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#because of how FASCINATING that dynamic would be
gonzo-rella · 2 days
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Them | Art Donaldson
MASTERLIST | AO3 | KO-FI
Relationship(s): Art Donaldson x gn!reader (unrequited romantic), Art Donaldson x Tashi Duncan x Patrick Zweig (romantic)
Summary: You'll never be them.
Warnings: Angst, unhappy relationship. (Let me know if I need to add any)
Word count: 0.3k
(A/N: I saw Challengers today and… oh boy. This throuple is so fucking compelling, I like depressing shit, and I had a crush on Mike Faist's Connor Murphy when I was a teen, so I figured why not write something to combine my crush, my love of depressing shit and my fascination with this throuple to write a little thing. I thought it'd be a really interesting dynamic to explore. If you'd be interested in seeing more from this idea, let me know, and I'll happily write something! I'm tempted to write an angsty thing where the reader is finally open about the fact that they know about Art's feelings for Tashi and Patrick.)
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You’ll never be them. 
You’ll never be Tashi Duncan, whose gaze he craves like sunlight. It’s like he searches for his reflection in her eyes- no matter the distance between them- because that’s the only place he wants to exist, or can exist. He gets lost in them. It’s a good job he doesn’t want to leave; he couldn’t if he tried.
You’ll never be Patrick Zweig, whose smile would make his knees buckle were his legs not strong from years of training. His stare can’t stop time quite like Tashi’s, but he’d probably melt if Patrick looked at him for long enough.
Their history is something you’ve pieced together from scraps of anecdotes he’s reluctantly offered up over the time you’ve been together. Each one serves as a bedtime story you can’t help but tell yourself late at night, the ceiling a screen on which to project memories that aren’t yours. Art always faces away from you when you’re in bed together. You used to wonder if he was dreaming of them, or just her, or just him. But, one night, you noticed the moonlight reflected in his eyes, and you realised he was lying awake, too, as tortured by Tashi and Patrick as you.
He can love more than one person at a time. Maybe he loves you, too. But, he doesn’t love you like Tashi, or like Patrick. You know that. He can say those three magic words all he wants. He can kiss you. He can look at you. It all rings hollow when adoration practically radiates off him when he locks eyes with Patrick or Tashi. You recognise it because it’s like the adoration that radiates off you when you look at him.
But, you don’t say anything. Just like how Art doesn’t say anything.
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OKAY SO i have been rereading dustorange's wonderful post here about Dick in an UtRH-esque scenario where he dies & then comes back to life
AND I HAVE INCOHERENT BRAINSTORMING THOUGHTS:
so first, i think Robin!Dick would be just as hurt by the discovery that Bruce has a new Robin, and brood about it - but i think the shame of having died would stop him from confronting Bruce about it the way Nightwing!Dick does in canon.
and I do NOT think that he would expect Bruce to kill anyone for him (or even be upset that he doesn't? I just don't think this would be a consideration for Dick. he's gonna be fixated on "I failed." so he'll be upset about being replaced but not about the lack of revenge. and if Bruce did take revenge, i think he'd actually feel angry and betrayed about that because it'd feel like the choice was taken away from him, a la how upset he gets when he thinks Bruce has arranged to have Zucco killed - even if he intellectually knows that Bruce wasn't deliberately undermining himbecause he didn't know Dick was gonna come back to life.)
anyway so what WOULD he do??
what comes to mind is something along the lines of "Dick obsessively keeps an eye on Batman & Robin even while telling himself that he's not"
and then - say - if it's Robin!Tim (i feel like this has to be Tim because in the world where Dick dies there is no way that Bruce is voluntarily picking a new Robin), then maybe the moment when Dick steps in is when Bruce is in danger & he's furious / critical of Tim for not protecting Bruce well enough
and i feel like that's how he'd channel the hurt feelings - it'd all be deflected under shame and obligation, and then translated into the anger of "you replaced me & yet you're failing to do the job that you're supposed to do" (which is actually about projection/self-hatred because Dick would actually be mad at himself for having died & not doing that job anymore)
and Dick wouldn't want to see Bruce at all because of the shame over dying & subconscious fear that Bruce doesn't want him back, plus every little thing that Tim does differently would drive him NUTS because it implies that maybe the way Dick did things wasn't good enough for Bruce
i'm actually kind of fascinated by this now. because i am me and i have (1) obsession i am mostly invested in the dick & tim side of it sdfsdfds
so i'm picturing Tim very stung by whatever critical things Dick said to him & tracking this mysterious vigilante down, and then Dick doesn't want to spend ANY time with him BUT he's also subconsciously desperate for news of Bruce!!! so then something something Dick starts sorta training him a la Tim's various contacts with edgy non-batman-aligned vigilantes, and Tim's very defensive about how he IS a good robin so THERE but of course he's also defensive because he's secretly worried he's not good enough.
normally i would have tim Recognize dick since recognizing dick is tim's most basic skill HOWEVER i think it would be much more fun if tim doesn't recognize him so he can give dick a speech about legacy & the first robin: "i do x and such because that's how the first robin did it so it is Objectively Correct." which Dick will find incredibly infuriating but will be unable to counter since he cannot counter with 'the 1st robin was ME'
…hmmm i do think Dick ought to be angry about SOMETHING about batman's methods/attitude just because that's more dynamic? I feel like in order to make the adaptation work, there ought to be SOME kind of argument with Bruce right before he dies that he can still be mad about, a la the garzonas fight for Jason and Bruce. unsure what though?
okay let's see: I feel like Dick's main arguments with Bruce aren't about vigilante issues per se so much as they're about working in a team - so e.g.
1) Bruce being controlling/demanding, and 2) Bruce being secretive and doing stuff behind Dick's back, and 3) Bruce not allowing Dick enough autonomy, 4) just generally a perceived lack of trust.
SO maybe whatever The Frustrating Thing that bruce was doing when dick died is a thing he's STILL doing with this new robin, and dick is getting frustrated all over again sorta on tim's behalf but mostly on his own behalf because he never got to resolve this with bruce
but anyway that way when Bruce finally spots disguised!Dick, then they can have the fight again before Bruce realizes who he is <3
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Thoughts on The Ghoul
So I think all the characters in the Fallout show are spectacular, but I had some thoughts on The Ghoul/Cooper Howard in particular that I just wanted to put down. Owing to his 200+ years of history, he's a downright fascinating, dynamic character, and I can't wait to see what they do with him next.
Anyway, here's my thoughts/character analysis of The Ghoul:
One of the things I found most interesting on my second watch-through of the show was how everything The Ghoul does is motivated by ruthless pragmatism, not cruelty. It can appear like cruelty--sometimes it tips over into cruelty--but cruelty is not the point. The point is always survival. He must survive to find his family. That is his goal and his one guiding tenet. Nothing else matters, everything else is fluid. Whatever it takes to survive.
Getting rid of the three bounty hunters who dug him up? Survival. Two of those guys were already one twitch away from killing him on the spot for being a ghoul, and the other threatened to harm him if he didn't show enough gratitude. Coupled with some of the other things he was saying, it seemed possible he would double-cross or kill The Ghoul the moment it suited him. No doubt The Ghoul has worked with the type before, and knew trouble when he saw it.
In Filly, he only shot people who were shooting at him. Cooper loves dogs, but he stabbed CX-404 because she was actively trying to kill him. On the surface, he healed her for equally pragmatic reasons: she could lead him to Wilzig. But he also seemed to respect, too, that she clung to life despite her debilitating wound. She's not his dog Roosevelt, so he tries to maintain a cold detachment from her (at first), but he has a soft spot for dogs.
He was willing to shoot Lucy in Filly, but he hesitated--which is more than he did for any of the other people threatening his life. Possibly he wouldn't have killed her (she was armed with a non-lethal weapon) until Maximus showed up on the scene and changed the calculus (dispatch the girl and deal with the newer, bigger threat without having to worry about her finding a lethal weapon and killing him with it). He didn't kill Maximus when he had the chance, either. He didn't need to. Maximus had already shown himself to be incompetent with the power armor. It was simple enough to damage the power armor and watch him tuck tail and run.
When he meets Lucy again, he uses her with the same casual, indifferent efficiency as he would any other tool. The point of dunking her in the water was to lure the gulper. It had the unfortunate side effect of also being torturous for Lucy, but the cruelty wasn't the point. Getting the head back was. The head=caps, caps=meds, meds=survival, survival=eventually find family.
We don't know what The Ghoul would have done if they had retrieved the head from the gulper and his medicine hadn't been destroyed. Probably it would have depended on what Lucy did. If she seemed likely to come after him and the head, he probably would have killed her or incapacitated her and left her for dead. If she had explained she needed to trade it with Moldaver for her dad, Hank MacLean, hoooo boy, he would have beelined for Moldaver's with Lucy in tow. Whether Lucy came along as his partner or his captive/extra bargaining chip would also probably depend on Lucy's behavior.
But they lose the head and The Ghoul's medicine is destroyed. The math changes. He can come back for the head, but he needs meds now, which means he needs caps now, and the only thing of value he has on hand is this pampered girl from a fucking vault who seems patently unwilling to do the things that need to be done to survive in the Wasteland anyway, so if she's gonna die, he might as well profit from it. He needs meds to survive. He needs caps for meds. It's simple, brutal math.
While he's hauling her to the Super Duper Mart, though, he does several interesting things that are degrading for Lucy, yes, but are simultaneously teaching her how to survive the Wasteland, testing to see if she'll adapt. First, he mercy kills Roger and butchers him. It's important to note that The Ghoul didn't have to take a detour from his all-important mission to obtain medicine--he could hear it was Roger, he could tell Roger was going feral and didn't have any meds-- but he went anyway to help ease an old friend's passing. And he made sure Roger's last thoughts were pleasant, too.
Then, because this is the Wasteland and the one law is survival, he wastes no time switching gears. There's no waste in the Wasteland, and a fresh dead body presents an opportunity for those willing to seize it. The Ghoul, mind you, has had 200 years to learn that he can't be picky. Ghouls are unwelcome in most "civilized" parts of the Wasteland, barred from the simple comforts and safeties and securities that other people can enjoy if they reach those scattered, precious oases. The Ghoul has had to eat people. It sucks, but it's that or die.
But Lucy doesn't understand that. She arguably doesn't understand what a ghoul even is because nobody's taken the time to tell her. She doesn't know what the last 200 years have been like. She's appalled--and then she has the audacity to voice her disgust. The Ghoul hands her the knife to keep butchering Roger in part to humble her, to drag her down into the dirt with the rest of them, but he's also teaching her a stark reality of the Wasteland. It was a lesson and a skill that he had to learn the hard way. (Interestingly, while nearly everyone in the Wasteland is disgusted by cannibalism, it's also a known thing that happens all the time. The Ghoul and Lucy are in the interesting position of being some of the only people in the Wasteland who were raised in societies where cannibalism truly was unthinkable).
On the walk to the Super Duper Mart, he refuses to give her water. On a pragmatic level, there's no reason to waste water on the equivalent of a dead woman walking--he's leading her to get her organs harvested, after all. (He is pretty petty when he pours out the last drops instead of giving them to her, though). But also, whether he is actively intending to or not, he is teaching her to adapt to Wasteland conditions. The water in his canteen, in fact, was just as irradiated and gross as the standing water from which Lucy ultimately drinks; he refills his canteen from the same rusted-out vessel Lucy drinks from, and likely drew the previous canteen's worth of water from a similarly unpalatable source. This is water in the Wasteland. Drink it or die.
When she runs away shortly after, he lassos her (and, sidenote: can I just add how fucking cool it is that they actually carry through his lasso skills? Like, that is actually an extremely useful skill and the writers utilized it!), which leads to that pivotal scene where she bites his finger off and he takes hers.
This is interesting for multiple reasons. The Ghoul calls her a "little killer" and seems satisfied to see her finally fighting with the same savagery as a Wastelander. This could be either because a) he believes all people have a killer lurking beneath the facade of civility ("I'm you, sweetie. Just give it a little time...") and she's finally found that steely will to survive no matter what it takes, and/or b) he believes she's been faking her doe-eyed, good girl persona. He's the one who first finds Wilzig's body, after all. To him, it looks like Lucy lured the doctor off and ruthlessly chopped off his head before running off with it. Maybe she's just a really good actress, and in biting his finger off, she's let that mask slip.
Either way, he introduces her to another law of the Wasteland: don't dish it if you can't take it. She takes his finger, he takes hers. He doesn't kill her for it, in part because that would be disproportionate, in part because that would be a waste (he probably needs he alive to exchange her for caps). But also, from a practical standpoint, she just bit off his shooting finger. Unbeknownst to her, ghouls can reattach body parts, even ones that are not their own. He's harvesting his replacement from her. If he wanted to be cruel, he had ample opportunity to be cruel here. He could have taken more fingers. He could have hurt her in ways that wouldn't have affected her value to organ harvesters. He could have degraded her and called her all kinds of nasty names. But he doesn't. He's efficient. If anything, he seems almost proud of her for abandoning her hoity-toity principles and fighting back.
He still needs caps. He's feeling the effects of not having his medication. He's still committed to delivering her to the organ harvesters. In his mind, he has no choice. This is about survival. He has to survive to find his family. This is the option he has available to him. This is how he lives to see another day. He brings her to the Super Duper Mart and, drawing deep from that actor's well, he maintains the tough-guy routine long enough to intimidate her inside, then he succumbs.
He's still down when Lucy re-emerges, victorious, and he knows, he knows that he's dead. He tried to kill her, now she'll kill him. It's the smart thing to do, the practical thing to do. Another law of the Wasteland...
But she doesn't do it. She has all the power here, she knows he's a dangerous element, that she would probably be safer if she left him for dead or killed him herself. But she breaks all the rules. She gives him, freely, generously, with supreme dignity and a selfless kindness he had long forgot, an abundance of the thing he needs to survive, the thing he was willing to sell another human being for no questions asked. Just like that.
There's also something to be said here about how resource scarcity (and the removal of that scarcity) affects people. As soon as The Ghoul gains a cache of at least 2 months worth of medicine, it frees him from the basic math of mere survival. He has room to breathe and think long-term (at least by Wasteland standards). He can reflect on the momentous thing that just happened to him, too. As he watches himself on the TV in the Super Duper Mart, watches the man he once was unwillingly (and unwittingly) take the first step onto the path to what he has become, he remembers what it was like being Cooper Howard. Why he, Cooper Howard, hated the "feo, fuerte, y formal" scene so deeply.
Cooper Howard was a kind, moral, and dignified man who seldom said an unkind word. He was a loving husband who deeply respected his wife and absolutely adored his daughter. Though his naivety, privilege, and ignorance blinded him to the ugly realities of the pre-apocalypse world around him, he valued justice, freedom, and equality. He wanted the characters he played in the movies to reflect that belief in the power of the law and respect the innate humanity of all people, even the villains. And, when he began to see the cracks in the perfect picture of his charmed life, he is driven to know the truth behind the facade. His deep, defining belief in justice and truth would not let him leave it alone.
Cooper Howard learned the truth that Vault-Tec (and by extension, his wife) were willing to drive the world off a cliff, and it destroyed his marriage and deeply affected him. Even then, demoralized and hurt as he was, he found it in himself to be thoughtful and kind to his daughter and the people, both adults and children, at the birthday party he worked the day the bombs dropped. Fundamentally, he was still a kind, moral man. And that kind, moral man found himself in the middle of the most horrific nightmare anyone could ever imagine experiencing: the death of the planet under a rain of atomic bombs. Then he lived through it and had to contend with the harsh realities of surviving on the annihilated landscape left behind. Fortunately for him, he already had several handy skills to carry him through: having formerly been a real cowboy, he knew a thing or two about surviving in tough conditions; having formerly been a soldier, he knew what it took to kill a man and had the experience and fortitude to do it; and finally, having formerly been an actor, he had a built-in psychological coping mechanism to insulate him from the horrors of the things he needed to do to survive.
Cooper Howard used to put on and take off personas for a living. Sure, he played white hats, but he had an intuitive understanding of character and narrative tropes. He played opposite some of the best bad guys in 21st century Hollywood! It wouldn't be hard for him to pull the cloak of acting around himself to do what he initially needed to do to survive. But somewhere along the way, the tough, ruthless persona he adopted stopped being an act and he became his character. He embodied the answer to the question posed by The Man from Deadhorse: what happens when a good man is driven too far?
Cooper Howard adapted to survive. His actions reflect the realities of being a ghoul (again, a people generally reviled by everyone and cast out of safe havens because they are deemed threats). Pragmatic and efficient violence are necessities if a ghoul wants to live long, stay sane, and stay out from under the thumb of would-be enslavers. Still, beneath it all, Cooper Howard is still there, buried deep down beneath the character-persona of The Ghoul.
The Ghoul is drawn to Lucy (platonically, romantically, or some secret third thing), to her goodness and old-world manners just as much as he is disgusted/irritated by them. She's an echo of himself, of Cooper Howard, of who he used to be, and he knows EXACTLY where that gets a person. She's going to get herself killed if she doesn't wise up. With those high-and-mighty, anachronistic principles, that black-and-white worldview, her totally naive misunderstanding of the realities of the Wasteland, she won't last long. And initially he sees her as a pawn, like he was, only good for moving him one step closer to his goal. But then she shows him she can adapt and survive. Not only that, she can be true to her core principles in the process. She can conduct herself with dignity. Lucy reminds him what it was like being the white hat, and shows him that yes, even in this hellscape, there can be heroes. Over 200 yeas, his pragmatism and need to survive sanded away the nuance between Good and Bad. But Lucy makes him reconsider whether maybe there is right and wrong after all, and maybe it actually does matter.
Thus begins his transformation, but the change is not immediate, and this is still the Wasteland. He escapes from The Govermint and goes after Lucy. To do that, he needs to find Moldaver. He tracks down someone who might know where to find her, kills him and accidentally blows a hole through the letter with the key bit of information he needs to find Moldaver. So, he goes to that guy's family to find the man's younger brother, Tommy. When he gets the information he needs, he kills Tommy. He gives Tommy the opportunity to back down, but The Ghoul has a lot of experience and reads Tommy like a book. Tommy is not the kind of kid to let something like this go, and The Ghoul has clearly been burned by leaving vengeful people alive before. Tommy reaches for a gun to shoot The Ghoul, and The Ghoul doesn't hesitate. He blows a hole in the kid. It sucks, but again, this is a decision born from sheer practicality, not love of carnage.
Later, he comes across CX-404 trapped in a Nuka-Cola machine (left there by Thaddeus). The head is lost to both of them now; the dog cannot help The Ghoul with finding it. But he saves her anyway and dubs her Dogmeat. He lets sentimentality get to him for the first time in who knows how long and allows himself to bond with another living being. When he does reach The Observatory (where Moldaver, Lucy, and her dad are), he clearly stashes Dogmeat somewhere to keep her out of harm's way and goes in after Lucy.
After fighting his way through the Brotherhood of Steel, we come to that pivotal scene where Lucy finds out about her father's history. Cooper hangs back to observe and learns that his niggling, hare-brained hunch about Lucy and her last name was correct: she was the daughter of Henry MacLean, a man-out-of-time who presents the first real step in 200 years toward Cooper's ultimate goal: finding his family. (I think it's important to note, however, that he isn't 100% sure of her connection to Hank when follows her to Moldaver's--his reasons for going to the Observatory are either to get information from Moldaver or simply to back Lucy up, should she need help). He lets Hank get away so that he can follow him, and he's willing to follow him alone. But now there's Lucy, who is as wrapped up in this shit as Cooper is (even if she doesn't understand it yet), and he figures they both deserve answers. She's shown that she can adapt to survive, she just needs a teacher. In their first exchange since she left him at the Super Duper Mart, he treats her with new respect and offers her the opportunity to come with him, learn from him, and find out about who she really is and the legacy that has produced her. But perhaps he also knows deep down that he needs to learn from her too. He needs to remember what it was like to be good, to be human. He needs it so he can be it for his daughter when he finds her.
So, yeah, I don't know, it's just interesting how Cooper Howard became essentially lost in method acting a villain to survive the fucking awful conditions he found himself in, but even then he isn't cruel. Like, there are a lot worse things he could have done to Lucy. A LOT WORSE. As far as I can tell, he never looks at or touches her in a creepy, predatory way. Yeah, he drags her around on a leash and cuts her finger off when she bites his off, but that's pretty damn tame for the Wasteland. He secures her with rope, but otherwise is pretty hands off with her. If he objectifies her, it's in an extremely non-sexual way. More of a taking-the-cow-to-market kinda way. Which still sucks, but again, it's not needlessly cruel or wantonly violent, which is pretty impressive given general Wasteland behavior.
He's a damn interesting character, and I'm super stoked to see how he develops--and how he interacts with Lucy going forward.
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eskildit · 8 months
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my current headcanon is that from ianthes pov corona has just been baiting judith all these years. like 'pretend to like the weird kid' style. because ianthe clearly had no clue corona had any real affection for judith in ntn even though shes been invited to every birthday party for years. but ianthe used her party invites for psychological warfare, why wouldnt corona?
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doortotomorrow · 1 year
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RAVEN + CLARKE - "Hey, Raven? I'd pick you first."
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wolves-in-the-world · 2 years
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thinking about how the one time eliot masterminds something, it's because the circumstances are dire and we don't actually see it happen; how he says he plays chess and nate believes him but we don't ever see it or hear about it again; how we don't even see his most basic fighting skills until they're needed and he has to drop the cerebral and nonthreatening grift he was using in front of the team. and I don't know what to think except that in some ways he's just as secretive as parker is, we just don't see it because on top of that he's this very believable gruff-but-sorta-amiable person who meets up with his vet buddies and goes on dates and cooks for his team.
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piosplayhouse · 1 year
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Me giving my hour long monologue about how trans lesbians jiang cheng x wen qing is the only form of the ship I'll consume
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sysig · 14 days
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Incomplete exchange (Patreon)
#Doodles#SCII#Helix#Max Vyer#DAX#*throws idea spaghetti throws idea spaghetti throws idea spaghetti throws#So Max and ZEX changing places - what if that but This lol#It would also be funny to watch Max stumble around in ZEX's body lol but considering ''how'' ZEX got isekai'd...#Not much left probably :| Dark#Really I'm just fascinated by throwing the almost-dynamics into relief hehehe - DAX and Dex so similar! And Max and ZEX similar in some ways#How would DAX react to Max :3c How would Max react to DAX! One of them knows the other - at least at arm's length - but not the other!#Seeing a VUX ''in person'' would probably be a whole other feeling as well haha - there's a familiarity when he's inhabiting ZEX's POV#Still thinks he's dreaming because I mean - would the reality be any easier to swallow? No lol#I guess this would be a scenario before ZEX dies since y'know - DAX is here haha - unless this is some afterlife something???#Both Max and DAX /would/ be dead in that scenario - or would they?? Haha the grey area is the funnest to play in <3#I think it'd be very interesting on DAX's end as well - obviously Max is very different from ZEX but if the language thing works both ways#VUX already have the translators of course but like - Max speaks very differently from ZEX he formulates his sentences very specifically#But if the way he attacks the words the way his accent moves the sounds around - if he speaks like ZEX but not /like/ him - s'interesting!#Would probably confuse the heck out of DAX haha he knows that voice very well!#By the transitive property would that make their accent space New Jersey? No that's too silly haha#I really love Max just dropping years and events out of the blue haha - very important! Written down! Kept track of!#A lot of things he doesn't pay much attention to but he's very careful with his dream data I'm love him <3#I also had So much fun drawing his hands here hehe ♪ His hand expressions have quickly risen to being my favourite :D#ZEX doesn't express with his hands! Which means it's a Max-specific type of thing in his body!#Tells <3
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muninnhuginn · 18 days
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feeling so normal about li bing and qiu qingzhi btw
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sesamenom · 23 days
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some funny snippets of a tentative timeline for the reverse gondolin au
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#silm#silmarillion#not art#reverse gondolin au#Gondolin-born Prince Elrond is a bit more active in numenorean politics#primarily attempting to keep them from self-destructing#numenor still Falls after sauron establishes his weird morgoth death cult#because having numenor around in the TA means there wouldn't be a war of the ring in the first place#but like 60% of them are still Faithful#they establish themselves in Imladris under Tar-Miriel & Elrond (Tar-hanotur? Tar-airatur?) btw#Prince Elrond is quite fascinating to write#also yes annatar is literally booted out under lomions advice#celebrimbor still struggles with his overly-trustingness#luckily for everyone lomion has no such reservations#lomion: tyelpe i know you dont trust yourself on this but. you trust me right#tyelpe: of course#lomion: okay then somethings up with that guy. get him out of your house asap#tyelpe: thanks will do#debating whether to kill off celebrimbor here? if he does die it would be in battle next to lomion so sauron doesnt learn of the Seven#also this tyelpe & lomion have been actively using the Three in battle since FA 500something#they're pretty experienced at the magical siege warfare stuff#so maybe celebrimbor makes it out alive but injured?#okay imagine a white council w assorted wizards; galadriel; cirdan; elrond; the numenorean king in imladris; lomion; and celebrimbor#i feel like lomion and tyelpe balance each other out well enough (lomion is still quite pragmatic but less actively distrusting than maegli#and tyelpe is constantly making an effort to be Wise and Understanding#he doesn't trust himself on big decisions bc of the whole feanorion baggage. but he does trust his bff lomion#so their dynamic is kind of like 'tyelpe has a Good Idea; lomion Validates his Good Conscience and figures out how to execute it'#btwn making the Three a few centuries ahead of schedule and them balancing each other out galadriel-and-celeborn-style they're kind of op#idk how sauron amasses that much power in the SA/TA of the au-verse
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not-poignant · 2 months
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Hi! from the Behind the Scenes ask, 11 or 21 for Stain? Thank you!!
11. Was there a scene that you hadn't originally planned to include? Why did you decide to fit it in?
I have no plan for A Stain that Won't Dissolve, so right now, there's nothing that I'm doing that I didn't 'originally plan for' because there's no plan! :D
There's not even anything that's completely coming out of left wing, so far everything is steady and on track.
21. What is something you didn't expect people to notice or gravitate towards in this fic?
I didn't expect so many people to believe that the town secretly or actually has Alex's back based on a few minor things, because - presumably - they're rooting for the town not to be abuse and rape apologists, which they absolutely are when it comes to Alex's family and his mom?
Like, the level of sympathy for the SDV town has made me watch in real-time in a way how much people will like... excuse the inaction of individuals or a community under excuses like 'well they want to help' or 'they're actually helping' or 'it's nice that they care for him so much' when we have extremely little evidence of that.
It was like watching that kind of abuse denial happening in a broader kind of macrocosm, and I've had to reply to actually a lot of comments - maybe over 20 now - patiently pointing out that people being benignly polite to someone doesn't mean they're being supportive or that they've ever been supportive. And that the town is a huge part of the problem.
It's one of those 'a lot of these readers have never experienced this kind of community isolation while being abused by a family member and it shows' situations, and that's realistic, it's just interesting to watch unfold!
Like, not bad, just... uncomfortable as I am someone who has experienced that isolation, and in some ways watching people defend the distance and inaction of an entire community is...a little too close to abuse apologism for comfort. The whole 'they care' without adding 'but not enough to ever have done anything about it' does make the author in me go 'OKAY SO NO ACTUALLY THAT'S NOT IT' lol.
~
From this meme!
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kotaerukoto · 12 days
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Kicking my feet and twirling my hair as I read Makoto's comments whenever he inspects something. Also my god he wants to destroy the cameras so badly. LET HIM
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littencloud9 · 19 days
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STOP STOPPP IM SO CONFLICTED OVER WHAT TO SHIP IN THIS DAMN SHOW
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pagetbewbster · 1 year
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I've been thinking about the ending of Criminal Minds 6x02 where they are all instantly so desperate to save the BAU upon learning it could be dissolved or absorbed by another department.
All of the other times this has happened (with Strauss, Barnes) we've seen it through the eyes of the team members and how personally antagonizing it is to all of them on top of the professional stress.
Because of the constant trauma bonding and unhealthy amount of time spent together over the years, their quest to keep the BAU together seems more and more personal each time.
Due to the nature of their profession, we're supposed to view them as the most reliable narrators, but it's starting to become obvious that it isn't just about saving the BAU or righting bureaucratic wrongs.
They depend on each other emotionally (even though none of them would ever admit it) and the BAU being disbanded would be devastating to each of them in a life-altering way that they can't even fathom.
The team will always put their careers and personal lives on the line to keep the BAU intact because they have become each other's strongest familial relationship and they absolutely need this.
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lol I noticed I’ve been highly into role reversal aus these days. as in, seem to just think for them for each of the fandoms I’ve been in LATELY. sasusaku? my demon? alchemy of souls? Jjk? and even I think for tg too. like lololol, it’s such a surprise to have this realisation because im really not into role reversals au LOL but all of this is staying otherwise
#suddenly getting wanting to role reversal ninjago now too#JFJJFJDJDJDJJDJDJDJD#i talk#but seriously. like. when i think “role reservals’ it’s incredibly boring to me. unless it’s sasusaku. everything is not boring when it’s no#t sasusaku#BUT I think it’s just cause. I think role reversals is the same story but just the characters swapped but. no. No it really isn’t#the dynamic might feel *similar* but it’s so distinctly different#and what i really like is the way its role reserval but OH how even if fate stands with the diff set of cards in hands#the story isn’t the same !!!!! since the ones with the card are diff people !!!!!!#also so fascinating to see how it *changes* characters and how this character would react to it#also very interesting to see how i could incorporate canon in the role reversal#like sukuna’s tattoo being his instead of itadori. Despite him being the king of curses#how Sukuna doesn’t swallow the finger in one swallow. the way it’s a concious decision too and how he bites into it because itadori is insan#and how he’s already incoprataed in the jujutsu world while Yuuji wasn’t#the way sakura’s brother isn’t the one to kill her clan. because she doesn’t have one.#the way cho yeong still has her family backstory but it’s still jang gang doing the deed.#with my demon it was really tricky. and i still am *thinking* abt human!Jeong Gu won#BUT…. went to think about madam joo + do do hee#and INCOHERENT. SO MISERABLE.#it’s so good. the way do do hee is the one who meets her as she was a child. and is there as she grows and is unable to do nothing while she#dies because that would be interfering with god’s work#ahhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHHH#role reversals my beloved#HJFJFKFKFKKD so fcking funny how i started with “actually don’t like role reversals to. role reversals my beloved#im so fcking funny
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forcedhesitation · 2 months
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I love that steve is in dbd because I do not have to give a shit about stranger things itself to get new material of him. I can just explore what his adventures in the entity's realm might be.
#dbd#thoughts about media#funnily enough I was introduced to him THROUGH dbd. and I liked him in dbd first lmao.#and it was only after months of deliberating whether I should bother watching the show did I actually do so.#I suppose it was worth it because mr. keery is just. so beautiful.#but god with every season the show got worse and worse.#it's genuinely more interesting to me to explore his character in the context of dbd.#because like. take it seriously- and it's objectively SUCH a fascinating setting to put a character in.#they are hunted over and over again by serial killers and monsters from many different universes.#they die in so many different ways. and have to watch the people with them die. day in and day out.#ultimately- getting yourself killed to protect your friends doesn't actually have purpose anymore.#not when it could lead to your friend dying anyway. or in an even worse way than you did.#it really transforms the meaning of sacrifice. of death.#so having the steve nancy and jonathan dynamic in this setting is INFINITELY more interesting than whatever the fuck the show is doing rn.#and I have lucy too. my ghOCtface born of my “never harm steve” playstyle.#and THAT. is SO interesting to me. because steve would NEVER normally fall in love with a person like lucy.#but they aren't in a normal place. experiencing anything normal. they're trapped in an endless cycle of killing and dying.#and lucy. lucy WON'T hurt HIM. but they'd still kill anyone else. including nancy.#so steve would hate him. at first. but how do you keep hating someone for killing your friends-#-when you're trapped in a place where death and pain ultimately mean nothing. whereas an act of mercy means everything?#it would be SUCH a complicated dynamic and I deeply enjoy trying to unweave how steve could ever love lucy back.
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