This eases ur fears a bit. I don't want to lose all faith in future seasons bc I love iasip and miss the gang. If you read this far youre insane but I literally love you so goddamn much because I spent so so long tapping this out on my silly little phone

Please feel free to add on or message me your thoughts and opinions I need to know I'm not the only one who uhhh went a bit insane. And finally: whoever made these is a cunt. Mwah.

#iasip #s15 spoilers #oy vey.....#they could also be written by a reddit fan who is too much of a pussy to just write fanfic but that seems kinda unlikely?#cause 1. itll be disproven so everyone will know u just... wrote weird fanfic #and 2. there are a lot of little details that are so random that even if this is a fan just messing with people.... why put in so much effo #wahtever im pressing post #actually tho what gge fuck is that priest line supposed to imply #i guess for mac it could be talking about his view that god smites enemies and u must fear him blah blah #i jus don't know what it was supposed to imply about gus!!!#bc they describe gus like he is fat mac with healthy views on the bible which :]#then that last line just gives me whiplash what does that mean!!

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fallindomino · 4 years ago

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how i would have changed s2 of hsmtmts

obvious disclaimer but im not a screenwriter or anyth so im not claiming what i want is best, this is just for fun lololol

okay so first of all nini would still have dropped out of yac but she wouldn’t have gone back to east, she would have transferred to north bc she was too ashamed to tell anyone she left at first and maybe she still wants to explore who she is away from ricky and the others

nini could join north’s batb and this way maybe we could have some playful rivalry with lily and nini and more scenes with antoine shdhdjdj also it could have been a great opportunity to flesh out lily’s character so those scenes where she reaches out to ricky and her confession at the end of the season actually make sense lol

speaking of ricky ,,, i think he should have left the play at some point hear me out. he only joined in the first place because of nini and barely wanted to do it at all once he realized he wasn’t gonna be able to perform with her. he could have joined crew and been a manager with natalie or smth considering he rlly does see the theater gang as a second family. also this would leave so much room for ej and ricky development and bants since ej joined the av club and began to pursue film. they could have some convos where idk ricky asks ej how he figured out what he wanted to do after duke didn’t work out and ricky could actually develop some interests that arent the play or nini ,,, maybe fucking art club i mean he did p good on that centerpiece for carlos’ quinceañera.

with ricky not being the beast anymore i think seb should take his place that would be soooo good. and since seb isn’t chip anymore carlos won’t make those snide comments about chip being a small unimportant role and we can just cut that whole fight bc it was dumb and bad. we could still have seb being insecure that carlos is only dating him bc there aren’t really any other gay guys at school. in a heartbeat is great and i did like ricky being supportive in the background it was kinda funny too idk dhdjdjfj

ooh i almost forgot abt rini ahshdj okay so i still think they should break up. but in my version there’s no ricky pulling an ej 1.0 and deleting comments off of nini’s insta, cause with ricky in art club and nini at north trying to figure out what she wants i think one of them would realize that they’re going in different directions and only got back tgt because they made each other feel safe cause what they had was familiar. this could be triggered by ricky mentioning smth abt nini at yac and then nini breaks down and tells him that she dropped out and is at north and doesn’t know where she’s going. and then they can both realize they aren’t good for each other rn and have a less tragic mutual break up.

honestly i really liked the scene of nini taking charge after miss jenn freaked out cause with the character detail of nini giving every person in the cast of productions she’s in a thank you note she just seems really like someone who is suited to lifting others up. this could still be explored at north, maybe she could help lily through her issues that were briefly implied in ep 11 and nini realizes she wants to be a drama teacher and encourage kids to go off book and put themselves into their acting, something she couldn’t have at yac.

okay now ej ,,, so like i said in ricky’s section, more bants between them cause i feel like friendships kinda fell by the wayside due to all the relationships so more friendship !!!! also the scene where ej tells his dad he’s not going to duke shouldn’t have been an ending scene, it should have been fleshed out with his dad pushing back saying how he pulled all these strings to get him in and ej saying he doesn’t wanna go if his own hard work couldn’t get him there. and also more scenes of ej doing av club things !!! and realizing he rlly likes film and wants to do it OMG IT WOULD BE SO COOL IF HE BROKE THE FOURTH WALL AND ASKED THE DOCUMENTARY CREW ABT THE FILM INDUSTRY god i would love that. the only scene we rlly got of ej doing film things was at the quinceañera which made me kinda sad. uhhh also i just wanted to specifically mention how ej got mr mazzara that job at cal tech bc it really showed how he wanted to be there for people not just for gina, who he had a crush on, but for mr mazzara who supported him outside of romance, so i wanna keep that for sure.

gina !!! okay so i mostly liked her arc in this season, the only changes i would make would be to flesh it out a teeny bit (god this hypothetical s2 would have to be like 22 eps at least shdjdjdjfj) anyways besides ashlyn singing home to get gina to stay i think there should be a scene where they actually talk in her room abt how gina feels safer when shes on the run (second chance reference ilysm) hhhh and also a scene of her and carlos actually working out compromises for their choreo cause i liked that bit of development too and fleshing that out would make gina an even better foil for lily, who felt a need to hog the spotlight like gina used to. with gina’s own arc fleshed out her character would feel more whole independently from romance and portwell would be even more rewarding than it is in the current s2. the only thing i would really change abt portwell is that they would kiss !!! in the finale but thats bc im biased.

ashlyn should have gotten a more fleshed out storyline about being insecure about not being a good enough belle or the typical belle. there were some throwaway lines when north did their typical dramatics but the only two real scenes that showed it were when ash talked to big red about it and when she was telling nini she wanted to do a run in “home” bc lily did it. ashlyn should get more screen time where she has to grapple with the reasons she doesn’t feel good enough and big red can still support her but also gina too bc i would like more roommate besties interaction.

kourtney could still date howie, that harry potter shit was cute but there needs to be smth else for kourtney’s arc. idk she’s still into fashion so maybe she could be out here trying to create her own line or smth? this doesn’t have to be resolved in s2 like making a wholeass line takes time and she could work on it into a potential s3. kourtney just didnt get much outside of howie and the stuff at the beginning of the season where she said nini inspired her to be independent and that's why she got a job was just dropped?? so i think that fashion could fill that for her if she’s still dating howie cause like having her whole arc just be the pizza place kinda overlaps w big red’s mini arc abt how he wasn’t settling for hospitality, its what he wants to do with his life.

ik what ur thinking. anna, even if you added more episodes, where would u find the room to add all these plotlines?? well first we cut (most of) the seblos fight, so thats some time saved. honestly most of the time that we r going to gain is going to be from cutting ms jenn’s time. things like ms jenn’s and nini’s car ride would get cut, but mostly all of ms jenn’s romances would get cut down. considering she’s the teacher and isn’t actually a character with an arc how does she have THREE love interests this season?? like all of the weird tension between her and zack can be cut, like just some short scenes of them being competitive can stay. all of the stuff with ricky’s dad can go bye bye we don’t need it. i did like her w mr mazzara so most of that can stay i just didn’t like how he said he would give up cal tech for her, ew no that would be gone.

the MENKIES !!!! this is the last thing im gonna address cause in a perfect world every character would get a long fleshed out arc but then the season would be waaay too long and also im mostly trying to work within material the show gave so this is mostly made up of “realistic” deviations from what actually happened. lol idk what that even means it just makes sense to me. but anyways!! uhhh bro idk i thought them dropping the menkies was funny but it also made the finale really BAD lmao. in this finale, seb is the beast, east still had to deal w the fact that they’re underfunded compared to north but no one is injured, lily is less of a poorly written character and maybe ppl are even rooting for her, and wow i just realized i never actually said what role i think nini should have in north’s show. OOH she could be student director instead of lily cause lily both being in the play while also directing was weird considering omg i just checked and according to her wiki page shes a FRESHMAN?? and they let her be student director? lol hell nah. okay so with all that in mind ,,, the menkies should have been the season cliffhanger instead of portwell. east and north should both be nominated, both schools perform at the menkies, and then the award winner is about to be announced and THATS when it cuts to natalie and the end of the season.

one, this actually gives more tension for a summer s3 as we would be waiting to see the consequences of whichever school won. also i bet people would be wondering if nini’s gonna be transferring back to east or staying at north. people would also prob wonder if ej would be getting the scholarship if east won and what that would mean for his interest in film.

lmao that got longggg and idk if anyone’s even gonna read this but it was fun to do :D

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ladyfl4me · 5 years ago

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I know you like that good sweet worldbuilding, sooooo if you could add just one thing to amnesty canon, what would it be?

JUST ONE THING? JESUS FUCKING CHRIST YOU CAN’T DO THAT TO ME. THAT’S NOT FAIR. I’ll give you options and then, in a hypothetical universe, I’ll pick one and Make It So for amnesty canon. it’s almost 1:30 in the morning where i am rn, so bear with me.

If i may, for the first one, i would do a switch: i would remove the reconciliation in its entirety, and make the villain some sort of political intrigue/antagonistic force within Sylvain, making the light figures from there instead. I’m basically just spitballing all the things that I am going to do in TCOS here, but like.

Okay, by keeping things centered on Sylvain, that would be a powerful thing to add. It could have been a possible domino for Griffin to push to do more Sylvain worldbuilding, and make them more fascinating as a society for the protagonists to interact with. Griffin called Earth and Sylvain sister planets, and then didn’t follow through on that connection at all, making it an artificial bond by fantasy space America trying to start a puppet war. Christ. You can’t reduce an entire planet down to one culture and set of political ideals. By making the villains have a more direct relationship to Sylvain, you might get a hell of a lot of nuance.

That’s not to say i didn’t like the Reconciliation plotline; i think it was really thematically interesting and had a lot of symbolic weight. I just feel like it superseded a lot more interesting potential ones in Sylvain, which got abandoned. Like! The exiles thing! Dani canonically has parents and a brother-- what’s up with them? The drama surrounding that! How do the councilmembers relate to each other? What are their individual politics? Alexandra’s dead fucking father - what kind of society puts a child in charge, unless it’s a dire fucking emergency? What happened to her dad? What’s their technology like? Their culture? Their music? What has Sylvain done to try and stymie the quell in the past, before they got to where they are today? Why has that failed? A gateway to all of this could have been opened if Griffin had decided to make Sylvain as a whole more significant, and while the “these two forces are actually being threatened by a third greater power” thing is cool, i wasn’t entirely convinced.

And if i couldn’t remove the reconciliation, i would add this: there are other sylvan communities all over earth like the lodge. The lodge is a microcosm for a much bigger sociocultural migratory phenomenon that crosses galaxies. The two planets have been connected for centuries, if not millennia; you cannot look me in the eyes and tell me that there aren’t sylvan communities embedded near major geothermal hotspots the world over.

“wait tin don’t they need energy to survive -” Barclay and Indrid had those crystals, and those kept them alive well enough. I specifically cite Indrid because that guy never once showed up at the hot springs for a dip, and seemed to be just fine living off his crystal - whereas the exiles who didn’t have a crystal had to make do with the springs. Like. Just imagine a whole society of crystal-wearing sylphs operating a society in the woods near a ski resort in Colorado, or a few miles from Yellowstone. Or a bunch of sylphs who’ve wired crystals to [throws dart] Manhattan’s power grid, and have created a gentle web of pseudo-sylvan energy over the whole city to give the sylphs and their descendants there sustenance. The idea of there being sylphs who were exiled to earth and formed their own communities - or sylphs who left lawfully and formed their own communities near gate locations, having children and settling on earth - is fascinating to me, and is completely in line with the lore griffin already has set out given how the gate travels.

I know you said just one thing, but i am still sitting here and thinking... If i wasn’t going to make it a worldbuilding thing, i would make it a character thing. I would dig the knife with stern to make him more of a developed character in arcs three through to the end - or at least make him more of a bad guy. I’ve talked about the “stern looks out the window during the post-arc-3 interlude, catches Boyd Mosche taking pictures of the lodge before his meetup with Ned, intercepts him, makes the mistake of hearing him out, and teams up with him in a quid pro quo effort to take down Ned in exchange for shade tree” AU at LENGTH. It is one of my favorite Amnesty AU concepts to think about. I still think that those two would be an absolute villainous powerhouse if they’d met in canon. (i have my own thoughts about them, related to the versions that show up in TCOS and TMWCIFTC, that i’ve been sitting on for longer than I’d care to admit, but, well. That’s for another time. Yes that’s an invitation to ask me to yell abt it if you’d like, their development in TCOS has taken a fucking U-turn that i’ve been excited about for a while and i like talking about my fic lskdjlskdjf)

But if not that, I would probably just make Stern quit the fucking FBI, man. Idk what to tell you, the only good cops are the ones that quit and the fact that he stayed an FBI agent, with a team there observing the gate, and was implied to be rewarded with a romantic relationship with his former prey, never sat right with me. I could accept it if he left the FBI and was shown to try and make up for his mistakes. Four good deeds for every bad, and all that jazz. But alas.

I know i listed three things but hey, these would not all be implemented simultaneously. It’d just be one. So it still kind of counts! A lot of this bitching boils down to the fact that Amnesty-the-story and Amnesty-the-DND-roleplay-podcast are not necessarily the same level of quality in my head; as an overarching story, I think Amnesty might have worked better as a TV show or book series, in terms of its narrative, even though the TTRPG aspects of its execution were awesome. A lot of things I would want to add would suit this podcast as a Balance-length epic or a piece of textual narrative literature, not necessarily a podcast. Sorry for the long answer, it is 1:30 am and i just think a lot about the holes in amnesty meta and What Could Have Been because my specific AU bread and butter is trying to patch them lsjdflksjdf

ask me anything! all asks will be answered

#asks #anon #ask game #taz amnesty #amnesty critical #?#feel like that one applies a bit #long post

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captainillogical · 6 years ago

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Devil’s Ballroom Ch.7

A year after the events from the earth’s final attack, Little Homeworld is finally complete, and there’s a new jazz bar where gems and humans mingle and drink. - As you’re typing back a reply, someone pulls the stool out next to you and takes a seat. You see a sliver of pink out of the corner of your eye as you try not to actually Look. Oh god. It’s her. God can’t help us now.

Spinel/Reader

collab with my lovely wife @firstofficertightpants

ya’ll im sorry lmao

You spend the rest of your evening doing exactly none of the errands that you needed to deal with today. Instead, you're laying on your couch and texting your friends.

Y/N: I'm so tornnnn.

Y/N: Do I say something about the cheek smooch?

Y/N: Should I leave it be?

Y/N: Because she's texting like nothing happened.

Y/N: What if I'm reading too much into it??

Y/N: What if that's just how she shows friendship affection???

Y/N: I might make it so fucking awkward if I assume something!

Y/N: This entire ordeal is mortifying!!!

Y/N: I want nothing more than to dig a big hole and lie in it forever.

Y/N: I might be low-key having a panic attack about this rn but what's new.

Harper: Y/N. chill. you're way overreacting to this.

Harper: even if it meant nothing, she still likes you as a friend right?

Harper: i think it would take a lot for her to like.. not wanna stay friends lol.

Alex: im just saying you could probably kiss her and she'd be ok with it

Alex: cheek kisses are pretty forward

Harper: don't listen to him. all of his relationships ended in failure.

Alex: wow

Alex: im seriously hurt

Harper: am I wrong?

Alex: no..

Harper: my point exactly.

Harper: i’m not saying you have nothing to lose or anything.

Harper: because i myself had to tread very carefully with leah..

Harper: but i think you should just see where it goes and not like

Harper: put too much emphasis on this incase it was nothing.

Y/N: Yeah see now you have me worried it WAS nothing!!

Alex: oh my goooooooddddddddddddddd

Alex: the both of you approach women so.. pathetically

Alex: take a risk

Alex: live a little

Alex: what is seriously the worst that could happen

Alex: she kills you??

Alex: lmao

Alex: its funny cuz of.. you know

Harper: i can’t wait to be home and smothering him with a pillow instead of affection.

Y/N: You and me both.

Y/N: Try being the only one available to play games with him.

Alex: both of you fucking love me okay

Alex: alsooooooo i get to be home the day after tomorrow

Alex: the alex is back, babieeeeee

Y/N: Harper please come home I’m BEGGING you.

Harper: sorry you gotta deal with him alone for another month lmao.

Y/N: Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

Alex: can i get a fucking crumb of love here please

You swipe over to the couple of messages Spinel has left you in the past couple of minutes while you were talking to your friends.

Spinel: It’s another stupid ball, I just found out.

Spinel: I told her that I’m sitting this one out this time.

Spinel: She has so many others that would absolutely love to help her, and yet, still absolutely insists that I must be there.

Spinel: I don’t want to go back to homeworld right now, and not for this.

Y/N: And you put your foot down? Hell yeah, dude.

Y/N: Planning a ball for a bunch of gems sounds like a chore anyway.

Spinel: oh, it is, believe me.

Spinel: And they need everything to be PERFECT.

Spinel: Which isn’t realistic anymore now that they don’t expect any of the gems to stay in line with their gem class nowadays.

Spinel: The last ball they threw almost 4 months ago was utterly chaotic.

Y/N: For thousands of years y'all as a race never pushed to deviate from the norm, and now that you guys are allowed to? I’d go batshit with it too.

Y/N: Being stifled in everyday life, and finally you’re free?

Y/N: Fuck, I’d go around fusing with anyone!

Spinel: That is precisely what too many of them did.

Y/N: Lmao. I wish I could’ve seen that.

You tab back over to your group chat for a moment to see what they’re talking about.

Harper: see? they’re everywhere.

Harper: i wasn’t expecting the campsite to have so many.

Alex: you could have built an army and instead you took pictures

Alex: do you know how easy it is to lure chipmunks?

Alex: oh that lil guy on the bottom right is so fucking chunky i love him

Harper: that’s the one that got the closest when i fed them. :3

Alex: oh i fuckin BET

Alex: you dont get that chubby in the wild without takin a few risks

Alex: if u know what i mean ;)

Harper: i hate whatever you just implied.

Y/N: It’s not a conversation with Alex unless you roll your eyes at least 3 times.

Alex: hey i thought it was 4 times

Alex: dont insult me

Alex: anyway, y/n

Alex: are you workin the day i come back

Y/N: Yeah I’m actually scheduled a double.

Alex: scheduled

Y/N: Yes.

Alex: a double

Y/N: Yes.

Alex: he can’t SCHEDULE you a DOUBLE

Y/N: He can if he asks me ahead of time as a favor.

Alex: that fuckin bastard

Alex: always ruining my plans

Harper: you’re still mad at him for firing you last summer, huh.

Alex: OF COURSE I AM

Y/N: Bro you stole like $300 of cotton candy sugar that summer.

Y/N: It’s only fair.

Y/N: Besides, I’m only doing this because he said he’d give me a long weekend for it.

Alex: kay well

Alex: i guess i’ll just go bug you at work and wait for you to get off that day :'(

Y/N: Get me written up again, I swear to god.

Your phone chimes several times, and you swipe down to see messages from both Spinel and Steven. You check Spinel's first.

Spinel: Do me a favor and ignore any messages Steven has sent you.

Y/N: What are you, my boss?

Spinel: I MEAN IT

You quickly switch over to Steven's texts.

Steven: I was going to ask you if your date with Spinel went okay, but I'm assuming it went fine considering she hasn't really stopped talking about you.

Ohhhh my god, this is wild. You reply to him.

Y/N: It wasn't a date as far as I know.

Y/N: I had fun.

Y/N: She's telling me to not read your messages, lmao.

Y/N: Also what do you mean she hasn't stopped talking about me??

Steven: She’s been lying on my floor for the last hour basically gushing about you.

Steven: But you didn’t hear that from me!

Steven: :D

Y/N: Haha thanks, kid.

You switch back over to text Spinel, and get up off the couch to make yourself some tea. Pulling out your kettle, you turn the stove on and grab some raspberry flavored abomination tea bag that your dad loves more than any of the other good tea flavors.

Y/N: Sooooo.

Spinel: You talked to him, didn’t you.

Y/N: Hahaha noooo. :)

Spinel: The fuck did he say?

Y/N: Absolutely nothing.

Spinel: Seriously? I was sure he’d reveal something embarrassing.

Y/N: Nope! You should probably get off his floor eventually, though.

Your kettle goes off and you grab a clean mug, and pour the boiling water into it along with the tea packet. You look down at your phone, and grin.

Spinel: goddammit.

You let the bag steep for a little bit, and add in a small amount of sugar. Walking up to your bedroom you take a snap of Jellybean half lounging, half falling off the stairs and send it to Spinel. She replies with a couple heart emojis, and you wonder if Steven was the one to show her the proper use of them. You set your cup of tea down on your desk, and turn your computer on. It’s evening now, and it’s much too late to do anything left with the rest of your day productivity-wise, so you settle in on playing more minecraft. Your thoughts wander quite a bit, and you find yourself stuck on thinking about Spinel. Naturally. You wonder about a lot of things she’s learned while staying on earth, from things like - does she pay rent? Does she have a job? Does she know what taxes are? Does she know what a relationship with a human looks like? She said she watched a movie, but didn’t exactly elaborate. You don’t know what human-norms she’s been exposed to. You can’t even concentrate enough to mine any of this redstone for Alex, and you nearly die in-game when the thought of ‘does she know what sex is?’ pops into your mind. You grab your phone and shoot Spinel another message.

Y/N: Quick question.

Y/N: If you don’t mind me asking.

It takes her a few minutes to reply.

Spinel: Sure?

Y/N: Do you know how humans are made?

Spinel: w

Spinel: Yes?

Spinel: Steven told me about it a few weeks ago actually.

Spinel: Why are you asking?

Y/N: No reason! Just curious is all.

Spinel: Hm.

Yeah you’re not too confident that she actually knows, and you’re too chickenshit to elaborate right now. You’ll enlighten her later. You spend the rest of the night browsing memes on your phone, and texting your friends and Spinel on occasion. Before you know it, your eyes drift close with your phone in hand.

You wake up when your alarm goes off for your morning shift, and curse at yourself for not charging it last night. It’s at a solid 32%, which isn’t really enough to go about your day, but you’ll have to make do. You get ready for a hopefully not shitty day, lock up the house, and head in to work.

It’s a complete shitshow when you come in, and you turn your phone off to save battery and concentrate on dealing with more than an average amount of tourists. You find Mr. Smiley sleeping in the breakroom/office/supply closet, and have half a mind to lock him in there from the outside for the rest of your shift. It’s pretty busy, and messy, and it isn’t until you’re there for several exhausting hours that you finally have enough time for a break. You turn your phone on, and instantly you’re flooded with messages from several different people. Ugh.

A couple from your dad - just checking in, really. Group chat too as usual, but none of it seems overly important. One from Spinel, and several from Steven. You open up Spinel’s message first.

Spinel: Do you think we could talk about a couple of things later?

Vague, and a little concerning. You text back an apology for getting back to her so late, and open the messages from Steven.

Steven: Hey are you busy?

Steven: I’m dealing with a bit of a situation right now, and could use your help.

Steven: Spinel locked herself in my bathroom, and she won’t come out.

Steven: She refuses to answer to anyone, and several of us have tried.

Steven: I’m just really worried about her, and you guys seemed to bond, so I was hoping..

Steven: That maybe you could come over?

Steven: Thanks regardless.

You check the timestamp, and that was over an hour ago. Jesus christ.

Y/N: Steven I’m so sorry, my phone was off and I’m at work, give me a few and I’ll be right over, okay?

Y/N: I’ll be quick.

He replies almost immediately with a “please” and you pocket your phone. You try not to worry too hard about Spinel as you rush over to grab your things, and knock on Mr. Smiley’s office/broom closet door. He opens it groggily, clearly just waking up.

“Yeah?” he slowly blinks at you.

“I gotta leave early. Emergency.” You stare at him, trying to not be pissed at his lack of work ethic.

“Are you for real? You’ve got another 3 hours left.” He says and crosses his arms, and you glare at him.

“I’ve been working my ass off while you’ve been sleeping this whole time, AND I’m covering your ass tomorrow so you can go meet your old friend! So the LEAST you can do is let me go early when I have an emergency!!!” You almost yell out at him, and he holds his hands up in defense.

“Okay, okay! Fine. Only because you’re a good worker.” He says, and has the gall to look at least a little ashamed of himself.

“Damn right I am.” You spin around and head out of the building, practically running.

You almost trip and bite it several times on the way over to Steven’s place, but you’re more worried about Spinel. You’ve only been to his place twice, but once you’re there you run up the stairs and open the door without knocking. You’re greeted by the only two people in the living room, Pearl, and Steven.

“Oh, she’s here!” Pearl says and nudges Steven, who looks up from typing on his phone.

“Y/N! Thank god you’re here.” He says with furrowed eyebrows.

“What happened?” You say and shut the door, and cross the room over to him.

“I’m not sure! We were just working on something together for Amethyst, and she got a call from Blue and Yellow. She’s been ignoring them lately, and they’ve been bothering me in turn because of that, so I asked her to take the call just see what they want.” He runs his hand through his brown curls, and just for a moment, you see that 12 year old him in again. The obvious stress masks just how young he really is, and you feel bad that he can’t live life like a normal kid. “She went outside to take the call, and was out there for quite a while. I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop, but I did hear some yelling. And just when I was going over to make sure they were alright, she comes back in tears, eyes spiraling like months ago, and nearly knocks Pearl over rushing into the bathroom.”

“And nothing since?” You inquire, fidgeting with your hands.

“No,” He says, frustratedly. “I’ve been trying to reach the diamonds to see what this is all about, but I’ve only been getting the pearls. I don’t know what to do. She hasn’t been like this in months. What were they talking about to make her this upset?”

“Maybe I can find out. You said she’s in your bathroom?” You raise an eyebrow at him.

“Yeah, the one right over here.” He says and points to it.

“Is it locked?” You ask.

“No,” Pearl glances towards the bathroom door and crosses her arms. “The lock has been broken on it for a while, since Peridot joined us actually. Both Garnet and I tried opening it, but I think once Spinel hears someone trying to come in she blocks the door.”

Hm.

“I’m gonna try something, but you guys are gonna wanna stay away.” You say to the two of them. “I don’t want to overwhelm her with more than one person.”

“Let us know if we can do anything?” Steven makes to pass by you and gives your arm a light squeeze. “And thanks for coming to help.”

“Anytime, dude.” You give him a half smile, and walk over to his bathroom. You turn to take a look back at the other two, and they’re already in the kitchen discussing something in soft tones. You move to knock at the door, make two light taps against the frame, and wait for an answer.

A couple seconds pass, and nothing. Not even any movement. Nervously, you knock again, a little louder this time, and wait for a good ten seconds.

Still nothing.

You take a deep breath, reach out to grab the door handle, and very slowly and quietly open the bathroom door. You see nothing but absolute darkness, and step in. You feel around the wall to your right and flip a switch just as you close the door behind you with an audible click. The room instantly floods with the dark red light of the heat lamp, and before you can even think about finding another light source, you find yourself slammed up against the wall and let out a surprised yelp. You open your eyes to see Spinel’s face inches from yours, pupils wild, her hands splayed against your shoulders.

“U-um,” Your voice cracks a little. “Hey.”

You watch her eyes take a second to find yours, and almost instantly, she lets you go, arms trembling.

“W.. what are YOU DOING HERE!?” She cries, large tears pouring down her face, eyebrows raised in confusion, mouth trembling. Her hair is in loose pigtails, strands untamed around her face, cheeks stained with tear tracks. She looks like a mess, and your heart breaks, just a little. “I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt y-”

“I’m fine.” You cut her off. “I should have said who it was outside the door, I’m sorry. And um.. Steven texted me while I was at work, and told me what was going on so I rushed over..” You trail off as you watch Spinel’s entire body shake, and she covers her face with both of her hands.

“I can’t believe I just did that.” You hear her wavering voice, muffled behind her fists, and she lets out a choked sob. “Maybe they were right. M-maybe I’m not meant to-” She quickly moves her hands down to look at the floor with wide, vulnerable eyes, and struggles to form the rest of her words. You hear her breathing pick up pace, and you’re starting to realize she’s hyperventilating.

“Spinel, look at me.” Her eyes shoot up to yours, lips trembling. “I need you to breathe.” You do what your friends have always done with you, and gently grab both of her hands and hold them with yours, thumbs stroking her palms in slow circles. She freezes up instantly, and you’re about to panic, because while a familiar touch helps ground you, you register that maybe it’ll make it worse for her. But before you can pull your hands away, her hands relax ever so slightly, and she lets out a shaky breath. “Good. Just like that.” You motion for her to follow your breathing inverals, and she copies you, hands still shaking in yours.

It’s been a while since you’ve had to deal with something like this, but you’re thankful for having similar life experiences. After a solid minute or two of this her breathing is back to a normal pace, but she’s still crying, and now not meeting your eyes. Almost like she’s avoiding them.

“Look, I.. I don’t know what happened with you and the diamonds, but you can talk to me about it if you’d like. No pressure, though.” You give her hands a small squeeze, and she whimpers, looking up to meet your gaze. Tears are still actively streaming down her face, and you have no idea how to make any of this better. It physically hurts you to see her like this.

“C-can I not talk about it? I don’t think I’m ready..” She pulls a hand from yours, and wipes at her face. She just kind of smeared half of her face with wetness, and she looks miserable.

“You don’t have to talk about anything, Spinel.” You look at her, making sure she sees it in your eyes. You slowly let go of her other hand, and hold your arms out in a silent question instead. Her mouth opens slightly, the red glow of the light around her making her look extremely vulnerable and soft, and she looks at your open arms with a blank face for a moment before understanding. Almost instantaneously, she throws herself against you and wraps her arms around your shoulders, shoving her face into the cradle of your neck. You envelop your arms around her tightly, giving her sides a squeeze, and you feel her start to shake again.

She lets out an unsteady sigh, and hiccups out another small sob. You pull her to lean fully against you as you stand there, bracing your back against the bathroom door. She lets you maneuver her, and you rest the side of your face against her temple while she cries. You resign yourself to letting her cry on you until she’s done, if she needs to.

You feel her sniffle against your neck, and try not to mind that she’s getting your shirt soaked. You give her back a few gentle rubs, feeling her body quiver against yours as she’s trying to control her choked breathing. You’re not really counting the minutes, as right now you’re currently having way too many rampant thoughts about what the fuck the diamonds could’ve said to her. You’re mad as hell, honestly, and if you could say shit to them, you would in a heartbeat. You don’t want to make anything worse for her though, as much as you want to steal her phone and video call them to curse them out. It takes a few more minutes, but eventually her crying dies down, and you feel her breathing even out. Slowly, she dislodges her arms from twisting around you two, and you feel a sigh, her breath hot against your neck. You do your best to school your facial expression as you’re realize just how close you are to her, and she pulls her face from its resting position to look at you. She looks awful.

“U-um,” She lifts up her hand to attempt to wipe her face, failing to rub half the tears away. “I don’t really want to go out there yet..”

“You don’t have to.” You say, quietly. “I can leave if you’d like some quiet to yourself.” Her face looks panicked for a second, and she grabs your wrist.

“Please don’t leave me.” She says, voice wavering again. You try not to let your heart shatter at her tone.

“I won’t if you want me here.” You say, and sigh softly. “Here, hold on a second.”

She lets your wrist go as you move slightly over to the sink, turn the hot water on, and grab a clean hand towel from the counter. You soak it in water, and squeeze out all the excess. Towel in hand, you turn back to her, and she’s looking at you cautiously. You lift the towel slightly, motioning to her face.

“May I?” You ask, and she nods slightly.

Tenderly, you brush a couple strands of hair away from her face, grasp her chin with your left hand and pull her forward, gently pressing the towel to her cheek. She closes her eyes, and her shoulders sag a little as she lets you dab at her face, cleaning her of any tear stain marks. She sighs into your touch, and it strikes you that it would be so easy to just.. lean in and kiss her.

Your brain almost short circuits and you snap your thoughts back to reality. There’s a time and place for everything. This is not the time, nor the place.

Once you’re satisfied that she looks a lot better than before, you pull your hands away to toss the rag in the sink, and Spinel, for a brief moment, looks disappointed that you had stopped. Which.. kind of gives you an idea.

“Can I try something? Harper used to do this thing with me when I.. had similar breakdowns.” You ask her. She raises her eyebrow in response, clearly exhausted from crying so much. “Here.” You say, and take her hand and lead her over to the rim of the bathtub. You sit down on the edge, and motion for her to sit in front of you on the floor. She takes a seat in front of you, still confused, but obeys nonetheless. “Can I touch you?” You ask her, watching her face to make sure she’s alright.

She looks up at you, the red light in the room flooding the entirety of her face, making her hair darker, and the whites of her eyes a bit more dramatic.

“Yeah.” She says in reply, voice tired.

You reach out to her hair, and stop for a moment.

“Can I have you face the other direction, actually? Come over here.” You move to open your knees, making enough room for Spinel to turn around and lean against the bathtub. She’s close to you again.

“What are you..” She trails off as you start to take the hair ties out of her pigtails, one after the other. It takes a second, as it’s a bit tangled, but you manage to get both out, and let her hair fall down. You comb out her hair with your fingers, gently, and she sighs audibly while leaning into your touch. You run your short nails along her scalp, scratching and massaging as you smooth out her hair, attempting to pull all the tangles out.

“Touch used to calm me down, and Harper was really good at it, honestly.” You say while pulling out a particularly difficult tangle without hurting her. Her hair is long like this, and you like it. You wish you could grow your hair this long, but it’s kind of a pain to deal with, and the longest you’ve ever had yours wasn’t even to your mid back, you think to yourself. “Sometimes she’d give me shoulder and neck massages, but I preferred that she’d just play with my hair. There’s just something different about another person touching your hair.”

“I kind of get what you mean.” She says, tiredly.

“Can I braid your hair?” You lean closer to look at her face.

“Do what you want.” She says, looking fairly relaxed.

“Cool. Anyway, while Harper was good at that, Alex, on the other hand, was just terrible at any kind of physical comfort. He’s genuine, and he tries, but he’s an idiot. He’s a lot better at distractions, for the most part.” You run your fingers through her hair one more time, before starting to separate her hair into three parts for a french braid. “He’s funny, and comes from a large family, so he always has stories and jokes. Whenever I’d have a panic attack, those two were always so good about being there for me. I don’t know what I’d do without them.”

You notice that Spinel‘s shoulders have lost most of the tension in them, and you’re secretly relieved. You keep talking to fill the quietness around you two, because you’ve always hated the quiet during moments like these. Your friends aren’t here, so it’s up to you to make up for it.

“It was kind of hard, at first though,” You say, and start looping the chunks of hair around your fingers, starting at the top of her head. “Because for a while there, back when I was 16 and dealing with the worst of my abandonment issues, I clung onto Harper like a baby koala. I had this super weird crush on her even though we had been friends since we were practically babies. I think I idolized her because she was just.. good to me.” You accidentally tug a little too hard on a strand of hair, wince and utter an apology while massaging the spot on her scalp. “I’m glad that didn’t ruin our friendship, but for a while there I really pushed my feelings onto her, which was kinda fucked up on my part.”

“Hm..” Spinel mumbles. “I kind of had a thing for Pink, I think. Which ended up screwing with me even more after what she did.” You stare at the back of her head and pause your hands for a second. Huh. Yeah, you had a hunch.

“If she were still alive, I’d punch her in the face for you, I hope you know.” You state, in full seriousness. This gets the first chuckle that you’ve heard from her today, and you’re secretly overjoyed.

“I’d pay to watch that.” She says, and you laugh out loud. You see her smile, just barely.

“So,” You continue, with both your hands and conversation. “A week or so after my 17th birthday, right after Harper talked to me about this guy at school that she liked, I confess to her. And not like a, ‘oh hey, you’re my best friend and I really like you’ kind of way, either. It was more like a, ‘have a mental breakdown over your best friend liking someone else and make them feel like shit about it on your walk home from school’ kind of confession.” Your hands reach the nape of her neck now, braid mostly done on her head, but you’ve got around another 20 inches of length before being finished.

“Harper avoided me for nearly a week after that. I was absolutely pathetic, and inconsolable. Alex was fed up with my shit after a few days, and nearly slapped me over it. He would’ve been in the right, doing so, honestly. I was a selfish asshole who only thought about her own feelings, and not about her best friends.” Your eyes drift to Spinel’s face, and her eyes are closed, eyebrows unfurrowed.

“Anyway,” You’re nearly done with the entire braid now. “She did end up forgiving me. Thankfully. I don’t know what I’d do if it were my fault that I’d split up our friend group.” You pick up the discarded hair tie from earlier, and tie it around the end of the braid.

“I’m all done, by the way.” You say to her. She opens her eyes tentatively, and she looks sleepy. You stand up, and stretch your back. She also gets up on wobbly legs, and turns to look at you.

“Um.” She’s avoiding your eyes. “Thank you. For this.” She’s twisting her hands together, nervously. You lean your face closer to get at eye-level with her.

“Anytime.. and for the record, you look really cute in a braid.” You say and smile, giving her a cheeky wink. You watch her entire face from the neck up turn bright red, and think that you could probably do this forever, and never get tired. She gives you a noncommittal grunt, halfheartedly smacks your arm and you grin at her.

You hear a quiet knock at the door, and look over to Spinel. She shrugs, so I guess it’s okay now.

“You can come in!” You say to the door. It opens slowly, and you see Steven peek his head in.

“Um.. are we okay?” He asks, clearly very worried about her.

“I’ll be okay.” She says, and you think that maybe she should lay down and sleep. You verbalize this immediately.

“Spinel. I think you should go take a nap.” You look at her, and she blinks at you. “I’m serious.”

“She’s kind of right.” Steven says in agreement with you. Spinel gives the both of you a shrug, and even that seems like it’s taking a lot out of her.

“Okay.” She says, and turns to walk out of the bathroom. Steven opens the door wider, and you can see Pearl in the kitchen leaning against the counter, trying to not seem like she’s intently watching all of you.

Spinel makes her way over to the couch and takes a seat, sitting up rigidly. You walk over to her to make sure she’s okay before you leave for home.

“You know you can text me, right? And if you need me, I’ll be available. I’ll leave my volume turned on.” She gives you a nod. “Oh, and.. take this,” You say, and pull off the pullover hoodie you’re wearing right now, and hand it over to her. “Alex used to let me wear his oversized sweaters, and they used to help me sleep, so..”

She tentatively reaches out, and takes it from your hands.

“Thanks.” She says, and gives you a small smile. With her hair pulled back like this she almost looks human, for a fleeting moment. You sometimes forget she’s a gem. You return the smile back at her, and turn around to leave.

After grabbing your bag that you set down earlier from beside the couch, you head over to the front door and open it. Shouldering the bag, you start to shut the door and see Steven behind you. He closes the door behind him, his face searching yours for something you don’t quite know.

“I don’t know what you did, but thank you.” He says, completely genuine.

“You don’t have to thank me. I’d do it for you, too, you know.” You say to him, and he smiles.

“That’s why I like you, Y/N. You’re sweet.”

“Yeahhhh, don’t tell anyone, though. You’ll ruin my reputation.” You smirk, giving him the side-eye. He laughs and pats your back.

“Ohhhhhh no! Whatever will you do!?” He rolls his eyes in jest. “Get home safe, okay?”

“No promises.” You reply, and jump down his steps, two at a time.

It doesn’t take you long to get home, and you’re pretty tired yourself. You make yourself busy by preparing dinner, cleaning the kitchen a little, and calling your dad for another check-in. Before you know it, it’s nearly 11, and you need to sleep for your double shift tomorrow that you almost forgot about. You’re laying in bed browsing social media before drifting off, and you receive a text from Spinel. You swipe down and open the message.

Spinel: Thanks again for today.

Spinel: I baked some new cookies with Steven, and would like to give you some tomorrow if that’s okay?

You smile to yourself. Ughhhhhhhh, you’re catching the feelings disease, and you swat the air around you like it somehow physically manifested around you.

Y/N: I work literally all day, but feel free to stop by and give them to me.

Y/N: Then I get to see a pretty familiar face to break up all the lame tourists.

Y/N: Cuz that sounds super nice. ;)

Spinel: I’ll see you tomorrow, then.

She didn’t react to your obvious teasing, but you won’t let that discourage you. You fall asleep thinking of the many different ways you can poke fun at her, and this time, you charge your phone.

You wake up the next morning feeling well-rested for once, and get ready for work. Alex has sent you a couple texts about when his flight will arrive, and when he’ll roughly come to meet you. Sometime around 4pm, apparently. You shoot Spinel a good morning text, and she replies almost instantly with the same, which makes you smile.

You head to work, texting your group chat about what happened yesterday with Spinel, and give them basically all the details. Alex makes fun of you for a bit, so you curse him out and pocket your phone as you clock in. Today’s going to suck, but you’ve got a few things to look forward to.

You make it a couple hours into your shift before you finally get a break, and Spinel texts you that she’ll drop by sometime in the afternoon once she’s done helping Bismuth with something. God you hope it’s not when Alex gets here, because you are so not fucking ready for that interaction. You eat your lunch and pray to any god out there that you could have one more day of peace.

You’re outside the main building repairing a couple parts on the carousel, ignoring the bulk of the tourists to focus on work. You don’t realize that quite a while has passed by, because someone walks up to you as you’ve got your head in a small door, and kicks you slightly on your ass. You jolt and bump your head against the opening, and you hear Alex burst out into laughter as you groan in pain.

God fucking dammit, this guy. You pull your head out to glare at him, screwdriver pointing at him threateningly.

“Do you want this up your ass? Because I can do that.” You say to him, and he laughs even harder. You roll your eyes at him.

“Don’t promise me with a good time, Y/N.” He says, and you stand up to smack him.

“I don’t think the pointy end would be a good time, idiot.” You deadpan stare at him. He grins.

“You don’t know what I’m into.” He shrugs, and flips his hair dramatically. You hate that he’s stupid and charming, and you love him so much.

“I know I haven’t seen you in 2 months, but like, I feel like you’ve grown taller?” You stare at him, a little mournfully. You’re the shortest one out of your friends, and you’re of average height. He also seems.. handsomer. You think he definitely got a lot more tan. He’s definitely grown into his looks, his dark curly hair and recently shaved face making him look older than you’re used to.

“I don’t think I did, but I think you’ve grown shorter.” He laughs obnoxiously, and you smack his arm again, which makes him laugh harder.

“You’re so mean to me, like all the time. Why do I love you?” You cross your arms and pout, because you know it gets a rise out of him.

“Youuuuuuu knowww, because I’m just so loveable and gorgeous and the smartest one in the group??” He flutters his eyelashes at you like he thinks he’s cute.

“Wow, you are none of these things.” You reply, smirking at him. He puts his hand over his heart in mock offense.

“Y/N, I’m offended. I’ve been here for like, five minutes, and I’ve received absolutely no affection from you. If I don’t get love, I will wilt and die. Do you want to be responsible for my death?” He opens his arms wide, and you roll your eyes dramatically, and stand there.

“We’re not doing this in public.” You say, standing your ground.

“Ohhh, YES we are, Y/N.” He wiggles his eyebrows. “Prepare yourself for the onslaught.”

You take a couple steps back, prepared to run. He grabs your arms, wraps his around your torso, and picks you up, swinging you around.

“Nooooooooooooooooo!!” You cry. “Put me down you oaf!”

“No! I want love!” He all but shouts, and spins you around. He grabs your cheek with one hand and starts giving you big ‘ol smooches all over your face, and you’re giggling and trying to push him away, when you hear something drop and spill on the pavement a good twenty feet from you. You look up.

It’s Spinel.

Her face is twisted with heartbreak, and before you can even speak up, she bolts.

You look down, and see the cookies she made you scattered on the ground.

#spinel x reader #spinel #su #steven universe #spinel self insert #fic #my fic #devils ballroom #look. im not sorry yall. i promise next chapter youll get what u want LMFAO

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hey-hamlet · 6 years ago

Text

BNHA AU Ideas: Don’t Praise the Almighty (Part 1)

Also on AO3

hold on to your hats everyone - this is part one. i was going to put them together, then i realised part two is 6000 words and thats just too long

TW for: implied abuse of all kinds, straight-up physical and emotional child abuse, gaslighting, all might if he was a terrible person.

TL;DR:

Things you must sacrifice to make a hero: Humanity, Empathy.

Things you must sacrifice to be a hero: Everything.

izuku wants to be a hero, imagine the first ep happens etc. yagi doesnt so much say "you can be a hero" as "ill make you a hero"

an aside: inko is an absent parent, to make ends meet and a poor way of coping with a missing Hisashi. Izuku grows up without any positive adults figures in his life.

yagi makes izuku train and train and train, the kid’s hands bleed and his legs ache but allmight makes him keep going. allmight says he's useless and pathetic and a crybaby and izuku believes him, because he's allmight

they spar and yagi just holds back enough to not let izuku get hurt too badly to train. even katsuki is disturbed bc quirkless deku is coming to school with black eyes and swollen wrists

when katsuki calls him pathetic izuku just nods

"ill get better though"

and katsuki feels so gross he doesnt try to fuck with izuku for weeks

and so izuku is so convinced this is normal because katsuki does it, and mum does it, and now allmight? thats just how you treat kids he thinks. or quirkless ones at least

hes still a big fan of allmight because he doesnt see whats wrong. hes just pathetic and useless but then he'll get a quirk and he'll be worth something for the first time in his life

he barely sleeps, barely eats, just trains and studies and trains some more. he collapses. all might stands there until izuku gets back up and makes him keep running

reasons all mights like this

he is 1, suffering from internalised quirk discrimination

2, nana's dead bc she wasn't "strong enough"

3, he thinks he can shape izuku into the perfect selfless hero, and better person than he ever was.

hes convinced this is for the greater good. hes a dick but hes so sure hes in the right here

by the time of the entrance exam izuku is,,, kinda fucked up

he passes with flying colours because he used his quirk for the first time, broke his arm, and immediately moved on to snaping finger after finger. the teachers watched on, horrified as this child mutilated himself to get points

all might smiled. because this is what he wanted.

he saves ochacco too

he gets in and allmight is pleased with him, even more pleased than the time izuku admitted he hadn't slept for 72 hours and still got a perfect score on his test

and izuku thinks this was all worth it to see his hero smile at him

izuku is in 1A

izuku actually listed that he feels less pain due to his quirk, which aizawa believes but hes still not sold on the idea of a hero that destroys themselves. he doesnt know if izuku heals better or faster, but he's sure that may broken bones cant be good

aizawa is convinced he's going to expel izuku during the quirk test. the look he sees on izuku’s face when he says he's expelling the lowest scorer makes his stomach churn

because all of the other kids look worried, nervous

izuku looks like hes going to throw up.

the kid is trembling and pale and aizawa watches as he turns to ochako, smiles brightly and says "let's do our best" while he holds back full body tremors the other kids don't see

he breaks toes and fingers and he cries but he doesn't flinch at the pain

the only time he flinches is when someone looks him in the eyes, if someone speaks too loud, and at the firecracker pops of katsuki's quirk

and aizawa feels sick

the ball toss, he just can't watch this kid break anymore, and he stops his quirk

for a second he freezes, because this kids quirk manages pain, he'll be feeling all of those broken bones, he'll obviously notice

right?

but izuku doesnt notice his missing quirk until he throws the ball. he turns around, looking sick. aizawa feels so lost when he looks at him with pure relief

"oh, you're eraserhead"

izuku tears up for the first time in that class.

"please give me back my quirk"

aizawa feels so lost he blinks, and his quirk drops with it. there is something totally wrong about the utter relief the kid feels having this horrifically damaging quirk back, and there is something bothering aizawa about it, but he doesn't know what

"dont use your quirk for the rest of this test, kid. not unless you can use it without breaking something"

izuku nods but aizawa knows the kid will just try to hide it. he takes him by the shoulder when the others have moved on

"i mean it, midoriya. no quirk, or i'll expell you on the spot"

and izuku just looks so lost

"but, i have to? i'm-"

"you didn't flinch when i took your quirk. you can feel every broken bone, can't you?"

izuku just nods, like walking with broken toes is normal, like throwing a ball with broken fingers is easy. aizawa knows it's not

he just sighs.

"no quirk. we'll work on training it after. you're ahead enough not to fail the course, go to recovery girl now. you aren't expelled"

izuku just looks hurt

aizawa shoos him away and almost misses the thin form of all might slink out from behind the wall to follow izuku

he's worried, and confused. But he can't just, abandon a field of kids

he texts hizashi bc that's just who he texts when he's panicking, and he asks him to look out for smallmight and izuku, somewhere on the way to the infirmary. so present mic turns on the first movie he finds on his computer (an english language copy of rocky) yells "ENGLISH PRACTISE TIME" and runs out the door

1C is so lost

anyway, present mic can be quiet when he tries and when he hears the sound of allmight sternly talking to a student that's crying? he tries real fucking hard

he basically catches

"you're supposed to be stronger than this, why did he make you stop?"

"he saw my bones breaking-i couldnt-"

"and so you flinched? didn't we train?"

"i didnt flinch! he made me stop!"

allmight backhands him

"dont waste it. either get better at hiding it or learn to use your quirk without breaking bones quickly or ill find another successor. one that isn't useless."

present mic hears izuku agree and cry and he feels ill. he sneaks back a little further, then loudly walks down the hall. allmight smiles at him, and he wants to punch the man

izuku smiles at him too, tears in his eyes but like he's happy to see another hero. present mic cant understand why izuku is pressed so close to a man that hurt him, like he's more afraid of present mic than allmight

he walks with them to recovery girl, chatting like he was meant to be there. hes so grateful allmight is new, because he totally has a class he's meant to be teaching right now and that would be so suspicious if he knew his schedule

he walks them all the way to the door, and he lingers. there is a touch of steel in his eyes when he tells allmight to take care because what he really means is "take care of yourself because i will not"

and hes halfway down the corridor before he freezes

why did izuku seem so comfortable with a man he shouldn't know

anyway present mic is having a quiet breakdown for 20 seconds before he sprints back to his class, pretends he never left, and panic texts aizawa

so aizawa, with a little great context, knows that that, particular, conversation wasn't as,,, unsavoury,,, as it could,,, be implied,,,

but like,,,,,, he's really lost on why izuku would know small might and he's very worried

bakugo is fuCKinG PisSed

izuku left?? and he wasn't expelled???

Any,,, unsavoury implications arent something I'm going to talk ab in this au bc it doesn't need to be worse,,, but it's very much intentional

so aizawa is having an actual moral crisis rn bc hizashi isn't a liar and he doesn't want to like, not believe when he saw. but really? the symbol of peace is terrible??? and hizashi doesn't want to believe it either. both of them as so sure they are just missing context or something

bakugo stalks up to recovery girls office after class bc wtf deku?? and he walks in to just see izuku blankly picking at new white scars

he actually perks up when katsuki enters

and there is this man standing over izuku. this man he's seen with izuku before, yelling at him, but someone izuku seems happy to be around. it's not deku’s dad, he knows that. and the guy is too blonde and tall to have literally any relation to him.

a lot of the fire in katsuki goes out when he sees how tired izuku looks, and the question he was going to yell becomes more of a mumble

"so, you have a quirk now? just like that?"

he looks up and he sees that man's hand on izuku's shoulder, curled like a claw, so tight it must hurt. but izuku doesn't flinch or shy away, he smiles softly

"i'm really lucky, huh kacchan?"

and as much as izuku looks like he believes it, katsuki has the strongest feeling that this is the worst possible thing that could have happened to his once-friend

he just leaves

and he almost runs straight into his new teacher. they lock eyes and even though katsuki doesn't know whats going on, aizawa doesn't know whats going on, they both just know something is happening

and its not good

but what can they do

hes the symbol of peace

recovery girl is 100% in denial bc she new baby toshi and he's a dork but he's a good boy

izuku gets knocked tf out by recovery girls heal and toshi carries him out of the school grounds and shes like "how cute"

honestly they get to they gate, he wakes izuku up and reminds him to run home to get in the extra cardio, and izuku does. all the way home.. not only bc yagi wanted him to, but that's a big bit but bc if he was late hed wouldn’t get dinner

so the battle trial

so aizawa is like,,, : | ab everything

so he attends the battle trial rather than take the nap he really fucking wanted

the kids come out in their costumes and something sits poorly about the way izuku positively preens at almighty compliments. so basically it goes like the show, but allmight doesnt try to stop Bakugo. aizawa doesn't have audio, but he sees what the kids see and rips the mic out of allmights hand to tell bakugo to stop

he doesnt have to, though

because izuku has already vanished from sight

bakugo looks lost, aizawa is worried, but allmight just looks smug because a second later, izuku drops from the ceiling where he swung up, and punches bakugo in the back of the head

allmight grins and it looks nasty

izuku gives bakugo a once-over to make sure hes ok, wraps his wrists, then puts him in the recovery position and scampers out of the room to ochako

aizawa is lost, because that is c l e a r l y combat training. from the back of the room, todoroki starts watching in earnest

with ochako, he grabs the bomb. they walk out of the exercise and all might congratulates them on winning and izuku looks so happy! but allmight isn't done

"young midoriya, why didn't you use your quirk?"

the only people that notice the way he pales are todoroki and aizawa

"sorry sir, i didn't want to disappoint mr aizawa"

allmight nods, and he smiles but aizawa doesnt like it

"thats ok my boy, we'll have to see about getting you some out of class quirk training, huh?"

izuku smiles. hes happy, but he looks panicked

he looks guilty about being afraid

aizawa silently tells his agency he needs the week off to investigate something personal, and they readily give him the time off

izuku mumbles happily to himself about the exercise, stilling when all might looks gazes with him. he stops, flushes, and apologises. allmight nods.

he begins again, but hes not mumbling anymore, hes speaking clearly and concisely with the other students, even though he doesnt want to talk to them, he just wants to think. but allmight says to talk clearly to everyone or to remain silent and he just wants so badly to talk about the exercise

todoroki looks between izuku and allmight and he wonders

USJ time baby

allmight uses up his time, like before

the difference is, when the nomu comes for aizawa? izuku doesnt hesitate to jump in. thats what allmight wanted. he wanted someone so selfless that "would i give my life for them" isn't even a question that would cross their mind, they would just move

izuku stalls. he's shivering and shaking, walking on broken toes but he stands between aizawa and the nomu and he smiles

shigiraki looks at izuku and doesn't see a hero in training. he sees someone like him, like his league. someone who has be stepped on and ruined and reborn

and he wants him

when he sees something he likes, he wants it. like his sensei and his quirks. shigiaki collects people like action figures to use how he likes

anyway, he sees this little 'hero' and for all his stubbornness he knows he won't get izuku today

so he does what his sensei did to him all those years ago

he shows kindness. just enough to break him

he looks izuku in the eyes and says

"hero society is so rotten they break children into weapons to fight other broken pieces. whats fair about that?"

and izuku looks stunned. he drops his smile.

"from one broken piece to another, i wont shatter you today."

kurogiri moves izuku and aizawa just outside of the usj

they cant get in, aizawa has no quirk to break through the walls and izuku is shell shocked

he takes a second to look at aizawa like his world is falling down and aizawa understands.

and then

allmight appears

and aizawa hates himself for how relieved he feels

allmight looks at izuku and izuku smiles so wide. and then he frowns

"they want to kill you"

"they aren't the first, my boy."

and izuku pauses

"they seem pretty sure they can, sir."

and allmights smile looks meaner

"what, you really think so little of this old man?"

and izuku shakes his head violently

"not at all! no, im sorry-"

allmight looks at his student and suddenly there isnt a wall anymore, blasted into tiny shards by allmight’s punch. izuku scrambles inside after him

aizawa tells him to stay outside, to stay safe. but allmight levels a glare at him that almost hurts to meet. aizawa cringes and rushes after them, cradling broken arms

the fight ends much the same, but upon seeing izuku in the way on his hand, shigiraki closes his fist

allmight doesn't miss that

and, with that the other teachers arrive. and again, present mic and aizawa wonder why izuku knows allmight small form

oh also just as a weird powerplay thing, allmight calls izuku by his first name in private while izuku calls him sir everywhere

aizawa has the worst of the injuries, but years of sleep deprivation mean he can pretty easily resist the call of sleep after recovery girls quirk. not that anyone knows that. so he hears the edges of a conversation between hero and student

he hears sobs and a slap and apologies from both parties. he hears a louder conversation on training after class to better use izuku’s quirk and aizawa decides he's going to force himself into this 'training' because he doesnt like the optics on any of this

allmights angry that the villains were fond of izuku, bc that means izuku was doing something wrong, right? and he's also angry izuku barely used his quirk, but he does kinda understand needing to be able to walk still

anyway in the training we get the joy of a creepy scene of yagi assessing the physique of a barely dressed izuku

aizawa isn't there yet and boy howdy does he feel ill when yagi walks out of the changing rooms a few minutes before izuku does

anyway so it doesn't take long for yagi and aizawa to get izuku using his quirk w/o achy breaky bones and izuku is proud, and so is aizawa

but yagi just kinda pipes in with "about time" and izukus face crumples

aizawa just says "better late than never" and izuku gives a watery smile

yagi scares enji but he just royally pisses off todoroki

bc todoroki just looks at the guy

"big strong me, what you gonna do, punch me? yeah right bastard and i'll go screaming to the press. I dont give a fuck what you think you dick of an old man!"

please izuku is totally convinced that this is just normal training, that yagi is doing his best and a teacher, is doing right by him. and shouto is just,,, he doesnt know the whole story. just knows that all might scares izuku and that all mights secretary has a connection to him

but he knows that yagi was creepy enough to make his old man have bad vibes and thats an achievement

Enji sat, reigning back a snarl as the green boy threw Shouto -his Shouto- from the ring, to land on his back in a graceless cloud of dust. Beside him, All Might’s secretary grinned. It wasn’t a nice grin, like the hero, but a nasty crawling one that made Enji feel cold even with his flames dancing around his face.

Enji had never liked the man, his instincts telling him there was something horrifically off about him. But the number one hero had resources he couldn’t dream of, so he kept his lips shut.

“Well done, my boy.”

There was no familial resemblance between the skeletal man beside him, and the boy who stood both victorious and broken where his son should have been. No resemblance to the hulking oaf of a hero either. But their quirks were markedly similar, as were their smiles, if the boy’s was a little kinder.

The man turned to him, all polite smiles and condolences for his son’s loss.

The smug aura around him so strong that Enji allowed himself, for just a second, to pity the boy in green.

Its just tenya and todoroki who know

and quickly bakugo too, bc he was there for shoutos tragic backstory reveal, which included izukus too

and like,,, mic and aizawa are in denial bc jesus christ its the number one hero and hes normally so nice

izuku v katsuki babey!

basically izuku starts to panic and bakugo stops the fight and grabs his hand

"pull yourself together deku. forget everyone else, this is just a fight between me and you, go it?"

and izuku gives a shakey smile, and nods. bakugo releases his hand

"lets start this again, huh izuku"

"sure thing kacc-. Katsuki"

and then fiGHT and its great and its a tie bc they are both so fucking exhausted. izuku and bakguo have to get hauled to their feet by midnight, but both of them are grinning

izuku has trouble w his hero name, like, a l o t bc everything he comes up with yagi says no

but yagi wont give him any ideas eventually izuku just ends up with his hero name being "nine" bc yagi liked that one

katsuki can just,,, tell izuku doesn't like it (bc it reduces him as a hero down to his quirk)

(he wants the name jackrabbit)

he has no supports in his costume bc "it makes you look weak" and no support gear either

ok so , his bones are less fucked than canon zuku but hes willing to break them fucking constantly

aizawa actually comes up to him before the sports festival and says "you break your bones, you get disqualified. no excuses"

yagi is p i s s e d but just nods politely to aizawa tells izuku hed better do as aizawa says, as stupid as a request it may be

also izuku really,, wants to paint his nails dumb glittery colours like ochako and mina do so they paint his nails for him! and then at lunch yagi scrubs the polish off with a dish scrubber

to make it worse, mina is sad izuku took it off, but she just

pauses

when she sees his fingers are almost bleeding

"midoriya, what happened?"

"oh haha funny thing, one of our teachers said i might get a uniform violation so i got a little enthusastic with scrubbing it off, sorry!"

aizawa just winces

one of the finals nails in the coffin is todoroki asking if "the tall thin blonde guy" is izukus dad

aizawa says no

todoroki says "good"

s t a i n a r c

so izuku finds iida and steps between iida and stain, starts fighting him, todoroki shows up, stain starts rambling about how allmight is the best hero and todoroki gives him a strange look

"i used to agree. but seeing allmight at school, i dont think hes the icon of morality everyone says"

izuku is spluttering, denying it, stain is just watching them. so stain isnt even fighting them, hes interested. bc this selfless kid is the one shigiraki wants

iida is lost too and he gets this,,, look in his eyes like he's starting to connect some dots

anyway, fight proceeds, they win the nomu tries to carry izuku off, stain stops the nomu and saves izuku and vaguely he realizes the way izuku just, sits in his arms, like he doesnt know how to react to being touched, and he pushes it aside

and he holds izuku close because all he knows is that this boy is kind and good and the world has hurt him and he says that this boy he is holding is the only hero hes ever worth met their salt

oh but after the hero killer thing, yagi storms into the office and hauls izuku out by his injured arm

and tenya and shouto just feel sick

"should, should we tell all might? about how his secretary treats midoriya?"

shouto just glares at the half-open door, quiet apologies drifting down the hall until they turn another corner

"i'm quite sure that man already knows."

#bnha au #bnha #dont praise the all mighty #all might #midoriya izuku #yagi toshinori #villain all might #Midoriya #Izuku #aizawa shouta #yamada hizashi #bakugou katsuki #todoroki shouto #uraraka ochako #Iida Tenya #hero killer stain #shigaraki tomura

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kendrixtermina · 6 years ago

Text

Someone finally uploaded a Kingdom Route run with everyone recruited!

So imma be doing a bit of reacting

Kingdom!Ignatz works a bit like Empire!Felix - He wanted to go his own way unlike what his parents said and is thus following Byleth. In this case it’s of course somewhat less angsty ‘cause the Victors have the means to flee if necessary, unlike Rodrigue who was a prominent leader of the kingdom side of things

In an interesting parallel to how half the cast abandons the kingdom cause it’s a sinking shipload of kamikaze, on the other routes, Raphael complains about the instability and confusing politics of the alliance and how she should probably grab Maya and his grandfather and get them to Garreg Magh. I suppose a lot of people without connections or political accumen must feel this way. the monastery IS light javelin proof, so yeah...Raphael isn’t salty toward Claude himself tho. Then again he has little capacity for salt and in his paralogue it’s kinda shown that he makes a deliberate choice to live a low-salt lifestyle its not just obliviousness, he actively doesnt want grudges or awkwardness in his life

Leonie is also here to babysit Byleth and tells them not to let Dimitri push them around

Hilda: “The Monastery is a mess. So is Dimitri. I’m only here because Byleth is competent and Holst is annoying“

Dorothea and Bernie have so far gotten identical dialogues to the church route

Lysithea is interesting and kinda morally ambiguous. She says outright that she cares nothing for the kingdom or anything other than a peaceful life for her parents. She wants to get at the slitherers for her own revenge and they’re in the empire so she finds Dimitri’s revenge obsession convenient. Also very ironic cause, are she and Edelgard gonna fight each other because they both want to get at Thales? Very interesting bc vanilla BL doesn’t adress the slitherers that much - of course Lysithea says she has beef with “the empire” and doesn’t elaborate. At the same time Lysithea is MUCH more logical and self aware than most of the kingdom crew bar Sylvain so yeah

actually, Lysithea, like Felix, has TONS of route specific dialogue. I guess the devs expected those two to get recruited a lot since they are just flat out the strongest students apart from the house leaders.

The Kingdom is arguably just as infiltrated but Lysithea doesn’t know... and at this point Cornelia’s cooperating with the Empire anyways

General trend of the Alliance recruitees not being all that attached to the Alliance as they hardly knew each other at the start and half of them had nothing to do with politics

Nothing to do with the recruitees, but so THATS what happens if you propose to go to Fhirdiad first. Dimitri is like “You’re supposed to lead the church! Go rescue Rhea!” ...he doesn’t know the whole thing with Byleth being experimented on by Rhea (neither does Byleth at this point) but it is kinda low. Mitya you have no leg to stand on here indeed the main reason I was sympathetic to you last playthrough is that you never ASKED Gilbert & co to put you on the throne and made clear that you’re not interested in that... so following you was on them to an extent. but you don’t get to say “Do your Bishop job” (that Byleth never asked for) if you’re not doing your job cause you’re too busy doing your kamikaze raid. Then again he’s probably too emotional and just plain done with everything rn to see the contradiction/look at this with perspective he’s probably physically incapable of chilling out rn

It just ends with Byleth doing a pointed sadface. daamn Mitya don’t be mean to By-By she still believes in you dude : ( Though it makes sense he’s big on obligation he’s doing this revenge trip because he feels he must. So it’s more a distortion than it really is a contradiction, as far as he’s concerned he IS doing his duty...to the fallen. I guess if you can’t handle him at his “Go be a bishop or something” you don’t deserve him at his “my beloved~”

Still hurts a bit tho. Especially when Claude, though not without his own agenda, was distinctly a good friend on the topic, “Teach you’re in charge now be more confident~ the church doesnt run you, you run the church”

Before Aillel Dorothea says something about the Kingdom people also looking undecided of where to march, but she also wonders if some fighting/ victory will quell uncertainty

Also she and mercie are standing next to each other! Ive said before that it’s weird how they don’t rly have a support though they are the two most popular extroverted ppl on the campus... they GOTTA know each other at least on a smalltalk basis

Alois is like “These kingdom ppl dont seem to know what they want... but hey this allow YOU to shine as a leader”... so basically Byleth is running this show but for all that they’re a good field commander and decisive when it comes to immadiate practical problems, as far as big picture direction goes, well, Sothis’ “boulder” quote comes to mind. They just never had big attachments on convictions, the Felix support chain is also salient here. They kinda just did whatever job they were given until they found a bigger cause/purpose after throwing in their lot with one of the lords or the remaining saints.

I wondered how this would play out as the Kingdom route is very kingdom-specific, whereas Claude, Edelgard and the church all have an universal cause for people to get behind. I guess how this plays out is that before Dimitri’s turnaroud there’s the kingdom faction and the Byleth faction and Byleth is kinda trying to run the show as they think Dimitri would if he were at his best

Caspar is still on the more unphazed side but also substantially more phazed than on the church or GD routes, he wasn’t particularly close to Randolph but he’s not unaffected by Dimitri going a tad over the top here - he also has the takeaway that Dimitri probably never trusted him much since he was born in the empire.

Sylvain actually alledges something about Dimitri not socializing much with any Adrestians even back in the academy days if you recruit him on CF so this does not come out of nowhere. Also kinda makes me wish they had a support - theyre both naturals at smashing things but they have very different attitudes towards it. then again i suppose it would go alot like the raphael one

Ferdie recognizes Myrrdin is a strategically better location but as Aegir territory is closeby he wishes we could have invaded through there so he could take it back... Would the citizens want him back tho? After the war its a no-brainer cause he helped end it, the peasants arent going to complain about too much peace and prosperity nor are they gonna feel nostalgic about anyone who started a war with their tax money and then lost it, but if he waltzed into an area that had thus far been far from the frontlines, following his fathers’s exploitative management and 5 years of semi equal rights under edelgard? he might have been welcomed with pitchforks, through no fault of his own.

He says something implying hed like to come rescue his relatives implying that some of them are still alive. of course the pm deserves all Edelgard threw at him and then some, but id be curious about Ferdie’s other relatives. His mom probably looks just like him, because he sure didnt get the looks from his dad... or anything else really, apart from the crest and hair color. - though i think the a support with bernadetta implies that shes no longer around

Lorenz bitterly remarking that of course Claude and his dad eventually made peace since they both only serve their own interests. (”So long as their interests are in allignment they will continue to cooperate”) Says the guy we just rescued from his endeavors in turncoatery. Lorenz you’re pretty opportunistic too, and as for your redeeming features Claude has those too - but of course you’ll never find out in this one. Still, it shows that he’s painfully aware that his father - whom he would have died protecting if we hadn’t spared him - is a villain and a hack

Claude isn’t super trusting and knows that he gets percieved as shifty so he promises people to get them theirs so that they support him out of self interest. No need to take a chace. Of course by the end of this route he WILL take big chance on Dimitri

That says Lorenz is not SO biased that he can’t tell that Claude might be interested in working with the kingdom army

Lysithea (who surprisingly has TONS of unique dialogue here, and I like that it’s a complex mature plot) is having her doubts and not trusting Dimitri for all that she finds him an useful idiot. By and large you get the sense that many consider Byleth the leader of this operation, she’s glad that Byleth is there to issue sensible orders. She tells Byleth not to tell anyone and worries about what will happen once the empire’s vanquished. No faith in team Kingdom... at all. Understandable of course

Hilda’s dialogue is largely the same as in the church route and at times kinda the same in all routes but I like how she’s like “Claude might’ve looked like a lazy bum but he’s smart! If he says he’s on our side he will defs help!” before the gronder fiasco

A lot of NPCs stir the suspicion here so it stands out how much she totally trusts him like hes any other friend

As with the other routes with the recruitees you get an idea of what’s going on in the other territories such as Lysithea deducing that Judith must be backing Claude in his gambit

One moment you think Lorenz is going to add some somber insightful commentary to the sincerity of Claude’s offer but then he’s like, “Granted Dimitri is much improved. He must be asking us for help cause he trusts ME” XD Like... no friend. You’re almost right but if there’s anyone here he was faith in its Byleth. And then he’s even like, “Well no choice but to save poor Claudesy” On the one hand it shows that there not just pure hate there on the other... lulz.

apparently one of the first things Dimitri did after getting his act together post gronder is profusely apologize to Caspar for that ugly business with Randolph. Thats a worthwhile detail and i want fanfic of it. Caspar being Caspar he wasnt really keeping a grudge, they’re a warrior clan and they were at war

They had to move out so quickly that Hilda had no time to go shopping in Fhirdiad #Priorities XD

Meanwhile Ignatz, like a normal person, hopes his folks will be safe

hilda does eventually remember to maybe save her folks and claude but only after making Byleth promise to go on a shopping trip with her. Someone should probably write that fanfic

Someone told me that Ferdinand had some prominent critical lines but it was really just one, and it’s as I suspected actually just a variant of the same “a king can’t be emotional” line he gets in all the routes, this time with the addendum that if he turned around and decided to go rescue the capital, he might be capable of reason/being a decent leader after all. granted I guess compared to how most of the Kingdom people go along with everything it comes off critical? IDK.

Lysithea misses Rodrigue :(

Lorenz and Ignatz standing next to each other was a nice touch they have a fairly wholesome friendship

Leonie’s just glad that ol’ Mitya is “back to normal” especially since she’s pretty sure that they don’t have enough soldiers to get to Fort Merceus let alone Enbarr

For obvious reasons, Petra is pretty sympathetic about the whole “retaking Fhirdiad” thing

Seeing Seteth and Catherine so certain that Rhea would want them to save the people of Fhirdiad first when you know that she wouldn’t hesitate to set the place on fire is just...OUCH. Though it does show the goodness in Seteth and Catherine themselves.

Manuela wishes she could’ve moved her informary to gronder and save a few more peeps :(

It seems like to Leonie, Dimitri will always be just “Dimitri”, King or not. Figures she aaaaalmost adressed even Byleth by name XD You really DO get the sense that he interacted alot with the recruitees

All the house leaders shouldve had more supports.

If you grabbed hanneman he’ll give you some extra backstory on Cornelia - apparently she was originally from the empire and an eminent scholar whose great work Hanneman was vaguely aware of. I would assume that was still the real cornelia. Judging by the timing it sounds like she might’ve smuggled Patricia out of Adrestia. Assuming both were still original at this point this might present a possibility for why she trusted/vouched for cornelia without being complicit / lend itself to a “she was duped” reading

But it’s still suspicious that she would end up courting the second most powerful man in the land right after number one.

Some had suggested that Cornelia caused the plague in the first place but the thing is there was a perfectly credible “mundane” explanation for it (the city’s sewers not being up to date technologically) that theres no reason to doubt

Assuming that all the replacements occurred 14 years before part one when Arundel stopped his donations/ thins being about the time when Cornelia’s personality was noted to have changed completely, that would mean both the “fixing the severs” thing and the soppy story about how Edelgards’ parents met would be real

AAAA everything to do with patricia is just so ambiguous - if they were longtime friends wouldn’t she have noticed something “off”? Same with her brother actually. Lambert had his own country so its not like there was no one to protect her.

Ahhh THIS is how lorenz gets iinto the midset for that prissy, hes pissed that Claude dissolved the Alliance and misses it XD

you DO get to call him out for being a turncoat himself tho. particularly hilarious since Byleth just blinks and asks a casual question there

He immediately changes his tune

oh lorenz dear, i love you but you, sir, are WEAK xD

Lysithea as always calls everything and notes how suspicious arundel was alluding to the hrym nightmare also mentioned in her paralogue

She also mentions that he was said to be good and just at one point suggesting that there was a real Volkhard von Arundel at some point.

if the replacement took place when those donations ceased then Edelgard and Dimitri were 3, 14 years before part 1. Early enough that this could be around the time Patricia left enbarr, if this is when it happened then the romantic tower story might be real assuming that the Arundels were replaced at the same time - whatever arrived in Faerghus recomended patricia for a job so it probably had already happened by then

Its all so ambiguos tho we can only speculate there are so many possibilities

Ignatz marvels at how Claude managed to minimize damage to Alliance lands throughout the war, as in CF only Deirdru itself got particularly thrashed. Ignatz’ folks are safe and sound! Leave it to him to wonder where Claude might have absconded to. He was always one of the insightful ones but not in the same way as the other clever ones. More intuitive I guess. Cant remember if it was indentical to what you get if you spare Claude on CF (Cue the lets player remarking that Claude is probably stuck in a washing machine somewhere... he hadn’t cleared the Alliance route at that point)

Lol HILDA “And then the whole Alliance descended into chaos...” or actually she is surprised that that DIDNT happen and how orderly Claude managed the dissolution. “But I Guess we’re screwed if Dimitri turns out to be a crazed despot... he’s not gonna go crazy again is he?” You of little faith XD But she says all this in her usual cheery nonserious voice like

this chapter has a lot of unique dialogue actually

Linhardt impressed that anyone would have the guts to attack Fort Merceus directly and suggests looking for weak spots in the old walls

He shows up guarding it in SS and Vw doesn’t he? Guess he was visiting Caspar or something - or would have been familiar with the place from visiting the Bergliez clan in the past.

Ferdinand is wowed by Claude bowing out giving him kudos for caring about the peoples wishes. He thinks Edelgard ought to quit at this point and he’s alot harsher on her here than in any of the other routes. (”Not reveryone with noble blood has noble ideals” - Coming from Ferdinand that’s an accusation ) Interestingly at this point hes sticking with Dimitri cause post character developement, lots of ordinary ppl support him at this point and hes popular with the crowds. He’s wholly on the Savior King bandwagon, and maybe that’s why he’s harsher. He’s partial. Says something about him actually, largely good things when you think about it. Dimitri is probably the closest to what Ferdinand’s (and Lorenz’) own beliefs were. He likes the existing order and living in a fancy palace but he thinks the rulers should serve the people.

Its kinda ironic and sad because in ALL the other routes he clearly thinks Dimitri is an idiot and a bad ruler, and says he should be more composed and objective. But Dimitri wasnt at his best there now was he?

now ill be sad everytime I get to those “Ferdinand disses Dimitri” lines. They couldve been buds!

but i dont see this happening in any other route. According to something Sylvain says in cf Dimitri avoided ppl from the empire at the academy so they wouldnt have cozied up pre-timeskip, and its only the version of Dimitri who has his shit together which appeals to Ferdie as a leader.

really torn here on the one hand its a nice synergy to see lorenz and especially Ferdinand (who is waaay less arroganz than lorenz) sort of getting to win on their own terms with a ruler that jives with them and their Lawful Good fantasy classic thing. It’s not just a status quo thing its a protectors of the people thing. It’s heroic. On the other hand it feels like they’re stagnating when they could have had growth. This is basically the same Lorenz and the same Ferdinand we first met except slightly more mature. Notably lorenz is the same in the church route whereas Ferdie isnt as he still ends up rebelling fleeing and fighting against the empire. It helps that he practically winds up leading the remaining Eagles, albeit under Byleth and Seteth.

He still gets that line about being kinda sad to see the empire go though he knows there must be an end to the chaos, i think a few lines are different, so, not wholly without doubt

Shamir muses about hoe the three countries were once one and the same, but wonders that even if we put fodlan togethere theres no guarantee that it wouldnt come apart again. i mean there isnt, and wether thats a bad thing would depend a lot on the circumstances but its also possible that theyll get used to being one and forget they wrere ever separate. no one controls the far future... and should they? After all its always possible that someone in the future will have unforseeable circumstances or better ideas

Caspar sighs with relief that they didn’t have to fight his dad, last second worry about him turning up in the capital nonwithstanding... right does he get to live in this? Carpar wonders what’ll happen to him if they win, but he’s not holding down Faerghus so he might not have died the way he did in Silver Snow and Verdant Wind. It’s at least possible that he was captured alive and pardoned somehow.

Marianne’s adoptive dad sure smelled which way the wind was blowing; He was supporting Claude’s strategy to get the Cloucesters back under controll but sent Marianne to curry favor with the kingdom. Make friends with whoever wins I suppose. Ambitious politician indeed.

When she doesnt her from him in a while she wonders if he forgot about her but says she wouldnt mind that much because at least she wouldnt have to do any more politics? I distinctly recall that in gd there was something about how they got along better after the timeskip. Sigh.

she is real glad that Dimitri and claude ended up cooperating in the end

So does Dorothea but then she makes herself sad wishing that Edelgard was also there :( Me too friend, me too. I think thats the one unique line she gets this route. I like how it’s consistent in the church route she’s also the one who feels the most sad about betraying her, they were pretty close pre timrskip

as far as leonies concerned Dimitri is still just Dimitri even after taking back his kingdom. i like to think hed appreciate that. its also very typical of leonie. as with the “Caspar gets an apology” thing plenty of the recruitees get lines hinting that theres been more personal interaction between them and dimitri, kinda goes with how ppl in his own house follow him more out of personal loyalty than because they follow his plans like with the other two. hes kinda a very approachable sort of leader, makes the decisions with the group or follows whatever gilbert and Byleth decide, in the other routes theres always a distinct inner circle. Its cool how they incorporated the recruitees into that dynamic.

Petra is dissapointed that they DIDNT do a sneak attack on fort Merceus contrasting her usual line about how she likes sneak attacks. Dimitri naps both that an Enbarr head on doesn’t he? The Church has a smaller Army full of peeps who would rather not destroy Enbarr, and Claude agrees with Petra on the sneak attack thing and then Edelgard did that sorta shady but largely very gutsy thing where she didn’t sound the evacuation to restrict Claude’s movements knowing that there was zero danger that he would plow through the civilians (they don’t do this here cause last time they met Dimitri he was not feeling merciful indeed judging by huberts welcome lines and engage quotes he doesnt buy the turnaround), the AM ending narration also suggests that Enbarr wasn’t rebuilt, though Dimitri gave distinct “No pillaging!” orders, so they probably just couldn’t avoid wrecking the buildings and relocated the citizens.

Ashe also speculates where Claude went. That’s one of the things i like about Ashe he consistently averts out of sight out of mind I particularly always loved how he consistently worried about Dedue. Someone ought to.

Ingrid interestingly changed her tune here / kinda speaks positively of claude here - in CF she was like “I always though he was creepy”

Then again that was before fighting him I don’t recall If those two dont get the same lines if you spare Claude, have to go back and check

id like to mention that the lets player put lorenz in the pyjamas/loungewear the whole time as “punishment” for being late to the reunion and poked fun at him throughout.

#fe3h #fire emblem: three houses #fire emblem three houses

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pawsimses · 7 years ago

Note

3. What are some of your character’s most significant connections with others?

This took months to answer but I did it >>;For Lin, it’s first his fellow Jedi and friends, but most specifically his adopted family. Syo in particular; his Master (unofficially) has been part of his life since he was small and Lin is very VERY attached to him (albeit not outwardly). He sees Syo as his father figure outside his biological and adoptive ones, possibly more so. Syo is both role model and friend, and Lin will always love him. As such, he was crushed to learn the truth of the First Son, and strove to save Syo instead of ending him like Master Kaeden initially wanted (another can of worms for Lin but that’s unimportant and more a personal headcanon from my trash self lol). Even afterwards, despite being successful, Lin is saddened deeply when he’s still forced to say goodbye to Syo for the last time. It’s both a memorable moment and a learning lesson for him; letting go. Now to be fair, he isn’t Anakin (he’s not deep rooted in fear of loss), but he does struggle with attachments like the average person. But he understood, being raised as a Jedi, the importance of letting go and respected that, should it boil down to it, he’d let Syo die because that’s what Syo would rather have than let the First Son linger. Even so… Lin was still too attached to take that route, passing it off as a “last resort” over and over again because he still clung to the hope that Syo would be saved. But upon the victory and seeing just how exhausted Syo was, Lin realized how hard pressed this reluctance to “do the Jedi thing and not place his personal affairs into his decision making” was. It teaches him that, though he loves deeply, sometimes he HAS to make the right decision and let his loved ones go when its their time. Syo’s wasn’t that case but others will be. All in all, his heart broke when Syo sent him his last letter of gratitude and Lin may or may not have shed tears over the final severe between his and Syo’s bond as Jedi, marking Lin as a freshly minted Jedi Master on his own.… And then he meets Theron. Oh boy. Theron is both his light and foil to his Jedi person. Despite SoR details, Lin and Theron actually meet once before, on Coruscant during a gala (shortly after RotHC) to which the Council and SIS were attending. Theron was brought along by Marcus as a guest for his hard work (and attempt to get him out of his apartment for at least one night). Lin was sent alongside Kiwiiks and the Grandmaster to represent the Jedi at the event. Halfway through the night, Theron wandered off from Marcus to grab food when he bumped into a crowd of Senators and Jedi, Lin among them. He was introduce to Lin as the Barsen’thor and newest appointment Council member, and after a quick handshake, they part. They obviously meet again on the Fleet at the start of SoR, but its that meeting that spurs Theron to look into Lin’s credentials while seeking potential candidates for the Assault on Korriban. The rest is history :PNow Theron and Lin’s relationship is sweet but its not flawless. They both love the hell out of each other and simultaneously drive each other up the damn wall. Theron adores how sweet and kind Lin is, his quirks and bizarre behaviour that surfaces (genetic thing from his witch mother I’m not getting into) from time to time. He also hates how easy Lin gives in to others and lets people walk all over him. Especially his brother, Coxio, though Lin will stand up to him when pushed. Lin tries to please everyone and Theron tries time and time again to tell him WHY he can’t/how it’s not possible. He sees Lin blunder when Lin doesn’t listen to him and it irks him to no end because this is his husband, he should at the very least give some consideration to what Theron is saying. On the opposite end of the scale, Lin adores Theron for who he is, social ungraces and all. However, he gets annoyed by Theron’s “solo mode” attitude when it comes to both work and home life. He understands Theron’s issues with commitment and relationships, but it does bother him when Theron insists time after time that he can “cook dinner by himself” when Lin is trying to subtly imply that he wants to BOND with this activity together, dammit. Then comes work; Lin easily gets pissed by Theron’s insistence to DO THINGS ALONE. Especially missions that require team effort or at the very least LIN’S KNOWLEDGE (looking at you, Nathemia…).Then comes the belief conflictions; Lin, of course, being Jedi still holds to some of their ideals even if he doesn’t consider himself one any longer (he’s broken the Code and frankly has no desire to mend that fracture at this point in his life). “Letting go” is one; he feels that, should someone want it, they should be respected (hypocrite alert; he believes in it unless its on his call… yeah he learned a lesson but its a behaviour he still doesn’t curb or try to curb yet will remark on it like he has the right -_-; ). Problem is, he dubs this to himself more than others (see?). He’d rather give his life for his cause and people than let them go for him (his conscious is a guilty one, a bit selfishly too… realllyyyy regretting Torian rn TTATT). Theron, on the other hand, disagrees; this ties in with Lin trying to please everyone, Theron has issue with him trying to “play the big hero” because he can’t and shouldn’t, he’s worth more than throwing his life away for others just for the sake of sacrifice. (He’s aware too that Lin would rather live than die, a bit cowardice there but eh who isn’t with something in life?). This has spurred bigger arguments than the two would like to admit. Nathemia being a prime example; Theron’s attachment to Lin causing him to run a solo undercover so deep even a sarlacc couldn’t burrow as far irked Lin to no end, because if it would have spared the galaxy his blunders come the months after Umbara then maybe it was meant to be from the Force. Cue big hellish fight that ends with both exhausted. They reconcile and come to an agreement to not go this far again, but its not a good fight. Lin, being the doormat he is, forgives Theron in the end because he does know Theron did it out of love and is truly regretful. This time though the careless behaviour on Lin’s part doesn’t piss off Theron, it pisses off Coxio. Especially considering how Theron takes the answer without question, Coxio feels Shan does not respect his brother nor understand the damage he’s done and takes Lin for granted. (Yeah that… does not go over well the next time Coxio corners Theron in the war room…)Outside that, minor things that bad habits and leaving dishes and datapads lying around (and Lin over spoiling the damn cat) are all that the two bicker about. Oh and Lin not using his damn inhaler (asthma from lung damage via carbonite poisoning) when he’s supposed to, insisting “he’s fine, he doesn’t need it now” and Theron refusing proper med care, “just kolto spray and go, its cool”, which drive LANA nuts. End of the day, they love each other; but as with all marriages, its not always flowers and sunshine. They fight, they argue, they kiss and make up, they’re a couple as any other are. They come home, they spend time together with their cat, its good. Now comes Lana. In some instances, Lana is the wife of both Theron and Lin, others just the exasperated best friend. For Lin, she’s his best friend and protector. Sith or not, she’s one of the few whose stuck by his side regardless of every stupid mistake and decision he’s made, even as she calls him out on it. He trusts her like no other, even with some things he doesn’t tell Theron about. She’s also one of the few to mother hen him unconditionally, especially regarding important factors like “TAKE YOUR KRIFFING INHALER BEFORE I FORCE SHOVE IT DOWN YOUR THROAT!” and “I SWEAR TO THE STARS IF YOU KEEP GRAZING FOOD, I WILL STRAP YOU TO THE TABLE, FINISH YOUR DINNER!” (directed at both Theron and Lin equally) and “STOP RUNNING HEADLONG INTO BLASTER FIRE!”. He loves her and its through her that he comes to realize that the Empire are a people too, like the Republic, and becomes more receptive of its members, even if he disagrees with a number of their policies (slavery and discrimination for two…).Now comes family, and for this I will go with Coxio. Like the rest of his family, Lin did not know Coxio until adulthood, when they face off first against Malgus on Ilum together and then SoR before meeting again years later during KOTFE. Hell, he wasn’t even aware that they were brothers despite similarities in appearance (like his dad Arol, Lin’s a little dense…). All in all, his relationship with Coxio is… complicated. Coxio, despite his careless attitude and being a complete shit-disturber, values family over all else and loves his little brother unconditionally. This stems back to early childhood, when Lin was first born and Coxio was introduced to his new brother. In the short time before their family was torn apart, he was protective and loving to the newest family member, promising his father with six-year-old vigor that he’d always look out for Lin. A promise that made its way to adulthood, even if Coxio recognizes that its not as imagined. Lin, on the other hand, doesn’t care much for his brother at all, both from lack of familial relation and disagreement with Coxio’s actions as a person. He gets into more arguments than talks with his brother, which end in frustration on his end because Coxio blows him off and yet still insists on treating him like little kid when Lin is clearly not for that. Coxio knows this; he recognizes that due to fate and circumstances, they may never be close as brother, if brothers at all. As heartbreaking at that is for him, who spent his life quietly loving Lin even when he didn’t know what happened to him, he understands why and despite that factor, still loves Lin unconditionally and would give his life to protect his brother in a hearbeat. Lin… hard to say if he would; he would die for Coxio like he would his fellow Alliance members, but from a Jedi standpoint than family, which is more an insult than a reassurance. Even so, deep down part of Lin does love Coxio. Despite being exasperated most of the time, he does not hate Coxio; Lin wants to love his brother, tries to, but Coxio’s personality clashing with his and his constant harassment of Theron (who Coxio believes isn’t the best choice of lover for his naive little brother) put him at odds. It’s also due in part to Lin not really knowing Coxio at all and Coxio pushing boundaries by treating Lin as if he knows him inside out, which makes Lin uncomfortable since he does this from the get go instead of letting Lin slowly acquaint himself with Coxio. (Granted, after Nathemia, Coxio and Lin’s relationship does improve and Lin accepts Coxio as his brother, even if he drives him nuts. Post Nathemia its put under strain again for a short time, but eventually improves again). There are others, like Acina (whom Lin forms a very close friendship to until Iokath erodes it) but this point is long as it is so I’ll stop here lol

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lizzybeth1986 · 7 years ago

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Really, Really Slow Thoughts on TRR Book 3, Chapter 3

• This QT took two days. Because my pace has been sluggish. Because my thoughts on this chapter have been sluggish.

• This chapter is the only time in the entire series that I was barely invested. That’s only ever happened to be at the beginning of Book 1, and only because I didn’t think it would amount to anything beyond a Cinderella story. I haven’t been in that space with a single chapter in this book since Book 1,Chapter 8. I’m just…bored.

• Title: Allies among Enemies. Sounds very Kenna and Luther, no? But I doubt Kenna ever had to sit and play marriage counselor to a squabbling couple.

•

Esther asking all the relevant questions.

I mean, sure, Bertrand, I get it: I need to make a tour and that involves visiting other duchies, Justin thinks Madeleine would make a bomb press secretary, and I have to play matchmaker for her parents –

Wait what. Why do I need to resolve a personal fight because Madeleine’s parents? I know it’s all about reaching out and getting allies and making connections but playing armchair therapist just sounds extremely silly.

• I like that they’re carrying over the “house colours” strategy from TCaTF. Kenna occasionally did this during alliances, especially when meeting with the Nevrakis family.

•

So I have a dress “as green as Madeleine’s envy towards me and black as her shrivelled heart” (bomb analogy, Maxwell!). Buuuut I’m taking part in a court event. A formal ball. Why is the dress style more like what I wore in the club for Madeleine’s bachelorette and Liam’s bachelor party???

• Also can you imagine how awkward waltzing would look in this dress? Ballroom dresses are long and flowy for a reason. Part of the beauty of your twirl comes from how your skirt flows when you’re turning, esp in a dance like the Cordonian Waltz where the twirl is the highlight.

• So I’m supposed to ensure Adeleide comes for the wedding. Loooogically the story should make this easier on me because I already did the hard work of winning her over the last book right? Wrong. Because the story doesn’t care. It doesn’t care which Liam I chose, whether I’ve ever worn pepto bismol in my life or not, whether I charmed the pants off Adeleide (not literally). Nope. I still have to start from scratch (wouldn’t be the first time tho. I won over Kiara and Penelope in Book 1 only for them to ditch me next book [even though Penelope knew it wasn’t my fault. You owe me big, sister]).

• Soooo Godfrey, Madeleine’s dad, is an English nobleman. His marriage to Adeleide was a political alliance and he doesn’t actually give a shit about Cordonia unless his daughter is the goddamn country’s queen.

• Hmm. So Madeleine is half Cordonian too. Jesus Christ for a country that doesn’t like foreigners very much, a lot of its major players seem to have at least one non-Cordonian parent: Liam (possibly), Madeleine, Drake, Hana…

• I was a little confused because Book 1 mentioned that Madeleine is “practically royalty” from her father’s side - but it’s possible that’s more a hint towards his English roots. I guess we can rule him out for who the enemy is rn because this dude genuinely doesn’t give a shit.

• So Liam, whose interactions with Godfrey have been few and far between and who admits he has never really met him in a social setting, is the one who provides us inputs on how to deal with the Duke. Turns out this advice is pretty helpful, coming from someone who barely knows the man.

•

Savour this moment, Liam stans. This - and the “we need to avoid this lack of crowd at our wedding” exchange, are the only times we will get to properly interact with him today.

• I know this decor looks like a piñata threw up over the ballroom but I love the purple and the soft lighting xD

• So the first event post Homecoming is super empty, which is quite dishearting. It’s enough to make even our resident bar-hopper Adeleide upset.

•

Is it just me or does “STOICISM RULEZ!!!” Regina sound like she gives zero fucks today? I mean sure it could just be her usual irritation around Adelaide but here even Constantine seems a little taken aback. And besides, it’s not the Krona duchy that needs anything from the Crown, it’s the Crown that needs something from them. Your arrogance doesn’t have any legs to stand on, Regina.

• Also idk but am I the only one getting a different vibe from Regina this book? In the debriefing meeting she wasn’t there at all, and this is someone who has been a part of every meeting we’ve seen in the books. Then she comes here, to an event where if anything SHE needs to be begging her cousin to come for her stepson’s/some random noblewoman’s wedding, and she’s busy making snappy comments about the appetizers (and let’s be honest, everyone else found their spread incredibly good. Even Drake. DRAKE)

• Madeleine’s dad is essentially Madeleine Sr.

• “Magic Friendship Dust” my ass.

• Madeleine’s reaction to this “be my press secretary” thing is “I told you so” followed by a resounding (implied) “fuck you”. What else were you expecting, Esther?

•

It’s great that they say this, but I would have preferred if they showed it. It really isn’t that hard. Show him talking independently to a noble or two (you don’t even have to show their faces) - winning some over and not managing to sway some others. The reason a lot of Liam fans are upset is that not only does the writing make weak excuses to keep him from working WITH the MC, we aren’t even given a proper glimpse of what he IS doing!

I’ll return to this point later, because I have a LOT to say 😠

• …cheeseburgers aren’t appetizers, Drake.

• I’d agree with you about the buffalo wings tho.

• Nomnom that pasta looks good.

• I’d betray me for a plate of truffled penne too, Esther.

•

Back in the essay I wrote on the Balcony Scene, I spoke of how Liam’s mother’s story seemed like a mirror to the MC’s (I mentioned that she might be a foreigner, though, and given that Neville and Drake make the comparison between the MC and her, and that her son is customizable by ethnicity, I still think there are chances that is true). Called it! xD

• Neville is still as big a creep as he ever was and this scene was extremely ugly, especially with regards to Drake. But it was also extremely powerful because the group gets to rally around and protect him, and show Neville that Drake has people who will support him no matter what. It was a scene I felt was needed because it gives you a much better idea of what Drake has had to deal with in court. (also I know he’s taking the tour coz he wants a wife [good luck getting one with THAT level of creepy, asshole!] but I’m suspicious about him following ppl he doesn’t even like around).

• This is also amazing buildup to the dancing scene. The version of the scene I got was automatically platonic, which I loved, and I got more comfortable with this scene than I have ever felt with any non-Liam-LI scene so far (you know how you keep stressing about accidental romance points? That).

• In my playthrough, Esther keeps it professional, gives him encouragement, teaches him how to glide using a mental image. Drake points out he needs to give Liam adequate support and he will need to actually prove himself to other nobles for that. As a romantic scene, it really shines (and indeed it should, given that the Cordonian waltz is primarily romantic) but it works very well on a platonic level too.

• I also really, really loved the comparison Drake made between his situation and hers: that the MC is proof that he can hold on to who he is even if he becomes a part of the nobility/has endured this much from them. Drake’s character arc is built heavily on his fear that being part of the nobility can change people, based on very valid experiences. We’ve seen in this chapter how desperately some nobles cling to their titles, almost using it to make up for their lack of personality (I’m looking at you, Neville and Godfrey). But he has proof all around him too, that you don’t need to lose who you are through a title. In a lot of ways this plays really well into his “letting go” arc as well.

• Okay so I went with Godfrey first. He’s talking to Liam, who again makes a disappearing act (I don’t mind, because the MC specifically stated she wanted to speak to the Duke alone). I’m not surprised Liam wasn’t making much headway. This is the second dude to dump Madeleine after all, and worse still he’s brother to the first dude to dump her. No wonder Liam’s sticking to safe subjects like choice of scotch!

• YIKES @ Godfrey’s constant harping of successes and defeats. Why don’t we talk about what a failure YOU are as a dad, Duke Karlington, since you’re only ever there for Madeleine to tell her what a failure she is!

• I like the exchange they show us between Adeleide and Regina before the MC steps in. Regina’s care and concern for Madeleine has pretty much been there from the beginning and for what it’s worth, it has been genuine.

• Oh man. I want to give Adeleide a hug and some champagne. I mean I don’t exactly envision her winning the “best mother” award anytime soon, but she’s trying. Perhaps a little too pushy and a little too focused on her own coping mechanisms, but still, she cares enough about Madeleine to want to be there for her no matter what. Which is more than I can say for Godfrey, who thinks being a father means paying an annual visit to his goddamn FAMILY and judges people for failing when he’s perhaps the biggest failure in the room.

• Waltz time!

• Though between Esther not having a twirly skirt and Drake having an injured shoulder I’m not sure they even looked that good.

• WTF ESTHER WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU DOES THAT LOOK LIKE A MAN WHO IS IN ANY CONDITION TO MANAGE A LIFT

•

HE’S NOT JOHNY CASTLE AND THIS ISN’T DIRTY DANCING. STOP PUTTING DRAKE IN A CORNER.

• AT LEAST BABY DIDN’T MAKE JOHNY LIFT HER ON AN INJURED ARM. AND AT LEAST THEY AGREED TO DO IT TOGETHER NOT SPRUNG IT ON HIM LIKE A FUCKING JACK-IN-THE-BOX.

• “He winces at the pressure on his arm, but smiles through it”. …damn I’m angry at my own MC now.

• Drinking game time!!

• I’m not going to comment much on the scene because it’s going to be part of my group scenes essay, but I *will* say I’m so happy Hana gets her due in this one. She really shines in terms of character development in this scene and she gets the best line this whole chapter xD xD xD

•

• I think Hana has had this burn simmering in her pressure cooker ever since the bell-pepper episode in Shanghai 😂😂

• “You all know there’s more to me than liking whiskey, right?”

This is unfair and inaccurate, people. Of course there’s more. He likes cheeseburgers and pasta and greasy junk food too, cmon.

• I recall speaking not too long ago about how Madeleine and Hana had very different approaches to similar issues (family pressure, feeling like they are failures, broken engagements with men they didn’t love), and that Madeleine very possibly faced a lot of family pressure (I was wrong about the source being Adeleide, though). To me this forms part of why Hana can see Madeleine the way no one else can, and why it’s essential to have her around when Madeleine opens up.

• This doesn’t really change my opinion of Madeleine, though. It makes sense of some things, but in my mind nothing can really justify the sick pleasure Madeleine gets out of breaking people. She makes excuses for herself by calling it “not tiptoeing on other people’s fragile feelings”, but that would imply she was just being honest and not actively working towards making people feel like shit. In both Hana and Penelope’s cases she was actively working on making them feel like they were beneath her, and enjoying doing that. To me what she did, especially to Hana, was emotional abuse. Speaking ecstatically about “breaking” a human being who has harmed you in no way, is abusive. No more, no less.

• Please don’t tell me a Madeleine and Hana ship will be a thing now. No. Eww. I’d rather not pair Hana with someone who was actively trying to break her. I don’t care how much of a “crush” Madeleine seems to have.

• No matter how misguided Adeleide’s attempts to parent Madeleine are, to me she clearly wins the parenting stakes hands down. She may have made Madeleine feel like she couldn’t mourn what happened to her, but at least she views her daughter as more of a human being than a prize horse.

•

Didn’t lie to get her way? Was saying “I’m allergic to chocolate and you could have killed me” just a figment of my imagination then???

•

• You have to be fucking kidding me. The MC is a duchess now. The Beaumonts are supposed to be helping her. These three should be at the top of their itinerary right now, not throwing things together at the last minute every chapter. Isn’t this Unity Tour supposed to be about knowing your allies and enemies, and preparing accordingly? Being unprepared (somehow, barely) made sense to some extent in the first two books, but things are different now.

• Penelope next week! That woman owes us big time.

General Thoughts on this Chapter:

• Things I feel might come up in Penelope’s estate:

1. Penelope’s anxiety and her parents’ fears about sending her back to court

2. Personal issues within the family maybe? Perhaps Penelope’s desire to take up pet couture designing and her mother’s disapproval of the same might feature.

3. At some point there may be some sort of redemption arc for her where she gets reminded of her involvement in what happened to the MC earlier. Penelope clearly owes the MC a great debt for letting her off the hook so easily.

4. I’ll be damned if I have to play therapist for these people too 😠

• This whole idea of “meddling” is stupid. These people are adults. Grown people, who should be expected to know how to handle their own lives and talk to each other. The royalty/the MC shouldn’t be expected to babysit them. That’s not what we came here for.

• It stings even more when you take into account that the common public is feeling pretty terrified at the moment, and having their own, and here we are busy resolving the family squabbles of rich people.

• It highlights even more strongly what’s wrong with the whole idea of a Unity Tour. I’m hoping this “resolving-aristocrat-issues” thing won’t become a pattern because it’s beginning to look ridiculous.

• @ladynevrakis mentions in her excellent write-up on this week’s chapter that this chapter is a lot better if you’re a non-Liam shipper, and extremely frustrating if you are.

Correct on both counts. As the MC you’re just starting out as a noblewoman, and you will need all the support you can get. If you’re with Drake (especially Drake), Hana or Maxwell, you get plenty opportunities for support from all of them. With Liam, you barely get a few lines here and there before he’s completely MIA. There is no opportunity for Liam or his fiancee to talk properly, or work together as a team. And this house is unquestionably the toughest one, so why does the writing not give Liam any chance to truly be there for her when she needs it???

• I can understand why he wasn’t there for the most part. In the Neville sequence he isn’t there precisely because the writers need to highlight how people treat Drake when Liam isn’t around (and to show what people say about Liam behind his back), and there is no way you could have Liam around in either the group scene or the final scene with the family without making things worse (daughter’s former fiancè, hello?). Plus if the MC is not engaged to him, it would look weird for him to be present at some of these conversations.

STILL, there were a whole range of ways you could write him without him actually being involved in the patch-up, and still do justice to his character:

1. Eat with the group: The group eating scene could have been a perfect time to have Liam come, speak about his progress with convincing ppl, bond with the group over the delicious spread, and leave before Neville enters.

2. Check in periodically: Liam is my MC’s fiancè. They are here together on their first tour as a couple. They’re doing this tour for his people and his country. She is a newcomer and it is essential he has her back. It wouldn’t have hurt to have him come in on occasion and ask her how she is holding up. It wouldn’t have taken more than a scene or two, really, and it could have worked perfectly both on a neutral and romantic level. If you’re going to make Drake such a huge presence in this chapter that you’d go the extra mile and write him two ways, you can very well do the same for Liam. It’s even more essential in his case because he is the King of Cordonia and pretty damn invested in making this tour work.

3. Have the MC notice what Liam was doing independent of her: The writing team is no stranger to writing conversations that don’t involve the MC’s presence at all. We know Liam was spending time speaking to the few nobles in attendance, but we’re never shown how he does this or whether he succeeds. I know he’s as hard at work as the MC is, but I don’t see what he’s doing. Could you really blame readers for thinking he is less involved, then?

4. The Little Things: A gentle touch here, a smile there if he’s your fiancè. Things you would do with your partner when you don’t have much time together but still want to show them they care.

It’s not like the writers don’t know how to involve Liam. They’ve done a really good job of this in the past. The entire social season saw Liam working behind the scenes to ensure the MC was protected and cared for, even when he couldn’t be involved. The engagement tour had him pitching in to help whenever it didn’t seem too suspicious to. In all these instances they kept in mind Liam’s role and limitations, and STILL managed to make him proactive.

The writers had plenty opportunity this chapter to have Liam be there for her in small ways, but hardly bothered to involve him. I appreciate wanting to make his interactions as neutral as possible but that doesn’t mean you don’t put any effort into writing him at all.

To add insult to serious injury, this chapter follows another one where the MC practically takes over Liam’s speech (post the video), leaving Liam with little space to do anything besides agreeing with her. It’s essential - now more than ever - to portray Liam as decisive and proactive, yet the writing has him take 10 steps backwards in terms of character development. The MC is his fiancèe/close friend now. She should be able to see him properly as a politician and a leader at this point. If that doesn’t get resolved soon, we’re in danger of screwing up an interesting character who has a lot of potential.

• I’m still holding out on this book, because it’s still early and I believe they can turn things around and ensure there is a fair balance between the LIs. They are taking what we say into consideration and they have worked hard to make our other LIs’ interactions with us as safe and platonic as possible. I think this is a matter of balance, and I still think they can manage to do a good job of it once they ensure there is a balance.

• But this chapter? I’m not going pretend I’m happy.

#the royal romance #liam x mc #king liam of cordonia #hana lee #maxwell beaumont #drake walker #countess madeleine of fydelia #duchess adeleide of krona #duke godfrey of karlington #trr quick thoughts #quick thoughts #unity tour #fydelia #krona

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whateverisbeautiful · 7 years ago

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Richonne in Retrospect

#7: The Spark (3x12)

Okay, so this next “Clear” moment is really special. And its particularly special cuz I think it’s the first time Rick and Michonne become more consciously aware that there might be something special between them. 😊

In re-watching their moments for these analysis, I’d try to figure out when exactly were the moments when R&M were more self aware of the fact that their could be something more between them, and to me this was one of the first big moments where I feel like they both sensed a spark.

So their first stop on this run is going to the station where Rick thinks they’ll be able to find the weapons they need. However, he thought. Because the place has been swept clean and there’s not any guns there.

We then see Rick have a moment of very visible frustration that the guns are gone. Like Homeboy’s pretty ticked and you can tell he’s taking this L pretty hard.

And I love that in contrast to Rick’s more frazzled reaction, we have Michonne who’s still cool calm and collected. I appreciate how her calm and composed nature definitely balances Rick out both throughout this scene and throughout their relationship. Especially with how distraught Rick had become after Lori, he def needs a calming presence like Michonne in his life, y’all. 💯

So Michonne walks further into the empty place and spots a single bullet. I feel like that bullet is symbolic of a small glimmer of hope. Like Rick thought there would be guns and, while that ended up not being the case, there was still this lone bullet which serves as a sign that hope is not lost.

And by Michonne picking it up she becomes associated with a more hopeful approach. Plus, it lets you know that she’s not disappointed with Rick or looking at him as a failure, she’s finding the potential in the situation.

I think her more hopeful approach is further confirmed when she calmly asks if they have any other police stations in town. Cuz as antsy and frustrated as Rick is, she’s not riled up or fretting, she’s just ready to figure out how they make this work from here.

Rick tells her how he was the police in this rather small town and as he tries to collect himself he starts talking about how there’s other places to check. He mentions how there may not be as many guns as were in here and then we see the beginning of the way they always repeat each other’s words cuz she says, “We need as many guns as were in here.”

And again, it’s not said in a challenging or upset way but more so in a way where she’s just stating the honest facts. And then, this is such a small thing, but I appreciate that he says, “Yeah we do” because he’s verbally acknowledging and agreeing with her rather than just moving onto the next thing.

Now, y’all this is where this scene gets particularly interesting lol. Cuz Rick starts to mention the other places they can find guns and Michonne is just you know listening and not doing anything to trigger him, right?

And yet, once Rick lays out his plan, he feels the need to pause and ask her, “Do you have a problem with that approach?” 🙃

It’s hilarious to me because Homegirl did literally nothing to imply she had a problem with that approach. But this just again illustrates how Rick’s a lil sensitive when it comes to Michonne. 😋

And I love that as much as he might have wanted to sound challenging asking this, it really does come across more like he genuinely wants to know her opinion on if she thinks it’s a bad or good idea. It could have easily been asked in an aggressive way, and while he’s def on edge, there’s still this element of respect in the way he asks.

It’s interesting how after he said the guns might still be there he immediately looked to her and because she hadn’t responded right away he quickly assumed it might be because she disapproves. And to me this really showcases the damage Rick had from his last relationship.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying the flaws in Rick and Lori’s relationship were all on Lori or all one sided, but I do think that Rick got very used to constantly being questioned and misunderstood and even disapproved of from Lori and I think by asking if Michonne has a problem it’s him expecting and bracing himself for yet another person to express doubt in him.

Which is why I absolutely adore what happens next because he gets the exact opposite response. 👏🏽

Up until this point in the station, Michonne hadn’t really been looking at Rick but when she hears this, she takes a moment to quietly turn and face him and I love that she lets a little bit of silence go by as she looks right at him, almost like letting him cool off for a second.

And then in the gentlest voice she tells him, “No Rick, I don’t have a problem.”

Can I talk about why I love this real quick? Like there are so many nice layers to this moment. 🙌🏾

First; for her to match Rick’s antsy energy with such calm and composure is so great. It’s so pleasantly unexpected and it lets you know this girl knows how to carry herself like a queen. By taking this gentle approach rather than a snippy or confrontational one, she manages to diffuse the tension effortlessly.

Second; it really does feel like this is about more than just not having a problem with the approach. This is about her trying to tell Rick “I don’t have a problem in general” and she’s not his enemy.

There’s also sort of a sadness here, cuz like everyone probably thinks she has a problem but it’s her way of saying “No, I’m actually much more human and easy to get along with than people take the time to realize” and it’s such a real vulnerable moment between them.

Three; her response is so significant cuz it lets Rick know this is different than the last woman who would doubt him and have a problem with his decisions. Here’s a woman who instead supports him and is gentle with him. Rick was totally projecting his own frustrations on her but then she softly helped calm the situation. Cuz 👸🏾.

Four; The chemistry and spark between them are just so strong once she says this. Like I get why Danai might have read this and thought there was a little something something there, cuz there def was.

And then y’all I love the shot we get of her handing him the bullet. To focus on their hands in this moment lets you know they want this moment to be emphasized and significant. This moment feels very symbolic and low key feels like it’s alluding to the imagery of exchanging rings.

Handing him that bullet is a way for her to establish a sense of belief in him. Cuz again, even though that was the lone bullet in a place he thought would be tons of guns, there was at least something there and her handing that to him was her saying there’s still hope. It was the one slither of hope in the room and she gave it to him rather than give him disappointment or disapproval.

This passing of the bullet is also like her way of saying I’m not here to fight you; we’re on the same team. And she offers the bullet to him, he accepts, and they continue to slowly but surely accept each other from here. To me it’s also symbolic of her handing him a softer side of her that he hasn’t seen before.

It’s so clear that these two are having a moment rn and that there’s more brewing beneath the surface.

And you know who also seems to know that these two were having a moment? My boy, Carl. 😋

Like as much as I love the passing of the bullet, my favorite part about this shot is Carl in the center as he seems to be picking up on the fact that this moment is not so “platonic”.

As young as he is, I feel like even he could sense some type of chemistry between them. Especially in the shot that follows with Carl looking from his dad to Michonne like “What’s going on here?” lol.

And I’m so here for the little look Michonne gives Rick before walking away cuz it’s like an “I see you, the real you” look and also a bit of a “Partner, let me upgrade you” look. 😂

Cuz she low key knows just how to harness his frantic energy. Like she’s like “Bruh, just wait, once you’re with me you’re going to feel a lot less crazy cuz I’m about to be your source of sanity” lol. Direct quote from Michonne’s mind, y’all. 😋👌🏽

I love that she looks at Rick with this gentle face as a reminder that this warrior has a soft welcoming side too and you know Rick took note.

Like I think this moment played a big part in helping him be more open to this woman and it definitely further intrigued him. Cuz homeboy is straight up mesmerized and can barely hide it when she walks away. 💯

Like, y’all, a lot of the build up between Rick and Michonne was fairly subtle, however Rick’s reaction as Michonne walks away wasn’t subtle at all. Watching this back I realized that it was pretty blatant that in some way shape or form this man has caught feelings. Cuz what did she do to make him have to literally pause and recollect himself? Whipped already, y’all. 😊

Like he stays watching her go and then he sort of holds the bullet like it’s gold and then stores it in his shirt pocket and then looks up to the sky and it’s just a lot, cuz that man is feeling a lot lol.

When he looks up I feel like it’s him really wondering what this moment just meant cuz it certainly wasn’t just casual. Like I think, in the beginning of their relationship, Rick was a little shook that he might be able to fall for someone so deeply so soon, but that happens with soul mates. 😌

This whole prolonged moment of his reaction to her feels very significant for the show to linger on. I feel like to spend this time on this entranced reaction is because they want to hint at something. And to me it’s hinting that Rick knows there’s a spark there. He knows it. And so does Michonne.

Like I think this was both the phase in their relationship where they started to become a bit more aware of the attraction between them and also the first time they knew they felt a significant connection. And as time goes on they’ll realize just how significant that connection is.

Overall, I really appreciate this moment for establishing a deeper kind of chemistry between R&M and the fact that, in a few seasons, he would hand her mints the same way she handed him this bullet and then Richonne would be born, it just makes this moment even sweeter. 🙌🏾😊

#richonne #richonne family #richonne fandom #michonne #michonne grimes #rick grimes #carl grimes #not my gifs #twd #the walking dead #s3

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