#but it doesn’t go as in depth as it does in the books

[frannyzooey]

In The Dark: One Shot

Series Masterlist

Ezra x m!reader

Rating: E (filth and yearning, my friends)

Summary: Six weeks after Birdie has left, a glimpse into how Ezra tries to forget.

A/N: all the thanks to my bestie in crime, @the-scandalorian who said “when will this freak be in MY sheets” and she was so real for that ❤️

--

It’s been over a month, and the wound is still raw. 

He’s tried to keep busy in so many ways: driving further for deliveries, taking on harder jobs that tire him out, seeking out his friends for a few drinks or a movie or dinner. Anything to keep him from reaching for his phone to text you or call you. 

Distractions, which is what he needs tonight. 

The itch to grab his phone is strong, so he grabs his keys instead. Stuffs his wallet in his back pocket, some condoms in the front. Steps out into the dusk and with a quick, restless stride, makes his way towards the nearest station. The train is crowded, not unusual for a Friday night and so are the streets when he gets off: streams of pairs, of groups, of single people like him all headed their way somewhere. 

A thought pops into his mind, the way you used to wonder aloud where everyone was going. You used to watch them from your window, the steam from the tea clutched in your hands curling into the air, and for a brief, painful moment, he sees it. Your profile, your cheeks stretched with a grin, your hand patting the cushion next to you, beckoning him closer. In nothing but a tank top and your underwear, you’re a vision – a literal one that he shakes free as he opens the door to the bar.

It’s loud, but that’s good. 

It doesn’t take him long to find someone. He’s never one to be shy about looking at someone with blatant want, and it takes only a few minutes before the man approaches him. It’s only been men since you left. He can’t bear the touch of another woman, with all their softness and sweetness and curves. He needs a hardness that matches his own: rough kisses, harsh grips. 

Ezra orders the man a beer to match the one he’s finishing off, and they talk for a while, leaning on the bar. He’s a drummer in a band, here to see his friend play. He’s got intricate tattoos that run the length of his arms, molding to the sinewy muscles. He’s got eyes so rich with depth that Ezra finds himself drawn in the longer they talk, empty bottles being replaced with fresh, full ones. 

He’s not you, and that’s perfect. 

A bundle of cash is thrown down on the countertop, and Ezra follows the man out of the bar, letting him guide him back to his place, just around the corner. The apartment is sparse in the way men’s often are. A couch, a coffee table, a couple of pieces of art on otherwise bare walls. Not as many books as Ezra would like to see, but that’s okay. He’s not here for intellectually stimulating conversation. 

He’s here to fuck. 

He’s here to forget the fact that he would rather be in someone else’s apartment, surrounded by their stacks of books, among other things that made it feel so cozy and lived in. So warm, just like the cloud of your bed, or the cradle of your thighs or – 

“You want a drink?” the man offers, standing next to his open fridge. 

Ezra shakes his head, coming closer. He reaches out, gently pushing the door shut. 

“No,” he replies. “Just you.”

—

The man’s bed is nothing like yours, but that’s okay. 

The sheets aren’t as soft and it doesn’t smell as sweet, but it does have a willing body with a tight hole and that’s all that matters right now. Something to turn his brain off for the night, to numb the deep ache that’s settled between his ribs. 

He aches now, but in a different way. A sweet, heavy ache deep in his balls as he tries not to come in the tight, wet fist of this man’s ass. The stranger is on his hands and knees, his back arched to take every one of Ezra’s rough thrusts, rocking back to meet every snap of his hips. His groans are deep and loud, his hands clenched in the plain sheets stretched over his mattress and Ezra runs a hand down his spine, his fingers splayed over his lower back. 

Tattoos extend all the way up to his shoulders and wrap around his ribcage. His body is gorgeous – all lean muscles and smooth skin; Ezra’s touch fits between his ribs along his sides as he bends forward to tug the man up. 

The stranger molds his back to Ezra’s front, and Ezra keeps a hand cradled at the base of his throat and fucks him harder, letting out his low, labored grunts into the nape of his sweat damp neck. His body is hard against Ezra’s, nothing like yours. When Ezra’s arm wraps around his front, he feels firm, flat planes instead of lush, weighted breasts. When his hand smoothes down the man’s torso, he feels a flat belly covered in scattered hair instead of plush, rounded softness. When Ezra’s hand dips lower, it wraps around a thick, stiff cock instead of finding a seam of wet, slick warmth. 

The man’s hand joins Ezra’s, the two of them pumping his cock in time with the beat of Ezra’s hips. Ezra wants something slicker, something to make the drag better, and he lets go, bringing his hand up to the man’s mouth. The man opens, sucking Ezra’s fingers in down to the knuckle, and they groan together, Ezra’s cock jerking inside. Ezra can feel the vibration of his hum around the thick digits and pulls them out of his mouth, bringing them back down to the man’s cock. 

“Fuck,” he groans when Ezra wraps him with a firm, slick hold, jerking him root to tip. He adds a slight twist to the motion, something he loves to do to himself, and when the man’s broad frames melt against Ezra’s, he grins. He pumps his fist faster, feeling the man clench around his cock, and when the man’s groans start to get louder, Ezra’s pace picks up. 

Sweat beads along his neck, and Ezra licks it up with a flat lave of his tongue. “It feels good, doesn’t it?” Ezra croons in his ear. 

When the man doesn’t answer, Ezra scrapes his teeth along the corded muscle, biting down. 

“Yes! Yes, fuck yes, it feels good. Jesus Christ. Fuck me.” 

The man is near babbling, his cock thickening in Ezra’s hold, beads of pre-come leaking steadily from the thick, rounded tip and Ezra swipes through the pearly mess, bringing his hand to his mouth. He sucks the sticky slick off the pad of his fingers, and lets out a lewd, deep groan into the man’s ear. The man whimpers, letting his head tip back against Ezra’s shoulder. 

Ezra’s got him cradled on his lap, his hand back on the man’s cock to finish him off, and when he starts to come with a shout and a steady stream of thick cum seeping through Ezra’s fingers, he digs his fingers into Ezra’s thighs, forcing himself down on Ezra’s lap to bury him as deep as he’ll get. 

Ezra’s chest is heaving, his body aching with the need to come, every muscle strung as tight as the hold he has on the man’s hair. He’s rough with him: pushing him forward on his hands and knees, digging into his hips with a harsh grip, pounding into the curve of his ass hard enough to bruise. His fingers dig into the crown of the man’s hair with a tug, and Ezra closes his eyes, teetering on the edge of his own release. 

The curve of your plush ass, the dig of your tiny fingers, the weight of your smaller frame enveloped by his. Your softer moans, the scent of your shampoo and your skin and the touch of your hair when he buries his face in it and the slick, tight warmth of your cunt or your ass as his hips jerk upwards – 

And then he comes, burying himself deep. 

He drops forward, catching his breath for a moment, resting his hands on the bed as his cheek rests on the man’s shoulder, and when he eases himself out, he feels slightly smug at the hiss he hears him let out.

“That was…a lot. Fuck, man,” the stranger laughs, breathless and sated. He drops down onto the bed, splaying out. His fingers dance along his tattooed stomach while he watches appreciatively as Ezra stands, tugging the condom off and knotting it. 

“The bathroom is over there.” The man waves his hand in the direction of the hallway.

In the tiny room, Ezra washes his hands and stares at himself in the mirror. He looks tired, even with his cheeks flushed with heat. 

His balls are empty, but so is everything else. 

He doesn’t stay long after that. A quick press to the man’s lips at his front door, a half-hearted promise to see him again sometime. He knows he probably won’t. 

He feels tired on his walk back home, his limbs drained of their restless energy, which is what he wanted – so he isn’t sure why he feels so..unsatisfied. Like he didn’t just fuck someone until they both finished. He wonders briefly if you’ve fucked anyone since you’ve been gone, and he immediately rebels against the thought…even though he knows he doesn’t have any right to. 

He just did, didn’t he? 

He wonders if you miss him like he misses you. If your world is tinted in Ezra-colored glasses like his is tinted in yours. If you also lay awake at night, staring at your face-down phone on your night stand, willing it to light with a text. 

He said he would give you time and space and he meant that. Christ, he did. He wouldn’t even be mad if you went out and had fun and fucked someone because that’s what he wants for you – to be young, to embrace this opportunity, to have those experiences. 

He just wishes it was still with him. 

Letting himself in the front door, he heads straight for the shower. Stripping his clothes, he stands under the steaming pressure, dropping his head between his shoulders. He lets the steady stream beat down on his back, washing the sweat of someone else off his skin. 

He sees a flash of your open mouth moaning in pleasure, your skin sliding against the shower tiles, and frustrated, he slams the water off. His cock comes to life, half hard between his thighs, and he ignores it, toweling off. 

Pulling on sweats, he should be tired enough to sleep after a fuck like that, but he heads in the direction of the living room instead, grabbing a beer on the way there. Slumping into the couch, he clicks the TV on. He pulls up his phone, swiping open the weather app. 

LONDON: 46F / 7C, 3AM 

The bright light of the TV illuminates his profile, and he sighs, setting the phone down. 

Are you in your bed? In someone else’s?

Hoping you’re safe, he slouches into the cushions and settles in for a sleepless night.

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

The Loudest Silence

YA contemporary

a newly Deaf-Hard of hearing girl moves across the country and starts a new school, struggling with navigating her disability and love for singing and lost friendships - determined to not make any new friends for the year she’s in Florida

and a boy struggling with family expectations and anxiety, after being made the fútbal captain even though he secretly ways to be on broadway, who quickly befriends her

bi & aroace-coded MCs

[paging-possum]

3.5 hours of sleep does crazy things to ones brain and by that I mean. Murderbot gender thoughts

[she-who-fights-and-writes]

“Show, Don’t Tell”…But This Time Someone Explains It

If you’ve ever been on the hunt for writing advice, you've definitely seen the phrase “Show, Don’t Tell.”

Writeblr coughs up these three words on the daily; it’s often considered the “Golden Rule” of writing. However, many posts don't provide an in-depth explanation about what this "Golden Rule" means (This is most likely to save time, and under the assumption that viewers are already informed).

More dangerously, some posts fail to explain that “Show, Don’t Tell” occasionally doesn’t apply in certain contexts, toeing a dangerous line by issuing a blanket statement to every writing situation. 

The thing to take away from this is: “Show, Don’t Tell” is an essential tool for more immersive writing, but don't feel like a bad writer if you can’t make it work in every scenario (or if you can’t get the hang of it!)

1. What Does "Show, Don't Tell" Even Mean?

“Show, Don’t Tell” is a writing technique in which the narrative or a character’s feelings are related through sensory details rather than exposition. Instead of telling the reader what is happening, the reader infers what is happening due to the clues they’ve been shown.

EXAMPLE 1:

Telling: The room was very cold. Showing: She shivered as she stepped into the room, her breath steaming in the air.

EXAMPLE 2:

Telling: He was furious. Showing: He grabbed the nearest book and hurled it against the wall, his teeth bared and his eyes blazing.

EXAMPLE 3 ("SHOW, DON'T TELL" DOESN'T HAVE TO MEAN "WRITE A LOT MORE")

Telling: The room hadn't been lived in for a very long time. Showing: She shoved the door open with a spray of dust.

Although the “showing” sentences don’t explicitly state how the characters felt, you as the reader use context clues to form an interpretation; it provides information in an indirect way, rather than a direct one.

Because of this, “Show, Don’t Tell” is an incredibly immersive way to write; readers formulate conclusions alongside the characters, as if they were experiencing the story for themselves instead of spectating. 

As you have probably guessed, “showing” can require a lot more words (as well as patience and effort). It’s a skill that has to be practiced and improved, so don’t feel discouraged if you have trouble getting it on the first try!

2. How Do I Use “Show, Don’t Tell” ?

There are no foolproof parameters about where you “show” and not “tell" or vice versa; it’s more of a writing habit that you develop rather than something that you selectively decide to employ.

In actuality, most stories are a blend of both showing and telling, and more experienced writers instinctively switch between one and another to cater to their narrative needs. You need to find a good balance of both in order to create a narrative that is both immersive and engaging.

i. Help When Your Writing Feels Bare-Bones/Soulless/Boring

Your writing is just not what you’ve pictured in your head, no matter how much you do it over. Conversations are stilted. The characters are flat. The sentences don’t flow as well as they do in the books you've read. What’s missing?

It’s possibly because you’ve been “telling” your audience everything and not “showing”! If a reader's mind is not exercised (i.e. they're being "spoon-fed" all of the details), your writing may feel boring or uninspired!

Instead of saying that a room was old and dingy, maybe describe the peeling wallpaper. The cobwebs in the corners. The smell of dust and old mothballs. Write down what you see in your mind's eye, and allow your audience to formulate their own interpretations from that. (Scroll for a more in-depth explanation on HOW to develop this skill!)

ii. Add More Depth and Emotion to Your Scenes

Because "Show, Don't Tell" is a more immersive way of writing, a reader is going to feel the narrative beats of your story a lot more deeply when this rule is utilized.

Describing how a character has fallen to their knees sobbing and tearing our their hair is going to strike a reader's heart more than saying: "They were devastated."

Describing blood trickling through a character's fingers and staining their clothes will seem more dire than saying: "They were gravely wounded."

iii. Understand that Sometimes Telling Can Fit Your Story Better

Telling can be a great way to show your characters' personalities, especially when it comes to first-person or narrator-driven stories. Below, I've listed a few examples; however, this list isn't exclusive or comprehensive!

Initial Impressions and Character Opinions

If a character describes someone's outfit as "gaudy" or a room as "absolutely disgusting," it can pack more of a punch about their initial impression, rather than describing the way that they react (and can save you some words!). In addition, it can provide some interesting juxtaposition (i.e. when a character describes a dog as "hideous" despite telling their friend it looks cute).

2. Tone and Reader Opinions

Piggybacking off of the first point, you can "tell, not show" when you want to be certain about how a reader is supposed to feel about something. "Showing" revolves around readers drawing their own conclusions, so if you want to make sure that every reader draws the same conclusion, "telling" can be more useful! For example, if you describe a character's outfit as being a turquoise jacket with zebra-patterned pants, some readers may be like "Ok yeah a 2010 Justice-core girlie is slaying!" But if you want the outfit to come across as badly arranged, using a "telling" word like "ridiculous" or "gaudy" can help set the stage.

3. Pacing

"Show, don't tell" can often take more words; after all, describing a character's reaction is more complicated than stating how they're feeling. If your story calls for readers to be focused more on the action than the details, such as a fight or chase scene, sometimes "telling" can serve you better than "showing." A lot of writers have dedicated themselves to the rule "tell action, show emotion," but don't feel like you have to restrict yourself to one or the other.

iv. ABOVE ALL ELSE: Getting Words on the Page is More Important!

If you’re stuck on a section of your story and just can’t find it in yourself to write poetic, flowing prose, getting words on the paper is more important than writing something that’s “good.” If you want to be able to come back and fix it later, put your writing in brackets that you can Ctrl + F later.

Keeping your momentum is the hardest part of writing. Don't sacrifice your inspiration in favor of following rules!

3. How Can I Get Better at “Show, Don’t Tell”?

i. Use the Five Senses, and Immerse Yourself!

Imagine you’re the protagonist, standing in the scene that you have just created. Think of the setting. What are things about the space that you’d notice, if you were the one in your character’s shoes?

Smell? Hear? See? Touch? Taste?

Sight and sound are the senses that writers most often use, but don’t discount the importance of smell and taste! Smell is the most evocative sense, triggering memories and emotions the moment someone walks into the room and has registered what is going on inside—don’t take it for granted. And even if your character isn’t eating, there are some things that can be “tasted” in the air.

EXAMPLE:

TELLING: She walked into the room and felt disgusted. It smelled, and it was dirty and slightly creepy. She wished she could leave. SHOWING: She shuffled into the room, wrinkling her nose as she stepped over a suspicious stain on the carpet. The blankets on the bed were moth-bitten and yellowed, and the flowery wallpaper had peeled in places to reveal a layer of blood-red paint beneath…like torn cuticles. The stench of cigarettes and mildew permeated the air. “How long are we staying here again?” she asked, flinching as the door squealed shut. 

The “showing” excerpt gives more of an idea about how the room looks, and how the protagonist perceives it. However, something briefer may be more suited for writers who are not looking to break the momentum in their story. (I.e. if the character was CHASED into this room and doesn’t have time to take in the details.)

ii. Study Movies and TV Shows: Think like a Storyteller, Not Just a Writer

Movies and TV shows quite literally HAVE TO "show, and not tell." This is because there is often no inner monologue or narrator telling the viewers what's happening. As a filmmaker, you need to use your limited time wisely, and make sure that the audience is engaged.

Think about how boring it would be if a movie consisted solely of a character monologuing about what they think and feel, rather than having the actor ACT what they feel.

(Tangent, but there’s also been controversy that this exposition/“telling” mindset in current screenwriting marks a downfall of media literacy. Examples include the new Percy Jackson and Avatar: The Last Airbender remakes that have been criticized for info-dumping dialogue instead of “showing.”)

If you find it easy to envision things in your head, imagine how your scene would look in a movie. What is the lighting like? What are the subtle expressions flitting across the actors' faces, letting you know just how they're feeling? Is there any droning background noise that sets the tone-- like traffic outside, rain, or an air conditioner?

How do the actors convey things that can't be experienced through a screen, like smell and taste?

Write exactly what you see in your mind's eye, instead of explaining it with a degree of separation to your readers.

iii. Listen to Music

I find that because music evokes emotion, it helps you write with more passion—feelings instead of facts! It’s also slightly distracting, so if you’re writing while caught up in the music, it might free you from the rigid boundaries you’ve put in place for yourself.

Here’s a link to my master list of instrumental writing playlists!

iv. Practice, Practice, Practice! And Take Inspiration from Others!

“Show Don’t Tell” is the core of an immersive scene, and requires tons of writing skills cultivated through repeated exposure. Like I said before, more experienced writers instinctively switch between showing and telling as they write— but it’s a muscle that needs to be constantly exercised!

If I haven’t written in a while and need to get back into the flow of things, I take a look at a writing prompt, and try cultivating a scene that is as immersive as possible! Working on your “Show, Don’t Tell” skills by practicing writing short, fun one-shots can be much less restrictive than a lengthier work.

In addition, get some inspiration and study from reading the works of others, whether it be a fanfiction or published novel!

If you need some extra help, feel free to check out my Master List of Writing Tips and Advice, which features links to all of my best posts, each of them categorized !

Hope this helped, and happy writing!

[chaosandmarigolds]

Could I go in depth into this? Yes. And will I? Yes (in the upcoming fic) but rn you’ll get a lil dabble

Simon Riley! Who lives by routine, he thrives on it- after years in the military it’s ingrained into his DNA

Simon Riley! Who takes feeding schedule for the baby very seriously, naturally waking up at 2am even if you were not awake-

“Simon, baby- come back,”

“In a minute luv,” he would mumble, leaning over the bed to press a chase kiss to your face, “gonna get Tessie her bottle ‘n I’ll be back, yeah?”

Simon Riley! Who makes Ollie is up and ready by seven am (since you said six was a bit early)

Simon Riley! Who likes cooking, and depending on the dish- he’s pretty good at it (don’t ask him to make pasta, bad idea)

Simon Riley! Who is baffled when one of the workers at the elementy school (he giving Ollie his lunch and brought Tess with him) told him that it was a ‘woman’s duties to watch the newborn

“I mean- look at you, it little embarrassing, don’t you think?”

…

..

“Yer one of those ‘incel’s my son was tellin be ‘bout, yeah?”

Simon Riley! Who still has to do conferences and trainings and whatnot but lord knows that man is on face time on the drive there and back; happily listening to whatever Ollie had to say or just being on the phone while you slept

Simon Riley! Who shows his love through installing a new shower head (the one you had been eyeing for a solid two months), helping you garden (gripes about his knees the whole time but nonetheless) or just sitting in your presence

Simon Riley! Who lets you ramble, doesn’t matter what about, butterflies, trucks, stationary, books, music, fishes any and everything that caught your attention he thinks is the new ‘thing’

On that! He buys you things related to what you love- if you love prehistoric reptiles (dinosaurs) oh look at that! Matching pjs for the whole family

Simon Riley! Who plays peek a boo with Tess on his lap during breakfast, the baby squealing with laughter, which would in turn cause his own

Simon Riley! Who makes sure to always keep the flowers on the dining room table fresh

Simon Riley! Who calls you at random times-

“Hi, honey, what’s up?”

“Does Ollie still like green?”

“Mm?”

“Foun’ a bike, his size, it’s green though- tha’ be alright?”

—

“Hey-“

“I love you.”

…

“A lot. Love you a lot.”

“A…are you okay? What’s going on?”

“Johnny…he-..somethin happened, I’ll be back tonight- yeah?”

“Simon…”

“I love you. Tell the kids that too.”

annnnd heres the fic Last Call

(Annnnnyway that’s all! Comments, feedback and all that jazz means so so much to me! <3))

[cameronspecial]

hii! I really love and enjoy all of your writings, you are so amazing and talented!

I checked just to be sure before I ask if you could write about rafe being/having casual dominance towards a clumsy!reader but she doesn’t really notice she’s clumsy or a bit reckless?

i’m so sorry if this doesn’t make sense my english isn’t that good but it’s okay if you don’t want to this, I love your work anyway! thank you so much!

Clumsy Princess

Pairing: Rafe Cameron x Reader

Warnings: N/A

Pronouns: She/Her

Word Count: 0.5K

A/N: You are so sweet, thank you!

Masterlist

Rafe knows how to control his body. He is aware of every movement he does and how it affects and is affected by his environment. He is practically Spider-Man. Y/N, on the other hand, is the completely opposite. She bumbles around the world like a baby doe on freshly born legs. Her depth perception is severely lacking and it has led to a variety of bruises all over her body. However, ever since she started dating Rafe, the number of her accidents has dwindled.

———

The couple walks hand-in-hand around the aquarium, taking their time to look at the different exhibits. Rafe booked out the whole place, so they didn’t worry about other people being in the way. The first place she has wanted to go is to look at the turtle and they have been making their way to the animals for five minutes now. They finally spot the hard-shelled sea creatures and her face lights as bright as a star. She rushes to the tank while dragging him behind her. As soon as they get to the tank, he places the back of his hand against the glass around her height. She can’t question what he is doing because before she can, the momentum of her hurry to get to the glass causes her forehead to hit his hand. Her left hand reaches up to rub where a bump would have been forming if not for Rafe and she turns to him with a thankful smile. “Thank you, Baby.” She rises on her tippy toes to place a kiss on his lips. 

———

Her hand is looped into his as they walk down the street after leaving the aquarium. They are heading to Chinatown to get something to eat. “And I told her that she was being mean…” The words Y/N is saying fade away from Rafe’s ears as he sees the street lamp coming up and he has a fortune-teller moment. He nods with a smile, pretending to listen. As they pass the lamp, he is sure to tug her to his side. She narrowly misses walking into the pole, yet she doesn’t notice and she continues on with her story. “She said I was the one at fault.” Rafe can now focus on his girlfriend’s words because there are no dangers in sight. 

———

They get back home and she can’t wait to get to their room to watch Coco like Rafe said they could. He holds her hand whilst she stumbles over her shoes as she takes them off, but she lets go of it as she runs to the stairs. Rafe is right behind her. She rushes up the stairs and feels his hands on her waist. As he predicted, she was going too fast and would’ve missed the first step, which would’ve caused her to face plant right into the steps. She straightens up and looks at him with a sheepish grin. He returns the smile and rests his hand against her lower back to help her upstairs. 

Taglist: @winterrrnight @loves0phelia @thelomlisrafecameron @wickedlovely121 @thepatriarchykeychain @drewsmusee @starkowswife @maybankslover @forstarkey @loving-and-dreaming @magicalyoura @rubixgsworld

[gracexthoughts]

the strong

jacaerys velaryon x targaryen!oc

warnings; slight canon divergence, cussing, canon typical incest, fighting, implied smut at the end (i cannot actually write smut to save my life sorry), s1ep8 spoilers ig summary; after vaemond's petition, aegon’s jesting, and aemond’s taunts, jacaerys is furious and seeks solace and advice from his step-sister and betrothed. inspired by tyrion telling jon to wear his bastardy “like armor so it can never be used to hurt'' him in the first ep of GOT (I’ve been rewatching to feed the brainrot) a/n; daenera is daemon’s eldest daughter from his first marriage, in my head daemon didn’t kill rhea and she died in childbirth just before rhaenyra’s wedding so daeny is about half a year older than jace but you can use your imagination as it doesn’t really matter.

“I dare you to say that again!” Jacaerys growls from the dancefloor. Daenera turns in her seat to see Jacaerys with his fists clenched, his eyes dark and glaring daggers at his uncle. The feast had been amicable considering the events of the day, but while the adults’ words of peace ring honest between them, animosity between the young princes, princess and ladies nears its boiling point. Prince Aegon has spent most of the evening cooing foul and crude jests to Jacaerys and Daenera about their soon approaching wedding. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Prince Aemond has added his own taunt to the pile: a thinly veiled comment on the Velaryon brothers' true parentage. 

“Why? Twas only a compliment,” Aemond defends, lowering his goblet to face Jacaerys, stepping towards him as he does. “Do you not think yourself Strong?” Jacaerys answers by bringing his fist up to Aemond’s jaw, the sound resonating through the hall. Lucerys leaps up from his seat, Vaemond’s slanders still heavy in his ears, but Aegon intercepts him, slamming him down on the table and sending food and silverware clattering from the impact. Daenera, ever protective of her siblings, leaps from her seat and wraps her arms around the eldest prince’s neck, putting all her weight against him to remove his hands from Lucerys. He grapples with her for a moment before she is ripped off by a Kingsguard. Knights separate Aegon from Luceryrs, Jacaerys from Aemond, and Rhaena pushes Baela back from leaping into the fray as well.

The Queen pulls her second son back, muttering angrily to him but he pulls away from her as Rhaenyra moves towards her sons and Daemon to his daughters. “I was merely expressing how proud I am of my family. Though it seems my nephews aren’t so proud of theirs!” Aemond continues to taunt, leveling a snide one-eyed glare at Jace. Jacaerys wriggles out of the guard’s grip and steps menacingly towards Aemond. 

“Wait, wait,” Daemon says, holding a finger up and stopping Jacaerys in his tracks, forcing him back to stand next to Daenera. 

“Go to your quarters, all of you. Go now!” Rhaenyra commands sternly, her eyes holding a warning as she stares down her eldest son and motions for the rest of her children, by blood and by marriage, to leave. 

“Come on,” Rhaena says softly, pulling her sisters along with her and out of the hall by their hands. Daenera relents with a sigh but not before squeezing Jacaerys’ and flashing him a sympathetic smile. 

“Are you alright, Daeny?” Baela asks as they make their way to their rooms.

“Fine, worried about the boys,” she mutters in reply.

“I’m sure Jace and Luke are alright, sister,” Rhaena says softly, wrapping her hand around Daeny and Baela’s arms. Daenera nods agreeing but still can’t shake the worry in her chest.

Near an hour later, a knock sounds on the door to Daenera’s chambers, pulling her from the depths of the book in her hands. “Come in!” she calls expecting one of her maids and, not bothering to stand from her comfortable position on the settee in front of the fire, turns to see who enters. “Jace,” the lady says softly as her betrothed steps into her chambers, his eyes still dark with rage. 

The pair have been betrothed for nearly ten years, the announcement made soon after their parents married, and as they grew up together they have grown a deep love for each other: a bond of unconditional trust and adoration between the future King and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Jacaerys comes to crouch in front of her, placing his hands on her knees and caressing the joint over the silk of her night gown. His tunic is gone, leaving him in just his white undershirt and trousers, Daenera’s eyes trail to the bit of collarbone she can from her vantage point. 

“Are you alright? Did Aegon hurt you?” the prince asks, searching her deep purple eyes that snap back to his face at his words. 

“I’m fine, Jace. If I can match you in a spar, I can handle myself against that drunken lecher,” she chuckles slightly, setting her book aside and reaching up to brush a stray curl away from his brow. “Are you alright?” She asks, reaching for his hand with its already darkening skin. She’d let her hair down to hang around her shoulders and even clouded by anger as his mind is, Jacaerys notices her etherealness. She has always been a sharp and unsettling kind of beauty, her eyes seeming to have the ability to gaze upon your soul, but Jacaerys relishes her softer side. The side she so rarely shows others.

“Wish I’d gotten more blows in,” he grumbles, standing and pacing in front of the hearth, his shoulders tight and face scrunched in anger. 

“Maybe you’ll have a chance before we return to Dragonstone,” she offers with a smirk. “The cunts deserve it, the pair of them.” 

“Will I never be free of this? Of these slanders that are whispered in my wake? Will they sneer at me when I sit on the throne? Ignore my rulings and snicker-” 

“Jace, breathe,” Daenera pleads, concerned with the rising panic she sees in his eyes. 

“I cannot, Daeny!” the prince exclaims, “How am I meant to be a King, a leader, when I am not respected?” 

“Darling, we are barely eight and ten, you are second in line at present. Respect will come with time. Once your mother is Queen the people will become familiar with you, with your grace, your kindness, your justness,” she says, placatingly, reaching out for his hand, forcing him to stop his pacing and look at her. “They will forget the slanders the Hightowers murmur because you will be a good and just King. Besides, it's your mother’s blood that makes you royal, not your father’s.” 

“And yet there will always be those who call me a Strong. The King cannot take every single one of their tongues,” he says with a heavy sigh, running a ringed hand through his hair in distress. Daenera considers this for a moment, knowing it is true enough, and Jacaerys sighs, turning to face the hearth, planting his hands on the stone and gazing down into the flames. 

“So make it a compliment,” the lady says after a long moment, leaning back on her arm on the settee, her deep amethyst eyes watching the prince. 

“Make the doubt of my paternity a compliment?” Jacaerys scoffs, turning to her. “How in the Seven Hells-” 

“If they shall call you ‘Strong’ no matter what, the more you rage against it the more power the slight has. The only way to take away its power is to show it cannot be used to hurt or diminish you. Take it as your moniker and wear it like armor so all know tis not a weapon they can wield against you.” 

“Jacaerys the Strong?” he asks slowly, the wheels turning behind his eyes, unable to deny the intelligence of her council. He sits down slowly next to Daenera, his eyes fixed on a point on the rug.

“King Jacaerys the Strong, First of His Name, King of the Andals and the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm,” she purrs, leaning towards the prince, a smirk on her lips. She watches as a firelight dances in his eyes, his pupils dilating at her proximity. 

“Hm, not bad,” he smiles, and leans down, connecting his brow with Daeny’s, running a finger calloused from years of practice with a blade across her jaw. 

“What is it?” Daenera asks softly after a moment, pulling away to look into Jace’s eyes, sensing he is still feeling troubled. 

“Nothing,” he shakes his head, not meeting her eyes. 

“Jacaerys,” she chides, cupping his face in her hands and forcing him to look at her. 

“Just… fucking Aegon… I fear he is right in his jests. I have no idea how to please you as you deserve,” Jacaerys confesses shyly, pulling his face from Daeny’s hands as heat creeps into his face. 

Daeny cannot help the laugh that escapes her lips, of all the troublesome worries that the day has brought, her sweet betrothed worries of her pleasure. Sex is not something the pair have discussed in length yet, even though their wedding is a little more than a moon away. The pair tend to flit around such topics, even when they steal secret kisses in dark corners of Dragonstone and come away with scarlet cheeks and racing hearts. 

“And now even you laugh at me!” He exclaims exasperatedly and stands to move away but Daenera quickly stands as well, stepping in front of him and stopping him from leaving. She pushes him back to his seat and kneels before him, her hands on his shoulders. 

“No, my love, I’m not laughing at you, I’m sorry. Tis just that you should not concern yourself with such worries,” she says gently, running her hand from his broad shoulder to the toned expanse of his chest, feeling his heart beating under his skin. 

“But I-” 

“I have no more knowledge on how to please a man than you do a woman, Jace,” she continues, her voice placating and soft. “We shall learn together and be stronger and better for it.” Jacaerys meets her amethyst eyes, finding comfort in the truth and lack of judgment he finds in them. “Besides, I cannot believe that Aegon knows any more than you do. He has never had any care for anything besides his own pleasures and you heard poor Helaena’s toast. He targets you because he knows you are more generous and loving than he could ever hope to be.”  Jacaerys chuckles at this, knowing she speaks true of his uncle and melts into her touch at last. 

“You truly do not care?” He asks, toying with the ends of her silver hair that brushes against his knee. 

“Shall I prove it to you, my prince?” she purrs, a teasing mischief in her eyes as she runs a hand up his chest to the nape of his neck, pulling him down to meet her lips in a kiss. He sighs into her embrace, his hands finding purchase on her waist as he deepens the kiss, his tongue darting between her lips. Realizing she is still kneeling on the floor in front of the settee, he grips her hips tightly and pulls her to straddle him, pulling a gasp from her lips which eggs the prince on. Jacaerys’ hands brush through Daeny’s hair, pushing it away from her face, and trail down her back to explore her figure; Daenera weaves one hand through his hair, tugging slightly at the roots and eliciting a groan she feels through her other hand which rests on his chest. 

Without warning, Jace stands and without breaking their kiss carries Daeny with him as he makes his way to the bed, resting her gently on the linen sheets and covering her smaller body with his. All his insecurities and rage momentarily forgotten as he loses himself in her, the only girl he has ever had eyes for, and proves to her, and to himself, just how strong a lover he can be.

[krummholz-go]

The Final 15 - Aziraphale’s Perspective

I see a lot of empathy for Crowley’s experience during the final 15 minutes of season 2 and it makes sense that we feel deeply for him. What he is experiencing is very human - acknowledging the depth of his own feelings, plucking up the courage to say something, having it come out all wrong, feeling utterly rejected, and then walking away in a mix of pain and anger. Who among us hasn’t been there?

But Aziraphale is experiencing something more complicated, something fewer of us have analogs for. Aziraphale has internally acknowledged his feelings for Crowley for some period of time, probably at least since 1941. Michael Sheen confirms this mental state in a NYCC 2018 interview:

“I decided early on that Aziraphale just loves Crowley. And that’s difficult for him because they are on opposite sides and he doesn’t agree with him on stuff. But it does really help as an actor to go, ‘My objective in this scene is to not show you how much I love you and just gaze longingly at you.’”

Unlike Crowley, Aziraphale’s struggle isn’t acknowledging his feelings. His struggle appears to be two-fold: 1) believing that Crowley could ever love him back and 2) even if Crowley did love him, believing a future for the two of them together could exist within the restrictions of his larger world view.

Can Crowley love?

Angels are, traditionally, beings of love. We see Aziraphale embody this time and again, showing kindness and support to almost everyone he meets, including the amnesiac Gabriel who has treated him abominably in the past. He is attuned to love, remarking on how the area around Tadfield “feels loved” twice in Season 1. As for how Aziraphale personally understands and expresses love, he shows his love to others through verbal affirmation and, to a lesser extent, physical touch. There are many examples of Aziraphale expressing his love for Crowley through positive verbal affirmation, typically by praising him for instances where he has been kind, nice, or good. And on the rare occasions when Aziraphale receives verbal praise, he absolutely interprets it as an expression of love, blossoming with happiness.

But from Aziraphale’s perspective, it may be unclear if Crowley can feel love in the same way. Can demons love? Did he lose that capability when he fell? Crowley can’t feel the aura of love in Tadfield that Aziraphale remarks on, and his reactions to Aziraphale’s praise are always to shrug it off, tell Aziraphale to “shut up,” or in the most extreme case to physically slam him against a wall and get in his face about it. In this last instance he tells Aziraphale, “I’m a demon, I’m not nice. I'm never nice. Nice is a four-letter word.” A four-letter word, like love, that is not in Crowley’s self-defined vocabulary.

If Crowley can feel love, does he love Aziraphale?

Even if Aziraphale believes Crowley is capable of feeling love, he does not always recognize how Crowley expresses it in the moment. Crowley shows his love for Aziraphale through actions, but Aziraphale often misconstrues Crowley’s motivations. In 1793 when Crowley rescues him from the Bastille, Aziraphale initially assumes Crowley is only there because he is responsible for the Reign of Terror. Similarly, in 1941, Aziraphale’s reaction to Crowley’s appearance is to assume he’s just part of the Nazi gang, saying,“I should have known. Of course. These people are working for you!”

Crowley doesn’t help matters in this regard because he is constantly muting and undercutting his signals to Aziraphale. Every time Crowley expresses his love for Aziraphale through actions - rescuing him, saving his books, even taking him to lunch - he does so in a nonchalant, dismissive manner, indicating he ascribes little value or importance to the actions he has performed. “I just didn’t want to see you embarrassed,” he says when he appears in 1941. And when Aziraphale positively glows with happiness about his books being saved, Crowley tells him to “shut up."On top of these confusing signals, Crowley is almost pathologically incapable of expressing his feelings in the verbal love language that Aziraphale can understand. This is heartbreakingly demonstrated in this scene after the bookshop fire:

Crowley can’t even say “I lost you.” Instead he speaks of Aziraphale in the third person while sitting in front of him, saying, “I lost my best friend.” The little hitch on Aziraphale’s face when he hears this is just devastating. Who is Crowley talking about? The last conversation they had before this scene was when Aziraphale called while Hastur was in Crowley’s apartment and Crowley said, “Not a good time - got an old friend here.” Aziraphale is left to wonder - is that who Crowley means when he says "best friend?" Crowley is everything to Aziraphale, but what is he to Crowley?

How Would It Even Work?

Even when Aziraphale does get flashes of the possibility that Crowley may care for him he immediately runs up against his second mental block - there is no world he can imagine where they could be together. When Crowley first suggests running off together in the bandstand scene in S1E3, Aziraphale collapses under the thought: “Friends? We aren’t friends. We are an angel and a demon. We have nothing whatsoever in common. I don’t even like you.”

While he is obviously in denial, Aziraphale is also under tremendous stress in this moment and is desperately trying to hold onto some stability by falling back onto his world view and ideology. In this state he backpedals all the way to “I don’t even like you.” In his understanding of the way the universe is supposed to work, he and Crowley are hereditary enemies and should not even be friends, much less in love. Aziraphale expresses this core belief throughout the series. What kind of existence could they ever have together in reality?

The Final 15

With this as a background, we can better understand what Aziraphale experiences in the final 15 minutes. Even before the Metatron enters the scene, Aziraphale begins to have his fundamental beliefs challenged which puts him off his footing. The revelation that Gabriel and Beelzebub are in love is deeply impactful. When Beelzebub says “I just found something that mattered more to me than choosing sides” and takes Gabriel’s hand, Aziraphale immediately reaches out to make contact with Crowley, a look of incredulity on his face. Here is proof that demons can feel love and that an angel and a demon can carve out a space together. The road may be difficult, but it is not impossible.

Before Aziraphale can digest this revelation the stakes are ratcheted up: Michael threatens to erase Aziraphale from the Book of Life due to his part in hiding Gabriel. The future that Aziraphale has just barely glimpsed is already under siege. It is at this point that The Metatron enters, offering Aziraphale not just survival and protection, but a version of everything he has ever wanted.

If Crowley is reinstated as an angel, Aziraphale will no longer have to wonder whether Crowley is capable of feeling love. And if they are both angels, there will be no conflict inherent in having a life together. In one fell swoop, the Metatron entices Aziraphale with a future where there are no remaining blockers to an eternal, loving existence with Crowley. It will be “like the old times, only even nicer” because they now have millennia of their shared history to build on together. Of course this logic is horribly flawed and does not take into account at all what Crowley wants, but in the moment it must feel like an enormous gift to Aziraphale.

Unfortunately, not only is Crowley’s reaction to this “incredibly good news” not what Aziraphale expects, the conversation quickly takes a baffling turn for him. Crowley shuts down the talk about returning to heaven and attempts to say what he wants to say. Sadly he once again utterly fails to speak in a way that Aziraphale can understand.

The audience knows what Crowley is trying to say because we have the context of his earlier conversation with Maggie and Nina. But Aziraphale lacks that and thus can’t understand where this is coming from or what it means. Rather than expressing his feelings as Beelzebub and Gabriel did, Crowley recites facts: we’ve known each other a long time, we’ve been on this planet a long time, I could always rely on you, you could always rely on me. He can’t even say the word “couple” when he describes them, referring to them more as colleagues with words like “team” and “group.” And the one time he does try to express his feelings and desires he is physically unable to get out the words: “And I would like to spend—.” He then retreats into his old plea to turn away from heaven and hell and run off together. Nowhere in Crowley’s confession does Aziraphale hear “I love you” or even “I want to be with you.” What he hears instead is what he’s heard multiple times before - Crowley wants to abandon both heaven and hell and default to just the two of them. From Aziraphale’s perspective this will not solve anything for them. They will still be an angel and a demon, at some level fundamentally separated by their very natures.

Having failed in his speech, Crowley then does two things in rapid succession that must be excruciatingly painful for Aziraphale. First, he does the opposite of verbal affirmation by calling Aziraphale an idiot. We have seen Aziraphale become physically radiant in the rare instances where Crowley has praised him, so a direct insult like this must feel poisonous. Then Crowley makes a last desperate attempt to communicate through Aziraphale’s other love language - physical touch - by initiating the kiss. But without context or understanding of what is behind it, Aziraphale can initially only experience it as forceful, angry, and shocking. With more time to parse it I think Aziraphale will come to understand Crowley’s meaning, but in the moment it must feel manipulative and borderline cruel.

The Results

In a very compressed time frame, Aziraphale has to move quickly and radically through multiple mental and emotional states. For 6000 years he has believed he and Crowley cannot be together. Suddenly, with the revelation of Gabriel and Beezlebub, that foundational belief is challenged. Before he can work through what that could mean for him and Crowley, the Metatron offers an even cleaner solution - they can be protected from retribution and be on the same side again. When Crowley rejects reinstatement wholesale, it makes Aziraphale feel that he and his loving offer of a life together have been personally rejected. Then that rejection is further confused through the shocking experience of the kiss which Aziraphale does not have adequate context for or time to understand and integrate. In his emotional turmoil, Aziraphale falls back on his default crutch for dealing with sadness and anger - forgiveness - which further cuts him off from Crowley. Taken all together, this is a tumultuous rollercoaster of whiplash emotions that pull at every part of Aziraphale's self- and world-views.

Compared to what Crowley is going through, I think Aziraphale is going to have the tougher road in Season 3. Crowley may still need to better reconcile and integrate his feelings for Aziraphale, but Aziraphale has 6000 years of foundational ideology to challenge and evolve to reach a place where he and Crowley can be together as their authentic selves.

[chosolala]

geto headcanons ⋆౨ৎ˚⟡˖ ࣪

my bad for edging u guys with false promises of content 😭 please accept my apology in the form of cute and silly geto headcanons :]

he’s really sentimental (w some ppl, apparently not his parents) but secretive about it, like he probably has a box hidden deep under his bed of cards, gifts and notes given to him over the years

feeds stray animals behind peoples back

he’s in touch with his feminine side, like he has an in-depth skincare and shower routine, you will NOT catch him lacking

if you’re in a relationship with him, his go to when he messes up is leaving flowers and a note at your door

the type of guy to listen to you talk shit but never say anything mean himself

he’s probably a really good cook, mama geto does not play in the kitchen.

remembers little things people tell him

^^ because of this he gives the most meaningful gifts

doesn’t really like people touching his hair but still lets you and his girls do silly hair styles on him

probably really uncomfortable with people touching him, he and gojo probably had fights because gojo kept slapping getos butt despite geto telling him not to

the type of guy to have piercings that aren’t super noticeable right away (same with tattoos)

i feel like he’d be terrible at drawing and he thinks it’s no big deal until everyone wants to play pictionary (everyone has pictures of his art saved in their phones for blackmail purposes)

probably plays guitar in his free time

i feel like he’d like nu metal music but also oldies like marvin gaye or something

trivia goat, he knows so much about random things

also i feel like he’d love watching movies in his free time, he seems like a horror movie kinda guy

i feel like he’d have a cat that he literallt treats like his kid

play video games with gojo and gen gets so angry bc he gets his ass beat everytime without fail

i know he’d get to cheating after a certain point too, he’d probably cover gojos eyes or ‘accidentally’ unplug gojos controller

unintentionally a backseat driver

did matching stick and poke tattoos for him gojo and shoko in highschool

he may have lost every fight he’s been in but he will NOT lose and argument, when they go low, geto goes lowER

i feel like he’s unaware of his looks, like sometimes he gets free drinks and compliments but assumes people are just being nice or he’s just lucky, not that he’s actually super handsome (hello sailor ;)

pin and sticker collector, but he doesn’t do anything with them like he just has them

really good at first person shooter games (but gojo refuses to play those with him)

i feel like he’d read books catered to a female audience and he’d be kind of embarrassed about it, like what do u know about girl interrupted 🤨

his closet is like 80% band tees

takes games so seriously, like he’s very competitive especially w gojo

when he’s feeling indecisive about something he literally asks an 8ball

.5 iphone picture victim, his girls constantly sneak in .5 pics of him

always wakes up early to make a good breakfast

literally gives the warmest hugs ever, his hugs could stop a person from crying

monster drink addiction

takes most of his skin/hair care from his girls, probably online shops with them too

hates shopping in person like in malls so whenever the girls want to shop he just gives them his card and tells them to keep their phones on

carries medicine on him at all times just in case, he’s prepared

[pricelessemotion]

poltergeists for sidekicks | E.M.

summary: [2.3k] the kids drag eddie to the halloween store where you happen to work.

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

warnings: fluff, pining, eddie being a lovestruck idiot, r wears big prescription glasses and is described as having messy hair

a/n: happy halloween! here’s something i’ve been working on for ages just in time for the end of spooky szn! xoxo

masterlist

Eddie doesn’t hate Halloween. 

He used to love Halloween. He likes autumn. He likes watching the leaves change colors. He can appreciate the novelty of a hot apple cider and a hay ride. Hell, ever since he was old enough to go trick or treating, he reveled in it. Free candy and all he had to do was put on a costume and say three magic words? Sign him up. 

As he got older, he started to like Halloween for a slightly different reason. Don’t get him wrong, he still liked the free candy, but he liked the excuse to be someone else for a night. He liked how he could throw on a Michael Meyers mask and go door-to-door and be greeted with glee and sweets. 

It does a funny thing to a kid’s self-esteem, being treated better when he’s wearing the face of a fictional serial killer. 

Now, though, Eddie Munson is decidedly too old for trick or treating. He’s resigned himself to spending the holiday like it was any other day by spending the night in his room, playing guitar, and coming up with new campaign ideas. 

Which is exactly what he was doing when three freshmen started pounding down the door of the trailer demanding entry. Within moments, they are practically on their hands and knees asking, nay begging, for the older boy to take them to get last-minute Halloween costumes.

“Aren’t you guys too old to go trick or treating?”

“This is why we need to go to the store! If we wear masks, no one will be able to tell how old we are, hence extending our years of candy collecting.” Dustin explains, matter of factly.  

Eddie sighs, leaning back into the sofa, steepling his fingers together. “What’s in it for me?”

The three boys huddle together, conspiring in a manner that is not dissimilar to the way they plan their counterstrikes during Hellfire. They nod in sync, turning around so that Lucas is standing front and center, flanked by the two other boys.  

“That one girl you like is working there.”

Eddie remains stone-faced, quipping sarcastically, “That’s very specific.”

Mike lets out an exasperated groan, threading his fingers through his hair before yanking at the ends in frustration. “Y’know, the weird one. Coke bottle glasses, messy hair, always holding a book?”

Lucas’ eyes widen. Dustin smacks Mike on the chest and the hollow sound rings out through the empty trailer. They all start talking over each other, with two of them berating the third for A. being insensitive and B. expecting a good outcome from said insensitivity. 

Eddie wants to make a comment that your hair is not messy, it’s actually more voluminous. Besides, his hair is messy and he likes to think it makes him look badass. The glasses comment was a little unfair. Sure, the frames are a similar shade to the iconic green of the bottles of Coca-Cola. But the magnification was endearing, leaning more towards doe-eyed than bug. Unfortunately, Eddie did not consider that while he was observing you, someone might’ve been observing him. 

The assurance of your presence is how Eddie ends up here, parked outside of a hardware store turned seasonal shop. He’s helping his friends. He’s supporting a local business and therefore contributing to the local economy! You being here is just a bonus.

A bell rings above them as he swings open the door, the motion setting off a scratchy pre-recorded cackle. He’s gotta hand it to whoever is running the store. They’ve gone out of their way to transform the dingy overhead fluorescents and worn-out linoleum into something that actually resembles an eerie boutique. 

“Welcome in! I’ll be right witch you!” Your voice lilts out from the depths. 

You appear out of the darkness, expertly weaving under fake cobwebs and pushing aside fanciful drapes that have no doubt been strung up precariously around the store to add to the ambiance. You’ve got a witch’s hat on, tall and black and pointy, which further explains the pun you greeted them with. 

“How can I help you?” You smile brightly, adjusting your glasses. 

The younger boys barely spare you a glance, just a chorus of we’re good! before running off to the other side of the store, where all of the costumes are located. 

You barely blink at their rudeness. Whether that’s indicative of your experience in customer service or due to your generally sunny disposition, Eddie isn’t sure. You turn your smile and magnified gaze at him, “What about you?”

Eddie startles only slightly. He begins to peek over his shoulder as if there’s somebody else in the mostly deserted store that you could be talking to. What about him?

“Oh, I don’t need anything. I just came here with–” He gestures vaguely in the direction that the boys wandered off to. “The little shits that left me in the dust.” 

You bark out a laugh, a small smile settling on your lips. “It’s sweet of you to help them out.”

Eddie only blushes in response, murmuring a quiet it’s nothing, scratching the back of his neck like he might find a switch that’ll make him remember how to talk like a normal human being.   

“Well, if you change your mind, let me know.”

You pick up a clipboard and a pen and start leisurely strolling down the decor aisle, making inconsequential markings on the paper. Whenever you come across gaps in the shelves you reach back into them, pulling the products to the front edge with a concentration that is quite adorable. 

He’s definitely staring by now. Feigning interest in a skull-shaped candy bowl, Eddie scrambles for something, anything to keep the conversation going. “I’m surprised you’re not busier.”

“You just missed the afternoon rush.” You say, straightening a pair of plastic tarantulas that have gone askew. “Not too many people came today, though. I guess they realized that it’s so close to the holiday that the shelves would be picked over.”

“Really?”

You shrug, “I think by October 30th, most people figure if they’re gonna dress up, they’d rather just pull together something from their closets than spend money. We’re actually busier the day after Halloween because everything gets marked down and people want cheap candy.”

“Makes sense.” He nods. “So, I take it you’re a big fan of Halloween?”

Your smile is apprehensive as if you’re not sure if he’s making fun of you. Your fingers brush the brim of the witch’s hat. “What gave me away?” 

He falls into step beside you, clasping his hands behind his back and puffing out his chest. “I just had a feeling.” Then, feeling much braver than usual, he adds, “I like your outfit.”

You look at him again, clutching the clipboard to your chest. For once, your eyes are leaning more towards bug-eyed. The black velvet dress has draped sleeves and a skirt that swishes with every step. Orange and black striped tights protect your legs from the inevitable chill that comes with October in Indiana. “You do?” 

“I do.” He insists, “It totally adds to the magical vibe. If you told me that you were an actual witch and this was just something you do to pass the time I’d one hundred percent believe you.” 

All apprehension has slipped off your face, replaced by a genuine smile that cracks open his chest. “Thanks…” You trail off.

“Eddie.” He supplies. 

“Well thank you, Eddie. I’d tell you my name but I’m guessing I don’t have to.” You say, rubbing the plastic name plate on your chest. 

Eddie does know your name, but it isn’t because of your name tag. He was far too proud to ask around for your name, and far too afraid of rejection to ask you himself. He’d been lucky enough to get a library book right after you. He’d pulled the weathered paper from the slip, seen your name at the bottom of the checkout card, traced the loopy letters with the pad of his fingers. It had definitely been more than a little pathetic. 

Eddie coughs, clearing his throat, trying to maintain any semblance of nonchalance. “Do you have any plans for Halloween?” 

Your face slowly lifts from the clipboard, twirling your pen between swift fingers polished in a deep burgundy. Directing your gaze at him, you peer through dark lashes and Eddie’s never been more thankful for the inventor of coke bottle glasses. The magnification allows him to see the spark of intrigue dancing across your pupils. 

“I was just gonna stay home. Maybe help my mom pass out candy.” The implication of the last sentence seems to hit you. You look down again, scrunching up your nose. Eddie finds it endearing how your first instinct is honesty rather than anything else. 

“Cool. That’s cool,” Eddie says in a manner that is decidedly uncool. He fiddles with his rings before shoving his hands into his pockets. “Actually, I was wondering if—” 

Suddenly, Eddie feels stupid for getting lost in your eyes and not paying attention to his surroundings. Maybe then he would’ve noticed how the linoleum got ever so slightly softer under the soles of worn-out boots. He would’ve seen the cloaked figure looming in the alcove, waiting for some unwitting soul to step on the pressure plate.

Unfortunately, Eddie did not see any of those things. The poltergeist, or ghost, or whatever the fuck it is swings out. He stumbles backward, releasing a shriek that is so high-pitched, that he wonders if he should start tapping into his upper range. Maybe it would add more texture to Corroded Coffin’s Tuesday night sets. 

Instinctively, his arms fly backward, as if to protect you. He stumbles right into you, and he’s sure that if you didn’t grab his waist from behind, you would’ve fallen right over. Unfortunately, the movement has both of you careening back into a shelf, sending bags of overpriced candy and shitty Halloween decorations tumbling to the ground in a cascade of all things creepy and corny. He quickly spins around.

“Shit, are you–”

“I’m so sorry!” 

“I should’ve warned you–”

At that moment, chests heaving and hearts racing, you both seem to realize that your hands are still grazing Eddie’s waist. You spring apart, scrambling to clean up the display, haphazardly grabbing the fallen items and placing them back in their rightful places on the shelves. Among them is your hat, another casualty of the calamity. 

“I should’ve warned you,” You say again, slightly out of breath. “That thing nearly scares me to death every other day.” 

“It’s fine. I should’ve paid attention to where I was walking. It just added to the whole spooktacular experience.” He picks up the hat from the floor, dusting it off. “I think this belongs to you.” 

You give a bashful smile, but instead of putting the accessory in your outstretched hand, he gingerly places it on top of your head. Your glasses have slid down your nose from bending over to clean up his mess, and his thumbs gently push the joints of the frames until they’re sitting in their rightful place. 

“There,” He punctuates his statement with a resolute tug on your hat, making sure it’s securely on your head. “Perfect.”

You preen at him, eyes sparkling, before you cast them down at the floor. Dustin comes running around the corner, closely followed by Mike and Lucas. All of them are carrying armfuls of miscellaneous Halloween supplies, obviously alarmed at the clamor, but not alarmed enough that they didn’t take their sweet time coming from the opposite end of the store. Eddie takes advantage of your bashfulness and distinctly shoots them a look that says get the hell out of here. Dustin’s eyes dart between the two of you before they widen and his mouth forms a small oh. He sends Eddie an exaggerated wink, walking backward in order to not interrupt the private moment, dragging his two friends along with him.

“Thanks,” You smile at him. “For protecting me. I know who to bring with me if I ever want to walk through a haunted house.” 

He gives a lopsided grin, “My pleasure.”

“Ahem.” You clear your throat, “Anyways, what are your plans for Halloween?”

This is it. This is the moment that Eddie has been waiting for since he put down his guitar and his notebook and opened the trailer door. 

“That depends.” He clasps his hands behind his back, jutting his chin up in the air. “Are you working tomorrow?”

“I get off at four.” 

“The Hawk is doing this continuous horror movie marathon. Maybe you would want to go?” Eddie’s fingers are practically vibrating with excitement. He nearly forgets the most important part. “With me? I mean— Only if you like horror movies, I just figured because I’ve seen you walking around with that Stephen King novel. NOT that I’ve been watching you or anything!”

You let out a small giggle. The fact that you’re laughing and smiling is a good sign, even if it is slightly at his expense. He decides to lean into self-deprecation, hoping it’ll seem more charming than desperate. 

“I’d say I don’t scare easily, but I think we’d both know that’s a lie by now.”

You scribble something near the bottom of the paper on the clipboard, delicately folding it and ripping it off before placing it in Eddie’s palm. 

“Well, I’ve heard horror movies are less scary if you have someone to hold your hand.”

It doesn’t even matter that a ghost animatronic essentially acted as his wingman. The note with your number on it sits heavily in his pocket, thumb tracing over looped ink. Even though it’s cold as shit, he embarrassed himself, and signs of the spooky season decorate every corner, Eddie has a smile that rivals even the best of jack-o-lanterns. 

As Eddie turns off towards the dirt path that leads to Forrest Hills Trailer Park, the smile still hasn’t faded. 

For once, the streets of Hawkins seem a little less haunted. 

likes are appreciated, comments and reblogs are cherished ♥️

[johannestevans]

Addressing Common Arguments Against “Consuming Harmful Content”

Challenging purity culture in online spaces and their fears of “problematic media”.

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Photo by Ethan Will via Pexels.

Constant and continuous arguments endure on social media about the dreaded and frightening spectre of problematic media — from television shows that supposedly “glorify” unhealthy relationships or “sexualise” and “excuse” abusive relationships; to erotica, adult books, and 18+ fanfiction that supposedly teach teenagers bad life lessons and impact their ethics; to anime and manga that surely must be the cause of child abuse the world over. 

I wrote an in-depth essay about the intellectual flaws in these reactionary assumptions, delving into their roots in lacking media literacy and rising anti-sex attitudes here: 

The above essay discusses at length many of the fears and anxieties that lead to this reactionary thinking, but does not challenge or explore the echo chambers that can arise in online spaces, particularly in aggressive environments such as Twitter/X, and for young or isolated individuals who are particularly vulnerable to peer pressure and fears of ostracisation if they admit to the “wrong” opinions.

Many of these arguments are used by “anti-shippers” within fandom and online spaces, the term commonly shortened as “antis” — if you’re unfamiliar with the term, these are people who define themselves as opposing one or more specific ships, fandoms, tropes, or kinks, often due to what they perceive to be their “problematic” or inherently “harmful” elements when engaged with or portrayed in various forms of media and art. Because of the virulent and highly aggressive nature of these online communities, these people — many of them young or isolated, often marginalised and disenfranchised from in-person, supportive environments — can become radicalised, and can experience great fear and anxiety at the premise of others holding different opinions or perspectives from the ones these online communities have impressed upon them should be held immutably by all.

In this piece I’m going to be addressing common arguments and assumptions seen on social media one by one — it is not really intended to convert the above, often radicalised individuals, but to provide support and guidance in understanding why their perspectives can be flawed, and how to engage with and deconstruct those arguments. 

It is also intended to provide support and structure to begin to engage with and potentially challenge or affirm your own beliefs and ideas about fiction, art, and other forms of media, and the extent of the impact it can have on you or others — this piece is me addressing these arguments with my own perspective, but I would encourage people to disagree with and critique my rebuttals!

The goal here is always more critical thought, analysis, and understanding, and that doesn’t come from automatically following another person’s line of thought or argument just because it’s well-poised or you particularly respect or like them — no matter who that person or people may be. 

--

“Depicting [a theme] in media is the same as glorifying it!”

Let’s first engage with what people might be discussing when they panic about “harmful content” and “problematic” ships or pieces of fiction.

They might worry about people reading or watching works that discuss or depict anything from violence, incest, sexual assault, age gaps, BDSM, kinky sex, child sexual abuse, trauma recovery, rape, rape recovery, drug use, bestiality, to abusive relationships or anything else, will encourage people to think positively about those acts, those traumas, and those experiences. 

You might look at the list of things I just wrote there and go, “Um, there are big differences between some of those things and the others!”

And yet the same consideration still applies. 

Just because a theme or idea is present in a work, or is depicted in it implicitly or explicitly, doesn’t mean it’s being “glorified” and portrayed as overwhelmingly positive — and even if a theme or aspect is being glorified, this does not mean we shall simply unthinkingly absorb that perspective.

Reading a story that contains something doesn’t mean I’ll automatically think that thing is good or bad, regardless of how it’s portrayed in fiction — the media and art we engage with doesn’t wholly change and adjust our own ethics and morals as soon as we’ve interacted with it. 

We might play a videogame and disagree with the way some themes are presented, have criticisms of them, whilst enjoying and appreciating others; we might read a piece of erotica and find some parts about it very hot, but find others disturbing and a little uncomfortable; we might watch a TV show and just think it’s in very poor taste, despite theoretically being up for the premise. 

Engaging with media does not turn off and on switches in our brains that make us completely “pro” or completely “anti” one premise or other. 

People are more complicated than that. 

We have complex and layered feelings about every argument and perspective there is, every experience there is, because human beings are social animals, and we experience very few things through an uncomplicated, binary lens. 

For me personally, I often seek out works that cover the same traumas and harms I’ve experienced — why? Because seeking out those themes helps me process and better understand what has happened to me, and how I’ve felt about it, how I’ve responded. 

“I don’t have a problem with people writing about certain harmful topics to show them as bad, but some people sexualise or fetishise them!”

I’m sure you’re right. 

Some people might write about rape to work out a complex trauma recovery narrative — others might write about rape in a work as kink. An author might well write with both goals in mind in the same work. 

A traumatic event doesn’t become less traumatic because it sexually aroused us or brought us physical pleasure — in fact, those feelings can add to the impact of a trauma and the inner conflict we experience in the aftermath. 

Some people undercut victims of sexual abuse by saying they “enjoyed” it, pointing out that they orgasmed or showed signs of arousal as signs they “secretly” wanted it, and these feelings can contribute heavily to shame and fear as a victim. 

Sexual arousal is a bodily response. It is not consent, and it’s not an excuse for assault or abuse. Moreover, some people might feel arousal or pleasure but not be fit to consent — for example, if someone is underage, or if someone is drugged or insensible with drink. 

These people cannot give knowledgeable consent, but abusers might still say after an assault that they “enjoyed” it. 

This is purity culture at work — anti-sex attitudes use people’s “enjoyment” of something to undercut their autonomy and right to consent, by implying they “deserve” that abuse — abuse is abuse whether it’s sexualised or not. 

But the thing is, the obverse applies. 

Just as someone’s mixed feelings or sensations of pleasure during a sexual assault does not mean they consented to the assault, or because someone’s feelings of happiness and love for their abuser does not mean they deserved the abusive treatment they experienced from them, a person writing sexually or erotically about a topic, or engaging with art and narratives about that topic, does not mean they actually want that thing to happen in real life, to real people, or to themselves. 

Fiction is not real life. 

We watch a horror film, and it doesn’t mean we want serial killers or demons to run amok, killing teenagers or possessing their victims — similarly, just because we engage with porn or erotica that sexualises certain topics doesn’t mean we’re pro- or in favour of those topics for real people. 

Rape fantasies are incredibly common, despite being highly stigmatised, and just because someone fantasises about this sort of control fantasy does not mean they actually want to abuse someone or be abused. 

“It’s harmful to depict abusive or immoral characters as sexy or desirable.”

If you have never experienced abuse, manipulation, or otherwise poor treatment from someone you thought was attractive, charming, or admirable, if you’ve never been groomed by someone with whom you were enamoured, I’m very glad. 

I’m happy for you, honestly. 

But many of us have. 

People want to believe that all abusers are evil, are ugly, are obvious from a distance, are blatant from the out. People want to believe they can “tell” someone is abusive just from a glance, and write them off — and that anyone who would or might spend time with that person is therefore “asking for it”, or “letting themselves” be abused. 

In actual fact, many abusers aren’t. 

Many abusers are beautiful and charming — some of them draw you in, slowly bring you closer and closer until it’s very difficult to untangle yourself from your need and craving for their approval. They ruin lives, ruin psyches, and they cause unspeakable damage to their victims. 

And yes, victims often feel conflicted in the aftermath of their abuse.

Many of us hero worship or greatly respect our abusers, love them very deeply, crave their good opinion, because we are carefully groomed and manipulated, over time, into relying on their praise and their attention. For victims isolated from other sources of care and support, and especially for young children and teenagers, it can be very difficult to recognise what is happening and has happened to us. 

Even after we know and understand exactly what has happened to us, and also internalised that it was wrong, we can still feel conflicted. 

We are not retroactively deserving of our abuse because we crave our abusers’ good opinion, or their love, still. This instinct does not excuse or justify the abuse we’ve experienced. Victims of abuse are still victims of abuse even if we go back to our abusers, even if we “accept” or attempt to justify our abuse to others, if we try to excuse it, if we don’t ask for help. 

Abuse is never the victim’s fault, no matter how imperfect we are as victims. 

“Writing queer characters as abusive is bad representation!”

If we exclusively write queer characters who are perfect and unimpeachable, we’re not letting ourselves write queer characters who are fully human, with all the flaws and complexities humanity comes with. 

Queer people are not less deserving of this complex representation than cishet people are — and in any case, the purpose of art and media is not exclusively to provide good representation, or to show good moral examples for others.

We create to express ourselves, to reflect the world, to critique it, laugh at it, commiserate over it, to feel our feelings, to connect and communicate with others through shared stories. 

If we only let ourselves do things that might be seen as “good rep”, we rob ourselves of the ability to express ourselves as completely as we might wish to. 

“If you write abusive queer characters, you’re just contributing to homophobia and bigotry in art and media!”

Queer people writing queer stories with queer villains is not the same as cishet people including queer people or queer-coded characters just to be villains. The power dynamic is completely different. 

Queer writers’ writing of queer villainy is often inspired by their own experiences, including of bigotry, and the harm they might do reflects harm by society, the ways harms might be felt more keenly by their victims. 

Writing queer villains as villainous because their queerness makes them (or is used as a shorthand for them being) predatory, cruel, or callous, is homophobic and is often shitty, whether people intend that or not. 

But just having queer villains, having queer characters do bad or abusive things, or just have flaws? 

That’s as much a part of queer humanity as having queer heroes and having queer characters do good and helpful things.

Why would you read about rape when you could read consensual non-consent?

[Consensual non-consent being a kink wherein partners agree to roleplay a non-consensual situation.]

Rape in fiction is a form of consensual non-consent. 

The fictional characters, who are not real and do not have real feelings, are not consenting, but the reader choosing to read is. 

In the same way that two people playing a CNC roleplay game in the bedroom might be a safe and fun way of experiencing or re-experiencing the fear and trauma of assault with an escape clause (a safeword), a reader can do the same — they can stop reading. 

If a television show, film, or videogame becomes upsetting, again, one can stop watching, stop playing. It is a person’s own responsibility to set safe boundaries for themselves and protect their own mental health. 

“Why would someone write about trauma and abuse when they could write fluff?”

Why would someone watch a horror movie when they could watch a romcom? Why would someone eat cheese when chocolate is an option?

People do not have to choose one or the other — many people like both horror films and romcoms, cheese and chocolate, and reading about both horrible shit and positive things. 

“You mentioned that people might engage with media about dark topics to work through their feelings from their own abuse. How do I know if someone’s actually been abused?”

Why do you think it’s your right to ask that? 

Why are you prioritising your personal comfort and curiosity over that person’s privacy? If your instinct is to try to license who is and isn’t allowed to engage with a piece of art or media, why? 

You are never entitled to the details of someone else’s abuse. Your validation is not important enough to potentially trade for someone’s private traumas and experiences. 

“If you write or create about certain topics as a survivor, you’re just perpetuating abuse and you are as bad as your abuser!”

Creating works of art or fiction about people who are not real experiencing fictional harm that is also not real, is not in any way equivalent to real people doing real harm to others. 

If your support of abuse survivors hinges on how palatable their reaction to their abuse is, and you believe that some abuse survivors “deserve” their abuse for depicting their abuse in art and fiction, you’re not actually supporting survivors. 

If you believe that all abuse survivors do or should act the same way, or respond the same way, to their abuses, you are mistaken. 

If you are effectively angry at someone for not looking enough like a victim, for being “impure”, and therefore the same as their abuser, that is a form of victim blaming. 

Do you hold artists who create media about non-sexual trauma or violence to a different standard than those who write about sexual trauma or violence? 

Why? What is the difference to you?

If someone writing about sexual abuse in media is equivalent to real life abuse, is a fictional murder?

“People shouldn’t write or engage with media about traumatic things, they should just go to therapy!”

Therapy is not a moral machine where bad people with bad thoughts go in and good people with good thoughts go in. 

Good therapy and counselling provides us with the tools to manage our own mental health, our own emotional and psychological needs, heal from our traumas, and so forth. 

Many therapists will actually recommend safe re-exposure to frightening or upsetting topics, and also encourage self-expression on the subject of one’s most impactful experiences, which might include creating art and media to explore and discuss their feelings. 

With that said, therapy is as flawed as any other tools for emotional catharsis and healing — therapy and mental healthcare can be very expensive or inaccessible because of one’s working schedule; some therapists and mental health professionals are abusive or bigoted; some people may not be in the right place for MH care or therapy at this time, et cetera. 

Therapy isn’t a catch-all for anything you disapprove of in someone else, and it’s also not a punishment to force someone to repent for their sins. 

“It’s okay to write a story to cope, but you shouldn’t publish it in case it upsets others!”

So long as the work has appropriate content warnings and/or is published or screened in an appropriate space, it is not inherently harmful. In fact, reading narratives and engaging with those narratives can be valuable for us. 

Engaging with media that bears similarity to our own lives, reflects our own experiences, written by other people who we know understand the complicated emotions of survivors — whilst still condemning the actions of abusers or not — can be extremely validating and offer a lot of assurance. 

This is especially useful in regards to media that shows victims having a codependent relationship with or still loving their abusers, or where their abusers are shown as sympathetic, whilst the narrative still shows the toxicity and pain caused by the relationship. 

Moreover, there can be a sense of reclamation and security in exploring stories about similar harm as we’ve experienced whilst knowing we are now in a place of safety and are free from those past experiences, or that other survivors have escaped and we can too. 

“If children read this work or watch this show or play this game, they might think that the things depicted in it are okay!”

Is the work rated G or PG? 

Is it shown on a children’s TV channel, or appear in a section that is marked for children? Is it put on a children’s website, where the primary audience is children? 

In short, is the work aimed at kids?

If no, then it’s not for kids. 

Particularly if a work is marked for adult audiences only, if it’s labelled erotica, if it’s marked M or E or NC-17, if it says it’s for adults or asks people to check a box agreeing that they’re an adult, then the work in question is most definitely not for children. 

Everything in the world doesn’t have to be child-safe just because children exist.

It is the responsibility of parents and guardians to appropriately supervise their children’s online use, and to teach children and teenagers internet safety, some of which includes setting appropriate boundaries for themselves and not seeking out content that might distress them, or to know what to do if they stumble across content that does distress them — namely, to speak with a trusted adult about their feelings and what they can do to manage them and look after themselves, and be looked after.

It’s not the responsibility of random other adults in the world not to make horror movies or watch porn or play adult videogames or anything else, just because a child could potentially learn of their existence. 

“But someone else engaging with that work might think the things depicted in it are okay!”

You’re right, they might do. 

They might also engage with the work and think things depicted in it are bad. Fiction does not exclusively exist for our moral education. 

“It makes me feel uncomfortable or unsafe that people are writing about [a topic] with a tone or in a manner that seems wrong to me!”

Yes, many of us feel uncomfortable with some topics being depicted in fiction, and might find them viscerally disgusting or triggering, consider them to be in poor taste, badly considered, or similar. 

This is normal and okay. 

It’s perfectly natural to have limits on what one can handle in fiction, or to find your ethical considerations don’t match up with the things other people make. 

But it’s our job, as responsible adults who look after our own mental health and consider our own boundaries, to avoid that content. 

You cannot control what other people think about, feel about certain topics, or how they portray them in fiction. You cannot control other people. 

You can only control your environment, your boundaries, and the works you choose to engage with. 

You can limit your time on social media, mute tags or keywords, block particular users or sites, or simply look away or leave the room / close the tab. 

“What about rampant problematic works on Ao3!?”

Works on Ao3 are not a real issue. 

They are not representation. Fanworks and original works on Ao3 are not the mainstream. They are being read exclusively by members of various internet subcultures who read fanfiction in those specific fandoms, after reading the tags. 

This doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t discuss certain tropes and norms in various fandoms — we might address our own biases around race, sexuality, religion, disability, and other characteristics, and how these biases and bigotries can come across in people’s approaches to fandom, the characters and ships they concentrate on, their headcanons, et cetera. 

The same can be said of people’s original creations. 

Ao3 has a robust tagging system, and allows people to mute and block tags they might be upset or triggered by — and in the event one clicks on an explicit work, a window will come up asking people to consent explicitly to moving through to read the work. 

It is people’s own responsibility to set their own limits as to what they can handle in reading fiction — and not to obsess over what other people might or might not be reading, which we cannot control, and is also none of our business. 

“What about loli and shotacon? Isn’t that the same as child pornography?”

“Child pornography” is generally not in use as a term — many people who have been victimised find that terms like “child porn” and CP grate, because “pornography” is work made with willing, adult participants. 

Videos and images produced of children are instead referred to either as CSAM — child sexual abuse materials — or CSEM — child sexual exploitation materials. CSEM is evil because it involves the unspeakable and agonising victimisation of a real life child or children, being abused and manipulated by adults around them, and worse than that initial victimisation, the recording their abuse is another victimisation in itself.

With every share of a piece of this material, that child or children are victimised another time, made vulnerable to more people, and the creation of this material can create more market desire, meaning that other abusers will encourage further abuse and recording of these children’s victimisation, or for the recording abusers to seek out other children to abuse. 

Victims of this sort of exploitation live in terror of the pictures or videos of their worst moments being shared to those they know, of being found by their loved ones, shared to workplaces, disseminated in any community they try to live in and be happy with — it is difficult enough to recover from one’s own abuse without the spectre of it constantly hanging over one’s head. 

People’s cartoons or art of fictional children is not equivalent to CSEM, because there are no real children depicted in it. 

It’s understandable to find these works disgusting or upsetting, triggering, unsettling — but to say that underage art or fiction is the same as or counts as CSEM is patently untrue. As a victim of CSA, it is galling to be told that choices my abuser made to harm and exploit me are equivalent to an abuser choosing to draw or read a comic about a victim that doesn’t actually exist. 

Some final questions to ask yourself: 

None of the above rebuttals are intended to imply people shouldn’t critique or criticise different media or their depictions. 

As well as the initial essay I linked, I actually wrote a big guide on how to approach close reading of text, and I’m working on another about analysing television and film.

In my opinion, it’s really important to be aware of different tropes and themes that you feel are harmful in fiction and art — racist tropes, sexist ones, homophobic ones, and all the rest.

It’s worth considering how works are harmful, and what you actually want to be done about it. 

I personally have criticisms of various tropes in media — I have particular dislike, for example, for the ways in which teacher/student relationships in TV shows and films are portrayed as “forbidden love”, with issue of their positions of power being depicted as one of bureaucracy or technical rules rather than a real power imbalance — I don’t care for the “sexy schoolgirl” trope, and the “barely legal” porn genre unsettles me.

All of the above three tropes often coincide with people’s thinking of teenage girls, especially those in school uniforms, as sex objects, and portraying school uniforms themselves as sexual or deserving of this sort of sexual attention. 

Not all depictions are the same — some works subvert the sexy schoolgirl trope by having those schoolgirls be secret monsters than punish abusers, and some works exist that critique teacher/student dynamics. 

It’s also important to note audience and outreach — a work that’s put on mainstream television channels or put in movie theatres by huge studios have a very different range of impact than an indie published novella, or one person’s fanfic on Ao3. 

Note where you’re holding individual or small studio creators — especially those who are in some way marginalised and are already facing adversity in their work — to higher account than large studios, or fixating on imagined harm their work could potentially cause. 

Is a work harmful, or is it just uncomfortable? Is it harmful, or is it just personally triggering to you? 

Can the work you’re concerned about do as much harm as you’re envisaging? Is it actually reaching the individuals you are worried might be vulnerable to harm as a result of it? Does the work intend to do that harm or hold those harmful views, and are the authors or creators working to address or apologise for that harm?

Is the work discussing, critiquing, or exploring the emotional impact of the dark themes within it? Does it have warnings or disclaimers before the work begins?

If you’re worried about a work “normalising” or “glorifying” a troubling subject — does the work actually do that? What is your evidence for this, having engaged with the text? Is that thing discussed in the text, argued, explored in-depth, or merely mentioned? Do characters show inner conflict and interpersonal conflict over it? Is it actually portrayed as good or normal? Is your concern the characters’ perspectives within the text, or the authors or creators’ opinions? 

Does the work carry ideas that are bigoted or feel like it includes apologism for some shitty ideas or ideology? Is the work a piece of propaganda, or function as propaganda? Do you feel the work is being advertised or pushed to an inappropriate audience for its subject matter?

If you do consider the work to be either likely to be personally distressing or upsetting to you, or potentially harmful because of its troubling or bigoted or just shitty ideas, how do you want to respond? 

If it’s the former, you should set your own boundaries — you should use your mute and block functions, you should avoid the work, you should seek out things that will comfort you, and perhaps discuss the distressing topics with someone you trust, whether that’s a friend or partner, a loved one, or a counsellor or therapist. 

If it’s the latter, you should absolutely deconstruct the piece in question and analyse the ways in which it’s shitty or harmful, or read essays by those who’ve done that work. You can maybe warn your friends about it, or if it’s a work of political concern — if the harm is being done because the work provides financial support to a hate group or a bigoted public persona, for example, you might perform a boycott, or involve yourself in acts of protest in response to the work or its creators. 

If it’s important enough to you and your beliefs that you feel urged to do those things, perhaps you should — if all you feel urged to do is to harass or shout at people online, though, it might be better for your own mental health to take a step back and do something more positive for yourself. 

Sometimes, a piece of work or media will be shitty, and shitty people will love it, and that will kinda suck — God knows I’ll see work that’s really transphobic or homophobic or antisemitic, and it’ll upset me that people I otherwise love and respect seem to be enjoying it so much. 

I can talk to my friends and my family about it, and I’ll do that — and I can mute and block the topic, and critique it in the right circles, or write essays if I’m really inspired to, responding to the work and what I feel its impact is…

But if my instinct becomes to just snipe at people for enjoying it when they really don’t know what the problem is, or have a go at them when they’re doing so unthinkingly, that’s not really helpful to them or to myself. It’s not addressing the harm I feel is being done, and nor is it really constructive. 

I’m an adult, after all — as I’ve said a few times already, it’s our own responsibility to set our own boundaries and consider what we’re doing to safeguard ourselves, and if in setting those boundaries and personal safeguarding limits, whether they’re in line with our own ethics and morality. 

We cannot control other people and their feelings, or the works they create, but we can take care of ourselves, including breaking ourselves out of obsessive moral spirals or anxieties about other people’s thoughts — and personally, I think that’s actually a very revolutionary thing to do given that we exist in a world that constantly tries to encourage (and monetise) that sort of aimless outrage. 

[cursecuelebre]

Top Recommendations for Norse Pagans that aren’t Problematic.

There is a lot of books by people who are racist and part of far right side of Heathenry and I’m going to try my best and list the books I have that helped me on my path that isn’t problematic and have questionable intentions. Books and YouTube channels.

Anglo Saxon Socerery and Magic by Alaric Albertson. He is very knowledgeable in his work and path especially on runes which includes the rune poem to make your own interpretation and witchcraft side of things. He even talks about the Elves which I appreciate because not a lot of Norse authors talk about them. It’s more Germanic than Norse but I can’t see any problem adopting certain aspects since they are very similar. I will say he does take himself a bit serious at times but his information is so good and worthwhile. I have not read his first book on Travels through middle earth but it focus on more the pagan side.

Poetic Edda and Prose Edda: it’s what every Norse pagan needs. It’s the foundation of Norse paganism not bibles but myths and tales that can help along our journey. There is tons of translations, but my favorites are Dr. Jackson Crawford Poetic Edda and Anthony Fawkes Prose Edda. But look into other sagas as well like Volsung which Dr Jackson Crawford also wrote about.

Beowulf. More of a Germanic tale but again includes it has roots of Germanic sorcery, traditions, religion like the concept of Wyrd (Fate), the runes, and values within his society like loyalty and mythical creatures. Again there is many translations even Jrr Tolkien did a incompleted version of Beowulf but I think Tom Shippey finished that version I could be wrong. Nonetheless explore more than one, the oneI have is by Seamus Heaney.

Grimm Fairy Tales this mostly German Folklore but it’s still quite important to learn about in German folk magic, creatures and entities in German folklore tends to be very real to the practitioner in their spellwork.

The Way of Fire and Ice by Ryan Smith a very progressive outlook in Norse paganism, he talks about creating communities in Norse paganism and calling out and denouncing Nazis in the community how Norse Paganism is inclusive and how to be open to all types of people. But he has a beginner approach to the deities, beliefs, values within Norse paganism.

Look into a lot of academic sources that’s where you will find a lot of information on Norse paganism and religions.

Tacitus Germania - A Roman historian talking about the Germanic tribes their culture and customs.

Saxo Grammaticus history of the Danes

The Viking Way by Neil Price it goes good in depths about magic in Scandinavia like Seidh

Dictionary of Norse Mythology a quick guide to northern myths, if you are trying to find a specific god and you don’t have time to look up in a book it’s in there with great information to each one.

Children of Ask and Elm: History of Vikings by Neil Price on Scandinavian culture during the Viking age

Some YouTube Channels

The Norse Witch: Bente lives in Germany and their channel encompasses all of Norse paganism more around magic. They do interviews with other Norse witches of folk magic like Icelandic and Danish. Even gives good book recommendations and advice on general spellwork as well!.

Dr Jackson Crawford he is an author but he also has a YouTube channel. He was a professor in Colorado on Norse culture, mythology, and language and now is a full time YouTuber. He did a series of videos on the runes which are more historically accurate. Discusses the myths and the language and what do they mean. Jackson Crawford isn’t a Norse pagan nor he doesn’t care if you are one but just letting you know he isn’t coming from a pagan perspective.

The Welsh Viking also like Jackson Crawford but still has really great knowledge on Viking culture.

De Spökenkyker who is a channel that focus on German Folk magic living in Germany who is a practicing German Folk Witch.

Please feel free to add on any recommendations that are helpful and useful to the Norse pagan Community!

[beannoss]

Something I think about a lot and wonder if maybe gets overlooked in Twilight’s story and as vitally indicative of his character is actually in the very first chapter:

Anya isn’t needed for Strix. Twilight decides to adopt her anyway.

[Spoiler warning: Mostly this post deals with early chapters already in the anime but there is reference to chapter 62, which has not yet been animated and will be in season 3]

Twilight decides it — “I’m going to rework the mission so it doesn’t involve a child because that’s too dangerous” and he’s 100% right! Donovan Desmond is canonically a far right warmonger with fascistic authoritarian aims. His government made liberal use of the SSS — a group to mirror the Stasi — who continue to operate in morally dubious ways (much more likely they’re actively morally reprehensible, though we’ve mostly only had rumours of that so far). From what we can tell, Desmond is at best an absent father and likely actually worse than that: if that's how he treats his own children, imagine how he might treat others. And the timeline seems to indicate that the experimentation performed on Anya was done under Desmond's government — even if Twilight isn't aware of experimentation on children, he is aware of both human and animal experimentation under Desmond's government. Taking all that and also the complexity of Strix's aims, undoubtedly there were other things that could be done, more straightforward if not necessarily easier.

So. Why? Why entertain the change at all? And then, having entertained it, why go back when the reasoning is indisputable?

On the Doylist level, I think Endo wanted to ensure that Anya had some agency within the set up — Endo also does this with Yor. It would be much harder to be on Twilight’s side fully, or to trust him on an ethical level/take him as any sort of moral authority, if he were just straightforwardly using these two people. To have them be active and consenting participants (arguably to actually be affirming the arrangement: Twilight sets it up, but Anya and Yor actually make it happen) even if the audience only knows the depth of their knowledge/motivations/etc currently, shifts the power dynamic in important ways.

But it also the set up tells us important things about Twilight. He is largely impatient, cold, detached in chapter one. His overarching feelings towards Anya are, I think, real annoyance, real confusion, and real impatience. He just doesn’t understand this damn kid and it turns out she’s a person which is frankly unacceptable — he’d needed and anticipated an automaton, ideally of himself in miniature form. (Though I think one could ponder whether Twilight was, in many ways, an automaton himself at this point, but that's maybe for another meta 🙃)

He’s not entirely unmoved of course — we're given to understand he’s affected when Franky tells him how many times Anya’s been adopted and returned, and isn't amused by Franky's joke about names. Franky's comment — "Just don't get attached" — reinforces this. The prospect of “the future” perturbs Twilight when he’s reading the parenting books. His initial reaction to Anya’s kidnap is horror. All these are true too.

Then there’s also this, from earlier in the chapter:

It’s exposition, yeah, and it’s also exposing. "Hopes" and "joys" are very specific words to describe those events. It could simply have been "A marriage? An ordinary life?" but describing them as such — hope for marriage; joy in ordinary life — expose something of what Twilight feels about those two experiences and, on the flipside, they expose what he deems he's lacking. No hopes of intimacy; no joy in (an ordinary) life. There's an argument as well, of course, that he's being ironic but I don't think that actually invalidates the above analysis. Drawing attention to 'hope' and 'joy' at all are revealing, regardless of Twilight's tone in thinking of them. I think it's also interesting this panel, taken in conjunction with a pair of panels in chapter 62, Twilight's backstory. The above is almost a pulled out version of this below panel of Twilight's recollection of his childhood, and of course the returning image of not just a rubbish bin but a rubbish bin on fire when it comes to disposing of his identity:

Back to Strix. Both his final interaction with Karen and the whole everything of the framing of Strix is making Twilight think (and feel, ahem) things that he hasn't for some time. Twilight decides, I’m reworking this. It can’t proceed this way. Not because Anya is a pain in his ass, not because she’s not as (apparently) intellectually advanced as he’d originally thought, not even because he thinks he can find another child who would better be exactly what mission parameters called for. No:

And what changes his mind is Anya asking to come home.

One of the important parts of this to me is this:

He seeks consent.

This moment is a keystone, I think, to understanding Twilight. It’s also more telling than he maybe realises. Twilight is decisive — we all laugh because he spirals at the drop of a hat when his daughter or wife look even mildly upset but outside those (also very telling) scenarios, he makes decisions and he pursues them. Often he makes decisions quickly. He’s a dab hand at it; it’s a large part of why he’s as good a spy as he is.

He’d decided to change Strix.

Anya asks him, in essence, not to.

So, he doesn't.

But it's wild that he entertains keeping her request at all — why? Why even entertain it? It’s dangerous; it’s impractical; there are too many moving parts outside his direct control; Anya isn’t the sort of child he’d wanted for the mission if he’d spent any time thinking about what a child might actually be like; Strix is in many ways an extremely long shot anyway, Desmond could just stop attending for reasons unknown and unrelated; etc.

So, yeah, why? Maybe because of this —

In conjunction, I often think of this moment in the cruise arc:

Twilight first naming the feeling as lonesome, and secondly tacitly conceding that he perceives Yor as a companion and that that relationship is important to him, something to be missed. What makes this for me though is that Anya calls this out "Papa's you're so sappy" and Twilight's reaction is that of someone caught-out. He doesn’t say “nuh-uh!” but he may as well have. Essentially, something landed a bit close to home, hm? Maybe some of that hope for marriage? A soupçon of joy of an ordinary life?

Twilight’s loneliness underpins many of his decisions with his family — probably without him being fully conscious of it. I think he is at least somewhat conscious of it, but also if he looks too closely... Well, best not to. I could fill this post, I think, with images that demonstrate his loneliness throughout the series; that sorrowful/pensive close-up of his eye(s) is one of the abiding motifs for Twilight throughout. I'd probably start with this one from Twilight's backstory arc:

Anya's request plays directly off his loneliness. Still though, he doesn’t immediately capitulate — he emphasises Anya’s choice. Is she sure? The last day has been scary for a child (and for him, but he's ignoring that part) and Twilight, in his increasing recognition that Anya is a person, is probably aware in the back of his mind that he hasn’t exactly been warm or welcoming or at all patient with her. Things that people respond to — he's otherwise excellent at manipulating people, so of course he understands this. So. Given she'd just had this scary experience, given he hasn't exactly been great with her: Is she sure? She wants to come home — with him?

I think the moment may get a little lost because Anya says something riffing off his own earlier thoughts and self-revelation (featuring that shadowed, lonely eye motif again!)

Were this a post about Anya, I’d talk about how it’s an important character moment for her as well by way both of demonstrating her agency/choice and also that she isn’t nearly as dumb as Twilight thinks (and the audience, maybe, also thinks).

But in my view, she didn’t actually need to say anything about it making her cry. I think she could simply have said yes in that moment and Twilight would have agreed.

Twilight’s an unreliable narrator; he’s disconnected from his heart and that shrouds his own motivations from himself — something he actually also concedes in this chapter!

And it shrouds from us just how much he actually understands himself. He’s also a master of deflection. Easy to assume or say that bringing Anya home is just to align with Strix. Nothing more to see here; nothing else going on. But also that ripping off of the mask in the panel above — and the literal 'riiip' sound effects — also indicate to us that this is an unveiling to himself.

In my view, Twilight agreeing to Anya's request, deciding to go back to original mission parameters, actually shifts his motivations, subtly. Now he’s committed not only to the original mission goals, but also to Anya. He needs Anya to succeed at Strix, not only for Strix's sake, but also because otherwise the mission will end and she’ll have to go back to the orphanage, and he’s just agreed with her not to do that (not right away, in any case). I don’t think at this point he’s thinking it’s forever — his thoughts throughout the manga indicate he still expects the Forgers to be temporary. I don't think the shift in motivation is necessarily even conscious, but given the set up, I think something inside Twilight recognises that agreeing to bring Anya home is a compact, jointly engaged. Mostly all this has become subsumed into Strix: he makes decisions. He pursues them. He deflects, even from himself. Of course it's just for the mission; this saved him the trouble of reworking it, of figuring out something else. Nothing more to see; no need to think any more on it. And to be fair to him, Strix is very high stakes, resting pretty solely on his shoulders, so of course that is, objectively, motivation enough. Why even consider beyond that?

But I personally think that to the extent he's aware of it at all, there is something else going on, that he wants to have Anya for as long as it takes him to work something else out for her. If that's the case, then of course, we have Occam’s razor: the simplest solution may be the best one.

Maybe Twilight should just keep Anya himself, eh?

[Image description: gif from Spy x Family season 1, episode 1. Twilight and Anya have just found out Anya passed her entrance exam and are overjoyed. Celebratory, Twilight picks Anya up and swoops her into the air as they smile at one another. End image description]

[flawseer]

Ok, these time rate me the Jade WInglets

I've been sitting on this work-in-progress picture for so many months now. Maybe if I post it here, I'll finally sit down and finish it.

Very long post incoming.

Discussing the Jade Winglet

Okay. So, you want me to rate the Jade Winglet group. That’s going to be very easy: I love all of them.

It’s also going to be extraordinarily hard because... well... I love all of them. How am I supposed to put them into an ordered list? It can’t be done. So I guess what I’m going to do is: First I will put them into a tier list, and then I’m going to just talk about each of them individually for a bit.

But on account of aforementioned adoration I have for all of these guys, said tier list is going to be very lopsided. The tiers are going to be “I adore them with the intensity of seven suns”, “I really like them”, and “I very much like them, but...”. You’re going to have to imagine that there are five or so more unused tiers below that.

Let’s unceremoniously get that ranking out of the way first. From top to bottom, the tiers are:

I adore Turtle, Qibli, and Winter.

I really like Moonwatcher, Kinkajou, and Peril.

I very much like Umber and Carnelian.

As for more in-depth commentary, here is a disclaimer: When I think about these guys I mostly consider books 6 (Moon Rising) to 9 (Talons of Power) and the first half of 10 (Darkness of Dragons). The second half of 10... if I’m being honest, I didn’t really enjoy it. I don’t want to go into it too much here, if you really want me to talk about my misgivings with the second arc finale, put a message about it in my inbox (it’s not just the obvious thing; it actually mostly pertains to Winter and the absolute nightmare ending he got saddled with, and some very unfortunate character implications).

Some of my musings are also going to be a bit critical. I just want it to be clear that I make these observations as a fan of the series. It’s a good practice to think critically even about media that you like. It helps you better understand why you like it in the first place. Also, I make no demands to be agreed with. This is just how I see it.

Anyway, enough stalling, let’s get into it. Not in order:

Turtle

CW: Parental abuse

Turtle is the most wonderful thing to ever happen in the history of the universe. I wake up every morning and the first thought in my head is “Ugh, another day in this backwards reality where Turtle is not real! No thanks!!” Then I go right back to sleep disappointed until the next day. Okay, maybe that’s a bit hyperbolic. But I do think that everyone’s lives would be greatly improved if Turtle was real.

Turtle is a very vibrant and insightful character who, much like Winter, is unfortunately cursed with a pair of malicious and incompetent "parents". Some of his scenes really hurt to get through if you’re a parent yourself or have ever had parental feelings. The first scene he is in, when Moon observes him arriving at the academy, his mother makes a passing comment about how Turtle has no value because he cannot inherit the throne. Turtle is within earshot when she does this. And he has no overt reaction to it, which to me hints that Coral asserts this about her male children so frequently that he has accepted her line of thinking and internalized it. He just accepts it as the truth. That is heartbreaking.

And then there is his father, mild-mannered and ostensibly gentle Gill, who killed Turtle’s budding interest in writing as well as the entirety of his self-confidence back when he was a kid, by assigning a little boy a task that was well beyond him (and only to him, even though there were more people present who could have helped), and then made him believe he killed his unborn sister when Turtle inevitably couldn’t do what he was asked. The narrative really tries to make Gill sympathetic in that moment by insisting he’s speaking in anger and doesn’t really mean it, but um, no. I don’t buy it, dude. You just gave a little kid a lifelong guilt complex because you couldn’t think of asking more people for help. Or taking the egg with you while you left the hatchery. Or telling Turtle to take a message to the palace guard so someone who didn’t still have their milk teeth could mount a proper, organized search while interim guards were posted in the hatchery. Or literally any of the thousands of other options that didn’t require traumatizing your own son.

As a result, Turtle became emotionally reclusive. He registers to others as dull, placid, unpassionate, and boring, like he cares about nothing and is content to never strive for or achieve anything in his life. He himself explains that writing used to be something he was into at some point, but then lost interest in. But I don’t think he has. He still loves literature and thinking about stories, he's still doing it in his internal monologue. He just denies it because he subconsciously feels the need to punish himself. I imagine he still gets that drive sometimes, to sit down and start writing again. But every time he thinks about it, or catches himself wanting anything, his father’s voice resurfaces in his mind, telling him that he killed his sister and doesn’t deserve it. And then he self-punishes by depriving himself of everything he loves doing and every positive emotion associated with it. Because he is convinced he is guilty for failing his father, when in actuality, the opposite is true.

The tragedy is that, if Gill had known how much damage he caused and wasn’t in a situation where he needed a flowchart to keep his 30+ sons apart, he probably would have apologized. He doesn’t strike me as malicious, just horribly, horribly incompetent as a parent. But as things played out, Gill is no longer able to fix his mistake. The only person who can now grant Turtle the forgiveness he needs is himself. I hope he will be able to do it.

Turtle truly is an endearing character and a wonderful son undeserved by his parents. If I could adopt him right now I would. In fact, I’m gonna do it. Hold on while I get the papers. Wait, I have to finish? Uh... okay.

Moonwatcher

In a sense, Moonwatcher may be the most interesting character in the entire cast. She certainly had the potential to be my favorite character period. But there are a few points holding her back.

The thing about Moonwatcher is that, more than any other character, she requires meticulous care and attention to detail to be written well. The reason for this is that, when you’re writing for Moon, you also technically write for every character she interacts with. She is written brilliantly in her own book, since the narrative is allowed to focus on her; Moon Rising may thus actually be my favorite book of the second arc. It’s very enrapturing, seeing her navigate the academy’s social dynamics after growing up as, essentially, a feral jungle child, and battling with her own feelings of loneliness and inadequacy.

The thing is though... Wings of Fire has a bit of an odd quirk. Something I’ve noticed with regards to its writing is that, whenever a character is not particularly in focus during a scene, they often get reduced to their most basic traits and will rigidly act according to them regardless of prior context or external factors. I call this phenomenon “Auto-pilot”. If you’ve read my Mail Call #3, this is what I think happened to Tsunami during the second arc—Tsunami’s basic traits are that she is bossy, emotional, and blunt, so she spends the entirety of her page time as a deep-sea-themed wrecking ball who yells at everyone and dismisses everything as “ugh, nightwing powers” and “Peril was bad in book 1 once, I hate her forever”, despite having other, more pressing matters to prioritize.

Whenever Moonwatcher gets set to auto-pilot, it is very depressing. She needs careful, attentive writing to shine, and whenever she doesn’t get it she turns from the most interesting character into a dull brick that recites exposition and occasionally exists to be fawned after by boys. Tragically, the auto-pilot hits her bad after Winter’s book is done, and she never manages to escape it afterwards, save for maybe one or two scenes. There is a particularly egregious example in book 10 that, in my opinion, does permanent, irreversible damage to her character. It’s all a bit soul-crushing if dwelt on.

So yeah, I like Moonwatcher. I really do. I just wish the strong way she was written could have carried through the entire arc.

Winter

CW: Parental abuse

I initially didn’t really know what to make of Winter when I read Moon’s book. He seemed kind of like a buttface who was needlessly hostile and unapproachable. But he really comes into his own in his book, and looking back at his earlier scenes with that new context makes it all make sense. He became one of my stand-out favorites after that.

Winter really has a lot in common with Turtle, so much so that I wish those two actually had some deeper interactions with each other. Like, at one point Turtle saves his life, you’d think they would want to talk about that some time. Where Turtle’s parents are one half malicious, one half incompetent, Winter’s are pure malice AND incompetence. Blessed with three children, they managed to completely ruin one of them, almost ruin the other, and then the third one is kind of out of focus so I don’t know how he is faring, but I doubt there is a lot of love there either.

In a way, you can draw a lot of parallels between Winter and Icicle, and Zuko and Azula from Avatar: The Last Airbender—The unfavorite who tries to do right but constantly fails to live up to his father’s/parents' warped standards, and the prodigy who seemingly has her father’s/parents' approval but secretly suffers from the abusive parenting just as much, but in different ways. Hailstorm then tries to take on the role of Iroh, an older figure that acts as a source of positivity and genuine love, and offers a reprieve from the abuse. But where Iroh is an adult drawing from a lifetime of wisdom, Hailstorm is just the slightly older sibling who comes from the same abusive household battling the same demons, so his effectiveness in countering the toxicity is limited.

Where Zuko pursues honor, Winter strives to be strong. Both his parents and his sister perceive him as weak and label him irrelevant. While this hurts him deeply, I don’t think Winter fully surrendered to his inferiority complex until he heard his brother mirror the same sentiment at him. Winter is repressed and struggles with processing his emotions—Thus he heard the words Hailstorm only said to save his life and took them at face value. Even the person he loves the most, the only source of affection and affirmation in his life, thinks he is weak. This is what drives Winter to feverishly desire strength and thus adopt a persona of the strongest thing he knows: a stoic Icewing warrior.

This is why he acts the way he does in book 6: aloof, threatening, unapproachable, invincible. But all of these traits are diametrically opposed to his actual personality, which is warm, compassionate, and just wanting to be loved for who he is. So whenever Moon reads his mind, he comes across as a confused mess of conflicting emotions. Because he is pretending to be something he isn’t.

The interesting thing here is that Winter actually is genuinely strong. He is just unable to recognize his own worth, due to the toxic way royal Icewings are raised, warping his perception of what strength means. When he meets Foeslayer, who is said to be an ancient enemy of his people, his mind cuts through the veneer of tradition and old bullshit justifications and sees her imprisonment for the cruel injustice that it is. He then undoes that injustice and frees her. It takes an incomprehensible amount of personal integrity and willpower to just casually defy the will of your entire country like that. This is equivalent to treason; by aiding her, Winter risks becoming an enemy of his people on par with Foeslayer herself. And he does it anyway, because it is the right thing to do.

This dissonance in his perception of strength with regards to his Icewing upbringing, and the actual strength he embodies and has embodied all this time, is something I would have liked to see explored more in the finale or something. As it stands now, he got pressured into putting his life on the line in the battle for Jade Mountain, has sworn loyalty to a people that mistreated him and tried to ruin him from a young age, and then got saddled with an existential nightmare of an ending that leaves me baffled to this day.

In terms of personal misfortune, he certainly is the Starflight of his group.

Qibli

CW: Parental abuse

Qibli is a very charming and versatile character. It is easy to imagine him in a variety of different situations and the scenes almost write themselves, especially when there’s another person with him whom he can bounce off of (figuratively, though I wouldn’t put it past him to try to literally bounce off of someone too). The 10th book posits him as some kind of parallel to Darkstalker; the latter even overtly states this and tries to recruit him as a manner of apprentice. It’s interesting because I think they are actually pretty different.

Qibli excels in situations where his options are limited. He is great at thinking on his feet and coming up with solutions to problems within a restricted framework. He'd be great in an escape room. This ability of his is shown throughout the arc, but it is especially visible in Moon Rising, where his presence in a scene often makes Moon stronger, or more adept at solving problems, because his mind is breaking down the situation for her in a way she would be unable to see on her own.

The twist then comes in when you take Qibli out of that limited framework, by giving him power. His pronounced intellect is very peculiar; it needs limitation to be brilliant. When he has unhindered access to all-powerful magic (i.e. doesn’t have to clear his ideas with another person), he turns into a colossal idiot who buries cities in sand and almost blows up inhabited mountains.

It only follows that, if you were to give Qibli what he wants and make him an animus, it would absolutely ruin him. The great intellect he cultivated would wither and, unshackled from the limitations that forced him to think critically and be his most excellent self, he would end up destroying himself, and likely others too.

Another interesting facet of Qibli is how he works as a parallel to Winter and Turtle (and Peril to an extent). All of these characters come from broken homes and have suffered under abusive parental figures. Qibli’s case in particular is interesting because it showcases how your circumstances can make a difference in how well you handle that issue. Qibli suffered under a tyrannical mother and a pair of cruel siblings, but in contrast to his peers, someone from the outside noticed his suffering was able to intervene—Thorn saved him from his hell and became his rescue parent, restoring his confidence and sense of self-worth.

Because of this, when his turn comes to confront his demons, while it is still difficult and painful (because trauma always is), he is able to navigate the confrontation with comparatively more grace and control than the others. The contrast really shows how difficult it is to escape a toxic relationship if you are still mired deeply within it, and how you need to put some distance between yourself and it before you can see where you are and what needs to be done with improved clarity. That is the path to healing.

I could probably keep talking about Qibli for 15 more paragraphs, but I’ll spare you.

Kinkajou

Every protagonist (and a good deal of side characters) in Wings of Fire is broken, usually has some kind of gut-wrenching past (often due to terrible parents), and struggles to find their place in the world. Luckily here is a pink-and-yellow Rainwing who is just happy and everything is fantastic and wholesome, right?

CW: Forced starvation

Nah, Kinkajou had it pretty rough too. The story plays it like it’s a humorous quip when she finds out Moonwatcher is her roommate and bemoans that nobody is taking her “trauma” seriously, but... yeah, it actually is legitimate trauma. She was captured, bound, and trapped on a hell island without sunlight for several weeks. While there, she was not fed, and she helplessly watched people whom she knew from early childhood starve and die. Death by starvation is not pretty, she likely had to witness her friends slowly being driven mad by hunger until they withered away, and couldn’t do anything about it. Then she was rescued and returned to a home that didn’t believe her pain was real, that claimed she made it up for attention, and that some people who she thought of as friends didn’t even notice she was gone. The only one who believed her was a stranger whom she had met maybe a few hours ago.

Personally, if that happened to me and I came home to that, I’d likely have pulled a Chameleon and said “Screw the Rainwings, I’m moving to the desert.”

That Kinkajou is still able to be positive and full of energy after that is a testament to her immense mental fortitude. She might actually be one of the most stable and resilient characters in the story. Some things shake her up for a bit, but nothing can crush her.

Still, I imagine there are some times, after a really bad day maybe, where she wakes up in the middle of the night. And there, for just a moment, she is scared to open her eyes... because she might be back on the Nightwing island and has to watch someone else die.

Peril

Peril is a bit of an odd case in arc 2. She gets grouped with the protagonists of that arc and the ending implies she is integrated into the Jade Winglet as their new Skywing. I have no real problem with that, in fact it’s good on her that she’s made a little less isolated. But to me, Peril always felt like an awkward appendix to that group. Her only real friend in there is Turtle; for the rest of them they feel more like vague acquaintances, like she's tolerated for being Turtle's friend.

To be fair though, that friendship with Turtle is really strong; it’s an exciting and deep character dynamic. But if I was forced to tie Peril to a group of protagonists, my first instinct would be to associate her with the first arc protagonists instead.

This poor girl has been through it. Everyone seems to hate her and wants her to leave, sometimes for understandable reasons and sometimes it just seems bizarre. I already went into Tsunami’s disdain for her in an earlier post, but I also vaguely remember a point in Escaping Peril where she meets Qibli and he gives her a withering glare for some reason. That confused me, to be honest. I thought “What’s YOUR problem with her? Have you ever even met??” Like, I guess the Outclaws were in direct conflict with Burn since they lived in the same country, and Peril was an infamous elite combatant under the command of one of Burn’s allies, so maybe Peril killed people he knew? But then he gets over his disdain really quickly and with no comment, so whatever happened can’t have been a big deal after all.

My favorite part in her book is when everyone--after having learned about Turtle’s powers--chews him out for not having helped his country during the war, and Peril cuts through the tripe by saying something along the lines of “So if he uses the power he was born with to serve his Queen it is honorable, but when I do the same for my Queen I’m a murderer and deserve to have things thrown at me?” I love all of these guys, but they really deserved to be called out for their double standard and feel stupid for a bit.

But yeah, I really enjoy her friendship with Turtle in the end. And since he accidentally made himself virtually indestructible, it means Peril can now get all the friendly hugs she craves.

Umber

Umber is cool. He has a potentially interesting relationship with Turtle, which is implied in the latter’s book when it is mentioned that they sleep with their backs touching to comfort each other about their respective siblings not being there.

Unfortunately he gets written out of the story arc very quickly. I wish I knew more about him.

Carnelian

I like Carnelian. I feel like she had a lot of potential that gets wasted by her death, for not much gain. It is used to give Queen Ruby a reason to come to Jade Mountain and kickstart the events of Peril’s book, but the same could have been accomplished by having her learn that the Academy is housing Peril and going there to demand the extradition of a (in her eyes) dangerous and murderous fugitive.

Same as with Umber, really, I wish I knew more about her. I already said this during my Smaugust drawing session, but I like to pretend that she and Bigtail didn’t die, and instead had a mini arc about recovering from their injuries. It also has the side effect of averting some very unfortunate implications that come with Bigtail’s death.

~~~

I think that’s all of them. Good lord I talk too much. Please don’t throw crocodiles at my face for it. Tumblr is my queen, and--much like the Queen's former champion--I was made to do it.

[rottenomelet]

Hey, could you do a little fic with yandere Choso? Going a little more into depth like the one you did with Geto? You’re writing is phenomenal

(note(s): i absolutely can :P i was thinking about doing this anyways like anon u just read my mind. and thank you :)

warning(s): implied kidnapping, implied stalking, mentions of period (non sexually), all-in-all slightly creepy tendencies. choso is just an oral king here so if that isnt ur thing, i sorry.)

Yandere Choso Thoughts (1k)

Here’s the thing: Choso is the oldest of ten. He’s hyper independent and he’s in a position of always taking care of others. But he doesn’t just enjoy the act; he embodies it. Being a caretaker is his pride and joy. Being an oldest brother is Choso’s absolute greatest accomplishment, and he wears the title like a medal.

So of course the same can be said when it comes to you, his precious darling.

Having you as his responsibility brings him immeasurable joy. Choso is prideful about how well he���s taken care of you, how much brighter and healthier you’ve looked since he’s taken you into his care.

He’s attentive to your needs like no one else, recognizes what you need even before you do. If you take any medication, he reminds you of it. He makes sure you drink enough water, that you eat balanced meals at healthy times, that you go to bed on time every night. Choso does not allow you much personal time for hobbies but he has no qualms about an - approved - book now and again, or even a tv show as long as you watch it with him.

Any nasty habits you have - smoking, drinking, not eating right, insomnia - he goes through absolute lengths to ‘cure’ you of. It’s not that he thinks these things make you imperfect, but rather that you’re his/. His darling, his responsibility - it just won’t do to have you feel anything but 100% good all the time.

Of course there is the more… concerning side of this attentiveness. He’ll mention special dates (an old friend’s birthday or the graduation of a family member). Choso will bring up tv shows you used to love but forgot about, give you comics you were once interested in but deemed too expensive. He even knows your cycle, buys you sanitary products the day before you begin. Choso sees no issue in telling you when you’re ovulating.

(“You’re at your most fertile today.” He’ll mention during dinner and you freeze. Your stomach churns as you process what he just said.

Choso doesn’t have to eat so he likes to sits there and watch you eat dinner. It was awkward at first, the man not much for talking and you reluctant to converse with your capturer. But as time passed, the two of you could at least exchange comments here and there for the duration of the meal.

Choso pays your discomfort no mind. “I know your stomach hurts, but try to eat a bit more. You have a busy night ahead of you and I want you at your best.”)

You’re in his capable hands now - there’s no reason to even think when Choso is there.

He’s caring in different ways too.

Choso loves your reactions. The way your brows scrunch, when you bite your lip, when your eyes roll into your skull. When your toes clench and your hips twitch and your thighs tremble. The sounds you make - heavens bells could never compare. Whether you’re moaning, whining, screaming, or crying his name, Choso revels in anything that leaves your lips.

He finds that the easiest way to get you to react is when his tongue is between your legs. You practically sing for him then.

The only thing he doesn’t like is how difficult it is to see your face when he’s down there. Because of this, his favorite position is with you on your back and your knees hooked over his shoulders. His face in your cunt, his eyes on you as he licks your most delicate place. He holds your shaking thighs apart as he suckles your clit. Choso practically moans with you when you cum on his tongue.

He doesn’t stop after one - doesn’t see a reason to. He’s here to take care of your every need - one orgasm isn’t enough for him.

(“No more. Please no more.” You whimper as you plead for Choso to have mercy on your sweet pussy.

You’ve come thrice on his tongue already. You’re shaking uncontrollably and the only reason you haven’t collapsed onto the bed yet is because Choso is holding you up. You’re overstimulated and your cunt aches. You can feel your clit pulsate on his tongue.

Choso only pauses his ministrations to reply. “You can handle it. You’ve done it before.”

He kisses the top of your cunt before sliding his tongue back against your special place. His tongue slides against your inner labia, only teasing your clit by circling it.

Your head falls back as moans spill out. It’s all just too much. You’ve never experienced pleasure like this - no one ever good enough at this to make you enjoy oral to this extent.

But Choso? Choso is a master at understanding your pleasure.

“I can’t.” You say, keening as you do.

“You can.” He responds and this time you know he’s not giving you any other options. “Just a little more, love. I know you can take it.”)

But even though Choso loves taking care of you, sometimes he needs to be taken care of.

He needs cuddles more than he would like to admit. He likes to lay on top of you with his head in your chest and your hand in his hair, scratching at his scalp. Choso likes praise, though he’ll never ask for it. Tell him he’s a good big brother, that he’s a good man to you too. He’ll be over the moon.

He’s quiet. He never reveals much of himself unless you prompt him to. He’ll always answer any question you have for him, adhere to most requests. But Choso will always be surprised, pleasantly so, when you show interest in him or want to spend time with him.

And when it comes to more human things, you find yourself leading. Kissing, hugging, holding hands. All things Choso has never heard about until you.

He was a shy kisser at first but now he absolutely loves it. That closeness? It’s something he could never replace.

He’s sweet, really. Choso just cares so much about you.

[briebysabs]

I’ve been deliberating for a couple days now and have decided to discuss in-depth about Kim Dokja and the tendencies of putting his life on the line. For most of the novel, I was split on whether I should view KDJ as a self-sacrificial bastard or a suicidal character. And by the end, I’ve reached the conclusion that he is both.

Before I elaborate further, it should be noted that while we all meme about KDJ’s dying count, he actually isn’t that careless with his life. What I mean is he sacrifices himself usually as a last resort, plans A to F didn’t work and it’s the only option left to hope for kimcom’s safety-ditch effort. Usually. We’ll circle back to that when we bring up OD. But his sacrifices are always done as granting his companions salvation, utterly blind to how they feel about it. But to understand his constant need to do this you have to first start with where he learned how to love. Lee Sookyoung’s love was sacrificial, she’d take the brunt of her husband’s rage to shield KDJ, she’d take on blame for his death and be incarcerated for years so Kim Dokja won’t discover the truth. All of this, in my opinion, unbeknownst to KDJ, imprinted onto him this interpretation of love. As nobody else until the scenarios began had loved him (Yes HSY technically but he doesn’t know that). Which gives the irony that multiple characters KDJ resent in the story such as Kim Namwoon, his mother, the constellations are ultimately revealed to be reflections of himself.

Another component to his self-sacrificing is “Kim Dokja the reader”. I’m not going to dive deep into how orv interweaves dissociation and escapism into its narrative, I’ll do that some other day. But KDJ views himself as the reader, an outsider, the sole member in the audience watching the story unfold before him. Yes he grants commentary, the players notice and acknowledge his existence, but he isn’t part of the play. So if he decides to step out of the auditorium for a while, if he decides to leave a bookmark where he left off and close the book, nothing should change. The story will continue in his absence, the characters cannot possibly miss him because Kim Dokja was not a character. He was not part of their world so even if he’s gone, the ending will still happen. And that is something I want to stress here.

KDJ says “he wants to see a certain story’s epilogue”. Specific choice of words, “see”. He doesn’t say he’ll be part of it,that he’ll be with them, or any close variation of those phrases.

This is where I want to diverge to talk about KDJ's suicidality. You can say “Ok then, KDJ has a clear goal in mind to reach the ending he desires. Yes he may feel the need to step out of the story every now and then, but he does so reluctantly. So obviously, he doesn’t want to die.” And you wouldn’t be wrong really but that simplifies it to an overwhelming degree. That’s how I initially thought of it until I realized how complicated it actually is. Because most people who deal with suicidal thoughts aren’t searching for death but rather feel there’s no other choice. It often isn’t as clear cut as 1863 YJH who, anyone that read this arc will say with certainty that he was suicidal. Yes KDJ isn’t chanting in his mind over and over that he wants to die but why does he want to live? To see the proper ending of a web novel that stopped him from attempting again to begin with. Over the course of orv he finds people he loves and who love him back deeply. People he longs to live for but despite that because of the disconnect between them, his self-loathing, accompanied with what I said before, believing he has no other way out of these threatening situations. Yeah it’s to save his companions but in the end Kim Dokja still feels the need to die. Even if you do not see KDJ as a suicidal character, it is undeniable that so much revolving him, the impact it has on those who care for him, and the visceral descriptions used to convey their thoughts, is a direct metaphor for that.

Or in a few cases, straight up what’s going on and now we arrive at what I think was the final straw for Kim Dokja. Meeting the Oldest Dream. For me, this is THE scene of orv. The biggest twist and what finally irreparably broke KDJ. Prior to this, Kim Dokja had become the “Enemy of the story” but it was unlike his previous dances with death. This time he truly had no intention of dying, he wants to be a part of the ending with his companions, he understands now that his sacrifices do hurt them. That according to him “I, someone of no redeeming quality, could be loved by the others.” That he is a character and that just maybe, he does deserve to live happily ever after with them. And then Kim Dokja meets a 15-year old boy with the same face as his, doodling in a notebook his ideas for Ways of Survival and a notification tells him to ‘Please end the Oldest Dream’. All of that progress is shattered in an instant.

KDJ tries to excuse himself by recalling his promise to SP to kill OD but we all know if that was any other kid, he would not have tried to kill them. He would’ve hesitated much more, he’d look for a loophole, he would’ve tried talking which is his biggest strength for every corner he gets into. Killing them would not be the first option but now it is. Because this isn’t an instance of sacrifice anymore, KDJ is sick of himself. OD is a presence that confirms KDJ’s worst fears. That he’s meant to be weak and pitiful and alone, that he was always an outsider, that he unintentionally causes pain and misfortune to people he loves, that everyone would be perfectly fine and better even without him. And Kim Dokja is the physical manifestation of them: a monster. And there’s only one way to get rid of this monster.

The chain of events from him swinging his sword at OD, trying to stab himself with the blade only for YJH to stop it desperately with his hand, everyone restraining and begging him to stop, KDJ crying and screaming for SP + the other Outer Gods to kill OD. Everyone else is forgiving him and KDJ is only thinking of getting a blade.

This is Kim Dokja’s relapse. It’s real, it’s harrowing, and he never recovers from it. He reaches the conclusion that he has to be alone, it’s his atonement, it's what he deserves. So he splits himself 49-51. I interpreted this when I first read it as presenting 49% of what you believe people want to see. More real than a facade but it’s not the true you. The true, fucked up version of who you are is trapped in a prison of your making, trapped in a darkness you feel you don’t deserve to escape. Which is why it’s so powerful that KimCom went after that 51%. They didn’t want just their version of KDJ, they wanted everything KDJ is including the larger side of him that he wishes didn’t exist. But the plan fails, they managed to turn that full stop into a comma but they couldn’t save KDJ. Because you can’t drag someone out of that train, out of that mentality, you can’t force someone to love themself. All you can do is reach out to any corner, every worldline you can and let them know you’ll always love them. That you’ll always love every aspect of their story and hope that perhaps one day, they’ll accept your hand and believe it.

[ID: Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint art by Blackbox: first of Kim DOkja smiling, seen through a space in a bookshelf, and second of astronaut Yoo Joonghyuk floating upside down as letters float around him. End ID]