#but yeah…hence why I can’t for certain say if I hate or dislike him now

[seokwoosmole]

Never has my opinion about a non-antagonist character changed so drastically than it has about Shigure ok there might have been some before but right now I can’t think of any.

I went from “Oh he’s just a silly lil guy” to “*sobs* silly *sobs again* DAD” to “ohhhh….silly….pervy😳lil guy” to “ohhhh….silly mysterious guy???” to “oh- oh….😬”

[selfwriting-sugarquills]

Something more infinite (George Weasley x reader) ch. 4

Chapter 4. What? Can’t a guy compliment his nemesis on her dress? 

Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 7 (final) |

word count: 2.1K 

Warnings: none. 

When your mother wrote to you sometime in November to ask how your sixth year had been going, you didn’t know what to say. It had been different so far, George had been more relaxed in his approach to you, in fact you rarely clashed anymore. Mostly he’d handed a couple of comments to you during classes but had seemed to be swallowed up by getting people to bet on the triwizard tournament. You hadn’t made any bets yet. You yourself had been busy with something else, or rather someone else. This guy named Lewis in your year had changed over the summer, suddenly he was like seven feet tall, and his hair had become this glorious, swoopy mess, his cheeks dimpled when he smiled at you, a gleam in his eyes (that you could swear was only there when he was looking at you) that made you weak. You’d fallen hard for him and you didn’t exactly know how to handle it. This was the first time a boy had made you feel this way, and you were torn between wanting the attention and love of Lewis and not wanting to interract with him out of fear that you’d say something stupid and confess your love for him. Your friends had quickly noticed your crush though (you were not subtle about it, after all) and after a bit of pressuring from them, a lot of pep talks and a couple house parties, you and Lewis were on good terms. You’d sit together at meals, go on walks by the lake and study together. You savoured every second you spent together, and when the yule ball was announced, you couldn’t wait for him to ask you to the ball. While you waited for him, you entertained yourself by watching George struggle slightly to find a date. It seemed that years of pranking had narrowed down the amount of girls willing to entrust “the most magical night of their lives so far” to Fred and George Weasley considerably. Fred had asked Angelina, though George couldn’t seem to find a date yet.

And it was driving him insane. How everyone managed to find partners so quickly was beyond George, as he’d been politely turned down for the second time, just on that day. Every girl’s answer was the same: “Sorry, George, it’s not that I don’t want to, I just feel like I want to spend the night with a guy who’s a bit more serious about the whole thing, y’know?” 

He knew they didn’t mean it as an insult, he understood how some girls probably had a certain vision for the yule ball. But he was still a good enough date, right? It’s not like he was actively planning on annoying his date with pranks or jokes….unless? 

“Hey L/n!” George broke out into a sprint to catch up with you as you excited the charms classroom, you turned and looked at him with a confused expression, 

“Yeah?” You asked, mostly looking like someone who just wants to turn around and go to lunch, 

“Have you perchance found a date for the yule ball?” He figured it was best to just ask you outright, and to his surprise (and maybe adding to his frustration) you burst into laughter, 

“You’re joking, right?” You say, still chuckling, 

“No?” 

“You don’t want to take me to the yule ball, Weasley,” you say, “We both know that. I actually plan on having a nice night, so even if I was available I’d have to say no, as much as I’m sure you’d be...something of a date,” you say, 

“Wait hold on,” he shakes his head in disbelief, “you’ve got a date?” 

“Yes, as shocking as that seems,” you say, your voice slick with sarcasm, “I have,” 

“Who?” 

“You know Lewis? Ravenclaw. Our year,” You say, “Gorgeous, and he actually likes me, hence why I said yes to him, and not you,” you chide, 

“Sounds like you’ve got yourself a crush,” George replies, feeling more annoyed than ever, if there was anything he hated it was when you had the upper hand, and the way you were talking about your date didn’t help, he couldn’t say he remembered a Lewis from your year, but based on your short description, 

“I don’t like him,” 

Fred and Lee share a look from across sofas in the common room, George is sat in an armchair, arms crossed, 

“Why?” Lee asks, “You hardly know the bloke?” 

Yeah, why did George dislike this Lewis? now that it was pointed out to him, George actually did struggle to pinpoint what exactly had bothered him so much that he’d spent the rest of the day sulking over your description of your date,

“I just do,” George resorted to replying, as it was easier than confessing his true, very confusing thoughts, “Probably just cause I associate him with Y/n,” he grumbled, sinking further into the armchair. Another glance was shared between Fred and Lee, 

“What?” 

“Nothing,” Fred replied quickly, George sat up. He knew Fred too well, “What, Fred?” 

“It’s just-” Began Lee, fidgeting with his wand, 

“Well,” Fred stumbled over his articulation as he adjusted himself in his seat, 

“Spit it out, will you?” 

“It’s just we’ve noticed, you’re different around her,” Lee says, George shot him a puzzled look, 

“What’s he on about?” He asked Fred, 

“Mate, you’ve sort of developed a habit for seeking her out, despite insisting that you hate her,” Fred explained, “With that sort of behavior we’re bound to assume- I mean we can’t help but think that-” he trailed off as George’s expression hardened, 

“You’ve maybe got a tiny thing for her?” Lee said, with an expression like he’d just stuck his finger into a loaded mouse-trap, 

“WHAT?” George exclaimed, “I absolutely do not have a thing for her!” He stood up, 

“Come on, George, we don’t mean that as an insult,” Lee said, 

“Well I take it as one,” George said, trodding towards the dorms with haste, “You’re out of your minds if you think I’d ever fall for someone like her!” He says, taking the stairs at three steps at a time, slamming the door behind him, and leaning against it while his heart pounded in his chest, his hands flying to his hair. Long fingers ran through long locks of ginger hair, as he swallowed hard, 

“Oh. Oh fuck me.” 

***

The yule ball really was magical, you had to admit. You and Lewis had had a blast thus far, dancing for the majority of the night, he’d introduced you to one of his friends named Michael and his date, a gorgeous girl from Beauxbatons, and you’d sat together and talked in the few moments you hadn’t been on the dance floor. At one point, the music had slowed and you’d gone to get a drink, Michael accompanying you, after you’d grabbed a glass of punch, you’d stood by the table with drinks and looked out over the crowd of students dancing, 

“You know, you’re really beautiful,” Michael said beside you, you turn to look at him in surprise, 

“Oh,” you said, not knowing what to say, 

“I don’t mean to sound creepy or anything,” Michael says, not a good start. you think to yourself, “It’s just that I noticed you a while back and I just think you’re really good looking and well, Lewis promised he’d introduce us since you were going to the ball together and-” He continued to babble as he stared at his feet, but you had stopped listening, your stomach sinking, 

“What?” You asked, Michael looked like a deer in headlights, 

“What?” He stammers, 

“What did you say about Lewis introducing you?” you asked in a hollow voice, 

“Well, you see, I told him that I fancied you, and he told me he’d introduce me to you, if I’d introduce him to my date, Vivienne, you see he-” You’d heard enough, almost instinctively, your head turned and found Lewis, as he’s leaned in, kissing Vivienne passionately. You felt as if the air had been punched out of you. Everything seemed distant, just as it had as you’d fallen from your broom the year before, you don’t hear Michael talking. You don’t hear the music. You don’t hear or sense anything. Your vision had blurred on all except Lewis and Vivienne as your intestines form knots inside you. You felt sick. You felt like crying. You felt far too hot and so you left. Tears were already streaming down your face as you wandered away from the great hall. A pair of footsteps could be heard on the stones behind you and without turning around you yelled out: 

“Leave me alone, Michael, I just want to be alone!” You yell, your voice breaking, 

***

George had had an alright time at the ball, after his little realisation he’d come to the conlusion that maybe he did have a little thing for you, but so what? It’s just a dumb crush, he couldn’t help that you’d grown up to become incredibly attractive. He’d sworn to himself to keep this crush to himself, it wasn’t to come between yours and his rivalry. After all he was sure you felt nothing similar for him at all, so why would he spend time on it? No. To pine after you would be a suicide mission, so instead he’d happily agreed to go to the ball with Katie Bell, after she’d confessed that she hadn’t found a date yet, in fact, she’d planned on going with some friends,  

“But if it matters so much to you, George, then sure, I’ll go with you,” she’d said. And going to the ball with Katie had been great, they were good friends and essentially the night culminated in their entire friend group hanging out and dancing together, the boys making a game out of trying to spike the punch as much as possible without being caught. George had, however, allowed his warmer feelings for you take over every now and then, and he had found himself looking around the great hall, scanning the faces of students in an attempt to find you, though he hadn’t found you until you were leaving, seemingly in a hurry, and curiosity got the better of him. 

***

“Who’s Michael?” George asks, stopping in his tracks, 

You spin around, wiping a tear off your face, 

“Oh, not you, please, not you,” you say, putting a hand out in front of you, you were hurt enough, you did not need George adding to that hurt. George opened his mouth as if about to say something but he didn’t speak, not at first, his face softened a little when he noticed how you were sniffling, 

“Are you alright?” he asked, not knowing where this gentle tone was coming from, 

“What do you think?” You snap, stifling a sob, you begin to walk away, but George follows, his feet moving almost automatically, and you’re just so fed up, you turn on your heel, 

“Oh for Godrick’s sake! ok, just come on then!” You sputter, trying to sound stoic and challenging as always but even you can hear how pathetic your words sound in between sobs, “just insult me! tease me! call me names like you always do! What do you care if I’m actually hurt and don’t have time for your bullshit right now?!” you bellow hoarsely,

There’s a prolonged silence between you as you turn away from him and let the sobs rake through your body, whilst trying to choke back your tears to the point of feeling as if your throat will split open. If only you could turn around and leave. But you’re unable to face him, unable to bear him seeing you so weak and small. He doesn’t say anything but you can feel his gaze on you. It burns into your back, 

“You look really pretty tonight.” He truly doesn’t know where that came from either, 

“Oh fuck off, Weasley,” you choke, 

“What? it’s true,” he says, “Maybe we’re not friends but I’ve got eyes, y’ know.” You turn around, confusion and rising anger stifling your crying. You can feel the thick streaks of mascara on your cheeks, it’s blocking parts of your vision in grey clouds but you stare directly into his unusually soft eyes, 

What the fuck was he on about? 

“You’re right, Weasley,” You say, stepping forward, “We most certainly are not friends.” You bump into him on purpose, and once again you’ve forgotten the muscles he’s gained from quidditch and as soon as you turn the corner your cold hand finds your now aching shoulder. Great, you think to yourself, a perfect ending to a perfect night. 

taglist: @schlongbottom​ @cardboardbenmazzello​ @unseensilver​ @quie-pls @mochamiilk 

Let me know if you want to be added :))  

[justanotherlifeff]

hey could you do a todoroki x reader who can control water and gets hurt during training? possibly how he’d react or if he’d take care of them? i love your blog!

Careful

You were one of the strongest students in class 1A. With your quirk that allowed you to control water, you were almost undefeatable. However, every powerful quirk came with a price and in your case, it was that you would suffer from extreme dehydration when you overused your quirk. However, this rarely ever happened since you were very careful when it came to using your quirk and you knew how much you could push yourself. That was until a certain gremlin called you an useless dumbfuck during battle training. In his defence, Bakugou always wanted everyone to fight him with their full potential thanks to his superiority complex. In your defence, you were in a rather bad mood that day and you let him get to you.

To know how you were in recovery girl's office with your boyfriend throwing passive aggressive comments on a guilty yet angry looking gremlin, let's start from the begining. You were pissed at Todoroki, your boyfriend. After all, how can someone be so damned oblivious? How the actual fuck did he not understand that the Camie bitch had a thing for him? To say that you were this close to punching Camie on the face during your remedial classes would be an understatement. Then again, what else can anyone expect from THE Bakugou Katsuki's best friend? Both you and Bakugou were hotheads and somehow became really good friends and no one really understood how you and Todoroki started dating but they had to admit that the two of you made a great couple (except Bakugou because he dislikes Todoroki with a burning passion). Anyway, what infuriated you was when you demanded Shouto to stay away from Camie, he actually was completely oblivious as to why. When you explained your reasoning, he told you that he had no idea what you were talking about. Ofcourse, he didn't have any idea that he was being flirted with. Ofcourse he didn't notice that both you and Bakugou made a pact on being extremely rude to Camie (cause even if Bakugou dislikes Todoroki, he's still your wingman and he will definitely not give up on the chance to be rude to someone simply because that's fun).

Hence, you were distracted during battle training. You were teamed up with none other than your best friend and he was not having it. Did he care about the fact that you had a fight with Todoroki this morning about everything? No, ofcourse he didn't care. You were supposed to know better than letting Todoroki's obliviousness get to you. How dare you insult him by not fighting at your full potential? Atleast, that was Bakugou's thought process when he shouted at you and called you an useless dumbfuck when you were fighting him. At that moment, you pretty much lost it. In your defence, you were already mad at Todoroki for being an oblivious idiot and now you were mad at Bakugou for being an insufferable asshole. Which is why, Bakugou was suddenly knocked out by a HUGE wave of water and when the water was gone, you were on the floor, passed out.

Todoroki on the other hand was confused beyond measure. Did he just have a fight with you? Why did you look the way Bakugou does when he's being an ass? Were you made at him? Did Camie really flirt with him? Is calling him handsome considered as flirting? Let's just say todoroki.exe had stopped working. Wait a second, he actually said that out loud to you. That you look like Bakugou when he's being an ass. Technically, he called you an ass? You definitely are mad at him right? You did call him an oblivious idiot... These were things that were going on in Todoroki's head when he was watching you fight Bakugou. You were definitely distracted. You trained way too many times with Todoroki and he knew exactly when you were giving full concentration in fights. Suddenly, Bakugou shouted something to you and you made the biggest wave of water he had ever seen you make. He knew you were overexerting yourself. While Bakugou was knocked away, watching you fall down on the floor made Shouto feel like the ground moved from underneath his feet. Without giving it a second thought. He rushed to you, picked you up and took you to Recovery girl's office with Aizawa sensei.

You woke up to your best friend shouting at your boyfriend. "It's all your fucking fault that (Y/N) is in this shape! Don't you fucking put the blame on me! How the fuck can you be so damned oblivious that the stupid bitch from remedial class flirts with you and you fucking let her even when you have a damned girlfriend hah? I don't fucking understand why (Y/N) even dates you" Bakugou barked at Shouto. "Yet she comes back to me every night and not you." Shouto told Bakugou nonchalantly. "What the fuck?! What's wrong with you?! (Y/N) and I are just friends! The fuck are you getting at half and half bastard!" Bakugou barked in disbelief. "WOULD YOU TWO SHUT THE FUCK UP?!" you decided to break the fight before you looked at Shouto angrily and told him, "You! Apologise to blasty for making that stupid ass comment!". "Sorry..." Shouto muttered, still glaring at Bakugou as Bakugou gave him an egoistic smirk. "You're not off the hook too Blasty. You don't fucking call me useless and get away with it. Apologise." you reprimanded Bakugou. "Hah? Like hell I will! Go tell icyhot to apologise! It's his fucking fault that you were half assing shit during training!" Bakugou barked at you. "Says the one who provoked (Y/N) into getting herself dehydrated." Shouto commented in a stoic expression. "SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU BASTARD!" Bakugou barked but you followed him soon enough. "QUIT IT YOU DAMN IDIOTS!" you shouted before looking at Bakugou and saying, "Dude, I need to have a talk with Shouto so get outta here since you can’t talk without shouting.". "Tch fucking shit for brains, you ain't getting me to make you ramen anymore." Bakugou grumbled before leaving the room. "You think he'll make you ramen again?" Shouto asked, looking at door. "Eh he'll make 'extra ramen' accidentally and throw that at me anyway." you shrugged. You knew Bakugou too well. "Isn't that flirting too?" Shouto asked you with a frown. "No, Shouto. That's called being a good friend. Calling someone hot on their face and fangirling over them is called flirting. Did you ever see me call that weirdo hot? Or did you ever see me try to get all over him like Camie did with you? You really gotta understand that stuff you know..." you sighed. "I'm sorry... I'll try to avoid her. You know that I love you right? No other girl could possibly make that change." Shouto told you earnestly, holding your hand. After a comfortable amount of silence, he asked, "(Y/N), do you feel okay? I'm sorry you had to shout at us when you should be resting...". "It's fine, Shouto. I'm alright. Just a bit tired." you answered with a smile. "Don't ever do that again (Y/N). Do you know how I felt when you passed out? I was terrified. Don't risk your health even if someone taunts you. I know you hate being taunted but please just keep yourself in control. I feel bad when you are in any sort of pain..." Shouto muttered. "Yeah I know. I went too far today. I'm sorry. It won't happen again." you answered, the smile not dropping from your face. To that, Shouto placed a small kiss on your lips. Maybe passing out wasn’t too bad after all given that everything worked out the way you wanted it to...

[Author's note: Uhhhhh I kinda got carried away with it?🥺🥺]

[hamliet]

hey hamy what did you think of geten now that you saw there face?

Hey Anon! 

So… Geten seems to be a hot-button topic in the fandom, so I’ll begin with a disclaimer that whatever follows will include a lot of disclaimers. I’m also going to presume that Dabi is Todoroki Touya. (At this point, if he isn’t, I think there’s no way to make that not bad writing, so we’re going to go with Occam’s Razor and presume he is.)

We know only a few things about Geten:

She is a villain with an ice quirk;

She has ideals about quirk supremacy that are hella yikes;

These ideals are reminiscent of Endeavor;

We don’t know her gender for certain but it’s pretty likely she’s a girl (hence my use of female pronouns for now);

She bears a resemblance to Todoroki Rei and has an ice quirk;

She had an emotionally charged fight with Dabi;

The Dabi-Geten fight was the only fight without an emotional (or physical, really) resolution in this arc. 

From this we can make a few assumptions: firstly, her bearing the ideals of Dabi’s likely father (ideals that were used to abuse him), the looks of his mother, plus the lack of emotional or character growth closure in their fight (Toga, Twice, Spinner, Shigaraki all had that) means that Geten is probably going to provoke development in Dabi’s arc going forward. They might have a rematch; I don’t know. Your guess is as good as mine. The only thing we can say for certain is that the set-up with Geten is promising for Dabi focus and development. 

Geten’s ideals are hella yikes, as I said above. They’re grotesque. However… Dabi has espoused these same ideals. That’s not entirely surprising, because Dabi is a character who has presumably been abused horrifically throughout his life for not being good enough, quirk-wise, for his father. 

But it’s not uncommon for abuse victims to internalize these same ideas and, as much as they hate them, also act out as if these ideals are true when they aren’t. And we have seen this with Dabi. 

I’m not saying inherently that we are to view Geten and Dabi as the same; by the time we saw this part of Dabi, he’d already saved Aoyama, had that weird encounter with Shouto, and overall been given much more depth than Geten has currently. Literally her beliefs are one of the few things we know about her. But I am saying that Geten might prove very useful narratively in challenging Dabi on these beliefs…  asking him whether he really believes them or if it’s extremely harmful (it is), and if he doesn’t believe it, if he doesn’t want to exploit weaker quirks like Endeavor, then he needs to take steps to act like it. (whispers *eventual redemption*)

He also needs to open up more to his comrades and that will probably happen when he’s revealed as Todoroki Touya. Geten could theoretically provoke such a reveal eventually if she digs more into that sore spot. All of this is development for Dabi in some respects, development we should get sooner rather than later. 

I’ve also seen speculation she’s Rei’s little sister, and while we can’t rule it out, I can say that I sincerely doubt it just as I doubted Geten was actually Natsuo. There’s no narrative gain to another character connected to the Todoroki family being a secret villain (if anything I think it’d take away from the narrative point of Todoroki Touya being Dabi), and I find it hard to believe someone who presumably loves Rei and has seen what Endeavor’s beliefs have done to Rei would remotely espouse the rhetoric Geten has. 

As for the way the fandom is reacting to her… sigh. I do think female characters get held to a higher moral standard than male ones, but then again she’s not nearly so fleshed out as other villains and the first impression being a supremacist one isn’t really gonna win people over, so I totally get why people dislike her. I’m personally excited to see where she goes in the story, but there also isn’t much to like currently, so yeah. 

As for shipping, I’ve seen a lot of people dislike the ship and express disgust that people are jumping to ship it, and that’s totally fine that they dislike it (there’s not much to ship right now). But as I said above, there’s a lot of potential for emotional development and worldview challenges for Dabi via Geten, so I also get why people see potential. Sure, some of it is probably heteronormative assumptions, but also… a female character poised to play a role in a male character’s development when the female character resembles his mother (very obviously in quirk and looks) is like a pattern in literature. It occurs frequently enough that it’s not surprising to me people are wondering about shipping (the so-called Oedipus Complex–saying nothing of its ickiness or whatever, simply commenting on where it comes from–comes from observing patterns in literature). I’m definitely not saying they’ll be a thing (I kind of like having a nonsexualized female character for once), but I am saying that I don’t think people hopping aboard the ship are drawing from nowhere. (I can also see Dabi defeating her in a rematch as a repudiation of both his parents, and this is currently where I’m interested to see it go, but I’m open to literally anything.)  

[king-paimon]

HNK Opinion: Defending the Earth gems

This has been a post that I’d been meaning to post for a good, long while and because the new chapter is supposedly focusing on the earth gems, I thought now would be a good time to post it, especially since the chapter will be popping up soon. This post was constructed BEFORE the Chapter 83 leak, so there won’t be any information from that chapter here.

Warning: This post contains opinions and critiques that may be very different from most in the HnK fandom, especially regarding the earth gems and their currently destroyed relationship with Phos. I know some will strongly disagree with me and I hope I won’t upset you too much with what I have to say. I promise, I’m not looking for a fight; I just want to give my honest thoughts about these characters as well as how I feel about the fandom’s treatment towards them thus far. I was honestly debating on whether to post this for a long time because I was scared of any backlash...But you know what? I’m going for it.This will be another really long post. If you want to comment or discuss anything in this post, feel free to reblog, comment, or even send an ask. I’d love to have a conversation about this. Again, hopefully I won’t make too many people upset. And sorry for my messy formatting again; I’m not very confident in my writing skills. Anyways, here we GO!

I must first say that these thoughts have been festering in my mind for a while, especially after noticing many posts about the growing hatred towards the earth gems, especially in the most recent chapters. Some people being angry at them for not listening to Phos, fighting him, shattering him, and in the latest chapters, chasing Phos down like an animal. So… yeah, I can see why they’re getting a lot of hate. But, in my opinion, this isn’t fair to them.

I want to make it clear that I don’t think that the earth gems are completely in the right for all of their actions, but I also don’t think they’re in the wrong. Simply based from what happened in the story from the earth gems’ perspective, especially their interactions with Phos ever since he first came back from the moon, most of their actions and shifted attitude towards Phos is justifiable. (With emphasis on most)

Burnt bridges: The destroyed relationship between Phos and the earth gems

Recall what happened the first two times that Phos came back from the moon but see if from the earth gems’ perspective:

The first time: Phos convinces (or to not sugarcoat: manipulates) a good handful of the gems to go with him to the moon, a place where many of their other comrades had been taken and had not come back. Most of the gems already had their own reasons for wanting to go to the moon, save for Padparadscha and Cairgorm, and Phos intentionally feed into their curiosity to get them to go with him. (Chapter 60, page 13; Chapter 65, page 04) Other than his one-sided confrontation with Adamant, I’m pretty sure he didn’t tell the full truth behind his actions to the other gems: he just gave his selected few bait that would influence them to come with him to the moon. And though he did do it for their benefit (or so he wants to believe), the main drive behind this act to get a reaction from Adamant for Aechmea. Some of the earth gems were already wary of Phos because of how he was acting but this main act sealed how most of the earth gems would see Phos from then on: a wolf in sheep’s clothing. (or: a Lunarian in gem clothing, though it’s literally the other way around… I hope you get what I mean)

(Chapter 60, page 13)

(Chapter 65, page 04)

The second time: Phos comes back with clear stated intentions of ‘breaking’ Adamant. Throughout the two chapters, Phos repeatedly tells the gems that Adamant was just ‘a broken machine’ who didn’t truly care about them and that dealing with him and for the other gems to change ‘was for their own good.’  

(Chapter 69, page 19)

(Page 70, page 09)

So, at least to me, it made sense that the earth gems would be reacted the way that they did. However, I’ll give credit to Phos for actually speaking some of the truth behind his actions, though Bort refused to listen.  

(Chapter 70, page 07)

But honestly, after what he did the first visit he came back, why would Bort believe Phos? This information was coming from Phos after all, and he’s now known by the others for his manipulating skills and is believed to be corrupted by the Lunarians and his own weak will (according to Bort), so why should they trust what he’s saying? Sure, Adamant advocated for Phos and pleaded with the earth gems to go to the moon, but besides seeing Padparadscha move again though was described as also being ‘nuts’ and possibly also ‘corrupted’, they still don’t have reason to believe going to the moon is a good idea. And as far as they’ve seen, Phos’s actions seemed to benefit the Lunarians more than them.

Maybe if Phos told them all of this instead of taking the others to the moon, maybe the gems would’ve been more willing to believe him?  But after all that had happened thus far, I think that ship had sailed, for this event just further cemented the distrust the earth gems had with Phos. At least Euclase seems to be one of the very few who���s still interested in salvaging the relationship, whether it’s because he does want the relationship back or use it to figure out what exactly was going on with Phos and the other moon gems.

The third time: I think it was at this point of the story that I started seeing parts of the fandom strongly disliking the earth gems, and while I totally understand where they’re coming from, I strongly don’t agree. Yes, this time Phos came back with intentions to just talk, to possible negotiate with Adamant and the other gems and yes, it would have been nice to have the earth gems listen to what Phos had to say. But really… after what happened the last two times he came back and after seeing how the earth gems were processing everything, why would anyone think that the earth gems welcome Phos back with open arms? Other than Euclase and maybe Cinnabar, the kinship the others once felt for Phos is gone.

The other part of these chapters that generated a lot of anger towards the earth gems was the shattering of Phos. Again, I understand the anger but this action, in my opinion, is also reasonable if you look at what happened from their perspective. We as the readers assume that Phos reaching out towards Adamant at the end of chapter 77 was a desperate, pleading gesture. (Chapter 77, page 18) But from the earth gems perspective, this was another act of aggression. Remember, the gems have already witnessed Phos act aggressively towards Adamant multiple times both before and after he went to the moon, and the gems knew that Phos had ill intentions for Adamant the last time came back, hence why they not only hid Adamant but fought Phos. With that in mind, the earth gems simply acted accordingly by continuing to protect Adamant from Phos. (Also, it’s kind of hard to tell how fast those alloy tentacles were moving. Based on how the page was laid out, it could’ve been a slow movement, but it could’ve been a fast one, too. If it was a fast motion, then it would also make sense why the gems quickly threw their weapons at Phos.) And I’m sure that this engrained perception of Phos has been further strengthened after the gems clearly witness Phos attacking Adamant after the 200-year skip in chapters 79 and 80. Again, from their perspective, they see Phos attacking and they acted accordingly.

So, after all of this, what does Phos’s track record look like in the eyes of the earth gems:

Phos broke the trust of his fellow gems

Phos manipulated most of the susceptible gems with half-truth/empty promises for better things, and he took most of them to the moon, the final resting place of past gems

Phos was willing to attack Adamant or the other gems, almost remorselessly

And though Phos may try to convince them, as well as himself, that he did these things for the greater good of all of them, these were still some very shady things that he did. So much so that if the manga was solely from the perspective of the earth gems, Phos would be painted as the villain of the story.

(Chapter 60, page 15)

Speaking of villains, I can’t help but feel like some of these facts parallel with another certain character…

(I don’t care what chapter/page I got this from. He’s always look like he’s up to something bad)

Ok... I admit. This is a bit of a stretch and I’m looking too much into this, but I can’t help but see some parallels between them, mainly with how they manipulate others for personal gain, though Aechmea is still clearly the worse and Phos is simply a poor victim of his influence who seems to get the worse out of it and currently, it doesn’t look like Phos will get out of his grasp anytime soon.

I sincerely hope someone can snap him out of it before it’s truly too late.  

My thoughts of the Fandom’s attitude towards the earth gems:

I am going to be a little heated in this section. I promise I’m not attacking anyone in particular: I’m just… really slight irritated by this certain idea that I’ve seen circulating for a while.

As mentioned before, I noticed some anger or rather frustration from the fandom towards the earth gems through chapters 70-82. So based off these past actions, was it really surprising that most the earth gems weren’t too willing to listen to Phos after he comes back a third time? I know several readers have stated that “The earth gems should have listened to what Phos had to say! They’re being unfair to Phos!” I think it was comments like this that sort of rubbed me the wrong way. 

Given the limited understanding that the earth gems have of the situation and Phos’s past actions, what sort of reaction were you guys hoping for, exactly? I’m honestly curious. After everything that they have experienced with Phos, would you expect them to just be like this?:

“Oh, hi Phos? Welcome back! I know the last time you were here, not only did you lie to us repeatedly but you also took some of our family to the moon to then come back again to ‘break’ Adamant, while telling us that you did it ‘for our own good’ without a proper explanation... but that’s water under the bridge! I’ll totally listen to what you have to say and not think that it was influenced by the Lunarians, who have taken most of our loved ones away to never be seen again!”

Ok... that was harsh of me to say or mock and I’m truly sorry to anyone that I might’ve offended but this is how I feel about this mentality.  I just don’t understand why some readers thought the earth gems would just listen to what Phos had to say after everything that happened or why they would be angry that they didn’t. Maybe I’m missing something... 

This is an honest question to anyone who reads this: What was the scenario you were hoping for upon Phos’ return? And if you were in the earth gems shoes, how would you’ve reacted? I personally can’t picture Chapter 79 and 80 go in any other direction given everything else that happened up till that point.

If things had played out differently, maybe the end result would’ve been less... harsh. Maybe if Phos was more honest with all of them when he first came back from the moon, maybe they would’ve believed more. But I know, considering the circumstances before then, specifically Adamant being elusive and not forthcoming himself, I see why Phos made his decisions, even though a lot of them were not morally good. If only they were freakn’ honest with each other, Phos and the others  But it’s too late now. Whether he intended to or not, he successfully burned bridges and when he tried to erect them back up, the earth gems tore them back down. You reap what you sow. And now Phos is in the worst mindset and I’m . Again, unlike many in the fandom, whether joking or not, I really don’t want this to lead to Phos truly going berserk and destroying the other gems. That would break my heart more than it already has and I can only imagine how Phos would feel afterwards.

Final words:

I realize that what I’ve said probably won’t sit well with some fans and they will likely disagree with me, but that’s fine. Like I said before, I didn’t intend on picking a fight with anyone and really hope didn’t offend anyone too much.  To the critics of the earth gems, even though I may disagree with you, I still respect your opinions. I just felt the need to defend the earth gems because I felt they were getting very little support for a while. Again, I’m not saying that the earth gems were completely in right nor Phos deserved what happened to him.  I am saying that I can at least understand why they acted the way that they did, just like Phos, and I just personally felt it’s unfair that they are detested for their actions while Phos doesn’t seem to get a lot of criticism for his actions. 

Maybe the new chapter will change the tune of some of the earth gems’ harsher critics, maybe it won’t. Maybe it’ll even have me change my stance on them a bit. We’ll have to wait and see I guess.

I’m nervous and excited to see what’ll happen next. But regardless of what happens, I do still hope in the end that the gems, including Phos, will come back together somehow and have a true happy ending. (Not in the morbid way, please? No turning everyone into dust or incorporating them into Phos’s broken body. Please no. Haruko Ichikawa I beg you.)

Until then…someone give that gem a hug! Please?

[calliecat93]

Top 5 Things I Disliked About Red vs Blue: Season 2

When I decided to do this series, I knew it was gonna be hard to do lists for Blood Gulch. Not because I can’t think of anything I like or dislike specifically, but as I said before, BGC is mainly comedic driven. The worst I can say is ‘this isn’t funny’ and critique the earlier production standards. Which that’s kinda mean since they were working with what they had and trying to learn to do the show. As such, I have to reach on Dislikes for these and S2 was a tough one in that regard. I managed to come up with five, but GOD I had to stretch haaaard on it.

But still, I did it. Just remember, take this with a grain of salt. So here we go, Top 5 Things I Disliked About RvB S2.

#5. Doc

If you asked me which of the BGC to write out and never bring back… I’d probably have to pick Doc. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate him, but I’ve also never loved him. He comes off more whiny than funny, and most of the time he’s only funny due to the back and forth with O’Malley. Otherwise, usually… he’s just there. Even here in S2, while having a pacifist medic in a cast where several are trigger happy could lead to some funny stuff, Doc was just an annoyance. The situations he got into were funny, like getting knocked into the Warthog when the Blues unknowingly made it go rogue, but he was literally just there for the ride. Something IDT later season really improved aside form 16 and 17, which tbh I think is stretching it.

IDK, I just find Doc whiny and kinda boring. Even if he’s meant to be the annoying, disrespected nice guy, doesn't Donut kinda fit that slot already? Heck, they both even have the recurring ‘disappear for seasons and then suddenly comes back’ joke. The only times that I feel invested in Doc is when he has O’Malley, which is how he re-entered the plot here. I’m gonna save more about that in the S3 posts, but on his own? Doc just… doesn’t really work and I didn’t really miss him in between the Reds dumping him and him reappearing when O’Malley infected him. It’s also a flaw IDT recent seasons have really fixed, though they are trying. Plus I don’t hate Doc and some jokes with him do work (the gag of his naming made me giggle), I'm just… indifferent. But that’s why he’s at the top of the list since the most I can say is I find him whiny and not as funny,

#4. The Cyborg Subplot

So due to losing Lopez and because he’s Sarge, Sarge decides to turn one of the Reds into a cyborg to do all the stuff that Lopez did. He settles on Simmons. Now in and of itself, the subplot is fine. It leads to a good few jokes, like Grif trying to ruin Simmons’ parts after the surgery or a few gags like Simmons shooting his own foot and of course, faxass. While IDT the season would have been hurt without it, it has plenty of funny bits. Sow hat’s the problem. Well… like I said, cutting it wouldn’t have hurt anything. It kinda is just there to give the Reds something to do during the O’Malley and Tex stuff since otherwise, they’d just be standing around and taking… well, more than normal. Otherwise, it’s only significance plot-wise is Tucker tuning into their frequency, which is important in the finale when he picks up Vic and Sarge’s conversation.

So yeah, the subplot isn’t all that important. But it is still funny, so I don't mind it being there. But nowadays… how much so we see this come up? I mean Grif got mutilated by a tank and got another guy’s body/organs haphazardly stitched on. Simmons, while he possibly gave up those parts to Grif willingly, was otherwise forcibly converted into a cyborg. This… hasn’t really come up again. I mean the only time I think Simmons mentioned it in-show was as a brief joke in S11. Nine seasons later. I don’t think Grif’s side of it has come up at all ever again. Though… considering you can only get so many jokes out of this setup since everyone is always in armor, I do understand why. Though I feel with Simmons’ side at least, they could play with it some more, both comedically and maybe even storywise. But that may be my need for Simmons content talking…

So yeah, the subplot was okay. It’s at Number Four since I don’t hate it and it was funny. I just feel like nothing would be lost without it, especially since it pretty much never comes up again. Maybe one day though, who knows? At least the fanfic writers keep it alive XD

#3. The Caboose Forgetting Church Thing

Okay this is brief, but it does annoy me. During the whole trip into Caboose’s mind, Caboose’s memory of Church gets shot. As such, Caboose forgets who Church is. Makes sense, O’Malley killed the personification of Church in Caboose’s mind, so his mind would forget it. It also explains why Caboose got, well… for lack of a better way to put it, intellectually challenged later on due to having three AI’s in his brain and all the chaos that broke out. But Caboose forgetting Church lasts like… one episode? Maybe two? Anyways, Burnie explained on the commentary that it was just too hard to write out so they did one joke with it, and then just dropped it. Probably for the best... but then we have to figure out how this works in-continuity... damn it.

Really this is only on here because it forces me to try to figure out how this is possible in a show sense. Which yeah I probably don’t need to, but I am a continuity loser who tries to piece together these things. If I had to guess, maybe the memory of Church fixed itself somehow or Caboose was able to recall after being around Church for a little while. But I honestly really don’t know, and trying to think it through hurts my brain. It also did little to nothing either story-wise or comedy-wise, at least we got a few jokes out of the cyborg subplot. IDK, I feel like they gave up on it too soon. But then again this is the saga where they’ll break/ignore continuity for the sake of a joke and that’s just how these seasons worked. Hence why I put it smack-dab in the middle.

#2. Some Holdover S1 Issues

You can tell that there was a mass improvement in terms of production for Season Two. Pacing felt stronger, more was going on, characterizations began to settle in, and they even began to form more of a plot. They clearly had a much better idea of what they were doing now that they got through Season One and I think things like Matt becoming more involved in writing and production as well as Gus moving back to work on the show really helped as well. That being said, not everything got resolved. Most did, but there are still a few holdouts.

Audio mixing is a LOT better, especially when it comes to effects. The filter is still a little distracting, though better compared to S1. Not all the characterizations really set in. Grif and Donut are about 75% there and Simmons and Tucker are probably the least set in stone. The traits are there, like Simmons clinginess to Sarge and Tucker actually showing some competence when forced to, but nothing set in stone. Donut’s also on the right path with his hobbies and tendency to babble into TMI territory, but the voice is still off and his personality isn’t quite there yet. There’s some other, but I’ll touch on it in the Likes list. Some jokes could also still drag, like the whole switch joke where some of Church and Tucker’s back and forth went on a little too long.

We’re clearly making progress, but the mark hasn’t quite been hit. It’s still an improvement over S1 though, the pacing especially. This is nitpicky, but still it’s there. But hey it’s progress, and that is never a bad thing. So yeah, RvB is still evolving here, but the progress bar is loading steadily and trust me, by S3 I think we’ll be settled in… well, for the most part.

#1. Some Outdated Humor

The BGC was made from 2003 to 2007. Obviously, there’s gonna be some stuff that is outdated. Take the graphics themselves for example. Halo has evolved, so the game can look a little outdated, especially when you compare the original footage to the remastered footage. Let's put it this way, VIC is uncanny in the remaster… and is utterly horrifying in the original version. Thank God that the DVD is the remaster and I was spared of looking at that monstrosity. Visuals aren’t the only thing though, some pop culture references can also come off as outdated, like Creed joke in the RL vs Internet PSA. So can some of the humor that shows how stupid we were back only two decades ago.

There are… some jokes that are uncomfortable to listen to. For example, there’s the Grif shaming himself joked by saying he’s a girl and likes ribbons in his hair. It’s not the worst joke and clearly, it isn’t made to offend… but nowadays I think it could look offensive to certain individuals. It didn’t necessarily offend me, but it did kinda make me feel uncomfortable when I first watched it, but it could be me thinking it over too hard. There’s also the casual usage of the R word. Last season it came up a bit, but I noticed it came up more frequently here. Not excessively, but there were quite a few instances where it was treated as a casual curse word. Obviously back in 2004 we didn’t realize this was an offensive term, and I think they’ve even said that they regret the casual usage of it during the early years. You certainly would probably not hear that word used unless maybe to emphasize how terrible a character is, but even then I think they’d be more careful.

Now obviously RvB uses a lot of adult and offensive humor, especially in this era. I guess you can kinda call it the web version of South Park, only RvB has never really resorted to shock humor. It puts it above many, /many/ animated adult comedies in that regard. Still, when you run for this long, you’re gonna have some outdated elements. It’s not necessarily their fault, it just shows that times has changed. Still, it does make some stuff hard to look back on without cringing, and I imagine that the Founders would agree. So yeah… there’s just some stuff that wasn't fun to look back over and S2 isn’t the only offender, but this was where it stood out to me and took me out of the moment. As such, it is Number One.

(Top 5 Likes)

[saltpepperbeard]

Okay I’m officially back on my Joshifer bullshit thanks to you lmao. What are your thoughts on all the drama surrounding JH and CT? Do you think she’s the reason Joshifer never came out and admitted they were dating? Or was it because of JL and NH? I figure it’s been long enough that you can talk about it freely without starting the Discourse™️. Feel free to ignore this though if you think otherwise, I don’t want you to get any hate lol.

I feel like my blog should come with a disclaimer honestly. Like, CAUTION: CHANCE TO GET BACK ON YOUR JOSHIFER BULLSHIT UPON VISITING lol. But oooh goodness we’re spilling tea of THAT caliber, huh anon? I don’t mind talking about it at all these days though. Because yeah, I believe we’re definitely out of the shipping war/Discourse™️ days, and I’ve also reached the level of Fandom Veteran where I just…No longer Give A Care lmao. TOO TIRED TO CARE.

But BECAUSE I have a tendency to get ramble-y, let’s go beneath the cut~

Okay so first off, I’ll start out with my honest thoughts on Joshifer, and what I think they had and/or what happened between them. The thing I lean towards the most is that they messed around at Hawaii. I think it’s the most likely thing, given that they were both young, pretty newly single, and alone on that island together. And looking at all the BTS footage, plus every promo that followed? Come on now. And maybe it wasn’t sex necessarily. But at LEAST making out/heavy petting or SOMETHING, my dude. I WANT TO BELIEVE lol.

So, what I LIKE to think happened is that Jen and Josh messed around/had sex/attempted to get into a relationship during the filming of Catching Fire filming somewhere. But in the midst of that, Jen got a little too scared with the whole idea, and ended up breaking things off to eventually go back to Nick. Which, in turn, hurt Josh enough to attempt to mend his wounds by starting a new relationship with Claudia that following summer.

And then that’s where things get…ROCKY lol. Because back in the day, I definitely used to think that Joshifer’s story didn’t end there. I thought that, somewhere down the line, they had to start messing around again or dating in secret, because there were some pretty eyebrow-raising events that took place.

The two ones that instantly jump to my mind are of course, Cannes and the MJ1 Promo. And hell, even MJ2 promo honestly. Cannes because of Jen giving Josh a LAPDANCE and the two of them leaving the party BY THEMSELVES, TOGETHER, “INTO THE NIGHT.” Mockingjay Part One because of them both contracting strep throat, but no one else in the cast/crew seemed to get it. And Mockingjay Part Two because of all those random kisses/bouts of physical affection.

Bruh, I was just CONVINCED that they were going to come out as a couple following the wrap of Mockingjay Part 2. I really really was. But then…they never did. They both seemed to go quite separate ways for that matter. So that’s left my mind to kind of shift a bit and to start questioning things.

Because, almost all throughout the Mockingjay Promos, both Josh and Jen were linked to relationships. Jen with Nick for a bit, and then Chris Martin for a bit, and Josh with Claudia (See I’m to the point where I don’t mind dropping names lol FIGHT ME). So like…BACK IN THE DAY X2 lol, I thought that they were just “cover up” relationships. Or PR relationships, if you will. I kind of hopped aboard that bandwagon because of how CONVINCING Joshifer seemed.

That, and Josh’s relationship with Claudia and Jen’s relationship with Chris just seemed…weird lmao. They didn’t seem anything like what I was seeing during promo with Josh and Jen. So that made me even more convinced that I was on the right track.

But then Jen broke it off with Chris only to move on to Darren, and then to Cooke, and Josh remained with Claudia. The ship I was nearly certain was going to take off never did. So it left me reevaluating tbh.

It made me think that Josh and Claudia had to be an actual relationship. Because, come on lol, there’s no way. Why the hell would he stay with her for six years now, for anything other than…a relationship? Because Paradise Lost lmao; who is she? We don’t know her. It never even made waves in the states at all. And that was FOREVER ago. Josh was never even that big of an actor to really properly “stunt” in my opinion anyway. That seems to be reserved more for the actors who are really on the media’s current radar. The talk of the town lmao.

BUT, that doesn’t mean I’m 100% a fan of them. Because I’m not. Never have been lol. And nor do I really like how they’ve presented their relationship. I’ve definitely seen enough sketchy stuff to make me wrinkle my nose. Which is the drama you were referring to I imagine lol. Claudia using Josh for her career’s benefit, their friends using him for their benefit, yada yada. Idk, once I kind of realized Joshifer wasn’t going to be an immediate thing, and once I kind of stepped away from Josh (which is a whole DIFFERENT story in itself lol), I just…really never jumped into that drama/cared about it at all.

AND, despite talking to a few different people about it, I feel like I never really gathered enough information to really formulate proper opinions on it. AND X2, I kind of realized that hey, these are actual people and we really don’t know what’s going on behind the surface level stuff we’re seeing. We could be 100% right, but we COULD be 100% wrong. So I just kind of stayed out of it, sighed whenever Josh was in Spain or she in the States, and just kind of moved on.

Same thing goes for Jen and Nick. Saying his name makes me shudder, but I think that’s only a self-inflicted gunshot wound lmao; THANKS, TWAAL. I had a lot of issues with him, but I think they were mostly…fandom driven? Like, it was one of those “I don’t like you because you’re interfering with my OTP and because your fandom hates mine” kind of dealios. I really didn’t have any VALID reasons to dislike him at all lmao.

People will say otherwise. I know a lot of Veteran Joshifer Shippers think that relationship was ENTIRELY fake/PR driven too. I can’t say I entirely agree? But again, it’s practically the same thing as my thoughts with Josh and Claudia. I didn’t dive that deep into things regarding that relationship, so I really know nothing, and so I REALLY can’t form a proper opinion.

*Wheeze* SO lol. Where does that leave me now. Well, since things did not go the way I and probably a lot of other people anticipated, I’ve just been…confused? Like yeah, there were things that I DEFINITELY thought were indicative of a possible fling/relationship. But Josh and Jen were with other people…? It seemed so so SO real, but then they moved tf on?

So yeah, I really don’t know what happened at all. I can’t prove anything. Josh and Jen genuinely could have been just friends all throughout promo, hence why they have nothing to tell. Or, they could have genuinely fucked all through promo, and their relationships WERE just indeed PR cover ups at the time. It’s literally impossible to say for certain.

I think if anything did happen though, it’s probably way too soon to tell. Especially with Jen in a rather new and very serious relationship now, and Josh still in the relationship that he was in all throughout promo. I feel like if something did happen, they’d probably open up about it like, a decade or maybe even more down the line. Or who knows, maybe it’ll be their little secret, and our little speculation.

Like, the both of them definitely don’t need anything “cheating scandals” or anything like that running rampant with their current situations. So yeah, if there was something, we likely won’t hear of it for a while, if…ever.

Which Goddddd gets my GOAT lmao. Still bitter to this day. And still can’t fathom what happened between those two. Because I was rooting for them so very hard, anon. I think everyone was at a point. There was just so much RIDICULOUS shipping fuel between them.

And I think for that reason, I’m always going to be rooting for them in one way or another. They’re the equivalency of a “first love” for me lol. Like, I’ll always always remember what I saw between them/have a soft spot for them regardless. And I’ll definitely ALWAYS have fingers crossed for ANY tidbits.

[hirakdesherrani]

Fifteen episodes into Diyar-e-Dil

I had made two posts earlier when I was done with three and then ten episodes of this show. Usually I watch finish Pak dramas pretty soon,’cos I bingewatch them like there’s no tomorrow. But I’m unnaturally slow with DeD. Maybe ‘cos its an ensemble show and there’s so much to the characters.

First and foremost, kudos to the dialogue writers, screenplay writer, whatever the makers for capturing the nuance of female characters so well. (Gul kuch seekh inse!). Ruhi, Anjumand, Farah, even Zohra and Zarminey, like each and every emotion is so crystal clear to the viewers, and the makers have a done a fabulous job of portraying the dilemmas and contradictions going on in the female characters’ minds. I have always maintained that female characters are infinitely more interesting then male characters, because just as in real life, men are simple, therefore male characters are also one-tone; its black or white or sometimes grey, but women are complex beings, hence female characters are also colorful. Unfortunately, the audience doesn’t understand this. I read some disappointing comments on YT which painted Ruhi with the broad brush as an ‘evil’ woman and Arjumand as the ‘good’ woman, showing that in our society, be it India or Pakistan, ‘firmabaddari’ or obedience is what defines how good a woman. Well, fuck you society, I’m so not buying this shit of an ‘obedient’ wife and bahu. 

Anyways, coming back to the plot, the last five episodes were epic. So much happening in just 5 episodes? Blessed! (esp. when I’m reminded the horror of FKFC’s fake wedding which stretched on for a month with nothing happening actually). The plot just took an absolute turn with Suhaib’s death.

The character transformation in Behroze was well, sad for me. The burden of guilt is crushing Behroze. His brother dying, Agha Jaan recovering from a heart attack, and mostly, the fact that Agha Jaan has been so welcoming and as in fact accepting his guilt in all this. My point however is that what could Behroze have done? He did come with Ruhi to patch up Agha Jaan long back, but Agha Jaan threw them out. So, I found his overwhelming guilt a bit putting off, though I understood it. Of course, then came episode 13 and Behroze just completely blew my mind, and not in a good way. Like I get it that you are feeling guilty, you want to fulfill your brother’s last wish, and you think you’ve less time on your hands; fine but nothing justifies marrying off your teenage daughter without even asking her wishes to a guy she doesn’t even know. Especially after how Agha Jaan had dictated Behroze years back on who he should marry. Matlab hadd hai! 

More than the fact that Behroze almost forcefully married off Farah to Wali, what angered me was his manner. Its easier to rebel against open tyranny, but the manner in which Behroze emotionally blackmailed Farah, without giving her opportunity to argue with him, is what pissed me off. It also made me realize that intrinsically Agha Jaan and Behroze have certain similarities (not just their pride and ego) which is why Behroze was Agha Jaan’s favorite son, and Wali always aspired to be Agha Jaan’s favorite.

Moving on to Ruhi, firstly I LOVE SANAM SAEED. I think DeD gave her opportunity to explore so much more as an actor. Like from the naive, loving young Ruhi to the present, grey Ruhi, Sanam has done a wonderful job. While some of Ruhi’s actions seem unreasonable, I could totally understand why she is behaving like this. The tiny scene in past, where Ruhi once woke up in the middle of the night to see Behroze gazing fondly at pictures of Agha Jaan and Suhaib, somewhere caused a deep seated insecurity in Ruhi’s psyche. That tiny memory is the trigger point of all her reactions years later. Behroze never shared his feelings with Ruhi, and she only has that one meeting with Agha Jaan as a reminder where he insulted her family. So, when she meets Behroze after a gap of 15 days and confronts him about his sudden change, I’m not surprised that she formed an even worse opinion of Agha Jaan.

That one scene where Behroze gives up cajoling and straight up orders Ruhi to meet Agha Jaan, as if she was his pet, that scene, oml, Ruhi’s face in that scene was something. The shock that she couldn’t reconcile the loving husband of 20 years with this tyrant standing before her (Sanam’s expression was so on point), was what set off Ruhi’s dislike full and final. From that point she totally started blaming Agha Jaan for everything and did not keep her rudeness in check. 

It was sorta predictable that Behroze was going to kick the bucket the way he kept insisting on Farah’s nikah and told Wali to bury him next to Suhaib, still I choked in that episode. Young Behroze is bae and I will always cherish him, so to see his character die was heartbreaking. I loved the scene where Ruhi is caressing his pillow and pleading that he has to come back, he can’t leave her because he’s angry. That scene was heartbreaking.

Behroze saying Ruhi failed him was harsh, and unwarranted. Ruhi did everything that a wife should, left her family, supported him, and they had a happy life together. She disagreed with him once in her life, and that was enough for Behroze to say that she failed him? Men! They just..disappoint me all the time. 

Ruhi wasn’t right in telling Farah to refuse the nikah to insult Behroze’s family, but here she thinking back to the time that Agha Jaan had insulted her family, so yeah it was irrational but I get where she comes from. However, she was absolutely right in telling Farah to refuse the nikah, because Farah was being coerced against his will. The way Ruhi said, “daro mat main tumhaare saath hoon”, it was exactly like how my mother would have done if I had been caught in a similar situation. My mum and I quarrel a lot, but when shit happens, my mum can fight the world for me, and Ruhi in that instant reminded me of my mother.

Coming to Farah, I love how Maya Ali portrays the vulnerability and confusion that Farah is going through. Her performance is top-notch. I wanted to reach inside my laptop screen and comfort Farah in the scenes where she is wailing in grief due to Behroze’s death. 

However, I’m not satisfied with Osaman’s portrayal of Wali. I dunno whether its Wali’s character which is emotionally restrained or whether its Osman’s acting, but he’s too stiff for me. Bhai, kuch toh expression dikhaao! He just looks constipated all the time. I’m more impressed with the actor portraying Muizz. I like Muizz. If not for the fact that I think Wali and Farah are endgame, I would be shipping Muizz with Farah.

Lastly, Ruhi and Arjumand are the most realistic and relatable characters for me in this universe. Arjumand’s introspection where she admits she hates Ruhi the most in the world is so understandable. Her difficulty in accepting Behroze and his family, especially Farah as her daughter-in-law, was done so well. Hareem Farooq has done a brilliant job here, and I wish I got to see more solo introspective scenes of Arjumand, rather than Wali’s constipated scenes. 

I’m loving this drama, but I really hope Osman has done better in the coming episodes. Till now the only scene where I liked him, was that short scene where Behroze places Farah’s hand in his. Though there is no change in Farah’s demeanor (naturally!), Wali quietly curls his fingers around her hand, and gazes at her lovingly. That one shot I really liked. Khudaaya, let there be more of this!

[7goodangel]

I'm new here, sorry to bother, but why won't answer any paperfresh questions?

Warning: Long post so yeah... hence why the read more o-o

(From Blog Description)

(From FAQ)

But... I’m gonna add slightly more detail to this - cause then I can just link this exact ask/answer to my description for more detail. 

So yeah... It’s not really the full ‘ship’ that I dislike. I am... just... meh with this ship if we are just talking about it in general. 

However - what I don’t like was/is how people were so obsessed over it, so focused onto that specific ship that it caused these things (in this order):

Mischaracterization of Fresh and PJ - So yeah - first was this whole thing. At the beginning - it seemed like a fun, yet harmless ship. Both CQ and I saw few things on it, added our two cents, and just continued to observe the fun (at least for me - it just seemed like CQ was doing that too and she’s really chill). It even got to a point where I was trying to see how this ship would actually work. However - this ship kinda brought in a wave of misunderstanding. Which - I don’t know - I was okay with that for PJ since I knew/know that I’m not a popular blog or anyone important so it’s my own fault for not getting all of the info on PJ out there straight away. But for Fresh? I honestly felt like it was my own fault that people were not seeing him as the complex character he is. Gosh have you guys read MommaCQ By Alania? That, at this time, is the closest Fresh that is to the actual Fresh (ya know... without that whole parasite thing). I just felt horrible that Fresh was getting mischaracterized due to my character (who was also getting super misinterpreted). It felt like it was my fault for that whole thing - so I started to not like FreshPaper starting at the peak of all of that mess. Moving from an OTP to a ‘eh it’s okay!’. I am still dealing with this aftermath today. People are seriously getting shocked that Paper isn’t in a canon ship with Fresh. (Examples come from the Undertale AU Amino on quizzes others made on canon PJ [you guys rock for making those quizzes!]):

(still continuing from above)Yeah - these are actual responses to stuff in the quizzes. I also made a quiz in that Amino and majority of the people who have done it (8 at this time cause it’s brand new) did not have a score over 20 (top score is 124... by a user named Paperfresh which gosh that was funny to me! Kudos to you though!) 7 out of 8 couldn’t do it. People outside of Tumblr still think that Canon PJ is a nice, shy, and innocent little 17 year old. Which is far from the truth. Again - people need to understand the difference between AUs and Canon stories for OCs. And that plays a part into this whole thing. 

Tossing any other ships that are not ‘just for fun’ under the bus/Tossing other users under the bus due to shipsNow this was the second wave of stuff that happened, and this happened right after Christmas of last year. Ever since I said “Oh yeah - This character named Omni (by Cereusblue)? PJ likes them. They are in a canon ship.” And gosh... you know what? Those Freshpaper shippers started to slowly ramp up their headcanons on their ship and tried to make it fact. Try to hide that PJ is in a different relationship with Omni than being in a ‘relationship with Fresh’. Let me first say that at first - it seemed like people who followed me were cool with this. From people who hate FreshPaper to loving FreshPaper. They were all cool with the idea that PJ wasn’t going to be with Fresh. OK! Awesomesauce!But then, I saw people complaining to Cereusblue and Askinfresh (an amazing Fresh RPer) about this - even calling them out (which by the way - Askinfresh had nothing to do with this so...?) and tossing them under a metaphorical bus for why their ship now cannot be canon. (which by the way - at this point CQ and I have stressed out enough times that it just won’t happen!)And eventually - there was one user that I have now blocked due to this - but I am going to go into detail about this, that made me just shut down on the whole topic of FreshPaper together. They were the straw on the camel’s back. And it hit right during the time I was trying to finish up my Masters. (fabulous timing there.)But gosh ok this story is long so just a warning:~~~So - I don’t know how it exactly started - but someone mentioned to me that this user (who honestly I loved and respected their work even though it was mostly FreshPaper stuff [and let me go ahead and say no - it’s not the first person you thought of]) was talking about me not only behind my back, but in a different language entirely. And they just kept saying on occasion on how I was the one who ruined FreshPaper, how I didn’t had the “kindness of being a multishipper” and that I was too blinded by this new ship OmniPJ to even notice how amazing Freshpaper is!And just... while this was translated by Google Translate for me - someone later on confirmed that the translation was pretty close to what they said...I just... I guess I snapped? But I took my time to respond to this, had others read it so then I had less of a chance to offend anyone - cause I HATE HATE HATE making other’s feel bad. And I just wanted to explain my side of the story - especially since this wasn’t the first time they tossed me under like that. And after that? What did they do?Cut PJ out of their story, blamed me for their action on that, and just - continued to draw without seeming like it hurt them even though they kept stating ‘how much they were hurt to even think about PJ’. ...DudeI broke down.I extended my hiatus at that time to “TBD”IT HURT me so MUCH to know that someone was SAD, or ANGRY, or just... so frustrated that they go to my face and say “well then I’m removing your character from my story” and then proceeding to put the blame on me when in fact that wasn’t what I was saying at all. I even replied to that comment and after that - I broke down and cried. And I hate to sound like I was exaggerating on this but - any of my close friends would be able to verify that this happened. I went to a table that I haven’t crawled under within a year - and laid there with a blanket, crying, until I just felt numb. It... kinda showed me that I wasn’t ready for any form of hate on the internet - where you kinda need to have a think skin in order to brush off hate. And while generic hate I was able to brush off until that moment - that.. THAT to me was like this:For a whole month, I panicked. I talked to friends on what I should do. Even after soft blocking and fully blocking their blog - I kept going back. Translating questions with the number 7 in them or with PJ in them to make sure they were not still angry about it... which then spiraled me down. I was afraid... afraid that a whole section of people who could only read and speak that language would see me as the devil’s advocate. Yep - I took the bait. And honestly that whole part of me feeling bad for a month was on me. That was entirely my fault. But... I guess this was the first personal attack I had received in my life - so I didn’t know how to handle it.~~~But now? I know better. I have taken that experience and will use what I had learned from it in a similar situation in the future (if that ever happens). Just... know that you will not please everyone even if you try your dang hardest at that. That was me learning that fully in action. However - due to knowing that discussing FreshPaper was behind all of that - and I didn’t want anyone to feel like that EVER - That’s why I took a stand and just said “nope. I am not going to discuss this ship anymore. I will not like any art of this ship (but know I still do appreciate it  and some I bookmark cause it’s so good) but I just need to take this side and stand - not let any more confusion or miscommunication happen.”

And...well... that is the full story of how it became to be a topic I will not discuss again. It’s just do to all of these things piling up on one another until one thing just shattered me.

I honestly thought about deactivating back during that break down. I thought about keeping my blog up for archive reasons, and starting from scratch with a brand new username and not ever bring PJ back again. I thought about possibly only using Tumblr to stay connected with friends I made but never ever do another social media blog again. 

But eh - I decided to keep going! I’m kinda persistent! Or Determined!

Anyway - this was the LONG LONG L O N G explanation of why I don’t answer any FreshPaper Questions. Just... it was due to bad situations and circumstances that just piled up on me until I just couldn’t look at the word “FreshPaper’ in any positive light. 

BUT LET ME JUST SAY:

I am completely fine if you ship FreshPaper. 

It’s 100% ok! 

YOU ship what you WISH to ship! And being a multishipper - I see those Freshpaper ships as alternate timelines! All coexisting at the same time as the canon timeline. 

Just - I wanted you all to know where I am coming from with this ship... and know why I don’t really like it. And sadly - it’s not even about the characters - it’s about the bad experiences within the fandom for me. 

In the end, respect the canon stories that people made for their OCs - whether it’s for OTPs, NOTPs, and BROTPs,. Respect that people can see certain ships work and others not be able to work. 

Let that whole ‘ship war’ thing die already and let’s create an area where people can discuss ships without the fear to be ridiculed, to be driven to insanity, to be harmed physically or mentally about what they ship or not ship. 

And this has gone on long enough! ^^

If you read this far - thank you. And I hope that with seeing things from my perspective, it brought a new angle to this whole shipping thing. At least with the Freshpaper stuff o-oAgain - you can still ship Freshpaper! Go for it! You like it - draw it! Write it! Sing it! Just... make sure you respect those who don’t like it or can’t see why you ship it. And apply that mentality to any ship you have in any fandom! ^^

Hope you all have a fantastic day!

[askthedespairkids]

Conflicting Views Part 2

Kyoji: At what point, does someone become unforgivable? In your opinion.

Sly: I’m not sure. I think there’s a different point for everyone. Relationships play a big part in it though I believe. Different reactions are given to different people based on previous interactions.

Kyoji: Do you consider me unforgivable?

Sly: I personally believe you are forgivable. Though that’s me.

Kyoji: What about Enoshima?

Sly: This may seem quite strange but I believe Enoshima to be rather intriguing.  Not only has Ms. Ikusaba convinced me to not kill her but I somewhat wish to have a conversation with her. Get a feel for her mindset. Though to answer your question as of now, yes I believe I can forgive her for all she’s done.

Kyoji: What about Maverick?

Sly: I’ve never heard anyone vouch for him. Seems to me like he’s been the way he is since he was young and has no emotional attachment to anyone besides his mother. I don’t think anyone can save him. He doesn’t have a Ms. Ikusaba or a Ms. Nevermind or a Hinata. The man won’t stop until he’s considered a god of this world.

Kyoji: Exactly.

Sly: I don’t think we’ve seen the worst from him yet.

Kyoji: No, but what we have seen is damn horrific. This is the guy who put Miaya in a wheelchair, and who’s killing off all our old classmates.

Sly: I heard. His goals go beyond Enoshima.

Kyoji: What about Fuyuhiko and Peko? Do you consider them forgivable for their actions?

Sly: I have no issue with them. Though he did threaten to kill Ryouko.

Kyoji: When did that happen?

Sly: Well he didn’t say her specifically but during the games we had to play he said he would take away someone I cared about as revenge against me. Obviously, it won’t be Ms. Ikusaba or Graves and he’s not dumb enough to go after Naegi. Koizumi maybe but with Ryouko coming back it gives him a perfect target to get at me. He’s a Yakuza. It’s how they would normally think.

Kyoji: (You’re one to talk) What about Peko?

Sly: I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to her.

Kyoji: I see. But you are aware of what they did, correct?

Sly: I’m very aware

Kyoji: What about Mondo?

Sly: I have no issues with him.

Kyoji: I don’t think anyone would disagree he should be forgiven for what happened with his brother. Unless they were very stupid.

Sly: It was an accident. Though he is an example of what holding on to a burden and not accepting a mistake can do to someone.

Kyoji: With all due respect Sly, I wish you’d have a little more tact. You talk like accepting something like this is easy.

Sly: It isn’t but it’s something that eventually has to be done or it’ll tear at you more and more until you hate yourself entirely

Kyoji: I know that from personal experience. What about Mukuro? I think she may have the highest body count out of all of us.

Sly: Ms. Ikusaba is the best friend I got.

Kyoji: So, you consider her worthy of forgiveness as well?

Sly: She’s the closest thing to myself. She’s accepted everything she’s done but she’s also trying to be a better person.  Nobody has more of my respect than her. Nobody has more of my admiration than her. Of course, I forgive her. It was never a question.

Kyoji: I see.

Sly: She’s someone I’d protect with my life

Kyoji: Same here. I can tell how much she wants to protect everyone here. And with everything she’s worked to accomplish, she’s more than earned forgiveness.

Sly: She told me she never wanted to kill anyone ever again. I will protect that dream. I’ll make it so she won’t have to. I’ll make sure she’s happy.

Kyoji: I intend to do the same. Not just for her, but for everyone.

Sly: Hmph.

Kyoji: If someone dies because of your actions or inactions, you can never take it back. You’re the one who has to live with that knowledge for the rest of your life. The circumstances may differ, and that can be a deciding factor, but killing is ultimately still killing. But those who take the necessary steps to make amends for it can earn forgiveness and respect.

Sly: ……. If you say so.

Kyoji: You know, I’ve been willing to listen to your perspective on this whole thing. The least you could do is try and see things from mine.

Sly: I’m listening. I don’t know what you want me to say.

Kyoji: Based on your worldview, do you think I’m crazy?

Sly: I don’t think you’re crazy. I think you are optimistic and you want everything to be ok. I think your fine and honestly you dislike me a lot more than I “dislike” you. I just want you to realize that you can’t deem the possibility of killing as impossible.

Kyoji: Yeah? Well, I want you to know something. None of this has been naive optimism or a misguided sense that everyone can be saved. I know it may not be possible, but that’s no excuse not to try otherwise. I choose to believe there are other ways of dealing with situations that don’t involve killing.

Sly: There are. Though that doesn’t apply for every situation.

Kyoji: Maybe not. Doesn’t mean we can’t accept that as a certainty though. Things often need to be handled on a case-by-case basis. If the world really worked in solid, easy-to-recognize patterns, our jobs would be much easier. But it never has and never will, hence why we need to be open to as many solutions as possible.

Sly: Do you not believe killing to be a solution. If you do, then you must take that it’s something you may have to do.

Kyoji: I’ll never see killing as a solution. Not again. The environment you were raised in clouded your perception of what is and is not acceptable. You need to open your eyes and see the reality of the situation: not everything can or has to be resolved with killing. Oftentimes, killing can lead to even more problems.

Sly: You aren’t getting a word I’m saying. All your taking from me is kill, kill, kill. I’m not saying that. That’s nothing close to what I’m saying. You’re taking my profession and mixing it with my words. I’m saying it’s something that has to be considered in certain situations. There are many solutions to problems. Not all of them are taking a life and all solutions have their own consequences but if taking a life is the best possible solution and you refuse to take it you and the other person may not be the only people that have to deal with the consequences. In our daily lives in this world killing isn’t always a first option but it’s not something you should say is impossible. Saying something isn’t impossible solution and saying it is our only option are two different things.

Kyoji: And yet you fail to realize that killing can send the wrong people after you. It can send shock waves down the wrong path that come back to hurt you, the people you care about, or anyone caught in the crossfire. You assassinate an oppressive dictator, that doesn’t mean their country turns into a democratic utopia. It leaves a power vacuum for someone potentially worse to take over. You kill someone’s kid, then their parents might come after you for revenge. In the world today, there are so many unknowns and variables we can’t account for. You don’t seem to realize that. Furthermore, this isn’t just about a choice not to kill. It’s about the morality behind it. We call people like the despairs criminals, but how can we expect to hold ourselves to a higher moral standard if we stoop to the same tactics as them? If anything, murdering a murderer make you worse than them. It means you judged someone for a crime, then performed that crime yourself and called it justice. And where does it end from there? Why hold any standards if you’re willing to break them like that? He who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster. But that’s the thing. I did become a monster, and I can never undo those things, no matter how hard I try. But what I can do is ensure people don’t make the same mistakes I did. And I’ll make sure they don’t make the same mistakes people like you make.

Sly: We’re fighting bears lead by a fashionista and her group of people that includes a bunch of people that were already dead and your speaking to me about morality like the sky is blue and everything is ok. The justice system is bad, everyone is the same, the standards are the same. The results of things aren’t the same as they were back then. The world has changed. Nobody cares about morals. It’s about survival. If it’s you or someone else, you can’t help anybody if you die right then and there. A monster back then isn’t the same as a monster now. The reason people are dying now aren’t the same as they were back then. This isn’t the same situation and not everyone is gonna be ok.

Kyoji: I care about morals. Mukuro cares about morals. The entire reason she refuses to kill is because she believes in morals. You say you respect her, but then you turn around and spit in her face with this kind of thinking. You’re a disgrace. I’m a doctor and a scientist. It’s my job to save lives, protect people, and help them survive. I will not lose sight of that, nor will I let you turn other people into killers. Not everyone is like you, you amoral hypocrite. Not everyone can handle killing, even if it is in the name of survival. And you can go on and on and on about how we’re the good guys and they’re the bad guys. But if you’re doing the exact same things as them, how does that make you any goddamn different? Because you say you are? People can always just say things. They can say how their motives are pure or holy or whatever. But it doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t change the fact that the line between you and the people you’re fighting is completely arbitrary. The people here are not soldiers, assassins, or anything like that. They’re refugees. They shouldn’t be molded into faceless killing machines and then told to gun down their own friends and family. Not everyone can handle that. Some people are simply more sensitive to stress and trauma than others. It’s basic genetics.

Sly: First of all, you’re completely wrong about Ms. Ikusaba. Her dream was to be solider. The thought of killing isn’t what stops her now. It’s her Sister. She doesn’t want to be like Enoshima. Enoshima made her feel like that was her only purpose in life. She’s stopped because Enoshima was wrong and she’s more than what Enoshima says she is. Don’t compare her to yourself because you aren’t the same. Nowhere close. And who is this “we” you speak of. I have never claimed to be a good guy. You know why? Cause I’m not and I never will be. Don’t get me twisted, if it weren’t for specific people and my class I wouldn’t even be here. I’m not pure. I’m not holy. And there you go again speaking as if it’s the only option. I will say it one last time. Killing is not the only option but it may be a necessary one. Not everybody needs to be a killer. But everyone must be ready to do what they may have to do. Any situation is possible. Which means things may happen in which people don’t want to or wouldn’t usually do. If somebody isn’t ready for that the consequences become greater and greater. Why do you think Kizakura asked me to teach her how to use weapons? What about Ryouko watching me train everyday so she can pick up how to fight? Or Naegi giving it her all to get stronger. They all understand that a time may come when they have to use what they know to protect the people they care about. Nobody is asking anyone to go kill hundreds and hundreds of people just because. Nobody is asking for anyone to take the lives of the ones they care about. What they are being asked to do is to be ready in case something happens and you need to take a life. Also, that isn’t a doctor’s job. There have been plenty of doctors who have experimented on people knowing they’d die. A doctor is a qualified practitioner of medicine. Nobody said the medicine had to be helpful or healing. A doctor doesn’t have to save anyone. In fact, they can condemn people to death. Just because those are the things you want to do doesn’t mean it’s your job.

Kyoji: …You know, you should be thanking me. I’m the reason you have Ryouko in your life. I’m the one who saved the only people who give a shit about you. I did everything in my power to save the students at that rotten shithole of a school when Slutko and her army of murder bears came through to kill everyone. You have no right to say this isn’t my job and I shouldn’t have to save anyone. That’s ALL I can do. That’s the only thing that will ever matter in this meaningless of mine. Helping people is the only thing that will ever matter. Don’t you dare- don’t you fucking dare- say a doctor doesn’t have to save everyone. And even then…hehe….it still wasn’t enough. Teheheheh.

Sly: Aren’t you suppose to know a bunch of history too? Saying a doctor’s job is to save everyone is a lie. Being a doctor doesn’t mean you are a good person. Slavery across the world, The Holocaust, etc. there had been plenty of certified doctors who experimented and have purposely killed their patients all across time. You make the complaint all the time that everyone just wants you for what you can do like you have more to offer and now you sit and say it’s all your good for. You want to judge me but there’s a reason you’re the only person upset right now. This conflict you feel within yourself. Then you say I should be thanking you? Ryouko died. She died in that school and when she was brought back her goal was to see me again. If we wanna play the “if it wasn’t for me game” I can say not only would she have been killed by Katayama if not for me but she would still be one of the most dangerous people, the Despairs have. She didn’t go into the game looking for you she went in there looking for me. Then even now she wouldn’t even talk to you if it wasn’t for me saying she should. I also think you should know my life extends outside of just this island and the people on it. I had people before I came to the school and if I would’ve graduated and never seen anybody again I still would’ve had people.

Kyoji: Then why don’t you just fucking kill me then? What’s stopping you?

Sly: What would be the purpose?

Kyoji: Nothing. Same as any murder. But why not do it? It’s what you do, right? So, what’s holding you back? If I came at you right now, you’d do it without hesitation. I know you would.

Sly: Well for one you’re the only person upset right now. Upset with me sure but mostly with yourself and your own past. Killing you wouldn’t benefit me, Ryouko, or anyone else. You say you won’t kill but I don’t believe it. You’ll have to. No ifs ands or buts. I have no feeling of dislike regarding you obvious I don’t like you either. You’re just there, suffering inside your own body trying to make up for something that you were tricked into doing. You aren’t threatening to me and I know you wouldn’t risk anyone’s life here if it came down to a decision. There’s no purpose in me killing you at the moment.

Kyoji: grabs Sly by the shirt collar Say that again, I dare you. Say it to my fucking face.

Sly: Am I supposed to be scared? Cause I have no issue speaking up. I don’t care about your mutations Nakamura. You are never going to be something I look at with fear. Even if you were to hit me right now it would be pointless. If I didn’t just dodge I wouldn’t be stupid, enough to kill you. You’re trying to provoke me and it isn’t gonna work that way.

Kyoji: After a few moments, he lets go of Sly’s shirt …yeah. I don’t want to be seen like that anyway. You may be right. I am upset. I do suffer from an internal conflict. And you wanna know why? Because I have fucking killed people. Not by accident, not out of anger-induced vengeance, not on a battlefield. I killed innocent people who couldn’t fight back. Because I was told to by those I considered a higher authority. I haven’t slept peacefully in almost four years. Every time I try to forget about it, something comes back around to remind me of it all. Like you. I never want anyone to feel like this. And this is what you risk doing to others. You risk turning them into me. Not everyone is cut out for this. Not everyone is gonna sleep soundly with the knowledge that will come about from killing people. That’s why I gave myself these mutations: so, I could take the place of other people on the battlefield. I don’t intend to kill, but I also don’t intend to stand idly by. Case and point, I will not sit back and let you traumatize innocent people by forcing them into these situations. You think Enoshima wouldn’t take advantage of that?

Sly: I’m not forcing. They’re being prepared to deal with situations when people like you and I aren’t there. Also, not everyone is like you. Matter of fact probably a third of the people in FF have killed before. Out of those people probably 75% of them accept what they did and have moved on. Then probably 50 percent of the people who haven’t killed have someone they would kill for with no regrets.

Kyoji: And you think that’s a good thing? We need to be better than this, Sly. We can’t succumb to base instincts like all the other psychopaths out there. We need to work together. We need to be smarter than this. Otherwise, there’s no real difference between us and the despairs.

Sly: I disagree. Actions have different meanings depending on who does them and the purpose in which they are done along with the situation that results in the doing of the action.  I see it as everyone being human and realistic. Loyal to their comrades and friends. Willingness to protect those that matter to them most.

Kyoji: What’s the rest of the world gonna care? We’ll just look like two groups of assholes warring with each other. *Sigh* No matter how hard I try, I can’t understand your logic. But…I do get what you mean. I want to protect what matters to most to me.

Sly: We are at war with each other though. A huge game of chess and really right now we’re losing. The rest of the world knows the situation. They know what happens if Despairs win. The people care about the results of this war more than anything.

Kyoji: I know too. You know what, forget this. Forget I said anything. I should’ve figured you wouldn’t care about what I have to say.

Sly: Not something I was really trying to imply.

Kyoji: Sure, sure. But before I go, I have one last question to ask you.

Sly: I’m listening.

Kyoji: You told me there would be a time when I had to kill. Conversely, there could be a time where you have to save a life. But maybe you won’t have the necessary skills or knowledge to do it. In which case, what would you do then?

Sly: You mean I can’t save them no matter what?

Kyoji: Not necessarily. What I’m saying is that there may eventually come a time when the killing stops and rebuilding begins. With your skill set, will you have a place there?

Sly: I would believe so. Even when there is rebuilding there will be people that wish to destroy the process. Along with dealing with that I’m still due to take over my agency when I turn 18.

Kyoji: Fair enough

Sly: If I don’t make it though. I know everything is in capable hands.

Kyoji: …

Sly: There’s this guy back at the agency. Though I suppose he was more of a mentor. I’ve always known him as K.I.. He was the right hand man to my father and he’s taught me tons of things and not just about fighting. He may not be blood but I consider him my only family. Actually, after my father died he took over the agency. It’s supposed to be that way until I’m 18 and I can take over. We’ve built a connection with Future Foundation and Munakata. We exchange supplies, medicines, intel, etc.  Though the two factions try not to intervene with each other’s plans or day to day doings. Of course, I oversee everything but K.I. is really good at being a leader, though if I were to die out here he’d probably hand everything over to someone else if she asked.

Kyoji: …must be nice.

Sly: Sigh She’s probably still really upset with me though. I made sure she didn’t know where I was after everything went down and that K.I. wouldn’t tell her. Though he did make the mistake of telling her I was alive. He chuckles If she found me she’d probably kill me for what I did and for keeping my location from her for all this time.

Kyoji: She?

Sly: Mhm. If I died a girl would take over. Is that surprising?

Kyoji: No, but you didn’t really mention her.

Sly: Try not to worry about her. What do you plan on doing when the world goes back to normal?

Kyoji: Fixing things, helping people, decontaminating the environment. Probably gonna have to assist in redrawing borders.

Sly: What place does Enoshima have in this? What will she do? Rot in jail for the rest of her life?

Kyoji: Not sure. That’s not my jurisdiction.

Sly: What would you do?

Kyoji: …. Honestly, I’m not sure. I’m a doctor, not a judge.

Sly: ……

Kyoji: What? It’s not my place to decide.

Sly: He laughs Oh nothing. I’ll accept your answer.

Kyoji: Hmm. Well, anyway, I really need to get back to the 4th branch. Got a few more organs to print.

Sly: Great. I’ve gotta go get more signatures and such for Gekkougahara anyway. Though before you leave I just want to give you something to think about. I really don’t wanna hear an answer I just want you to think. How long does self-pity and loathing have to last? When do you move on and focus on rebuilding the love you used to have for yourself. A broken man can’t fix a broken world. Mistakes are made by everyone but when does one forgive themselves for their own mistakes. Self-pity and self-hatred won’t get you anywhere you want to be. Like I said though I really need to focus on Gekkougahara’s gifts so I’ll see you later Nakamura He flashes a peace sign before walking off.

Kyoji: Yeah….see ya. (If only you knew what you were talking about, kid. The truth is that some things just can’t be forgiven. They shouldn’t be forgiven, regardless of who’s responsible for them.)

[allonsysilvertongue]

The Elusive Miss Trinket

The Elusive Miss Trinket: Chapter 5

Haymitch Abernathy was pulled out of his self-imposed retirement by the Trinkets with a request of utmost urgency. [Hayffie AU]

Or... I can let her lead and see where this goes.

Haymitch found himself ushered towards one of the velvet sofas in the room. She smiled radiantly at him and treated him the way one would treat a potential customer. One of her staffs, came to offer him a drink which he accepted gruffly.

"Give me one minute," Euphemia Trinket trilled in a high tone. "I am almost done with Ms. Tan and then I will be right over with you. Make yourself comfortable!"

He gave a nod, still staring at her. She hurried across the room to her customer, her heels clicking loudly against the marble floor. He let his gaze roam her figure from the elaborate hair-do to the silk blouse tucked neatly into the waist band of her skirt down the long legs and the high heels, and wondered if she had ever broken her ankle from it before.

This was the woman he had spent more than twenty hours on a plane across the globe for. She was beautiful, he would admit that but it still felt a little underwhelming to him. Aside from the fact that this was the fastest he had ever located anyone he was put on a case for, he couldn't see anything special about her. He could see it in Annie Cresta. He could see it in Iris Everdeen because of her children but Euphemia Trinket....

He tossed the thought aside.

Special or not, he had been tasked to get her back and getting her back would be a challenge.

With time on his hand, Haymitch composed a single line of text for Stephen Trinket. Found her. She's safe.

He brought up the camera function to take a photo of her shop for her father's benefit. He heard the noise of her heels first followed swiftly by a hand on the screen on his phone.

"Ah, ah, ah, no photography," she warned him.

Haymitch lowered his phone. "Why not? I thought you got all these stuff up on your Facebook? Your dresses are there, yeah?"

The smile she threw him was dazzling but he also noticed the impatience in it.

"Not all of my designs. Some dresses are customised specially for my clients. It won't do to have those up on special media before their big day. As much as I do not want people stealing my wedding designs, I also have to respect my customer’s wishes for it to be a surprise until their wedding day. Now," she clapped her hands together, "do we begin or shall we wait for your fiancé?"

That question caught him slightly off guard. Haymitch looked around. He was in a bridal boutique and it was not wrong of her to assume that he was there for a very specific reason.

“We shall wait for her. It is uncommon for the groom to be to be here without the significant other since the bride usually has more specifications in mind,” Effie laughed lightly. “Most decisions are made by the bride, from my experience.”

“There’s no need. No one’s coming.”

She looked surprised at that but Haymitch hated lying. He could give half-truths but to pretend that he was here for her wedding services in order to get closer to her… He was sure he could think of a better alternative without giving himself away.

“I’m here on business… Was just passin’ by your shop… I don’t see many – I mean, it is usually the locals with this sort of business, isn’t it?”

She tilted her head to the side and fixed him with a strange look.

“Am I to understand that you stopped by because you saw a white woman working in a bridal boutique?”

“Yeah,” he answered. “Like I said, don’t see that often here.”

Not that he had been here long enough to form such deductions but it would have to do, he thought.

“It’s interesting, is all,” he added amicably.

“Oh, is that really so?” She seemed pleased by what he said as if she had found a slice of validation in what she had achieved her. Lowering herself on the seat across from him, she asked, “You are not here for my services then?”

“Nah,” Haymitch mumbled. “Got no prospect, not interested.”

Her eyes lighted up and it raked over him, taking the sight of him before she simply told him, “Do not sell yourself short.”

Haymitch raised an eyebrow at that.

“You seem oddly familiar,” she commented and briefly, Haymitch feared that she recalled him calling out to her at the light show yesterday. “I cannot recall at the moment but I will eventually. How long have you been here?”

"Few days,” he answered and it made her laugh, a little too derisively in his opinion.

“How could you possibly know that there are no other people like me with a boutique?” she exclaimed.

She was sharp, he would grant her that.

“Something I observed. Maybe there are others, I wouldn’t know and that’ll be my mistake for making an assumption. Your place just caught my attention,” he said and paused.

He learnt that if given some sort of attention, he would get a reaction in return so he waited to see if she would be flustered by it but she merely held his gaze.

He should have known, though. With a mother who was a famous model, she was probably used to having people’s attention that coming from him, it was nothing.

“Like I said, Euphe- ” Haymitch stopped abruptly. He cleared his throat. “Like I said, here on business and haven’t done much sight-seeing.”

She froze. Her whole body tensed at that.

Haymitch schooled his expression carefully. He realised his slip up. She was Euphemia to him. Her parents had introduced her as such when they came and until that morning, she had never been anything else to him, especially not an Effie.

“What was it that you were going to call me by?” her voice had lost its warmth.

She no longer looked like she welcomed his presence.

“Effie,” he answered. “I was going to call you that. But that’ll be me assuming that you’re the Effie whose name appears on the outside of this shop. I think I’ve done one too many assumptions today. You haven’t introduced yourself, sweetheart. Rude, that.”

He had once tried to imagine what she would be like, if she took after her mother or her father, and he remembered Lysandra Trinket being big on manners the day they met. She should have instilled the same on her children so he waited to see how Effie Trinket would react to being called rude.

“Oh! How terrible of me!” she exclaimed. “Effie Trinket, pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Her demeanour was much more relaxed now as she extended her hand to him.

He smirked. Like my mother, like daughter.

"Haymitch Abernathy," he clasped her proffered hand.

“I am still certain I have seen you somewhere before! Did you follow me from anywhere?” she teased.

“The only interesting thing I’ve seen in this country so far is the light and water show…”

“That must be it! I was there yesterday,” she beamed. “I likely saw you in passing, hence the familiarity.”

And the two weeks before, he added silently.

“Yeah, that must be it,” he shrugged, hoping she would put the matter to rest now.

XxX

The only indication that perhaps something was not right was the incessant tapping of her finger against the side of her phone as they waited for their Grab car.

“I have to warn you,” she said, turning her body slightly to face him, “there is nothing interesting to it.”

“Got it,” he nodded curtly. “Is that the car?”

“It is an entirely boring process and not one you should saddle yourself with on your free day.”

“It doesn’t bother me. Like I said, sweetheart, I just want to see more of this city.”

"Hmm,” she hummed, not entirely convinced by it. “I do have a name that is not ‘sweetheart’.”

He faced her, a contemplative look on his face.

"You don't want me to come,” Haymitch stated.

“You are correct. I do not know you.”

“That’s a fair point,” Haymitch conceded. “Thought if it was so boring, you could use the company but… Your loss then,” he took a step and lightly brushed passed her. “See you around, sweetheart.”

“Tell me, Haymitch, are you here to steal my business?”

He stopped dead in his track at the absurdity of her question.

“What?”

“I just find it suspicious that you want to come with me while I scout for venues for an outdoor wedding.”

He chuckled but she did indeed look perturbed.

“That didn’t even cross my mind. I know nothing ‘bout weddings. I just want to see more places before I leave. Look at this way… You can do your job and at the same time, act as a guide for me. Works well, yeah? We both benefit from it.”

“What is it that you do exactly?” she narrowed her eyes. “You said you’re here on business but you never said what kind of business.”

"That’s cause it’s on a need to know basis so I can’t tell you.”

"That’s exactly what someone who is trying to steal some else’s business might say!”

"Sweetheart - "

"Effie," she insisted.

“Effie,” he amended because he needed to get through to her. “Even if I quit my job, your business is the last thing I wanna get into. You don’t want me around, that’s fine. No need to go accusing me of somethin’ that ain’t true.”

She studied him before letting out a breath.

“My apologies,” she said. “I just had to make sure. Everything is a little…surreal. From seeing you out of the window of my shop to … here. If you tell me something about yourself, I will let you come along,” she compromised with a little challenge of her own. “You seem to me like the sort of man who keeps things to yourself so why don’t you tell me something.”

Haymitch resisted the urge to roll his eyes. If there was one thing he disliked, it was talking about himself. But it was his job to earn her trust and that was what she was asking of him, that he give her something that could make him appear a little trustworthy to her.

He was a stranger to her and she was not wrong to be wary.

He needed time with her and he could not afford to blow this out of the water. So when the car pulled up in front of them, he opened the door and slid in, leaving her to enter the car from the other side. She glared at him as she closed the door.

“Well?”

“Tell you on the way,” he said, slipping his hand inside his pocket to touch the familiar silver flask.

He wanted a drink as he thought through the pieces of this absurd situation he was in that he could tell her.

I hope you like how their meeting went! Leave me a review with your thoughts :)

marizpe who wanted to learn more about weddings in Singapore which I thought I should share in the A/N too… I can't really say much bc weddings are based heavily on one's culture. For example, I'm Malay, so our engagements and weddings will be very different than how the Chinese/Indians will do it which means, when a friend from a different race/ethnicity invites you to their ceremony, it is always fun because it is different than yours :)  but don't worry, Effie will still have business here because people also still wear modern wedding dresses in addition to traditional ones.

Grab is an app, very much like Uber, but only works in South East Asia.