#he deserves so much better than this completely accurate answer.

[tymptir]

WHAT KIND OF VILLAIN ARE YOU?

Then Let Me Be Evil. - Garlan Tyrell

You never wanted to hurt anyone, but the world never gave you a choice. You did the best you could with what you had, but every innocent mistake you made was held against you when it counted, every crossroads led you down the wrong path no matter which way you went. No matter what you did, the odds were stacked against you. It wasn't fair, and you are sick and tired of being told what a monster you are for things out of your control. Well, fine. They want a monster? YOU'LL GIVE THEM A MONSTER!

tagged by: @goldenngore ♡

tagging: you if you enjoy pain . . .

[the-guilty-writer]

Big Biggie

Request: from @itmejado

Could you write an imagine where Rossis daughter has an asthma problem and has to go to hospital for antibiotics and stay for a few days and the team comes and spends time with her, like playing chess with Spencer, penny makes cookies, she watches sports with Derek?

David Rossi x daughter!reader, Platonic!BAU x rossi!reader

Summary: reader with asthma finds herself in the hospital while her dad is away. The team steps in to keep her company.

A/N: I don't have asthma so I did research to try to get as accurate as possible. I hope this captures everything okay. If not, I am always open to feedback in order to make the next request better. Thanks!

CW: reader has asthma, minor swearing, hospitals, IVs, reader is sassy (as I'd imagine Rossi's daughter would be)

---

You hated frat boys

No. That statement didn’t cover it all; you hated frat boys that didn’t have the decency to cover their damn mouths when they coughed. Of course, not everyone had been raised in a mansion, but sometimes the level of common sense people lacked completely baffled you. After just one class of sitting next to a guy from Sigma-Phi-Disease-Factory claiming that he “just has allergies” you ended up with pneumonia.

No biggie, right?

Yes biggie. Big biggie.

Because having athsma made treating pneumonia far more complicated than taking a trip to the student health center.

The persistance of your wet cough and the burn in your chest as you heaved air in and out of your lungs became increasingly concerning. You weren’t sure if you had so much pain in your chest because you felt like you couldn’t breathe, or if you felt like you couldn’t breathe because of the pain. When your temperature skyrocketed and your skill chilled, you had your roommate drop you off at the ER.

It didn’t take the doctors long to decide you needed to be admitted, and immediately after finding out the pneumonia was bacterial, you were glad you hadn’t waited any longer than you did. Growing up with athsma meant you had been through enough treatments, seen enough specialists, and had enough infections to know that you’d be laid up in the hospital on IV antibiotics for at least five days.

Staring at the ceiling, you found yourself craving company, but you weren’t sure who to call. Your roommates were busy working and your dad was on vacation. Well, actually he was on his book tour, but that was the closest thing David Rossi got to a vacation. You didn’t want to bother him.

The problem with that- you were still on his insurance plan. You’d have to bother him some time before you got discharged. It was probably better that you did it now rather than later.

“Ah, if it isn’t my favorite girl," he answered after the first ring. “I was just about to call and tell you about this fantastic restaurant I went to last night. I think it’s the best carbonara I’ve had since your great-grandmother was alive.”

“That’s great, dad,” you managed to choke out.

“(Y/N), what’s wrong?” Your dad said, his voice filled concern.

You wanted to sigh, but it came out as a cough. “I’m in the hospital,” you managed to say between heavy breaths. “Bacterial pneumonia. I have to be on an IV for a few days, but I’ll be okay.”

“I’ll catch the next flight home-”

“Dad, no.” You coughed, the speed at which you cut him off causing mucus to come up your throat. “There’s only one more day left of your tour. You deserve to have some fun every once in a while. I’ll be fine. Bored, but fine.”

You heard your dad hesitate. Rossi had raised you on his own. Every minute he didn’t spend working to catch the most dangerous criminals in the country, he spent taking care of you. The man deserved a break.

“Okay,” he said. “But if you need me all you have to do is call and I’ll be there.”

“Okay, dad.” Your eyes felt heavy. “I love you.”

“I love you too, kiddo.”

---

You weren’t sure how long you were asleep for, but when you woke up there was someone next to your bed.

“Who are you and why are you eating my jello?” You muttered, your eyes still only half open.

“Good morning to you too, (Y/N).” Derek chuckled. “How are you feeling?”

“Never better,” you replied, followed by a wheeze. “Why are you here? Let me guess, one of the nurses here is a serial murderer- wait no. Dr. Super Genius managed to get shot again.”

At that, Derek burst out laughing, nearlying dropping his empty jello cup on the floor. “You are your father’s daughter, aren’t you?” he said. “I’m here because I heard a certain Rossi told her dad not to come home from his book tour early and I couldn’t let the BAU’s favorite oldest kid be bored and alone.”

“I appreciate that, Derek, but you really didn’t have to. There isn’t much to do around here.”

“You didn’t let me finish,” Derek grabbed the remote for the TV. “The Commanders are playing the Bears today and there was no way I was going to miss an opportunity to watch my home team beat yours.” His smile turned cocky.

You wanted to back-talk him but you began coughing violently, mucus rising in your throat, chest heaving as you struggled for air.

“Let it out, kid,” Derek rubbed your arm softly. “Let it out.”

Just then another agent you knew all too well walked into the room, but this one was far less fun- Agent Hotchner. Though you had known him the longest of anyone on your father's team, he didn’t make for great company. Unless, of course, one considered filling out copious amounts of paperwork in silence a fun activity.

“Morgan, what did you do?” He asked.

“Nothing, Hotch!” Derek said defensively.

He was right- it wasn’t his fault your body decided that it needed to try to eject your lungs from your chest. But Hotch wasn't looking at you, instead, he walked over to the table with not one, not two, but three empty jello cups.

Your coughing subsided and Derek turned to look at his boss, who raised a suspicious eyebrow. “I might have participated in the jello.”

Hotch let out a small, rare smile and turned to you. “Your dad gave me the information to get your forms filled out so you don’t have to worry about it. I have to go, but you can call me if you need anything.”

“Thanks,” you managed to get out.

Hotch nodded. “Of course. Get some rest.” The interaction was short, brief, and to the point, but Aaron Hotchner leaving work to fill out medical forms so you didn’t have to do it later was his way of letting you know he cared.

“Now,” Derek said. “Where were we?” He turned up the volume on the TV just as the Commanders scored a touchdown.

“You’re going down.” You smirked at him.

---

“Ha! The Commanders win 14 to 7!” You cheered weakly. The antibiotics were starting to kick in, making the suffocating feeling in your chest far less painful than before.

Derek rolled his eyes. “Alright, alright, kid. But they only won because that ref made a bad call.”

“It doesn’t matter. They still won.”

“Who won what?” Penelope Garcia toddled into the room on bright pink heels. She was wearing a black and white polkadot dress with a cardigan to match her shoes. Sometimes you wondered if she had to bribe someone to get around FBI dress code.

“The Commanders beat the Bears,” you told her, smirking at Derek.

“Ooo!” Penelope squealed. She didn’t understand sports, but she understood enough to ask “So your team beat Derek’s team?”

You nodded.

“Do you know what that means?”

You shook your head. 

“It means that you get to pick out your cookie before he does.” Penelope smiled and pulled a box of cookies out from her purse, offering them to you. They were the good kind- the ones that she spent hours icing and designing to look like cartoon kittens.

“Penny, you are the best,” you told her. You picked out a cookie that looked a whole lot like Sergio and took your time enjoying the delicious treat. “So good.” 

Derek nodded in agreement as he finished off his first cookie and went to grab another one. Penelope swatted his hand away.

“I made one for each of us,” she said.

“But there’s one left,” Derek observed.

Before Garcia could reply, Spencer Reid made his way into the room and grabbed the last cookie. Derek looked defeated.

“Hey, (Y/N),” Reid said, putting down his satchel and taking a seat before starting on his dessert.

“Hey, Spencer,” you replied, then furrowed your brow in confusion. “You came in here without a hazmat suit on?” Spencer was known for having a slight problem with germs.

“As long as we stay five feet away we should be fine,” he countered. “Plus I want a rematch of our annual holiday game.” He pulled a chess board from his satchel and began to set it up on a small chair.

“Reid,” you started. “How are we supposed to play if I can’t even reach the board?”

“Morgan can move the pieces for you,” Spencer said with a mouthful of cookie.

“Penny can’t do it instead?” you asked, half to tease Derek and half because you were sure the guy had never played chess in his life.

“Hey, ouch!” Derek said, bringing his hand to his chest and pretending to be hurt. “But you are right. I think Penelope would be the better choice.”

“I’m on it!” Garcia got up from her seat to move closer to Reid, who had placed himself as far from your bed as possible. 

The game took far longer than normal, with Spencer having to guide Garcia through what moves you were asking for, and the match ended in a stalemate. You were about to start another round when a nurse came by, letting everyone know that visiting hours were up.

You said your thank you's and goodbye's to your father's team members. After that, it wasn’t long before you fell asleep.

---

“Yes, and according to Morgan, her and Reid’s chess match ended in a stalemate. I have a feeling he might not be able to wait until the holiday party for a second rematch,” Hotch told Dave over the phone.

“Thanks for doing that, Aaron,” Rossi said. “It means a lot.”

Before Hotch had a chance to answer, a flight attendant tapped Rossi on the shoulder. “Excuse me, sir. I’m going to have to ask you to put your phone on airplane mode for the flight.”

Rossi gestured that he just needed one more minute and put the phone back up to his ear.

“What time are you getting in tomorrow?” Hotch asked.

Rossi sighed. “Not till the afternoon at least. I forgot that layovers are a huge pain in the ass.”

“Well, try not to worry too much about (Y/N). Emily and JJ have something planned to keep her occupied.”

Rossi smiled. “I’m sure she’ll love it.”

“Well,” Hotch said, taking on a bit of a playful tone. “As Garcia might say, it’s no biggie.”

“Sir.” the flight attendant came back, this time looking far more annoyed.

“I’ve gotta go. Thanks again, Aaron.” Rossi hung up the phone.

It’s no biggie.

But it was. Even when he couldn’t be there for his daughter, his team- their second family- always would be. And that was a big biggie.

[breyito]

Batfamily Introduction- Matt Reeves universe

So...this is how I'd go about assembling the Batfamily in Reeves verse. I have (at least the movies about Jason) completely developed in my brain, but well, writing the scripts is a whole other issue. I could, but 2k fics are too much for me at the moment, so I thought I'd share this with the world, free some space in my brain, so to speak. Praying that someone out there, that has the actual pull to make this happen, reads this and maybe uses it a little. Mainly about Jason, because my poor boy deserves better, and an live action portrayal that is accurate and true to character, instead of the constant angst trainreck that is his life in the comics, for some reason.

The more detailed an idea is, the more doubts I have about it, idk. Dick's is less developed since pretty much everyone is familiar with him, so I kinda skipped him, sorry. And Damian...well, I don't know enough about him to write him much more than he is, and tbh, I'd like to do something with him and Jon more than anything else.

Here it goes!!! (Also, I'm just a fan, so please don't hate on this, yeah? If you don't like it, move on.)

Batman: Gravity / Gravitas/ Gravitational Pull

(Dick's origin story as Robin movie, Zucco,  Selina helps, Ace shows up, Zucco almost dies but D!R decides not to, little scenes with Batgirl (?),etc)

      •Robin the first*: Dick's solo movie when he's older, establishing the Titans (Babs, Roy, Donna, Joey(?)), Deathstroke as antagonist(?). He ends the movie as Nightwing (?).

Batman: Mind Games

(Jason as Robin origin story, Jason steals the Batmobile tires, B sends him to a home. Mad Hatter/ Dollmaker is buying kids from Ma Gunn's and Jay helps B & Gordon realize this and to put a stop to it, B ends up kidnapped and Nightwing isn't answering Agent A and Batgirl is holed up in the precinct with Gordon; so Jay dresses up as Robin and goes to try and stop the freak. He trips the rogue with his marbles and knocks him out, waiting until Batgirl/Nightwing come to free the hostages from the tech, keeping the conscious kids calm. Dick is surprised about Jay but not a dick about it. Bruce offers to adopt Jay, and says it's not necessary to be Robin too, but Dick Is all "unless you want to, little wing! I'm gonna teach you all the *best* moves B is too old to do!" Sue me, I want one happy Batfamily, ok? Ok).

      •Robin the second*: Jason's solo movie, Kid Devil Pen pal, Kyle(?), Rose(?), Gar(?) or the Titans say he's too little?; Catwoman/Ivy/Nocturna as mentors/aunts? Heist movie. Professor Pig/Toymaker as antagonist? He ends up saving the Titans/Batman despite the doubts about him.

Batman: "A death in the family"/[?]

(Garzonas/child trafficking ring; they butt heads about 'procedure' and 'too much violence'; Barbara is paralyzed; Jay looks for Haywood, she sells him out to Joker, Jason dies. A few months later, B gets called to deal with Flashpoint and finds out Flash is the reason Jay died ("Allen, you killed my son? You killed my SON!" "I'm sorry- Bruce, I'm-" "Effective immediately, Allen's tenure in the Justice League is terminated. Central City will be relegated to Wallace, if he's ready to take on the name." "Bruce!" "If he can not use his powers responsibly, he can not be trusted with them. Unless you want me to give you an antidote." "...you don't have one." "Are you willing to try me?" post-credit scene. Jay's hand breaking the ground of his grave post-post credit scene)

Batman: [?]/Bane of the City

(Tim as Robin Origin story. Broken back, Dick as Batman for a little while, they defeat Bane, Bruce heals a little bit, Barbara remakes herself as Oracle and saves their asses at a crucial moment, etc. Jason is alive and with the LoA, baby!Damián? post-credit scene.)

    •Robin the third*: Tim's solo movie, he finds Connor and goes against Lex? + Cassie and Bart, of course. Steph is introduced at the end (iconic brick-in-the-face moment).

Batman: Under the Red Hood/[?]

(RH takes over the Alley in a couple of weeks; steals the kryptonite and ruins deals for Black Mask; kills the leutenants of the mobs and gains control over them, etc. ("B, this guys is not out of control." "Dick?" "I'd say this guy is completely in control. Look at these! He hasn't killed a single innocent. Every one of these men and woman have charges for murder, rape, abuse, child pornography or molestation, human trafficking... and all of them got away with it or got the minimal sentence or had the charges dropped or the witnesses killed. They weren't casualities, they were targeted." "It doesn't matter, he's still killing people." "Yeah, bad people! The worst society has to offer." "Dick..." "Bruce, we have bigger problems than a man that keeps the civilians out of things, the children protected and only takes his rage on the worst of humanity.") Jason still attacks Tim at TT, but only to keep him out of the final confrontation -broken wrist, ankle and bruised ribs- ("No more dead Robins" is written in Jason's blood on the wall). Jason as RH reveal; B accepts Jay killing Joker -he turns around and gives him permission- but the damn clown blows up the building before he can and scapes even after RH shoots him a few times. Jason collapses in Bruce's arms, sobbing, terrified. B asks Jay to comes home and he does, to a heartfelt reunion. Jason apologizes to Tim, giving him the R he cut off the Robin suit in the case instead of the one he took in the Tower. Damian's existence bomb drop post-credit scene. One big happy Batfamily, see?).

    •Robin the fourth*: Steph's solo movie. She starts the movie as Spoiler, ends the movie as Robin but dead. Steph tries to stop her dad, meets R!Tim, they fall in love somewhere in the middle. R!Tim wants her as part of the Titans, she refuses cuz her mom doesn't know about Spoiler and she wants to stay in Gotham due to Cluemaster. Jack Drake forces Tim to give up Robin (Steph finds out his identity due to him screaming threats to Bruce) and Bruce offers R to her a few days later, she agrees. Tim doesn't like ir, but Steph is Tim's only contact with the Batfam, so he's ok-ish with it. Cluemaster realizes his daughter is Spoiler/the new Robin and sells the info to Sionis, hoping he'll get him out of prison (he thinks Black Mask will use it to find out who Batman is, not torture her to death, but still). B&Steph butt heads, some "you're too much like Jason" comments/classism thrown her way (Jason is in the LoA trying to convince Talia to give up Damian to B, btw) She starts a war between two gangs to stop them destroying her block/neighborhood's business and homes. BM kidnaps her then, and tries to torture the info of Batman and Red Hood (his bitter enemy) out of her. She holds out until N&B&RH rescue her, but too late. She "dies" then ("was I a good Robin?" "you were a great Robin"). (Post-credit scene is her waking up gasping in a hospital bed, her window shows a Savanna.)

Batman: Blood Son/ Blood Feud

(Damian gets to Gotham to witness the end tail of the gang war after Steph's death. Tim is back in the Manor, back as Robin (he put on the suit to stop the war and BM; since Jack is in a coma he doesn't care anymore), working with B & N & RH to clean things up. R almost kills BM by beating him, so RH puts a blade to the guy's throat and says he will kill him if Tim says the word. Tim, in the end, says no. RH then cuts through BM's spinal cord, leaving him paralyzed. ("As a compromise" he grins savagely at Batman, winking.) Damian tries to off Tim the moment they meet, but Tim is very on edge and puts him down quickly and brutally ("You want to be Robin, remplace Steph, with *those* skills? Ha! Give me a break/Pathetic.") Dick tries to explain how fragile Tim is at the moment, while Jason & Alfred try to make them bond by cooking together, and B makes them solve cold cases together (it turns into a competition, of course, but since it ends with Tim spending less Time on the field, B doesn't stop it). Jack dies after an attack at the hospital by Cap Boomerang; after the funeral he goes out as RR, to get revenge. Zsasz gets him first, since RR is out of it. Damian -who was following him, not worried- ends up saving Tim after Zsasz kidnaps him on BM's orders, as payback. He stalls Zsasz until the others get there and cuts off one of his arms while trying not to kill him. (I wanna add Killer Croc here somehow, he's hired but Damián either convinces him to leave or beats him by drugging him or something). While Tim is recovering in the hospital/cave he passes the R to him. (''You'll do a good job." "Tt, of course I will." "Just...maybe get a less sharp weapon?" "Because blunt force trauma is more elegant?" "Nop. It's usually less deadly, tho."))

The (*) means I have no idea for a tittle. I know I want it to be secuencial, like a series, because that's what they are lol.

[danglovely]

Regrading Taskmaster: S04E01 A fat bald white man.

*Score changes noted in parenthesis.

New series alert and I'd say we've finally reached one of the series that most consider a peak of Taskmaster. I've said as much in the post where I ranked the series, but I'm not quite as fond of this series as most. However, Joe Lycett might be one of my favorite contestants of all time . . . so if this regrade ends with him as the winner, you can call me biased.

Prize Task: The most interesting autograph on the most interesting vegetable.

Two possible methods of grading this exist: (1) It can be evaluated by the total completed submission, or (2) The vegetable and autograph can be evaluated separately. The former seems more appropriate because some of the contestants use a theme for their whole submission.

Hugh brings in a forged "Malcolm X" signature on a carrot. He's actively sacking his points for a joke here. Joe had Sara Pascoe trick Greg into signing a yellow courgette and gets marked down because she lied about it being for charity.

Lolly tries a workaround by placing a signed Black Eyed Peas CD on some black eyed peas. Even if this is considered "on the vegetable," it's a very temporary or conditional sort of on. I'm dropping her below Joe because, to quote him: "fuck charity."

Mel had four of the five members of Take That sign different vegetables (I don't think there was any connection as to the specific vegetables, but they were all interesting). While incomplete, she quadrupled the amount of signatures anyone else got (presumably Lolly just bought a pre-signed CD).

Noel had Sir David Suchet sign a broad bean. Impressive signature, but I'm wasn't familiar with him so I'm struggling to see how it can beat Mel's four, no matter how impressive he is.

Hugh: 1 (0) Joe: 3 (+1) Lolly: 2 (-1) Mel: 5 (-1) Noel: 4 (-1)

VT 01: Destroy this cake. Most beautify destruction wins.

No disagreement on the winner here. Joe using fireworks to blow up a cake looks just as good as it sounds. Production even helped him out with slow-mo and a little Hoist.

I cannot figure out how Noel beat Lolly here. Chucking a cake in a washing machine is not more beautiful than what is actually a pretty good heart portrait. I honestly find Hugh's knife-work a little hypnotic and might have put him above Noel had it been a little cleaner.

Sorry Mel.

Hugh: 2 (0) Joe: 5 (0) Lolly: 4 (+1) Mel: 1 (0) Noel: 3 (-1)

VT 02: Create the best caricature of the person on the other side of the curtain. You may not look at the person.

Let's address the Hugh situation. He was looking at the model. Telescopes use mirrors to enlarge things and it is not incorrect to say that you are "looking at that thing through a telescope." Greg gave him one point because his drawing was terrible. He deserved a DQ.

The other thing I just noticed about this task is the word "caricature," so it's supposed to be ridiculous. Noel's is easily the best actual drawing and probably more accurate than Lolly's (despite her adding a properly colored dress). Joes is a better drawing of a human than Lolly's but at first I thought it was a caricature of himself. I'd probably put Lolly ahead for accuracy.

Mel's is really bad. So including the bonus point for getting the name, the scores are:

Hugh: 1 (-1) Joe: 3 (-1) Lolly: 4 (+1) Mel: 3 (0) Noel: 5 (0)

VT 03: Fell all the rubber ducks.

TM has done this task so many times and most people have figured out that the answer is "string." Since it's a matter of time the only question is whether someone breaks the rules. Weirdly, Alex explains they have to stay behind the rope in the studio and it's not read out on the task.

Regardless, no one tries to get around it and there doesn't seem to be any inadvertent crossing (unless you count them leaning over it to throw things).

Hugh: 5 Joe: 3 Lolly: 4 Mel: 1 Noel: 2

Live Task: Make the most juice. You must pick one fruit and one tool. If you pick the same tool as someone else, you must juice blindfolded. If you pick the same fruit as someone else, you must juice one-handed. If you pick the same fruit and tool as someone else, you must juice blindfolded, one-handed and bouncing up and down.

Everyone but Mel needed to juice one-handed and blindfolded. Joe immediately starts off by trying to pick up his bucket with two hands, realizes his mistake and drops it. I think this is mostly forgivable because I'm not even sure if he actually gets the second hand on it.

Less forgivable, Noel and Hugh just ignore the one-handed rule and use both regularly throughout the task.

I cannot fathom why they didn't get disqualified.

Hugh: DQ (-4) Joe: 4 (+1) Lolly: 3 (+2) Mel: 5 (0) Noel: DQ (-2)

Final:

Hugh: 9 (-4) Joe: 18 (+1) Lolly: 17 (+4) Mel: 15 (-1) Noel: 14 (-4)

So already a win to Joe originally achieved by Noel. Sort of hinges on whether or not Joe ought to have been disqualified in the live task. Even if he touched that bucket, I'm pretty confident he never "juiced" with both hands.

[sirenalpha]

Why are Thanos and Azula fans so mental

idk if u want a real answer but have it anyways, I haven't interacted with any Thanos fans so I can't say there, I think he was portrayed well and more memorable than a lot of other MCU villains though not all but ultimately his plan is kind of nonsensical so I don't find him that interesting to discuss

he's kind of a lot like Ozai in my opinion, Ozai has bricks for brains and he's only made interesting through his children and his menace and atla actually does better with the build up and menace and follow through probably because they had one consistent team rather than multiple directors

you only really need one post to discuss either of them which is that they're stupid and cruel and their children are better than them as people and/or characters and their actors did a really good job in helping their believability despite their super dumb plans

but if I were to guess, I think Thanos fans are mental because they think his plan is sound and applicable to the real world, and yes we humans on planet earth without magic are living on a finite planet under an economy that needs infinite growth to function which is obviously in conflict with finite reality which will make people twist themselves to try to square that cognitive dissonance to begin with, but ultimately the non-cruel and more effective though supremely difficult and potentially dangerous solution is to change the economy, but instead they support Thanos's halving the population as a logical and good solution but it's not, if you don't solve the underlying problem - the economy - you will still end up in a place of running out of resources due to an infinitely growing economy

to make it worse, Thanos's plan is even less sensical in the MCU than in the real world, he has the ability to make whatever he wants at will, he could make infinite resources and chooses not to, so if you take something that's cruel but could be a short term solution in a finite world and apply it to a scenario where those limits don't apply because magic

you have to be mental and also cruel to treat Thanos's plan as good and smart, you are fighting reality

and fighting reality is also why Azula's fans are mental

don't get me wrong, I really like Azula, she is a much better written character than Thanos, she doesn't have any plans or do anything super obviously stupid, but she is still a villain, has a negative character arc, and is flawed and some fans really cannot accept characters having any flaws or being culpable for their own problems in any way

a lot of the really mental Azula fans completely deny how manipulative she is, especially of Zuko, they see her as a fundamentally honest character because she told the truth a couple of times which does not match the text of the show

and if you deny that she is manipulative it's obviously hard to see that she is abusive which she is, mostly to Zuko but she's also cruel and tests Ty Lee and Mai

they see her as an abuse victim of Ozai, Ursa, and Iroh and one who did not receive help from anyone and deserved help and rescue from Iroh but more importantly from Zuko, and while it's true Ozai abused her, there's no evidence Ursa and Iroh abused her though they obviously weren't able to prevent the abuse, and Zuko as her abuse victim actually doesn't owe her shit and that's unacceptable to them

so accurately describing Azula as she is in the show is seen as an attack denigrating the character by Azula fans because they have a completely warped view of her that doesn't match the text of the show and only exists on their head which obviously is in conflict with reality

[missingn000]

hi yes this is incredibly late b/c work is shit tm but better late than never amirite

anyway, something about this chapter that leapt out at me immediately was Maki’s “uh, we are kids.” because i’m pretty sure something similar was said a couple chapters back (i can’t remember the exact instance though) and it seems to be a recurring theme in tpg: people being put into roles they don’t quite fill, not through any fault of their own, but simply because they cannot. gojo’s deification by jujutsu society is one such example, but it wasn’t something he had a say in, while nobara by comparison appears to have voluntarily taken on the task of acting(!) like an adult. she does, thankfully, end up joining maki & gang on the playground, but her conversation with higuruma undoes some of that progress:

“You treat me like a kid!”

“You are a kid!”

“And that’s enough reason to shut me out?!”

oh, higuruma… your intentions are kind, but your lack of tact is almost cruel. i think nobara’s response, coupled with the next line (“…brought a cannon and she’s not afraid to swim”) are very telling of her true feelings: even though she hates the fact that higuruma’s a murderer excluding the fact that his boss is worse, she is aware that he’s her parental figure now, and seeks (as all children do, especially those who were denied of it) emotional validation from him. higuruma really tried to pull the “being a child is not a sin” card but nobara didn’t hear the ‘not’ part lol. i find it depressingly ironic that his attempt at shielding her from the ugly truth of humanity & the entire mess with the sheriff end up widening the rift between them—it’s not… a terrible idea, in theory, but their circumstances are unique: nobara’s trying to understand & rationalise why the person she’s stuck with as a father did what he did, but she can’t do that if she’s missing some of the puzzle pieces. more accurately, higuruma won’t give them to her because the picture they complete is bleak, but she doesn’t know that!!!!

“I don’t know, Nobara. You deserve better than this.”

“You’re right, I do! But you won’t even try!”

… yeah sure kugisaki “you’re not my dad” nobara. and then, as if on cue, her phone rings with a call from her actual dad. the way she has to fight the urge to answer the call is nothing short of heartbreaking. she has to quash her own hopes, before her dad does it for her.

AAANDD THEN THEY HUGGED. THANK YOU FOR THIS. the part where higuruma wonders whether he’s about to be socked in the face reminded me of toji and maki’s hug in ch4 (yes i remembered), cus toji thought the exact same question. is this intentional please say yes. nevermind your answer is irrelevant i’m gonna start drawing parallels anyway /lh. toji & higuruma both start out extremely rough around the edges and knowing fuck all about parenting; maki & nobara both grew up with parents that didn’t love them. at least maki & toji had something to bond over (beating the shit out of other people. uh, curses. i mean curses.) nobara and higuruma on the other hand…….. lol

Also I didn’t miss the way Nobara was saved from a curse!!!! again!!!!! but the group shrugs it off, you know, as kids who literally just exorcised a curse by themselves do, and nobara’s too preoccupied with her crush on maki to feel all that offended. okay all jokes aside i think it really helps that they’re her age + she’s already interacted with them prior to this; she’s in a much better mental state than when higuruma first found her. i think it’s really cool that nobara has even more people fighting for her, which is exactly what she wants; she just hasn’t realised it, and i hope she does someday. (on an unrelated note: gotta love how maki takes centre stage and cleaves the curse in half though… her using yuuji’s sword as a platform to power herself thru the air is just 👌)

Does Nobara have anyone like that?

Yes. Yes, she does. Chi you’re drawing so many parallels here and I’m gonna throttle you. please don’t pit higuruma against a special grade…unless it’s toji, that’d be funny. who lets their kid bring a sword to school anyway?? tbf, it’s Phantom Guardian; i adore the idea that yuki’s cursed energy is with her, at all times…

btw yuuji is my fave if the pfp wasn’t obvious enough, and i cherish every crumb of his characterisation i get. i love the way he’s able to de-escalate any social situation because of how emotionally perceptive he is. kinda want to put him in a room with yuuta and maki and see what happens lmfao 💀💀

okay that concludes my horrendously long ramble. thank you for making it this far if u did. cheers

HIII KAY OH MY GOD??? THIS ANALYSIS IS SOOOO i put it into a word counter out of curiosity and the website said the reading level was college graduate so. 100000/10 analytical skills the curtains were indeed not just blue

response below cut this got long as hell

you're totally right that "uh, we are kids" was said in an earlier chapter! maki says it to megumi when toji gives the kiddos the stuffed animals he got for them at the zoo, and maki suggests they play with them:

--

Megumi turns up his nose. “Playing with stuffed animals is for kids.”

Come on. Maki slants an eyebrow. “Uh, we are kids.”

--

megumi is another child who had to grow up way too fast before gojo took him in, and now has to make up for lost time that he doesn't know quite yet how to reclaim. it's so cool you noticed this parallel between them, because it's gonna be super important in the upcoming chapter!!

it's so true that all of the tpg kids (and initial teenagers that are now in their low twenties) had some aspect of childhood taken away from them. isolated from the villagers, nobara tried to shed her own childlike qualities because she thought she had no choice but to take care of herself, especially because of the yet-to-be-revealed circumstances of her parents' disappearance.

and god....yeah, higuruma really has no idea how to handle that. i've said it before and i'll say it again: it's so, so important to me that he's genuinely terrible at this. he's the pinnacle of right idea, wrong execution: he wants to fix the ills of society but does it in the worst possible way, and he wants to shield nobara from how dark and terrible the world is by telling her she's just incapable of understanding it altogether. he doesn't want her to know all the pointless cruelty in the world. he doesn't want her to know he killed the sheriff to free her from the countryside. higuruma shutting her out is his way of protecting her, but the way he carries out his protection almost does more harm than good. almost.

PLEASE THEIR HUG....you're not delusional to draw that parallel between nobara & higuruma and maki & toji!! nobara and maki are the two tpg kids that have the most on-screen clashes with their parents, yet despite their initial doubts towards their parental figures, they still crave that emotional validation. after a lifetime of being shunned, finally, someone cares about them -- only nobara is half-convinced higuruma doesn't. i think some part of her does know he cares, but it's a part she refuses to acknowledge because she doesn't want to be let down by her father. not again.

nobara's confrontation with the curse was so!!!!! i really wanted to follow up with yuuta telling maki that nobara cares more about actions than words, so maki demonstrates her sorcery abilities rather than just saying it. maki's words post-fight, however, do end up having an impact on nobara: she's able to correct any misconceptions before nobara even has the chance to draw them. this will also be important as nobara's character develops!!

maki carrying the phantom guardian with her stems a lot from toji's desire for her to be able to protect herself, even in his absence. especially after the kids meet mahito in shibuya back in ch12, both nanami and toji don't want their kiddos to be unarmed, hence why yuuji also has playful cloud stuffed into his backpack.

YUUJI MY CHILD. MY SON. his emotional intelligence + crumbs that he blames himself for his family's doom even though it hasn't even happened yet. the first yuuji angst moment of many, many, MANY more

as for higuruma vs some special grade where he'd have to hurt himself in order to protect nobara...huh. yeah. sure would be interesting if that happened someday

alright, i'll conclude my horrendously long reply here. also sorry for the sukuna rant in DMs last night i think i was on something else

[quillsmora]

Hopefully it's okay to ask you a question because I'm wondering do you know why Gamora hasn't been included in the vol 3 merch? I ran across some stuff a while ago and when she wasn't included I assumed it was just a one off incident. But I just ran across some other merch and she's still absent. So I'm not sure if they are waiting for the movie to create merch for her or what

Firstly, it's always okay to ask me questions about this stuff! I love talking about film marketing (I did study this stuff for 2 years after all). Always feel free to send me asks about anything!

As for your question here's my honest answer: I'm not entirely sure. There are a few logical conclusions though.

Spoilers. Historically the first wave of MCU merch is very clean when it comes to the events of the movie, only featuring characters we know will be in it and vague aesthetics that align with the plot. So far the main advertisements and merch for Vol 3 have featured the Guardians in their comic-accurate group suits, which we haven't seen Gamora in. She might end up getting that suit in the movie, but we have no idea and that would be a major spoiler, so it's easier to leave her out of cereal box promotions and toy box art to keep that unified aesthetic.

Along the same lines as spoilers but deserving of their own point is the LEGO sets. LEGO sets are 50/50 when it comes to being accurate to the events of the movie because again, spoilers. The Endgame sets they released to go along with the movie had absolutely nothing to do with the actual plot because sets get leaked so often and Disney didn't want the plot of their biggest superhero movie ever to be ruined. The Wakanda Forever and Multiverse of Madness sets were also pretty vague if I remember correctly. It's easiest to leave Gamora out of sets like the Guardians HQ or the Bowie because while she might actually be in those scenes, we won't know until the movie comes out (we can assume she'll be on the Bowie at one point based on that shot of her pulling out a knife but it's not official). Since the LEGO sets and toy lines release weeks before the movies, it's again easier to exclude Gamora from these first waves of merch.

The historically bad representation of Gamora on merch already. Outside of figures like Funko Pops and Marvel Legends, it's always been nearly impossible to find officially licensed merch of just Gamora, especially cute good looking merch. This has also been an issue with most of the MCU's female heroes but it's definitely gotten better these past few years. Unfortunately due to Gamora's role in Vol 3 being pretty secretive, that positive change doesn't get to apply to her this first wave.

So basically TL;DR, don't stress about this too much. We're still 2 months out from the movie's release and a month away from promo and press starting. Yes, it sucks that so far Gamora isn't being featured in anything outside of posters and trailers, and yes it's valid to be upset and frustrated with that. But remember that there's still a whole other wave of merch to come after the movie's release, and Zoe Saldaña is still second-billed. She and Chris Pratt were the last two (humans) to wrap the movie. James Gunn wouldn't have brought Gamora back if he didn't want to. If you're still feeling uneasy or worried (which I totally get!) @enigma731 has some great posts about why Gamora will be fine.

Sorry this is so damn long, I kinda got carried away lol. But yeah I do wish there was at least like a Funko Pop or something and find it ridiculous that Kraglin of all people is getting more merch than the female lead, but I'm personally not getting too worried right now because we still have two months until the movie. It's not looking completely terrible right now. (Trust me, I was a Star Wars sequels stan during 2019 TROS press. That movie's plot was leaked via an official German Burger King ad. If it ever gets that bad for Vol 3 you will definitely hear about it from me lol).

[donotpercieveme123]

If nobody asked for him yet, Izuna for the ask prompt because I can’t get enough of him. And I’m going to throw a new one at you (only if you want to!) : Naori

Thx for the ask <3 and sorry for taking so long to answer😅 life kept happening or I kept forgetting.

I'll answer both. It's gonna be long so I'll put it under a cut and apologies in advance lol

Izuna

First impression

Didn't really have much of an impression of him watching the series I won't lie. I guess I thought he looked like Sasuke but NO WHY ARE YOU STANDING IN THE WAY OF PEACE?! Did think he would have had a lot of potential if they actually bothered to give him a shred of personality tho. And aside from wanting so so so much more about him and Madara, I also low key really wanted to see more of him and Tobirama because come on! The chemistry was there and they were obviously presented as parallels and foils of each other. I wanted more violence and I wanted it to be personal. Also them interacting as kids was kind of really cute (the way they knew each other's name) but also really heartbreaking seeing how fckn big those swords looked

Impression now

He was right about everything. But if ppl think Tobirama was bad Izuna would have been worse. On purpose.

He is just SKSJJSJSZB!! Best, most interesting, fun and heartbreaking and compelling and perfect character!! The layers, the grief, his importance!!

I won't lie his character is almost entirely made by the fandom and I don't even agree with or like the vast majority of the interpretations, but God I would kill everyone in this room then myself if I don't see him happy or in pain or perfectly collected and impartial but murderous and covered in blood and so fucked up beyond belief but still holding everything and everyone together despite the way every loss and failure kills him over and over again until he's lost all sense of himself outside of his duty and the people he failed. JDJDHXHXXXHXH HIMMMM!! Just imagine the moment any shred of child like hope he used to have was completely shattered and he became entirely nihilistic, angry and bitter, but also leaving him craving the peace he knows is impossible.

Also he so has eldest daughter, middle child energy

Favourite moment

It was pretty funny when he punched Tobirama in the face ngl

Also the way he reacted to another kid possibly being stronger than his big brother!😱 Djjdhd I can't breathe!! His little face!! He deserves everything good in the world

Idea for a story

Oh boi oh boi do you just want a never ending list of all my wips?

Literally endless endless possibilities so idk which to pick, where to start or how I'd ever stop talking lol

Literally anything and everything from back story and character analysis fics, to crack, to dark smut and graphic violence, to wholesome bittersweet found family. And that's not even touching the endless possibilities AUs would open up!!!

Unpopular opinion

As needed and honestly refreshing as the 'canon accurate' take on his personality is, I don't really think I like it all that better. It's honestly kind of boring and it reduces him to a narrative plot or some vague object in someone else's story that can be placed to the side and completely forgotten about or ignored. I find it takes everything that's significant and interesting about him then sucks everything else that would give him a fully fledged and compelling personality right out of it. I'm as tired as the next person by a lot of fandom interpretations but he doesn't need to be reduced to the human equivalent of a perfectly square, perfectly blank piece of paper. His role, importance, actions and convictions within the narrative aren't remotely changed if he's allowed to have layers of messy, gritty complexity. They'd become more fleshed out if anything. Let my man have a messy personality, please! I need something to sink my teeth into and tear apart like a chew toy!

Favourite relationship

It's literally impossible to pick just one so here are the ones I cycle through as the mood takes me.

MADARAAAA, I would actually kill for more gen uchiha siblings content! They're just- yh I don't even need to explain!

But also in that same vein HIKAKU!!!! Only child Hikaku adopting Izuna as his little brother after all his cousins are killed. Them working better together and having more in common with each other than with Madara a lot of the time (despite Madara initially being the glue that brought them together). Then the grief and blame after Izuna dies and jdndndndb!!!!

Similarly but on a different note NAORI!!!!!!! Platonic soulmates all the fckn way! Just them being best friends since childhood (probably the only stable and healthy relationship, that is only a touch codependent, that Izuna has ever had). Also I love the idea of the wlw mlm solidarity of having kids together because madara refused to procreate. And don't let me get into how Izuna's death affects her!

But also TOBIRAMA ALL DAY EVERY FCKN DAY!! They’re so perfect, the way they respect and hate one another for everything they represent and how much of themselves they see in the other, and the violent possessiveness born of it. But also the way they would fit and work together so well, how they see the possible friendship in the other and it only makes them more adamant about wanting the other dead. But also soft healthy friendship that's fun and bittersweet, especially as kids, and hdhdbxbx- No more needs to be said really

Favourite headcanon

God there r so many! But I love the thought of him having a younger sister who's somewhere between tobirama, itama and izuna in personality. And he got his sharingan after seeing her die at the hands of bloodline thieves, which he never stops blaming himself for. It massively shapes his unhealthy and somewhat obsessive need to keep everyone and everything together and safe. Not to mention the way he takes failure so personally.

(Thank you sm for asking for her btw!)

Naori

First impression

Her plotline was weird as hell tho, and it would have been cooler if she was around during the founders era

Really liked her right off the bat! Thought she had a cool design, amd loved her personality and the mediator role she played. Also loved the way she seems genuinely powerful and well respected, and how put together and kind but stern she was. True infj lol

Impression now

Same impression really, + my own ideas and backstory sprinkled in. For example, she's a lot more cynical than she present herself. I love the idea of her growing bitter after Izuna's death but coming out the other side better than say Hikaku because she still had people she needed to remain tender for.

Favourite moment

Idk the way she was introduced was pretty cool. Girl boss play ur mind games!

Idea for a story

I'd love to write anything after Izuna's death and the founding of Konoha.

Also I have zero fckn clue what her backstory was even about so I wanna rework that. I'm thinking a small group of Uchiha growing paranoid as Madara did and trying to assasinate Tobirama. Having accepted the reality they were now stuck in she makes it her mission to keep everything running smoothly and do damage control where necessary. (All for the benefit of the clan tho. She never actually accepts the will of fire and she would be the first to be able to say 'I told you so' when war breaks out again). So anyway, Tobirama agrees to let her peacefully deal with them as a 'show of trust' to any other Uchiha who might follow, but it still makes him weary of them as a whole regardless.

Unpopular opinion

Not a fan of her being written in to be shipped with whatever male character just so they can have a straight love interest. I want her to have motivations, a story, and complex thoughts and feelings outside that. That's how she was introduced in the first place! But idk if that's actually unpopular lol

Favourite relationship

Of course Izuna! Aside from what I mentioned in his bit I also like to think that they shared the same views about how the clan should be run, and especially about peace (as a whole vs peace with the Senju). And alongside being a genjutsu master and being well respected on the battlefield, I like to think that she had an affinity for healing, and she woke her Mangekyou after Izuna died because she felt responsible for not being able to save him.

But also Hikaku!!! After Madara leaves she's the only person Hikaku still has around, and despite both being two of Izuna's closest people, they only really get close after that. After he officially takes over as clan head she essentially also steps into the role Izuna had as Madara's 'right hand'. Which basically means that for all intents and purposes they lead the clan together.

Favourite headcanon

Tobirama came to her about the police force and despite hating his guts for killing Izuna they worked together. She founded the police force with her wife and had a hand in the way the anbu was initially structured. Tobirama first went to her out of guilt (and because Hikaku was more outwardly hostile lol), but over the years she became someone he deeply respected and who's advice he sought out. And despite never fully forgiving him the respect was mutual.

[lonelier-version-of-you]

What do you think the significance is between Henrik's mother drowning herself in a lake, and John eventually doing the same?

Okay, it's taken me 2 days, but I'm finally answering this.

I think John had been fixated on the idea of dying by drowning for years, and I think that was because of Henrik. He'd been suicidal before, no doubt, but it was after pulling Henrik from the lake and finding out about Elisabet that he decided he wanted to die by drowning specifically.

John is someone obsessed with his own self-image. Fandom tends to boil this down to an idea of him thinking highly of himself, but I think it's a lot deeper and more complex than that. First of all, John does not hold anywhere near as strong a belief in his own superiority as many would think. He has essentially the same unstable self-perception as Henrik: he'll think himself a genius who's better and smarter than everyone one moment, and view himself as completely worthless the next. For some reason, a lot of people simplify both their characterisation into "John is arrogant and thinks he's a god, Henrik is self-hating and thinks he's unloveable", but that's just... not accurate at all. (Mr. Clarke the psychiatrist didn't call Henrik a narcissist for nothing!) I think this isn't helped by the fact that John is suffering increasingly from grandiose delusions throughout his storyline, something which I suppose it's easy for people, especially those without much experience with mental illness, to misread as him just being egotistical.

I've had a lot of conversations with Lucia (@prydon) about this, because it's an aspect of John's character we both find fascinating. John sees himself as less worthy because of his background. Sees himself as broken (in the same way Henrik sees himself). He feels he has to meet a ridiculously high standard of 'greatness' in order to deserve basic human respect like other people. In fact, I'd argue the path he went down makes much more sense if you read it as, at least in part, John going to more and more desperate lengths in an attempt to 'prove' himself and feel like he was worthy.

This does circle back to John's chosen suicide method, I promise. Part of that whole spiel was just me trying to introduce the fact that Lucia is responsible for, like, half my views on this subject!

So, John has a lot of terrible coping mechanisms for his poor self-image, and one of them is him developing a viewpoint of seeing certain things as "tragically beautiful". (I think things like his canon love of poetry can easily fit into this.) He can't romanticise his own past - much as he wishes he could (I've read fic that has him being jealous of Henrik's trauma because he thinks it's "prettier", which, as awful as it is, is utterly in character) - but he can try to romanticise his present. (See: what I said to you a few days ago about John trying to romanticise himself for being "insane".)

But that only goes so far.

It's basically canon that John romanticises just about anything to do with Henrik. His dialogue in Report To The Mirror part 2 as good as confirms it, sounding, basically, like John wondering how Henrik is able to carry his trauma with him in a "prettier" way (in John's mind) than John himself does:

"I know how you suffer. Every day, like the rest of us, you report to the mirror. But when you come into work, you come into a place where so much tragedy has befallen you. And yet you’re still able to carry on. For this vision. So that we can do this together. If we don’t have this, then… how do you do it, Henrik?"

So because John sees anything to do with Henrik as "beautiful", even the ugliest, most painful parts - like his mother drowning herself and him going on to try to do the same (see, we're getting there.....), it's no wonder he ends up romanticising the idea of dying by drowning. In particular, the idea of drowning with Henrik. Let's face it: you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn't, on some level, find the idea of dying alongside the love of their life to be romantic (or at least I assume you'd be hard-pressed? Maybe I'm just fucked up).

I don't think this desire was at all one-sided. I think John just felt it more intensely (story of his life right there, poor lad). But - look. There is no way those two didn't have a 30+ year long suicide pact.

You know how normal friends sometimes promise each other: "Hey, if we haven't found our soulmates by 50/60/70, we'll get married to each other"?

John and Henrik's equivalent was definitely "if things don't work out in our lives, we'll drown ourselves together". I don't know if they ever said it to each other and I don't know how seriously they said it, but on some level, even if just through their weird borderline-telepathic Understanding, they knew it was a possibility.

But they just kept putting it off. The years went by, they went their separate ways, floated in and out of contact. Henrik probably hardly ever thought of the idea by the time John turned up at Holby, although I think John was still obsessed with it and fully believed that drowning with Henrik was how he would die eventually.

I also think John and Henrik having made an agreement to drown themselves together if it came to that, in the past, would go some way to explaining why Henrik knew exactly where to find John when he disappeared in Report To The Mirror, and why John had equally been expecting Henrik to come. Still doesn't explain why Henrik knew it would be that specific lake, unless it's the only one in Holby lol, but it does add another layer to those scenes.

Lucia once said that John's mindset regarding the idea of drowning himself and especially of drowning with Henrik was him thinking "my entire life has been so ugly, I want at least my death to be something beautiful". And I mean... yeah. Yeah, that's the whole thing summed up. :(

(...I've just spent over an hour typing up this answer. I do apologise if it's not coherent.)

[thebiggestmenace]

Never apologize for long answers!!!! I love them!! I don’t have any IRL friends who like the game or show, so I love talking to someone else who’s as passionate about it as I am.

I also preferred Joel getting stabbed rather than impaled. In the game it worked, But also like- there’s no way he should’ve survived that. In Left Behind it takes Ellie a while to get medical supplies, so he should’ve bled out. Also somehow it didn’t hit any of his organs?? And he didn’t have any back/spinal damage from the fall?? The stab wound just made a lot more sense lol.

I love Episode 7 so much!! It was so accurate to the game. Also the way they displayed their emotions?? The pining, the awkwardness, and the friendship was so great. I loved it so much. Idk for some reason tv shows can never get teenagers right, they typically write them like they are older than they are.

Episode 8 was the only episode I never rewatched. Even the first time I went to watch it I skipped forward to the end because I had to remind myself they reunite and she’s ok. Bella better get an Emmy for that. Their screams still haunt me.

I get what you mean about mirroring! The finale scene where he tries to take the brunt of the bomb felt like the scene from the game where they jump off the bridge and he puts himself between her and the rock

AAAA thank you, anon! I also don't have anybody irl to talk to, so the amount of asks I'm getting about this silly little franchise means so much to me! I truly am having a blast >:)

yeah! how did he survive that??? how were no major organs hit?? how could he stand after that?? that was a two story fall? which sure, isn't that high, but?? with a stab wound??? that's a lot of damage?? but yeah, both work for their respective media? like, the impalement? works for the game and the stab works for the show. yeah! he should've! never thought about that, but yeah! she had to fight so many guys? and you're telling me he didn't bleed out? did Ellie even stuff the wound? is that the term? did she wrap it or anything? or was it just There while she ran around, looking for things? bonkers.

yes! I saw screenshots before having watched it, so I was assuming they were together the whole time because of the pining between them. like, the look Ellie gave Riley on the merry-go-round?? I totally thought they had been dating for a while lmao they do, yeah! I feel Bella and Storm were really able to capture the teenage gay experience. the staring through the Victoria's Sceret window? the complete adoration of the other? I remember being brought back to my own teenage relationship during that episode :')

totally get that! yes, be safe when watching stuff! I don't skip that episode, but I flip david off the whole time he's on screen and I make sure I'm doing something else for That Scene. I'm very forgetful, so I can't usually get away with skipping scenes/episodes? but I totally get why you would, it's a Bad episode (just the events). I got into reading tlou fics simply for the aftercare of that episode, so skipping to the end just to know they reunite? very smart. Bella does deserve an Emmy for that performance. their acting in that entire episode is just. spectacular. their screams are stuck in my head, too :( VERY worried for the next seasons for that exact reason

omg yeah! I never thought of that! he truly is a dad :((

[killa-trav]

see i am genuinely confused about mclaren because the drivers/andrea stella actually seem optimistic about the baku upgrades and even the car as it is now? both oscar and lando made up at least 1 (i think for oscar it was a few more even) position before the reliability issues kicked in. and i know lando isn't afraid to talk massive shit about the car in the media and even he seemed to think it would have been a decent race without the issues in post-race interviews? but then this stream max seemed to have NO faith at all until next year, lando was just kind of agreeing with him, idk idk i am going to pray for the best because i have an agenda to push here and i need both of them to do well in order for me to push it. also i do not want to see the american as rookie of the year pls don't do it

i think what they say in stream is way more accurate than in the media bc obvi w the media u have reporters whose job it is to twist words and so u have to be giving the perfect pr answers to avoid unnecessary headlines as much as possible whereas w the stream, there won’t be a reporter whose sitting there watching the stream and noting down everything lando says or max says so lando has a bit more freedom to essentially say whatever he wants

in terms of the car itself obviously it’s early days it’s only the first race etc etc but even from pre season testing no one at mclaren seems overly optimistic about this car which is a real shame bc both lando n oscar deserve better n i genuinely still think that lando will leave mclaren before his contract is up unless mclaren get their shit together bc his talent is being wasted completely

dw oscar will end up getting rookie of the year bc out of the rookies he is the strongest and williams are still williams n i think alex will comfortably outscore trumpie massively

[wyldwyldwest]

SCANNING…IDENTIFICATION COMPLETE. ENTER [WYLDER ZANDER ZATARA-WEST], [CHILD] OF [ZATANNA AND WALLY WEST]. CODENAME: [KID FLASH].  A  [24]  [THIRD] YEAR ENROLLED IN THE [SUPERHUMAN] TRACK. INTEL SHOWS THEY ARE [CHARMING], BUT CAN ALSO BE [OVERBEARING]. ABILITIES INCLUDE [SUPER SPEED AND MAGIC]. FACIAL RECOGNITION MISTAKES THEM FOR [benjamin wadsworth].

Demographics

Name: Wylder Zander Zatara-West

Alias: KidFlash

Gender: HetMale

Course: Superhuman

Year: Third

Birthday: December 8 (Sagittarius)

Age: 24

Sexual Orientation: Experimenting/unsure

Moral Alignment: Neutral Good

Hero Profile

Power/Talent: Low level magic and super speed

Power/Talent Description: Because his father isn’t homo-magi, Wylder’s magic powers are far inferior from his mothers. He tends to instead stick to enchanting objects and using his super speed. Due to his connection with the speed force, Wylder can cast multiple spells of quickly and accurately.

Weaknesses: Like his mother, Wylder has to speak his spells. Also magic tends to drain him a lot more than it would someone who full homo magi, leaving him only capable of doing small spells. He also

Hero/villain Name: Kid Flash

Costume Description: Click here J

Weapons: Wylder uses a bat that he will enchant to fit the situation. He usually opts for titanium, he hits with the velocity of the speed force, making his hits powerful and destructive.

Gadgets/Tech: N/A

Bio

As the oldest son of Zatanna Zatara, Wylder was born a Momma’s boy. Spoiled? Yes. There was rarely a day that he heard the words no. And when he did it often only took a smile and a please for the answer to be changed. He loved and idolized his dad too, but the bond he had with his mom was special. He was born with a sense of adventure and found himself in all kinds of mischief, quite literally living up to his name.

He knew he didn’t have the traditional family. His parents didn’t exactly plan to be having a child together. While they loved each other it was more of a platonic than romantic. He envied his friends that didn’t have to “go to dad’s” every other weekend. Yeah, it only took them a matter of moments, but that wasn’t the point. Still, Wylder always had hope that somehow, his parents would end up back together. Over all though, he had a happy family and a happy childhood. As long as John Constantine wasn’t around. Wylder had never been a fan of the man. In fact, he very much hated him. He hated how many times he’d seen his mother cry over him, no matter how well she tried to hide it. And she always seemed to drink more when he was around. Not to mention he reeked of cigarettes. His mom may not have loved his dad, but they deserved better than him.

So when she told him that she and John were going to get engaged over the summer well….needless to say Wylder didn’t take It well. He packed up his things and moved in with his father and Linda. The two still haven’t spoken, though his mother tries. But he’s angry and hurt and refuses to let her ruin both their lives. Coming back to school was a blessing for him this year. He’s able to escape and pretend that his home life isn’t falling apart.

Wanted Connections

all of these are vague jumping off points for connections, and with any of them, details would be UTP and dependent on character chemistry & interactions!

Basic Plots

Best Friend: Ren 

Hookups: he’s a whore. Let him be a good one.

Exes:

friends with lingering feelings

Teammates

Teen Titans

Baseball

Track and Field

lab partners

tutor – wylder needs the tutor.

first loves

more detailed

U Up? (0/1) - Wylder + muse b met on a crazy night . their chemistry was undeniable ; up to the point where they had slept together on a drunken night . sure they swore to each other that they would never ever ever talk to each other again , yet , somehow , they always find themselves longing for each other , and just wanting to send that one text at 3 am about how much they miss the other .

#Squad – (0/5) a group of friends that would do just about anything for each other. they’ve grown up together, and their bond never changed as they made it through high school, college, and now into their adult lives. if one is in trouble, all they need to do is call and the others will come to their rescue, no matter where they are or what the situation is. even when some things in life aren’t as good or easy, there’s no doubt in any of their minds that they’ve always got a strong bond of friends to keep them grounded and love them unconditionally.

#Romantic Arch nemesis – due essentially? Enemies to lovers.

Opposites Attract – (0/1) Wylder comes from a wealthy family, and was born with a silver spoon in their mouth. MUSE B is not as wealthy, and has had to work for everything they have. When they meet Wylder he is smitten, they are immediately put off viewing him as nothing but a spoiled brat. But wylder is willing, and do anything they can to win even the slightest bit of attention. He knows one day that they’ll be able to get MUSE B to fall for them. It’s only a matter of time before they truly see what they’re missing.

[notjohnlegere]

Heyy, I just read it “toxic” and I’m begging for a part two😩

Maybe she finally leaves him, but after some months he comes back and they ended up together again? Maybe a little smut✨

Back by popular demand, Toxic pt. 2 ✨

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Done...Maybe

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Done...Maybe

Timothée Chalamet x Reader

sequel to toxic. the reader finally breaks up with timothée for good and he flips out. smutty ending, but some heavy stuff beforehand. if you like accurately written timmy, this isn’t for you.

*obligatory mobile formatting apology*

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He did fine...for a week.

He was faithful, polite, and loving. For a moment, you naïvely thought that maybe your old Timmy was coming back to you. How dumb you were for thinking that.

You were moving your things back into the bedroom when you heard the news. Your phone blew up, as it always did when your boy did something extravagant, but this time it was worse than you could’ve ever imagined.

You packed up your stuff and quickly left, your best friend Naomi graciously helped you move your things and still offered her spare room to you. You were a complete blubbering mess the whole time. You didn’t deserve her.

Naomi had asked her boyfriend to leave for the night. To give you two some girl time, which you knew was just code for you getting in trouble. Which you understood, you completely deserved it.

As you sat on the couch next to her, the both of you holding glasses of wine, a romcom quietly playing in the background, you braced yourself for yelling that never came.

“Do you really hate yourself that much?”

You were taken back by her quiet question, not really sure how you were supposed to answer it. You didn’t hate yourself. At least you didn’t think you did.

“What are you talking about?” You responded. She quickly snapped up your deflection.

“You know what I’m talking about.” Naomi said, taking a small sip from her wine glass. “You keep letting him hurt you. Over and over again. And you always go back to him. Don’t you know you’re just giving him the satisfaction of controlling you?”

You were quiet. She spoke up again and continued.

“I can’t keep doing this with you.” She said sternly. You could tell she was upset. She was so nice to you and loved you so much, she never got this serious unless there was a big problem. “I love you, and you will always have a friend in me, but I can’t keep supporting this watered down self-harm.”

You took a big gulp from your glass and thought about what she said. Watered down self-harm. Was that what this was? Did you think you deserved the hurt? Even worse, did you secretly like the pain? You had never really considered this angle before. But you trusted your friend, and you knew that if she got to this point, you had a serious issue.

“I won’t go back.” You said.

“You said that last time and ended up sleeping with him.”

“I can’t go back. I won’t allow myself. You’re my best friend. You’re more important to me than some stupid boy. Even if I did think he was the one.” You let out a weak laugh in attempt to cover your shame. Hot tears rolled down your cheeks and she put her arm around you. “God, why am I so stupid?”

“You’re not stupid.” She said your name. “You’re just desperate. Desperate for his love, and he doesn’t want to give it to you.”

That stung like a knife hitting your heart straight on. However, you knew she was right.

“If he really loved me he wouldn’t keep hurting me.” You came to the conclusion yourself and let out a sob.

“It’s gonna be okay. You’re gonna find someone who will be better to you than him. And you’re gonna be so happy and in love you won’t remember his name.”

*

“I’m done, Timothée!” You shouted. You had reluctantly gone back to your apartment to retrieve the last of your things. This time Naomi came with you, but she was downstairs.

“Done with what?! Everything we’ve gone through?!” His voice was booming so loud that it cracked. For a moment you thought you saw pain in his eyes.

No. He’s not going to take advantage of me again. He’s no good.

“Everything we’ve gone through?! I’m the only one that’s gone through something and that is hell!” You shouted and he flipped the coffee table in the living room. This caused you to flinch. Never in all your years of knowing him have you seen him express such emotion.

“You can’t go!”

“Fucking watch me, Chalamet!”

He lunged at you and you froze in place. He didn’t put his hands on you, but he came very close to grabbing your arms. Your eyes widened and you felt tears beginning to fall down your face.

“I love you.” He said softly.

“No you don’t.” You croaked. “If you did, you wouldn’t treat me like you do. You wouldn’t cheat on me when you know how bad it hurts me. You wouldn’t call me crazy when I cry, and you wouldn’t say I’m psycho for having an opinion. You don’t love me. You just want to get your dick wet.”

His jaw was slack and he was frozen. He watched you gather up your things and storm out. You had finally put him in your past where he belonged.

*

Three months had come and gone, and time had barely let you know. Things moved more smoothly now. You didn’t have constant drama in your life, and you felt like everything was slipping by you quicker than ever. You weren’t sure if you were alright with that or not.

You had decided on one random Friday evening that you would go to a local bar and relax. You had brought along some extra work from your new class you had picked up, considering you were at the bar so early. You doubted anyone would bother you, and the place was always so quiet.

You didn’t plan on drinking that night. You just wanted a seltzer water and some good, greasy food. You were sitting at a table by yourself in the corner when you saw a bachelor party burst in the door. Shouting, partying, men being men, you changed your mind on not drinking. It gave you a migraine, and to make it all worse, you saw a familiar tuft of curls in the party of at least a few dozen.

He didn’t see you for a while, but when he finally did he just stared for a moment. He was giving you a look you had never seen before. It was so deep, so desperate. He looked like a sad puppy, a boy that had lost all lust for life, a broken heart personified.

No. He’s not going to take advantage of me again. He’s no good.

That’s probably what you would’ve told yourself if you were smart. And sober. But you were neither of those things.

There wasn’t even a greeting exchanged between you two. You waved your finger and he ran to you, his lips on yours and his tongue in your mouth within an instant. His party cheered, you knew that they had no clue who you were, but that was the least of your worries.

You drank him in and ate him up, tasting the familiar flavor of alcohol and cigarettes, something you never knew you’d miss.

“Take me.” You messily whispered against his lips.

“Where?”

“Anywhere.”

You were off your feet and he was dragging you to the bathroom before you had a chance to react. The room spun, and you clung to him as if your life depended on it, because you felt like it did.

“Timothée-“

“Shhh.” He shushed you with his lips once you were in the small bathroom. He slammed the door closed behind the two of you and locked it.

You gasped when you felt his hands slide under your top and grab your breasts. Everywhere his hands touched seemed to light you on fire.

“Fucking incredible tits.” He mumbled in a drunken slur. His mouth left yours and your shirt came off, the fabric quickly being replaced by his lips. Your bra followed suit.

“Oh, fuck.” You gasped when his mouth clamped around your nipple. Your fingers ran through his curls as you looked down, the blurry sight of your boy causing your core to throb. Almost as if he knew, his hand came into contact with your underwear under your skirt. You bucked your hips into his hand.

“So fucking desperate for me.” He whispered, grabbing hold of your underwear and tugging them down. “Bend over the sink and take my big cock like a good girl.”

You felt weak in the knees when you turned around and bent over the sink willingly. He grabbed your hair and pressed you further into the sink. A soft beg came from your lips before you could even think about what was happening.

“Please.”

“Fuck.” He swore as he bottomed out all at once, filling you fully. “You’re so tight and wet. When’s the last time you got fucked?”

“W-with you.” You stuttered, clenching your muscles around him. You let out a yelp when he began to thrust, hard and deep.

“Yeah?” He teased. “Didn’t get anyone else to take care of you?”

“N-no. Oh fuck me, oh god.”

“Why?” He slowed down. What a fucking tease he was, he knew exactly what he held over you. His hand gripped more at your hair. You let out a cry.

“Please just fuck me.” You were nearly in tears. You needed him so bad it almost hurt.

“Answer me and I will.”

“I-I don’t know.” You gasped when you felt his hand come into contact with your clit.

“I know.” He breathed into your ear. “Because this pussy? Is mine.” He lightly slapped your clit to get his point across.

“It’s yours!” You begged and ground your hips back against his.

“Nobody could ever satisfy you like me, and we both know that.”

You were about to beg again when his hips finally began moving against your body again. You threw your head back and shouted.

“I-I’m gonna-“

“No.” He stopped you from speaking with his hand. “Me first. Then you.”

You felt small to his words. You couldn’t believe the control he had over your body, but you didn’t have time to think about that right now.

Ragged thrusts, wild grunts, your hair being pulled so hard you feared it might fall out, and he sputtered. He filled you with his seed and pulled out.

“Please please please let me cum.” You gasped, desperately pressed your hips back. You looked into the mirror and didn’t see him in the reflection. You nearly decided that he had left you to fend for yourself when you felt hands on your thighs.

A soft growl and an all-too-familiar mouth came into contact with your soaking and throbbing core. Your eyes shut tightly and you threw your head back. You were crying out for him so loudly you knew you’d get kicked out and blacklisted as soon as you trudged back into the restaurant floor, but you didn’t care. It felt too good.

“Right there, right there, oh Timothée just like that.” You cried as you ground your clit into his lips, your orgasm taking you over as you soaked his face with your juices.

You nearly collapsed when you came down, but strong, slender arms gripped your waist. He held you back against his chest.

“So good, so good for me.” He cooed into your hair quietly. “I love you. Fuck, I love you so much.”

You stayed silent. You didn’t love him anymore.

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ao3 is johnlegere, find my fics there too. requests are open, send one in my ask box. hope you enjoyed :)!

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🏷: @thestarsaregivenonceonly @timotheeisthelomll @imnotoverlyobsessive @dayafied @ohladymoon @writings-art @lxna-mikaelsxn @mxciscastleintheair @sufferingstarlight @timotheesl0ve

[tteokdoroki]

waves that hurt | k.bakugou + i.midoriya.

♡ pairing: katsuki bakugou x gn!reader x izuku midoriya.

♡ word count: 3.04K

♡ rating: everyone.

♡ genre: pro hero!au, hurt, angst and comfort.

♡ summary: dark days mean dark waves that crash across your mind, intrusive and mean the waves pull you under— but they are the helping hands that pull you up and let you breathe.

♡ warning(s): please read ! heavy tw for depression, intrusive thoughts and self depreciation, self doubt and low self-worth. this fic is written mostly from personal experiences and may not be accurate to how everyone feels! mentions of therapy.

♡ author’s note(s):  this is my contribution to @doinmybesthere​ ‘s mental health awareness collab, this is kinda personal to me and something i experienced recently!! i hope it can provide some comfort to anyone out there, please don’t forget to check out everyone else’s works and i hope you’re all safe ‘n well <3

♡ masterlist | requests | kofi

“kacchan, it’s much worse this time, i really think you should come home early tonight.”

deku whispers into the phone, his marred hands rub slow and soothing circles into your back from over the duvet— you can feel his warmth, light and airy through it but he feels and sounds much further away. a million miles across a dark ocean that trickles through your thoughts, intrusive and mean, keeping you under and away from clear air.

you wouldn’t want to pull him into this, bother him with the way you drown in dark thoughts— so you pull away from your boyfriend and tuck yourself away into the sheets.

izuku doesn’t retract his hand even as you pull away, listening to katsuki grunt orders down the phone— make sure yn’s eaten, make sure yn’s had water. basic things you should be able to do on your own but can’t, paralysed by the anxiety and depression that clamps down on you like a vice and refuses to let you up so you can just breathe. you want to breathe and not feel like the world is crashing down on you, to have a second to yourself where everything seems like it’s okay.

brushing fingers over the nape of your neck, toying with the coils of your baby hairs, your boyfriend speaks, only gently. “baby,” says quietly, his weight causing the bed to dip. “katsuki will be home soon, do you want to come with me to let him in?” you shrug, a sick feeling twisting in your gut. you see the black tendrils and waves in the back of your mind, bringing forth a new batch of ugly words that force you down. are you really that much of a burden these days that katsuki has to call it quits on work for you? “how are you feeling?”

you don’t know, you don’t know how to tell him that every thought you have hurts and there’s a pain in your chest with every breath you take. “i don’t know, it’s just...bad izu…” you want to explain how you feel deep inside, but the words are trapped like balls of tar in your throat— fear that if you say something he’ll walk away.

“you don’t have to say anything, don’t force yourself to…” he speaks with a soft voice, cotton to your ears in an attempt to soothe you. you can just about feel the clean air flowing through your lungs at the sound— it tells you he loves you, no matter what and you almost believe it before sinking back under. “let’s get you some water okay? wouldn’t want kacchan scolding us would we?”

the joke hangs in the murky and heavy air for a few seconds before you muster a small smile— your green haired boyfriend lets out a tiny sigh of relief and pressed a kiss into your hairline, the affection simmers under your skin and briefly brings light to your dark mind as izuku starts leading you to the kitchen.

you’re curled up in izuku’s lap when the front door pops open with a click— signifying your other boyfriend had arrived home. you flinch, hiding yourself in the blankets keeping you warm and locking away the dark thoughts from the eyes of your lovers.

part of you hated them seeing you this way, that’s why you forced yourself to keep everything away from them— but they knew, they always did and always came to your rescue. you didn’t want them to feel like they had to look after you when the days were bad and draining and your mind took hold of everything that you felt. you didn’t need the weight of your own problems on the shoulders of two pro heroes who had enough to deal with.

in the end, you would destroy them like you did with yourself.

you can hear katsuki shedding his gear by the door, feeling his intense and heated presence flood the room and barely penetrate the barrier you created for yourself even while you lay in izuku’s arms. for as long as you’d known the two— even from back in your U.A days, bakugou had hated self-pity, of course in recent years he’d cooled down a little and spoke less on the actions of others but even still, you weren’t sure if you could handle him looking down on you for looking down on yourself and for feeling this way.

the blanket is suddenly lifted from your head, momentarily blinding you with the overwhelming light that is your boyfriend, katsuki bakugou. a twinkle of concern lines his ruby eyes and you can see traces of his charcoal eyeliner that he usually smudges underneath his mask— he’s so beautiful but you’re afraid of the twitches of worry, afraid that he’s mad at you for being the way you are.

“hey honey,” bakugou hums, crouching to your level to cup your cheeks, stress bleeding from his body when you nuzzle into him.

izuku gives you a squeeze, an encouraging one and you nod. “hi,” is all you can muster, afraid of blurting the intrusive words that crackle across your brain.

katsuki sits back on his haunches, looking between you and his boyfriend before he attempts to kick off his shoes. the room is full of a thick, ugly quietness that you know you’re responsible for— they don’t have to say anything, you know that it’s you. because when you’re like this it’s hard for bakugou and midoriya to talk, afraid that they’ll say something to set you off and you afraid that they’ll leave if they knew how you really felt. how trapped and alone you felt inside, how the twisted darkness added tones to your vibes and dragged you down with every step that you took.

they don’t need to say it because it flows from your body like a rushing river and drowns them, fills their lungs and it’s your fault for infecting them with your own bitter taste of life.

“have you eaten?” the blonde of the two boys asks, looking you dead in the eye. you want to answer, but again the viscous back from earlier starts to flood through your body. you try to take care of yourself of these days where you feel it the hardest, but it’s difficult to move and to breathe— and the drive to complete even the simplest of tasks is barely ever there.

you move to speak, caught up in the thick smog of your own brain when izuku gives your body a squeeze and shakes his head, the forest of his hair brushing against your cheek. “you’ve had water, right?” izuku has no problem answering for you. “but nothing to eat,” he whispers, keeping his voice low as if to hide his worry from you— it’s light in his tone but tremors throughout the number one’s body. you feel sick for making him feel that way.

katsuki’s gaze shifts back from his boyfriend to you, his expression unreadable because he knows how you get if they worry too much about you. you’re thankful, partly for that at least, his blank face prevents your mind from reading too deep into things and blaming yourself for things out of your own control.

“‘m makin’ your favourite for dinner. you’ll eat it, no questions asked.” the explosive pro hero states firmly, rising from his place crouched down by your side, obviously not before thumbing over your cheeks to wipe away evidence of your dried tears. “gonna run you a bath too, damn nerd better get you upstairs and ready by the time it’s done.” deku’s chest rumbles with a light hearted chuckle beneath you, lifting the heavy weight of the air within the room— bakugou had always loved brashly, with a fiery intensity that hardly left room for the answer ‘no’, and while izuku was more tame, they balanced one another out in a way that felt more like a warm hug than a battle. they grounded you, in the best of ways.

true to his disgruntled words, your blonde headed boyfriend runs you a hot bath. you don’t miss the addition of lavender oil to the perfectly warm water, the baking soda which you’re sure he only knew to add because his mother had said it would remove the demon spawn toxins in his body. izuku is the one to help you strip, holds your hands as you kick off gross comfort clothes and folds them away, after pressing kisses to your groggy face and chin.

it’s almost funny to see the two biggest and beefiest pro heroes sit on your bathroom floor crossed legged and beside the tub— both of them taking up the majority of the room. you know for a fact that no one would believe the sight unless they saw it, but they’re there. both of them, izuku midoriya and bakugou katsuki are with you encompassed in the silence while you wash away the ugly words that plague your mind and fill the pores of your skin.

they’re still there.

even as sweet lavender water moves in soft waves over your bare body, while black ink moves in the same way across your brain— tattooing self-depreciating thoughts into every inch. you’re not worth their time, they say, you’re wasting it. because how could their precious time be put to good use if you’re taking it up, they could be saving people but instead your boyfriends are here, drowning in your own darkness.

they’re still fucking here.

when they could be out there saving the people who needed it, who were suffering out there in the world outside of your home.

and the suds against your body, the warm water sloshing over your thighs isn’t enough to get rid of the burning sensation of vile phrases printing themselves against your body and clouding every thought that you think. toxic, mean and nasty things you can’t scrub away— none of it is enough to make you feel like you deserve bakugou tenderly lathering you up with the rose scented soap his mother had sent you for christmas or the sips of cool water midoriya brings to your lips in order to prevent you from overheating in the steam of the bathroom.

deku catches the painful twist in your face, pausing his movements to study you. “whaddya need?” you need it to stop, to find something to replace the pain and doubts that fill you.

“water, hotter,” you croak quietly, tears building up in the base of your throat as katsuki catches on and flicks the tap for a stream of hot water to fill the tub. “please,”

they tell you to let them know when to stop if the heat gets too much, but the scalding water burns away any reminders of the self loathing you feel across every inch of your mind, your body and your soul. it stings at the darkness in a way that’s painfully soothing and maybe if you sink under— it could stop hurting completely. if you could slide deeper into the water, would the waves of darkness not crash so hard?

and then the damn breaks, like a tsunami the guilt and anguish you feel crashes over your body and takes control, leaving you fighting for oxygen in the form of your happiness.

everything that you’d been holding back flows freely in salty tears from tired eyes, scorching a path down the apples of your cheeks and mingling with the contents of the tub below. your boys, they don’t notice at first, how you cry and curl in on yourself until you think the world won’t notice you anymore but then just as they always do, they’re pulling you into their warmth and bubble of light— freeing you from black intrusive tendrils even if it means they have to crawl into the tub and wade their through the ocean you’ve made to set yourselves apart.

“don’t—!” you heave with an uneven voice, signs of you falling apart evident in every way. bakugou and deku pull away from you slowly, with dripping shirts and worry written across freckled faces and red eyes. they’re scared for you, hate seeing you force your feelings down and away from them. “please don’t touch me—you’ll—“

the water in the bathtub sloshes from where you retract from their touch, backing yourself up against the wall and away from your boys. “we’ll what?” izuku presses but only gently, keeping you afloat, stopping you from sinking and bakugou stays put in his place, letting the latter talk you down.

you shake your head, trying to think of the right words but it’s hard to, with the crashing waves heavy against your ears. how do you tell your lovers that everything hurts, to think and to feel, to live day by day. you don’t want to bother them with and an extra stress to their busy lives. but you can’t keep it in any longer, bursting at the seams. “you’ll drown. i-if i touch you, i’ll pull you under, you’ll drown with me and you won’t be able to breathe and all those horrible things that i think about will burn in your lungs until you give up fighting like me,” your tears and hiccups interrupt your words, but they listen. bakugou and deku, they listen and they stay.

“yn—“

“because if you do, then all that i feel will be a burden to you— i’ll break in ways that can’t be fixed and you’ll be forced to pick up the pieces and i’ll just be a burden,” you continue, not even pausing to take a breath while you continue to cry. “if you stay to pick up the pieces, you’ll be taken away from people who need you, who are worth saving, and can be helped and—“

you can’t recount how many nights, similar to this in which you wondered why and how two pro heroes could want and love you, why they dealt with your down days that sometimes outnumbered the ups— even if they’d shown you how much they cared, you couldn’t help but feel guilty as if your sadness took up their time to save someone else.

“you can be helped, yn. you don’t have to go what you’re going through alone, you’re worth the time and the effort of helping, no one deserves to suffer,” the green haired of your two boyfriends cuts through the tail ends of your words, still keeping distance until he knows it’s safe to touch you again. there is no look of condescending pity on his face, no sign to show you’ve pulled him into the dark of your mind. it’s just izuku, trying to help you pull through.

you look to katsuki hesitantly, he hasn’t said a word. “but i don’t want to be seen as...as weak, or to worry you because i can’t get out of my own head—“

“y’not fuckin’ weak, we’d never think that of you. we see you try to hide your pain, pretend things don’t get to you when they do. but fuckin’ handlin’ things on ya own can make y’stronger than any two heroes combined,” a look of anger flashes across his features, finer with age and tired with work. but bakugou isn’t angry with you, but with himself for leading you to believe that you were an extra weight on his shoulders. both of their shoulders. “yer not gonna get rid of us or scare us away, we love ya, we’re here for ya ‘n if it’s help that you need or think yer not worthy of, we’ll find some. it’s okay t’ask for help.”

maybe it’s hearing it from someone else, that your pain and your depression is valid, that you’re not an extra weight on the people you love that allows you to come up from a tar-like ocean for fresh air in your lungs, for the waves to calm and the storm raging in your mind to soothe. maybe it’s the two of your boyfriends being there for you despite the fear that you’d scare them away with not being okay that washes away some of the awful things you think.

you know that their support won’t make things go away over night, that it will take time for you to heal but for now you can keep your head above the water just long enough to breathe.

“can i touch you now? is it okay?” deku asks, feeling less distant from you than at the start of the day, but as your body shakes with the last of your tears all you manage is a nod before the number one hero is pulling you into his chest from the tub and the number two is wrapping a towel and his arms around you.

you sit sandwiched between the two, they keep you at the surface— holding you tight while you let out what you’ve been holding back. “we can get some help if y’want it, the doctors...therapy might be nerve wrackin’...scary even, but it can help and we’ll be there every single step of the fuckin’ way,” katsuki reasures you with pets to your head, rocking you back and forth on your bathroom floor, steam clinging to the air that you can finally breathe.

izuku nods along in agreement, pressing kisses to your wet hairline. “we’ll be here. you won’t be alone.”

the murkiness of the water in your mind starts to clear, but only just— their warmth starts to push through the clouds like sunshine brushing against your skin. a light to the dark that's plagued your every waking moment, the waves no longer crash and destroy but instead lap comfortingly at your painful thoughts and tame them just enough for you to have a moment of clarity.

you don’t have to be alone or millions of miles away, you deserve the hands of your loved ones that offer you help instead of pushing them away. the process of healing and things like therapy or meds will be hard sometimes, but katsuki and izuku will be here by your side, to help you manage days where darkness rolls in waves that hurt and help you breathe once again.

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Anonymous asked: I love your long posts which make for great reading and I wish you could do more because you’ve got such a range of astonishing interests. I’m hoping because you’ve served in the military you would have studied military thinkers. Do you think the Art of War by Sun Tzu is way overrated by everyone? I studied him a bit for my masters but I still couldn’t get my head around him. Interested to know your thoughts. Thanks!

“To lift an autumn hair is no sign of great strength; to see the sun and moon is no sign of sharp sight; to hear the noise of thunder is no sign of a quick ear." - Sun Tzu's Art of War, Chapter IV - Tactical Disposition, Clause 10.

Sounds cool, doesn’t it?

But what the hell does this quote really mean? Do you know what it means? Can anyone else tell me?

Look, I enjoy a good Sun Tzu quote as the next person. Only recently I was exchanging thoughts with a fellow blogger whose studying Thucydides, Clausewitz, and Kissinger for an advanced course at the US Naval War College. Even he prefers Sun Tzu over Clausewitz. I can see why too. If you can make sense of chapter one of Clausewitz’s tome On War you deserve a Nobel Prize.

Unlike my very learned fellow blogger, there are lot of folk who don’t know Sun Tzu at all. They can quote him, but almost certainly out of context. As someone who partly grew up in the Far East and even learned Chinese and Japanese (a pitiful but functional degree of fluency) I’m embarrassed (not hard since I’m English) when I hear other Western compatriots romanticise and elevate Eastern icons to mythic status that the Chinese themselves have never done.

I am even more bemused than embarrassed after having hung up my military uniform for ‘civvy’ corporate clothing at how badly abused Sun Tzu’s book is in the corporate world. In my workplace I grit my teeth at corporate high flyers who mistake a balance sheet for a real battlefield by quoting Sun Tzu out of their arse, and then as self-styled ‘corporate warriors’ work themselves up in a lather of testosterone induced self-importance to crush their corporate enemies into the dust.

This is why the The Art of War by Sun Tzu has invited a jaundiced eye roll. And rightly so. I can see why many view Sun Tzu as over-rated because many easily impressed people go all woo woo over anything ancient and Eastern.

It’s become a familiar trope to say the art of ‘strategy’ as a science began 2,500 years ago with the writing of The Art of War. I would dispute this. Not that the writing of Art of War was the earliest written but whether I would call it a manual of strategy per se - more on this below in my answer.  However you rate or overrate the Art of War it’s important to have perspective and remember this book is written in 512 BC. Other than the bible and some religious books, there are not many books that can survived thousands of years and still remains a steady bestseller and enjoys a wide influence in military academies and army staff colleges today and even as far into board rooms.

The question behind your question is just as interesting to me: why did Sun Tzu and his Art of War gain such traction in the West?

Sun Tzu (544-496 BC) wrote the original text of The Art of War shortly before 510 BC. During most of the past two thousand years, the common people in China were forbidden to read Sun Tzu's text. However, the text was preserved by China's nobility for over 2,500 years. The Chinese nobility preserved the text of The Art of War, known in Chinese as Bing-fa, even despite the famous book-burning by the first Emperor of Chi around 200 BC. The text was treasured and passed down by the Empire’s various rulers. Unfortunately, it was preserved in a variety of forms. A "complete" Chinese language version of the text wasn't available until the 1970s. Before that, there were a number of conflicting, fragmentary versions in different parts of China, passed down through 125 generations of duplication.

Indeed at the beginning of the twentieth century, there were two main textual traditions in circulation, known as the (Complete Specialist Focus) and (Military Bible) versions. There were also perhaps a dozen minor versions and both derived and unrelated works also entitled Bing-fa. Of course, every group considered (and still considers) its version the only accurate one.

When I last visited China before the Covid pandemic for work reason, I had time off to go to a couple of museums that housed the fruits of a number of archeological digs uncovering the tombs of the ancient rulers of China in which sections of Sun Tzu’s works were found. These finds have verified the historical existence of the text and the historical accuracy of various sections. I understand new finds are still being made.

The first complete, consistent Chinese version was created in Taipei in the 1970s. It was titled The Complete Version of Sun Tzu’s Art of War." It was created by the National Defence Research Investigation Office, which was a branch of Taiwan's defence department. This version compared the main textual traditions to each other and to archeological finds and compiled the most complete version possible.

This work was completed in Taiwan rather than mainland China for a number of reasons. Mainland China was still in the throws of the Maoist Cultural Revolution, which actively suppressed the study of traditional works such as Sun Tzu. The mainland had also moved to a reformed character set, while Taiwan still used the traditional character set in which the text was written. Only today is the study of Sun Tzu in mainland China growing, interestingly enough, through the translation of Sun Tzu into contemporary Mandarin. Based on the archeological sources we have today, we are reasonably certain of the historical accuracy of this compiled version that is the basis of what most people use today.

Surprisingly, the Art of War only came to light in the West around the 18th Century.  

Historians believe it was first formally introduced in Europe in 1772 by the French Jesuit Joseph-Marie Amiot. It was translated at the time by the title “The thirteen articles of Sun-Tse”. Joseph-Marie Amiot (1718-1793) was not just a Jesuit priest but also an astronomer and French historian, as well as fervent missionary in China. He was one of the last survivors of the Jesuit Mission in China (he died in Beijing).

Many of the historical problems with understanding Sun Tzu's work can be trace back to its first Western translation in French. A Jesuit missionary, Father Amiot, first brought The Art of War to the West, translating it into French in 1782. Unfortunately, this translation started the tradition of mistranslating Sun Tzu's work, starting with the title, The Art of War (Art de la guerre).

This title, copied the title of a popular work by Machiavelli (a criminally underrated writer on military strategy), but it didn't reflect Sun Tzu's Bing-fa, which would be better translated as "competitive methods."

We cannot say what effect being translated by a Jesuit priest had upon the text. It was unavoidable that the work's translation reflected the military prejudices of the time era when war was both popular and Christian. It was also unavoidable that most future translations would reflect some of the first translation's prejudices. However, war was on the verge of becoming much less Christian in the West since this time was the era of the French Revolution (1789).

The work might well of slipped into obscurity after its initial publication, but it was discovered by a minor French military officer. After studying it, this officer rose to the head of the revolutionary French army in a surprising series of victories. The legend is that Napoleon used the work as the key to his victories in conquering all of Europe. It is said that he carried the little work with him everywhere but kept its contents secret (which would be very much in keeping with Sun Tzu's theories).

However, Napoleon must have started believing his own reviews instead of sticking with his study of Sun Tzu. His defeat at Waterloo was clearly a case of fighting on a battleground that the enemy, Wellington, knew best. Wellington’s trick at Waterloo was hiding his forces by having them lie down in the slight hollows of this hilly land. This is exactly the type of tactic Sun Tzu warns against in his discussion of terrain tactics.

After Napolean, Sun Tzu's theories made their way into western military philosophy. Many of his ideas are reflected in the ideas of work of Carl von Clausewitz. who defined military strategy as "the employment of battles to gain the end of war."

The first English translation of The Art of War is less than a hundred years old. Captain E. F. Calthrop published the first English translation in 1905. Lionel Giles, an assistant curator at the British Museum and a well-known sinologist and translator, attacked this early translation, and he published his own version in 1910. It soon began to be read alongside Clausewitz’s 8 volumes of turgid German military prose.

It wasn’t long before military thinkers were ditching Clausewitz for Sun Tzu because no one could get past Chapter One of Clausewitz’s On War. The “Clausewitz is dead, long live Sun Tzu” school was first championed by the influential British military theorist B.H. Liddell Hart in the 1920s.  Basil Henry Liddell Hart (1895-1970) was a captain in the British Army. He was a very influential military theorist and historian, and author of several books such as The Future of War (1925) and Strategy (1954). Having witnessed first-hand the mechanised onslaught of the Great War, Liddell Hart sought a philosophy of warfare based in the prudent use of technology, psychology and deception - and the avoidance of the 'total war' catastrophes of preceding decades.

The main idea of Liddell Hart is to bring the set of principles of warfare in a so-called ‘indirect approach’ to the enemy. His advocacy in his scholarly work of an ‘indirect strategy’ over direct, frontal operations, was a reaction to the high casualties of the Western Front in the First World War. But his ideas were not simply about physically outmanoeuvring an opponent. Instead he pushed for a psychological scheme: to strike from unexpected directions, to generate strategic dissonance, and to induce paralysis. Hart’s well-known thoughts are “Only short-sighted soldiers underestimate the importance of psychological factors in time of war”, “Originality is the most important from all military virtues”, and “The principles of war could shortly be condensed in a single word: concentration”. 

Liddell Hart believed that distilling historical insights of strategy and operations would offer the chance to avoid the costly disasters of modern war and ensure a more cost-effective route to success. He imagined technological solutions in the form of air power and mechanised land forces outflanking and shocking an enemy at the tactical level. This would be complemented by taking indirect strategic ‘ways’. Like his contemporary J.F.C. Fuller, Liddell Hart considered concentrations of air and armoured forces driving deep into enemy territory to destroy their ‘nervous system’. The psychological aspects of this were central, since acquiring an advantage demanded moves that were unexpected, with precise attacks at the most vulnerable points. As the most influential military writer of the modern age, revered and reviled by three generations of strategists, armchair and armipotent, his controversial theories of armed attack laid the foundation of the famed German Blitzkrieg.

Hart’s championing of Sun Tzu’s work as articulated through his own works got a new lease of life as the world gingerly settled into the ice bath of the Cold War. The rise of Communist China, against all the odds having defeated the well disciplined nationalist armies of Chian kai-Shek, was a wake up call for the West. There was a general befuddlement among western military analysts to explain the secret of Maoist success. There was an intellectual inquest in the 1950s and 1960s for some way to explain (and, it was hoped, learn to counter) Maoist military doctrine. Sun Tzu was seen as one of the historical and cultural sources of some particularly Chinese or Asian way of war, and his work made its way into Western discussions of counterinsurgency and asymmetric warfare.

Into the breach - and with fortuitous timing - appeared a new translation of The Art of War that was to become the defining translation right down to our day. Liddel Hart provided the foreword to Samuel Griffth’s 1963 translated copy of the Art of War. It was to quickly become a key text in US war colleges and this version is still to this day favoured by most of these institutions. We also studied Griffith’s translation at Sandhurst alongside Liddell Hart’s ideas.

There is no question that Griffith’s translation has become the standard go to translation to this day in military circles - that is until James Clavell’s more populist and looser translation came along in the 1980s. One can see why. Griffith’s translation provided a number of historical Chinese commentaries on the text. It should also be noted that Griffith’s strengths was his immense experience in the military and knowledge of military history as a brigadier general in the U.S. Marine Corps.

However, this was also his version's greatest flaw. Like many other critics I have the impression that Griffith did not really believe or understand all of Sun Tzu. Indeed he would often explain away Sun Tzu's direct statements without making it clear that this was his commentary and not what Sun Tzu wrote. The other main criticism and this one is stylistic and therefore just my opinion, Griffith was also not much of a writer. By our standards today, much of Griffith’s language can seem awkward and dated.

Looking back it feels ironic of the US military were wrapping their heads around Sun Tzu as way to get inside the Chinese communist mind (of Mao the military strategist especially). Unknown to them Mao had desperately tried everything to get hold of a copy of the Art of War from the Chinese Nationalists. Cambridge historian and doyenne of intelligence history, Christopher Andrew in his book The Secret World: A History of Intelligence, wrote that the theory that Sun Tzu’s The Art of War was critical to mastering contemporary warfare is propagated through the use of a tantalising anecdote: “During the civil war between Communists and the Kuomintang regime [Mao Zedong] sent aides into enemy territory to find a copy of it.” The ancient text, ostensibly, was of such vital importance that Mao was willing to risk men’s lives to obtain it, while Chiang Kai-shek vowed to protect it all costs. It’s a questionable anecdote at best as there are no historical evidence of it.

We can say that the notion that Sun Tzu’s slim treatise is considered both potent and slightly dangerous - providing the master key to unlocking victory in war through the ages - is a compelling myth that refuses to die. Mao most likely never ordered a clandestine operation to pilfer the text, nor did Chiang Kai-shek give any thought to shielding its contents from prying eyes. Both men certainly read it long before the start of their civil war, both most likely had ready access to it during the conflict, and neither man won or lost based on adherence or divergence from its teachings. But undoubtedly it set the hearts of Western military theorists aflutter in trying to unlock the secrets of Eastern military thought.

Sun Tzu and his ideas in a reincarnated form took hold of the wider public imagination in the 1980s. The 1980s was synonymous with Japan. With the perceived rise of Japan as a global economic power and the changes in post-Mao China, there was a Western (meaning American) search for more explanations. What was the secret of Asia’s rise? How were Japan and China ‘doing’ this?

In Western business circles it was for a time trendy to read it because of the perception that it was part of what made Japanese businesses so successful during the 70s and 80s. Management gurus and other corporate consultants certainly latched on to it and touted it as a way for Western businesses to re-orient their entire management and business philosophy. I don’t know if that ever actually was the case in Japan - my father who worked in both China and Japan in the corporate world at a very senior level said it wasn’t - but what is true is that in the West as the Japanese economy languished into the lost decade of the 90s so too did interest in Japanese business practices, and thus Sun Tzu.

The idea that The Art of War was a kind of how-to guide to ‘strategy’  was made especially popular by Hollywood in the 1980s. Oliver Stone’s iconic film ‘Wall Street’ seemed to typify the ‘greed is good’ New York capitalist scene of the 80s and 90s. Hollywood mirror imaged the rise of the corporate raiders and junk bond kings like Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken. Hollywood sent thousands of American businessmen off to read Sun Tzu to look for ‘leadership secrets’. This is part of a general Western fascination with ‘timeless Asian wisdom’, the American idea that ‘the mysterious East’ is possessed of secret knowledge. American and European businessmen were enamoured of the idea that “a battle is won or lost before it ever begins”, a saying that reinforced traditional American business attitudes about a winning mentality and a ‘can-do’ spirit being two keys to success.

Because Japan and China were trendy in the 1980s and 1990s it also influenced Western popular culture, not just fashion (think Kenzo) but also comic books (manga) and anime. In this Eastern friendly climate it led a number of popular fiction authors to release their ‘own’ versions of the work to capitalise on its newfound popularity. These versions were more about the pop culture of the era than Sun Tzu. Unfortunately, though popular, none of these versions took advantage of the work completed in Taiwan creating a definitive version of Sun Tzu's text by this time. These versions were based either on old English translations (the Calthorp and Giles versions) or incomplete Chinese sources. However, all of these versions remain popular today, despite their questionable sources and poor quality of translation.

In 1983, James Clavell updated The Art of War translation of Lionel Giles and published it in a very popular version. This started a very common practice in English translation: creating a ‘new’ version from other English translations instead of going back to the original source. Authors today continue to follow this practice, which only perpetuates and exaggerates the problems with early translations.

Thomas Cleary, another well-known author, did his own The Art of War translation with historical commentary in 1988. Again, his name recognition did much to increase awareness of Sun Tzu, even if his work did nothing to improve the general quality of the translation.

Looking back the whole Sun Tzu as a business model fetish in the 1980-90s was really pretty silly, rather like 80s shoulder pads. Of course, there are some similarities in leadership regardless of profession, but the basic goals and working environments of war and of business are so wildly different that applying Sun Tzu to business is superficial at best.

So to me the problem is not that Sun Tzu is ‘overrated’ per se, the problem is that every half baked author out there try to apply its principles to every problems that mankind have. The Art of War, as the title suggest, is not The Art of Managing your Business, the Art of Winning in Competition against your classmates, The Art of picking up Women, The Art of Living Life to the fullest. It is, and only is, The Art of War. It is ‘overrated’ only if you expect it to answer every problems in your life.

The Art of War is not the word of God. It is a war manual advocating common sense with pithy aphorisms - and a very good one.

It’s not that I think the Art of War is over-rated it’s that the more common problem is that many people vastly under-rate Sun Tzu. By misreading Sun Tzu thoughts and ideas, I believe many are in effect under-rating the problems which Sun Tzu is addressing, namely war, or the continuum of conflict resolution where divergence in interests of multiple parties extends to the possible use of lethal force on a massive scale. A lot of people trivialise this problem with idiocies like “what if someone threw a war and nobody came” (clue, they would win, then hunt down and enslave or kill everyone too foolish to contest the issue, as has happened countless times in human history) or “ban war” (said ban apparently enforced by throwing flowers at soldiers).

Understanding that war is a very real and intractable problem is necessary to fully appreciate the genius of Sun Tzu’s work, especially where it avoids fixed and easily definable tactics specific to the Warring States period and instead illustrates timeless concepts of out-thinking the enemy at every level of conflict. That the text is still mostly readily applicable or at least reasonably insightful after thousands of years is a testament to the inability of humans to push warfare beyond the fundamental aspects of conflicting interests and continuum of forcible resolution Sun Tzu addresses.

Still, the particular translation matters far less than having an appreciation that, in war, you have an active opponent who is trying to out-think and counter any moves you make, and having an appreciation of non-dualistic philosophical reasoning more characteristic of Chinese classics generally. The classic symbol of Yin-Yang (and a number of derivative versions) illustrates apparent dualism as being a part of a deeper structural unity which does not permit a fixed division into separate parts.

Hence the difficulty of applying the principles of the Art of War to artificial ideas of “winning/losing” (or war/peace, right/wrong, us/them) as categorical absolutes rather than negotiated possibilities in a continuum of desirability/costs. And it is very difficult, no one should sugar coat that. Humans sort and construct their perceptions of reality by appeal to such gross simplifications. Binary logic is an immensely powerful tool in many areas because it leverages the ability to simplify complexity and then build valid inferences based on fixed premises. But at some point you have to go beyond that to have a more fluid response to reality as it is. Which Sun Tzu does for the reality of war.

I would recommend anyone to read it. At the end of the day it’s a book of highly general aphorisms that effectively synopsise the essential insights that apply to all kinds of human conflicts. Turning an enemy's flank has the exact same effect in 2500 B.C. and in 2000 C.E. and it has the same effect in the boardroom, or public market as it does on the battlefield. Deception and intelligence are still used in exactly the same way, whether conquering foreign lands, or stealing market share from a competitor. It's a book about common sense; but common sense must seem profound to those who have none.

Overall, I think Sun Tzu’s Art of War is a worthy read and not overrated because in our society of over educated achievers, common sense is in as short of supply as it has ever been; if this book can provide the meaningful framework for educating very bright people in down to earth common sense, that can only be a good thing.

The value of the book then is to drive home the fact that, in human conflict, there really is Nothing New Under the Sun (Tzu).

Pardon the pun and thanks for your question.

[silversatoru]

megumi + gaslighting / iq reduction

pls mr fushiguro, undermine my intelligence every day, purposely keep me unstimulated until im ur dumb, dependent plaything ❤️

a present for you when you get off the plane <3 i took a slightly diff approach to this and i know ur degree is very much not related to science but science is all i know,, so idk,, pretend u were a bio major or something for the sake of this fic okay

megumi + gaslighting/iq reduction

tw: nsfw 18+, f!reader, college-student!reader x professor!megumi, dark content, gaslighting, heavy manipulation, iq reduction, dumbification, slight misogyny?

wc: 1.3k

you still remember the first day of mr. fushiguro’s class, and the way he seemed to pick on you of all people — the way he asked you to stay after class and immediately offered you a position on his team of research students. you remember questioning why he chose you instead of someone else, to which he affirmed that no one had quite the credentials that you did. and you were left wondering how he could possibly judge that on the very first day of classes.

you still remember the first time you showed up to the lab for said research group, the straps of your bag clutched nervously in your clammy palms. mr. fushiguro was a young but incredibly esteemed professor, and this was going to look great on your transcript, so you were nothing but a ball of excited jitters. and you were smart! you knew you’d be an excellent addiction to this team of students, and you were grateful for the opportunity.

or so you thought; but it quickly became apparent that you weren’t nearly as prepared as you thought you were. it seemed like everything you did was wrong — all of your experiment results were compromised, lacked accuracy, and were always rejected. it seemed like all the other students were excelling, and mr. fushiguro loved them — but he was always so frustrated with you.

if only you knew the frustration was a front. if only you realized that every experimental result you got was right, that every answer and every theory you came up with was painfully accurate. if only you knew that your struggles were entirely fabricated by mr. fushiguro and his ulterior motives.

eventually he made the recommendation that you do some remediation with him — a few one-on-one sessions to help sharpen your skills so you can contribute more to his research. so of course you said yes! because you wanted nothing more than to be helpful and you couldn’t understand what you were doing wrong.

so you attended the tutor sessions with your dark-haired professor; but they were less about learning and more about brutal criticism of your skills. mr. fushiguro berated and insulted your intelligence several times, making you falter at his words and wonder what you ever did to deserve to be involved in his research project in the first place.

“i just don’t think you’re cut out for this, ms. l/n”.

maybe you really weren’t cut out for this.

“your lack of skills has surprised me, i can’t say i’m not disappointed in your performance so far”.

you were disappointed in yourself too.

“you’ll have to put in a lot of extra work if you want to stay on the team”.

you’d do whatever it took.

you were always bright, always excelled in your science-related classes, so what was happening to you? why were you the weak link of his research group? why were you on the verge of failing his class? why was everything suddenly so hard?

you didn’t mean to break down in front of him, tears streaming down your cheeks as you choked back sobs and hid your face behind your hands. it’d been building up for a while now: your frustration, your sudden lack of self-confidence, your feelings of inadequacy; they were all overflowing. but mr. fushiguro showed you zero sympathy, staring down at you with icy eyes and not a shred of mercy. you were exactly where he wanted you, and he was about to seal the deal.

“i really expected more from you”

those were the words that broke you in half, your fear of failure becoming all to real in that moment. but his next words halted your tears and created a small shred of hope in your despair.

“but i do want to help you. my door is open to you anytime. i have practice questions and study methods that i’m happy to share with you”.

and so here you were, anxiously sitting at his kitchen table trying to solve a few problems that he’d given you to practice. but you couldn’t seem to figure them out no matter how hard you tried — brain frying as you tried and failed over and over.

but it was all exactly as it was supposed to be — the problems were never solvable in the first place — there were no right answers — they were simply meant to melt your little brain.

you came back to his house time and time again, and each study session was worse than the last. you were never able to figure anything out on your own, you always needed his help, you couldn’t do anything without him.

it was no shocker when you began to admire him, depend on him, feel like you couldn’t do any schoolwork on your own. his months of manipulation were finally paying off, you were finally a dumb little thing who had no self confidence and who was constantly begging for his help. and he was happy to provide that for you, but you were going to have to start making it worth his time — his expert help doesn’t come for free.

you’re not sure what possessed you to agree, to have his cock lodged in the back of your throat while he groaned and leaned back in his seat — but you needed his help, this was just a small price to pay. you’d bob your head and choke on his tip as it pressed into your esophagus as if your future depended on it, because at this point, it kind of did.

but the prices kept getting steeper; eventually a quick blow wasn’t enough to appease mr. fushiguro. he wanted more. if you wanted to keep his help you needed to be face down and bent over his kitchen table — and so that’s exactly what you did.

brain foggy and knees aching your sweaty fingers grasped at the smooth table top as he took you from behind. his strained cock dragged against your sopping walls, your ass nearly bruising from how hard he was fucking himself into you. whimpers and moans overflowed from your lips as your bare tits pressed into empty worksheets — the two of you had completely glossed over the “studying” portion of your night tonight, skipping right to your payment.

you could barely even think straight, your head spinning with endorphins as you cried out in response to the tip of his cock kissing against your cervix. his fingers dug into the sides of your hips, pressing little red circles into your skin from how hard he grasped at you. your were shaking, your entire body pulsing with bliss each time he thrusted up into your cunt.

he was so happy with himself, balls deep inside one of the smartest students who had ever graced his classroom. he’d taken a girl with so much potential it was sickening, and convinced her that she was worthless, reduced her to a less than average student who was desperate enough to take her professor’s cock in exchange for better grades. you were pathetic, embarrassing even, laying here on your stomach and babbling complete nonsense while he filled you up.

all it took was patience and a sprinkle of manipulation to get you like this. to make you a dumb little fuck toy who came to his house several times a week under the guise of getting help with class work.

and he’d keep this up until you could barely even think for yourself — reducing you to a brainless little pet who deserves to be stuffed with cum and nothing else.

you didn’t belong in STEM, you didn’t belong in a university in general — you belonged right here on his kitchen table, your face sitting in a puddle of your own drool.

you were stupid, or at least he convinced you that you were so much so that you actually became it.