#given that she refused to include that part of her life in fiction

[fictionadventurer]

Current level of Little House nerd: Internally freaking out because Rose wrote a short story based on their time in Florida which means we have filled in the last remaining major gap in the Ingalls-Wilder family fictional timeline.

[georgiapeach30513]

Your Mark On Me, Part 12

Summary: You and Bucky are in love, and Bucky has to talk to Steve.

Pairings: Bucky Barnes X Reader

Rating: explicit

Warnings:  explicit language, explicit sexual content, depictions of PTSD/panic attack, mentions of alcohol abuse, mentions of sexual harassment, mentions of drug abuse, soft!Bucky, unprotected sex, PIV sex, creampie, mentions of street life, 18+ ONLY

Word Count: 6.4K

Previous

Series Masterlist

A/N: this part does dive into Shy's past with her father, and we learn about Dove's sister. It can be a bit dark. Read ALL warnings, and if you feel it's too much for you, I don't apologize. This story was always going to be dark.

*dividers created by @firefly-graphics

*Bucky edits by @nixakimbo

There’s a comfort with living here with Bucky and Alpine. You’re able to relax, not fully, but you are getting there. Alpine definitely helps. Bucky. You want to let him in as easy as he let you in, but you just can’t. You could sit and listen to him talk, but don’t want to talk about your life just yet.

You want to, and then you don’t. You need to, but you just can’t. He is giving you so much of himself, including a place to live. Refusing to even take money from you. You weren’t poor, in fact you had done well with your books. That ugly piece of shit house had insurance, so yay for that.

But Bucky. He’s a mystery to you like all men. You know you shouldn’t, but you compare them all to your father. It’s why you wrote; you want to make stories of men that were good, honest, and didn’t have crippling and poor coping mechanisms. Bucky didn’t seem like that. In fact he gave you just enough distance, and you craved him more.

Was crave even the right word? You dream of him. Wished he would close the gap a bit more so you could count the colors of blue in his eyes. Had a desire to snoop in his room just so you knew what cologne he wore or if that scent was purely Bucky.

Why did he haunt your thoughts? Your newest male character was Bucky. Down to the cleft in his chin. The very dimple you longed to poke a finger in, hoping to bring a smile big enough to make the faint dimples appear on his cheeks. You liked when you could get that to happen.

Why couldn’t you be more comfortable with him? Why couldn’t you just speak more than a few words? Every evening he even asked if he was talking too much, and you’d respond by shaking your head no. You’d never been given much of a voice in your home, yet another reason you wrote. Your writing gave you that voice. Those moments to say what you wanted, even if it was fiction. There is always a bit of truth in the midst of fantasy.

If you could have made the perfect man, it would be Bucky. He is handsome without question, but his patience astounded you. He never once raised his voice. He saw you look in the fridge at the beer for too long, and the next day the beer was gone. You still haven’t found remnants of even beer garbage. He watched you curiously as you traced your finger along the walls, asking what you were doing. “They’re spotless.”

There aren't burns, dents, or ripped out wiring in his home. It is fascinating that there was a man that could no doubt live in a world of turmoil and danger, and yet his home is a safe haven for him, you, and even the cute little kitty that snuggled up to you every night.

Alpine is a godsend to you. She followed you around like a lost puppy, well cat. When Bucky came home, she would stand between the two of you, making sure there was a safe distance, but that you could hear her purring. You liked her purring. When she greeted her dad, Bucky would look at you but you kept your eyes trained on Alpine. Only random looks would move up to him. You were a puzzle that he couldn’t quite put together, but he knew once he did that you would be beautiful, even if there were missing pieces.

You kiss the top of Alpine’s head as you allow yourself to drift off to sleep. Sleep still scared you, and you found yourself panting and in a puddle of sweat almost every night, so far you’d been able to keep it within the four walls of your bedroom. “Goodnight, sweet girl. Keep us all safe.”

Sleep was always fraught with dreams that transformed into nightmares. Dreams of how you wished your life with your father was, but morphing into nightmares of how you viewed things with the eyes of you as a little girl. Parties that would get too loud, and your father would start cussing and pushing everyone around before they’d leave.

Parties where he would pass out early, and you’d have to hide in the closet as people would have sex in your bed. You’d sit in the corner of your closet with your fingers in your ears and tears running down your face as you try to block out the noises just a few feet away. You got smarter as you got older, but their gazes would follow you if you wanted food or to go to the bathroom.

Those slobs begged for the days that your father would pass out and they would beat on your door. They never made it in there with you, but their lingering eyes and words to each other was enough for you to swallow bile on more than one occasion.

Your nightmares held the fights that you had with your dad. When he’d drunkenly throw whatever he could get his hands on at you, or punch walls. Even ripping the phone off the wall because the sound of it annoyed him. How many fires had you put out because his disgusting self fell asleep with a cigarette.

This dream is your worst. His ghost is chasing you around the fire that you started on purpose. Letting you know that you would never get rid of him. His voice would be in your ear for the rest of your life, and would even haunt your children. You would never know peace because you were the reason his wife was dead. It’s what you deserved.

His voice repeats ‘It’s what you deserved’ over and over again. Marking itself in your very soul, until you believed that no good could come into your life because you didn’t deserve it. You deserved to live a miserable and loveless life like he did because it was your fault, and you deserved every bit of suffering that ever came in your life.

“No! Nonononono!”

“Hey,” Bucky whispers into your ear, giving your body a light shake. “Hey, come back to me.”

“You’re a liar!” You shoot up in the bed, and see his face trying to touch you. “Stop touching me! Don’t touch me. You’re wrong! You’re always wrong!” Your arms swing at him a few times and he starts to step back with his arms up in surrender, “I don’t want you to touch me!”

“It’s me, Bucky,” your body freezes, but your eyes blink a few times as he comes into clear view. Bucky isn’t your father, and your father isn’t Bucky. “I can leave.”

“No!” You should have let him. Why did you stop him? What is it that you want? “I don’t want to be alone. I’m always alone because he isolated me. I’ve never had a friend, and I don’t want to be him. I don’t want to blame everyone for my problems. I don’t want to be without…touch.”

You extend a shaky hand out to Bucky. Who are you? You didn’t want touch, you wanted to be left alone. Bucky’s head twists to the side as he looks at your trembling hand. His eyes move down to Alpine who is on your lap, and ready to pounce. She never took a defensive approach towards Bucky, “Can I hold your hand?”

“I don’t know,” you answer truthfully for the first time. You wanted him to touch your hand, and you wanted him to go away. Conflicting emotions were complicated.

“How about I hold my hand here?” He holds his hand straight out to yours barely an inch between you, and you close the space and press yours against his. Your fingers look so small compared to his. You bet he could play the piano beautifully. He has long lithe fingers that you wanted to weave yours into his.

His rings are cold against your skin. They were menacing to so many people, but to you they just looked like Bucky. You look up at him and start laughing. Laughing so hard that tears spring to your eyes. This is what crazy is, you just know it. He was going to walk away from you, and you’d never see him again.

Your hand just looked so tiny against his. Holding up your other hand, Bucky meets it with his metal hand, and you can’t stop yourself from weaving all ten of your fingers with his, continuing to laugh. He doesn’t retreat, his mouth just turns up into a crooked grin before he laughs with you.

“Are you okay?”

“I gotta break the cycle,” you laugh even harder, and aren’t sure why. Was this the mental break you assumed would eventually find you? If this was a mental break, you’d take it. You had no desire for alcohol. Didn’t want to turn to drugs. The only thing you wanted was to know that Bucky is smiling, and you wanted to keep learning all about him.

“You are. You’re breaking the cycle,” he answers with so much certainty that it cuts the air off from your lungs. Your laughing stops as soon as it had started, and he smiles as he sits down beside you. “You got yourself a little guard cat. Alpine, I don’t want to hurt her. Are you okay with me here?”

“Actually, yes. I hate men,” his mouth tightens as he watches you. “They’re thoughts of defiling a woman are so evidently clear in the way that they ogle you, and…the things they say.”

“Has anyone ever…”

“No,” you cut him off. “I’m not just saying that to avoid a trauma talk. It wasn’t without trying, but no. Not like that. Not sexually,” Bucky takes the abrupt finish as you wanting to move on past this talk. And yet you’re still looking at him, and opening up.

“Your father?”

“He was a mean drunk, and can we leave it at that?” Bucky gives you a head nod in response. He wouldn’t dig, he never did. “Thank you. I just…I don’t want to be alone anymore. Not in my life, and not in here,” you point at your head as you study his eyes. How were there so many shades of blue? “I’ve never really lived before. Had friends, but as soon as we got close, I’d push them away, and they’d give up on me. Bucky, if I push…don’t give up on me?”

“I’ve devoted a lot of time to you. I don’t want to give up. I always see things through.”

“Thank you,” two words have never held so much power for you before. You could never thank Bucky enough for the things he’s done, but mostly for the things he just said. Everyone with their good intentions always gave up on you. You couldn’t blame them. There’s only so many times that you push someone away that they give up on trying.

You bump your hip into Bucky’s as you look up at him with a genuine smile. Dates. You have been on six of them now, and he is still as much of a gentleman as he was the night he brought you home with him. The man slept in the bed with you, and still wouldn’t initiate anything. And heaven forbid if the two of you kissed at home. It’s like he had a timer that went off, and he would pull back.

“Bucky!”

“What is it?” His silvery blue eyes look down at you. His lips pull up with a smirk. He knew. He knew exactly what you wanted, and you were trying to get his attention.

“You know!”

“Just tell me then. Use your words, and tell me explicitly what you want,” it sounded like a bigger invitation than what you were wanting at this moment. What you wanted when you got home was entirely different. “Shy?”

Your fingers tickle along his as you will him to grab ahold of your hand. “My sweet little Shy Violet, all you have to do is use those words that I know you have.”

“Well…aren’t you my,” you stop your words. Could you call him that? You lived together. You saw him everyday, and talked to him throughout the day, there was no other woman. But could you say boyfriend?

“I think we’ve earned the right to call each other boyfriend and girlfriend,” Bucky would say those words over and over again just to see your sweet smile, hear the little giggle that rose up your throat, and even feel the warmth that was circled your body. “Shy, you’re my girlfriend.”

“I want my boyfriend to hold my hand then,” you blurt out. Bucky chuckles, but he does entangle his fingers with yours, pulling you as close to him as he possibly can as you walk back home. Your steps match each other, and you’ve never felt safer than you do right now.

“Shy, what are you feeling right now?”

“Right now?” You look up at him with your brows furrowed, “What do you mean?”

“Explain your feelings towards me and us like you would in one of your books.”

“Oh…well,” Bucky winces as he looks at you, fearful that he overstepped his bounds, and pushed you too far, too fast. The two of you had been making great progress with this new step in your relationship, and he doesn’t want to offset it or have you regress.

”Never mind. Forget I asked.”

”No,” you strain out a giggle. Grabbing his arm with your free hand. “It’s not that simple, bubba. It…words don’t always flow, they just get caught in my throat, and don’t want to come out. And I usually close my eyes before I start writing, and imagine the scene. What are you doing?”

He stops in the middle of the sidewalk, removing your hands off him before he steps in front of you. Squatting down a bit as he peeks over his shoulder, “Hop on, and close your eyes. You can whisper it in my ear.”

Exhaling loudly, you jump onto Bucky’s back, resting your cheek on his shoulder as you close your eyes. Letting your body feel everything that you feel about Bucky. “It’s new.”

“But good?” He asks. You give a quick peck to his neck. “I take that as a yes.”

“It’s so good,” you hum, wanting to express everything that you’re feeling at this moment. “It’s like this warmth deep inside my soul. It rushes out into every part of me, and wants me to always be with you because I don’t want to miss any breath that you take, or any blink of your eyes. I want to hear every groan of pain that you have because I want to be the one to make you feel better. It’s this rumbling fluttering feeling in my stomach that makes me feel like I’m in knots. It scares me and excites me all at the same time.”

Giving him a few nips to his neck, you move to right your head. Placing your mouth right behind the shell of his ear as you continue to whisper all the things that Bucky makes you feel. “Every time you touch me I get goose pimples, and this flood of…heat throughout every part of me. All the way to my soul, and to places I’ve never felt before. And I want you to explore those parts of me. And it’s like I’m home.”

“Hmm?” His voice is a whispered groan. You can feel his body tense under you, and you know why. He’d been starving his body of sexual gratification just to make sure that you were comfortable. He could also feel just how heated you are, right at your core. You meant more to him than a good lay, but each part of the past few minutes has his body on edge. Hyper alert of how your body is craving him as much as he craves you.

Your heated core presses into his back, making his aching cock twitch with a fervent need for your warmth. He is just about in a state of not seeing things clearly because of your pulse. The pulse that is in sync with his, and he felt it in your entire body. Throbbing harder than even he is. He’s tried to deny his animalistic needs because he felt like it was what you needed. But maybe you needed him in the same ways he needed you.

“Because my home is wherever you and our daughter are. Bucky, you can start calling me her mommy if you want to.”

“Please,” he strains out. Not even realizing himself how much he wanted Alpine to belong to both of you. Hearing you call him her daddy just felt so right, and he wanted you to feel the same way he did. That…yeah, the warmth.

“James, I love you,” he stops his walking right before you get to the complex. His body freezes as his eyes well up with tears. “I love you,” you whisper right behind his ear, and softly press a kiss before you wiggle out of his grasp.

Going to stand in front of him, your arms wrap around his waist. And you rest your chin on his chest as you stare up at him. “And I’m never going to get tired of saying that. I love you, James Buchannan Barnes.”

“I love you,” two broken people that had created a weird codependent relationship had no business falling in love. He needed you. Needed you every day and in every way. You are his best friend. The best thing that had ever happened to him, and he wanted to learn you all the more because of it. “I LOVE HER!”

Bucky throws his head back, yelling up at the sky before he looks back down at your scrunched up nose, and your eyes shining with the tears you weren’t allowing to spill over your lash line. “I love you.”

“And I want you to have all of me,” you slide out of his embrace, and pull him towards the door. “Tonight. I want us to rush into the apartment, and struggle to get each other's clothes off. But once we are completely bare in front of each other, I want our hands and lips to discover our bodies. Trace each line and curve with our fingertips. Intertwining every limb with the other until we’re too close to avoid your cock going into my cunt, and…”

His mouth crashes into yours as the two of you stumble into the building. A mad dash of hands roughly roaming over each other. Undoing buttons in the elevator until the two of you hit the door of the apartment and it’s a struggle to get in with the way you’re pulling off jackets and pulling apart shirts.

Crossing the threshold and the clothes fly at an alarming rate. Some in pieces others being tugged off at awkward angles because you need your mouth back on his. Thirsty for the taste of his mouth and you revel in it every time you get that tiny sip.

And just like you promised when you’re both naked, and pressed up against each other in a heated embrace the kissing stops, and his eyes peer so desperately into yours. He gulps, squeaking as he tries to talk. You can feel his pulse through his heavy cock that is pressing up against your stomach, “We can…we can stop whenever you want.”

“I don’t want you to stop,” you whisper as you start kissing down his chest. His hands caress your back as he watches you discover the hills and valleys on his chest. Dipping lower to kiss over every hard line that makes up his abs. Gazing up at him through your lashes. He isn’t sure if you knew how crazy you are making him feel, but he hopes you did.

No woman has ever shown him the care that you are. Making sure you kiss every scar with the most tender press of your lips. All this time he was spending hoping you were okay, he didn’t realize he wanted someone to do the same. And you had been. Not with words, but with how you took care of him. How you would jump up and run to the door with a smile just to greet him. Jumping into his arms, you would rub on his shoulders asking how his day was.

You felt real because you were. You didn’t want the amazing sex he could give you; you wanted him. His heart, body, and soul, and you had it. You had every part of him wrapped tightly around your little pinky finger, and he didn’t want it to ever unravel. He craved you like an addict to their next hit. He wanted to experience every part of life with you, including growing old.

Bucky never thought he was going to have a long life, and now he didn’t want to die before he was five hundred years old, and that still wouldn’t be enough time with you. Eternity was just the start of enough time with you.

His hands grip the underside of your ass before he picks you up. Letting your legs wrap around him as he takes the two of you to the bedroom. You are drenched and ready for him now, but you were right, he wanted his fingers and mouth to discover you first. He didn’t want this moment to end.

Sitting you on the edge of the bed, he yanks you back down the mattress when you try to scoot up the bed. Sinking to his knees, he starts at your toes, and kisses all the way up your leg. Stopping at the top of your thigh, he steals a glance at your glistening folds, kissing across your thigh before he makes his decent back down.

Moving to your right leg, he does the same motion. Finishing at your feet before he sits up a bit more. His eyes bore into yours before he leans forward, kissing over your mound. Right above the split, and you tremble. He is everywhere but where your body needs him. But you needed him more than your body.

His lips trail all over your soft pliable skin, and your fingers ghost over his arms and shoulders at the same speed. The tips of your fingers paint every inch of his flesh before he hovers over your body, and you take a haggard breath, giving your head a nod, “I can’t stand it anymore.”

”Good,” his legs move between your own, and he pushes you further apart. His digits slide down your arms, before he weaves his hands within yours, and pulls them above your head. “I can’t wait either,” slipping one hand free, he lines himself up with your entrance, “Don’t take your eyes off me,” he grunts.

”Okay,” your voice croaks out before he slowly descends inside of you. Moving at such an achingly slow pace, and making sure that your body memorizes the vein that runs over his cock. He makes sure that your velvety skin feels every inch of his head as it spears through your walls.

Biting on your lip, you are overcome with so much…just so much, but he shakes his head, “Do not withhold any sound from me, Shy. I need every part of this. If you wince, I want to know that it’s because of the stretch you feel as your body adjusts to me.”

“Okay,” he couldn’t fault you for becoming breathless, and unable to form words. He knew you’d been out of commission for a few years, and he could tell. Just like the proverbial walls around your heart, he would break, well stretch, these walls, too. He’d make sure that you learned how to take every inch of him. “Why did you stop?”

“Baby, I’m too deep.”

”No,” you want to cry. He wasn’t close enough, “I need to feel you on me. I belong to you, Bucky. Because you belong to me. I just,” Bucky slides completely home, and your words stop. Balls deep, and his weight is on every part of you. He is the most perfect feeling on you. Covered in Bucky. It’s what you wanted to be for the rest of your life.

Letting out the sweetest whimper when Bucky starts to slowly and steadily rut into you. Your body sounds vulgar with how wet you are, but your voice is the most angelic noise. Mewling, and calling out his name because nothing else mattered in the world. Only Bucky and you. The two of you had created a bubble of safety and care, and you had no desire to leave. Just wanted him. Always him.

“You’re my home,” you whisper as the constant fluttering knot in your stomach tightens. This is happening way too fast. No way is this going to last all night. You didn’t want to stop this feeling ever. “It’s…”

“It was always you,” Bucky pants out as his thrusts quicken. Normally he could last longer, but not this time. This time is overwhelming and feels too good. Nothing was better than this, and he was going to spend the rest of the weekend inside of you. Learning all the secrets to your body.

Even though you are struggling to hold on, he could feel your walls fluttering around him. Keeping your intense gaze just on him just like he asked you. “Thank you, Shy,” he coos, changing his angle he starts to drive into your warmth, and you gasp. The build up of the most beautiful high is becoming unbearable, but you weren’t finished just yet.

“Shy, let go for me, and we’ll do it again. And again. And again.”

“Promise?” your voice is hoarse as you choke down the need to come again.

“I’m never going to stop making love to you,” you let go as euphoria surges through every inch of your body. Racing through your blood, and making you all dizzy in the brain. Not even getting a chance to come back down when your walls grip around Bucky’s length so hungrily that his balls tighten and he shoots sticky warmth into the depths of your body, and you release again at the feeling of him in your belly.

”I love you,” you whimper, trying to ground yourself so you don’t lose sight of the face Bucky makes as he releases in a woman for the first time. Letting your body milk every drop of his thick cum as it blooms in your tummy like the best warmth.

“I love you, forever, Shy.”

”Forever.”

“Shy,” Bucky gives you a lingering kiss on your cheek as his left hand presses on the swell of your belly. He claims he could feel the baby better that way. His left hand is much more sensitive, and he wanted to feel the two of you growing and ‘swimming’. “Sweetheart, why don’t you ladies go whip up some lunch?”

“Of course, come on,” you grab Dove’s hand, pulling her into the kitchen. That was code for Bucky and Steve needed alone time. But his spoiled brat didn’t even want to leave him. She turns her head to look back at Steve giving you a clear view of her mark. She is completely stuck on him. Guess he finally sealed the deal.

You clear your throat, looking at her with your eyes wide, “They need a moment.”

“But…”

Ugh. You snap your fingers, and point into the kitchen, but she still looks back at Steve, “Dovey, follow Shy into the kitchen, and make me something real tasty, and we can share, okay?”

“Okay,” her body swishes back and forth, and she stands up a bit straighter, dropping your hand, and following you willingly. He tamed the brat. You were sure she still would stub up on him, and become a bit too childish for your liking, but even Bucky is watching Steve in an odd way.

“So how was it?” You ask with a smirk, as you pull out a few things from the fridge. The least you could do was talk to the girl. Maybe she wasn’t that bad.

“How was what?”

“Weren’t you a virgin?” Bashfully she looks down at the counter, finding her a seat in one of the stools. You’d have to hand her some things to chop, and hope she knew how to handle a knife. Her eyes never move back up to meet you, and you worry you made her shut down. “I’m sorry.”

“No, I just don’t even know how to begin to explain it,” you smile, sliding over a cutting board, knife and veggies. Without hesitation she starts slicing things up, and thinks? “It’s the best thing I’ve ever felt, and I can’t even begin to describe it. He loves me.”

“Steve told you that?” She shakes her head no, but her smile never fades. It’s the one thing Bucky said Steve claimed he’d never do again. Love. Of course he wouldn’t tell her, but sometimes a woman just knows.

“He pretty much told me without saying the words. We’re going to get married, and have babies like you,” sweet summer child. You and Bucky have built a relationship for years. Strangers to saviors to friends to lovers. She wouldn't understand your dynamic. “Every love story is different, but I do love mine and Steve’s.”

“Because he stalked you?”

“No,” she giggles, clearly forgetting the way that they met. “Because he had a goal, and he achieved it,” by breaking her down. “I’m not the person I was before. I feel like I have power, and a voice, and I’m desirable. I’d never felt like that before. My parents somewhat sheltered me. I don’t talk about Steve to them. They both want different things for me, and I just have spent so much time being the perfect girl for both of them. Dad wanted me to teach at a university, mom wanted me to be a pediatric nurse, so I went into early childhood education.”

“Do you have anyone you do talk to about Steve?”

She shrugs her shoulders as she bites into a carrot stick. “Just my sister. They don’t even know I talk to her. She’s my mom’s daughter, not my dad’s. She stopped trying to be perfect a long time ago,” there’s a sadness laced in her eyes as she stares at the cut veggies. “I don’t think they’d much approve.”

“Fuck ‘em,” she looks up at you with her brows furrowed, and a smile tingling to spread on her lips. You could see why Steve melted in her presence. You didn’t like seeing her sad because her smile is radiant. “How do you feel about Steve?”

“I love him,” no hesitation and with so much conviction.

“If they can’t see that you love him then why have them in your life? So what is it that your sister does?”

“Currently? Uh…changing her phone number again,” there is more to that story, and you’re not sure what.

“Their job — you’re around the business a lot. Are you using?” Her head shakes rapidly, taking a moment to look back where Steve and Bucky were, and her body goes frigid. “They’re just in the study with the door closed.”

“Steve doesn’t allow me to. He only lets me shotgun with him, or drink if he’s around. I’m a cheap drunk. And I get too flirty,” her giggle is awkward, and she avoids your eyes.

“IsYyur sister a junkie?”

“Not that bad. Steve says he doesn’t sell to her. I showed him her picture, and he told everyone while I was there not to sell to her. Told her that he would pay for her to go to rehab, and pay her phone bill so we knew where she was, and she disappeared for a while. She…she’s going to be okay. Steve will help.”

Walking over to her side of the counter, you open your arms wide. You understood addiction in people you love better than most. “Or you can just hold the baby?” With a sweet smile, she meets your hug, pulling back only to feel around your belly.

Steve shuffles in his seat as he stares at the monitors. Bucky doesn’t say anything as he watches his friend. “Shy and I like knowing where each other are in the house. She works here a lot and it’s a way for her to just see where I am.”

“I wasn’t questioning your need for cameras in your house. I’m just observing Dovey.”

“You’re looking awfully hard,” Steve straightens up only when you step away from Dove. Turning to look at his friend, but his eyes still wander over to the monitors. “So, why did you want to come here?”

“I want to apologize for what I did, but also the things I said about Shy.”

“Why?” Bucky cocks up an eyebrow at him. He’d love to have Steve graveling on his knees for the things he said about you.

“What do you mean why? I’m just apologizing and there’s no other fucking reason.”

“Don’t smoke in here,” he points a finger at his friend who started to touch his pocket. “We can walk outside, but this is a smoke free house. I’m asking why you’re apologizing because if it’s to ask me back, I’m not ready for that.”

“Why not?” Steve’s question shocks Bucky as he’s the one that turns to the monitor, pointing one of his fingers at the screens where you are. “I get it.”

“I don’t think you fully do, but you’re getting there.”

“So you’re just going to sit around and be a house husband for the rest of your life?”

“I could,” Bucky smiles, leaning back in his chair. “I could do that. Shy has had another successful book, and I made good investments. Just like you. My priority is my family now, Steve. And I can’t jeopardize her or our…you haven’t even asked me what we’re having.”

“This is a new thing for me,” he sighs. He’d been a horrible friend. Dove had told him as such. The more he talked to her, the more he realized how he had good people in his corner that wanted what was best for him. “What are you having?”

“He’s a boy. He’s all boy. Ember. Shy is insisting that Buchanan Barnes stays as well. She’s a bit of a romantic like that. I wanted a girl, but I hope he’s as in love with his mom as I am. She deserves another good man in her life. Speaking of family; I haven’t heard anything about Dove’s sister, Larkin. I still have our underground crew that stake out the trap houses,” he shakes his head, knowing it's the one thing that Steve couldn’t protect Dove from. That ugly world.

“Two weeks, Buck. That’s a long time out on the streets.”

“Look at me right now, and promise me that you haven’t done anything or sold to her,” Steve’s eyes roll up to look at Bucky. His face is somber and full of anger at the audacity in the question. “You love her,” Steve shakes his head no, confusion laced in every one of his features. The dramatic tonal shift in the conversation gives him whiplash. “I didn’t ask, you do.”

“I can’t love anymore.”

“Oh, bullshit, Steve. You can walk around acting like your heart is impenetrable because fucking Peggy left you for Rumlow, but you can’t fool me. You love her, and you need to tell her. Sam the other day was saying how different you are, and how you were already making preparations on a wedding, and future children, and where the fuck does that come from if it isn’t love?”

“Loyalty,” Bucky rolls his eyes as he looks at Steve. “It’s close enough to love, and it’s all that she’s going to get.”

“You’re a fucking dumbass, you know that? You have got Dove sitting on your cock asleep while people who can switch on you any minute see it. Yeah, information gets out, and it’s not just fucking Sam telling me this shit, Steve. You’re in love and you’ve gotten goddamn sloppy because of it. You show her the same fucking love that you gave Peggy, or you let her go. This life already consumed her sister, is that how you want to see Dove? Strung out? Selling her body for a hit, and too ashamed to seek help somewhere? You give her the same life you would have given Peggy. You tell her what she means to you, and you keep her away from that fucking life. Since when did you get so stupid?”

Steve sits in silence, letting his friend berate him. The only person besides Dove that can talk to Steve like this, and get away with it. “You got stupid when you let that little brat into your heart. You smile now. You’re looking for her fucking sister on the regular so Dove knows she’s okay. You have her lips burned into your skin just like she’s burned herself into your heart. Eventually if you don’t let the fire die down Steve, it burns away.”

“And only ashes and embers remain,” he smiles at his friend, almost laughing at the name Bucky and you chose for your son. Ember. The last remnants of a fire. The tiniest bit of spark that burns bright amongst the ashes. The light in the darknes.

“Do you want to lose Dove?”

“No,” his voice is ragged as his eyes move back to the monitor. Watching as her hands slide over your belly. Dove on her knees, whispering something to your son that Steve couldn’t hear, but he is addicted to seeing her so soft. Longing for the day where she was you.

“Steve, you’re going to. Whether it’s because you’re too fucking stubborn, or because of your stupidity. Do right by her when she’s with you, or let her go. She deserves someone who can give her this. When is enough, enough? Why are you still in this game? We’re getting too old, this is a young man’s game. You have more money than you could have ever possibly need.”

When was enough, enough?

“Steve, I love you, brother,” Steve meets Bucky’s eyes, and Bucky knows there’s still a human still left in his cold soul. “You see how easy that is? And I love you enough to tell you, I can’t go back into that life. I won’t leave my wife and son behind because of jail or death. Let’s go eat.”

When is enough, enough?

Next

Masterlist

Taglist: @tis-thedamn-season @marveloustaylortot @pono-pura-vida @peaches1958 @seitmai @smile1318 @andydrysdalerogers @cjand10 @midnightramyeoncravings @kmc1989 @annaallicce @feyfantome @jesevans @tittittoee @bananapiedreams @onclouds999 @darkserenity24 @abbatoirablaze @ashychangeling @identity2212 @mrsevans90 @weirdothatwritess @floralwsloki @thestralwriting @ambearsstuff @lyndys @kandis-mom @hoodiesandicedcoffee @awhoreformoree @nyxbellabarnes @buckybarnesisdaddy @theinheriteddutchess @honeyhoneylovelylove

[yuikomorii]

// Ok I didn’t want to go this far but at this point, you guys are hating on Ayato just for clout and it shows. It’s okay not to like a character but straight up spreading misinformation about him is not okay. If you lack reading comprehension, just admit it.

What makes Ayato’s past so sad isn’t only the fact that Cordelia was mean towards him. She mentally and physically abused him, yet what genuinely hurt Ayato the most was the way Cordelia treated ALL the triplets. A part of him didn’t even want to kill her, given that he CRIED in the MB flashbacks because, despite being a huge abuser, he STILL felt sympathy even for someone like her. No matter how horrible Cordelia was, Ayato still wished for Karlheinz to reciprocate her feelings only to finally see her happy.

Don't even get me started on the Adam curse. He was practically used as bait and abandoned to death by his own brothers, but he still hoped for their safety after escaping. That curse literally destroyed his entire life because its purpose was to make the person who ate the fig drown in despair and go insane. That's why he was sooo obsessed with Yui's blood. Heck, he's cursed in routes other than his own, as he goes insane in Ruki's MB one, to the point that his brothers had to lock him inside the dungeon. In addition, in his MB Vampire Ending, he falls into a coma because he refuses to hurt Yui and keep drinking her blood.

Other than that, Laito was the one who made him believe that he wasn’t special, hence he adopted the “I will never make someone special again” mentality. He also wanted to kill him when he was younger (no hate towards any of his brothers though). Kanato was the only one who never did something bad to him, considering that when Ayato was a child, Reiji called him the disappointment of the family after failing a test.

Ayato did twisted stuff too; no character is a saint, but he always tries his best to fix things. Even when not dating Yui, he’s capable of showing compassion, support and a desire to improve his relationship with his brothers BY HIMSELF. Check this analysis for example.

Other than that, despite every time being hurt when trying to show kindness, he still became a very selfless guy who’d sacrifice himself for anyone at any given time. What makes this even more admirable is that according to Karlheinz, he’s literally the only one who actually VALUES his life. This guy who loves life would risk it all for Yui, even when not dating, or for any of his brothers.

Credit to: dialovers-translations and tournesolia on Tumblr

On top of that, he's incredibly empathic?? He forgives everybody, no matter what they do to him, and seeks to maintain good relations with them. In Kino's LE route, for example, he tortures and burns Ayato, but Ayato is the first person to recognize him as his brother because he wanted Kino to feel that he, too, belonged to a family.

Last but not least, nobody silences Karlheinz as good as him. He was also the only one who connected the dots by himself about his dad being the root of all evil (Laito too but that was after the letter), including being the only one who didn’t want to kill him only because he didn’t want to fall into his plan. Check this post.

Oh and, Ayato is actually really big; it’s not that only his fans make him that way! This post basically proves that he’s the IT boy of otome games and I should also mention that he’s the character that sells the most in Japan and China! Just look what Japanese fans think of him. ;)

You can dislike him as much as you want but nobody can deny how brave and pure-hearted he is. He’s the definition of from zero to hero.

As I mentioned earlier, it's fine to dislike him, but don't become obsessed with it, lol. At the end of the day, he's merely a fictional character with endearing characteristics and the male lead. It's really not that deep. Besides, it's embarrassing when the hate comes from Yui stans because she definitely wouldn't be happy of any of you talking about her man in that way.

[screamingatanemptyroom]

Screaming at an Empty Room -

Reintroduction/Update

Hello everyone! Probably too late to do an intro, given that I've been writing on this blog since 2017, but since I've returned after a few years away from writing, I wanted the opportunity to talk about my blog and projects completed and my upcoming plans!

I go by Avaleon everywhere else on the internet, but respond to pretty much anything, including Screaming, hey you, etc! Started this blog in my mid 20s, and aged normally into the early 30s from there. I love writing, have always loved it, but between work and life, it's definitely something that I mostly do late at night and on weekends. I love hearing from people, but I usually answer asks in bunches, and typically right before I post writing. Love hearing about other people's projects as well!

I write short stories, novellas, and occasional full length novels. I am not published, but actively working on self-publishing some of my full length works. Everything I write is posted online, I enjoy sharing my work. The main reason to self publish for me is to have physical copies for myself or anyone who might want one!

My short stories can be found under the #writing tag on my blog. As for the long completed stories, I'll post them below the cut!

Love you Tumblr, happy to be back!

A. Full Length Novels (100,000+ words)

Please Fix the Story!

Description:

I don’t know who I am. I don’t know why I’m trapped in this never ending cycle of rebirth. All I know is that I wake up inside the worlds of unfinished stories, with a mission to accomplish the author’s wishes and stabilize the worlds now headed for destruction. I do my best, hoping, praying that maybe if I complete enough missions, I’ll be able to remember my past and return to my home.

It’s just fixing stories, it should be simple enough.

So can someone explain who this random villain is who keeps following me to each world?

Masterpost linked here

2. I Can’t Eat Love

Description:

Lenora did not have a wonderful life. After her engagement to Prince Ronan is broken, she loses everything… her reputation, her home and her family. Starving on the streets, she dies angry and bitter at how her life unfolded… only to wake up in her old bed, fifteen again, five years before her death. 

Now she must struggle to change her fate, and the fate of the around her. This time she won’t trust in something as flimsy or changeable as love. No, this time she’ll have the power and the money she needs to protect herself. 

Lenora has already lost everything once. She’s not going to lose again. 

No matter the cost. 

Masterpost Linked Here

B. Novellas

I Refuse to be a Named Character

Description:

I woke up inside the world of one of the best selling fantasy book series “Deadly Crown.” Intrigue, handsome heroes, adventure… sounds great, right? Just one problem: all the named characters except the main hero and villain die, are replaced and their replacements die. Being important in this story is a death sentence, so I plan to move to the middle of nowhere, and avoid the plot! 

It should be a fool proof plan, so why do the main characters keep dragging me into the story?

Masterpost Linked Here

2. Living in a Rewrite of my Own Book World

Description:

This is the story about an author who gets hit by a car right before she can finish her bestselling book series. Trapped in the role of a terrible side character antagonist, she must find a way to change the story’s ending. Not just for her own survival, but for the characters that seem just a little too real to be fiction. (30K words)

Masterpost Linked Here

3.Baby’s First Revenge!

Description:

When Charlotte is betrayed and killed by the friend she sacrificed everything for, she thought it was the end. Instead, she found herself reborn as a baby, with her killer still enjoying the fame of stealing her work. Now, she's coming after him, and plans to make him pay... But first, nap time.

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 / Part 5 / Part 6 / Part 7

4. The Supervillain’s Daughter

The story of Erica, a girl who finds out that her brother is the kidnapped child of superheroes, and that her parents are villains. Years later she is the best agent in the Villain Suppression Unit, and hates everything to do with superheroes. So of course she isn’t pleased when she is paired with the strongest man alive, especially because she knows him. But with even darker parts of her past surfacing again, she will have no choice but to join forces and save the world. 

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

Other smaller works and the incomplete ones can be found on this page

Thanks everyone!

[jeanbie]

WORDLESS #1 ★ masterlist.

pairing: levi x reader

genre: sugar daddy & contract killer au | warnings: mentions of blood and violence, unconventional relationship, angsty themes, smoking mention, mature rating, potentially ooc levi | wc: 4.2k

note: there will be overall 5 parts to this series. see end for more notes ^^ could be a little bit ooc but it's all fiction anyway so lets use our imaginations :P btw i dont speak french so sorry to my french readers

★ ch1. ch2. ch3. ch4. ch5

⏤ Sometimes, saying “I love you” is inappropriate, and given your circumstances, you think it might send Levi over the edge if he hears them again.

Now, it definitely was not a stretch to assume that everything in Levi’s life was indeed unconventional. People didn’t need to understand that what Levi did for work was something that, by the law, was considered unprofessional and inhumane, and so when asked, Levi sufficed for “clean-up work”, and questions weren’t asked. If they were, Levi came up with a slightly more conventional lie, to make up for the reality that was Levi working on the clock, killing nobodies for a bit of cash.

Erwin, his right-hand man, had expressed how unconventional Levi seemed to be over a dinner in Venice, a little restaurant tucked away unconventionally in a street that did not belong to America. Levi spoke four languages comfortably, and had parents retiring in the Canary Islands. Levi donated money to women’s charities and mental health services, and helped bribe his cousins into Ivy Leagues. Levi was a Joe-Exotic in the making and owned a rescue black panther named Elio, and had houses across the globe for use when working.

And, Levi was dipping his toes into playing house with a sugar baby who was only five years younger than him, of whom he had met in a stakeout which involved the hit being on your brother’s head.

Unconventionally, you led him to his target, and afterwards, dined with him in a Thai restaurant.

Things in Levi’s life were far from ordinary, but perhaps it was the denial of mundane comforts that kept Levi going. If he went back to normality, to working a shitty customer service job like when he was seventeen, dumping trash into overflowing piles behind the off-license he worked at, things wouldn’t be the same. Levi would feel alien, like he didn’t belong.

At least here, amongst the pain and the bullets and the years worth of trauma packed in his wrinkles (which, yes, if he looks hard enough, he can see some cursing his twenty eight year old skin), Levi felt like he sort of belonged. In an unconventional way.

Having met Levi during his line of work, there were difficulties in being Levi’s sugar baby. For one, he always felt guilty for having murdered your brother, even though you heavily supported the hit. Your brother was a jerk, a bully with money, someone who had wronged your entire family, turned off your younger sister’s life support when there was a chance of her survival.

Asshole, he deserved it.

Secondly, Levi was impractical and irrational and often acted selfishly, meaning he was often out of the country on work, only available in whispers for a few hours and then he was gone, compensating with a few sums of cash.

He tried his best. Levi, despite technicalities including his work and his past and his occasional mean streak, genuinely cared about other people. When he could, he made the effort, otherwise not attempting to make promises to you that he could not keep.

Levi knows that he got really lucky when he found you. You didn’t ask questions. Nobody was better for him.

However, Levi was selfish, and broken, and in refusal of fixing what was wrong with him. When it was of convenience, Levi drew comparisons to the last girlfriend he tried to entertain. One who wronged him, and died when he tried to repair everything she had destroyed.

Levi carries that with him like the tattoos on his skin, a permanent memory, and something that often disturbs what could be and should be between the both of you.

Levi is worthy of love, and capable of loving. On days where Levi is free to lounge without the guilt of not working, you find it is so easy to love him. But, it can’t be that way. You couldn’t just tell him that.

Telling him that you loved him would be inappropriately unconventional.

Sometimes, saying “I love you” is inappropriate, and given your circumstances, you think it might send Levi over the edge if he hears it again.

(1) Holding their hands when they are shaking.

Levi is in his living room, his right leg bouncing like a spring as he cradles an infant glass of whiskey. His eyes are glazed, yet wide, staring at the Seoul city draped in darkness and neon, and without even looking inside, you know that his brain is spinning, thoughts chaotic and loud.

“Hey,” you call out to him, and his eyes stutter to the left to catch you in the doorway, “I heard you get up. What’s wrong?”

Levi shakes his head gently. “Nothing, baby, go back to bed. I’ll be up in a minute.”

Levi often makes comments without expectancies. You stand in the doorway that connects the living room to the long hall that stems into bedrooms and bathrooms, and watch him for a moment. His whole body vibrates like a speaker, his hands trembling as the glass drains and he reaches for a second, or a third, or maybe a tenth.

You want to sigh, without being patronising, but you know that any sign of sympathy is mistaken for that whenever Levi is around to make the judgement.

He looks back to the skyline and frowns, his attention panning from the window to his phone that buzzes blue, but he ignores. Stepping across the cool wooden floorboards, you approach him sleepily and take a seat next to him on the sofa.

Neither of you move, but he recognises you’ve moved. He bristles slightly, like it was unexpected.

“You can take your time,” you suggest to him, and his hands ache in his lap as he sets the glass down on the coffee table with a careless thud. He scoffs, devoid of emotion, and dips his head so his chin is near his collarbones. In his lap, those hands shake. “Maybe don’t drink so much tonight.”

“I’m clearing my head,” he insists weakly. Those hands still shake.

Brows creased with a pinch, you swallow the unease and reach for his hands. Levi doesn’t say anything as you do so, enveloping his hands in yours, and so suddenly the shaking ceases. Like trying to block the shakes from reaching his wrists, your hands keep his safe.

“I know,” you understand honestly, because you do know what he’s going through. “How about tea, or something? To calm down, calm down the mess that’s up in there.”

Your chin is on his shoulder, and he smiles softly. “Are you calling me messy?”

“Nah, I’m calling your brain messy,” you reply. “It’s a cruel fucking brain.”

“Hate my brain.”

“Today, we hate it.”

Levi’s head turns slightly so that he can see you, and in his lap, his thumbs brush across your skin.

“Thank you,” Levi says quietly, attempting a smile that doesn’t quite convince. It doesn’t necessarily have to, not tonight anyway. His phone continues to flash like a light show, Erwin’s name in bold. “Fuck. I’ll take the call, and then I’ll come back to bed, okay?”

You nod, “Mm, okay. Want me to make a drink?”

“I don’t need it,” Levi concludes. “Not today.”

(2) Tucking the sheets around them when they stir during the night.

Sometimes Levi wakes up in the night due to nightmares, but tonight, it’s different.

Beside him, you stir uncomfortably and kick his leg for the fourth time. He huffs and looks over, trying to figure out if you’re awake and indignant, or lost in the dream. He settles on the latter when you strain out the name of your brother and his heart swoops with a dull ache.

“You’re just dreaming, baby, come on,” Levi mutters quietly into your ear, holding you in place to calm the thrashing. “He’s not here anymore, I’m here. Y/N.”

It subsides after a few minutes, making it the longest you’ve gone on record. He looks into your sleepy, upset eyes as you break awake and brushes the hair out of your face. He tries to smile for you, and maybe you can’t see in the dark.

“I’ll get you some water,” Levi suggests gently. “Hm? Sweet thing. It’s just a dream.” He says this into your hair in a hug, leaving a kiss on your temple as he breaks. “You’re fine.”

“I’m fine,” you breathe uneasily, and he separates to get a glass of water and returns to find you sleeping again. What relief Levi might have is exhaled as he sets the glass on the bedside table, stroking your hair until he moves away with the sudden realisation that this is not a normal exchange.

Before Levi decides to leave again, he makes sure the bed is made and that you are safe; he tucks the duvet in tightly and presses a kiss to your forehead before grabbing his coat by the front door and leaving your apartment, one tucked in the city so far that Levi finds it a hassle to visit.

(3) Travelling long distances just to see them.

For three days now, you have been in Colmar, and Levi is beginning to feel lonely. It had been his idea to send you away, when the heat on his long, long feud with a rival colleague threatened your safety. In return, you got a new apartment that Erwin had found closer to Levi’s own when your address got leaked, and Colmar could be considered a vacation if you pretended for long enough.

With tensions cool and the coast somewhat clear, Levi picks the skin around his fingernails as a distraction before deciding that enough was enough. He missed you, and missed how you were always around for him when he needed you most. This is what drives him to jumping on a plane in his company’s name, and flying to France.

A small boat passes underneath the bridge you are standing on, and your hands dig into the barrier as you arch to smile at the tourists beneath. One catches a glimpse of your denim skirt and cherry print blouse in the sunshine and extends his hat with a wave, and you wave back.

France is nothing like Seoul, and is indeed warm and fruitful and unique. The sun is hot, the sky is clear, and the streets are filled with an atmospheric buzz of friendliness, the smell of coffee and some food you don’t know yet entrapping your senses.

“Madame, je peux vous prendre en photo?”

Hearing the voice, you turn your body left and prepare to face the tourist, but instead you are welcomed with the sight of Levi dressed in black, sunglasses sliding down his nose with a smile. He does hold a camera in his hands, although teasingly.

“Oui,” you quip, posing cutely and Levi takes a photograph anyway, to humour the moment, to print when he gets back to Seoul. You join his laughter as he peers at the photograph and he walks without looking up towards you.

“When did you get here?” you ask him, a round of laughter from the little boat making you turn to stare at them with a giggle.

“Bout an hour ago,” Levi replies, and he shuts off the camera and puts it in his coat pocket. It’s only a small camera, probably cost him a crumb to buy from a vintage store. He meets your eyes with a comfortable smile and rounds in, pressing your lower back against the bridge barrier and circling your arms around you.

Carefully, then, he kisses you, tasting the suncream on your skin as his lips wander from yours to the skin around your face.

“Miss me?”

“Terribly,” Levi responds. “I am so bored when you’re not around. You always have something to do, always have something to say.”

You hum in response. “I’m glad I’m of some entertainment for you.”

“Oh, for sure,” agrees Levi. “I don’t think I’ve used my brain so often when I’m away from work as much as I do when I’m with you. Did you know that you’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met?”

“Wow,” you exclaim with a smile. “Hire me.”

“Ha!” he remarks, kissing you again and taking your hand in his. He moves, back in the way you came. “Over my dead body.”

(4) Making their favourite meal when they are having a hard day.

“You.”

“Not now, Y/N, I’m working,” Levi replies non committedly. He fists his hair.

“Not up for discussion right now,” you huff, and he has the nerve to glare at you which only makes you uncomfortably angry. “You haven’t eaten in fourty eight hours, and I’m not about to be held responsible for your death when you die of hunger, so get your ass in the kitchen before I dump this food over your stupid head.”

He challenges you. “You’re brave talking to somebody who could destroy your life like that.”

“Do it, I literally have nothing to lose,” you answer. “Please eat something. I made it with love and care.”

Levi relents, sighing at his paperwork but nonetheless moving away from his home office and following you like a child towards the direction of the kitchen. He feels bad, you know he feels bad, and he circles his arms around your body as you walk, stumbling into the space of the kitchen and smelling the familiar aroma of pork rice stew.

Alas, he sees the bowl steaming in his spot at the table and his eyes follow you as you hum and set start to washing the dishes.

“Y/N-”

“No words, just eating,” you instruct. “Bone apple teet.”

He takes a seat. “You know that’s not the phrase, right?”

“Tell that to the Internet,” you sigh.

(5) Giving them a kiss before going to work and they are still in bed.

Levi prefers to see you when he doesn’t have work the next day, because leaving when you’re asleep is an asshole move in any dictionary.

So, when one of his men phones him at four in the morning and relays the horror that someone’s died on his property, Levi has to fight the demons that almost convince him to hand the job over to somebody who gives a fuck about the intruder stuck on his barbed fence.

He gets up, anyway.

Next to him, in the bed that belongs to you because this is your new apartment, Levi stares down at you and feels a tug in his stomach. Guilt, it follows him everywhere like a ghost.

Before he leaves, he likes to give you a little kiss for the morning, so the tingling sensation reminds you that despite being an asshole and leaving without properly saying goodbye, he still gives several shits about you, and will be back when he can be.

(6) Tucking your head into their neck during a hug.

Levi wants to hang Erwin for making him remember the reasons why you had to move across the city to a new apartment.

It had, of course, been Levi’s fault, and when the notification came from an exhausted worker in his line of work that the alarm system in your apartment had been triggered for an intruder, Levi remembers all he saw was red.

The front door was forced open, a body indent in the wood and the front porch ransacked and littered with shards of glass and bullets. Inside was no prettier, with mess scattered everywhere and photos smashed on the floors. The carpets were stained with red that Levi prayed was just wine, the glass coffee table in two pieces and a knife covered in red on the floor.

Levi and his men, along with the few police officers Levi could actually trust in this god-forsaken hellhole, noticed that the blood belonged to one of the intruders who lay dead on the stairs.

Nobody knows how Levi got through the apartment so fast, and why, without any hesitation, he murdered the remaining intruders without suggesting questioning and torture. That was his go-to when it rarely concerned you.

He wanted those stupid enough to even try and go after you to really fucking regret it as he picked off fingernails and made them suffer for hours or days. This time he just killed, and moved onwards, calling your name like a mantra.

Levi could have cried when you emerged, petrified, from inside one of the closets. Upon seeing you, Levi collapsed his gun on the floor and stepped towards you protectively, pulling you in tightly for a hug.

Sobbing into his neck, you hugged him tighter, feeling finally safe when his hand held the back of your head, like you were a precious thing that was of value.

You were of the highest value to Levi.

“Fuck you,” Levi barks suddenly, and Erwin shrugs and exits the office.

All he had asked was if he loved you.

(7) Lightly kissing on top of a freshly formed bruise.

There might be the assumption that Levi comes home with more bruises than you do. Which is true, technically, and there’s no hesitation from your end in nursing them to a comfortable recovery.

On rare occasion, Levi comes home and finds you exhibiting a new purple blob on your skin. Like today. 

Levi hasn’t seen you in two days, and when he lets himself into your apartment with the key he has glued to him at all times, he follows the silence and light to the bathroom. You sit on the edge of your bathtub, gently rubbing cream on your knee in little circles.

“What happened here?” he asks quickly, and you continue rubbing with your tongue poking out between your lips.

“You’ll laugh, don’t ask,” you mutter.

“Hey, I won’t laugh,” Levi says. He rests his weight against the doorframe, “You open the front door the wrong way again?”

Ha! You laugh humourlessly. “Worse!” You look up at him sadly, “I tripped in the parking lot carrying my groceries. It’s on camera and everything, I want to die.”

Levi pokes the inside of his mouth to resist laughing. “Well, fuck. That’s your leg ruined.”

“I know,” you pout. “Good thing you’re my sugar daddy- wanna pay for cosmetic leg surgery?”

“I like your bruised up legs,” says Levi.

“Me too, but not these ones.”

“Jesus, that’s enough cream on your skin,” Levi exclaims, moving forward to snatch the cream from your hands. “More is not better. Come on, you’re okay.”

“It hurts.”

“Boohoo,” he sighs. You don’t move. “Ugh, whatever. Come’re.”

Levi drops the cream tube onto the sink but it clatters into the bowl. He’ll move it later if he remembers to, and he pretends it’s hard to pick you up off the bathtub and carries you swiftly out of the bathroom and into the living room.

Things have barely moved since he last came to visit; the swarms of paper still invade your coffee table and your laptop is on sleep mode by a half-empty coffee cup filled with hot chocolate, because he knows your standing on coffee.

Everything is a lot messier now that you’ve decided you want to go back to school, but at least Levi knows it keeps you busy when he’s away.

“Oh,” he says suddenly, as you’re sat down with one leg up around him still. He pokes at a spot on your leg and you squirm, “there’s another one.”

You peer to look, “Oh, yeah, that one’s you.”

“Oh.” He pauses, “Pretty, though.”

You huff like a little baby and he dares you with raised eyebrows. That keeps you silent and Levi moves his body at an angle to the right, sweeping to kiss the bruise better, the bruise that he made a few nights ago with tender love and care.

“All better,” he assures.

“It feels better already.”

“Mm. Magic.”

(8) Buying them something unrequested because it made you think of them.

“So, I was at a school fayre today.”

“Really?” Levi sits with his laptop on his legs, and your legs are tangled around his body like some sort of jungle maze. He rarely works on his bed, not unless the work is sudden and he can’t help it. You’ve just come in, dived on the bed and claimed his waist as something to squeeze your legs around.

“Yep. Like, one of those little craft things where students sell their shit and make money from it. You know, supporting local artists! It’s really cute, if I was good at something I’d have participated.”

Levi thinks of things you’re good at, and there’s a lot. “Aw. There’s always next year.”

“Yeah,” you reason. “Anyway- point is, is that I got you something.”

Levi stills for a second, glancing over his right shoulder to see you, “Me?”

“Yep. You.”

“What did you get?” he asks, and then he’s back to checking blueprints.

You untangle your legs and slide off the bed, retreating to your bag slung across the room by the bedroom door. From here, you take out a small little pin-badge and when you’re sat next to Levi again, you fiddle with it until it catches his attention.

“What’s this?” asks Levi.

“It’s a badge of honour,” you claim, and you slip it into his palms. He fingers the front when he examines it, reading the little words of “Number One Dad” and he stares up at you. “Like it?”

“It’s for me?” he asks again.

“Yeah. You can wear it and like, I don’t know, think of me,” you shrug.

Levi thinks for a moment. Even though it’s stupid, and cliche and a little bit embarrassing, he still thinks it’s funny and thoughtful.

“Want me to wear it to work?” he asks you.

“Oh, absolutely,” you encourage. “I’ll get your friend Erwin an uncle badge if he wants one. He's a nice guy.”

“Hey, you’re mine and he’s not allowed a relationship to you, no matter what definition,” Levi mutters. “He wants a sugar niece, well…he’ll have to look somewhere else.”

You gape. “Wow. Who thought you had it in you to be so possessive.”

“Please, with a pussy like that of course I’m possessive,” he teases. He’s joking.

“My power,” you sigh anyway, and jump off the bed claiming that you’re hungry. Levi looks at the badge again and pops it in his breast pocket before he loses it and regrets it.

(9) Participating in their hobby even if it doesn’t personally interest you.

Levi’s bored out of his brain.

He has no idea how you can be so fascinated by this stupid game where you’re essentially in debt, but he still sits and watches you tour him around this weird island that is inhabited by ducks and an ugly gorilla villager dressed in pink. And to think that he had a part to play in all of this, because his bank account definitely helped pay for this Nintendo Switch and game.

“Do you like my beach?” you ask him. It’s literally just sand and one coconut tree, and a few shells by the water. Oh, there’s a beach chair on there too, but it makes little difference. “I’m poor, I can’t afford furniture yet.”

“Can’t you just make it?”

“I can, but I’m sick of making axes to collect wood,” you explain with a grudge against the fact that tools now break in this Animal Crossing game. Levi hums like he’s invested, and he tries to be, because he cares about you too much to unintentionally hurt your feelings by displaying his crippling disinterest.

“Oh. Makes sense.”

“Can I show you my hybrid flower garden?”

He sighs. “Yeah, you wanted to show me all of your island, right?”

You nod enthusiastically. “Once you’ve had a tour, I can make you a profile and you can play too. You can live next door to me!”

“Why can’t we share a house?” Levi presses.

“Because I don’t think it works like that, babe,” you confess. “Anyway. Here’s my garden.”

(10) Sitting in comfortable silence while eating a meal.

He’s tired. You’re tired.

The radio plays quietly updating Seoul on the fires that spread across the city today, and Levi smells like smoke and salt. He keeps his head down as he eats his meal, something he brought home with him to make up for the fact that he’s been absent for almost a week now.

You have so many things to say and he has so many things he needs to say to make up for everything, but nothing is said tonight.

You know he’s having a hard time, because Levi’s been smoking again. He smoked on the balcony earlier, and once again in the bedroom. There are now ashtrays around your own apartment, and you don’t even smoke. Levi takes a drink of bourbon and swallows it dry.

You look up at him from across the table, not wanting to press the issue when you know it’ll end in an argument, and then sex to make up for it. You’re both too tired to fuck today, too tired to speak. Just being in each other’s company is enough for tonight.

The only words he says are goodnight and something you don’t catch as you’re drifting off to sleep. Levi’s awake all night, the fires burn until early hours, and the smoke smell is still there in the morning even when he isn’t.

[ellrond]

What do you think about elves only falling in love (being able to) once over their whole entire lives? I thought that was canon but now I’m like 🧍‍♀️ maybe not 😭

LaCE discourse ahead, proceed with caution!!!

Laws and Customs of the Eldar, an essay in Morgoth's Ring (the 12th book of The History of Middle Earth) gives us the most information about marriage between the Eldar (which does NOT include the Silvan*) and that information is lacking at best. All it tells us about elves falling in love is that they marry only once in their lives and that for the most part, marriage is entered out of love rather than duty. "It was the act of bodily union [sex] that achieved marriage" is what Tolkien tells us.

However, it's always important, even in fiction, to consider the source information comes from - it's talking about the laws and customs, rather than the inherent nature of the Eldar. Given Tolkien's Catholic background, it can solidly be interpreted that the Eldar believed sex was an act between two married people, and so if two unmarried people had sex, that meant they were married. Remember, laws and customs can be broken.

I bring sex into it because much of the passage about Eldar marriage alludes to it. Of course, that then raises the issue of marriage without sex not truly being marriage, but that's not the case at all. Then there's also the question of what do the Eldar define as sex? The conservative answer is pretty well known, but we here at ellrond.tumblr.gov know better than that.

This small passage's reliability is somewhat undermined by the existence of Finwe's second marriage. He entered into his marriage with Indis (mother of Fingolfin and Finarfin) out of love and desire to have more children. He deeply loved both of his wives (he stayed by Miriel's side while she walked the line between life and death, and then had thousands of happy years with Indis) which indicates that yes, the Eldar can be in love more than once. The counter-argument could be that Finwe was a special case because it was known that Miriel would never take physical form again, and the hostility that Feanor had for Indis and her children ultimately led to the darkening of Valinor, the Doom of Feanor, the kinslayings, the rebellions, and the War of Wrath (to name but a few events). Perhaps it was seeing the fallout of an elf remarrying that led to the Eldar saying that they could not marry more than once?

In Tolkien's world, love usually leads to marriage as far as we know because he was the product of his time and environment. Even in the early-mid 20th century, he was socially conservative and his portrayal of love and sex, and marriage reflects this. However, there is enough wiggle room within his texts for readers to interpret them liberally. Personally, I believe that the Eldar could fall in love more than once, that they could have sex without being married, that they could be married without having sex, and whatever else. To me, it seems reductive and almost lazy to say otherwise, it is refusing to acknowledge some complexities that the Eldar would be capable of, as seen in other aspects of their long lives.

TLDR: if you want elves to fall in love more than once, there's strong enough arguments to support that idea to be found within canon, go wild!!!!

If you'd like to read LaCE yourself, you can find it here! There's lots of cool info on marriage, on elf kids, death, those affected by the Doom, healers vs warriors etc!

*Silvan elves (like Tauriel, Arondir, and Haldir) aren't bound by these laws and customs.

[todayisafridaynight]

Of course! I'm glad my Unmitigated Braindumping has given you more opportunities to talk about them at length I never know where to start myself, so I'm very thankful for the jumping-off point that first post provided (and that many of your posts provide!) This has been a wonderful experience. (Also, uh, since these "bookends" work for more personal stuff--I am No Longer Sick and I'm happy to hear you seem to be doing a bit better!)

Reading it over, I figure the event transcript itself is okay to share, so here it is on my test wiki! It's, well, it's about the same length as this ask will probably end up, and it's a "sequel" to his first event. A thing I really like about Mine's RGGO content is that It's All Connected; the narratives continue to build upon each other to this day. That's not the case for almost any other character.

And totally! With Mine in specific, I feel there's enough reductiveness on "both sides" regarding his sexuality and regarding Daigo that trying to put forward any particular stance would be detrimental on top of the reasons we've discussed. It's probably a bit weird to say this about a fictional character, but Mine's a whole person independent of the men in his life, y'know?

I actually fell for the red herring with Katase myself until the Kanda scene we talk about below haha, so I guess that's fair enough on your friend's part. Definitely the case that the ending makes it clear that's not how it is, though.

Mine's interactions with women are always fascinating to me, especially in contrast to Kanda as you mentioned, but also in contrast to the main series protagonists. Just the way he immediately drops everything to help the woman Kanda attempts to assault when he and Kanda first meet almost on instinct says a lot to me when almost every protagonist occasionally acts like it's an inconvenience to Them to intervene.

I'd say a lot of it comes from growth on the writers' parts in terms of understanding that, hey, being totally complacent in Kanda's actions is scummy. So I appreciate that Mine is by far the one who does the most to minimize Kanda's harm (up to and including having him killed, of course, but also getting him arrested in that event as well as physically stopping him--and apparently dozens of others, since every woman who picks him up in that event is apparently a woman he saved lmao.)

I feel like Mine, when mentally stable, has this almost "chivalrous" quality to him. I'm kind of reminded of Hijikata as well in that they both insist on calling every younger woman they meet "miss"; it's a little old-fashioned, perhaps condescending, but still kind of cute (biased though lol, the ratios on those three things may vary.) There's a lot I want to talk about on this topic with regard to Hijikata, the historical account, and other "definitive" Shinsengumi media, but I'll probably save that for another ask.

But on Mine and relationships, there's so much to unpack there! The old joke is absolutely applicable. And because he was talking about how he's "never 'picked anyone up' in his life" in that event, agreeing to all these "dates" but never enthusiastically (I think the one and only time he didn't seem actively unhappy was in the finale to the accompanying card's character story), I do wonder to what degree his passivity would play a role in other romantic encounters. Agreeing to whatever those women wanted whether he really wanted it himself.

Rewinding to Katase a bit, while that was obviously not romantic, I think the interaction in the finale could perhaps provide insight as to a problem he may face in romantic relationships. Which is his refusal (or inability) to be emotionally honest while sort of expecting the other party to be perfectly attuned to his emotions.

Because like, I don't think Katase /didn't/ care about him whatsoever, I think she just took his "I'm fine"(s) at face-value and took a "business as usual" approach without realizing how much that would upset him in his current state. I would be mortified in her position if I called up my boss on an urgent matter and he said he was "fine" and then just completely stopped responding before hanging up lol, especially upon learning he committed suicide shortly thereafter.

But that interaction is (or appears to be) something he emotionally experienced as a "betrayal" despite being totally unintentional, so I have to wonder how much of a pattern it is in his life; he's been concealing his real problems and saying he was """fine""" since he was a kid, after all. I obviously can't say anything conclusive, but it "feels like" there's something there with the way he sort of lumped in the women he's been with with his coworkers when talking about how "they'll all abandon ship sooner or later" or whatever.

Like, I don't doubt that some (or perhaps many) women would like him for shallow reasons, but all of them…? Hm. Not Sure. That said, there's definitely an argument to be made he was seeing hostesses and sex workers (seeing him talk to a hostess is one of my top 10 reasons for wanting him to be a protagonist at some point tbh), but I guess there's also an argument to made that those types of relationships are overtly "fake" and "paid-for" and so wouldn't appeal to him? I wish we actually got to see some of that when Kanda took him to cabaret clubs.

And hey, you're totally right about Aoki's secretary! That was something that stood out to me as well. Her screen-time is roughly comparable to Katase iirc, so it's puzzling. Jo's leftover files really are such an enigma, because everyone's got unused voice lines and stuff (and they're still interesting to listen through for "another dimension" to the characters you don't get to see in-game), but there's so much that's Unique to him. I can only hope some of those ideas are explored elsewhere.

Kanda's insult is a lot of fun to examine for the exact reasons you mentioned, because on the surface and in a literal sense, the translation is "off the mark"--but is it? I'm not sure how much crossover there is between cultures in this regard, but I know when I came out as bisexual to my family, there were a lot of accusations thrown around that I'd become "too Westernized." It's definitely something I'd like to ask native speakers about if I can get over the embarrassment; perhaps if that's no help, one of my books or papers on LGBT issues in Japan might have an answer.

I'm definitely under the impression that both localization teams understood Mine wasn't straight. I might be a little bit biased with regard to the original, since, like I said, that was actually the scene I began to "suspect" Mine was gay lmao. But there was an effort to maintain accuracy in the finale even if the wording is superseded by Y3R's intensity. In that respect I kind of wonder about the reason for the change, because it addresses the homophobia but not the inaccuracy.

Right! I do give Mine some credit for attempting to be cautious with Kanda and Daigo, of course. It does seem like his misanthropy (or his tendency to spiral into it when things go wrong, anyway) has a lot to do with his guardedness. And he definitely does have a tendency to look to the future to the detriment of his ability to consider the present (or even that the future might not turn out exactly as he predicts). "The pinnacle of hindsight bias" is the perfect way to put it.

I think that's very much evident in how much of his mental state hinges on things he takes for granted. He'll finally be happy now that he has Daigo to dedicate his life to, because of course Daigo will be around forever (spoilers: he won't.) He'll finally be happy now that he can take over the Tojo, because of course the Tojo will both accept him without a fuss and be around forever (spoilers: it won't).

But I very much agree this is exactly the sort of thing that makes him such a captivating and relatable character! It's been a lot of fun exploring that side of him with you, just as it's been a lot of fun exploring the Arakawas. Of course, I would also be interested in your take on Arakawa and femininity whenever you're feeling up to it.

It was no trouble, thank you so much for taking the time to watch my recommendations! Also gave me the push to get started on Hero with a friend and am excited to see how much that changes my perception of the special! Tsugaru's very much got things going on and I'm excited for the rewatch. Eventually! I honestly have no idea where I stopped watching Pure haha, but I recall wondering if her dependence on her family would just end up being transferred onto Toru, so I'm glad that's not the case at least.

I really appreciate the vote of confidence regarding examining the localization further! That means a lot to me. I think it was especially worth emphasizing Jo and Ikumi's youth because both dubs make the somewhat odd choice to have Jo voiced by the same actor (whereas teen Arakawa is given a different actor), and the model doesn't really have the same wide-eyed innocence Tsutsumi did when he was younger.

I did notice Tsutsumi's performance was much more animated than for Jo as an adult though, and it was a lot more "obvious" when he was saying things he didn't mean, so I appreciate the effort to make up for it in terms of Tsutsumi's acting and probably-Yokoyama's direction.

It's probably hard to believe these days haha, but if anything, people were significantly more vicious towards Arakawa than towards Jo at launch. It just got to be too much to take after a while, especially because I had to see it from ~mutuals~ too. Like you guys know that man's my namesake and that I can see what you're saying, but you're not even going to tone it down a little bit? Okay I Guess.

It felt really aimless to me, because it was like, what, "betraying" Ichi? Having a "weak" "redemption?" I'm not going to say Arakawa Did Nothing Wrong, and I'm sure even he would never be satisfied with whatever he tried to do to make it up to Ichi (he never was when it came to Masato), but he Kind Of Died before he had the chance. Sometimes that's how it is, but Ichi was always going to forgive him.

Of course I should be happy people loved Ichi enough to feel so protective over him, and I kind of am, but I can't fully put my experiences aside either. I don't want to harp on all that too much now that things are looking better though lol.

All of that aside, I'm glad Princess Toyotomi was an enjoyable enough experience! Although it's not as direct as Honnouji Hotel, I think there are still some time-bending aspects with reincarnation and such that history buffs can enjoy. For example, Matsudaira was Tokugawa Ieyasu's family name, and Sanada was the name of a samurai he respected greatly although they were on opposing sides. And of course, the Sanadas as a whole served as vassals to Toyotomi (after the Honnouji incident, coincidentally, haha.)

Chako was also named after the mother of Toyotomi's heirs, so I suppose one could have seen that coming if they were aware of that, but I really, really wanted Daisuke to be the princess too! She (and Sanada's acceptance of her) were very much one of my favorite things about the movie as a whole. I appreciate that, whenever I've seen transgender identities and gender non-conformity come up in Nakai and Tsutsumi's works, that's generally how it goes. Most of their works tend to narratively align with their viewpoints in real life so it's cool.

Speaking of, family issues are very much a pattern in Tsutsumi's characters! Most of what I could say here is a bit spoiler-y, so I won't, but I hope you'll notice more as you go on to experience other roles.

I was hoping to reply to the other asks here, but that got to be Too Hot To Handle (read: way too long), so I'll section them off into a different ask (that you'll probably end up seeing before this one haha). Hopefully they're a bit easier to respond to separately as well. Thank you for your time, and sorry to take up so much of it!

I love how all of Mine’s stories are connected, it feels like some sort of atonement for the fact that Mine wasn’t going to be RGGO’s main protagonist anymore: if we can’t have him in a brand new story, then we can at least make up for it by having multiple prologue stories line up together. HUGE huge thank you for sharing this with me, it was an absolute honor to be able to read this!

It’s incredibly interesting to see Mine and his line of thinking in this story. At the end of Y3, Mine practically explodes with anger towards the people who betrayed him back then, yet with Tashiro he’s almost entirely the opposite. I guess in this particular situation though, Mine managed to find an optimistic outcome of that deceit: because Mine was booted from his company, he was able to find the thing he really wanted with the Tojo Clan. I can’t explain it properly, but that’s a sweet mentality for Mine to have honestly considering his displeasure with the society around him: something terrible happened to him (and Tashiro even tried to worsen the wound), but having been able to make the most out of the situation, he was almost prepared to let Tashiro go unpunished (I suppose this ties back into Mine’s whole thing of not striking unless attacked first). As a final small note on the story and translation, I love the sprinkle of French in his dialogue. As we’d talked about before, it’s just small details like that that help enhance his Westernism and I appreciate it immensely.

I totally agree on Mine being his own man/character and wanting to focus on that! That’s something I’m always worried about when I post honestly, as weird as that might seem. It’d be ridiculous for me to try to deny relationships between characters are some of my favorite aspects of RGG, but I also try to highlight the characters on their own. The reason why examining the relationships in RGG is so fun is because of how the characters are by themselves, and ergo the type of characters they become when put with others/how certain qualities of their characters become enhanced when in a (any sort of) relationship. In that, relationships help deepened characters, but they definitely shouldn’t be reduced to ONLY the relationships they have.

As for Mine’s relationship with women in RGGO stories, that’s an aspect of Mine I adore too, and I agree on the whole ‘address women as ‘miss’’ bit: it is old fashioned and potentially condescending, but the over-polite nature of it is endearing all the same to me personally. Just in general, Mine’s very polite and I feel like that’s a detail that’s overlooked at times, but it’s a detail I love all the same. Moreover, Mine generally being- at the very least- a decent person does remind me of Hijikata now that you mention it (despite his scary reputation, apparently almost all personal accounts with him only ever said nice things about him and how amiable he was), not to mention the virtuous nature of kirins, to go back to his original symbol. To extend on that, it does just solidify that Mine is a kirin at heart: he respects the people who haven’t done anything wrong or egregious, but he’s harsh on the people who do injustice (and even then, his tolerance is incredibly high. Back to the subject of when Mine first meets Kanda, he doesn’t punish Kanda for acting inappropriately with the woman, he only engages in a fight with him to get his attention. I appreciate that Mine still wanted to make sure the woman he helped was alright though, making sure she was able to walk first before putting his full attention back to Kanda).

I agree that Mine probably doesn’t pursue relationships himself and more so lets them come to him (especially if the ending of that Okinawa story where Mine’s approached by a woman on the beach is any indication or hint at his past relationships), and I especially agree that due to his closed-off nature, he ultimately jeopardizing any romantic partners he could have had. Ergo, I agree in that Katase shouldn’t be put at fault for dismissing Mine’s feelings (while we’re on the subject, I’ve always wanted to explore how Katase might have reacted to Mine’s death. I know she’s considerably an irrelevant character, but I can’t help but wonder how she might have felt and if she ever felt guilty for something she had no control over). I personally always live by the idea of saying what you mean, and as a result I don’t get upset with people if they can’t discern I’m not okay if I don’t tell them that. As for Mine, it’s painfully evident that’s now how he operates: he fully expects others to be on the same page as him, and as we see that becomes incredibly detrimental to him. It’s a consequence of his need to be independent, I believe: he’s become so focused on himself, he either isn’t comfortable with expressing the truth and relying on others emotionally, or he doesn’t know how to do it.

To expand on the hypotheticals of his past relationship, it really is hard to discern what ‘type’ of women he was entangled with (as in whether they were hostesses/sex workers or women he met naturally), and trying to find out which one is significant to understand the depth of his grievances. We know Mine isn’t fond of money- he understands it’s a tool to achieve what he wants, but it doesn’t make him happy (it wouldn’t be a stretch to even say it disgusts him in some aspects, or at least the greed it brings out of people turns him off). So would he seek out workers to get a sample of a human bond? But again, he’d know right at the start that bond would be artificial, so the only conclusion I can come to is that he really did have the capability to attract women on his own (or at least he didn’t have to ‘buy’ them, per say). And of course, the reason they didn’t work out could have been due in part to multiple reasons: women being with him only for shallow reasons, Mine’s inability to be sincere with others, potentially his sexuality, or maybe some mixture of these factors. Not all relationships are the same, after all. BUT this is all speculation at this point, and unfortunately I doubt we’ll get a concrete backstory on Mine’s relationships (but I do agree in being curious as to how he behaves around hostesses…)

I’m not overly versed on LGBT issues and terminology in the East, so I can’t say my input would be anything of much value. All I know is that- at least in the West as well- the concept of LGBT seems to be very ‘western’ for whatever reason (or at least, I see a lot of people get upset with Japanese franchises having LGBT elements and then claiming they’re ‘affected by the West’. Maybe it’s a two-way street for some). But yeah, all-in-all, it really is an interesting case of ‘technically this is wrong translation wise, but character wise it’s accurate’.

As for Mine and his tendency to be ‘short sighted’, that’s precisely how he operates! He very much has the mentality of ‘there’s no problem now, so don’t worry about it’, or at the very least he is very present-minded (outside of business endeavors, of course) and focuses on his happiness in the moment. I can’t fault him for that, though: again, it’s a very human trait to have, even if a little naive, so to say, but again it’s greatly compelling and relatable.

On to Jo though, it definitely was a weird choice to not have child Jo dubbed with a different actor- I know some boys can have deep voices by 15, but it really is jarring to watch and doesn’t help keep me in the mindset that they’re kids at the time. But you’re right in Tsutsumi’s effort to try and sound more youthful at least: it’s not perfect of course, but it’s definitely easier to discern that he’s supposed to be younger (and definitely fits better based on the interpretation the director might have wanted. For the Japanese dub, Jo sounds a lot more carefree about the situation and like he’s just ready to go home- like the circumstances are more of an annoyance than anything severe. Whereas in the English dub, Jo sounds more remorseful- or at least like he’s struggling with moving on from what happened. But that’s just my takeaway, of course).

About Arakawa’s negative reception though, on the surface I get it just from the premise of ‘Arakawa betrays Ichiban’. Even when I didn’t know anything about Y7 and I was just reading a quick summary of the game, I had a sour taste in my mouth after reading that part. BUT of course now I adore Arakawa. His methods were extreme and deadly, but it’s hard to come up with any alternatives for his situation (and it’s not as though he isn’t aware of the pain he put Ichiban through with his elaborate plan. It’s just another case of not everything a character does can be categorized as a purely good or purely evil action), and it’s unfortunate we didn’t get to see Arakawa try to make things up to Ichi after all they went through.

Onto Princess Toyotomi, I wish I was as much of a history buff for Japan as I am with American history: I love history so much, so I’m sure if I’d known these bits before watching I would’ve appreciated the movie and its details a whole lot more (not that I didn’t enjoy it of course, but having that context definitely would’ve been fun to notice while viewing)! It’s also sweet to hear that Nakai and Tsutsumi seem to be accepting of LGBT themes (I try not to look too deep into actors since I’m scared I’ll find terrible things and it’ll make viewing media they’re in awkward, but so far I’m glad that they appear to be decent guys)! On that note, I am absolutely excited to watch more Nakai and Tsutsumi works when I get the chance- I’m curious what you’re referring to when you talk about spoilers, but I’ll find that out seen enough I guess!

And I also have replies to your second ask, though I'll put it below the cut just to keep things separated and organized.

Whatever you decide to do, I’m sure it’ll turn out great (and if you ever need the tweet, I have it bookmarked and screenshotted- I can never be too certain on whether Twitter’s going to nuke a tweet nowadays…)! As for Masato though, I’d be absolutely surprised if he somehow survived. My reason to doubt as much were the funeral scenes, but with Mine- even if unlikely without repercussions- it’s not impossible to survive a fall from that height, so yeah RGG if you drop the confirmed He’s Fine I have no promises on being Not Annoying LMAO

In reference the nature of Jo and Arakawa’s relationship, I’m glad to have given you a chance to talk about their relationship further (it really is an awkward subject to navigate: it’s fair and reasonable to assume SOMETHING is there obviously, we just can’t put an exact label on it.)! And I am open to criticisms, whether that was the intent or not, otherwise I’m a fan of peer review and looking at notes on a subject together, so no worries!

I’ve always been a big fan of turn-based RPGs, so RGG’s push towards the genre’s been really fun to watch! Again, while you certainly can do storytelling through gameplay for action games, RPGs inherently being more story based definitely lend a hand in being able to inject smaller details better (especially in regards to attack/ability and weapon names that highlight aspects of a character)!

Thank you about my latest comic, it means the world that you enjoyed it despite how simple it is! It’s unfortunate I never draw Ichi since whenever I do, I always have fun with how different and expressive I make him (most of it’s due in part to wanting to make a homage to Akira Toriyama since if the gameplay of Y7’s going to be affected by Ichi’s love for Dragon Quest, then I might as well draw him with Toriyama in mind. But at this point, it’s just fitting to draw him so exaggerated)! And I definitely wouldn’t say your contribution was ‘small’, our back and forth’s were a pretty significant reason for me to have the energy and inspiration to draw the thing in full, so thank you again for chatting with me so much!

The subject of Hijikata and his poetry’s one of my favorite topics (if not majorly because according to people who read them, his poems weren’t all that good despite their famous nature nowadays), and I’m glad they managed to sneak in bits about him and in poetry in Ishin (like him reading in his room, and as you said, the quote at the end)! I can definitely see Mine wanting to thoroughly analyze Hijikata’s poetry just on the basis of being an art buff and wanting to extract as much meaning as he could from the writing (but again, considering the questionable quality of them, I can just as easily see pretty much everyone else looking at it without much regard lmao). On that note though, I’d be interested to see how the poems’ meaning ultimately become reworked in your vision!

Talking more about Ishin, Arakawa and Jo would have fit well with Kondo and Hijikata’s roles, I agree! Honestly, if it weren’t for Mine and how popular he is (which I’m infinitely grateful for, I shouldn’t have to say), it wouldn’t be hard for me to imagine Jo filling in his spot (especially if they were willing to swap in Zhao for Baba; they weren’t afraid to switch out RGG characters for other RGG characters. Though imaging Y7Jo having that slightly friendly air that Hijikata does definitely would have been… something to see lmao). Kondo was also considerably sneaky in Ishin too, wasn’t he? That definitely would have been a good fit for how lowkey Arakawa tries to keep things in Y7.

The complicated nature of Ichi and Jo’s relationship is such a neat subject. As you said, I’m sure part of Jo’s frustrations with Ichi lie in how Ichi’s seeming aloof nature reminds him of his own careless attitude as a kid: nothing like old-fashioned projection to make you irked by someone, right. On the note of Arakawa though, it will be interesting to see how they interact now that they aren’t technically ‘required’ to with Arakawa gone and there’s technically no more need to keep the peace. As I said in some ask ago, I do hope they have a more neutral bond come LaD8; I don’t think it’s reasonable to think they can ever be as close as Ichi and Arakawa are, especially how shut off Jo is, but it would be nice to see them more civil and relatively on the same page (maybe despite Arakawa being gone, they can at least appreciate his memory together right. Not that Jo seems too earnest to crack on sharing his personal feelings about Arakawa anytime soon, though, but maybe one day Ichi can convince him lmao).

Shifting a bit, I do wonder why Kiryu was responsible for making sure Jo was going to be alright. That seems so weirdly specific, especially when Kiryu doesn’t seem to have any connection with the Arakawa family. I hope Gaiden answers that question too!

And if you ever want to talk about Ryuji, feel free to write in about him! It’s been a while since I’ve focused on Y2’s story, but I at least remember his scenes well and I’m pretty solid on his character!

[apparitional-lesbian]

dear yuletide letter 2023.

First of all, thanks for offering one of my fandoms! I mostly said what I wanted to say about the specific fandoms in my optional details, so the goal of this letter is to build on the initial vibe for your consideration.

General Likes

stories about complicated relationships. I love stories that explore messy relationships, including (especially) platonic relationships. I love when authors explore the place where intent fails to connect with action. I like stories that examine codependent relationships, toxic relationships, deeply flawed relationships.*

genfic. I've enjoyed plenty of romantic fiction, but my favourite relationships to read about are complicated guardian-child relationships and friendships.

Sad or Manic Failures. Think Harrowhark in Harrow the Ninth, Spamton G. Spamton from Deltarune, Adachi from Person 4, Beanix in Apollo Justice. The desperation, the futility of life, the unrelenting temptation to give into despair, mhuh! It's exquisite.

people caught up in Authoritarian/Religious systems. If we matched on Deeplight, you're probably already acquainted with Frances Hardinge's masterful explorations of this theme. (And if you are not, I highly recommend checking out Frances Hardinge's novels.) Regardless, we're talking doubt. We're talking desire for control. We're talking distorted thinking and self-serving thinking and delusion. We're talking justifying the unjustifiable. We're talking devastated self worth. We're talking feeling out of step with everyone around you. You get it.

characters who refuse to give up their integrity. I love characters who struggle with temptation and ultimately give in, but I also love characters who struggle with temptation but ultimately stand firm. Also, characters who have given in to the easy thing, but then resolve to do the right thing---especially when the motivation for doing the easy thing is the desire to be loved.

strong worldbuilding/atmosphere. I like stories to have a plot, but a well-developed atmosphere/sense of place is essential as far as I'm concerned. I have enjoyed the most pointless, meandering stories on the strength of the atmosphere/worldbuilding. I love stories that have a fairytale-type atmosphere, or a haunting, surreal atmosphere (think anything by Patricia McKillip, much of Gothic literature, some of Frances Hardinge's novels e.g., Cuckoo Song and Unraveller).

*Important caveat: I enjoy fictional explorations of messed up people and how being victimized can mess you up and messed up relationships in general; that doesn't mean I'm signing off on the idea that you can rape someone and still be said to love them. There might be some idea of comfort in familiarity (the devil you know), but let's not retreat into outright abuse apologia.

General Dislikes

I'm not a big fan of fluff. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I don't hate it, but I don't love it either.

I'm also not a fan of modern AUs. Typically, the worldbuilding is a big part of my interest in a particular work of fiction, and modern AUs tend to render that a moot point.

Jenny LeClue: Detectivu

I already said this in my optional details, but it's worth saying again: Jenny LeClue is an awesome game. It has a great sorta-spooky atmosphere, gorgeous graphics, shocking revelations, clever puzzles, and funny, sympathetic characters. I love Jenny's reluctant friendship with CJ. I love how dedicated Jenny is to helping her mom and discovering the truth, and I love how she learns to be a better friend to Keith and Suzie.

If you do like to write fluff, this would be my preferred fandom for it. (But, of course, you are free to do what you want.) A slice of life fic about Jenny and her friends solving a mystery would be fun. I think there's a lot of potential in exploring the fallout of the game while Jenny is forced to cool her heels after her mom/the Dean disappears. She's found out so much, but doesn't have a lot of room to act, which would be very frustrating for her.

The Lion In Winter (1968)

Watching The Lion In Winter for the first time is such a crazy experience because the film creates such a strong illusion of shit happening. Characters deliver ultimatums, overhear incriminating accusations, and threaten to kill each other, but then the film ends and you realize that nothing has fundamentally changed. It's like they're trapped in purgatory, incapable of moving on or changing in any significant way.

I don't have a lot to add to my optional details here, but I do find the idea of some sort of future fic interesting since a) my understanding is that in history Eleanor outlives Richard and b) the characters in the film seem to have no future; instead, they are doomed to play out the same roles and actions for the rest of existence.

Deeplight (Frances Hardinge)

Frances Hardinge is my favourite author, and Deeplight is yet more evidence of how great she is. I love the worldbuilding in Deeplight: the mysterious Cataclysm, and the creepy Lovecraftian gods, and the even creepier priesthood, and the sea-kissed, and the tension between the Myriad and the continent, and the godware contraptions.

I also love the characters. Hark's realization that he doesn't owe Jelt his life is so !!! I also enjoyed the mad scientist aspect of Dr. Vyne. Plus, Selphin's determination was very cool.

I'm super intrigued by the former religion of the Myriad. The idea that priests were specifically tasked with keeping the people afraid is such a crazy reveal, but so on-brand for Frances Hardinge. And then you find out about the origin of the gods and it's like... wtf??!!!

There were no nominated characters for this one, so you'll have a lot of freedom if you write for this fandom. And you know, if you want to write a worldbuilding fic with original characters, I'd be cool with that. I really like the characters in Deeplight, so I'll miss them, but the world is just so cool here, so feel free to explore that if you want. I have faith in you. I think the priesthood and their role in placating the gods in particular would be very interesting to explore.

Once again, thanks for offering these fandoms. I have faith that whatever you'll write, I'll love it (or at least like it). 👍

[squarebracket-trickster]

happy blurbo blursday! I am not familiar with your characters so could you give them a little intro? 👀

Thank you so much for the ask!!! I had a lot of fun with this and it was a great exercise for me in trying to give a spoiler-free synopsis of my plot.

(I really tried to make this spoiler free but if you think about the information I've given here for a minute you'll probably figure the story's big twist. Truth be told, I think the earlier in the story a reader figures it out the funnier the story gets so I am not worried about people guessing it. Still, I refuse to outright say it because that would cheapen the experience.)

The important plot stuff:

Isadred, the main character, is the eldest daughter of a king. She is married -- by proxy, she's never met her husband -- to the crown prince of the neighbouring country (the marriage was intended to ratify a treaty to end the war between their countries) and she is *supposed* to be travelling to her husband's kingdom. But Isadred does NOT want to be married. She escapes from her escort and joins up with some bandits disguised as a boy named Adris, but the plot won't leave her alone. Someone is playing a dangerous game and Isadred realizes that she is it's most valuable pawn -- whoever possesses her wins. It is only a matter of time before she will be forced to either return to her husband or plunge both their kingdoms into war. In the meantime, a bandit named Sorin catches her eye. It will never work out between them because Adris/Isadred has sworn off marriage, and Sorin is saving himself for it, but that does not mean they can't have a bit of fun while it lasts.

Sorin is a talented swordsman of noble birth who became a member of the bandit king's inner circle to protect his family. When a half-starved peasant kid shows up on his doorstep claiming that a certain missing princess is alive and hiding in the forest, the bandit king sends Sorin on her trail. But there is a larger game afoot and Sorin's loyalties lie first with his family. He knows far more than he lets on, including just how valuable Princess Isadred is to his own family and to the bandit king. He will do anything to find her, even if it means getting close to that mysterious peasant boy -- just not too close. He is a married man after all... even if he has never met his wife. Adris respects his decision but being around him/her is hard. He/she reminds him of everything he is missing out on.

Fun facts:

Both characters are in their early twenties but their exact ages are never mentioned in the story. Sorin would have to be old enough to be knighted, so at least 18 but more likely 21 or older. Adris describes herself as being around Sorin's age.

I have not decided what ethnicity these characters are yet. The story is loosely Shakespeare-inspired so, in true Shakespeare fashion, the politics, warfare, and culture of the world is based on English history, specifically that of High Medieval England (1066 - 1327) -- the marriage-by-proxy to ratify a peace treaty arc, castles and trebuchets and longbows, the size of the armies in the story, the lack of canons, the social sensibilities around gender. But it is completely possible that both Isadred and Sorin have a parent from another, more distant country, or several ancestors. Also, my setting is a fictional place so I can do what I want. The physical appearances of the characters have no impact on the actual story. I am on draft 2 and have yet to write a single physical description of a character.

Sorin is bi. He is attracted to Adris when he still thinks he is a boy. He is still attracted to her when he discovers she is a girl.

I have been treating Adris as cis so far but I am considering making her nb or gender fluid. Getting to be anything but a cis man while still having control over her life is a critical part of her story, and that struggle is not exclusive to cis women, but I am cis woman so that is the story that resonates with me most.

Isadred is really good at sewing and horseback riding. She is also a terrible shot but she can use a short bow with a light draw-weight.

Sorin can sew. It's not pretty but his stitches do hold. He is also a very good rider and skilled with a knight's weapons: sword, lance, polearm, mace, sickle, crossbow etc. He cannot use a longbow though--that is a peasant's weapon.

Isadred loves parties and is very fashionable.

Sorin knows Isadred's husband.

I am probably going to change both these characters' names when I finally figure out how I want naming and ethnicity to work in this story.

[tbooks79]

My review of “sweat” By Zora Neale Hurston

Zora Neale Hurston was known to be very pragmatic about life. Since she was a kid, she knew that hard work was essential to a good and fulfilled life. She also believed in telling her truth no matter what other people had to say, mainly the men she encountered in her lifetime. When they offered help, she accepted it, yet kept her authenticity in her writing no matter the outcomes. In her short story “Sweat,” I can see the bits and pieces of her in the fictional character Delia, whom, despite all her ordeals, is always able to fend and stand up for herself. In this story, Hurston creates a character who not only challenges the gender expectations put on women in society, she also utterly resists them. By relying entirely on herself throughout the story even though she’s a married woman, Delia shows that she’s able to provide for herself in all the areas where her husband cannot (will not). Meanwhile the power of the husband as the man in the relationship is totally diminished by his abusive actions towards his wife, which completely goes against the idea that men must be the safeguards of their women or family. Hurston uses a reversal method to show that women can have strong will and be hard working while men can be the opposite. By allowing Delia to find a way through her traumatic experience, she completely shatters all societal expectations about gender roles in a relationship or marriage.

One of the biggest expectations put on women in society, for the most part, married women is to stay at home and to take care of the family and to let the husband be the provider and bring the money on the table. This concept is one of the oldest and most widely accepted societal ideologies among humans. Yet in “Sweat,” Delia is not even given such a choice. With an absent and abusive husband, she has to go out there and provides for herself on her own. The first scene in the story is an interaction between Delia and her husband that sort of gives an introduction to their marriage and their characters, and also what they represent. He says to her, “ Ah don’t keer if you never git through… Don’t gimme no lip either, else ah’ll throw’ em out and put mah fist up side yo’ head to boot”(1023). This Is a vivid depiction of how poorly he treats her. But this passage is to show that he abuses his power to control his wife. Hurston does not specifically say in the text that Syke is a terrible person, but everything he does discredits him and takes away his true power as the masculine figure in the relationship. That’s also when Delia finally stands up to him for the first time which leaves him surprised. The story describes her “poor body” (1023) and her “bare knuckle hands” (1023), a representation of not only her tiredness, and loneliness, but also of her hard work. Even though her husband tells her to quit washing “white folks clothes on the sabbath, “and then threatened to throw them all away one day, Delia always keeps working, which identifies her as the provider in the home as well. When she stands up to him, she says “Lookah head, Sykes, you done gone too fur. Ah been married to yuh for fifteen years, and Ah been takin in washin for fifteen years. Sweat, sweat, sweat! Work and sweat, cry and sweat, and pray and sweat” (1023). The vulnerability of her words is such a demonstration of how much strength she has culminated and what she has been through mentally.

Notice the word “cry” in her previous statement. A subtle way to point out the effects pf her marriage on her. With all the expectations society put on women, they fail to realize the mental hold that ought to have on them. To emphasize this idea, Hurston includes an interaction in the middle of the story between a group of men debating the situation between Delia and her husband. As she was riding around on her pony, delivering her washing, they talk about how unfortunate he must be for her to work so much with her husband’s refusal to provide for the both of them. “Yep…Hot or col’, rain or shine, jes ez regl’ar ez de weeks roll round’ Delia carries em’ an’ fetches ‘em on Sat’day” (1024) one of them says, to which the other one answers “She better if she wanter eat… Syke Jones aint wuth de shot an’ powder hit would tek tuh kill ‘em. Not to huh he ain’t” (1024). Here Hurston is trying to make a very interesting point. First, with the fact that this whole interaction is between men only, with most of them, arguing in favor of Delia and rightfully belittling Syke. Second, is the intention of the author to make the reader see Delia from a perspective other than her own, considering that Delia often thinks of herself in a very diminutive way. For these men, Delia is the ideal woman who found herself trapped in an unhappy marriage with a very problematic partner, they talk of her as being very “pritty” (1024) once and praise her for putting up with all of that for years. However, never did they mention that she should get out of it, or even offered to help her. The entire town is watching this unfold, and none of them raise a finger to help. And again, Hurston does not specifically blame anybody for what is happening, but she is showing how society often allow men to take advantage of women, even though they know it’s wrong. The same thing happened when Syke brought the snake home, they knew Delia feared it, yet chose to gossip about it instead of helping her get rid of it.

To continue the idea of the emotional hold of marriage on women, let’s go back to the beginning of the story, where she is lying awake thinking about what her marriage was like in the beginning. “Anything like flowers had long been drowned in the salty stream that had been pressed from her heart. Her tears, her sweat, her blood. She had brought love to the union, and he had brought a longing after the flesh” (1023). This part of story is the exact moment where Delia realizes that she gave so more much than what she received. And that the whole time she stayed in that marriage regardless of all the abuse, she in fact deserved better. There’s a lot of blame and shame in this part of the text. Almost as if it’s her own fault. She blames her “knotty, muscled limbs, her harsh knuckly hands” (1023) as if in any way, she’s the reason why Syke does not cherish her the way he should. It is not the case of course, but oftentimes, women think there’s something wrong with them when they are the victim of an abusive partner, and even as Syke was taking his last breath, Delia couldn’t help but bear the weight of him one last time.

Through this text, Hurston uses Delia as an example for all women who feels pressured to stay in relationships in which they are not valued, while also praising them for pulling through and speaking up for themselves when they had to. Although Delia is a victim of her husband, the main lesson to keep from that story is the fact that she is not a typical “wife.” She rises in the face of her challenges, shattering any expectations placed on her in her wake.

Works Cited

Hurston, Zora Neale. Swear. Edited by Carol Oates et al., Oxford University Press, The Oxford Book of American Short Stories. Oxford: 1992.

This work is written, edited, and owned by me:Teri Jacques. Every word except the work cited is my own.

[hadeskitchen]

DEMO (tba) | CHARACTER PROFILES | GUIDE | NAVIGATION | PINTEREST | AUTHOR

Welcome to the Underworld...

Play as a deceased chef given the opportunity of an (after)lifetime in Hades' Kitchen. The story follows a cooking competition set in the Underworld from Greek myth. Hades' Kitchen is a character-driven interactive fiction story about rivalry and redemption.

Hades' Guide, a codex containing the lore bible and character database for both Hades' Kitchen and Neo Olympus (a second series that will take place in the same universe), is available here.

The demo release is currently tbd. The first season will consist of eight chapters: seven episodes + a prologue.

Content Warning: Hades' Kitchen, this blog, and its discord server are rated 16+ and the game will eventually have optional 18+ content. The game will contain swearing, alcohol and drug use, sexually suggestive content, light violence, and discussions about trauma, grief, terminal illness, and death.

So you died - very sorry about that - but this doesn't have to be the end of your story. Since you're such a talented chef, we want to make you an offer. We can either send your soul to Asphodel now, or you can refuse to accept that dull fate and audition to become a chef for our royal family.

Now, this isn't a guaranteed position. You'll be competing against twelve others for one spot and it'll all be filmed for a TV show. I understand these shows are quite common in the Upperworld, so you're likely familiar with the concept. However, it'd be wise to expect the unexpected. We aren't limited by mortality, so we can afford to spice things up with magic and monsters and you'll probably be fine.

You could end up in Asphodel, but you might not. Each time someone's eliminated their fate is randomly reassigned. The longer you stick around, the higher your chances of getting sent somewhere better (...or worse).

If this sounds a bit overwhelming, remember you don't have to go through this alone! You'll have the crew, the judges, Adonis, and, of course, your fellow contestants. I've met them all and I can assure you, for the most part, they're lovely people. You may even recognize some from your mortal life.

So, what are you gonna do? Do you believe you can win? Will you risk your fate for a chance at something greater? What do you say?

Will you compete in Hades' Kitchen?

- Fully customize your protagonist

Name and nicknames

Gender and pronouns (custom options)

Physical appearance

Taste and culinary background

Personal history and key life events

- Define your protagonist's personality and watch the narrative voice evolve with them

- Use and improve various skills to unlock unique choices, scenes, and dialogue

- Build relationships (good and bad) with a compelling cast of characters including your fellow contestants, mentors, and a handful of Greek gods

Six love interests (five gender selectable)

Complete storylines for asexual, aromantic, aro/ace, or simply uninterested MCs

Two poly routes (either T + K or Hero + T/K/C/[redacted])

- Explore a world that blends Greek myth with science fiction

Shar Patil

The Artist. A culinary wizard with a stoic yet playful nature. They keep their distance and do their best to avoid getting close to people.

Shar is romanceable and gender selectable: Sharvari - cisgender female (she/her), Sharva - agender (xe/xem/xyr), Sharvin - cisgender male (he/him)

{Inspiration | Tag}

K Ishida

The Home Cook. An altruistic goof who claims they just want to help, but there's something hiding beneath that grin. There has to be. Right?

K is romanceable and gender selectable: Kenji - cisgender male (he/him), Kairi - transgender female (she/her), Kira - x-gender neutral (they/them)

{Inspiration | Tag}

T Sarpong

The Influencer. A free-spirited, chaotic troublemaker who uses their supernatural charm to mask their true intentions and intelligence.

T is romanceable and gender selectable: Thema - cisgender female (she/her), Tano - cisgender male (he/him), Tawiah - pangender (she/he/they/xe/ey)

{Inspiration | Tag}

Cecil Gray

The Celebrity. This arrogant genius has been your bitter rival for years. They behave as if insults and anger are all they've ever known.

Cecil is romanceable and gender selectable; Cecil has the same name whether transgender nonbinary (they/them), transgender male (he/him), or cisgender female (she/her)

{Inspiration | Tag}

Hero of Thebes

The Assistant. Even though they always look and feel panicked, this self-conscious satyr has far more talent and power than they realize.

Hero is romanceable and gender selectable; Hero has the same name whether genderfluid (they/she/he), genderqueer (they/them), cisgender female (she/her), or cisgender male (he/him)

{Inspiration | Tag}

Adonis

The Prince. Creative, clever, and compassionate, this god has a hard time convincing others to see him as a person, not just a pretty boy.

Adonis is romanceable but gender-locked. He identifies as a cisgender male and uses he/him pronouns.

{Inspiration | Tag}

Chef Alex

The Legend. A tempestuous visionary, she's remembered as a prolific inventor and one of the first chefs to explore cooking as a science.

Alex is not romanceable. Alex identifies as genderqueer (nonbinary butch) and uses she/they pronouns.

{Inspiration | Tag}

Chef Julio

The Icon. The first celeb chef and still the most famous, he's known for his kindness, enthusiasm, and humor as well as his many cookbooks.

Julio is not romanceable. Julio identifies as a cisgender male and uses he/him pronouns.

{Inspiration | Tag}

For more on any of these characters: head over to this post, check out their MyShade profiles in Hades' Guide, send me an ask, or join the discord server.

Thanks for reading, all reblogs are greatly appreciated!

Special thanks to the Hades' Kitchen beta readers:

ciels-tears, manonamora, momomilk, piscesaf, roguesgame, sistersolaris

Last Updated: Dec 18th, 2021

[critical-thinking-is-mandatory]

Hey I wasn’t sure if anyone asked you before but how would you rewrite Marinette and her family to include her Chinese heritage or lack of Chinese heritage if you want to go down the path where some kids refuse to learn their parents’ cultures because of their peers or whatever and then regret it as they’re older? Also side note but I hope you had a wonderful week or as best of it ! :)

hey anon, thanks for asking! i think, given the fact that the show is set in paris, france (aka a very bad unsafe place for poc), that i'd probably lean more in the direction of Marinette being assimilated and play with the fact that she is fairly white looking.

because like, i think it's really important for white-passing poc to be represented in fiction because we do exist, we deserve to see rep for us, and also other people need to see that there is no single 'look' or experience for any given minority.

anyway.

i feel like, seeing as Sabine is like a 1st gen immigrant, we'd probably have a greater divide between Marinette's home and school life, culture-wise. especially given that Chloe is a racist bully. and i'd like to see that really worked with, especially as a source of conflict and then reconciliation between Marinette and Sabine.

i think because ML is a superhero show it actually gives us a fantastic avenue for Marinette to develop her identity and sense of self and the fact it's not worked with is a huge missed opportunity.

like say, at the start of the series we have Marinette doing her best to be "normal" aka white. she meets Alya, becomes Ladybug and suddenly she has a friend who knows what it's like to be picked on for looking different and having "stinky" food. she has someone in her life who is boldly and unapologetically herself and it's amazing for Marinette. and Marinette has this whole new avenue of her identity to explore as Ladybug.

she's not Chinese Marinette, and she's not white Marinette, she's Ladybug. and Ladybug is Marinette.

and it's just like, the kick starting moment of Marinette's development and as the show goes on we could see Marinette slowly bringing all sides of her identity together to just be Marinette. she invites her friends to celebrate Lunar New Year, starts bringing home-cooked Chinese food for lunch to school again, either learns her mum's dialect or starts speaking it again in public.

just...just having a secret identity as a way to really learn about who Marinette is and how to accept all parts of herself.

[danganronpadespairtime]

Bonus Episodes + Other Questions

Briefly, I will open up the askbox again, because I think there may be some questions.

You can send in questions here. A Tumblr account is not needed to ask questions.

There may be chapter 1 spoilers.

Anonymous asked:

Can we get color palettes for the characters? It's hard to get the right colors from the sprites since there are so many gradients, and not every character has a CG. Sorry to inconvenience you.

I color pick from sprites, because when the gradient is removed it may make certain colors look lighter... But if that isn’t a concern for you, then I will provide flats.

Anonymous asked:

What each of the cast member’s clothing preferences? I want to do fan art of them in casual clothing, so I’m pretty curious! 

Sorry, I have a bad fashion sense and it may limit my responses, but I’ll try to answer to the best of my ability

Eden: She enjoys cute fashion, but she also enjoys wearing androgynous style clothes.

J: Refuses to wear feminine things. Likes dark colors and hoodies.

Teruko: Her fashion sense diverges from what she’d actually wear. Secretly she wants to wear girly, cute things, but is unable to afford that kind of thing. She likes skirts.

Nico: Like Teruko, wants to wear girly things but doesn’t due to external factors

Hu: Wears modernized casual hanfu. She also likes long skirts

Veronika: Complicated, lolita-like fashion

Min: She cares more about practicality than looks. She wears comfortable clothing

Levi: Fashionable

Arturo: Something that appears expensive... Designer clothes, faux high fashion

Whit: A similar style to the clothes that he is current wearing

Arei: Cute,Girly

Ace: Sporty

Charles: Semi-formal, but he doesn’t care too much about appearance

David: Semi-formal. ‘professional’ and stylish look

Rose: Eccentric and colorful, and not delicate

Anonymous asked:

This question doesn’t relate to the episodes, but rather the comic: would you say that the comic is also canonic and prior to the events of drdt? 

No, it was just a joke.

Anonymous asked: 

Was the Ultimate contest for eminent students part of the Korean Hope’s Peak, and then Min later came to america?

Currently there is no confirmation that Korea has built a Hope’s Peak. I think there may be some assumption that because someone has a foreign name, they can’t be american nor have grown up in america. This isn’t really true.

Stated explicitly, every member of the cast is American, and has spent a significant portion of their childhood growing up in the US.

That being said, Min has always been serviced by america’s Hope’s Peak. Whenever DRDT references Hope’s Peak, it will almost always be in reference to the American ones.

Anonymous asked:

Why Xander has both eyes? What happend to his eyepatch?

Xander presumably received his eye injury shortly before the start of the the events of DRDT, so it’s not like he had it for most of his life.

Anonymous asked:

sorry im so confused... is chariton like, a country that xander is from or something?

Chariton is a fictional town in an unspecified state in the US. North C is a city that is north of Chariton, in the same state. Both receive water from Chariton River (also fictional) that flows from north to south. 

There is a real town and a real river named Chariton but that is an unintended coincidence.

Anonymous asked: 

Is there gonna be more Bonus episodes? 

That is all there is for now. More bonus episodes may come after chapter 2.

Anonymous asked: 

Is there a fully body for Xander's casual outfit in the bonus episode? I think it looks really awesome!

Anonymous asked:

Do you have a rough estimation of the next chapter release? It’s ok if you don’t!

No to both, sorry. Regarding the second thing I am so early on in the production process that I cannot even begin to fathom a release date.

Anonymous asked:

Are both "unnamed students" the same person given that they have the same voice actor? Or is it just a coincidence? Also, why is Nico called "Nico Kasabyan" in the prologue? Was that his original name?

1. Same person

2. That was a mistake

Anonymous asked:

Not exactly an important question, but did Ace’s hair turn more dull?

Yes. He is getting a little sloppy with his hair dye maintenance, and/or he stopped caring.

Anonymous asked:

What year does this take place?

I don’t want to be too specific with dates nor places lest I accidentally invoke some real-life associations. DRDT takes place 70-80 years after the events of Danganronpa, somewhere in the US. That’s about specific as it gets.

Although you’d expect things to be very different after almost a century, much of that time was devoted to rebuilding post-Tragedy, so it is about analogous to our present day.

Anonymous asked:

Will Duke Spurling be mentioned in the main story at all? The story in the side episodes intrigue me a lot, and it makes me wonder if they’ll ever cross over.

I should clarify that the bonus episodes being “not plot important” doesn’t mean that none of the content will show up in the main story, just that if any events in them are plot important, then they will be also discussed as necessary within the story themself. That is to say, you can skip them and still understand the main story.

I do realize now this may be misleading wording on my part, so I apologize. That being said, some of the people and events mentioned, particularly in the second episode, may come up in the story... sometime in the distant future... Please remain patient!

koivoid asked:

How many students were in East Class 27? 

16 students, with (including) one randomly selected Ultimate Lucky Student. This is standard for all Hope’s Peak classes, with very few exceptions. In addition the classes are always “evenly split by gender” (in theory).

Anonymous asked:

are Nico's eye fades red or gray? Cause I noticed some inconsistencies between the videos and cast page. I'm not sure if it's intentional or the cast page is old and needs to be updated.

I changed them to gray after seeing that too many characters already had red eyelashes, but I haven’t updated the cast page. If there are any discrepancies within the cast pages or photos, they’re usually insignificant.

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Mia Deserved Better: An Analysis of RE8's Themes/Symbolism

Foreword: I would like to thank @lepusrufus for posting about both Mia and Miranda, and at one point directly saying that Mia deserved better, which is a large part of what caused me to start examining her role in the canon story. Now, I will say that this post, like some of my previous explorations of Village (such as my attempt to determine Donna's age), will not be the best organized. My ADHD makes such things rather difficult for me. However, I have tried more than usual, and have broken up this "essay" into several distinct sections. Still, I am worried that my thoughts will not be as concise or coherent as they were inside my head.

Under read-more for length and spoilers for RE8: Village.

Introduction:

Village is, inarguably, about parenthood. Is it a horror game? Yes. Is it also science fiction? Also yes. But is it still, at its core, a story, and therefore contains imagery, symbolism, and themes? Yes. Now, you may be wondering what this has to do with Mia deserving better. My proposal is as follows: While Village is overall about parenthood, it is more about motherhood than fatherhood. Furthermore, Mia's background + actions from the previous game tie her story directly with Mother Miranda's, making their potential interactions massively important to the story... and could have served the theme beautifully. The missed potential in her involvement in the story is honestly a little bit absurd.

Now, let's examine each of the Four Lords + their sections, as the beginning of analyzing the game's theme.

Lady Dimitrescu + Castle:

Ah, perhaps the clearest (albeit unimportant) bits of theme within the whole game. We are immediately presented with another parent, with three daughters she loves very, very much. Initially they work as a team to capture Ethan, easily overpowering him. When they do split up, each still has dialogue regarding their family members. Each of the daughters expresses a desire to be like their mother/make their mother proud. Lady Dimitrescu herself gets very upset every time one of her daughters perishes, and delivers some important dialogue about this in her final confrontation with Ethan.

To paraphrase, Lady D says that Ethan has done something unforgiveable, caused damage that can never heal, and deserves to die before his daughter. That last part is interesting, in the sense that Lady D seems to believe that outlasting your own child is a fate so terrible that she would not wish it upon anyone, including the person who killed her daughters.

Throughout her dialogue and actions, Lady D serves as an important figure of a living mother. What do I mean by that? Well, the only other mothers we see in game are Mia and Miranda. The former doesn't show up until almost the end of the game (seeing as the "Mia" at the start is not actually the real Mia), while the latter does not have a living child, and her behavior has (presumably) changed quite a bit since that loss. As Ethan goes through Castle Dimitrescu, he watches (he causes) Lady D to go through what Miranda did all those decades ago. When we see her loss, when we experience her loss, it is something we connect with, even comparing it (as Lady D does) to Ethan's loss of Rose.

For the more visual side of symbolism, we can turn to Lady Dimitrescu herself. She is very tall, is visibly older than the majority of the Village cast, and has a fairly classic (old-school) motherly look. Everything about her reinforces her position as an example of a mother, especially when she's with her daughters and becomes such a strong figure of protection. Her height allows her to seem the caretaker for her children, even though they are scary/intimidating in their own right.

Donna Beneviento + Waterfall House:

Yes, the baby/fetus/monstrosity is part of this. No, it is not the only bit of thematic work in this section of the game.

To begin, you can find out that Donna is officially the adopted daughter of Mother Miranda. Her birth parents are dead, implied to be from especially tragic causes (more than is the norm when it comes to "orphan making"), and she has suffered greatly from it. We see that she has been seemingly neglected by Miranda, and is incredibly isolated. The tragedy of her loss, along with the consequences presented by it, are something to keep in mind further down the road, when we inevitably deal with Ethan's own death.

One of the consequences of the environment Donna was raised in is, arguably, her reliance on Angie. While interpretations of their exact relationship (aka how much control Donna actually has at any given point) vary, the two very clearly have something akin to a mother/daughter vibe. Alternatively an older sister/younger sister sort of thing. This shows in the way that Donna holds/carries Angie, as well as the contrast in their demeanors. Moreso, the fact that Donna gave a part of herself to create Angie is almost enough to make the symbolism nonnegotiable.

We also see that Donna has a strong understanding of family/family dynamics, through the way that she uses her powers to manipulate Ethan. She dissects his connections to Mia and Rose, taunts him with the lengths he's willing to go to save his child, then shows him a grotesque version of parenthood: The aforementioned fetus monster. Does the monster represent Ethan's fears, or Donna's?

What if the monster is how Donna sees herself, in some way, perhaps thinking that it's her fault her parents died? Bit of a stretch, but it's not a keystone of my theory, so I'm just throwing it out there. We could, however, go a step further and ask ourselves if Donna has noticed the way Miranda neglects her, and the fetus monster is how Donna thinks Miranda sees her. A baby, true, but grotesque, so terribly imperfect compared to her "real daughter" (Eva, obvs).

Regardless, the monster presents an ugly side of parenthood. It shows us the blood, the hunger (with the way it repeatedly attempts to swallow Ethan whole), the wailing. If Lady D shows us the love of parenthood, the bond, Donna in turn shows us the hate, the misery. Everything that one must endure to reap the rewards of family.

Lastly, we get one last bit of symbolism with Donna's death: We play a game with Angie. A childhood classic, hide and seek. Ethan chases her down repeatedly, stabbing away, seemingly only hurting the doll. But what happens when he kills Angie? It turns out that he killed Donna. You kill the child, you kill the parent. A reinforcement of the connection that comes with parenthood, along with another notch in Ethan's family-murdering belt (not saying that he's the "true antagonist" or anything, just keeping track for one of my later points).

Moreau + The Reservoir

Let's get the worst possibility out of the way: Moreau, weakest and sickest of the four lords, lives in a reservoir, where he is relatively safe. To defeat him, you have to drain the water, forcing him onto dry(ish) land. Paired with the main ideas of his section (which I will detail after this nightmare), one could theorize that he's meant to represent birth itself. Again, he's safe in his ("womb") water, and becomes vulnerable when he leaves (like a fragile newborn). Kinda gross, in my opinion, and also not a strong enough connection for me to care much about. It was merely an interesting (albeit horrifying) enough thought that I felt it warranted sharing.

Moving on to the big stuff with Moreau: He's a baby. Evidence: Whiny, has difficulty moving around, struggles to adapt to his growth, throws up a bunch, loves his mother very much, cries for his mother when he's in trouble, etc. Although Mother Miranda does not care for him, he clearly cares for her, and plays yet another role of an abandoned child (like Donna). Without Miranda there to protect him, he perishes terribly, crying out for someone who does not care to answer.

Hearing him cry out for Miranda, over and over, only for her to continue ignoring him is a key piece in the build-up to our confrontation between Ethan and Miranda. The game, in many ways, centers around the comparison between the two. In my humble opinion, Mia should have been involved in this comparison, as opposed to supplying the solution to the result of said comparison. Yes, I know that was a lot of words that don't mean much yet, but trust me, I'm getting there.

Heisenberg + The Factory

Ironically, of the four lords, Heisenberg is the most similar to Mother Miranda. In his massive factory, he is alone except for his numerous experiments, the results of decades of playing God. In comparison to Ethan + Mia, Heisenberg represents artificial parentage, or more accurately, the artificial creation of "life". While the others Lords also performed experiments, they used living subjects. Heisenberg instead chose to use corpses, which he then "brought back to life" with cybernetics + his powers, a somewhat futuristic version of Dr. Frankenstein.

Together, Miranda and him show a rotten side of parenthood (whereas Donna + Moreau showed us the uglier side of the children themselves). To put it simply, they are bad parents. They throw their "children"/experiments into the fray, uncaring, using them as pawns for their own greater gain. The most important part of this is that Heisenberg offers to "help" Ethan: By using Rose as a weapon. In his act of refusal, Ethan demonstrates one of several important distinctions between himself and Mother Miranda. Where she is willing to use her "children" (read: lives that she is responsible for) as tools, he is not.

Miscellaneous Symbolism/Imagery:

The old hag is one of my favorite parts of Village. She's seemingly nuts, has a crazy old lady laugh, wears bones that make soothing bone noises when she moves, and she draws lots of symbols in the dirt. If you look closely (I can provide screenshots if anyone desires, but it will take a bit of work to get them onto my computer), she's drawing one of the most iconic images in the titular village: The winged unborn. This symbol acts as the key you build up after every fight with a Lord, understandably called the Unborn Key (which turns into the Winged Unborn Key). Whether this counts as foreshadowing towards the hag's identity reveal is technically irrelevant, but I like to think it does.

In essence, you build up the key, this depiction of an infant, to progress in the game. The more wings it gains, the closer you are to your goal of rescuing your child.

The cadou itself is very clearly fetus-shaped. Furthermore, the only place within the human body that we know it ever gets implanted is in the "tummy" (thanks Moreau), aka roughly where someone's womb is/would be. Every infected person we see presumably had the Cadou implanted there (though I think it would be interesting if implanting it in different spots caused different mutations. of course, that is a discussion for another day). To become immortal, you have to "bear" a "child". Does it get more direct than that?

Mother Miranda gained her immortality in part for her grief at the loss of her child. She embodied the despair that Lady D spoke of, becoming an eternal source of anguish. Just as the loss of a child is a wound that lasts forever, so too would Miranda last forever (well, until Ethan comes along).

Mia is a loving mother, who puts up with the BSAA making her move across the world, deals with the complications of having a mold husband and mold baby, and has proved herself (see her section in RE7) to be an immense badass. Previously I had forgotten that, and even embarrassed myself in the comments of another person's post by implying she wasn't a tough, ass-kicking machine. Y'all remember feral Mia? People talk about "poor Ethan's arms", but sometimes we forget that Mia was one of the people who did a number on them. Furthermore, she's one of the only living people (from outside the village) to have any connections (pun intended) to Mother Miranda. They worked together, although possibly not directly, on Evelyn. If anyone in Village has a chance of really understanding Miranda's plight, or knowing the truth behind it, it would be Mia. Yet we don't see them interact a single time. Which leads me to the next section...

Conclusion On Theme + Missed Potential:

Okay, okay, so it's pretty obvious at this point that, as previously stated, the game's theme is parenthood. Every section has its symbolism, the story is very obviously about a man trying to rescue his daughter, etc, etc, but what's the point? Is there a lesson, or a more focused interpretation of the central theme? Let's take one last step back, and focus on something I've mentioned a few times now: The comparison between Ethan and Mother Miranda.

Recurring dialogue from Ethan, Alcina, and Mother Miranda all point towards the developers acknowledging that the characters are similar, but there's nowhere near as much conversation about it as I would like. Several times we have the antagonists ask Ethan how he's so willing to kill someone else's child, or prevent them from (essentially) doing what he's doing (aka saving his daughter). While Ethan responds with a mix of "well you started it" and "aghhh fuck-a-you, bitch", there's a much more solid, unspoken difference: Mother Miranda sends her underlings to kill, so that she may revive her daughter. Ethan kills (read: does the work himself) to get his daughter. The difference is much bigger, and more important, at the end of the game, when we realize just how far it goes. Ethan dies to save his daughter. Time and time again Mother Miranda has killed others for her work, but in the end she is stopped when someone willingly dies to stop her.

Where does Mia come in? Mia, the badass mother, the one who once worked alongside Mother Miranda, should have been the nail in the coffin. She is the one who survives, who lives on to raise Rose, she is the silent solution to Ethan's sacrifice. Miranda, you fool, what could you have accomplished if you had held onto your makeshift family? Through Mia (and Chris, to a lesser degree), his "loss" becomes a victory. There's a certain poetic justice that comes with Rose's full family being instrumental in saving her, when Miranda so readily spurned her own family.

Mia could have had an actual conversation with Miranda, their history giving the latter a reason to actually listen. I'm not saying that Miranda would have changed her mind/plans, but the conversation would have been a well-needed contrast to Ethan's "arggg what the fuck is happening, I only have two reactions to things. agg fuck you". Additionally, I feel that Mia (who was captured and had to endure who-knows-what) deserves the opportunity to be the one who points out Miranda's mistakes, who delivers the final "fuck you" to her. More than that, she's the one at the end who can say that hey, maybe she can understand some of what Miranda did. Was there anything her and Ethan wouldn't have done to save Rose? As much as Ethan is a foil to Miranda, Mia could (and should) have played a similar role.

When so much of the story and symbolism revolves around Miranda's experience as a mother, it only would have been fair to shine a light on her equivalent. Her better.

There's more I wanted to say/feel like I didn't properly get across, and I might add more to this at some point, but it's 5:40 AM right now, and I'm starting to feel like my brain is slowing down, so... Feel free to reblog/comment and add your own thoughts!

[idreamtofmanderleyagain]

Hot takes about Severus Snape are a wierdly decent glimpse into how a person with progressive values analyses things. Literally every time someone talks about Snape, it’s like this tiny window into how one-dimentionally people actually think.

Recently saw a twitter post that was a fantastic example. Here’s how it goes (paraphrasing):

Person A:“Snape is POC and Queer coded, that’s why you guy’s hate him uwu lol.”

Person B: “Actually I hate him because he was mean and abusive to children under his care uwu but go off I guess lol”

Both of these takes are designed to be dramatic and/or reactionary. They each use partial truths to paint very broad strokes. These are get-em-in-one-hit quips. This is virtue signalling, if you’ll excuse that loaded phrase. Nobody had a substantial conversation, but now everyone who sees their statement knows the high ground they took.

At least a hundred other people chimed in to add their own little quippy hot takes into play, none of which add anything significant, but clearly made everyone feel very highly of themselves.

So many layers of nuance and complex analysis is completely lost in this kind of discussion. On tumblr, you get more of this kind of bullshit, but you don’t have a word count limit, so you guys just spew endless mountains of weak overblown evidence backing up your bullshit arguments, none of which was really about engaging in a real conversation anyway.

Here’s the thing about Snape.

He is a childhood domestic abuse victim. His abuser is a muggle.

He becomes a student at a magical school that takes him away from his abuser and immediately instills in him the idea that being a part of this magical world is a badge of self-worth, empowerment, and provides safety and security - provided that he keeps in line.

There is a war is being waged in that world over his right to exist (he is a half blood).

He is a marginalized person within the context of the narrative, forced to constantly be in the same living space as the children of his own oppressors who are being groomed and recruited into a hate group militia (the pureblood slytherins). They are in turn trying to do the same to him.

He is marginalized person bullied by children who are also part of his oppressor group, but who have “more liberal” leanings and aren’t direct about why he’s being targeted (the mauraders are all purebloods, Sirius, who was the worst offender, was raised in a bigoted household, the same one that produced Bellatrix.).

He had a crush on a girl who is a muggleborn, and therefore she is considered even lesser than him and carries a stigma to those who associate with her. That girl was his only real friend. In his entire life.

For both Snape and Lily, allying themselves to a pureblood clique within their own houses would be a great way of shielding themselves from a measure of the bigotry they were probably facing. There would have been obvious pressure from those cliques to disconnect with one and other.

Every other person who associates with Snape in his adulthood carries some sort of sociopolitical or workplace (or hate cult) baggage with their association. Some of them will physically harm and/or kill him if he steps out of line. He hasn’t at any point had the right environment to heal and adjust from these childhood experiences. Even his relationship with Dumbledore is charged with constant baggage, including the purebloods who almost killed him during their bullying getting a slap on the wrist, the werewolf that almost killed him as a child being placed in an authority position over new children, etc. Dumbledore is canonically manipulative no matter his good qualities, and he has literally been manipulating Snape for years in order to cultivate a necessary asset in the war.

He is a person who is not in the stable mental state necessary to be teaching children, whom has been forced to teach children. While also playing the role of double agent against the hate group militia, the one that will literally torture you for mistakes or backtalk or just for fun. The one that will torture and kill him if he makes one wrong move.

Is the math clicking yet? From all of this, it’s not difficult to see how everything shitty about Snape was cultivated for him by his environment. Snape was not given great options. Snape made amazingly awful choices, and also some amazingly difficult, courageous ones. Snape was ultimately a human who had an extremely bad life, in which his options were incredibly grim and limited.

In fact, pretty much every point people make about how shitty Snape is as a person makes 100% logical sense as something that would emerge from how he was treated. Some if it he’s kind of right about, some of it is the inevitable reality of suffering, and some of it is part of the cycle of abuse and harm.

Even Snape’s emotional obsession with Lily makes logical sense when you have the perspective that he literally has no substantial positive experiences with other human beings that we know of, and he has an extreme, soul destroying guilt complex over her death. Calling him an Incel mysoginist nice guy projects a real-world political ideology and behavior that does not really apply to the context of what happened to him and her.

Even Snape’s specific little acts of cruelty to certain students is a reflection of his own life experiences. He identifies with Neville; more specifically, he identifies his own percieved emotional weaknesses in his childhood in Neville. There’s a very sad reason there why he feels the urge to be so harsh.

Snape very clearly hates himself, in a world where everyone else hates him, too. Imagine that, for a second. Imagine total internal and external hatred, an yearning for just a little bit of true connection. For years. Imagine then also trying to save that world, even if it’s motivated by guilt. Even if nobody ever knows you did it and you expect to die a miserable death alone.

There are more elements here to consider, including the way Rowling described his looks (there may be something in there re: ugliness and swarthy stereotyping). These are just the things that stand out the most prominently to me.

J.K. Rowling is clearly also not reliable as an imparter of moral or sociopolitical philosophies. I don’t feel that her grasp of minority experiences is a solid one, considering how she picks and chooses who is acceptable and who is a threat.

All of that said, this is a logically consistent character arc. Within the context of his narrative, Snape is a marginalized person with severe PTSD and emotional instability issues who has absolutely no room available to him for self-improvement or healing, and never really has. And yes, he’s also mean, and caustic, and verbally abusive to the students. He’s also a completey miserable, lonely person.

There are elements in his character arc that mirror real world experiences quite well. If nothing else, Rowling is enough of an emotional adult to recognise these kinds of things and portray something that feels authentic.

In my opinion, it’s not appropriate to whittle all this down by comparing him directly to the real world experiences of marginalized groups - at least if you are not a part of the group you are comparing him to. There have been many individuals who have compared his arc to their own personal experiences of marginalization, and that is valid. But generally speaking, comparing a white straight dude to people who are not that can often be pretty offensive. This is not a valuable way to discuss either subject.

Also, I believe that while it’s perfectly okay to not like Snape as a character, many of the people who act like Person B are carrying Harry’s childhood POV about Snape in their hearts well into their own adulthood. And if nothing else, Rowling was attempting to say something here about how our perspectives (should) grow and change as we emotionally mature.  She doesn’t have to be a good person herself to have expressed something true about the world in this instance, and since this story is a part of our popular culture, people have a right to feel whatever way they do about this story and it’s characters.

The complexity of this particular snapshot of fictionalized marginalization, and what it reveals about the human experience, cannot be reduced down to “he’s an abuser so he’s not worth anyone’s time/you are bad for liking him.”

And to be honest, I think that it reveals a lot about many of us in progressive spaces, particularly those of us who less marginalized but very loud about our values, that we refuse to engage with these complexities in leu of totally condemning him. Particularly because a lot of the elements I listed above are indeed reflected in real world examples of people who have experienced marginalization and thus had to deal with the resulting emotional damage, an mental illness, and behavior troubles, and bad decisions. Our inability to address the full scope of this may be a good reflection of how we are handling the complexity of real world examples.

Real people are not perfect angels in their victimhood. They are just humans who are victims, and we all have the capacity to be cruel and abusive in a world where we have been given cruelty and abuse. This is just a part of existing. If you cannot sympathise with that, or at least grasp it and aknowledge it and respect the people who are emotionally drawn to a character who refects that, then you may be telling on yourself to be honest.

To be honest, this is especially true if you hate Snape but just really, really love the Mauraduers. You have a right to those feelings, but if you are moralizing this and judging others for liking Snape, you’ve confessed to something about how you’ve mentally constructed your personal values in a way I don’t think you’ve fully grasped yet.

I have a hard time imagining a mindset where a story like Snape’s does not move one to empathy and vicarious grief, if I’m honest. I feel like some people really just cannot be bothered to imagine themselves in other people’s shoes, feeling what they feel and living like they live. I struggle to trust the social politics of people who show these kinds of colors, tbh.

But maybe that’s just me.

[jmoriarty-221b]

So I saw somewhere a post that talked about how some fictional characters just have a divorce vibe going on, like, at no point in time were they ever married but they just give off that feeling that they got divorced

And now I can only think of Clark Kent and Lex Luthor having that vibe

And I spent close to an hour talking about this to my sibling and how it would be a good idea for a new DC show like, you can make so much money off of just the main Batfam alone and there are literally so many people in there that it’s just an amazing idea to have them all in a show together but kind of like a Good Luck Charlie kinda thing because there’s more than enough angst in the world

But in the case of not having enough of a budget for so many characters in one show I turned to the Superfam (Batfam is Huge like, I don’t even know half of the extended family version and that’s like at least ten characters so I could see why it wouldn’t be entirely feasible to have a show that included everyone while still being good with nice character development without having a billion dollars for the budget)

The Superfam, in my personal experience, is composed of Ma & Pa Kent (farm vibes plus I refuse to have either of them die in my AU), Clark Kent (main Superman), Lois Lane (Lana? was Smallville Lois i guess??? But idk enough about her so she’s not here), Jon Kent (Superboi II), Kara Danvers (Supergirl) & Conner Kent (Superboi I)

Now I’ve stopped watching CW shows like, forever ago??? But my brother kinda keeps up with them and basically the gist is that the ratings of every other show suck Except for the Superman & Lois show (because it’s 💫new💫) and I saw the cover of the poster like “Ah, the werewolf dude. . . mmmhhmmm that’s Lois yes, yes that’s Johnny boi, and um is that???? Nooooo, they wouldn’t do that to Conner right???? Please tell me they didn’t make Conner blonde” and I was informed that the blonde teen is Chris???? Like

Whoms’t do ye speak of

I’m not even joking but the only way I even know of Chris is from a random fanfic I read where Dick Grayson gets his own super from an alternate reality named Chris, that’s my only point of reference for this character

But let’s talk about how Conner Kent (OG Superboi) was excluded

Now I haven’t seen any episodes of this and I probably never will (no hate I’m just really unmotivated to start new shows at all) so idk if they might mention Conner or even allude to him in one scene or something

But this was my main motivator as to my new Superfam TV Show Idea

Have Lex Luthor not be a Superman villain, he’s mainly a successful businessman, a little shady but who isn’t, and he doesn’t want to Kill Superman, he just wants to be able to have some sort of viable protection against a Kryptonian in case of an invasion (see Man of Steel + CW’s Supergirl) or suddenly having a mind controlled Superman on their hands (see Justice League series or just look up what Red Krytonite does) so he makes it like his side thing to figure out ways to neutralize or hold back a Kryptonian, Clark totally thinks that Lex is obsessed with finding a way to kill Superman because they had a bad end to their friendship in high school so he’s always suspicious of Lex, Lex hasn’t really ever tried to kill him though because 1. It’s not that deep Clark ok? And 2. He’s a busy busy man with a very important job position and a company to run so does he look like he has time to harbor an obsession over someone who rejected him back in high school??? You’re more of a constant side quest Clark, so stop trying to put him on the JL watchlist ( btw ik about Lena Luthor, haven’t forgotten her but she doesn’t really play a part in this AU so let’s just have her and Kara off to the side doing their own thing ok? Ok)

Lex, Bruce & Oliver all knew each other when they were kids and went to the same school, this is just an extra detail I wanted to happen because Lex and Ollie definitely know Bruce is Batman and absolutely HATE having to deal with Brucie Wayne because “I know you’re just doing this to irritate me Bruce, you just want to see if you can make a vein throb in my forehead but I will valiantly ignore your dumbassery because I know you hate being Brucie just as much as we hate having to put up with Brucie so suck on that you petty bitch” because they bonded in ye olden days, childhood friends so to speak

Anyway so Cadmus tries to get Lex to make an investment in their company, seeing as Cadmus is shadier than Gotham when it rains Lex is basically like ‘no ❤️’ and doesn’t make a deal with them, Cadmus gets mad at not having Lexcorp financially backing them so Lex has an ‘accident’ and they steal his DNA, then they steal Superman’s DNA somehow and *boom* a Superboi is formed

Because I don’t know much about how the Core Four became friends in the first place (Robin Tim Drake, Impulse Bart Allen, Wonder Girl Cassie Sandsmark & Superboy Conner Kent) I’m just gonna go with what happens in the show Young Justice except it’s the Core Four becoming the Core Four when they liberated Conner (who at this point believes himself to be a clone of Superman and has only been given Superboy as a name) from Cadmus, same shit goes down meaning that Clark is just straight up NOT vibing with Conner, Conner just wants a mentor please, and the Bats kinda give Clark a passive aggressive treatment for not taking Superboy under his wing or at least agreeing to teach him how to control his powers, especially Tim because that’s his Bestie so yes

Anyway, YJ saves ppl and is on the news or whatever and Lex finds out about Superboy’s existence that way, so he researches this new super on his free time, finds out that he came from Cadmus and claims to be a clone of Superman, yet doesn’t have the whole power set Superman has??? Wait, didn’t Lex reject Cadmus’ proposal and the got into a mysterious accident??? Long story short Lex goes connecting the dots, hacks into Cadmus’ files, finds out he technically has a son with Superman and decides to take Superboy under his wing (I’ll go more in depth as to why Lex would want to do this in this AU later but the abridged version would be that he wants a kid but doesn’t have the time nor interest in finding a wife??? Also the radiation that made him bald as a kid also affected his reproductive system so while it’s not impossible for him to conceive kids he would have a very hard time actually getting to father a kid)

Him and Conner, who still goes by Superboy at this point in time, meet up and Conner finds out that here is a parent figure that is both available and actively wants to be a part of his life, so he agrees to get to know Lex and the series would focus on them becoming a family, with a special episode when Conner asks Lex for help in choosing a name for himself and it ends up with him agreeing to become Conner Luthor, it would be heartwarming and Mercy would make sure it happens within a day (Mercy is Lex’s bodyguard/PA but they’re also besties and she becomes the Responsible yet Chaotic Aunt as Lex and Conner’s father-son relationship progresses)

Obviously Clark becomes super suspicious of Lex getting close to his ‘clone’ and when Conner decides to go public as Lex’s son he’s like *GASP* and calls up Bruce because we need to get on this Bruce, Lex is a villain and blah blah blah but Bruce would be over Clark’s shit and hit him with that “actually, Lex was also an unwilling genetic donor to Superboy, who actually is not your clone either, and has agreed to take him in, I’ve been on this shit since they first met and the kid is doing just fine so if you keep poking your nose in their business then that’s your problem but you better be ready to pay child support bitch . . . have a good day ❤️”

The series would just focus on Conner getting to have a good parent figure in Lex and go more into their civilian lives rather than focusing on the superhero thing, Conner, Bart, Tim & Cassie have a sleepover at Lex’s house at one point, Lex totally Knows what’s up but it’s all good because these are his baby’s friends and they’re good people who are more than willing to prank Superman for rejecting his kid and giving his baby self worth issues (Mercy supports them)

Anyway, that’s basically the idea for a new Superhero Show