#final theory is i try to act super friendly and confident all the time and one way that manifests is avoiding asking so the person I'm with

[jypbae7]

Me me meeee <3 I'll request a full analysis about NCT's Johnny! 😚😚 Include errrrthing baby hahaha 18+ stuff, him as a romantic partner aka bf <3 whatever you want! I'm so excited to read this akndfkgkfn 😎😎😎❤️❤️

Johnny Suh - Natal chart

Finally finished it!! Johnny was actually the most requested member I received in my inbox! Sorry that it’s nearly the length of a novel lmao but I sectioned it to make it easier to read and navigate 💕

(Not claiming to be an expert this is just for fun please don’t take anything too seriously!) Hope this is helpful and that you enjoy it 🥰❤️

Personality: Aquarius Sun, Gemini Moon, Aqua Mercury, Virgo rising, Leo Mars

While Aqua is a fixed sign it is definitely the most adaptable of the 3 fixed signs due to the Air element of Aquarius plus the ever spontaneous Gemini moon. Most things that make the rest of us feel anxious tend not to seem that scary to fearless Gemini or cool as a cucumber Aquarius.

Natural social butterflies who love their tribe deeply and fiercely once they find them. Busy bodies who are easily bored if left unstimulated too long which will turn into crankiness if not rectified quickly. Thankfully Aqua & Gem have a zest for life that makes them quite easy to please. They are open minded and will gladly stay up till 3am talking about aliens and conspiracy theories, just like they are thrilled to go on last minute random trips just because why not (Gemini impulsivity at it’s finest lmao)

Gemini is a mutable sign unlike fixed Aquarius. This is a pretty big difference and something that goes under the radar with Aquas due to that cool as a cucumber attitude. Because they are adaptable and typically very easy going they don’t often show their stubborn aggressive sides and honestly prefer not to have to unless they are feeling extremely disrespected or pushed beyond their boundary which is a BIG let me say that again, BIG no no with Aquarius (almost as big as it is for for the water signs)

Adding to these deep inner thoughts and vast inner world that Aquarians have, his Virgo rising adds more depth and self awareness. As perfectionists and highly intellectual minds they are a lot more self critical than they let on, just like they are a lot more caring and soft than they let on. They deeply care about others and the world in general seeing the big picture in a very earthy and traditional way - good people should strive to put good out and try their very best at whatever they do. They deeply dislike mean, malicious, manipulative, or spiteful behavior or people and generally keep guarded around people they don’t know well until they feel certain of the person’s true intention. There’s nothing Virgo is more cautious of than to be swindled or hurt by someone they take it reallyy hard and they know it.

Now we alllll know his swag and confidence is legendary and we can all thank the Leo Mars placement for that and the beautiful lush shiny hair and big toothy smile (Looking at Mark, Jaemin and Xiaojun like 👁👄👁) But beyond the aesthetics and dripping confidence and charisma, Leo is another creative sign that tends to be a lot more intellectual and intuitive than people give them credit for.

When the other members call Johnny one of the scariest members you can bet it’s his aggressive fiery fixed Leo Mars which is loud and even violent when provoked enough not to mention the fixed Aquarius tornado energy...Oooof that is a lot of Fixed sign rage right there honey so let’s tread lightly with Johnny boy and appeal to his open minded and friendly nature with a gentle tone and non-pointed words during discussions and all shall be good even if there’s some disagreeing!

Honestly if the argument starts getting bad you can always distract the Gemini moon by just bringing up other interesting topics! Geminis minds move FAST and while they can process a lot of information quickly and precisely they tend to get distracted easily (but here’s the good side of that😉)

Aquarius have a deep love of family and the desire to create their own (Geminis often share this trait) they can feel a bit like outsiders or “other” from people and thus crave to build a tribe of their own - this can be friends that are lifelong deep relationship carried on no different than family or starting their own family with a partner and kids

Relationships:

Non-Romantic Relationships & overall communication style: Aquarius Sun, Gemini Moon, Aqua Mercury, Leo Mars, Virgo Rising

Built off laughter, time spent together whether its at home hanging out casually or going out for meals and fun new things to try together

Wants to bounce lots of ideas off of his closest friends and secretly loves doing creative stuff together the most - this is pretty evident if you watch JCC he’s happiest when he’s doing stuff with his bros whether it’s sporty, musical, or crafts

Does not like to be vulnerable even with those he’s close to, tends to stick to neutral and more light hearted topics of interest and conversation because he prefers to spread a good mood instead of a heavy one

If he really trusts you or has worked through it enough already to want to talk about something serious you’d better listen cause the boy drops gems of wisdom and has a really soft mushy heart

Immediately adopts his close friends as family and no matter the time apart or distance will always treat them the same

Likes friends he can learn from and take on new adventures with they satisfy the intellectual Virgo rising and Aqua & leo sign thrill needs - Gemini is all about BOTH of these

Deeply appreciates loyalty, acts of service, and quality time with his friends and family - makes his heart soooo happy BUT

He would rather fucking DIE than let you or anyone see him cry so he cries like 4 times a year at 3am in the bathroom while everyone’s asleep (HIGHKEY feel like Ten & Jaehyun are exactly like this too)

Romantic relationships and preferences: Capricorn Venus, Leo Mars, Capricorn Juno, Capricorn Eros

Mr. Johnny Suh has THREE Capricorn placements tied to love and intimacy so that’s saying something lmao

Going against Aquarius’ open mindedness and anti-traditional persona Capricorn prefers all things traditional and stable.

Very much does acts of service for his partner as a sign of affection also lots of touching and quality time.

A veryyyyyy spontaneous boyfriend/partner thanks to that Gemini moon - he either wants to stay at home in pjs and order food and have movie marathons or whisk you away on zero notice to a trip lol

Earth sign men are drawn to women who embody very flowery feminine energy and aesthetics. They prefer a “natural beauty” who can spice it up sometimes rather than a super flashy 24/7 partner. (He’s said in the past that his ideal type is Yoona which says it all lol)

Will be highly drawn and intrigued by someone with a high work ethic and high intellect. BIG bonus points if you can keep up with his sarcasm and jokes.

Earth signs are pretty physical and handsy so expect to have little personal space around him, make no mistake they enjoy this very much. He will definitely be grabbing you and picking you up often! He’ll be smirking down at you devilishly watching you get flustered backed into a corner trapped by the sheer size of his muscular body. A Capricorn male’s ego really enjoys this dynamic, trust me lol.

Also another quirky male Capricorn trait that actually applies to Aqua & Gem as well… They like to initiate all the touchy feely stuff - What I mean by that is they can get easily spooked by clinginess too early on. These three signs want romance and definitely want to feel that you’re into them but they also are innately independent and enjoy relationships where their partner can also go off into the world and thrive in their own way and meet back together in the middle. So long as you can find a happy balance, when you are together you won’t have to initiate anyways honestly because he’ll be the one pulling you.

Okay let's talk about Juno & Eros - Juno in Capricorn is about serious, loyal, long term commitment though they tend to marry later in life once they’ve already achieved the things they want to for themselves which I can see being the case for Johnny as well especially with his current career.

18+ Preferences:

Eros in Cap where to begin - high libido, stimulated by visuals and touch. Wear interesting colors, patterns, textures to catch his eyes & his hands - lacy lingerie is a plus the texture will really excite him and the feminine look will please his earthy traditional cap side. If you really wanna have him drooling throw in some spicy contrasts like a leather choker with the lace set and you’ll also set off his Aqua, Gem, and Leo placements as well ;)

Tends to bounce back and forth between fucking you like you’re a cheap groupie whore and taking his time staring you in the eyes and kissing you passionately as he’s stomach deep - no inbetween but really who’s complaining??

DOM KINK - NOT UP FOR DEBATE he has THREE Capricorn placements for fucksake meaning 3 cardinal signs which are literally called “the INITIATORS” plus all his other fixed personality placements

More of the classy rich ceo vibes kind of dom (suits, expensive cologne and jewelry, leather, black and red binds) - takes you to bougie hotels when he really wants to ramp it up and not have to care who hears. You can expect not to sleep those nights but he’ll damn sure pamper you afterwards with cuddles, food, and a spa date.

Now...with all his Air sign placements...I have to say it...he’s a kinky ass dude. Few things are off the table, but he’s also super content with “normal” stuff too. It’s more about the person and experience for him than doing the wildest things possible. So if it feels natural and right then he’s down.

Don’t be surprised if he wants to tie you up like a pretzel or role play because he’s definitelyyy going to ask. Well actually he’d probably just buy whatever outfit or binds he wanted to use and casually be like “look what I got for us baby” as if it’s matching charm bracelets or something. The good news is he’ll dress up and get into it with you and he’s super receptive to your boundaries, fantasies and making it enjoyable as possible for you too.

If you flip the script on him and suddenly break the norm either by taking the initiate/lead first or trying something new he will absolutely combust 🤯 and be in the palm of your hand staring in absolute awe and fascination till he can’t take it anymore and reclaims his spot as the one in control

Nudes, videos, and phone sex when apart are a definite and they really keep the passion burning for him which is honestly VERY important and don’t worry he’s NOT shy and you will be grateful for the beautiful collection of photos and videos 🤤

Boredom for Aquas, Gems, and Caps can quickly lead into self-sabotaging behaviors and/or wandering eyes not because they don’t value loyalty but that they really need and benefit from mental stimulation and feeling wanted so when that’s gone they can pull away

Honestly pretty much any type of lingerie or outfit will turn him on because the most arousing part for him is knowing that you spent time doing such a naughty thing for his sake

Breeding kink - 3 earth placements and has said himself in interviews he would’ve started having kids at 25 if he wasn’t an idol soooooo that’s a definite. He imagines you pregnant with his baby and it makes him super soft and warm which quickly turns to super turned on. He loves the primal marking aspect of claiming you in such a way and also watching you unravel to the point of begging him to do it. Even if it’s just “play” he loves it and will probably think about it a lot more than you know. If you ever do it for real he will be utterly and completely obsessed with you forever and be practically more excited about all the stages of your pregnancy than you are

[itsthenovelteafactor]

Vanya and the Phantom

I asked and y’all answered (special thanks to @schizoidwire and @the-aro-ace-arrow-ace  and all the people who responded to my earlier post for encouraging me!), so it is time for how The Phantom of the Opera song introduction can be read as a look into Vanya’s self-narrative and also foreshadows future events in a really subtle and interesting way. 

I’m channeling my inner Elliot and going into full conspiracy mode. This is gonna be a long one, y’all. 

Part One: In Which I Expose Myself as a Former Theater Kid

So, for those who aren’t familiar with The Phantom of the Opera, it was originally a novel by French writer Gaston Leroux back in 1909. In 1986, Andrew Lloyd Webber rewrote it as a musical. For purposes of my analysis here, I am just going to be discussing the musical because 1) the score used in the opening scene is from it and 2) I’ve never read the book. (If anyone out there has read the book and wants to weigh in, please do!) 

It’s a very aesthetic show, and draws on a lot of gothic themes and imagery. The plot follows an opera house, and specifically a young chorus girl named Christine Daaé. I’m not going to explain the whole show plot in detail because wikipedia exists, but I will do a quick overview here and point out some things as they relate to things I’ll be discussing later. Also there will be a test after and it will NOT be multiple choice.

The show begins when the opera house is sold to new owners who 1) just want to make money and 2) do not respect the opera house’s resident ghost (who isn’t really a ghost, but we’ll get to that later.) When the Phantom makes his presence known, and freaks out the resident prima donna singer (who will be relevant later) Carlotta, who says she won’t sing under these conditions. It is then that Christine appears. She’s quiet and humble and has always lived in the background, but is incredibly talented. The woman who runs the chorus (also owner of the opera house’s resident braincell) suggests Christine sing the part. She does, and is amazing. Everyone is blown away, and she’s catapulted into instant fame and success. 

We later learn that Christine has been studying under the Phantom, who appears to her in mirrors. She calls him the Angel of Music, and thinks that he was sent to teach her by her recently deceased father. He isn’t. He’s actually pretty malicious, and is obsessed with Christine, wants to control her voice, and doesn’t like her dating anyone. Which is a bit awkward when her childhood friend shows up and promptly falls in love with her. 

Anyways, Carlotta is jealous of the attention Christine has been getting and threatens to leave prompting the new owners to cut Christine from the program. The Phantom doesn’t like it at all, sends a bunch of letters, things escalate, people are murdered, and the whole first act ends with the chandelier falling from the ceiling and crashing onto the stage (which is done with really cool effects, oftentimes beginning the show hanging over the audience. It’s a BIG MOMENT and one of the most iconic ones from the show. This will also be relevant later.)

Act two takes place a few months later, wherein no one has seen the Phantom. Shock of all shocks, though, he’s not dead. He’s been writing an opera and he wants Christine to star in it. More stuff happens, you learn the backstory of the Phantom (which is pretty sad, ngl, but in no way makes him less of a creep) and the story ends with the Phantom kidnapping Christine and giving her an ultimatum: stay with him forever, or he kills Raoul (aka childhood friend/romantic interest guy). She agrees to stay with him and he’s so moved by her compassion that he lets them both go and disappears forever. 

Part Two: Casting the Characters

That’s interesting, Rosie (note sarcasm) but you said this was about The Umbrella Academy? I did, in fact. So, we meet Vanya when she’s playing a medley of songs from The Phantom of the Opera. Since it’s primarily the melodies and not one of the orchestral pieces from her performance later (I don’t think), we can assume she’s just playing it for herself (which is nice! good on you, Vanya). 

Maybe she’s never seen the play and just likes the score, but for purposes here, let’s assume she’s familiar with it. 

You can tell a lot about a person by the stories they connect with (for example, I like TUA because I like fun sibling dynamics, found family, music, and being sad). And I think that it makes sense that The Phantom of the Opera would be a story that resonates with Vanya. The overlooked chorus girl finds power in music, and, after years in the background, is finally given a chance to show how special she is. 

So, yeah. I don’t think it’s outside the realm of possibility that Vanya sees herself as Christine. There are some discrepancies, sure, but this is Vanya’s self-narrative, which we learn pretty much immediately is unreliable. (Love her, but it’s true.) And if Vanya is Christine, then we can try and tap into her perspective to look at some other characters. 

Anyways remember Carlotta (the prima donna opera singer who always got the spotlight and tried to destroy everything good that happened to Christine because she felt threatened that someone might be as good/better than her whose entire personality and role in the story I just summarized, rendering my plot recap useless)? Carlotta is how Vanya views Allison. (Kind of all her siblings, but her relationship with Allison is the most important here.)

Think about the scene in the cabin? 

“You couldn’t risk me threatening your place in the house! You couldn’t handle the fact that Dad might find me special!” - Vanya, having a mental breakdown.

This always struck me as an interesting accusation to throw, since prior to this moment, I don’t think there was any indication that Allison had ever felt threatened by Vanya. She excluded her, sure, and wasn’t super friendly at times, but the idea that Allison has been pulling strings to keep Vanya out of her spotlight is new. But that is exactly the role Carlotta plays in Phantom. 

Fun fact! At one point in the musical, the Phantom enchants Carlotta so that she loses her voice right before coming on stage. 

Part Three: The Phantom of the Opera is there

So based on everything I’ve said so far, the most straightforward reading is then, that Leonard Peabody/Harold Jenkins (who for purposes here I’ll call Leonard) is the stand in for the Phantom, which works... really well. Both in helping to understand Vanya and also because it foreshadows the twist of season one in a really cool way.

So, the Phantom appears to Christine first not as an enemy, but as a friend and teacher, who encourages her to be more confident in her abilities. He trains her to develop her singing ability. While the teacher-student dynamic is actually inverted initially with Vanya and Leonard, from the get go, he is showering her with compliments, encouraging her to be confident in her abilities, and, at least on the surface, supporting her in a way she hasn’t been supported before (he’s a trash human but an expert manipulator). 

But, in the play, the Phantom is also very possessive over Christine and her power (er, I mean voice). He also is perfectly willing to kill and/or hurt people who he views as standing in the way of Christine and her success (see the aforementioned Carlotta incident). Which is exactly what Leonard does to Vanya. He kills the first chair violinist to help her get it, and orchestrates a whole master plan to get her to reveal her powers on his terms. 

Even the part where he starts “training” her to use her powers kind of resembles the second act of the play. The Phantom wrote a play for Christine and she’s going to star in it, whether she wants to or not. 

(One could even make the argument of the parallels between Christine believing the Phantom was sent by her father to teach her and Leonard showing up because of his revenge scheme against Vanya’s father, but I honestly don’t have much support for that.) 

Part Three: Two Conflicting Narratives

So, as you might’ve noticed, I sort of have two different threads of analysis going on right now. 1) The Phantom of the Opera parallel is part of Vanya’s self-narrative and in it she mischaracterizes Allison, making her more suspicious of her motivations and 2) Leonard Peabody is clearly the Phantom and doesn’t bother being subtle about it. I hope that I’ve been convincing (or at least intriguing) for you to get to this point, because here is where they come together.

Vanya has this parallel going, but she doesn’t see Leonard as the Phantom. In the beginning at least, he’s her Raoul. If I had to guess, I’d say Reginald Hargreeves is the Phantom in Vanya’s self-narrative (says he’ll train her but wants to manipulate her and keep her locked away for himself, strict teacher who doesn’t really care about her well being, wearing a mask to appear more normal/human... she wouldn’t exactly be wrong). Leonard, on the other hand, is Vanya’s supporter. He validates her, and believes in her, and taker her side when Carlotta and the opera house owners (er, the rest of the Hargreeves children) gang up on her and conspire to keep her out. 

This is all building to, of course, the final confrontation. The Phantom says Christine has to pick one or the other. When Allison comes to talk to Vanya, Vanya feels as if she’s been given an ultimatum and lashes out.

And that’s where everything (including this parallel) starts to crumble. 

(I honestly don’t know a lot about the other characters and how they fit in. I suppose we could have Five = Raoul if we ignore romance plot and focus on the childhood friend that hasn’t been seen in a while angle? And maybe also Pogo = Madame Giry. Vanya doesn’t really have any friends to be Meg.) 

Part Four: It’s All About the Moon

So that is kind of the gist of The Phantom of the Opera as a window into Vanya’s self-narrative theory, but there are a couple of other loosely related ideas I thought I might as well bring up since this thing is already ridiculously long. 

Remember how I mentioned the chandelier is like, THE scene from The Phantom of the Opera back in part one, and said it’d be relevant later? Bringing that back now, because I’m going to pull a Luther and connect everything to the moon. 

So, to get the obvious out of the way, the moon exploding and the chandelier coming crashing to the stage are similar because something falls, breaks into a bunch of pieces, destroys a bunch of stuff, and creates a powerful and memorable image to close off before an act/season break (the next installment of which begins with a time jump). 

Additionally, it’s worth mentioning that The Phantom of the Opera is told out of order. The opening scene shows a grown up Raoul at an auction for the items left behind after the opera house closes, and it switches to the past as the remains of the chandelier rise upwards to the ceiling, Phantom’s theme swelling (it’s a really cool moment, tbh). Following the prologue of The Umbrella Academy, we switch to the present with two images: Vanya alone on the stage, and then Luther alone on the moon. Which has a kind of symmetry that might mean nothing, but is still kind of cool. 

(Also the item that Raoul buys from the auction is a music box with a monkey crashing symbols on top of it. Which might mean nothing.) 

Part Five: How is she STILL talking about this? (AKA Conclusion)

To be honest, this is more a very tangled “things I noticed and thought were interesting” discussion than a formal essay with any clear thesis. While there is a chance that this was all coincidental and I’ve gone full Pepe Sylvia, the music selection in The Umbrella Academy is one of the things that they seem to be really deliberate about. 

I would love to chat with anyone about this theory, so feel free to reach out in the notes or message me! My inbox is always open. Much love, and thank you for reading, if you got this far! ❤️

[bltngames]

Review: Hotshot Racing

(For this review, Hotshot Racing was played on the Nintendo Switch and the Personal Computer)

If you were to ask me what the most important features of a racing game are, somewhere near the top of the list would be artificial intelligence. Racing games are one of those genres, like fighting games or shooters, where simulating how real human people play the game is vital to the experience. They are inherently multiplayer concepts, even if you’re playing by yourself.

Focus on multiplayer artificial intelligence has waned over the last 15 years. With the rise of the premium multiplayer subscription, it’s more important than ever before to drive players to play matches with flesh-and-blood human beings online. Thus, advancements in “bot” (simulated human player) development hasn’t just slowed down, but in some cases actively regressed. Epic Games, once home to some of the smartest, most robust first person shooter bots in Unreal Tournament, now features bots in their popular Fortnite Battle Royale that fumble around the map with low attention spans and aim like they're blindfolded.

Humans are hard to simulate. The basic functions of a player are easy to emulate -- navigation, aiming, and so on, but it’s the organic logic underneath that proves to be the primary challenge. Humans have lapses in judgement. Humans make mistakes. Mistakes compound on other mistakes. A person wins or loses a given game because of a constantly cascading sequence of decisions, all feeding in to and out of themselves. Whether they realize it or not, every individual person is their own infinite web of chaos. For a computer, which operates in a binary of either perfect success or total failure, no amount of processing power can make for an accurate duplication.

As such, artificial intelligence has to “cheat.” Flaws are introduced into the simulation in order to throw the player a bone. Intelligence almost doesn’t even enter the equation; instead, it’s more about developing a bot that the player simply believes is human, like some kind of a magic trick. It’s a tight balancing act -- if the bot is too good, it looks like an unfeeling terminator. On the opposite, well… compare my Fortnite example up above. There’s a sweet spot that must be hit: smart, but not too smart. Dumb, but not too dumb. It’s easier said than done.

Racing games are a special category here. On top of simulating a human, they must also simulate an automobile, with all of its physical interactions. Tire friction, suspension bounce, weight distribution, and horsepower efficiency just to start. I’d argue that this lends to a much greater tendency for natural mistakes to occur, as the two different simulations (vehicle and player) interact and bounce off of each other. This has led to racing games relying on a handicap known as “rubberbanding.” Essentially, if the player is doing a little too well, the game will start giving tiny advantages to the computer-controlled racer. A boost to top speed, a reduction in weight to improve handling, whatever it takes to ensure the player does not remain unchallenged for very long.

Which finally, at long last, brings us to Hotshot Racing. Developed by Lucky Mountain Games, with assistance by Sumo Digital, it attempts to capitalize on the growing faux-retro-3D trend. It promises visuals to remind you of Sega’s Virtua Racing or Namco’s Ridge Racer, but with decidedly modern vehicle physics and a bit more content than any of those old games could muster.

It honestly makes for a weird first impression. This is a retro-looking game that does not feel like any retro racing game I’ve ever played. Some would undoubtedly argue that’s for the better; like with most sports games, there’s this sense that more simulation is always better. Even modern “arcade” racers like Need for Speed or Wreckfest run pretty robust physics simulations under their hoods, even if they do not necessarily adhere to the rules of reality. But I’ve honestly never seen a problem with this -- I will readily go back to something like Daytona USA or even Stunt Race FX on the Super Nintendo, and never feel especially bothered by their primitive simulations. To me, racing is often more about the sense of speed, how well the controls respond, and the track design than any notion of feeling “realistic.”

That’s not to say it’s really a negative that cars in Hotshot Racing have some vague facsimile of modern weight and “realism” applied to their driving physics, I guess. It’s just something that takes a little bit of getting used to, because seeing these cars drift and sway like the racing games of today is a little anachronistic to the era being called back to. If you still burn a candle for the eventual release of the long-lost Kickstarter darling “90’s Arcade Racer,” know that this isn’t that game. I think it’s fair to say it’s trying to scratch a similar itch, but it’s doing so in a very different way.

One of the more important things Hotshot Racing brings to the table is a roster of personalities to race as and against. When you think of characters in a racing game, your mind probably more naturally gravitates towards something like Mario Kart or some other similarly kid-friendly cartoon racing franchise. For most "serious" racing games, your opponents are unknowable, faceless competitors, but Hotshot gives them voices and identities. Every character in the game has a garage of four cars unique to them, in addition to having their own story to tell. It’s nothing especially deep; most plot manifests in a single cutscene played at the end of a given grand prix, sort of like what you'd get for finishing arcade mode in a game like Street Fighter 2. It’s just a snippet, a taste of what motivated these people and what they’re going to do after winning, but it’s enough.

It goes back to what I said earlier, and how it’s important for the player to believe the artificial intelligence is more than just a computer. Making the racers into characters, with identifiable personalities, faces, and dialog goes a long way to fleshing things out and makes you connect with what’s going on just a little bit better. Or at least, that’s how things would work in theory.

The problem is… well, none of that matters. Put simply, the actual artificial intelligence you race against kind of sucks. In fact, it’s hard to even call them competitors, because your opponents seem to be running a different race where you straight up don’t exist. During any given event, your rival computer drivers seem to be totally blind to your presence, as they will spend the entire race trying to drive straight through you. I don’t know how else to explain it. This isn’t a simple case where the computer drivers are a little aggressive, because they usually aren’t racing to be destructive. They never seem to specifically go out of their way to attack, they just don’t seem to be able to see where you are, and make no effort to react to your presence. You happen to be in their way, so they plow through from behind, ram from the side, and generally just knock you around as if you were invisible.

A side effect to this is something I’ve started noticing in games that bear the Sumo Digital name: computer drivers can hit you way harder than you can hit them back. Whether rubbing against a rival car or engaging in a full-on collision, computer drivers always seem to be able to overpower player vehicles no matter what. In Hotshot Racing, I’ve encountered multiple scenarios where a computer driver shoves me around with little effort, but any attempts to return the favor and my car may as well be made out of styrofoam for how little impact there is. I know Sumo Digital only assisted Lucky Mountain Games on the back half of developing Hotshot Racing, but this has been a consistent element I’ve noticed in Sumo’s Sonic Racing games, too. The computer can be as aggressive (or as blind) as they want, but human players are never allowed to retaliate in a way that feels meaningful.

The worst, by far, is what I mentioned earlier: rubberbanding. “First place” in Hotshot Racing is an often endless war of attrition, where no matter how fast you drive, there are always cars nipping at your heels. Hotshot Racing has a boost system, wherein by drifting or drafting you charge up a segmented meter. Once a segment is full, you can burn it for a burst of speed. I’ve spent 2, 3, even 4 consecutive boosts in a row and the same three opponents were still right behind me, aiming to blindly smash my car out of the way. Hard, medium, or easy mode, it doesn’t matter. They are always there, just a few feet from your rear bumper, magically closing the distance to constantly steal your lead.

From a game design perspective, I understand why rubberbanding exists. It’s to keep the player feeling challenged and engaged. Spending too long in first place going unopposed can start to feel boring. Some game designers view that as a turn off. Races are meant to be battles. At the same time, being able to totally shut out my opponents and gain huge leads makes me feel good. Hotshot Racing robs you of that sense of total domination because of some artificial rule of competitiveness. It’s not that the computer-controlled racers are better than you; they don’t seem to race with any sort of great care or skill. Instead, they catch up and pass you strictly because the Hand of God bends the rules to accommodate them. That doesn’t feel very challenging and it certainly doesn’t feel fair.

That being said, the pseudo-realistic physics mentioned earlier do have their own downside: I found it a little too easy to lose control of my vehicle and spin out. If you brush against a wall wrong or get bumped by a rival during a drift, you often find yourself in a tailspin and unable to recover. Combined with the blind artificial intelligence and the rubberbanding, you have a recipe for getting frustrated. I want to feel confident in my losses, not because I couldn’t predict what Mr. Magoo was going to do next. To add insult to injury, the rubberbanding only gets more prominent as you move up in difficulty, so expect to get spun out more and more as you progress through the game.

There also isn’t a lot to do with your vehicles, either. For many, tuning is an important aspect of racing games, going all the way back to 1989’s “Super Off Road” in the arcades. No upgrade path is available for any of the vehicles in Hotshot Racing, with a basic unlock system geared towards limited cosmetic tweaks. There's tons of tracks to race on, and you constantly earn currency for winning races, but I never cared about spending any of it, because there wasn't much worth buying. Arguably the specific mid-90′s era that Hotshot Racing is aiming at wasn’t really heavy on upgrading or modifying around vehicle stats, but neither were they focused on visual customization either, so it does feel a little arbitrary what they chose to modernize about this experience and what is intended to be a retro tribute.

Beyond standard racing, Hotshot does offer a few alternative modes, but none of them are spotlight features. “Barrel Barrage” has you earning an explosive barrel to drop behind you at every checkpoint until the track becomes a minefield. “Drive or Explode” takes the concept of 1994’s “Speed” and straps a bomb to your car that will explode if you slow down for too long. Finally, “Cops & Robbers” is a confusing push-and-pull where you must steal money as a robber and alternatively wreck other racers as a police officer. Of the three modes, “Drive or Explode” is the clear winner, as it most easily fits into the standard three-lap structure the game centers around. “Barrel Barrage” is merely okay, and benefits more from an increased number of laps, as things slowly get more and more dangerous as you progress. These modes would also benefit if I didn’t get thrown back to the menu after every race; they really needed some kind of Grand-Prix-style playlist.

“Cops & Robbers” deserves its own entire paragraph for what a weird idea it is. It’s less about stealing and arresting and has more in common with the “zombie” modes seen in other games, where everyone gets converted to a specific team until there are no more players left. The idea is that you start with a pot of money that slowly depletes, and you have to race to the next checkpoint to cash out. The faster you get there and the higher amounts you cash out with, the more the cops specifically will target you. Once they wreck your car, you become one of the cops, and it’s your job to wreck the remaining robbers until they all become part of the cop team. Once all the robbers become cops, winners are tallied based on who stole the most money. On paper, this works, because it plays into the game’s slap-happy nature, but in practice I would find myself miles ahead of my fellow robbers and once I finally switched over to a cop, I had to slam on my brakes and wait for everyone else to catch up. By then, the computer-controlled cops had usually done most of my work for me and I lost for... being a better robber than a cop, somehow? It left a lot to be desired.

All of these modes can be played online, where presumably human players would make them more balanced and fun, but finding random pick-up games proved difficult in the time I spent with Hotshot Racing. Now, to be fair, I didn’t try especially hard -- racing games have always been a single player experience for me, as should be obvious by my spiel on artificial intelligence. But I did spend a couple nights trying to match into an online “Quick Race” on the Switch, where I universally came up empty handed. On the PC version of Hotshot Racing (which I received as part of a Humble Bundle), the application completely froze upon trying to start a “Quick Race” lobby, forcing me to ALT+F4 to close the game. For what it’s worth, the Switch version does also include a “local multiplayer” option for playing wirelessly with friends in the same room, and all versions support traditional split-screen.

Despite all of these shortcomings, I just can’t bring myself to hate Hotshot Racing, and it’s hard to pinpoint why. I’m definitely in love with this aesthetic -- the retro visuals, the upbeat music, the blue, blue skies (that I see), it all appeals to a certain part of my brain that likes razor-sharp, ultra-clean polygons. The introduction of named racers with backstories and character-specific “endings” is a really smart, fun idea. I just wish it was more fun to actually, like… run a race in this game. I understand the necessity behind concepts like rubberbanding, but it feels like the artificial intelligence cheats just a little too much, and as a player I don’t feel like I can do a lot to fight back. Running a good race isn’t always good enough.

Some games deliberately incite a feeling of disempowerment in their players, and that can be a totally valid design decision. But should that really be the goal of this kind of racing game? I guess I don’t have an answer for that, but I do know that I probably won’t be going back to Hotshot Racing very often.

[alpaca-writes]

Mystics, Chapter 27

When Arch becomes hired on at Mystics by the strange shopkeeper Lyrem Nomadus, everything seems to be going well- in fact, their life nearly becomes perfection. Soon enough, however, Arch realizes that perhaps not everything is as perfect as it seems….

Read Chapters 1-26 and more HERE

Taglist: @myst-in-the-mirror, @livingforthewhump

CW: Drugs and drug mentions, manhandling, swearing, violence, and gore mention

------------------------------

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: TEENAGE WASTELAND    

      Arthur remembered well how to find Benji’s house. He had to pick up Arch from the narrow condo a few times in the past. They would always emerge from there a little bleary eyed and tipsy. He never said anything to Charlotte. Not once. To him, it was just a normal part of the teenage experience. He’d try to sober them up and send them home with a good enough excuse that their little bender would be over-looked as an innocent sleepover- without the sleep.

      Persephone had used all of her remaining strength to launch him back into the mortal world, and Charlotte would have to remain behind for now- until they were able to open a door to the Labyrinth from the Underworld.

      At least he wouldn’t have to worry about his sister. She would be safe with the gods.

      At least Persephone dropped him in the middle of the city this time. His first visit plunked him in the middle of abandoned farmland and it took too much time to steal a truck into the city to kill Lyrem. He ended up finding Arch in the back alley instead. It felt like it was only yesterday he was stabbed in the leg while trying to rescue them.

      The creaking of a window shutter opening nearby filled the courtyard with a familiar Bob Dylan song and the poor mimic of a kid trying to sing along to it. Ballad of a Thin Man, and it was definitely Benji.

      Arthur walked up to the window, feeling like there was nothing that would stop him from getting to Arch and he rapped on the open shutter.

      “Benji!”

      The drifting smoke and strong skunk smell made Arthur back off from the window again. Benji didn’t hear him.

“And somebody points to you and says, ‘It's his’”

        “Benji!!”

“And you say, "What's mine?" and somebody else says, "Well, what is?"”

                    “BENJI!”

        “And you say, "Oh my God! Am I here all alone?!"

         At this point, Arthur stuck his head through the window, and watched him in the corner high as a kite with a tall bong sitting on a table in front of him. The boy continued singing and acting out the lyrics with impeccable quality of a stage performer.

        “But something is happening and you don't know what it is

Do you… Mr. Jones?”

        At the last line, Benji turned toward the window to see Arthur’s scraggly face, impatient and red as a brick with the anger of not being heard. Benji jumped back, eyes wide.

        “Benji, finally! I’ve been calling you from outside!”

        “Dude,” Benji swallowed, growing pale and looking sickly. “Not again man, I don’t know what drug you forced into me, but I do not want anymore.”

        Arthur scrunched his face, “what are you talking about?”

        Benji shut off the music from his phone, and approached the window wearily.

        “Look man, I know you and Arch are close so I’m not gonna play this game with you. I don’t have any, and I don’t deal opiates. I’m not telling you who does, either. You gotta get clean.”

        Arthur hopped up, and popped himself up through the window. Jumping down, he landed in a pile of dirty laundry.

        “I’m not here to deal,” he explained, “I need your help with something.”

        “I said I don’t wanna be the guinea pig for your shitty mushrooms, dude! Get out!” Benji opened his bedroom door. If he needed to make a break for it from the crazy man, he would.

        “I’m not trying to give you drugs!” Arthur reached out, and pulled Benji in by the arm. “Last night at prom you were sent to a different world. I need you to help me get there.”

        Benji was plopped down on his old bed, and he didn’t try to move any further. He rubbed his arm where Arthur had held him and massaged the bruises that he had started forming. This man was crazy; he was insane and his timing was WAY off.

        “Prom… was like, a week ago, dude,” he said meekly. “And I don’t know what you’re talking about. I got super high that night and I saw some really crazy shit, and I don’t want to think about it anymore.”

        Arthur sighed and scratched the top of his head, only then realizing how disgusting his hair had become. He probably didn’t smell too great either.

        “Look, kiddo, I’m really sorry that you’ve been dragged into this- but right now, I need you to listen to me.

        Arch was taken by that creature that I lit on fire. That wasn’t a bad trip, it really happened. And now I need to get to where Arch is. The only place I can think of that they were sent is the same place that you went that night at prom. That’s the working theory, anyway. I’m not giving up on it.”

        Benji interrupted. “But I don’t… I don’t understand… I know that there was a point in time I got really muddy… or I fell into a puddle of oil or crude or something sick like that, but…”

        His nails lifted toward his teeth, and he started biting between words. His breaths shortened.

        “Nah, nah man. I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

        Arthur nodded. He couldn’t expect Benji to understand or believe him, so he gave up. Instead, he focused his energies toward creating the portal. Whether Benji had believed him or not, shouldn’t matter. The kid was still sent to that realm whether he chose to remember it or not.

        “Dude?”

        Arthur’s eyes were closed, and he was holding out his hand to hopefully create the portal as Benji watched on.

        “Dude! I told you to get out”-

        Nothing was happening yet, but Arthur continued to concentrate the best he could with Benji’s distracting shouts. He grabbed Benji’s arm, hoping that it would be enough.

        “DAD HELP! There’s a crazy junkie in my room!”

        Shit. Arthur didn’t have any more time. He broke his concentration and wrapped a hand over Benji’s mouth to stop his yelling, but it was too late. Footsteps that were loud and heavy started pounding down the hall from the kitchen.

        “Fuck!” he shouted out. He released Benji reluctantly, and his face was splattered with regret. He turned back toward the window. Instead of seeing the trees and the grass and the cars lining the street, he saw black. A void into the next realm that was just large enough for him, and it was shrinking.

        “Benji? Everything okay bud?”

        Benji froze. As he had turned to show his father the man who had tormented him, he saw the pitch-black void that had erupted in his room and the man standing before it, hesitant to step into it. The wide shouldered man who was Benji’s father pulled his son away and stepped back. Neither of them, completely able to comprehend what was in front of them.

        Arthur stood still in front of it, fearing the way forward. Then one hand emerged along with another. Grabbing Arthur by the shoulders, they pulled him in, and he was finally consumed by yet another void.

        He fell, crashed into the dark glass that carpeted the expansive land of rolling hills and flatlands. Arthur only hoped he had ended up where he needed to be, and that the hands that pulled him through were at least, friendly ones.

        Supporting himself with his arms, he looked up from the ground and saw a familiar set of legs standing in front of him. Then one of them kicked out, landing into his side and he fell again, this time, laying on the ground completely. After wincing through the sudden blow, he blinked, seeing the last of the void turn to nothing and a deep orange sky took its place. He groaned, clutching his ribs.

        “That, was for stabbing me,” Lyrem’s face came closer into view as stood over Arthur.

        Arthur wasn’t really in the mood to argue with the dead man, but he didn’t seem to care terribly.

        “Worth it,” he mustered, and rolled back to where he was before.

        “And you can finish that sentence by thanking me for saving you from the Depths of Despair,” Lyrem sniffed. He looked around, mildly paranoid that Paimon wouldn’t be far behind.

        “I’ll thank you when I’m good and dead,” Arthur stood, brushing himself off, and pulled some of the glass from his calloused fingers. “For now, I need to find Arch and bring them home.”

        “Not so simple a deed-” Lyrem said simply. He turned, heading towards the mouth of an open cave. But Arthur had different ideas, and pulled the old man up close, by the collar of his shirt until they were nearly nose to nose. He growled into his face, but Lyrem was hardly put off by the close contact.

        “Don’t fuck around with me, because I am not in the mood!” Arthur studied the man’s face as it was still inscrutably unfazed.

        “Listen very carefully, Arthur. Arch trusts Paimon now- quite possibly more than they trust me or you. I’ve been here long enough to see that their bond has strengthened. We need to play this wisely or else Arch will become Paimon’s next plaything. He is too strong for either of us to defeat on our own,” Lyrem spoke calmly, lowering his voice until it was just a little more than a whisper. “We need Apollo.”

        Arthur pushed him away and pulled out the jar of holy water from one of his cargo pockets.

        “Arch wouldn’t trust a demon more than me,” he said with confidence.

        “Ah- Paimon isn’t a demon.” Lyrem countered. He straightened his shirt collar and pointed toward the jar in Arthur’s hand. “He’s a god. And you would be wise to put away the jar of lynx urine before you spill it on yourself.”

        Arthur looked down at the jar. It was a tinge yellow. He scoffed, exhausted though he was of talking. He unlatched the top, popping the rubber seal and sniffed. He grimaced, and held it far from his nose.

        “A god? And hold on- this is lynx piss?” Arthur questioned. He latched it again. Lyrem didn’t seem to be lying. He seemed to be quite sure of himself, in fact. “Why… Why did you have a jar of lynx piss in your back room?”

        Lyrem waved him off.

        “I needed it to summon a Goddess”

        “Why were you summoning a Goddess with lynx piss?”

        “Because my wife had cancer”

        Arthur stared at him blankly until Lyrem decided to explain himself in slightly more detail.

        “The urine is solidified into a crystal under several moon phases and then engraved with- you know what”-

        Lyrem hushed him at this point, wondering if it would be easier to just put him asleep and drag him to Paimon himself. He thought better of that and ushered the man nearer to the mouth of the cave. Arthur placed the bottle inside his pocket again.

        “If you want Arch to come out of this alive, then you must follow my lead. Paimon is powerful here and if we want to avoid suspicion, then we must play the parts convincingly. Starting,” he said, poising himself, “with this.”

         “What? With wha”-

        Arthur received a blow to the side of his head. One strong enough that it forced him to keel over onto his side, and before he had any time to recover, Lyrem’s knee connected with the front of his face, knocking him flat on his back. He wheezed out.

        “You… asshole!”

        “Nice and bloody just how Paimon likes,” Lyrem winced a bit as he walked around his backside and rounded him. Finding the jeweled knife on his belt, Lyrem took it away from him. “I know you would do anything for Arch- that is the one redeeming quality of yours.”

        Next, he pulled up to Arthur’s right side as he was busy nursing his nose. Lyrem licked his lips and then pressed a foot down into his thigh. Loud, agonizing howls filled the air, and Lyrem relished in it. He didn’t let up until his was certain his leg had fallen back into disrepair.

        “But the question, I think that is on everyone’s mind, Arthur,” Lyrem picked him up, and dragged him forward. “-is whether or not Arch would do anything for you.”

        Lyrem lifted up his eyes to the opening. Seeing the figure of Paimon stepping through the threshold, he grinned wickedly.

        “I believe I’ve found a little gift from your uncle, and Arch’s next carving project.”

        Paimon tilted his head, hiding his excitement with a smirk of mild amusement and crouched down. In his left hand he presented Arthur’s strained looks with his own bowie knife.

        Arthur shook as the knife approached his face, threatening to make the first cut deeply against his cheekbone- but Paimon pulled it away just in time. Arthur let out a relieved, heavy breath and stared down at the obsidian carpet as the sweat dripped off his temples. He heard the gritty voice of Paimon above him.

        “I think we’ll have to place a little bet.”

        “Oh? What are you thinking?” Lyrem asked, adjusting his collared shirt around the nape of his neck.

        “I bet you that Arch can carve out his heart in five minutes or less,” Paimon proposed, “blindfolded.”

        Arthur’s head snapped up in alarm, eyes wide and blinking through blood.

        Lyrem raised an eyebrow, “and if they fail? If they take longer than five minutes?”

        Paimon considered all of the things in the world that Lyrem could want. He wanted the bet to be interesting, after all. Taking a tour of Mount Olympus, giving him a vial of water from the fountain of youth, or bringing him Phillip as a fun little reward would be all great and wonderful ideas but-

        “Let Arch go…” Arthur interjected, “If they can’t do what you say in five minutes or less, then let them go- Back to Earth and back to their real life.”

        Lyrem hesitated- not something that he often did. His eyes darted to the man and up to Paimon, gauging his reaction. Would Paimon take it?

        It wouldn’t be so easy, would it?

        Paimon held a finger to his lips in contemplation, then swiftly brought a hoof down on Arthur’s back, forcing him into the jagged slices of volcanic glass. He grunted and seethed into the ground.

        “I accept the bet, although it will take me some time to decide what I want when I win; when Arch succeeds well beyond my expectations and rips your heart from your chest,” Paimon smiled. “Oh, you would have been so proud, Arty. I do wish I had taken a picture for you of what they did to young Marcus… For now, I’ll have you locked in a cell until I make up my mind about what I want.”

        Paimon lifted his hoof off of Arthur’s back. He let out a sigh of relief in that there was at least some hope for Arch after all.

[wolf-nir]

I am writing this in full quarantine since there is not much to do besides overanalyzing each little thing too much. Thank you anxiety.

I will analyze everything from the beginning, but I will focus mainly on Hawks, Twice and Dabi.

So, first of all, a minute of silence for all the shit Re-Destro had to go through in the last few months since he decided it was a good idea to fight the LOV. The guy really went through a lot and in the end, he's seeing his father's legacy and himself being destroyed, in addition to having lost the few people, he considered important.

(I declare that the defendant is in serious need of a vacation.)

Second. MY BABY, KAMINARI I KNEW I LOVED YOU FOR A REASON. I really want to do a character analysis on him, but I'm controlling myself because half of what I write will be me hyping my little Pikachu. I AM A PROUD MOM AND DON’T DENY IT.

(Now, please, that all his theories of being a traitor are gone because I'm tired of having my heart broken.)

Also, please appreciate the magnificence of Midnight because I love this woman too much to be health.

Now, to the real shit hole.

We barely started and we are already shown that Hawks are not there for jokes. So far we've only seen him lose all his feathers once and it was during his rescue actions during the High-End.

Basically, this chicken knows what Twice is capable of and is ready to go with everything.

The scariest thing is not knowing that the Hawks already know that they will need to fight Jin, but the almost relaxed way he seems to use to explain how he managed to accomplish his mission.

(Now, a useless little lecture on scenario structures and scenes for free to you.)

See this? From the moment that Hawks starts his dialogue, he is completely in the shadows or hiding his facial expressions.

In some situations, this shadow cast on a character's face means that

a) he may be emotionally out of control (think in Gon from hxh)

b) ready to commit some violent/criminal action or 

c) that he is revealing something forbidden to someone who shouldn't know about this.

At first, I thought it would be the second case. Hawks is clearly prepared to attack Twice at any wrong move on the part of the villain, the predatory eyes, with unusual pupils and enlarged in a way that makes you feel fear are clear signs of this.

The thing is. Hawks' speech and even his stance (not counting the feathers) tell a totally different story.

Keigo slowly approaches Jin, the two feathers he uses as a sword in a relaxed, downward grip, as if clearly saying that Hawks has no intention of attacking. Of course, maybe it's because Hawks is confident enough in his ability to control his already sharp feathers and surrounding Twice and even with all this clear threat, Hawks still asks Jin not to resist.

Many may think that maybe it’s because Hawks is wary of Twice’s ability, but Hawks- no, Keigo, created a kind of connection with Jin in earlier chapters, one that seemed to go beyond a simple infiltration attempt and perhaps “use the weakest link” kind of thing. So Keigo asking Twice to surrender almost willingly is more of a sincere request than a veiled threat.

So we can say that this situation is heading towards the third option, in which Hawks genuinely says what he thinks (finally dude).

Please, a minute of silence for my baby's suffering. Twice finally realizing that Hawks is a traitor is the most painful thing I have seen since the last All Might fight. Worst of all is seeing him blaming himself and remembering the last time he trusted someone outside the family he found at LOV.

Returning. It's super interesting to see the use of contrast of light and shadow here.

The entire appearance of Hawks is in the shadows, he looks more like a villain than Twice himself. It's like this scene is showing us through images of the Hawks' double agent role, showing him completely in the dark, with only his eyes distinct enough, showing that he's always been there to spy. Unlike Twice, which is completely in the light, and even covered by the mask, its expressions are completely exposed.

This is all very cool and ironic, since Hawks is, technically, the good guy, but he finds himself in a position that only villains find themselves when they are drawn in the moments when he intends to attack one of the good guys or protagonist. But Twice is completely engulfed by the light, portraying him in the ordinary role of the hero and, at the same time, transforming him into someone vulnerable, leaving no loopholes for him to hide his feelings of anguish.

(Ouch, these flashbacks from Jin are killing me.)

“How sad is it if nobody trusts you?”

That, right there, is the golden question. Or we can call it the key to the pandora box.

It's just a sentence, but it makes us reflect on how, because of all that the Hawks have gone through to become who he is now, Keigo has never really shown himself to be a character with great connections or someone trustworthy.

And it is noticeable when we see him interact with other Pro-Heros or the Commission. Dude, in the first meeting with the Commission, he shows exactly this scepticism when he reveals that he knows information that the organization itself was trying to keep completely confidential.

He doesn't let anything be a secret and he has said that he always prefers the truth, even if for that truth to be revealed he has to “get his hands dirty”.

Hawks doesn't trust anyone, maybe, but himself. Sure, he trusts that heroes will do their job and that they are reliable in that, but he is still the type to investigate everything he can in any situation, even when he shouldn't know anything.

(Clear paranoia and trust issues, but with such a shitty childhood, who would never?)

As a morally grey character, this desire to always know everything and to have control over things around him is quite predictable, but it also shows that Hawks doesn’t necessarily create a connection with people without seeing some kind of benefit behind it.

Hawks works with Endeavor and tells him his own truth (and perhaps ideology) because he knows that, even if Enji doesn't understand his point of view or doesn't like how he does his job, Endeavor is still Hero # 1 and he needs that strength. Honestly, for me, none of the Hawks' interactions with Enji suggests that the Hawks really are some kind of Endeavor fan anymore like when he was a kid, he just sees the merits of maintaining a friendly relationship with Endeavor since he is Hero # 1 and for to believe that Enji can bring a new image to heroism that differs from all the fanaticism around the image of All Might being the "Symbol of Peace".

NOW. Enough of my improvised character analysis on Hawks and let's skip to what matters because I'm already like Izuku, murmuring incomprehensibly at this point.

THE SHADOWS ARE FADING!

It starts very slowly as if Horikoshi is creating a climax to reveal exactly what Hawks really thinks, or rather what Takami Keigo really thinks and believes. So far we've only seen Hawks, the Hero, but never Keigo, the only time we had a concrete glimpse of the person behind the hero was in the dialogue between him and Twice.

At that moment Keigo really let himself be vulnerable because he found himself mirrored (perhaps in the worst ways) in Jin. Two men with life experiences and opposing paths, but who are still connected by how mentally fucked up they came out of everything they went through.

(What a beautiful friendship *sobs*)

AND NOT ONLY THAT! It's not just Hawks being as true as possible at that moment that makes the shadows disappear, but also the fact that he, a hero, believes in the recovery of a villain, to believe and declare that Twice is a good person, that he deserves a second chance.

And you know what? At first, I thought it was just that. Hawks recognizing that a villain deserved a second chance. But honestly? It’s much more.

Remember this?

We have already stated that Hawks is not the type of person who likes to lie (he can and has done it before, but he prefers to speak the truth in most cases), so when he tells Twice how he feels caged because of the current system, I don't think he's lying. Especially because his entire life Hawks has always been in a beautiful golden cage.

So when he tells Twice that he is a good person, that he can get a second chance, Hawks is implicitly saying that Jin can get rid of his own cage, that is, the role of villain that he ended up playing in search of acceptance.

Hawks believes that, unlike him, Twice still has a chance to have the freedom of choice that the two never really had.

Note that I use the word “believe”, simply because Twice's reaction and what he says clearly shows that Hawks is being naive in his own way.

And Keigo knows that. 

He knows that his words are empty promises. The Hero Commission would never lend itself to the role of creating a rehabilitation program for a Class S villain, especially one who is part of the antagonist group that almost managed to destroy the reputation of the Heroes and the UA, which has a great reputation for the Hero Course. Besides that Hawks himself made it clear that Twice, because of his quirk, was one of the most dangerous villains among the League.

Notice how Hawks tries to stop Twice from talking. And I understand don't wanting to be called out in his own bullshit. Hawks acknowledge that Twice is a good person goes against everything that he was trained to believe from a young age, and then, having to see Jin also breaking his expectations when telling the reality of the situation certainly messes with him.

Hawks' expression is quite revealing at the moment, he seems sad to face reality, even reaching the point of acting in denial. He seems ready to attack, but in the sense that he wants Twice to stop telling the truth of the situation.

(Now look at that, my baby is crying and is your fault Hawks.)

Keigo doesn't want to fight Twice, but that doesn't change the fact that he has to. Keigo betrayed the League, the family that Jin finally found, and worst of all, used Twice to achieve this.

If Hawks really thought that Jin wouldn't fight him after doing so then he certainly doesn't remember what happened to Chisaki. The League takes care of each other. Especially Twice who is the most open to declaring how important other members are to him.

Now a minute of silence to admire the work of art that is this picture. Twice using Sad Man’s Parade always makes me excited and sad at the same time.

(You go, boy! This is what I call loyalty. You can say what you want about the League, but you can never say that they don't care about each other.)

Okay, a lot is going on one a single page, omg.

Hawks' resigned expression made me want to curl up in a corner and cry. But then we have Dabi's magnificent manic smile at his side and it is difficult to feel sad.

I saw a lot of people debating whether the sentence on this page was said by Hawks or Dabi, but after searching almost all the sites to read the chapter, it's very clear that the sentence is from Dabi.

Besides, it would be kind of out of character for Hawks to think that heroes are trash when he knows and agrees that heroes are needed in today's society, even if the ideal future he wants is the opposite.

So yes, that phrase is from Dabi, and you know? It’s the only good thing in the entire chapter. Hawks and Dabi indirectly agreeing that Twice is a good person is my jam.

Looking further and throwing some theories here, this statement by Dabi can go far beyond Dabi by not blaming Twice for the heroes' attack. It could have something to do with his own secret past *insert Touya's theory here* and it could mean that in the next chapters we will either have a bloody fight or we will have more clues to Dabi's past and a bloody fight.

Anyway, my friends, Dabi will burn a chicken in the next chapter.

(Ok, so this is the end and Jesus fucking Christ, I don't even know if it makes sense, but yeah.)

(if anyone wants to know about my analysis on Hawks and Dabi character, let me know that it might motivate me to finally finishing write this shit that’s been sitting on my google docs for a long time to be healthy)

[dailytomlinson]

After Louis Tomlinson’s recent show in Madrid, some fans got the chance to meet him. One girl wanted to talk to him about his song Two of Us , which he had written after the death of his mother. The girl had lost her dad, and wanted the singer to know how much his lyrics had meant to her. He’d never had that in his band One Direction, he says. “We wrote cool songs, but they were love songs. It only goes so far, and to have someone say that I could help them with my…” He pauses. “It blows my mind, that shit. I was proper proud.”

It has been a hard few years. Tomlinson’s mother died in 2016, just as he was about to launch his first solo single. In March this year, his 18-year-old sister was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. We will come to that, but, professionally, Tomlinson was struggling too. One Direction – that supernova of a boy band – broke up in 2015. Or announced they were taking a break. Or “‘hiatus’ or whatever word we use”, he says with a smile.

At the time, Tomlinson, now 27, was finding his place as a songwriter. “I wasn’t singing a lot, I wasn’t the frontman. Without being a sorry little bastard, I thought: ‘How do I do better, how do I make something of myself, an identity?’” In the last 18 months of One Direction, he says, “I felt like I knew who I was in the band, and I felt a real worth for who I was.” The break up, he says, “rocked me. I wasn’t ready for it. I felt like I was getting to be a better songwriter, singer, a more confident performer, and all of a sudden, when I felt I was finally getting some momentum …”

We meet at a bar in north London. Tomlinson greets me with a hug as if I am one of his fans (I am not, particularly, although I am by the end). He seems open but not vulnerable, and more self-aware and modest than you would expect from a man who was once part of the biggest boy band in the world. He is friendly and relaxed, dressed in a black tracksuit, with a beer in front of him.

Tomlinson’s personal tragedies also meant his solo career has had a bit of a stop-start quality, but now it looks as if there is focus and momentum. He released his single Kill My Mind earlier this month; an album will follow next year. Kill My Mind is an indie-pop delight, not so huge a departure as to alienate his fanbase, but it sounds like the music he grew up listening to – Oasis and Arctic Monkeys – and his South Yorkshire accent brings more than a hint of Liam Gallagher-style northern vocals. He sounds confident on them, more so than on the previous singles he put out, a couple of fairly forgettable collaborations. “I think, in hindsight, that was me trying to find my place in the industry and making music I thought I had to make to get on radio.

“I had this epiphany when I was thinking about the music I grew up with,” he continues. “I kind of had a bit of a word with myself and worked out what I want – to be happy and proud of what I’m doing. I love those early singles, but I never really felt proud of them, because it didn’t feel too true to me.”

As a child, growing up in Doncaster with his mum Johannah, who raised him alone until she married Tomlinson’s stepfather, he loved performing. “I liked to be the class clown, I liked to make people laugh, to show off, all that.” When his younger twin sisters were cast on TV dramas, he would sometimes go along as their chaperone, earning £30. “Where I’m from, we don’t have anyone who’s been on TV or anything like that, so it was super-exciting,” he says. He ended up picking up work as an extra. “The pinnacle of my acting career was one line on an ITV drama. I don’t even know if they used my scene,” he says with a laugh.

When he was 15, he joined a drama group in Barnsley, which his mum would take him to when she could afford it. “I think I was confused, thinking I wanted to act when actually what I wanted to do was perform.”

At school he joined a band, where they sang Oasis and Green Day covers, and when The X Factor came up, he made it on to the show in 2010 on his third attempt. He queued from 3am to make sure the producers wouldn’t have audition fatigue before they saw him, and he got his goal – to get in front of Simon Cowell “and just have a professional opinion on how I am as a singer. I was so flustered. Going from school performances to performing in front of professionals, TV cameras, a 3,000-strong audience. I wasn’t present. I sang terribly. I remember coming away from it thinking: ‘I wonder if I’ve got through as one of those lads who looks all right but isn’t really a good singer.’”

Yet he ended up in One Direction, the band the show put together in its 2010 series. For six years they sold tens of millions of records, broke America and each made a rumoured £40m-plus fortune. Their fans, Directioners, are another level of devoted. I don’t know how he coped with the attention, or the pressure.

There were really only a few times when it got too much, says Tomlinson. They were in Australia and a local news station had got a helicopter and a photographer was trying to get pictures of Tomlinson in his top-floor hotel room. “I think I was naked, or just in my boxers, and even in my hotel room there was no escape. I could feel the pressure.” He tweeted about it – “your standard bratty celebrity tweet” – and was attacked. “At times it did stress me out but never was I allowed to whinge, allowed to be a human and say: ‘Today has got too much for me.’ I found that difficult at first.”

But he is keen not to sound as if he is complaining. “There was much more positive that outweighed that.” And he never blames the fans for their intensity. Theirs is a special relationship, he says. “So many people have bullshitted about what they feel about the fans, but they’re like family to me.”

Even when Directioners have got a bit too ardent – there is a conspiracy theory, for example, that he and his bandmate Harry Styles have long been in a secret sexual relationship – he seems more bemused by it than annoyed. Although he is wary, he says, of adding “fuel to the fire” by talking about it. “I know, culturally, it’s interesting, but I’m just a bit tired of it,” he says. The HBO drama Euphoria recently showed an animated sequence of Tomlinson and Styles together, as imagined by a smutty fan-fiction writer. Was it annoying that a show had taken something fairly niche and given it new mainstream life? “Again, I get the cultural intention behind that. But I think …” He trails off, trying to work out what he wants to say. “It just felt a little bit … No, I’m not going to lie, I was pissed off. It annoyed me that a big company would get behind it.”

Why does he think he never went off the rails during the band’s heady period? “My mates and my family, really. It’s from my upbringing and where I come from. If I went back to Doncaster and I was dripping in Gucci or whatever, I’d probably get whacked. I’m always very conscious of not acting too big for my boots. It’s the people around me who keep me sane and normal, because they give me insight into real life. Some celebrities, in pop in particular, only surround themselves with amazingness, and all they see is good, good, good, which is lovely, but you don’t understand the real world then. I have the luxury of my mates around me, just reminding me how fucking good I’ve got it, really.”

The day of One Direction’s final concert in November 2015, Tomlinson and his bandmate Niall Horan sat together “and had a little cry, because it was such a journey we had been on. That day in general was so poignant. As much as you try and prepare yourself, it’s a whole other thing when it comes.” Because they had worked so much with few days off, he assumed that a break would be exciting. “But it wasn’t like that. When you’re used to working however many days, it’s all that more evident when you’re not doing something. Especially in the first six months. My life became –and I don’t mean this to sound derogatory – very normal, from being a life of pure craziness.”

At the same time that Tomlinson was trying to work out what to do with himself, his mother, to whom he was intensely close, had been diagnosed with leukaemia; she died in December 2016. He performed his first single on The X Factor just a few days after her death, then seemed to half-heartedly continue with his solo career, releasing another single in 2017. It would be another two years – during which he became a judge on The X Factor – before he released Two of Us, a raw and beautiful (and under-rated) song.

“After I lost my mum, every song I wrote felt, not pathetic, but that it lacked true meaning to me,” he says. “I felt that, as a songwriter, I wasn’t going to move on until I’d written a song like that.” He knew he needed to get it out of him, but there was a lot of pressure – he felt he should be an experienced songwriter before he attempted it. Two songwriters he worked with played him the chorus. “It was like the song I always wished I’d written. I went in and put my personal touch to the verses. It was a real moment for me in my grief, and as part of the creative process, because it felt like it was hanging over me.”

Earlier this month, an inquest found that his sister Félicité had died of an accidental overdose; she had been taking drugs, including anxiety medication, since the death of their mother. He has been through some terrible times, I say, which must put a perspective on a pop career. “Exactly,” he says, a little quieter than before. “That whole dark side I’ve gone through, it sounds stupid to say, but it gives me strength everywhere else in my life, because that’s the darkest shit that I’m going to have to deal with. So it makes everything else, not feel easier and not less important, but, in the grand scheme of things, you see things for what they are, I suppose.”

His fans have been crucial, he says. “I’m sure every artist says this, but I do believe it. We’ve been through some dark times together and those things I’ve been through, they carry a weight, emotionally, on the fans as well. And I felt their love and support. I remember really clearly when I lost my mum, that support was mad.”

What have the experiences of loss he has been through taught him about himself? He thinks for a second. “I keep going back to it, but I don’t know if it’s a combination of where I grew up and my mum’s influence, but I just have this luxury of being able to see the glass half-full no matter what.” He is the oldest of his mother’s seven children, which is grounding and means, he says, “there’s no time for me to be sat feeling sorry for myself. I’ve been to rock bottom and I feel like, whatever my career’s going to throw in front of me, it’s going to be nothing as big or as emotionally heavy as that. So, weirdly, I’ve turned something that’s really dark into something that empowers me, makes me stronger.”

He gets up to go to the toilet, which I think is his polite way of asking me to move on, although when he gets back he says, by way of a final word on the matter, “I don’t want people to feel sorry for me. That’s not how I feel for myself. Somehow it fuels me.”

One Direction will get back together one day, he believes. He still speaks to the others. “We’re not texting each other every day, but what we do have, which will never go away, is this real brothership. We’ve had these experiences that no one else can relate to.”

Styles has become quite the superstar. The others seem to have steady solo careers. Tomlinson says he’s embarrassed to admit that, when he first went solo, he would have been devastated had his album “only” reached No 3, so used is he to everything he did with One Direction going to the top. Is it hard not to measure himself against his former bandmates? “Oh, naturally,” he says. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. I��ve never been competitive like that, but, naturally, you think: ‘If they’re getting this then I deserve that.’ I think, the longer time goes on, I can see it for what it is and just be proud of them.” And success means something else to him now. “It means I’m happy with what I’m doing.”

[hlupdate]

Louis’ full interview for The Guardian - 25/09/19

After Louis Tomlinson’s recent show in Madrid, some fans got the chance to meet him. One girl wanted to talk to him about his song Two of Us , which he had written after the death of his mother. The girl had lost her dad, and wanted the singer to know how much his lyrics had meant to her. He’d never had that in his band One Direction, he says. “We wrote cool songs, but they were love songs. It only goes so far, and to have someone say that I could help them with my …” He pauses. “It blows my mind, that shit. I was proper proud.” It has been a hard few years. Tomlinson’s mother died in 2016, just as he was about to launch his first solo single. In March this year, his 18-year-old sister was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. We will come to that, but, professionally, Tomlinson was struggling too. One Direction - that supernova of a boy band - broke up in 2015. Or announced they were taking a break. Or “‘hiatus’ or whatever word we use”, he says with a smile. At the time, Tomlinson, now 27, was finding his place as a songwriter. “I wasn’t singing a lot, I wasn’t the frontman. Without being a sorry little bastard, I thought: ‘How do I do better, how do I make something of myself, an identity?’” In the last 18 months of One Direction, he says, “I felt like I knew who I was in the band, and I felt a real worth for who I was.” The break up, he says, “rocked me. I wasn’t ready for it. I felt like I was getting to be a better songwriter, singer, a more confident performer, and all of a sudden, when I felt I was finally getting some momentum …” We meet at a bar in north London. Tomlinson greets me with a hug as if I am one of his fans (I am not, particularly, although I am by the end). He seems open but not vulnerable, and more self-aware and modest than you would expect from a man who was once part of the biggest boy band in the world. He is friendly and relaxed, dressed in a black tracksuit, with a beer in front of him. Tomlinson’s personal tragedies also meant his solo career has had a bit of a stop-start quality, but now it looks as if there is focus and momentum. He released his single Kill My Mind earlier this month; an album will follow next year. Kill My Mind is an indie-pop delight, not so huge a departure as to alienate his fanbase, but it sounds like the music he grew up listening to - Oasis and Arctic Monkeys - and his South Yorkshire accent brings more than a hint of Liam Gallagher-style northern vocals. He sounds confident on them, more so than on the previous singles he put out, a couple of fairly forgettable collaborations. “I think, in hindsight, that was me trying to find my place in the industry and making music I thought I had to make to get on radio. “I had this epiphany when I was thinking about the music I grew up with,” he continues. “I kind of had a bit of a word with myself and worked out what I want - to be happy and proud of what I’m doing. I love those early singles, but I never really felt proud of them, because it didn’t feel too true to me.” As a child, growing up in Doncaster with his mum Johannah, who raised him alone until she married Tomlinson’s stepfather, he loved performing. “I liked to be the class clown, I liked to make people laugh, to show off, all that.” When his younger twin sisters were cast on TV dramas, he would sometimes go along as their chaperone, earning £30. “Where I’m from, we don’t have anyone who’s been on TV or anything like that, so it was super-exciting,” he says. He ended up picking up work as an extra. “The pinnacle of my acting career was one line on an ITV drama. I don’t even know if they used my scene,” he says with a laugh. When he was 15, he joined a drama group in Barnsley, which his mum would take him to when she could afford it. “I think I was confused, thinking I wanted to act when actually what I wanted to do was perform.” At school he joined a band, where they sang Oasis and Green Day covers, and when The X Factor came up, he made it on to the show in 2010 on his third attempt. He queued from 3am to make sure the producers wouldn’t have audition fatigue before they saw him, and he got his goal - to get in front of Simon Cowell “and just have a professional opinion on how I am as a singer. I was so flustered. Going from school performances to performing in front of professionals, TV cameras, a 3,000-strong audience. I wasn’t present. I sang terribly. I remember coming away from it thinking: ‘I wonder if I’ve got through as one of those lads who looks all right but isn’t really a good singer.’”

One Direction in 2012 (from left): Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson, Liam Payne and Harry Styles. Photograph: IBL/Rex Shutterstock Yet he ended up in One Direction, the band the show put together in its 2010 series. For six years they sold tens of millions of records, broke America and each made a rumoured £40m-plus fortune. Their fans, Directioners, are another level of devoted. I don’t know how he coped with the attention, or the pressure. There were really only a few times when it got too much, says Tomlinson. They were in Australia and a local news station had got a helicopter and a photographer was trying to get pictures of Tomlinson in his top-floor hotel room. “I think I was naked, or just in my boxers, and even in my hotel room there was no escape. I could feel the pressure.” He tweeted about it - “your standard bratty celebrity tweet” - and was attacked. “At times it did stress me out but never was I allowed to whinge, allowed to be a human and say: ‘Today has got too much for me.’ I found that difficult at first.” But he is keen not to sound as if he is complaining. “There was much more positive that outweighed that.” And he never blames the fans for their intensity. Theirs is a special relationship, he says. “So many people have bullshitted about what they feel about the fans, but they’re like family to me.” Even when Directioners have got a bit too ardent - there is a conspiracy theory, for example, that he and his bandmate Harry Styles have long been in a secret sexual relationship - he seems more bemused by it than annoyed. Although he is wary, he says, of adding “fuel to the fire” by talking about it. “I know, culturally, it’s interesting, but I’m just a bit tired of it,” he says. The HBO drama Euphoria recently showed an animated sequence of Tomlinson and Styles together, as imagined by a smutty fan-fiction writer. Was it annoying that a show had taken something fairly niche and given it new mainstream life? “Again, I get the cultural intention behind that. But I think …” He trails off, trying to work out what he wants to say. “It just felt a little bit … No, I’m not going to lie, I was pissed off. It annoyed me that a big company would get behind it.” Why does he think he never went off the rails during the band’s heady period? “My mates and my family, really. It’s from my upbringing and where I come from. If I went back to Doncaster and I was dripping in Gucci or whatever, I’d probably get whacked. I’m always very conscious of not acting too big for my boots. It’s the people around me who keep me sane and normal, because they give me insight into real life.” He lives with his girlfriend, Eleanor and his best friend, Oli. “Some celebrities, in pop in particular, only surround themselves with amazingness, and all they see is good, good, good, which is lovely, but you don’t understand the real world then. I have the luxury of my mates around me, just reminding me how fucking good I’ve got it, really.”

With his mother, Johannah, in 2015. Photograph: Dave J Hogan/Getty Images The day of One Direction’s final concert in November 2015, Tomlinson and his bandmate Niall Horan sat together “and had a little cry, because it was such a journey we had been on. That day in general was so poignant. As much as you try and prepare yourself, it’s a whole other thing when it comes.” Because they had worked so much with few days off, he assumed that a break would be exciting. “But it wasn’t like that. When you’re used to working however many days, it’s all that more evident when you’re not doing something. Especially in the first six months.” He spent time in Los Angeles with his son, who was born in 2016, after his relationship with a stylist, Briana Jungwirth. “My life became -and I don’t mean this to sound derogatory - very normal, from being a life of pure craziness.” At the same time that Tomlinson was trying to work out what to do with himself, his mother, to whom he was intensely close, had been diagnosed with leukaemia; she died in December 2016. He performed his first single on The X Factor just a few days after her death, then seemed to half-heartedly continue with his solo career, releasing another single in 2017. It would be another two years - during which he became a judge on The X Factor - before he released Two of Us, a raw and beautiful (and under-rated) song. “After I lost my mum, every song I wrote felt, not pathetic, but that it lacked true meaning to me,” he says. “I felt that, as a songwriter, I wasn’t going to move on until I’d written a song like that.” He knew he needed to get it out of him, but there was a lot of pressure - he felt he should be an experienced songwriter before he attempted it. Two songwriters he worked with played him the chorus. “It was like the song I always wished I’d written. I went in and put my personal touch to the verses. It was a real moment for me in my grief, and as part of the creative process, because it felt like it was hanging over me.” Earlier this month, an inquest found that his sister Félicité had died of an accidental overdose; she had been taking drugs, including anxiety medication, since the death of their mother. He has been through some terrible times, I say, which must put a perspective on a pop career. “Exactly,” he says, a little quieter than before. “That whole dark side I’ve gone through, it sounds stupid to say, but it gives me strength everywhere else in my life, because that’s the darkest shit that I’m going to have to deal with. So it makes everything else, not feel easier and not less important, but, in the grand scheme of things, you see things for what they are, I suppose.” His fans have been crucial, he says. “I’m sure every artist says this, but I do believe it. We’ve been through some dark times together and those things I’ve been through, they carry a weight, emotionally, on the fans as well. And I felt their love and support. I remember really clearly when I lost my mum, that support was mad.” What have the experiences of loss he has been through taught him about himself? He thinks for a second. “I keep going back to it, but I don’t know if it’s a combination of where I grew up and my mum’s influence, but I just have this luxury of being able to see the glass half-full no matter what.” He is the oldest of his mother’s seven children, which is grounding and means, he says, “there’s no time for me to be sat feeling sorry for myself. I’ve been to rock bottom and I feel like, whatever my career’s going to throw in front of me, it’s going to be nothing as big or as emotionally heavy as that. So, weirdly, I’ve turned something that’s really dark into something that empowers me, makes me stronger.” He gets up to go to the toilet, which I think is his polite way of asking me to move on, although when he gets back he says, by way of a final word on the matter, “I don’t want people to feel sorry for me. That’s not how I feel for myself. Somehow it fuels me.”

1D face the fans: the band’s last performance was in 2015. Photograph: Sportsphoto Ltd/Allstar One Direction will get back together one day, he believes. He still speaks to the others. “We’re not texting each other every day, but what we do have, which will never go away, is this real brothership. We’ve had these experiences that no one else can relate to.” Styles has become quite the superstar. The others seem to have steady solo careers. Tomlinson says he’s embarrassed to admit that, when he first went solo, he would have been devastated had his album “only” reached No 3, so used is he to everything he did with One Direction going to the top. Is it hard not to measure himself against his former bandmates? “Oh, naturally,” he says. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. I’ve never been competitive like that, but, naturally, you think: ‘If they’re getting this then I deserve that.’ I think, the longer time goes on, I can see it for what it is and just be proud of them.” And success means something else to him now. “It means I’m happy with what I’m doing.” Kill My Mind, by Louis Tomlinson, is out now on Arista. His debut album will be released in 2020

[louistomlinsoncouk]

Louis Tomlinson on loss and love: ‘The dark side I’ve been through gives me strength’

The One Direction singer has had to battle a series of personal tragedies while launching his solo career. And it’s his fans and friends who have kept him going.

After Louis Tomlinson’s recent show in Madrid, some fans got the chance to meet him. One girl wanted to talk to him about his song Two of Us , which he had written after the death of his mother. The girl had lost her dad, and wanted the singer to know how much his lyrics had meant to her. He’d never had that in his band One Direction, he says. “We wrote cool songs, but they were love songs. It only goes so far, and to have someone say that I could help them with my …” He pauses. “It blows my mind, that shit. I was proper proud.”

It has been a hard few years. Tomlinson’s mother died in 2016, just as he was about to launch his first solo single. In March this year, his 18-year-old sister was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. We will come to that, but, professionally, Tomlinson was struggling too. One Direction – that supernova of a boy band – broke up in 2015. Or announced they were taking a break. Or “‘hiatus’ or whatever word we use”, he says with a smile.

At the time, Tomlinson, now 27, was finding his place as a songwriter. “I wasn’t singing a lot, I wasn’t the frontman. Without being a sorry little bastard, I thought: ‘How do I do better, how do I make something of myself, an identity?’” In the last 18 months of One Direction, he says, “I felt like I knew who I was in the band, and I felt a real worth for who I was.” The break up, he says, “rocked me. I wasn’t ready for it. I felt like I was getting to be a better songwriter, singer, a more confident performer, and all of a sudden, when I felt I was finally getting some momentum …”

We meet at a bar in north London. Tomlinson greets me with a hug as if I am one of his fans (I am not, particularly, although I am by the end). He seems open but not vulnerable, and more self-aware and modest than you would expect from a man who was once part of the biggest boy band in the world. He is friendly and relaxed, dressed in a black tracksuit, with a beer in front of him.

Tomlinson’s personal tragedies also meant his solo career has had a bit of a stop-start quality, but now it looks as if there is focus and momentum. He released his single Kill My Mind earlier this month; an album will follow next year. Kill My Mind is an indie-pop delight, not so huge a departure as to alienate his fanbase, but it sounds like the music he grew up listening to – Oasis and Arctic Monkeys – and his South Yorkshire accent brings more than a hint of Liam Gallagher-style northern vocals. He sounds confident on them, more so than on the previous singles he put out, a couple of fairly forgettable collaborations. “I think, in hindsight, that was me trying to find my place in the industry and making music I thought I had to make to get on radio.

“I had this epiphany when I was thinking about the music I grew up with,” he continues. “I kind of had a bit of a word with myself and worked out what I want – to be happy and proud of what I’m doing. I love those early singles, but I never really felt proud of them, because it didn’t feel too true to me.”

As a child, growing up in Doncaster with his mum Johannah, who raised him alone until she married Tomlinson’s stepfather, he loved performing. “I liked to be the class clown, I liked to make people laugh, to show off, all that.” When his younger twin sisters were cast on TV dramas, he would sometimes go along as their chaperone, earning £30. “Where I’m from, we don’t have anyone who’s been on TV or anything like that, so it was super-exciting,” he says. He ended up picking up work as an extra. “The pinnacle of my acting career was one line on an ITV drama. I don’t even know if they used my scene,” he says with a laugh.

When he was 15, he joined a drama group in Barnsley, which his mum would take him to when she could afford it. “I think I was confused, thinking I wanted to act when actually what I wanted to do was perform.”

At school he joined a band, where they sang Oasis and Green Day covers, and when The X Factor came up, he made it on to the show in 2010 on his third attempt. He queued from 3am to make sure the producers wouldn’t have audition fatigue before they saw him, and he got his goal – to get in front of Simon Cowell “and just have a professional opinion on how I am as a singer. I was so flustered. Going from school performances to performing in front of professionals, TV cameras, a 3,000-strong audience. I wasn’t present. I sang terribly. I remember coming away from it thinking: ‘I wonder if I’ve got through as one of those lads who looks all right but isn’t really a good singer.’”

Yet he ended up in One Direction, the band the show put together in its 2010 series. For six years they sold tens of millions of records, broke America and each made a rumoured £40m-plus fortune. Their fans, Directioners, are another level of devoted. I don’t know how he coped with the attention, or the pressure.

There were really only a few times when it got too much, says Tomlinson. They were in Australia and a local news station had got a helicopter and a photographer was trying to get pictures of Tomlinson in his top-floor hotel room. “I think I was naked, or just in my boxers, and even in my hotel room there was no escape. I could feel the pressure.” He tweeted about it – “your standard bratty celebrity tweet” – and was attacked. “At times it did stress me out but never was I allowed to whinge, allowed to be a human and say: ‘Today has got too much for me.’ I found that difficult at first.”

But he is keen not to sound as if he is complaining. “There was much more positive that outweighed that.” And he never blames the fans for their intensity. Theirs is a special relationship, he says. “So many people have bullshitted about what they feel about the fans, but they’re like family to me.”

Even when Directioners have got a bit too ardent – there is a conspiracy theory, for example, that he and his bandmate Harry Styles have long been in a secret sexual relationship – he seems more bemused by it than annoyed. Although he is wary, he says, of adding “fuel to the fire” by talking about it. “I know, culturally, it’s interesting, but I’m just a bit tired of it,” he says. The HBO drama Euphoria recently showed an animated sequence of Tomlinson and Styles together, as imagined by a smutty fan-fiction writer. Was it annoying that a show had taken something fairly niche and given it new mainstream life? “Again, I get the cultural intention behind that. But I think …” He trails off, trying to work out what he wants to say. “It just felt a little bit … No, I’m not going to lie, I was pissed off. It annoyed me that a big company would get behind it.”

Why does he think he never went off the rails during the band’s heady period? “My mates and my family, really. It’s from my upbringing and where I come from. If I went back to Doncaster and I was dripping in Gucci or whatever, I’d probably get whacked. I’m always very conscious of not acting too big for my boots. It’s the people around me who keep me sane and normal, because they give me insight into real life.” “Some celebrities, in pop in particular, only surround themselves with amazingness, and all they see is good, good, good, which is lovely, but you don’t understand the real world then. I have the luxury of my mates around me, just reminding me how fucking good I’ve got it, really.”

The day of One Direction’s final concert in November 2015, Tomlinson and his bandmate Niall Horan sat together “and had a little cry, because it was such a journey we had been on. That day in general was so poignant. As much as you try and prepare yourself, it’s a whole other thing when it comes.” Because they had worked so much with few days off, he assumed that a break would be exciting. “But it wasn’t like that. When you’re used to working however many days, it’s all that more evident when you’re not doing something. Especially in the first six months.” “My life became –and I don’t mean this to sound derogatory – very normal, from being a life of pure craziness.”

At the same time that Tomlinson was trying to work out what to do with himself, his mother, to whom he was intensely close, had been diagnosed with leukaemia; she died in December 2016. He performed his first single on The X Factor just a few days after her death, then seemed to half-heartedly continue with his solo career, releasing another single in 2017. It would be another two years – during which he became a judge on The X Factor – before he released Two of Us, a raw and beautiful (and under-rated) song.

“After I lost my mum, every song I wrote felt, not pathetic, but that it lacked true meaning to me,” he says. “I felt that, as a songwriter, I wasn’t going to move on until I’d written a song like that.” He knew he needed to get it out of him, but there was a lot of pressure – he felt he should be an experienced songwriter before he attempted it. Two songwriters he worked with played him the chorus. “It was like the song I always wished I’d written. I went in and put my personal touch to the verses. It was a real moment for me in my grief, and as part of the creative process, because it felt like it was hanging over me.”

Earlier this month, an inquest found that his sister Félicité had died of an accidental overdose; she had been taking drugs, including anxiety medication, since the death of their mother. He has been through some terrible times, I say, which must put a perspective on a pop career. “Exactly,” he says, a little quieter than before. “That whole dark side I’ve gone through, it sounds stupid to say, but it gives me strength everywhere else in my life, because that’s the darkest shit that I’m going to have to deal with. So it makes everything else, not feel easier and not less important, but, in the grand scheme of things, you see things for what they are, I suppose.”

His fans have been crucial, he says. “I’m sure every artist says this, but I do believe it. We’ve been through some dark times together and those things I’ve been through, they carry a weight, emotionally, on the fans as well. And I felt their love and support. I remember really clearly when I lost my mum, that support was mad.”

What have the experiences of loss he has been through taught him about himself? He thinks for a second. “I keep going back to it, but I don’t know if it’s a combination of where I grew up and my mum’s influence, but I just have this luxury of being able to see the glass half-full no matter what.” He is the oldest of his mother’s seven children, which is grounding and means, he says, “there’s no time for me to be sat feeling sorry for myself. I’ve been to rock bottom and I feel like, whatever my career’s going to throw in front of me, it’s going to be nothing as big or as emotionally heavy as that. So, weirdly, I’ve turned something that’s really dark into something that empowers me, makes me stronger.”

He gets up to go to the toilet, which I think is his polite way of asking me to move on, although when he gets back he says, by way of a final word on the matter, “I don’t want people to feel sorry for me. That’s not how I feel for myself. Somehow it fuels me.”

One Direction will get back together one day, he believes. He still speaks to the others. “We’re not texting each other every day, but what we do have, which will never go away, is this real brothership. We’ve had these experiences that no one else can relate to.”

Styles has become quite the superstar. The others seem to have steady solo careers. Tomlinson says he’s embarrassed to admit that, when he first went solo, he would have been devastated had his album “only” reached No 3, so used is he to everything he did with One Direction going to the top. Is it hard not to measure himself against his former bandmates? “Oh, naturally,” he says. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. I’ve never been competitive like that, but, naturally, you think: ‘If they’re getting this then I deserve that.’ I think, the longer time goes on, I can see it for what it is and just be proud of them.” And success means something else to him now. “It means I’m happy with what I’m doing.”

Kill My Mind, by Louis Tomlinson, is out now on Arista. His debut album will be released in 2020.

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

Punk Girl/Civil War Submission by The Wild West Pyro

Heyo, good morning/afternoon/evening/night

My friend on discord (The Wild West Pyro) had an absolutely mind-blowing theory concerning who the band ‘Punk’ Girl is, why she’s important to the story, and how she will lead to the rift in the Calypso Twins relationship. I don’t want to spoil anything for you guys, so I’m just going to dive right in.

(A majority of this will be directly from our conversation, with [some edits by me] to help with context and add in pictures.)

Here we go!

So we figured Punk Girl is in some way related to the CoV, or the cult in general, as she makes an appearance on what seems to be a cult-centric shirt on the gearboxloot instagram page (more credit to @ifalnasminiatures for providing me with this link!) 

“Well, there are [a few] ways this could go:

Punk is linked to the COV and is intended to spread their message even further with the typical subliminal brainwashing thing. So they can broadcast outside of the planets the Cult has a presence on.

It’s a sore subject between the Twins, but one they hide rather well. The girl is related to them, she’s just considered by one of them as “that disgrace who refused to reclaim the birthright and ran off to join a band instead, ugh.”

She’s a band that works for the Cult sometimes. But in fact, she’s the eyes and ears of the Alliance within the Cult. Best of all is that she’s directly related to the Twins. Secretly, she disapproves of what they’re doing, but she’s the Alliance’s best hope of what’s going on.”

[That last one is the one he goes over the most, and it’s super interesting.]

“The Twins never suspect that the spy was in fact the one closest to their hearts.”

[my response: It would explain why there are no other bosses on the MoM that we know of (excluding the twins bc those are guaranteed), because she’s never going to become a fight even tho she looks the part]

“Also, [regarding] the last bit of your post, it’s just asking for a sidequest where it’s revealed that all the Gen 3.0 VHs known how to play some sick bass.

Punk Girl: ‘Hey, my bass guy is sick, can you take over?’

Zane: ‘FECK YEAH’”

[We talk a bit here about a Scott Pilgrim-esque Battle of the Bands, with Mr. Torgue as the competition, so there’s a bit of a transition that’s missing.]

“Hey, you know how Athena encrypted her messages between Engorge commercials? Punk Girl cleverly hides her messages in her music or backmasking. That’s how she sends her info to the Vault Hunters.

The twins never suspect a thing, and when she finally reveals she’s been working for Lilith, they’re genuinely shocked- and then the rift develops. One sibling would want to protect the girl, the other would want to punish her. The twins seem extremely close, so I personally feel it’d be odd if one of them up and betrayed the other [without outside influence].

It would be a great twist, too. Jack always had something planned out to trip up the Vault Hunters. But Lilith has learned much within these seven years. It turns out, Lilith is far better at pulling the strings than we ever thought Tyreen was.

Also, when Punk Girl reveals that she’s a spy for the Alliance (likely mid-game), this happens:

Tyreen screaming “YOU BITCH” amongst other horrible things and ECHOing up Punk Girl to verbally abuse her for hours, which continues through the rest of the game.

Troy trying to gently persuade his youngest sister to “Please come back” and “I don’t want to kill you”, attempting to smooth-talk her back into supporting the Cult. He keeps on ECHOing her gift baskets.

The twins arguing with each other over the fate of Punk Girl. Which, if done right, could potentially lead to a civil war within the Cult…

And to think it was all over a nice girl in a cool band.

Of course, both Troy and Tyreen are trying to kill the Alliance still, they’re just now divided over the fate of the girl and who’s gonna get the power of the vaults.

Which would add a human layer to it all- in the end, it’s just two selfish children squabbling over some big, universe-shattering toys. Albeit with billions of lives ended in the crossfire.

The war predicted by the Watcher was terrible. Zarpedon said so as well.

And, honestly, nothing’s more brutal and vicious than a civil war several galaxies-wide.”

[It was at this point that I absolutely lost my shit (in a good way) bc goddamn bro]

“Ideally, Tyreen goes out of her way to harass, demean and try to ruin poor Punk Girl’s life, and the [Crimson Raider] Alliance have to help her stand emotionally as Punk Girl undergoes a truly horrible campaign of cyberbullying, physical assault, very violent death threats and actual attacks on her band members. Tyreen mobilizes all her loyal followers to just try to hurt Punk Girl on whatever way they can.

Troy is a little different. He’s supposed to represent the streamer who manipulates fans into giving him what he wants, or scams folks by pretending to be disabled or whatever. Or the handsome fellow who’s a total self-centered jackass on the inside, but charms many people’s hearts nonetheless. So he tries to subtly brainwash Punk Girl into returning over to the Cult, and sweet-talking her to try and get her back on his sides. He’s like the caring, warm big brother on the surface, but really he just wants a new loyal sibling at his side, someone he can control far more easily. Troy’s promises are extremely alluring, his followers appear to be proposing an alliance with the Raiders (which Lilith refuses at all costs) and it’s going to be difficult for Punk Girl to resist his brainwashing techniques and honeyed words.

Basically, protect Lilith’s most treasured and loyal agent, including asking out Atlas and maybe other friendly corporations for favors to protect Punk Girl and her bodyguards (the new VHs). Bonus points if Punk Girl really is a latent Siren or something, and her power has to be safeguarded.”

[So, we know the unknown Sirens (there are two atm) are, if we understand Siren powers correctly: 12 and 7 at the time of bl3. 

HOWEVER. It’s been stated by Danny Homan that there are multiple ways for someone to receive Siren powers: 

The most important part of this exchange is the idea that, in universe, somehow, existing people can become Sirens. Now, I am not sure if this is solely through other Siren powers (Tyreen), or Vault bullshitery, or if they just wake up one day with the tattoos, but according to Homan, it’s definitely possible. In fact, I would go so far as to say the writers are keeping things intentionally vague for this reason.

What I’m trying to reason here is that even if Punk Girl is older than 12 or 7 (odds are she is, if she’s in a band!), she could still be a Siren, just that she got her powers at a later age, like 11 or so, meaning she’d be about 23 or 18 in BL3, respectively]

“If Angel does return, and Punk Girl is going through utter hell thanks to the twins, Angel will be the finest confidant and greatest friend she’ll ever have. Angel went through similar treatment at the hands of Jack, and she’s not going to let another girl with wings get hurt again. 

I mean, most of Punk Girl’s story arc would be heartbreaking, as it really seems like the Twins have fully turned their wrath on her rather than Lilith and the Alliance. Luckily, the Vault Hunters are there to act as her shield. Like, whenever you pass her in the ship, your character can give a random line of encouragement in the really tough times she’s going through, or something like that. 

And if Punk Girl turns out to be the final Siren after all, Lilith, Angel, and Maya would all ensure that she’d never be hurt like they were in the past. 

As the abuse Punk Girl would be receiving is from her own blood relations, [it] would be far more painful for someone to experience.

Now, for how the corporations may get involved, they’ll probably just start by trying to exploit this new galactic-wide civil war (especially as it’s hinted that the Twins do mass brainwashing or something [in the] Psycho character guide), then throwing each others’ armies at their rivals in support of one Twin or another. Although I’d imagine that Atlas and maybe Jakobs would stay out of it. [In addition], the Hyperion analyst in Moze’s ECHO from Commander Lily has dialogue that implies that all the corporations are preparing in case a Second Corporate War breaks out, since the first one essentially made the BL universe what it is now.

There we go, we have the war set up, as entire populations turn on each other, having become psychos pledging undying loyalty to one of the Twins. It’s going to be a mess.

[To end] on a comical level:

Maya: (hugging both [Ava and Punk Girl]) I love my dumpster children.

[Also:]

Tyreen, with this red background and thrash metal playing in the background and “angry war face” makeup: HEY MY WHORE OF A LITTLE SISTER, YOU ARE A [insert hate speech from evil liverstreamer gremlin here].

Troy, in a fancy suit and in a warm armchair with a fireplace roaring behind him: Hello, little sister. You remember the time we played at the beach together? Well… [insert sentimental tale of sibling love and fun here that is really a thinly veiled plea to rejoin the Cult].

That’s it, that’s both their streams from that point on.”

[I don’t have much to add, to be honest. This was great.

I love the whole thing, all the way down to his characterization of everyone involved. I can totally see Tyreen being the loud, explosive one out of the two, with Troy being quieter, but far more manipulative. I think it would contrast nicely with their designs and what people might be expecting from them, especially with how Troy is the big one with his cybernetics and always scowling, and Tyreen is shorter, always smirking and looking like she’s in control. It’d be so funny to see those two roles reversed and I really, really hope that’s the plan. Especially after the reveal that Troy is the one with the braincell lmao.

The idea that this small incident could end up causing a huge, brutal war, not just between the twins, but the corporations as well, is great. We know the Watcher claims ‘war is coming’, and this would help explain what we should expect. It would be very interesting if we needed to pick a side of aid at the start of the fight (i do imagine this will be Troy if The Wild West Pyro’s characterization of the twins is true), then turn on that side once the other is eliminated.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this as much as I do!! Massive credit to The Wild West Pyro for literally all of it. It was a really fun read.]

[fox-household]

Act 4: Education and Moral Standards, Chapter 3

Whoa whats this? A post that didn’t take two centuries before the last? I know, a real shocker. I even would’ve got this one done earlier if I wasn’t also writing a longer event chapter which is also getting closer to being done, although you won’t be able to see it yet obviously. I mean you probably think it’s a Christmas chapter, but actually no, while a Christmas one isn’t out of the question (I’m thinking I’ll do a short one for that), I’ve got a fun one planned for New Years, weird decision, but I’ll fully explain it then, I promise. Anyway here’s the first of the shorter chapters, feel free to let me know how it goes, it does feel super short to me, but maybe that’s because I wrote it in one go and I’m just used to the longer ones still, but I still think it’ll be better than waiting 100 years for a chapter. Ok I’ll stop rambling now, hope you enjoy, you people have a good day and stuff. 

FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT, INFO 

Asgore Asgore found the familiar halls empty of anyone he wanted to see, he passed parents and students that he didn’t really know very well, one of them was in a class of his, though obviously he was busy. Honestly, he’d hoped that maybe one of the kids would show up or Simon, or anyone he knew well enough to hang out with. With a final defeated sigh, he leaned his back on a locker, finding that this was a better place than any to rest, in another ten minutes or so he would go on another search, perhaps more people would out and about. For the next five minutes nothing changed, only one pair of parents passed him, the recently cleaned halls shined a little, yet revealing nothing of interest to break him from his boredom. That was until he heard footsteps running down the hall to his left, glancing over to find a girl clad in what he could only describe as cowboy attire, the old western look being the main thing anyone noticed on first seeing her because of how out of place it was. Although for him and his classmates, seeing Clover like that wasn’t so weird, at least not anymore. Clover stopped in front of Asgore, looking at him with eyes of contempt and pure aggravation, ‘’God damn it, my fucking luck’’. She kept looking behind her, back towards the corner she came from, now the two could hear some slightly heavier footsteps approaching. Before Asgore had enough time to even give her a ‘Howdy’, he found himself being dragged by the arm further down the hall, slowing down only 5 meters further and coming to a halt in front of a cleaner’s closet. The human quickly opened the door and shoved him into it with a lot of unnecessary force, causing him to stumble and almost impact the concrete floor, luckily, he regained his balance thanks to being able to grasp some support from a dusty wooden shelf, although he did knock a bottle of cleaning chemical to the ground in his attempt to save himself. Clover soon after dashed into the closet and closed the door slowly, obviously trying to prevent any audible sign that they’d gone inside. She turned to Asgore and put a finger to her mouth as a sign to be quiet, watching him pick up the bottle off the floor with a look disdain. Her attention moved to outside the door as the footsteps became louder and louder, eventually peaking when the individual got the front of the door, their shadow covering the light from under the entrance. But the shadow didn’t move. Asgore could tell Clover was holding her breath and he couldn’t quite blame her, he didn’t even know why he was here and yet he was dreading what would happen if that door opened, what type of situation was he about to get himself into? A deep feminine sounding sigh came from the other side of the door before finally the light from under the door was unblocked and the footsteps begun to fade away. Clover let out a huge sigh of relief, even taking a few deep breaths afterwards, ‘’Shit, that was real close’’. She looked back at Asgore who now had a matching but less intense look of relief. Once the halls had once again returned to its former silence, she opened the door and took a few steps out, looking both ways to keep watch and already looking to be on the move. Asgore followed her out, giving a friendly smile, now enjoying the open, light hall compared to that cramped, dark space. ‘’Hey Clover, uh you alright, what’s going on?’’ The moment his words reached her, she appeared to tense up, her tone making it clear that this wasn’t a conversation she wished to be having, especially with him of all people. ‘’None of your damn business, as far as you should be concerned everything’s fine. Just go run along and do whatever dandy stuff you like to do, I don’t care, just do it away from me’’. His smile turned to a much more nervous one, faltering at the hostility, ‘’So you’re just going to involve me like that and not tell me why I had to hide from some stranger?’’ She pulled down her hat as she groaned loudly, ‘’No, I didn’t do it to involve you, I bloody well did it because I don’t trust you not to sell me out, for all I know your stupid extreme honesty would’ve kicked in and I ain’t risking that…’’, she pulled her hat back up as her brown eyes found his with an irritated gaze, ‘’Why don’t you stop being real damn nosy and focus on your own problems… because we know you have them’’. It was finally at this that his expression lost the smile, ‘’Excuse me? But what are you on about?’’ ‘’You know, the fact that you get your ass beat every few days because you want to protect some kid… don’t give that confused look, you think those bruises you try to hide were only noticed by those close to you? Almost everyone in class knows something is going on, though most don’t know what… even seems to be a theory going around that maybe that’s happening to you at home after school, if you know what I mean?’’ ‘’Th-that’s… That’s not what’s happening! That’s completely wrong!’’ ‘’Well the less informed don’t know that. Tell us Asgore, what is going on? Because I mean the way Tori’s been asking around, she doesn’t know either… so why don’t you clear up the truth?’’ The goat monster’s surge of anger disappeared and was replaced with a silence, he only watched Clover with a look that showed he wasn’t going to say anything. ‘’Whatever Asgore, you’re not my problem so just stay out of my way, see ya, make sure to leave me alone’’, with an annoyed and dismissing tone, she walked back the way she came swiftly, trying to leave the situation as quickly as possible, leaving the prince to his own thoughts and secrets.

Sci

While the school was unfamiliar to him, it was thanks to signs and random people walking around that actually knew the place that he managed to find his way. The school itself from the inside looked nice, it was simple and a little generic. However, it was clean, had a large amount of running facilities and lots of room to do whatever classes and students needed to do, he felt like he wouldn’t have minded going to this school back in the day, a time that felt like it was a long time ago, a time where he felt he was a different person to the one that he is now, who knew being an adult could change you. Stifling another yawn that he could feel were becoming more and more overpowering, he made his down the last hall to his destination, seeing two doors to a bathroom for each gender. He opened the door to the male bathrooms and was half way from stepping inside when something made him stop, sending a shiver down his spine and making his eyes widen as well as making his eye lights disappear. ‘’Sans… Sans… come to us… Sans’’ The voice was faint and raspy, as if it had to rely on the wind to carry it anywhere, but despite the voice’s quirks, it was all too familiar to him. He turned his head to the left, looking down the hall where he saw a tall shadowy silhouette standing there, not moving, only being audible, repeating those words. Swearing, he dashed into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him and running to the row of sinks in front of the large horizontal mirror. Sci stuffed his hands in his right pants pocket, finding nothing, trying to slide his finger into a small crevice. ‘’Quick, quick, ah shit please, c’mon’’. Finally, he found what he was looking for, opening the concealed pocket and pulling out a syringe in the open, the glass in the small thing filled with an orange liquid. His eyes found the mirror in front of him and in its reflection, he saw the shadowy figure from before standing on the other side of the room behind him, this time joined by a smaller figure right next to it. They both had eyes develop onto them, familiar eyes, and then that’s when he started to notice colours were starting to form on the taller one, white spreading along its head to make a bone like material. ‘’Is this really Sans? Come to us’’. This time two voices spoke with the filtered-like voice, the second one seeming a little higher than the first, the way he spoke also had a less confident tone, it made him feel guilt. ‘’G-get… get the h-hell way from me!’’, panicking now, his hands were shaking fiercely and twice he nearly dropped the syringe on the floor. He rolled his right sleeve up and managed, with a struggle, to position the syringe above where his forearm would be. Barely giving him any time to aim properly, he stabbed it into the bone, gritting his teeth from the sudden sharp pain, finally pressing down on the end of the syringe, making the orange liquid disappear into his arm. After a few seconds of nothing but fear and pain, both feelings just suddenly stopped. Energy, lots of energy, it was the only way he could describe the sensation that was going through his entire body. He felt new, refreshed, powerful. Putting the syringe back in his concealed pocket, he looked up at the mirror. Both figures were gone, he was alone in the bathroom now. He looked at his eyes, making the pair of them blue, the type that would usually show in his left eye whenever using a lot of magic. The skeleton returned his eyes back to the normal white eye light and let out a deep laugh. ‘’Oh, this feeling just never gets old’’, he said to himself as he cracked the bones around his neck. Any feeling of tiredness had been eliminated, no impending yawns, no sign that he was ever like that in the first place, all they could see was the Sans who was ready to take on the world. ‘’Hopefully this will allow the others to worry a little less, I told them I’d be fine and look at me now, right as rain’’. With those last few words, he stretched his arms a little before finally leaving the bathroom to go find Alphys and Asgore.

[yourfandomfriend]

Context is Everything

One of the things that lit a fire under me to start this blog was my crippling inability to unpause youtube videos in my watch later when I had a meta on the brain, this one about how much context changes old characters but why Donald Duck is somehow still the star of The Three Caballeros.

Random right? Get used to it.

**SPOILERS** For The Three Caballeros and Legend of the Three Caballeros **SPOILERS**

So let's go back to the 1940s. By the time America finally got dragged into WWII, the Axis Powers had been taking it over like an evil Beyonce. Understandably terrified that our southern border would go the way of Kelly and Michelle, the United States government decided to start trying to actually, you know, make friends with Mexico, Central, and South America.

Those were the days, right? And all it took was one little Hitler.

So Walt Disney grabbed a planeload of his best artists and went to South America, coming back with all the inspiration they needed and then some to make a movie to help friend our cousins down south. But instead of it being a forced, pandering, culturally insulting attempt to kiss Brazillian ass, it was one of Disney's greatest successes, in no small part due to its popular new character, José Carioca, a Brazilian green parrot whose popularity in other countries outlived our short American attention spans.

But of course, Donald Duck was ultimately the star.

And while Disney had a policy of no sequels, ("You can't top pigs with pigs.") Amigos was so popular that Walt tried again with The Three Caballeros, this time going to Mexico and introducing another amazing, popular character, Panchito Pistoles, a Mexican rooster who made the duo a trio. Somehow, this movie was everything Amigos was and more.

And still, as fun, interesting, and likable as José and Panchito were, Donald was still the obvious star.

Now let's skip ahead to a darker time for Disney: since the early 1980s, Michael Eisner had been saving the company from financial ruin with his business acumen, but unfortunately, the future chairman of the Walt Disney company didn't have a creative bone in his body. 

And I can't help myself. I have a theory, that Eisner deeply resented artists, especially Uncle Walt. He completely restructured the hierarchy in the company to put businessmen at the top while creative became expendable. He kicked the animators out of their own building so he could have fancy offices for himself and his corporate cronies --

-- and eventually shut down feature animation altogether. He drove off Jeffrey Katzenberg, which is why we have this --

-- And did you know Eisner tried to get rid of Mickey Mouse? Yeah, not hyperbole, he tried to replace him as the company's mascot with Winnie the Pooh on the logic that Mickey was too old-fashioned, which is why Disney in the late 90s and early oughts had so much Pooh just flung around like we all demanded “More Pooh!” and they were just obliging.

As a result of Eisner's influence, hand-drawn animated offerings (when available at all) had become script-driven rather than creator-driven, which is why I was so stunned all these years later when Gravity Falls came out. 

Not only was it a beautifully animated show, but it was creator-driven and coincidentally, turned out to be a giant success for Disney. But I'm guessing the part where Alex Hirsch (the show's creator) got to decide big things (like when and how the show would end) bothered them, and meant Disney was looking to make lightning strike with some properties they already owned outright.

And so the rebooted Ducktales last year, and it was (and is) a huge success due to the talent, hard work, and imagination of the team reviving it. But could Disney pull off the hattrick?

One of their latest attempts (one they don't *seem* to feel confident enough with to release in the US yet) is a fun, nostalgic little series called Legend of The Three Caballeros, a very different AU adventure comedy with a mystery element, where Donald, José, and Panchito are the no-account, flat-busted descendants of the original Caballeros, who were hero adventurers.

This time around, they modified the characters a bit for a modern audience and a series format, but they basically stayed the same. 

Meanwhile, Disney's sensibilities, sense of humor, and priorities have completely changed around them.

So why is Donald still the star? It's not because he's the more famous character, though he is that. And it's not because he's so popular, though he's that, too. So what's up? What have I been driving at for paragraphs and paragraphs?

Well, let's look at the original. The number one priority of Disney and his artists during the studio’s golden age -- more than patriotism or technical advancement -- was artistic achievement, and basically, Donald was the funniest guy they had, and the most fun to animate. He was the butt of every joke, the one with the shortest fuse, the one who acted on every impulse, no matter how extreme.

Meanwhile, José and Panchito, fun as they might've been, were created to represent their native countries and to a certain extent, they were way more chill than Donald, who was prone to going off the rails on a whim.

But the values of the company would go corporate. The belief Eisner fostered was that earnest, happy, carefree characters were no longer relatable in a post-Seinfeld world. So it's no surprise Donald is the main protagonist now -- his sulky, surly, cynical, anxious, perpetually unlucky character suits current tastes far more than his super-friendly, endlessly optimistic pals.

So while José and Panchito began as the far more grounded and realistic characters in the 1940s, in the new millennium, sullen Donald is the straight man and his happy, lighthearted friends are taken as empty-headed goofs for not having the good sense to be as miserable as the rest of us.

Context is everything, even when it ends up coming full-circle. It's weird how that one worked out.

[wavemaker9]

If the swap au did happen after mel/austin started dating in family au, a couple things to consider that i decided to string into a long sort of scene:

mainly just s!mel and f!austin actually having like half a moment because of that. Because mel’s in the range of people austin’s comfortable with at that point so even if he knows it’s not his mel and isn’t expecting her to be, there’s this weird and unexpected level of comfort and friendliness that austin shows her that’s just. Like austin’s not suddenly super casual with her or wahtever, but compared to normal austin, and on top of that compared to /superpower au austin/, this is stunning.

Them getting a moment to talk, though, maybe middle of the first night all three are working together. Kyle didn’t want to sleep with austin around but after a little bit of time, mel waking up to see kyle’s still awake but fighting hard not to nod off, and her offering she’ll keep an eye on things, make sure austin doesn’t do anything to kyle, promise. Him a little iffy but ultimately trusting mel. She may be a bad guy and normally work with austin, but she’s always helped him get away before including times where, if she were just working with austin all along, it’d have made more sense not to help him, so he figures she’ll at least not help austin stab him in the back if it turns out this was all just some clever ruse. After kyle nods off, mel noticing that she doesn’t actually know where austin is, and that’s a little concerning, so trying to look for him (without wandering too far and leaving kyle wide open). Finally finds him sitting outside, looking at the stars. He welcomes her to sit with a soft smile that falters and then falls when her expression is not equally as warm, admitting when asked that he can’t sleep. Too much going on in his head, everything he needs to do to get back home, everything he worries the other him could be doing if he’s there now instead, everything he has to lose if they can’t fix this, either fast enough or at all. It’s… a lot, he says with an anxious, shaky laugh, leg bouncing and absentmindedly fixing already straightened clothing. And this is super weird for mel. He looks so uncertain about a lot of this. The austin she knows has never seemed uncertain a second in his life, and yeah, this austin says he’s different, but she’s probably still like 85% convinced it’s just austin with amnesia versus some alt universe where they hooked up and had a kid and also he happened to be related to kyle. But him acting like this makes a somewhat compelling case for alt universe because again, she didn’t think austin knew how to fake uncertainty this well. If he were doing this for an act at least, he’d be way more confident, and if he lost his memories, why would he latch onto such a wild idea to replace them. It’s just really weird.

After a moment, he puts his hands in his lap, waving off that he’s fine. And either way, unless she has a way to get him home right away that she’s been hiding from him all this time, there isn’t a whole lot she can do to ease his nerves and help. Offers that he appreciates the attempt, but she’d be better spending her time heading back in to sleep too if able. Her explaining that she said she’d stay up to make Kyle feel better and austin looking a touch disappointed, offering that he does understand the concern, but he really wouldn’t try anything, promise. Her quickly countering back “oh well if you promise.” and him giving a slight shrug and half chuckle like. Alright, yeah, fair enough. before noticing she stopped laughing around the time he started, asking if she’s okay. She sighs and shakes her head, admitting she just can’t get used to him. even him just laughing like that, so casually, is weird. She didn’t think he /had/ a sense of humor, and him chuckling again and admitting his mel usually thinks the same too if he’s being honest. She asks to confirm he’s not weirded out by how she is and him admitting a little of course, the look she wore when she walked in? Mel used to look at him harshly when they saw each other before, but not the way this mel did. but despite that, there’s still a lot of how his girlfriend is that he can see in this version of her too. Kyle’s a little harder to come to terms with, but not that far off, and any changes- like kyle not trusting or liking austin -are completely justifiable, specifically thanks to the change that’s the hardest to accept. “The Austin Dunn here is… a monster. He’s… abhorrent and cruel for no real reason.” he gives another shaky, disbelieving breath of a laugh. “For a /scar/. For a scar that’s always made me like Kyle /more/ for it.” he glances over his shoulder back in to where kyle is and mel came from. “That man’s ruining his life, trying to /take/ it, for a /scar/ Kyle didn’t even /mean to give him./ It’s /ridiculous/ and the more I think about it, more I think about someone with /my/ face doing all that… I /hate/ it.”

Again, mel’s a little ~ about how deeply austin looks like disturbed by this, something they discussed before so it’s not like he didn’t have time to get over it, it’s just still that upsetting to him which is like. ????. yeah that’s the life you’re living, i think it’s shitty and dumb too but it’s weird that /you/ think it’s shitty and dumb. Figuring she should help given how truly upset he seems by this, she starts to offer, “C’mon, it’s not-.” but he cuts her off to call out that she has no real counter to what he’s saying. It’s all true and terrible, she can’t deny it, and it sickens him to know any version of him is capable of this. After a moment, though, he sighs, before shaking his head and waving it off, saying that of course she already knows that, though. She lives with that, she’s gotta be well aware. He’s just complaining about her and kyle’s entire lives for them, which is a waste, too. After another beat and a deep breath, he thanks her for the talk, reiterating she doesn’t need to babysit him, but clarifying he means that in a ‘you must have better things to do than listen to me talk about how i miss my family’. After a beat, she leans a little closer, asking if they really mean /that/ much to him. They seem like it from what she’s heard him say but like. Forgive her for needing some more evidence that an Austin Dunn could have a family he actually gives a shit about. Austin raising an eyebrow, asking if this version of him had a rough childhood or something, muttering he can’t imagine a version of his parents that would be cruel enough to lead to such cruelty from him. Mel dismissing this without thinking the answer through though, saying no, from what she understood they weren’t cruel, the austin she knew just killed them when he was young; he’s always said he didn’t regret it.

It’s probably something austin shares with targets and allies alike as an intimidation tactic. ‘I killed my own parents before I was old enough to drive, you think i’m going to hesitate ending /your(or X’s)/ life?’ so that’s how mel knows. But austin did /not/ realize that. Hadn’t even considered it as a possibility because he can barely grasp some version of him wanting to kill kyle but some version of him /succeeding/ at killing his /parents/ is practically impossible to him. All of a sudden that mild anxious energy is ten fold. He’s shaking, moving a lot more in his seat, shaking his head and saying that that can’t be, before that he feels like he’s going to be sick at the thought, especially as further fear sinks in that this monster killed his own parents and now he’s probably with austin’s whole family and who knows if they’re realized they’re in danger yet. and mel sees how fucking distraught he suddenly is from all this and again taking this as good evidence for the ‘this isn’t austin faking it’ theory, decides to try to settle him enough to get him back to he was before.

Probably tries to help ease him to sit on the floor, allows herself to get close enough to put a careful hand on his shoulder, and again this isn't his mel but it’s mel so he’s more allowing of it. Her initial point to calm him down is to just try to reassure him that just because that austin killed his parents doesn’t mean he’ll kill this austin’s family too. Basically makes the case of like a, at this point he really only has a motive, however shitty, against kyle anyway and it’s not even his kyle, and b, dealing with the aftermath of murder in a world he /doesn’t/ have ties to that could keep him out of danger or see him unable to be blamed as a young kid not outed as a mutant yet is not a smart move and he’s intelligent enough to see that. He won’t just start attacking people for kicks the moment he walks in, especially if he doesn’t have powers. she admits they’re probably not safe forever, but one night isn’t going to make the difference, she’s certain (and smash cut to s!austin trying to strangle f!kyle, jk jk)

That helps to calm him down from the immediate threat of a fucking panic attack or something, but she can tell he’s still uneasy. As a further attempt to distract him plus like. Wanting to understand /how/ exactly an austin /does/ have a family he cares about given what she knows, i think her using questions on that to try and distract him more. Calm him down by talking about these people he cares about and wants to get back to? If this you loves your parents so much, what were they like? You’ve said you have a daughter you’re totally amazed by, what’s she like? What in the hell happened that had some alt version of me actually befriend and then date some alt version of you?

And it takes a while, def, but eventually talking about a lot of that stuff is enough of a distraction and reminder of better parts of austin’s life that it does kind of settle his nerves. Mainly, i like this simile for austin to bring up of equating his family to wild flowers in a sea of white flowers (meadowfoam is a good example i think) or something. Not planned to be there, not part of the original design, but the wild colors add life to an otherwise monotonous space and they make this garden out of all their colors, this beautiful collection of different yellows and reds and pinks and blues that add a sense of life to a place he didn’t realize was lacking it. Him admitting he thinks back on where he was before when things all first happened, and he understands his reaction, he does. Of course he does. This wasn’t a part of his plan, having friends or a wife or a kid- a /family/. He wasn’t ready for this then, he gets why he tried to dismiss it as he did, but also, he still kicks himself for taking /so/ long to realize the value of having the others so involved in his life. He knows he wasn’t ready to see it then, but he wishes he had been, wishes he hadn’t almost lost it all because he wasn’t ready. Wishes he didn’t have the risk now of possibly losing them all over again but worse if he’s not fast enough. She again tries to reassure him, but makes the case it’s like 2 am, they’re all tired, not much that can be done at this hour anyway (likely a specific reason like ‘we need to go do x that’s only open at y hours so we have to wait until then anyway’). If he sits here and worries all night, that can’t possibly help more than just getting some sleep, too, and them all starting again in the morning asap. Him finally nodding, sighing reluctantly and leaning back slightly. admits she’s right as he tries to get into a more comfortable position to sleep a bit. After a long pause as he starts to nod off, he thanks her, saying this world’s austin is missing out by being such an irreparable villain that he won’t be able to be better friends with her.

Mel probably tries to stay up as well to continue to keep an eye on him, but her nodding off too. When she wakes up, it’s kyle very carefully nudging her in an attempt to wake her up but not austin (prolly with a comment like didn’t realize you were going to keep such a close eye on him, huh? and her shooting him a look and telling him to help her get up), which is harder than expected because the two ended up moving in the sleep enough where austin is leaning against mel in his sleep. Her carefully shifting and starting to get out, but finally starting to stir austin. The issue is only half waking him up from the careful movements though, because i like him still like 90% sleepy and just. In his mind he doesn’t process yet that he’s not in bed at home, he just feels and hears mel to his side. So him leaning over further, brushing his lips against her cheek and wishing her good morning before starting to roll over and stretch himself awake too. And it’s only when mel immediately pulls away at this rubbing at her cheek, and kyle blurts out, “Excuse me????” that that actually snaps him to wake up and process his surroundings. Him almost immediately trying to apologize and explain himself. Kyle joking this austin /must/ be some new fake version, their austin doesn’t seem like the sort to have been sorry for a damn thing he’s ever done (again, the family thing), let alone for him actually /wanting/ to kiss mel, what the fuck is up with that. Meanwhile i love mel coming out of momentary shock to be at least a little mad because he has toxic saliva and what if he’d caught her lips instead or something. Beyond that idea just being eugh, is he trying to /kill/ her??? And that being how austin realizes hold on i’m sorry that’s a part of my powers too???? That’s horrible??? Why does he have that??? Why is the austin here literally as toxic as he is figuratively, i ///hate/// the other austin??? Kyle letting out a rough scoffing breath with a smirk that’s too sharp to be only playful. “Join the fucking club, mate.”

Also unrelated to shenanigans in taht world, back in family au world, a concern I think would be dal probably trying to be more active in this. The way i was picturing it before, she was younger, but like i think i mentioned i picture pre-teen to teen dal around the time the two start dating again, and pre-teen to teen dal is the most confident dal there is. She’s still really confident when she’s older but she learns to reign it in and be subtle confident whereas (pre)teen dal is the ‘my friends need to know they’re wrong’ dal. Also she’s even more convinced of how great her dad is so when he’s suddenly acting terrible and weird, her wanting to get involved to try and figure out what’s up and fix it. Mel and the others prolly having to really step in to keep her from getting involved at all because i refuse to let superpower au!austin and family au!dal have any sort of serious conversation at all. That cannot happen, no way.

[the4thhousemystic]

The painful 6th/8th house axis

Hello Dear Reader,

I have come to notice this phenomenon a while ago. This definitely also makes me look at the signs of Virgo and Scorpio (the original rulers of the 6th and 8th house) in a different light, since their natures kind of reflect the scenario that I am describing below.

So let me explain how this plays out:

Example:

I am a girl and my sun is in the sign of Aquarius. This makes my opposite be the sign of Leo. (And unlike 99 % of the time that this can turn into an enemy repulsion thing, especially in same sex situations, this is one of the nice yin-yang connections of the zodiac.)

But who is the 8th sign to Aquarius? That’s right, it’s the sign of Virgo.

Now when I first met a Virgo male (who became my crush a little after that) I felt a soulmate connection. It was like we were the same person, we had the same intellect, the same humor, the same way of being a little cynical, the same tedency to “people-watch” and so on… it was magnetic, I thought I finally found someone to fall in love with. And he was just as into it at first, too. Or so I thought…

So here comes the repulsion.

The more we hung out and the closer I wanted to get to him, the more he desired anything else but me. It was like he was disillusioned about how he felt about me and what my personality was like on the whole. He couldn’t by any means appreciate my quirky-futuristic type of thinking and also my interest in understanding the human mind. He actually was very magnetized by the impulsive, direct, aggressive, confident, fiery people (Aries, which is his 8th house) that we came across. Funny enough, those were the people, that thought he was such a fool to even try to impress them. Since Virgo men tend to be somewhat feminine, Aries males can never really take them seriously, same with the Aries ladies.

So this became really painful to me since I always seem to hopelessly fall for Virgo guys (my Venus is in Aquarius - North Node is in Virgo in my 11th house) and I never seem to be appreciated back by them at all.

But I definitely have experienced the other side aswell:

So around the same time, there was this Cancer guy in my class, who had a crush on me. It was the same thing here: First, that big spark and then the repulsion. It’s like the sign that is 6th to you (in my case, Cancer) desires to have those qualities you have. Meaning, Cancer wants to be a giver, not only to family and friends but also in the society/larger groups, take things that people say to them lightly and be charismatic and full of life regardless of how people make you feel, be emotionally independent/cool, the list goes on…

But it felt like hanging out with him was leading me no where. I desired the Virgo axis. I admired the Virgo traits of being emotionally cool and yet not too detached to get called out on it like Aquarius, being independent and yet accepted by society and being super friendly and accessable and yet somewhat of a mystery to everyone around them, which makes them even more desireable. That last thing is also kind of secret about Aquarius -> they LOVE being desired by others and acting like they don’t even notice it (which would turn a Leo on but not a Virgo…)

You know, I have had this thing happen to me too many times to just write this as a theory. This is a fact, people. But of course, you have to look at your chart for other indicators of mutual understanding, to see if this will really apply or not.

Trying to make a relationship like this work is definitely possible, though.

Don’t get discouraged, if this applied to you. It just depends on both partner’s maturity and self respect, since you are looking up to and desiring your 8th house to be with the person that makes you feel like they are beating you in your own game, who therefore would be your “trophy partner”.

But once, you have aquired the needed self awareness and apprectiation for your own qualities, which can take years for some, you will not look down or up to anyone and actually be transformed into the best version of yourself and your sign.

So in case you are going through something like this, remember these feelings of endless fasinaction that sometimes even feel like jealousy, are just a reflection of your own unawareness of your own true beauty and purpose in this life.

[holtzmannish]

Lab teamwork with Holtzmann

holtzmann x reader where the reader has a sleeve of tattoos and in general just really badass and holtzmann thinks that she's hates her cause she doesn't talk as much around her and holtzmann confronts her one day and the reader tells her it's bc she thinks she's cute, and has anxiety and had no idea if she liked girls & holtzmann just kisses her?? sorry if this doesn't make sense 😬

This was super awesome and inspiring so props to whoever sent this in! Been thinking a lot about education and stuff lately so that’s the direction this went in. Hope it works :) (for the record, I have never caused a fire at school... :P) ((it may have happened one time))

You flick strands of hair behind your ears as you try to focus your attention on the professor, who stands at the front of the lab trying desperately to explain safety procedures and group-work to the less cooperative members of your class. She waves her hands in exasperation, stressing that “if we only have one fire in class today, it’ll be a goddamn miracle”.

This draws a slight chuckle out of the entire class, but your attention is elsewhere, on the woman sitting at a bench a row in front and to the right, with blonde hair, eclectic fashion sense. She keeps looking at you and you make an effort not to meet her gaze. She’s probably the most intelligent person in this class, which is really saying something about her, seeing as this is a fairly select group of the best and brightest science students at your university. 

You see her eye your bare arms, turning around in a sly attempt to appear as if she is stretching. You cannot quite read her eyes, and in this attempt to gauge her emotions, your eyes meet. You’re unsure of what she’s thinking, as she presses her lips together and raises her eyebrows slightly at you. You attempt to give her a friendly half-smile in return, but before you can really do anything, your lab partner elbows you impatiently, handing you some paper to write on as she dictates your lab report.

Too distracted to resist her bossiness, you comply and begin scrawling down her words, trying to pry your thoughts from the pretty and intriguing woman in your class. You wonder what she’s thinking when she looks at you. How was she looking at you? Might she like you? Or perhaps she just doesn’t really care. Just being friendly. Your lab partner drags you into conversation and soon you are chatting animatedly about the experiment, your weekends and other trivial matters in your life, you thoughts not quite leaving the girl as, from the corner of your eye you see her head turn as if she’s waiting for something. When it seems as if she too is absorbed in the exercise and ceases to grant any attention to you, you feel your heart sink a little for the rest of the class.

The next week there’s talk of some group work. A thesis, combining the research of two groups, four people, and your lab partner is already gesturing to the blonde girl and her partner to join the two of you. You’re familiar with the boy who partner’s the blonde woman, though introductions had never been made between you and the blonde woman. She walks over confidently, stretching out a hand to you in a way which seems oddly familiar for a ‘formal’ greeting.

“Call me Holtzmann,” she says with a grin, energy bubbling off of her. “Or you can just call me.”

You feel heat rise to your face but noone seems to notice, as instead you let the other two take charge of the assignment, only speaking to correct them on some incorrect information. Several time you catch Holtzmann eyeing you, yet you say nothing, do nothing, as her very gaze makes you feel as if you’re at the apex of a roller coaster, about to go over the edge. You’re not quite sure whether you like roller coasters but you definitely know that roller coasters and Bunsen burners have no business associating with one another. So you attempt to ignore her, only stealing quick glances at the slight furrow between her eyebrows as she thinks, the messy scrawl she uses in her brilliant calculations and the deftness of her fingers as she turns pages or gestures wildly with her hands as she explains new concepts to your teammates. (You fail miserably at ignoring her, instead basically dismissing the task at hand as you become increasingly smitten with Holtzmann.)

The two weeks allocated to finish the assignment go by, the four of you meeting up in the library, or for milkshakes, to finish work and discuss theories, all the while you manage to barely say two words to Holtzmann, though your eyes are familiar with every curve and angle of her face. One day she’s late to class and as the rest of the three of your group set about finalizing and editing your paper, you take charge for the first time, standing over the two of them as they edit out commas and polish grammar on the final copy, ready to hand in the next day to your professor. It has to be perfect, much of your grade is relying on it to be so, and as Holtzmann is not here right at this moment, your entire attention is focused upon getting it just right. Slight nods are the main communication you get from the pair as you polish it and the next thing you know, a hand is on your shoulder. Holtzmann stands next to you, reaching out to make contact with your bare shoulder as she scans the writing on a computer before your lab partner. You can feel the heat radiating off of her, smell the faint seductive smoky scent of her, combined with a light citrus that must be her shampoo and this consumes you. She opens her mouth to speak and your gaze has narrowed to only encompass her in the world around you. 

“It’s per -“ All of a sudden you are aware of this effect she is having on you and you step away, her hand dropping to her side mid-sentence.

“-fect. It’s perfect,” she says, her brow furrowing as she obviously notices your sudden withdrawal from her touch.

“Well you did most of the calculations and [Y/N] is an absolute whiz with the report, so I dare say we’ll be getting a brilliant mark on this!” your ab partner says with a grin, and a slight knowing glance between you and Holtzmann.

“Yeah it’s pretty darn good, if I do say so myself,” says your other friend, reaching out to give the whole group a light high-five. You dodge this, slinging your bag over your shoulder and taking the computer from the desk, calling behind you that you’ll bring in a hard copy to the professor tomorrow morning. Only one person has to be there to hand this in and you volunteer to do this tedious job just so you can leave and catch your breath.

“Hey, [Y/N]!” you hear as your exit the door and round the corner. You do not stop. You do not pass go, nor collect $200. You head straight home, trapped in the prison of your mind, obsessing over your interactions between yourself and Holtzmann, and why the hell you’ve been acting this way. How can one person, who you’re not even sure is interested in you, have this much of an effect over you?

Barely rested from obsessing ost of the night, like the adult you are, you turn up a minute before class ends, presentation neatly displayed in a clear folder and perfectly printed up. You hand it to the professor, flustered, who confirms she received your digital copy and thanks you, commenting that the brief glance she gave it looked highly promising. You smile faintly in response, and having collected everyone else’s work, she slips it into her briefcase and exits the room, saying a quick goodbye to you, and Holtzmann. Holtzmann? You hadn’t even noticed her when you walked in.

She stands leaning against of the benches, arms folded and lips pursed. The usual aura of energy which surrounds her is absent, as she purses her lips and looks at you expectantly. You give her a small awkward wave, suddenly keenly aware of how you’re dressed and how you didn’t brush your hair this morning. You see her eyes graze up and down your body and she runs a tongue over her lips, seemingly thoughtful.

“Holtzmann,” you say with a nod in way of greeting.

“[Y/N],” she responds, mimicking your nods before standing up straight and fixing you with her gaze. You feel that roller coaster tumble in your stomach at this and wait for her to say something else.

“What’s your deal?” she asks, walking over to you. “I’ve been getting this weird vibe off of you the entire time.”

She’s studying you as if you’re some curious experiment or specimen which she doesn’t understand, but maybe she wants to. “You’re smart, you have ideas. You’re not exactly shy from what I’ve seen. But it seems as if you hate me.”

At this you can feel the anxiety in her and what it takes for her to be able to say this to you. All of a sudden you feel completely guilty but she has advanced towards you with each word and is now so close you can hardly think.

“You’re cute,” you manage to get out, but you say this as if the words are poison on your tongue. You can see that she doesn’t receive this sentiment as it’s intended, in her body language and how she backs away slightly.

“I- I like you?” you say, furrowing your eyebrows and not meeting her eyes.

“Is that a question?” she says, a touch of humour breaking through the confusion in her voice.

“No, no. It’s a fact,” you say, trying to express yourself with at least a smidge of eloquence, and failing. “You make me nervous and I like you. Obviously this isn’t something I’m good at dealing with.”

“No kidding,” she says, reaching out a hand to linger lightly upon your forearm, tracing the intricate patterns of your tattoo. She does this instead of meeting your gaze, perhaps giving you a little space within your head to straighten (A/N: HA!) your thoughts out.

“I’m just a really anxious person and have a massive crush on you. There, I said it. And I’m really sorry if that makes you uncomfortable or anything, I don’t know if you’re into girls, or me or-”

All of a sudden she cuts off your rambling by standing toe-to-toe with you, hands placed lightly on your arms and planting the sweetest of kisses on your mouth. Legs turning to jelly, you reach one hand out to hold onto her, yet this turns into a deeper embrace, and the other to brace yourself against the bench behind you.

She deepens the kiss and you involuntarily let out a soft moan, which sends a smile to her lips. Your shoulders relax and all of a sudden your book bag crashes to the floor with a loud bang. She pulls away, leaving you feeling a little disappointed. She sees this look on your face, more able to read you now and smirks.

“You know, I do think that this goes against the lab safety procedures, in some way. It’s getting hot in here, we don’t want to start a fire,” she says with a wink, reaching down to pick up your bag and handing it to you. You accept it and return her smile, accompanied by a blush.

“Yeah I guess you’re right. How about we go someplace else?” you suggest.

“My apartment is a ten minute walk from here,” she says heading towards the door. You take her offered and follow her out of the room, unafraid of getting burnt by the flame that has sparked between the two of you. Perhaps you do like roller coasters...

[smireyac]

yea boi u already kno what it issssss 🍾🎆🎉🍾🎆🎉

hey so i started writing this at 8 o’ clock so i would be ahead of the game and actually have more than an hour to write but HEY its already 20 after midnight so who the eff care amiright ladies

WOOOOO 🍾🍾🎆 🎉 🎆 🍾 🎉 🎉 🍾 🍾 🍾 🎆🎆 🎆 🎉 🎆 🎉🍾 🎉 🍾🎆 🎉

so.................... its 2019.....................

i watched vox’s “2018 in 5 minutes” video and cried so thats how this year has been :^) a lot of lows......... we always think we leave the shittiest year behind then lo.............. the next year rears its ugly head and we never learn............ despite this, im gonna try to keep a positive outlook on the new year......... its literally just another day and i have to be in at work @ 9 tmrw but its what ever im already super fucking tired whats losing another hour of sleep anywahy?? its practically expected of me any way what with being a youth,,, ANYWAY i spent my time ringing in the new year watching spiderman homecoming so i think that wa sGREAt its also great  that im gonna get to see spiderverse AGAIN tmrw after work so SUCK ON THAT im ringing in the new year RIGHT!! its a very spidey new year and i wouldnt have it any other way heh.....

alright

so its time.... to reflect...........

and actually reflect this time last year was weak sauce compared to the first year “im too unfocused right now happy new year or whatever” *scoffs* what r u too good for self reflecting now a days huhh

been doing a lot of self reflecting this year,,,,,, but today we will look back on how the previous years have gotten me to where i am today...

if 2016 was the year of change and 2017 was the year of getting used to things.............. 2018 felt like............ the year of getting TOO used to things, of not ENOUGH change............. like alright i scratched a few of the bigger things on my yearly “to do” list/resolutions, i. e. finally going back to school and getting a job at the library, but like.......... i definitly dont feel like i did enough........... my art game was SO WEAK and i feel like i wrote less than 10,000 words ALL YEAR (not counting my academic papers) i didnt really CREATE anything this i dont have ANYTHING significant to show for this year............and to get more negative i didnt even make any friends all year NONE FRIENDS im only *just* starting to get more friendly with people at the library thank GOD theyre nice and gave my shy ass a chance to open up but i still dont feel like ill make FRIEND friends theyre just work friends and u kno what thats making me so pissed bc its tricking my dumb ass into thinking i have a crush on someone at work aND that i want a *romantic* relationship with them!!! OUTRAGEOUS im so peeved.......................... i also still havent gotten behind a wheel but at this point im not sure if i will anytime soon bc im That Way..... grrrr im just mad thinking of all the things i didnt do so motherfucker i will make 2019 the year of DOING!!!! and i had so many resolutions last year i feel like the more i had the less i felt like i had to do them, like i was just saying all that to be like “oh wouldnt it be nice if any of these things happened lmao” so yeah 2019: the year of DOING... and since ive kinda sorta figured out that writing is my thang.... i think i wanna focus on doing that.. and anything that will help me do it

SO: #GOALS for 2K19

-WRITE AT LEAST 50.000 WORDS U COWARD, more than just “brainstorming” too bc thats like a cop out, write like stories or dialogue or scenes or scripts or WHATEVER just make it to 50,000 pls some people do that in like a month

-READ UR GOD DAMN BOOKS, u *cant* buy anymore if u dont read the ones u’ve already bought,,,, im willing to make an acception re: checking things out from the library................ but u rlly shouldnt IT WOULD’VE BEEN SO EASY TO WIN THE BET DUDE srsly..... maybe .... an hour b4 bed ? try to read ? at least try to read once a week dude....

-heres a curve ball WATCH MORE MOVIES !!! u say u love film well fuckin act like u do...... u only went to the movie theater 5 times all year and three of those were all in the last month to go see spiderverse, more than that HOW MANY movies are there on netflix that u see and go “oh i should watch that finally” or “people say thats rlly good bro” and u scroll right past to watch the same 3 fuckin movies i s2g

-oh yeah back to the writing thing, to reach that 50,000 goal u should write about what you read and watch, there u’ll prob meet the goal b4 summer if u do that bro but....u actually gotta do it....................

ok those r the 4 im REALLY gonna work on and try to keep track of in either of the journals sien got me :^) these next few i rlly want to happen but..... we’ll see

-make some friends pls.... pls be more friendly......... ENGAGE  people when u have the opportunity askQUESTIONS about them like if they have a dog or a hobbie jesus h christ

-go out..... on ur own..... do stuff............by urself if u have to... go to the movies by urself go to a park, walk around down town for the fuck of it idk DO STUFF

-finish something............ for once in ur miserable life...................................... finish the vlog or the scrapbook..... or the reading list or this set of goals PLEAsE ANYTHING

im not even gonna put draw/art blog related stuff on here bc........ its not what i want........ like i love drawing and i dont think im terrible at it, im at a good place with it but i dont wanna put my energy this year into drawing stuff for the sake of me being able to say “i did it” like...... last yr and the yr b4 i rlly RLLY wanted to get better at art to idk prove that i could?? but like i havent picked up my drawing tablet in months ... that makes me really sad but i dont really feel like picking it up either? ? i said i wanted to take a painting/color theory/ life drawing class maybe i will this yr and it’ll reinvigorate my love of drawing........ tbh spiderverse got me *this close* to being pumped about art and animation and like yeah i still am, i love the medium and its still a dream of mine to be apart of it but it feels like a pipe dream if i try to go thru the art angle........ so many people r better than me at that and its not really what i wanna do,,, i wanna CREATE STORIES and worlds and characters and like i used my art to help *me* develop those but... i dont wanna use my art to do it for someone else i guess............. the art of animation itself still facsinates me so they door isnt close yet but,,, i wanna focus on the other aspect of myself that im more and at the same time LESS confident about lmao WRITING like alright,,, i think im a good writer .... sorta ? like yeah people tell me i am and sometimes when i look back on things ive written im like “dAMN i wrote this ???” but like,,,, there are some things to writing that still. escape me... like poetry.... and a lot of other aspects to it that i cant describe write now bc it would take too long and im getting cold and tired SO YEAH hopefully this english class will help me, even tho its just writting for college essays, i need to start somewhere and if shes rlly as good of a professor as rate my professor says then ill learn smthg new

where was i

well the year wasnt ALL bad, like i said i got the job at the library i wanted and FINALLY got to go to school, stressful as that mightve been........ and i got to see my love, my darling, the light of my life rhys again for one glorious week,, hopefully ill be able to see more of my friends this year? either in miami or milwuakee idc which MAYBE BOTH lmao im not that rich but hey i can dream,,,

alright its 1:12am i think im ready to sign off,,,,,,,,, here’s to DOING in 2019

🥂 cheers

[afurst]

There’s Nothing You Can Do to Change the World, So Don’t Ever Stop Trying

At a retreat I was helping to lead some time ago, I made a comment during the Dharma talk that rustled a few feathers. It went something like this, “There’s nothing you can do to change the world.” At the end of the retreat one of the participants followed up for clarification. He asked with a friendly but incredulous look on his face, “Did you really mean that?”I admit, it sounds harsh. But, let me explain.

It’s Not Just a Good Idea, It’s the Law

I’ve just finished reading a fantastic book called This Explains Everything. It’s a series of essays by various prominent thinkers answering the question “What is your favorite deep, elegant, or beautiful explanation?”

The authors cover a gamut of disciplines including cognitive science, biology, economics, music, social sciences, and physics. I confess to being an avid pop physics fan. So I was drawn to the essays focused on cosmology and quantum mechanics. Three ideas that weaved through the book will help me make my point.

The first is order. The universe appears to follow a set of rules.Our formulations of these rules, for example Newton’s laws or Maxwell’s equations, are highly predictive and explain a lot about our experience. Even the bizarre probabilities of quantum mechanics demonstrate that there is a certain order to the universe.

Implicit in this observation is that the rules don’t change. This explains how we’re able to use them to predict events with some degree of probability. If the laws changed, things would be completely unpredictable, in fact life couldn’t exist.

Getting There From Here

The second concept is determinism. The probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics has shown that while the universe has order, it’s not precisely predictable. The laws of nature point to likely outcomes, but not rigid cause effect chains. This is a very important point. Ideas about determinism and free will have always been critical to defining our world view. If we misunderstand cause and effect, we’re at risk of misunderstanding everything.

The final idea is Emergence . This is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Scientists have used emergence to develop plausible explanations for everything from the creation of stars to the evolution of life. These explanations are truly deep, elegant and beautiful.

To illustrate how cool these ideas are, I’ll give you some examples. Interesting fact; in the beginning, if the universe had a perfectly uniform density, it would have been a very different, bland place. The ever so slight differences in density throughout the fledgling universe allowed particles to congregate by way of gravity (see a recent TED talk on the confirmation of this hypothesis). Over the course of billions of years these congregations of matter formed hydrogen and helium atoms which in turn formed the first stars.

As the process of emergence unfolded, the stars exploded as super nova, resulting in the creation of larger elements like carbon, iron and so on. These ingredients formed the raw materials for new stars, planets, and ultimately life.

It’s remarkable that scientists have been able to reverse engineer the story of the cosmos. We have a decent picture of the past and a certain degree of confidence that it’s correct because it was derived from the same rules that we use to reliably predict probable future states.

Emergent Selection

The human body and its behaviors are adaptations produced by an emergent process we call evolution. We’ve evolved to respond to our environment in ways that increase the likelihood of our survival (or more specifically, to increase the likelihood we reproduce).

For example, we blink when something approaches our eye. We produce adrenalin and its associated self-preservation responses when we are in danger. These naturally selected traits allowed our ancestors to live another day by surviving one moment to the next.

Evolutionary development has allowed humanity to move beyond the survival stage into relative comfort and wealth. We even enjoy the luxury of contemplating happiness.

Emotional Rescue

Is happiness an evolutionary trait?

Norwegian biologist Bjorn Grinde proposes in his textbook, Darwinian Happiness: Evolution as a Guide for Living and Understanding Human Behavior, that it may be.

He argues that human emotions find their cause in evolution. Evolution might tend to add stronger incentives for behavior benefiting the genes in an individual with a powerful free will; as otherwise, the free will could easily result in maladaptive behavior. — Wikipedia

Recognizing emotional traits as emergent phenomenon is not hard to see. The love between a mother and child clearly serves to ensure that genes are successfully passed on. But, day to day, it’s difficult to see our emotions in this context. We don’t view our love of family in the context of the perpetuation of our DNA. It seems a little more complex than that.

Never forget that justice is what love looks like in public ― Cornel West

But Grinde is right in that free will without the incentive to self-preserve would likely result in the annihilation of life. Even with the power of evolution behind us, we don’t always act wisely. The effects of our bad decisions can be devastating. The fact that climate change is considered a man-made phenomenon, tells you how much of a mess we can make of things. But broadly speaking, our track record with free will has been net positive. The success of the human species speaks for itself.

So it seems that emergence has resulted in two natural principles. First, we are fundamentally motivated to perpetuate life — i.e. pass on our genes. Second, related to the first, is that freewill is also governed by natural selection. We’re incentivized, via emotion, to get along with each other. The latter principle I would describe as our natural inclination towards social justice.

There is Nothing You Can Do to Change the World

To steer back to my original point, we have to acknowledge that there is much in the world we cannot change. On an impersonal level, it’s fairly easy to recognize that the laws of nature are what they are. The acceleration due to gravity will be the same tomorrow as it was 300 years ago.

But getting a little more personal, there are some truths that can be harder to accept. Learning that your purpose is to perpetuate the information you carry in your genetic code can leave you a little cold. Viewing the love I have for my wife and children as simply the actions of “selfish genes” seems belittling. But no matter how I choose to view it, I am basically a DNA carrier.

Free will is a little more complicated. While our self preservation instincts tend to invoke simple mechanisms to help keep us alive long enough to reproduce, our exercise of free will doesn’t seem to be as automatic. Climate change, pollution, and addiction are all problems stemming from the misguided exercise of freewill. Why do we do these things?

These problems stem from a disconnect between our actions and their consequences. At the foundation is a faulty understanding of what is in our best interest. Why do we act in ways that are a detriment to our well-being? That’s literally insane. This is the root of suffering.

And there it is; the Buddha’s message!

The centrality of suffering and the causes of suffering in the Buddha’s teachings is very compelling to me. The journey begins with diagnosing and treating our own flavor of disconnection. If we fail in this, we’ll have little to offer the world.

Don’t Ever Stop Trying

The Buddhist teaching of the great embrace, the Mahamudra, tells us about the peculiar union of the unchanging eternal nature of the universe and it’s constantly evolving character. Both aspects of the world are observably true. The universe is what it is. Its laws are inviolable. But as these laws manifest over time, a vast diversity of matter, energy, and life unfolds before us.

This esoteric teaching is deep, elegant, and beautiful. It’s something I view as on par with the theories of evolution and quantum mechanics. It reminds us that both things are true in this quirky little universe of ours. The world is simultaneously unchanging and constantly evolving!

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. — Margaret Mead

We have freewill. We have intentions, make choices, and those choices affect the future. There is much good we can do. It seems we’re actually wired for it. We can listen and empathize. We can speak up when we see injustice and we can be better stewards of our environment.

But we have to do the hard work of putting our own house in order before we can start changing the world for the better. We need to align our efforts so that they actually do good.

It sounds obvious, but in practice it is monumentally difficult. We need only look to history for a multitude of people who have paved the road to hell with good intentions. These would-be saviors arise out of naive ideologies and their actions tend to do more harm than good.

The 1960s and 1970s were a showcase of misguided efforts to better the world. The Symbionese Liberation Army, the Weatherman, and the Black Panthers were all founded on deeply held, but flawed premises. They spiraled out of control because they perpetuated the cycle of suffering.

We must accept the world as it is. If we don’t come to grips with the rules of life, we won’t be able to play the game. When it comes to social justice, there are a lot of dead end routes. Forcing people to adopt social change by legislation or coersion doesn’t work. These approaches don’t take seriously the fact that free will is not a group phenomenon.

The Buddha acknowledged that change comes one heart and mind at a time. It’s an act of freewill to see and acknowledge the world as it is. Its an act of freewill to discover the true path to happiness. We can only walk ourselves across that bridge.

So how do we promote social justice? By example. It may sound ineffectual, but it’s magical seeing how infectuous it can be. In the same way that smiles are contagious, enlightenment can move from one person to the next; sometimes like wildfire. Gandhi said it well:

If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do. — Mahatma Gandhi

  So get out there and change the world. Social justice doesn’t happen on its own. But do it from a firm foundation. Do the work that’s required to understand the causes of suffering and apply what you learn to reduce it. It often less about doing good for others, and more about living in a way that shows that you have found your way.

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