#i belong to the latter group btw

[monocotyledons]

my observation so far is that people enjoying freefall can be split into two camps: pop/rnb fans whose fave tracks are dreamer and deep down, and rock/indie fans whose fave tracks are growing pain and skipping stones. pretty cool how people of different tastes are responding to the album

[stargazerley]

Remember It

I had a whole thing prepared and saved in drafts to continue after ep 5 but then I watched it and decided that particular post will have to wait. My thoughts on this episode are....well we'll get there. If you haven't watched it--Do that now because I'm not pulling any punches. Also this is very long so be warned.

As always I'm focusing on our Rogue and Remy moments. Those Jean/Maddy/Scott/Logan....that shit is not my concern. (Short answer it's messy as hell and I hate it.)

The episode starts with Rogue, Remy and Erik in the Blackbird heading to Genosha. Remy makes a comment about how long they are taking and Erik decides to remind Remy that the latter cannot fly. For what reason I don't really know, as if Rogue won't catch the Cajun. Rogue tells them to shut up and play nice. (good on her)

They arrive and Remy is unexpected again earning a comment from Erik. Soon after they are ambushed by Kurt (hell yes the fuzzy elf) who tells them that a lot has happened since they last saw him (though we are not granted the details). Kurt proceeds to show Remy and Rogue around Genosha. Here we get a glimpse of the mutant island. It's nice and everyone seems happy to which Rogue makes a comment about "him" being right. Obviously "him" is Erik.

We learn that apples apparently cost $10 to which Remy remarks on the price and Kurt brushes it off as a necessary evil (not his words). We then get more cameos of mutants (awesome btw) and eventually a long coveted Remy and Kurt scene wherein Kurt is everyone's favorite guy. He proves to be a "shipper on deck" telling Remy that Remy and Rogue belong together and they should cut the act and just get married. (Seriously I love Kurt. He rocks.)

Next up we have Rogue talking to Erik and learning that he wants her to rule Genosha with him (there's a whole scene with Moira, Emma Frost, Banshee, Sabastian Shaw, and Madylene). Rogue declines, offended that he seems to have set it up but Erik assures her that he didn't want this and that it was something Xavier would have wanted. He also proceeds to address Remy's feeling for Rogue as "you make broken men feel whole." She leaves to think about his offer.

She then goes to Remy and explains everything. She tells him of her past with Erik and how they had something special but it wasn't like Remy. Remy is understandably upset at the secrets, saying he was fine keeping things unofficial. She admits she loves Remy that he "lights up everything he touches" and that she "can't touch his heart." This leads Remy to tell her that "some things are deeper than skin."

She doesn't believe him and tells him she'll take Erik's offer despite not being in love with him anymore. Remy tells her that Erik will break her heart and that when he does, Remy will be there for her. Until then they shall remain as friends. (Seriously perfect this man.)

At the gala, where Erik is presented as the future of Genosha, Rogue makes an entrance as Remy watches. He leaves as Erik and Rogue dance, holding hands and being very physically intimate. He doesn't see that after a kiss, Rogue tells Erik that Remy was right- "Some things are deeper than skin." She leaves to find Remy.

All hell breaks loose as a massive Sentinel attacks. Rogue finds Kurt, injured and without her gloves she is unable to help her brother, Thankfully, Remy arrives and assures us Kurt is alive. Remy goes off to find the Morlocks and lead them to safety while Erik and Rogue help out where they are.

Remy and the Morlocks are attacked leading to a showdown where Erik is protecting the Morlocks and Rogue and Remy by keeping the latter two away from the fight. Erik fails and Rogue, grief-stricken, tries to attack the Sentinel, Remy stops her. The machine turns to a group of mutants, including Kurt and Remy charges in to save them.

He gets close but is impaled, at which point he says the title of the episode while charging the entire Sentinel- "The name is Gambit, mon ami. Remember it." Rogue finds him in a crater, dead- "I can't feel you."

Ok so more or less that ended up as a synopsis of the episode because the whole thing was basically about Romy. The Key notes we get are:

Kurt being a supportive brother and rooting for the relationship giving us a beautiful line "love is not without sin".

Rogue wanting to do what is best for mutant kind even if that means she cannot be with the one she loves.

Remy deciding that he can wait for her to be ready and will be her friend until that time comes.

Rogue deciding that Remy was right "some things are deeper than skin."

Erik accepting Rogue's decision and saving not only her, but Remy as well.

Remy proving that despite what he thinks of himself- he is a hero and a good man.

This episode broke my heart but handled the Erik/Rogue/Remy triangle very well. It is so mature in stark contrast to that of Scott/Jean/Maddy/Logan. Logan being the most mature person in that entire mess, knowing that Jean and Scott love each other and that he can be her friend. Cable (who was the orignial person in the series to say "My name is_. Remember it.) made an appearance confirming that he is Nathan and that he has already tried to stop the attack from occurring. We can only hope we get a chance to see him succeed and see Rogue tell Remy their love is deeper than skin.

Now if you don't mind me, I'm going to go find something to stop these tears. Until next time, "look to the stars for hope shines bright." (I know that's the wrong franchise but it works. Apparently the Watcher was visible in the sky at one point.)

[zecoritheweirdone]

decided to try and draw some of the groups’ loomians! ..emphasis on try, some of these are,, better than others. i’m mainly showing the ones that didn’t suck, or at least didn’t suck as much as the rest of ‘em.

clara the rabburn!! tommy’s starter in the au!! was tempted to call her clementine, but there is a moth loomian in the game, specifically cynamoth, so i saved the name for that. also no, there’s no clem in this doodle dump, i tried (and failed) to draw her.

the rest are going under the cut,,, also btw, quick warning ‘cuz the next one is based off a spider, i don’t think it’s a particularly realistic one, but better safe than sorry!

shroud the psyder!! this doodle feels kind of ehh but it’s not horrible.

here we have chat the kleptyke! name is subject to change, i am. not good at names.

okay this slugling wasn’t originally on the list of loomians i was gonna give tommy but i was replaying the story but with tommy’s loomians to refresh myself on the story and i encountered this guy and thought. why not. so here we have mud.

now, here we have two loomians that don’t belong to tommy! on the left we have noodleboo the weevolt, belonging to ranboo, and on the right we have micheal, belonging to tubbo. again, feel ehh on how i drew them both here, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

next up,, we have henry the cafnote, and clarencio the vari! on the latter’s name, i was- i was running out of names to use. also,, i really love how i drew the vari, it’s one of the best looking ones here, i think.

tommy isn’t the only one with a vari, ranboo also has one,, but they basically look the same, except ranboo’s vari doesn’t have horns.

…and last up, we have clarencio, again! but here he has evolved into a pyrolen up on the top. ignore how you can clearly see my failed attempts of drawing the rest of his body.

then there’s also ranboo’s vari at the bottom, except his has evolved into a buzzolen!! she doesn’t really have a concrete name at the moment, currently thinking beloved(or beeloved),, but if anyone has any better names, feel free to share!

if anybody ever wants me to share the full list of teams for everyone, send an ask over and i’ll do so!

[thebgcharacter]

hi hana, welcome back! was curious if u have any fanfic recs? im p much inlove w all the soukokus and the typical side ships that come w them 😺😺

Hello, anon! Sad to say I haven't been reading up much during my break, but I do still have some recs that I think were amazing reads from a few months ago! Though I'll be honest, even then I wasn't reading a lot, but-

Here are my top 5!

This is technically an ongoing series but I loved this to bits, and I will insert this as my collective top 1. Am I biased? Yes, yes I am, but that's besides the point. Chuuya, born in the muggle world, finds out he is a wizard and attends Hogwarts, where he befriends Dazai, the adopted son of notorious Mori Ougai. I loved the incorporation of Harry Potter and Bungou Stray Dogs into this, being an old fan of the former and a current fan of the latter, and it's just genius writing. Good characterization, and good plot too. It's not just a rewrite of the HP series with a change of characters, the plot was tweaked too, to better fit BSD's vibe. Definitely my top 1 on this list.

Honestly, anything by setosdarkness in AO3 is a blessing. This one, I think, I've read maybe 5 times already, because I get so much serotonin from this! It's funny, it's crack, it's on-point in a way, and it's the fix-it I need what with ADA, Port Mafia and the Guild all being in one party, playing charades. Easily my top 2, this is my comfort fic of sorts. I read it again recently, after coming back here, you should too if you're into crack/no angst fics!

THIS!! This fic is one of my firsts in the BSD fandom, and I loved it so, so much, I even have the linked Spotify playlist saved in my library. THIS is what you read if you want slow burn and tension and mafia involvement and ANGST but also some good soukoku shit. I swear, their characterizations is on point with this. Basically, Chuuya gets married off to Dazai and their marriage signifies peace between their groups. Kouyou leads Chuuya's, and Mori leads Dazai's and THE PLOT TWISTS and SLOW BURN is so worth it.

My favorite shin soukoku fic, for one reason and one reason only: CAT RASHOMON!!! Seriously though- neighbors au is everything. How I long for domestic shin soukoku. This is no angst/lowkey crack but overall just very light-hearted. I love the way other characters are involved in this too! If I remember this correctly, soukoku also pop up as a side couple, but the focus is mainly on cat dad Aku and adopted cat dad Atsu.

Can't finish off a rec list without some RanPoe so here! It's basically just them being geniuses yet completely oblivious to one another's feelings. I love Louisa's involvement with this, and this fic is the reason I stan platonic Poe/Louisa when I initially haven't considered it since they don't interact much in canon. Oh, and it's a college au, all fun and games and maybe some mental breakdowns over finals (if I remember correctly). Just a light, fluffy fic with a healthy sprinkling of humor. I'll probably read this again for the feelgood vibes it gives me.

Now for some honorable mentions!

All you need to know is FukuMori watch their son Dazai grow up with Chuuya- whose dads are VerRim. Very domestic, highly recommend this.

No, it's not the popular one from Haikyuu lol BUT! Paul and Arthur adopting Chuuya instead of... you know, whatever happened in canon?? The perfect fix-it, especially after reading Stormbringer.

Again with the family dynamic of zskk/dazai and verrim/chuuya except this one's more focused on soukoku. It's ABO, but it's also a royalty au with an amazing plot, and overall development with twists on canon events. If you don't mind omegaverse then this I urge you to read this!

On the topic of long fics, here's an iconic one for skk. Think: singers! soukoku but better. If I remember this right, this was inspired by the song "still still still" sung by soukoku's voice actors??? Which was a catchy song btw, check it out. And it gives us fake dating, turned real dating, with lots of bad decisions and Dazai taking up acting. A good read if you want a longer fic!

Much shorter soukoku, with the classic coffee shop x flower shop worker au. I love the flower language from this fic, and the light vibes. I also love the way other characters were incorporated into this?? And I like soukoku being idiots in love.

Now I've reached my link limit damn this site but I will not be stopping just yet.

For fics with less than 4k words: here's one where atsu and rashomon interact, it's all soft sskk; here's where aku spoils atsu, in the soft way okay? Get your mind out of the gutters; here's one where almost everyone in ADA kiss dazai to break the curse of an ability and because dazai is a little shit he lets them; here's ranpo introspection and coming up to the deduction that he has feelings for a certain mystery writer; and here's the prologue?? of Full Tacit Understanding (see Top 2) but it's just Chuuya grocery shopping and Dazai watching him.

These are for the brave, but here's Chuuya in a dress plus relieving sexual tension and here's an ongoing series where sskk help one another but there's also some plot... but mainly I'm adding this here 'cause it's hot.

I'd also like to add that my bookmarks have some good stuff but also know that 60% of my bookmarks are privated, and with good reason <3 That's all I can think of, I hope you like these, anon!

[hithelleth]

The Cleaning Lady S1

It’s been a week since the season finale, so my feelings had the time to settle and I need to write out some things.

Mainly, look, I’m a simple, shallow fangirl. ;) I came here for a ship. The ship. Of the not quite enemies but maybe adversaries-to-lovers (hopefully :P) variety. And the show has definitely delivered on that with off-the-charts chemistry and real connection despite everything.

But also so much more.

For airing on Fox, this show was really good about how it tackled the topic of immigrants/undocumented workers and the difficulties they face and the unfairness of it all.

But mostly, I liked how it dealt with the notions of morality and really showed the complexity good and evil. (Emphasis on showed, because it really did that, not told, so of course it may have flown over some people’s heads.)

I loved how they wrote the characters to show that what’s legal is not always good and what’s illegal is not always bad and that and belonging to the group designated as good does not make one a good person.

That said, I do not hate Garrett (yes, this is about him, in part).

(I read some meta/opinions along watching while hunting for pretty gifs to reblog (and there’s barely any of Garrett, oh well [enter something about having to them myself but not doing it :P])and he seems to be universally hated and people seem to be mostly focused on shipping (which is fine, I’m too, but…).

As opposed to some other shows (okay, one in particularly), what I liked about TCL is that Garret as an FBI agent is clearly designated as the supposed good guy. But he is a) shit at his job (skirting and breaking the law) and a) often a disaster of a human being, although he means well, and sometimes, when he realises/acknowledges his fuck-ups, he tries to fix things and makes up for it.

And that’s what makes him not hate-able, not lovable-either, but interesting. And it’s what I loved the most in TCL: showing that and/or when the designated ‘good guy’ is not good at all and making it clear, clearly framing it as him being in the wrong. A fucking +++++++ job!

In the opposite way, they show Arman, the mobster who should be in the ‘evil’ group as often much more decent human being.

And then there’s Thony, clearly ‘violating the law’, but obviously set up as good, as the protagonist to sympathise with and root for.

Marco is a whole another issue I have not spoons or desire to deal with but again I liked the dichotomy between Thony leaving with Luca to get Luca treatment and him leaving with Luca (I called that, btw!) because of, I guess, his manly pride & need to be in charge, and maybe a bit of vengefulness (or a lot of the latter.) And I’m not even getting into his gambling (although at least he had some decency to save some money for Luca).

But, maybe somewhere behind there’s something good in him, too. At least, I think, he does love Luca.

So, yeah, I don’t like Marco, but I don’t quite hate him, either. Okay, maybe a bit, more than Garrett at least. Which says something. Maybe because we really didn’t learn much about Marco, definitely less than about Garrett, so he doesn’t seem as interesting. (And a boring/uninteresting character is worse than evil.) But they might flesh him out in S2, considering how S1 ended.

So, yeah, from what I read there are good chances for S2 considering the ratings and TPTB’s enthusiasm, but what worries me is it being on Fox. I guess we have to wait and see.

I do hope there is another season, because there’s a lot of potential from Thony (hopefully) getting Luca back to trying her new criminal enterprise and manoeuvring between working with Arman and not going to jail (I guess the deportation trial is still on? I forgot.) and everything else.

I also loved Fiona and the kids and Fiona and Thony’s friendship and would love to see more of them, too.

[chicago-geniza]

well i intended to go for a nice evening walk, ended up having a panic attack, ordering a couple of cocktails at the bougie bar, joining a jam session with a bunch of old hippies on the logan green (one of them gave me a handpainted wooden medallion which seems to be carved out of tree bark, strung on a length of yarn???), met a crustpunk train-hopping dude in town for the month (& his dog, in a leather-studded harness) who's lived in 45/50 states & a 44 yr old guy everyone called "the wizard" wearing a tattered, patch-covered robe who shares most of my parents' conspiracy theories & considers himself a latter-day prophet, he bought us sorbet & ice cream, wound up hanging out with them & staying up all night at their indescribably eclectic, cluttered, blood-spattered (!!!) apartment, belonging to 44 yr old guy's art curator father & decorated accordingly, smoking m*th & listening to music & talking (or rather listening to them rant/rave/recount stories from their incredibly wild lives), i gave them advice on applying for unemployment & medicaid & how to appear compliant enough w/ carceral psychiatric intervention so they won't section you without actually submitting to forced medication or institutionalization, especially if they assign you a case worker & do regular "wellness checks." also how to pass off certain aspects of behavioral dysregulation as executive dysfunction, get them to pay for an adhd evaluation, get an adderall IR scrip, sell the 30 mg pills (cite body weight, high doses of other psych meds as reason for higher dose; look sincere; play to systemic biases toward cis white men, unfortunately), & use the cash to buy m*th, if they'd prefer to keep doing that. you can also pass positive psychotic symptoms--agitation etc.--off as severe anxiety, especially if you have a history of trauma, & they will give you benzodiazepines. it is in their best interest to keep you docile, i.e. tranquilized, particularly if your past convictions & involuntary institutionalizations revolve around a pattern of aggressive behavior, & that's On The Record/there's a paper trail. (e.g. one dude got arrested trying to keep cars away from an injured bird on the road, some genre of raptor i think (???) by threatening them with a shopping cart, not hitting them, but like, running at them as if to collide then feinting at the last minute so they'd swerve out of the way. not the safest or most effective maneuver, lotta reckless endangerment, but the motivation was admirable. probably put the fear of god into some drivers, though. he doesn't seem to have, like, impulse control.) it's a lot easier & you have fewer run-ins with the cops if you game the system & appear cooperative. they gave me this coat, which "just showed up in their apartment one day," like i did. 44 yr old guy walked me back to apartment, stole a street sign & tore down a real estate sign en route, lori lightfoot did indeed take down the pride flag in front of her house on july 1st & replace it with an appropriately patriotic american flag, i walked past the idling plainclothes cop car & another marked police vehicle with their Mayoral Guarding Detail inside at like 4.30 am smoking a menthol cigarette (not inhaling), high on m*th, draped in a neon anime jacket, in the company of a visibly insane, unshaven & unshorn middle-aged man in a technicolor patchwork trenchcoat, holding a lit cigarette in one hand & an upside-down traffic cone in the other, which he was using as an ad hoc amplifier for a noise track playing on my phone. he was also carrying the stolen real estate banner &, inexplicably, a stack of mail. i gave him my old backup phone (no SIM card & doesn't hold a charge long, ancient, but still works), since neither he nor the other dude have phones (cops took them), also one hybrid edible for each of them, as a thanks for the m*th & the kindness. their hearts are in the right place but they have some fucked-up beliefs about "reverse racism" being real, while also saying in the same breath that you can tell our country is irredeemable by the way it continues to

treat black people. we were discussing medical weed for seizures on medicaid & 44 yr old guy mentioned one of his close friends, a black epileptic woman, whose seizures were frequent & severe enough they prevented her from working. then he added, in apparent bemusement, they she hadn't spoken to him in some time, & he wondered why. a little while later he relayed their last conversation & i was like "my dude, i can say with 100% certainty she is not talking to you because you said some *appallingly*, jaw-droppingly racist shit & did not even realize it was racist." then i, comma, a white person, explained to this man that he literally thought of their exchange as, like, an abstract argument over insignificant ideas, a theoretical exercise, & therefore considered it simply a smug gotcha to "counter" hotep theories about egyptian origin by claiming that "if that's true, american slavery & the oppression of black people in america are divine retribution for the enslavement of the jews in ancient egypt, an eye for an eye & a deserved punishment." like, first of all, what the actual fuck, if i were that woman i would also never speak to you again, second of all there's the collapse of historical time & mythical time, history & exegesis, an assumption that rests on spurious claims of biblical literalism (zionist colonization logic, btw! him: what's exegesis? what's zionism? me: never mind, not the point. exegesis is the interpretation of religious texts in a religious CONtext, in this case what you would likely call the hebrew bible.)--but most importantly it is 100% irrelevant to this discussion whether or not black americans are Actually Factually descendended from ancient egypt! you just told this woman to her face that the ancestry she claims, of which she's proud, is the reason & justification for SLAVERY & BLACK SUFFERING--not only that, but that if it WERE true, than black people would DESRVE to suffer, by DIVINE DECREE. you are trying to force her to abdicate her claim on this heritage by putting her in a position where she'd be forced to concede complicity in her people's historical & present-day persecution, oppression, & essentially the existence of structural racism. & using The Figural Jew as a rhetorical cudgel to bludgeon her into this corner. what a despicable thing to say. like, he hadn't considered it from her perspective at all, & once he groked why the comment itself was, like, unforgivable (idk, maybe she's more forgiving; she has a virtue-name), i started socratic-method-ing him through why it was particularly unforgivable for *him* to say to *her*--the individual is not responsible for the systems from they benefit, but they are imbricated in them, they are implicated when they actively perpetuate & uphold them, even with speech acts. & finally gave the same "there is no such thing as reverse racism because racism is not an individual act, it is an institutional, systemic phenomenon, & it is an ideology, one which individual acts can bear out or be in accordance with, & to which individuals can subscribe (this bearing it out in their behavior, in their institutional roles, in their interpersonal interactions--here i gave & solicited examples of each) or be subject (also gave & solicited examples). m*th makes me very good at Explaining clearly & he was surprisingly receptive--like, it was astonishing that it had not occurred to him??? but it hadn't, the same way it hadn't occurred to my mother, & she interpreted it as "reverse racist" when their next-door neighbor called her the "white devil" for disputing their property line, & i had to be like "ok but if you called in a random third party to mediate in lily-white [city], oregon, where white supremacists openly drive down the street in pickup trucks with swastika armbands, whose side do you think they would take, statistically speaking, in your property dispute. that's why racism is systemic & institutional, & your rude neighbor calling you a name over a disagreement does not constitute 'reverse racism,' because 'reverse racism' by definition cannot

exist." now this dude wants to like, read books, so i gotta get him some entry-level Intro To Racism primers??? how did i end up here, but better me than his black epileptic (ex-)friend, i guess??? jesus christ. both of these guys have the most chaotic, reactionary politics in a potpourri with these deep commitments to abolition & mutual aid & a kind of proto-anarchist consciousness, none of which would be called by those names, but all of which is borne out in practice & in the politics of everyday life. they remind me a LOT of my parents. i'm loath to imagine how they'd internalize my stepdad's rambling, street-preacher-style libertarian lectures. probably go out & buy guns & invest in gold on the stock market & double down on the conviction that free speech is being curtailed & individual rights are in jeopardy because you can no longer unleash a barrage of harassment against some guy on the street because you think he looked at you funny. these claustrophobic convictions, like the space to express oneself is getting smaller & smaller every day, *other people* are taking it away from you, suffocating you on all sides with their offense demanding your silence, they are *making* the walls close in--when in fact it's more like a holodeck. you're a member of the Hegemonic Group, afforded the privilege of the default, so you don't question the vast verdant expanse that is your domain--ah, Free Speech, the sun never sets on the empire of ~uncensored expression, you can say whatever you want whenever you want without facing consequences because you control all the organs that mete out consequences & you have also determined that those groups who might be adversely affected by your words--emotionally OR materially--are not, well...of consequence. but of course the vast verdant domain is an illusion, photons & forcefields, held together by the all-encompassing TOTALITY of the dominant group's hegemony, power, etc. once that power begins to redistribute throughout the system--however unevenly, however incrementally, however slowly--as even the smallest pieces are appropriated by those deemed inconsequential, who have endured years of systemic, material, institutional violence that allowed the dominant group to become dominant & retain its dominant position--once those 'inconsequential' groups speak up & say "actually, these words bear an indelible imprint of the violence enacted upon us, these words are the legacy of that violence, these words are a tacit endorsement of the ideology behind that violence, which classifies us as subhuman, & even if *you* can't hear those echoes, the words broadcast on two historical frequencies, so now that we're able to broadcast on a frequency *you* can hear, we request you find other language, & consider the implications of the words you've been using for years." well--once The Subaltern Speaks, the dominant group loses its 'innocence,' & becomes aware the vast verdant expanse of language is an illusion of infinite space, aware of the four holodeck walls pressing in behind the simulacrum of the horizon, & suddenly "what one can say without negative consequences"--largely social, sometimes, rarely, if social media goes viral, professional--feels much more claustrophobic. so they get angry. & some of them are just bigots, obviously, but some of them--like my parents, &, even, this weirdly well-intentioned m*thhead who said one of the most shockingly racist things i've heard in my life & *honestly didn't understand why it was racist*, is really riled up about free speech & individual rights, hates the government, hates "FANG" (facebook amazon netflix google) & has a bunch of dystopian conspiracy theories about data harvesting & personal information that only miss the mark in that they get too nefariously biopolitical (billionaires want to put microchips in everybody for surveillance to monitor our movements & sell us more stuff; they don't need to, they already use our phone location & browsing habits to generate the algorithm & sell the information to ad companies lol, it's digital& cast a

single illuminati figure in the role of comic book villain, controlling the operation behind the scenes like an evil puppetmaster (classic conspiracy fare; again, we gotta take that energy, that suspicion, the understanding that they are being taken advantage of & tricked, the idea that power & capital & resources are concentrated among a very small number of people, however it's not an individual wealthy villain with a desire for world domination who wants to turn Free Americans into microchipped drones, it's a *class* of people--or rather several classes, but *who those people are as individuals does not matter*. if you guillotined bill gates, another billionaire would take his place. bill gates qua bill gates is not the problem. it is classes of people who control the means of production & own property & profit enormously from exploiting the labor of a desperate, rapidly increasing underclass, i.e. from the system as it is. therefore it is in their interest to maintain the status quo, because it serves them. 'the rich get richer, the poor get poorer.' the middle class gradually ceases to exist. if you want to compound it by race, consider the GI bill as an example - you learn about it as the leg up that enabled thousands of WWII vets to buy houses, enabling them to enter the middle class. hundreds of thousands of third-gen middle class white americans still reap the structural, socioeconomic benefits of their grandparents' initial upward mobility, including,, very tangibly, those selfsame houses, which can be inherited & then rented out as a second property if the children or grandchildren accrue enough money to buy their own properties. but only about 100 black vets got approved for homeownership loans, despite the staggering numbers of black soldiers who enlisted & applied through the GI bill. anyway! the impulses are there, & they're only being funneled into conspiracy thinking because that makes intuitive sense on a narrative level. these guys have a high school education; so does my stepdad. their reading habits are...eclectic, sporadic, pretty much dictated by occasional recommendations & like, little free libraries around the neighborhood. it's both interesting & frustrating to see like - hey, here are these people, we agree on a lot of things, they're earnest & open & want to learn & would give their neighbor the shirt off their backs as a matter of principle. they'd give a *stranger* the shirt off their backs; they'd share whatever they had. even what chores there are in their collective--they live with two other guys--(dumpster diving, walking the dog, tidying up the apartment) are allocated by ability & inclination. they made advance plans to look after the dog & their roommate with War PTSD on the 4th of july if the fireworks upset them, jokingly called the dog an emotional support animal. you give them the tools, the reading, talk to them like normal people with a stake in society--like, imagine a society that would have a stake in people like you instead of criminalizing you & consigning you to the margins! that's already *political imagination* because anyone who occupies a marginalized position will have their existence politicized, whether they want this or not, so better to become a self-aware, self-reflexive political subject, no?--talk *with* them because tbh i am them, i'm just better at situational masking & also i am very very afraid of cops so i only damage property in groups during planned political actions (not spontaneously, because i feel a flash of rage at my neighborhood gentrifying, & simply do not have a superego, so i tear down the real estate sign for the fancy new apartment complex in a fit of pique, because in this house we believe that spontaneity can & should be developed into class consciousness, again, the seeds of which are there in the initial trigger for the spontaneous reaction, i.e. anger at gentrification. not opposed to a little direct action, but they're just gonna put up a new sign tomorrow, it doesn't advance your agenda or hinder the gentrifiers' progress. now, if

you sabotaged the construction site for the new apartment buildings & painted a few potent symbols + graffiti'd a pithy, written statement expressing your opposition to gentrification generally & these apartments specifically? in a prominent place, large font, eye level, visible & legible from oh, a block away? maybe as a member of a collective, your neighbors, perhaps? & you could sign it "[neighborhood] or [block] residents" to pack more of a punch, the power of a crowd speaking in unison to say "not OUR home, you predatory developers"? that's no longer spontaneous, impulsive, affective violence, & it's also no longer an individual--acting alone leaves you vulnerable. again--i didn't just *intuit* that he tore the sign down because he was mad about gentrification, i asked, in a genuinely curious tone, not at all accusatory, no hint of reprimand or censure, just...interested, "why did you do that?" & he was like "it made me fucking mad." & i was like "what about it made you mad? the apartments? how come?" & he thought about it for a minute & explained. i'm not sure *he* necessarily made the conscious connection until prompted. idk, i know people talk a lot about the fact that breitbart & drudge report are free while NYT & "all the news fit to print" is paywalled, & q-pilled covid hoax sites are free while "reputable" pandemic coverage & public health guidelines & explanations of mRNA vaccines for a lay audience are paywalled & that's true but also We Live In A Society & if you talk to the wingnuts who AREN'T that way because of any far-right ideology, a lot of them are just...autodidacts without much formal education but a lot of raw intelligence that leads to analyzing The Big Picture & trying to deduce a pattern, find a framework that explains why the world is the way it is, profoundly frustrated, deeply aware of American society's, universalized & figured as the world's, exceptional unfairness & cruelty, & *that can be redirected* with reading, discussion, prompting critical thought, introducing community connections, & perhaps most importantly for this genre of person, getting them to see patterns at work in terms of systems & structures rather than individuals, letting go of American individualism's explanatory power & belief in its liberatory potential (see: the sort of ad hoc libertarianism that goes hand-in-glove with much conspiracy thinking, both stemming from 1) mistrusting the government, & 2) ultimate freedom of the individual as the most sacred value, therefore it is what all enemies want to take away), outlining positive, actionable goals rather than just ambient suspicion & anger at authority, & figuring out how those goals can be accomplished more effectively by an organized collective (but this will ultimately benefit the individual). If the world isn't run by a shadowy cabal, if you begin to understand the structures responsible & how they manifest even on the scale of your block (e.g.!!! predatory developers buying up properties during a pandemic, tearing down affordable housing to build expensive condos on the lot, or giving old buildings a "spit and polish" so they can double the rent, pricing all the current residents out, not to mention all the little local businesses, almost all mexican & run by the mexican families who live here, that give our block its culture & will get pushed out by boutique coffee shops & the like, catering to a more affluent & almost certainly whiter clientele)--you can, in fact, change the world, something both of them repeatedly referred to as their purpose on earth. it may not be as a maverick figure, one against an army, but strength in numbers is an aphorism for a reason.

anyway! thse guys were also really weird about jews, in the philosemitic way conspiracy theorists of a certain stripe often are. the itinerant vagabond guy gave me one of his drawings; it's really lovely. i'm going to give them "are prisons obsolete?" & "the wretched of the earth" & some david graeber. 44 yr old guy has this idea that society is atomized & people aren't connected to each other & have lost the willingness or the ability to communicate with each other, also that the overreach of authority has driven some people to violence, & that makes the world feel unsafe to everyone else. he feels guilty because he is acutely aware that language, when wielded adroitly & intentionally, always has the capacity to manipulate; he is afraid of succumbing to the temptation, because he senses the coercive power of language within himself. the other guy was mostly quiet but said 44 yr old guy is one of the best friends he's ever had. he thinks animals are able to sense emotions and to heal, & he thinks they can mediate between people who have become too isolated, who have forgotten humans' innate ability to forge connections, approach others as social creatures seeking to bond instead of mistrustful, apprehensive, rejecting overtures of friendship because they expect subterfuge, or propriety has evolved to deem such overtures inappropriate outside of strictly delineated, artificially orchestrated contexts. deviation from the norm is not permitted. & back again to policing. they have an idea called "the omega family," omega for the end, a group of like-minded people who come together, who encounter each other serendipitously (predicted through auspicious auguries & recognized on sight through a constellation of signs & wonders, because of course we are all psychotic here, it was nice to just be psychotic & discuss these things like they were normal lol), & serve as catalysts to each other's "personal truth." anyway this is why i don't go out when i'm crazy, i always end up in situations like this, see also: the last time i did m*th, in a pizza hut bathroom in tallinn with an art student from glascow named muhammad ali (he went by ali), the son of white muslim converts--we thought it was c*ke but it got lost in translation & that's how i figured out i had adhd. later i got [redacted] by a filmmaker from kazan & he gave me his business card afterward for some reason, which was extremely funny. thankfully these dudes were better behaved. one of them even gave a speech about how men shouldn't rape people??? & also how our society shouldn't construct women as universal victims because in doing so it makes victimhood almost compulsory & shoehorns women into a victim role as part & parcel of womanhood? i was like yes my dude you are almost there, read the essay "abject feminism." (i did not tell them i was trans bc i wasn't sure how that would shake down, to be honest; couldn't get a read on it. did tell them i was gay & they respected it, though one did say he dated a lesbian once, & i explained that many men feel compelled to interject with an anecdote relating an exception to the rule or insist that they will he the exception to the rule, & it's really just bad manners, not even getting into the bad politics. he took it on the chin & talked about how the girl in question came home to find her partner dead of an overdose & his wife had just died of MS, so their relationship was more about grief & comfort than sexual attraction. i was like that's really, really sad, & it's wonderful that you were able to be there for each other at a time of such staggering loss, & i am a person who totally understands what you mean to communicate, but if a lesbian tells you they're a lesbian & you reply that you once dated a lesbian & they get offended & instead of responding with contrition or correction you elaborate on the tragic backstory of the relationship as though that explains the circumstances in which a self-proclaimed lesbian would date a cis man, other lesbians *will* deck you, or at the very least not take you, an unwashed white guy in

his 40s who isn't neurotypical & sits way too close for social convention in a way that could easily be construed as a come-on, in good faith.) tl;dr made some new friends, did some good drügs (i much prefer smoking m*th to snorting it, basically like purer, more potent adderall, & as such will not be doing it again for a LONG time, because i enjoy it FAR too much; slices through the brain fog & the chronic fatigue & the joint/bone pain, makes me able to pay attention, follow the thread of a conversation, actually be *interested* & want to ask *questions* & expand, build, encourage my interlocutor to elaborate, place more kal-toh pieces until the conversation shimmers into a three-dimensional shape, instead of being listless & exhausted & disengaged & *bored* all the time, so obviously i would get addicted immediately if given the opportunity, & i've known this forever lol)--now going to hydrate, refill pill case, write some emails, & meet C at the beach! not how i expected to reboot my brain, but it works! also putting them on limited facebook view because i try to keep some groups of people in my life quarantined from each other & that includes 1) my relatives & my academic ~colleagues (ne'er the twain shall meet), 2) my exes & my family, 3) my relatives, colleagues, & uh. a couple of lovely, but extremely psychotic dudes with very long criminal records i met while doing hard drugs

[sheisbeautyweareworldass]

I feel like... for the sole purpose of writing books within their contexts (Edwardian era), CC felt obligated to write authentic characters belonging to the time as well. I understand her reasoning behind having all the white families privileged (Herondales, Lightwoods and Fairchilds), while having the brown family/characters struggle a little bit (Carstairs and Ariadne). But what doesn’t add up for me is the fact that TID seemed to have more openminded characters compared to TLH, even though the former was set 20+ years before the latter. If I remember correctly, only Jessamine appeared to be racist towards Jem when she made negative comments about his foreign background. Whereas, in TLH, we have Matthew and Anna behaving in a similar way towards the Carstairs siblings AND Ariadne. Wasn’t society supposed to move forward rather than backwards? Setting aside contexts, I’d also like to point out that as an international group, Shadowhunters are supposed to be more evolved than mundanes. Yeah, majority of the main characters in TLH had lived a very sheltered and white-oriented life, but they should’ve been beyond the ignorance/racism/micro-aggression towards minorities.

Yes, certainly no one is expecting the TLH kids to go around making speeches about systemic racism or anything like that. Sticking to historical accuracy is very important in any book but it doesn’t make sense for the TLH kids to be so ignorant when the TID gang, as you pointed out, who lived at a time when society was even more “traditional” is much more open-minded and in touch with reality than them. (I only remember the Jessamine situation and Gabriel’s comment about opium when it comes to this issue in TID, btw.)

The TLH kids have been sheltered a lot from experiences that are often connected with being a Shadowhunter, such as battles and grief. On the other hand, the TLH kids clearly have a better relationship with the Downworld and Mundane society, to put it like that, so it’s quite strange to me that having contact with both of these worlds, they are still so oblivious to social issues, as a whole.

 Are we supposed to believe that the Shadowhunters in London have no clue about the countries colonized by England? Are we supposed to believe that the Shadowhunters who live on the African continent, for example, never mentioned anything about slavery? Were the Shadowhunters who live on the Asian continent oblivious to the strong presence of Europeans on their land? Didn’t no one find it odd how their countries were called “colonies”? Yes, Shadowhunters are Shadowhunters first and their nationality doesn’t matter, I’m aware of all of this, but those Shadowhunters were still born in those nations and had to face the hardships of living in a poor country or the privilege of borning in a rich one. It doesn’t make sense to me for Shadowhunters to be so clueless about things like this when this is a topic that could easily come up at a meeting in Idris.

Going back to the TLH kids, who are lucky to know at least a little about the mundane part of society - just look at Matthew and his obsession with Oscar Wilde, Anna and how she knows about the last-fashion and Christopher and Marie Curie. Were they really able to filter their surroundings so well that they only heard about books, fashion, and science - things that mattered to them - and not even once they heard about racial discrimination?

I can see their ignorance being blamed on the period that story takes place, but it still feels like a lazy excuse to me. Again, I don’t think anyone is hoping or wishing to have the TLH kids as social activists or anything, still, we're allowed to feel kinda angry/hurt by the way this topic is being dealt with in the story so far.

[oumakokichi]

What's your opinion on Kaito and Maki! I don't know if anyone's ever asked this before (sorry if yes) Ur blog is epic btw!

This question is pretty recent, so I feel like this is a great one to kick off with getting back into writing full meta! I know in the past I’ve answered a few brief questions on how I feel about Momota and Maki respectively, as well as their relationship in-game, but I don’t know if I’ve ever written at length about the two of them.

I also don’t know whether you want my opinions on them both as individual characters or their relationship together, so I’ll probably touch on both aspects! This ask will obviously include spoilers for the whole game, so I’ll talk more under the cut!

Momota and Maki are definitely two of the most important characters in the game. Both their dynamic with each other, as well as their eventual friendship with Saihara, are pivotal plot points that come up again and again. Momota’s good intentions and attempts to help Maki come out of her shell and self-imposed isolation from everyone else are initially met by her with skepticism, distrust, and a feeling that he’s being incredibly overbearing and putting his nose where it doesn’t belong—but in the end, she does find herself pulled in by his unrelenting optimism and offers of friendship.

As Momota helps Saihara begin to overcome his anxiety and self-doubt by pushing him forward and reaffirming that he believes in him, Maki also begins to face some of her own demons. Like Saihara, her issues are rooted in deep-seated trauma from a young age, though hers is considerably more severe as it concerns both physical and mental child abuse, as well as a life filled with violence and murder.

It’s interesting, because both Saihara and Maki struggle with what I would call self-loathing, but go about showing it in completely different ways. They both doubt their own ability to do anything right and feel that they’ll only hurt people in the end, but where Saihara overcompensates for this by trying to please everyone and being afraid of saying no, Maki’s approach is much firmer: she tries to shut everyone out completely, keeping everyone at arm’s bay in order to prevent any attachments from forming in the first place. As someone who lost pretty much everything at such a young age, she’s clearly afraid of the same thing happening all over again, as well as wary of anyone who might try to get close to her, only to attempt to “take her out” in the same fashion that she’s had to kill people her entire life.

Momota’s persistence in striking up a friendship with her is therefore really, really interesting. It’s the first time in Maki’s life that anyone has ever been so adamant about wanting to get to know her. Considering how harsh and unfriendly she initially is, as well as the fact that her talent is revealed to everyone by the end of chapter 2, it would make complete sense if Momota wanted nothing to do with her, in her opinion. She’s used to being alone, and she’s already convinced herself by that point that it’s preferable to the alternative.

But Momota is a character who fundamentally refuses to take no for an answer. This is simultaneously both his best and worst trait, in my opinion: it’s literally right in his catch phrase, whenever he claims that he’s going to reach the stars someday. He runs purely on the idea of faith and belief. There’s no middle ground with him: either you trust someone implicitly, regardless of everything stacked against them, or you don’t. Shades of grey, especially at the beginning of the game, are virtually nil. It’s a very “shounen protagonist” sentiment that winds up being somewhat challenged for him as the game goes on.

He’s interested in Maki, and wants to know why she closes herself off in her research lab. When the finger is pointed at her in chapter 2 and she falls under suspicion of murdering Hoshi, he defends her even at the expense of making himself look worse, and even to the point of claiming that he would “bet everyone else’s lives” that she’s innocent (a line which was completely omitted in the localization and dub, but which you can still hear him say in the jp dialogue of the chapter 2 trial).

There’s absolutely no evidence to back Maki up or support her; Momota’s defense on her behalf stems more from the fact that he hates Ouma’s equally black-or-white “guilty until proven innocent” approach, and resents the attempts at mutual suspicion and paranoia that Ouma tries to force between them. Momota is, in a word, stubborn. He figures things out by “feel” or “intuition” and is extremely slow to change his opinions even when facts and evidence are presented before him.

Again, this can be a good trait: his loyalty means he’s the last person who would ever throw someone else under the bus, and it’s the main reason he succeeds in getting closer to someone as emotionally closed-off as Maki at all. It’s less of a good thing, however, in later chapters like chapter 4, where his stubborn refusal to look at the facts genuinely endangers everyone’s lives in the trial and results in a huge blow-out that threatens his friend group with Saihara especially, but really with the whole training trio.

It’s this stubbornness of his that really baffles Maki. Initially, she doesn’t know what to make of Momota’s attempts to befriend her. She assumes he must be reckless, or stupid, or both, to want to get close to someone as dangerous as she is. But as she gradually begins to let her walls down and starts opening up despite herself, it’s such a nice change to see her eventually starting to believe in herself and view herself more positively as a result of Momota’s own belief in her.

I think momoharu as a ship works really well and has potential specifically because of these themes of “self-love” and “believing in yourself” that come up in the main game’s narrative again and again. And unlike the dynamics between Momota and other characters, such as Saihara, I feel like Momota and Maki are on much more of an even footing, where the two of them can view each other as equals and aren’t afraid to challenge each other whenever one of them is in the wrong about something.

For example, Saihara and Momota have much more of an imbalanced, sometimes one-sided friendship. That’s not to say that they aren’t both extremely important friends to one another—but between Saihara’s inability to say no to people and Momota’s tendency to take charge and view himself as “the hero” while everyone else is his “sidekick,” their relationship becomes incredibly uneven very quickly.

Add to this Momota’s unspoken jealousy of Saihara’s talent and his pivotal importance to the rest of the group in trials, and it gets even messier. I’m reminded of the chapter 4 trial, when Saihara really goes against Momota’s opinion on something for the first time by proving that Gonta is the culprit, and Momota is livid. Even when all the proof is laid out before him, and even when he knows, logically, he feels so betrayed by Saihara’s lack of “belief” in him that his underlying jealousy bubbles up and he lashes out. The localization considerably dulled the impact of this, but in the original Japanese dialogue, Momota even stops referring to Saihara by his first name for a long time, referring to him much more coldly by his surname from the end of chapter 4 until the latter half of chapter 5.

Momota and Saihara never feel as though they’ve really escaped that “hero and sidekick” dynamic until the very end of chapter 5 when they say their farewells, and even then there’s a real hesitance with Saihara to call Momota out when he’s wrong or ask for an apology even when Momota owes him one. If the game had explored more of Momota’s jealousy and feelings of inadequacy compared to Saihara, I would have really loved that, and I feel like there would be real potential to explore how they could eventually be on even footing… but as it stands, in canon we don’t really get that, and most of Momota’s shortcomings and flaws are somewhat brushed aside after his death in favor of Saihara remembering him more fondly.

This isn’t to say that Momota doesn’t have any flaws when it comes to how he interacts with Maki, of course. His character has a lot of “toxic masculinity” baggage, including unironically believing really outdated things like “women shouldn’t be fighting, they should be raising children,” or thinking that women are inherently weaker physically and more fragile emotionally than men. Luckily though, Maki often consistently proves him wrong on all of these points: her ability to wipe the floor with him during their training sessions is of course part of it, but it’s worth noting that she’s also considerably more level-headed than Momota is in many ways.

Where Momota is superstitious and afraid of the occult to a comedic degree, Maki remains the rational, down-to-earth one who doesn’t believe in such things. Where Momota is prone to letting his pride and temper get the better of him and refuses to speak to Saihara or apologize for the things he said during their fight in chapter 4, Maki is the one who attempts to push them into interacting with each other again, and believes that Momota is being much too childish about the whole ordeal. Again and again, Maki proves Momota’s outdated and harmful stereotypes about women wrong, and isn’t afraid to poke fun at him or get exasperated with his bullshit whenever he’s being kind of a dick.

Her relationship with Momota works specifically because of how much it feels like the two of them are on a more even footing. Where Saihara somewhat meekly accepts the “sidekick” role, even when he thinks it’s unfair, Maki doesn’t really accept it or go along with it in the first place, beyond showing up for training sessions. And when she gradually begins to develop romantic feelings for him, it feels authentic—particularly because it ties back into the idea of Maki learning to believe in herself the same way that Momota has believed in her from the start.

Deep down, Maki is someone who fundamentally believes herself not only undeserving of, but borderline incapable of love. She feels as though any human emotions she might have once had were stomped out of her from a young age and that absolutely nothing remains, to the point where she says “even Kiibo is more human than she is.” This self-loathing and dehumanization are the main reasons she keeps people at arm’s length: she simply thinks she doesn’t deserve any kindness, and that even if it’s given to her, she doesn’t know how to reciprocate in turn.

Her entire character arc is about unlearning this, and gradually coming to accept that she does have the capacity to love, including love for herself and for others. I’ve seen some people who believe Tsumugi when she claims in the chapter 6 trial that she “gave Maki those feelings for Momota” for the sake of the show, but I feel that believing that at face value really doesn’t do justice to Maki’s autonomy as a character.

Even if Tsumugi somehow did insert those feelings there (which I highly doubt, especially considering how she blatantly lies about giving Momota his illness too despite pretty obviously not knowing he was sick prior to chapter 5), the whole point of Maki’s confession to Momota in chapter 5 and reaffirmation of those feelings in chapter 6 is that she eventually comes to believe that they’re her feelings, and no one else’s. As someone who was denied any free will or choice for her entire life, her coming to view Momota as someone precious to her, as well as herself as an individual capable of making decisions and loving other people, is an incredibly powerful arc of character growth. I honestly really love to see it.

And it’s clear that Maki coming to love and value herself as an individual is exactly what Momota wanted to see from her. We don’t really know if he reciprocated her romantic feelings or not since he dies without really giving her an answer. I personally think he spared her an answer because even if he had said he reciprocated, it only would’ve hurt her worse to see him die immediately afterward.

But what he does make really clear is that he fully believes that because she could come to love him, she could also eventually come to love herself. Whether it’s romantic or not, he clearly cherishes her a lot as a person and wants her to be happy. He wants her to live on as herself, and not any of the roles she’s had to take thus far in order to survive. She eventually does do this, and I think he would’ve been absolutely thrilled to see it happen.

All in all, I feel like momoharu has a lot of potential for character growth (both for Maki and Momota), as well as for cute moments, comic relief, and all around as a feel-good ship. Momota definitely has some issues to work out with misogyny and toxic masculinity, and while it’s certainly not Maki’s job to hold his hand and walk him through those things, she’s the type of person who doesn’t mind putting her foot down and telling him no when she feels like he’s crossed a line, which is exactly the type of dynamic I like to see in relationships.

Anyway, I’ll wind this up here. This was a really fun question to go into, thank you again anon! I had a lot of fun getting back into the swing of writing meta, and I’m glad I got a chance to write a little more about my thoughts on momoharu, and Momota and Maki as characters.

[peterstanslizzie]

Reacting To: Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Season 3 Episode 2)

Episode Title: Code Word Milkshake

Spoiler Warning: Kindly proceed if you’ve already seen the episode or are able to handle spoilers 

1. OMG! A K-pop song? That’s so cool! It sounds like BTS lol. And the song is pretty catchy too 🎵; “Dive into my ocean of love”. It’s such a bop! We see the mutes (even the Mod Frogs) fangirling HARD. But what animals are these guys supposed to be? Are they dolphins? But why do they have horns? And apparently abs as well: 

2. Aww but the leader of the group, Hyun Soo (as revealed in the subtitles) soon gets paralyzed by a dart and is kidnapped after signing fan autographs. And of course, it’s the doing of Dr. Emilia as she’s seen testing a serum sample on Hyun Soo. Again, I’m impressed with her ability to be so stealthy. However, she’s finding it difficult in getting the right formula for the genetic serum since none of the samples she’s used so far has worked on the kidnapped mutes. BTW, Jamack talking to Hyun Soo is hilarious. 

3. In Timbercat Village, Kipo is planning with HMUFA a mission to find Emilia, rescue their friends and retrieve Song’s research journal. Oh, did Asher get a haircut? If so, they look really nice.

4. Our boy, Benson wants Troy to come along because he feels safer when he’s around. How precious! I’m  happy he gets to go on a mission with Kipo for the first time too. It’s nice to mix groups up sometimes. And it looks like it’s just gonna be a human/hybrid-only mission because the mutes won’t be able to handle Emilia’s sonic emitter. Dave is upset that he won’t be able to tag along with them. I think it’s a good thing to sit this one out because he does have a tendency to die during their missions lol.

5. They manage to hitch a ride on a couple of dragonfly mutes due to Kipo coming up with the codeword, “Milkshake” to keep situations calm.  Random but okay. As they’re flying over the sea, they spot a ship, which definitely belongs to Emilia since we hear Zane asking Greta to turn on the sonic emitter as some mysterious sea creature was circling around them. Because the dragonflies are not immune to the sound, this causes them all to fall into the water

6. The group tries to climb over the ship to get a peek of the situation aboard and they can see the burrow humans enjoying their time there, splish-splashing in a giant pool paired with a crazy slide and everything. 

7. Dave lets Lio and Roberto know that he wants to have a boys night out (BNO) with them. But it’s clear that he’s doing this because he still feels salty about not being included in the stealth mission. Roberto looks like he doesn’t want to go out but Lio is down to hangout with Dave-o lol. 

8. Back on the Dr. Emilia’s ship, Kipo and gang try to find her lab but they almost got spotted by a blonde human girl, who apparently is able to hear Hyun Soo  sing through the cafeteria vents and thus, wants him to sing for her. Kipo and Troy actually recognize her from their old burrow. She’s actually Hoag’s daugther, Doag! I can’t believe he named his daughter that lol. Anyways, they were all actually friendly with one another, so we shall see if she’s willing to help them or not. Doag really likes dancing and we see her dancing around to Hyun Soo’s singing. She then does a split and spots them. Well, she doesn’t look alarmed actually. 

9. Meanwhile, Dave and Lio are playing cards but afterward, they went to check out the so-called “community bonding” session between Timbercats and the Umlaut snakes. At first, it seems like they are having a huge argument but they’re actually just writing a song and having a couple of debates. It’s song-break time. This time, the song is called ‘Friendship Alliance’. How fitting. After the performance, Lio says he wants to go to bed but Dave isn’t done yet and wants him to check out his secret stash of explosion berry cola.

10. Doag explains to the group that Dr. Emilia has been treating them nicely so far but they want her to know the truth about Emilia who has been trying to kill Kipo since she was a baby. Plus, according to Troy (and Benson from earlier on), she didn’t eat his Benson’s pancakes. Troy is way more upset about the part about the pancakes, which of course he has to be since it’s his boo’s pancakes. But my goodness, Doag’s voice is like nails on the chalkboard. Don’t you agree? 

11. I think it’s hard for them to convince her that Dr. Emilia is a bad person, especially since they don’t have any real evidence to show. Emilia is like a savior to these humans. Fortunately, Doag wants to help them rescue Boom-Boom, Jamack, Camille and Hyun Soo regardless. 

12. She takes them to Dr. Emilia’s lab, which isn’t very hidden like they said lol. The door’s locked but Troy, the skilled magician was able to pick the lock no problem. Benson is impressed and he actually addressed him as his boyfriend! Cute!

13. They enter the lab and we see all the kidnapped mutes trapped in their individual mute-proof cells. Aww the way Jamack called Kipo, Burrow Girl was so sweet. He has come a really long way with her since Season 1 huh? I don’t know what’s up with Boom-Boom but she(?) doesn’t look too good, almost unhinged. So, Hyun Soo is known as a Dolphicon! I guess that’s short for Dolphin and Unicorn. That’s explains the horn. I actually like the name “Wall Siren” for him as well. Despite only speaking in Korean, Hyun Soo does seem to understand English when Doag asks him “who are you?”. I feel like the introduction of Hyun Soo is like paying homage to Kipo’s animation studio, Studio Mir, which is in fact South Korean. 

14. Kipo proceeds to then break them out of their cells. Doag declares she’s going to help them escape. I actually hope there’s a chance that she would be part of Kipo’s group officially. She seems cool, mostly lol. Wolf also finds Song’s research journal but before they could make their escape, the traumatized Boom-Boom looks at the needles Dr. Emilia has been using on her, freaks out and drops her nectar bombs on them, which causes the whole lab to explode.  Boom-Boom needs therapy for sure. Ughh…Wolf also accidentally drops the journal and leaves it behind the lab. That book is probably destroyed. 

15. Back at Timbercat village, I assume Lio had already drank the cola before he is super hyped. Yumyan also joins in on their shenanigans and he gives them the idea to steal Molly’s axe and put it in an axe bush (is that what Yumyan said?). Also, is this supposed to be a pun or something?

16. Doag puts Hyun Soo in their getaway boat but it’s weird since he’s a dolphin and can just swim in the water instead lol. They’re supposed to leave now but Kipo wants to face Emilia now. I say she’s making a bad decision here. Dr. Emilia then arrive with Greta and Zane but Wolf takes out the latter two easily. The rest of the humans come out to the deck to see what the ruckus is all about and Emilia tries to play coy and innocent with them. 

17. Hoag notices that his daughter isn’t around. Our heroes try to explain to the humans that Dr. Emilia is the bad guy; They told about how Song is the Mega Monkey and how she got her to attack and destroy their home back in Season 1. And they explain that she mind-controlled Song to kill her own daughter. 

Even grandma can deliver a beatdown on someone lol

18.The humans are reluctant to believe them because it does sound very farfetched. But c’mon…they should know by know that Las Vistas is a messed up place; Anything can happen. Also, don’t they remember the Mega Monkey saving them from getting gilded in Season 2. Suddenly, Hoag makes an attempt to paralyze Kipo with one of the darts but she quickly reacts and knocks him out. The humans see this and they get mad at her. Eventually, Kipo and the others make their escape. Finally. 

19. Back to Lio and Dave. We find out towards the end that Molly actually killed Dave 5 times for the stunt he pulled on her lol. Anyways, the both of them are glad to have this bonding session with one another since Kipo isn’t around. 

20. Our heroes reach land but Doag wants to go back because she knows her dad is worried sick about her. And so, Hyun Soo and I guess the rest of his groupmates are bringing her back there. Aww, she should’ve stayed but I understand why she wants to go back to the ship. But to be honest, somebody should’ve thought to give her a communicator or a walkie-talkie or something because at least they can know what Dr. Emilia’s next move is. Perhaps they don’t really have to think too much into it since the journals has been decimated and all…or is it?

21. Wolf, I hope you’re happy you dropped the journal lol. Dr. Emilia figures out that Kipo is X. Wait, I’m trying to remember if there any mention of X in the previous episodes. Anyways, I wonder what she’s going to do with the fur Kipo left during their last confrontation. I guess since Kipo is a human who also has the DNA of apex predators, Emilia is going to play with her recombinant DNA and figure out a way to reverse the effects of the mute DNA so that only the normal DNA will be present? I dunno….

22. Last note/tiny bit of criticism: Is it just me or do you guys sometimes think that some of the character designs look a little wonky in this episode? Sometimes, I felt like Kipo, Benson and even Troy look a little off in some frames. Anyways, that’s the end of my review of episode 2. Stay tuned tomorrow for my review of episode 3. Thanks for reading everybody!

[donotstopthisdebatenow]

V3 Prologue Replay 0.1- It’s Time to Wake Up

Well, guess this is happening now.

Hello there. I figured I might as well write down things I picked up on during my replays and discussions with others, as well as some translation issues I (and many others from what I’ve seen) have noticed throughout out the game, with some fun trivia along the way too. This is mainly for the sake of my own peace of mind than anything, as I haven’t properly went through the game chapter by chapter in order recently, and I mainly compared translation as bits and pieces than going through line by line.

I will be recording the game both in English and Japanese to compare the lines and comment on differences if they seem of worth to note, which honestly most of it isn’t given that in terms of adapting the language in a natural sounding way -as a localization- they did a pretty good job. Most issues seems to come from lack of communication between the team in terms of context of some lines, but that’s mostly on the management of the team and I don’t have the insider’s knowledge beyond knowing that they were given some characters/sections of the game to translate so I can’t exactly comment on what was going on there.

For the trivia bits, please do keep in mind that it is me being nitpicky as a translator myself, and that I’m only pointing those out as how I would personally prefer those to be translated but at the end of the day, it really does come down to preferences since they do communicate the main thing they are trying to relay and unlike context relevant errors that do in fact cause geniune harm to gameplay and player’s experience (ie. inconsistencies in translation making Trial 5 a confusing mess) they are more what it says on the tin- some extra info/context on things.

All that said, let’s start~

Here we start with a shortened version of the V3 promo we will see in trial 6, as well as the V3 opening. Before I move to the latter though, I do want to note that for the “This story is not over” part, the Japanese counterpart uses “物語は終わらない” which due to the verb tense has a heavier “This story won’t end” vibe, which Monokuma kept insisting on in trial 6 as well.

It is not a big thing but simply a nice touch with the bold claims they make throughout the game on how it will never end.

It is also worth touching on given that one commenter in trial 6 was saying that it’s been three years since last season, so it is a bold “come back” line by whoever the group running this season 53 is.

Beyond that, it is just a nice recap and I personally love how the music blends fairly well together.

Hello there, “Team Danganronpa”. Still love how this spoiler was staring at us in the face entire time.

For the actual opening Tsumugi having a red string (of their fates) at hand and Rantaro being the only one who becomes one with their shadow to have pink eyes open was a nice touch.

The character in that pink blinking eye that for some reason wasn’t translated is the kanji for “lie” (嘘) btw. Also nice touch with Kaede facing the culprits in that blink and you will miss it scene before they dissolve to letters.

Tsumugi and Rantaro being on top of the slot machine just like how Monokuma’s ‘throne’ is between their trial stands is nice too.

The opening, which was supposedly used in-game as show intro as well, having the meteorities and that talent suppressing machine for the Ultimate Hunt plotline is of worth noting too. It is easy to dismiss the Gofer Project plotline for us players now, but the show was genuinely going for that angle before Kokichi’s takeover, hence it is worth keeping in mind while going through first four chapters especially.

For the game name, this is sort of a dead horse at this point but “Killing Harmony” rather than “Everyone’s [Mutual] Killing School Semester” was likely used due to character limit, so they had to get creative with an alternative subtitle. Character limit is a genuine issue translators face with especially with a language like Japanese and why we end up things like Yasuhiro telling us to call him Hiro or Korekiyo saying we can use Kiyo.

It is also interesting that they play the show intro twice in the prologue, one before and after their memories were altered by the flashback light, and given Monokuma when he appears later saying that this prologue was going on too long, it seems like whoever was in charge of that (supposedly Monophanie, if kubs indeed have their own AI, or the person using the avatar of said bear) messed up so they had that version aired unintentionally, hence having to go for an intro again later.

And now it’s time to wake up for one antenna girl.

If this part felt pretentious and weird to you when you first read it, don’t worry it is just usual “Kodaka trying to go purple prose except it comes off really awkward especially in English” and the translator chose to simplify a good chunk of it, going “yeah we ain’t doing that here” and I can respect that tbh.

But just for the sake of having it here: A more literal translation of that part would be “There is nothing here yet. No light, no sound. Nor my form or voice. Nobody knows who I am yet. Who I am? Who am I? I reach out a hand. A hand that doesn’t belong to anyone yet. To grasp my own existence- This is me. My name is Kaede Akamatsu. I finally recognized who I am. ...Nice to meet [you,] me. Miss protagonist of this crazy story.”

Again, a few things are just reworded to sound natural in English for the localization’s take, but if the line “Nice to meet... me” confused you before, that’s because translator went half way cutting out Kodaka waxing poetics on regaining consciousness, so taking off the subject in translation makes it sound weirder when she suddenly seems to start to talk to herself.

Also, the heavy protag framing with her and Shuichi honestly did more harm to the game than good, at this point. It would be better if they started off without that last line, as it would blend better with unreliable narrator we just happened to see events from the POV gimmick way better. Same goes for Demo having her, Hajime and Makoto sharing the “Protagonist Room” and how much hype they caused by actively pushing that angle. Part of that was preserving the twist, yes, but I also get why people do feel like it was meant as a “take that” as well.

It also did not help with people recognizing that we were playing as “side characters” the entire time as far as in-universe story plotted by this TDR was concerned too, since Kiibo was set to be the in game Naegi-expy protagonist of the season.

But enough of that for now, because we have a title card to tackle.

蘇る超高校級

I have to admit, revival probably was the best choice to use there as looking back now, there are a few things this is refering to-

1-) The simpler explanation of how they supposedly had their memories sealed, hence the “restoring/bringing back memories” meaning of 蘇る, which also means “reviving” the title of Ultimate in the Gofer Project plotline universe given how they were supposedly last survivors of the earth and

2-) How this is a revival of Danganronpa, going again with the fact that show stopped for three years/some people were awaiting for a new season for a while now, hence the resurrection/revival of Danganronpa and by extention, the concept of Ultimates by using that meaning of 蘇る in that way too. After all, “Ultimate” is really just “Best in X field amongst other highschoolers” title (as commonly fan-translated and iirc even made it to anime subs as “Super High School Level”), so having high schoolers who are given memories and the title to match with it is reviving that.

Finally out of the closet locker, and before we move on, I want to add another side note that when you invert the UI, pre first flashback light UI turns a familiar pink.

While one reading of this could be that this lie magenta being the inverted version hints at prologue being a lie, I personally take it as due to the inverted color being the one we see, it means the prologue has the “truth” than later parts, since in trial we have blue truth bullet changing color to become pink lie bullet theme, that the color they are inverted to being opposite of what they are simply makes more sense to me.

We will see when we return to this locker again later that our UI changed to yellow which inverts to blue, reverse of truth, which is especially poignant with Tsumugi’s later trial 6 comment on “if they will call fiction a lie, then all their actions and words were indeed all just lies, since they were performed based on things some people wrote, fiction, too.

It changing immediately after we are shown that first light simply felt too relevant to not tack this on here, but moving on-

A mood tbh

Poor girl, honestly. This is not even the only time she will end up hitting her head when we are done with prologue.

A bit of a short fuse there, but also fair.

That’s what we all would like to know too.

Imagine someone goes through the trouble of kidnapping you while you are on the way to school, and brings you to... another school you’ve never been to. It almost sounds funny if you ignore the small big fact that they are brought there to kill each other.

You tried, Kaede.

Also I forgot how much of the prologue was really just “Kaede causes herself physical pain while trying to calm down simulator” wow

Dun dun duun

Insert “Wow, Kaede comes out of her own closet AND brings hat boy out his closet too? Doing Arceus’ work, Kaede” joke.

Also hi, Shuichi.

This is honestly a weird way to phrase it, as what Kaede says is that it is “A boy dressed in a normal school uniform...” than emphasizing on Shuichi’s own normalness, in the Japanese version.

It is also the only line that has a slight change in both takes as in the second take, she says “A boy dressed in a bit weird school uniform...” which due to copy-paste and adjective being used to describe Shuichi than his clothing in the translation, it ends up being glossed over.

On the one hand, still funny. On the another hand, this kid is justifiably terrified...

“Buddy I need some context here I have no clue what’s going on”

“Oh yeah that happened”

Shuichi: Sees a girl in high school uniform, kidnapped by likely people older than them himself

Shuichi:

Shuichi: You are working with them aren’t you?!

10/10 detective work there hat boy. I know he is probably just still too scared to think straight, but it is still funny on hindsight.

That’s one way to calm someone

And both of their names are the same both takes too. Their way of referring to themselves (私 for Kaede, 僕 for Shuichi, which are both used in the Chapter 1 title as well) are same, as well as their general speech patterns too.

Damn, girl.

Also a nice time to point out that Shuichi spends a good chunk of prologue retake and chapter 1 doubting if they can really trust everyone, and it is good to see that he had same tendency to assume he is the only one facing something/that people around must be enemy unless he is explicitly told or shown that they are not.

It makes sense in the situation, really, especially with how Kaede being the one who opened the door to his locker, his experience is that this girl could be working for/with the ones who kidnapped him, but still worth mentioning.

A real flashback time-

Which is coming soon, because tumblr refuses to add more pictures to this post OTL

[lesbianrobin]

You played Tomb Raider? What did you think of it, and did you see the movie? Did you play any of the sequels?

Yes!! I absolutely adore the 2013 Tomb Raider reboot. I haven't replayed any other game half as much, besides Life Is Strange, which is of course very replayable as a choice-based game. Something about Tomb Raider just settled right next to my heart and hasn't left since. I think it's kind of the perfect comfort game. It's enjoyably challenging without ever being punishing, and the various difficulty options allow for a breezy experience or a harrowing one as well if the player so chooses. I can't remember the term from my game design class a couple years back, but I think TR is excellent at maintaining a sense of immersion through its design, allowing players enough freedom to feel as though they're operating under their own volition without giving the player the opportunity to wholly forget about the plot of the game and spend hours screwing around getting collectibles. I love TR'S little challenges and collectibles! There's not an overwhelming Assassin's Creed level of shit to find, the challenges like burning banners are fun to do even if you aren't aiming for completion, and it's always exciting to find a new artifact or object belonging to your crewmates because you'll get some nice background information as well as insight into Lara's state of mind and her true enjoyment of studying history.

Obviously I love the Sam/Lara element of the game. The fact that the (somewhat homoerotic) friendship between two women was much of the plot's motivation for a large part of the game is just really unique, and I like the way that the game emphasizes Lara's human connections while still developing her as a fierce, formidable survivalist who can take down an army on her own if need be. And the ending... wow, that shit meant a lot to my lesbian little heart.

I did see the Alicia Vikander flick, and I was... underwhelmed and perplexed. They made a lot of odd decisions, and though I think they intended to tell a new story with clear inspiration from the game, it instead seemed as though the studio/writers/whoever couldn't make up their mind whether they wanted to follow the game's plot or not, which resulted in a bunch of odd borrowed elements shoved into a lackluster and poorly-paced plot. You expect action and fun ancient setpieces from Tomb Raider, and as I recall the film spent a confusing amount of time more or less dicking around in modern urban environments. Alicia Vikander was pretty good, though, very hot and badass, and the dude with the boat was cute, so that's nice, I guess. They either should have gone with a condensed version of the game's plot (starting off with the boatwreck, following Lara as she's separated from her documentary group, struggles to survive, and ultimately rescues Sam) or written an entirely new story. Instead they managed to make Yamatai boring as hell, they stripped Lara of much of the depth and humanity she had in the game by cutting out her entire supporting cast and making her an island from the start, and in my opinion they squandered a talented and well-cast lead. Vikander absolutely could have helmed a new franchise, more grounded and markedly different than Angelina Jolie's, but they gave her a weird lame plot and now we're unlikely to ever see her reprise the role.

I did play both Rise of the Tomb Raider and Shadow of the Tomb Raider. I have some real issues with both games, but they are both absolutely gorgeous and fun to play. They both have settings and cutscenes that linger in my mind for their beauty and excitement. My primary gripe is the expansion of open-world elements and the addition of sidequests. Now, while sidequests in Rise were generally clunky and felt pointless, I did enjoy a lot of the sidequests in Shadow, so I think they did improve on their design, but my issue is that not every AAA game needs to be open-world! The stakes in Tomb Raider are quite literally apocalyptic, so it feels pretty ridiculous for Lara to be helping some rando find their lost chickens when the world is gonna end in, like, a day if she doesn't go to this tomb and do some shit. I love TR because it feels immersive to me, and while conventional wisdom often assumes that open world = immersion because player freedom lets them project more wholly onto the protagonist, that just isn't the case when the degree of player freedom disrupts and undermines the game's own plot.

My second-biggest issue is the total exclusion of Sam in both games. It's nice that Jonah sticks around, and it makes sense that Sam may be incredible traumatized and not fit to go on adventures with Lara, but she was the driving force behind Lara's determination in the latter half of the game, and it just feels weird for her to be nothing more than a footnote in the sequels. Lara doesn't feel quite as human with only Jonah's constant company (BTW it's absolutely insane the lengths he goes to for her and they're lucky they made him such a lovable guy or it would feel ridiculous and strain credulity) and the implications that she's essentially cut or lost all ties aside from him. While it was definitely intentional to make Lara's character more troubled and isolated as her adventures went on, I just don't think it was accomplished quite as well as it might have been. Rise and Shadow have high stakes, as well as interesting plots and plenty of human drama, but I find myself missing Lara at times. She's still there! She still has her moments of incredible kindness, of awe and excitement when she finds something extraordinary, but it just feels to me like something's missing, perhaps because of the increased scope of the disasters she faces.

Ultimately, I think all three games are excellent and enjoyable, and Rise/Shadow really stepped things up in just about every technical aspect, but there's some little bit of soul in TR that means it'll always be my favorite. I could probably say a lot more, but I guess that's all for now. Thanks for the ask!

[lunarity2013]

OC Details: Lucy Stone

So, I figured it was high time I told you guys about my Hogwarts Mystery OC! I got most of these questions on here from @thewasp1995 (Go check out his OC David, btw, it’s super detailed and so cool!) I really hope you guys enjoy!

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

Name: Lucille Maria Stone

DOB: October 16, 1972 (turned 12 during her first year)

Parents: Candace and Sean Stone

Siblings: Nathan Samson Stone (oldest, 9-year age difference, Ravenclaw), Casey Andrew Stone (youngest, 6-year age difference, muggle)

Nationality: Irish

Ancestry: Muggleborn

House: Hufflepuff

Height: as of Year 4, she's 5'1". She doesn't get much taller until after graduation, stopping at about 5’3” by age 25

Eyes: large, round, dark brown

Hair: waist length, light brown, wavy

Sexuality: Demisexual, hetero-leaning

Likes: reading, writing, singing, helping others, cheering her friends on, card games, charms, astronomy, ancient runes, nifflers, cats

Dislikes: being the center of attention, hurting people, fighting, doctor’s offices, spiders, clowns, being betrayed, baking (she’s bad at it)

Friends: Rowan (best friend), Ben (best friend), Penny (surrogate sister), Charlie (competitive best friend), Bill (surrogate brother), Tonks (good friend), Barnaby (crush), Tulip (good friend), Andre (friend)

Enemies: Merula (formerly), Ismelda (thinks her constant threats are a big red flag), Rakepick (evil), Snape (his decision), Nathan (depending on the game's ending)

Neutral: Skye (she helps tutor her), Talbott (more Penny’s friend, but she enjoys seeing him), Merula (after finding Nathan), Liz (Barnaby and Charlie's good friend), Murphy (he's cool)

*Badeea, Jae, Diego, and others to be decided at a later date, after I actually meet them in-game*

Love Interest: Barnaby Lee

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Strengths/Weaknesses/Hobbies: 

Positive traits: honest | trustworthy | thoughtful | caring | brave | patient | selfless | ambitious | tolerant | lucky | intelligent | confident | focused  | humble | generous | merciful | observant | wise | clever | charming | cheerful | optimistic | decisive | adaptive | calm | protective | proud | diligent | considerate | compassionate | good sportsmanship | friendly | empathetic | passionate | reliable | resourceful | sensible | sincere | witty |funny

Negative Traits: moody | short-tempered | emotionally unstable | whiny | controlling | conceited | possessive | paranoid | lies | impatient | cowardly | bitter | selfish | power - hungry | greedy | lazy | judgmental | forgetful | impulsive | spiteful | stubborn | sadistic | masochistic | petty | unlucky | absent-minded | abusive | addict | aggressive | childish | callous | clingy | delusional | cocky | competitive | corrupt | cynical | cruel | depressed | deranged | egotistical | envious | insecure | insensitive | lustful | delinquent | guilt complex | reclusive | reckless | nervous | oversensitive | rebellious

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What’s their personal philosophy?  Do they even have one?

For much of the earlier portion of her life, Lucy’s motto would be “do unto others and you would have them do unto you”. Up until about the time Rakepick shows up, and Ben’s secret-keeping, and just the all-around mess that her life becomes when the Vaults come into question, this is what she lives by. After about Year 4? It shifts a bit, focusing her own values and energy towards protecting her loved ones and innocent people from those who would cause harm, and doing whatever necessary to stop them. And after finding Nathan, she begins to include him in the latter.

How do they feel about their status and reputation as the curse-breaker in the school?

Lucy was never one for the spotlight, even as a little kid. She was content for years to simply look up to her older brother in his successes, and then later to help her parents with her baby brother, showering him with love and attention. Actively searching for the Vaults, and subsequently breaking the curses within, was only part of her plan to try and find some closure as to her brother’s disappearance (something she has convinced herself he was merely a victim of and not an active participant, to save herself grief of her brother not being what she thought). She doesn’t like having so many eyes on her, especially for something she knows is dangerous and putting herself and her friends in harm’s way. But every time she tries to back out and leave it be, she gets dragged back in.

Did they get sorted into the Hogwarts House they expected to?  Did the Sorting Hat have any problems sorting them?  Or did it not even have to touch their head?

Before Nathan’s disappearance, she would have loved to consider herself lucky enough to be a witch, let alone be sorted into her brother’s house. After his disappearance, however, she had mixed feelings about the idea of sharing his crest and colors, and possibly having more eyes on her than before. Her values lined up differently than his, however, and the Sorting Hat gave her an out in the form of Hufflepuff house. She was still a little disappointed by being so far from her brother’s life there, but years later, she’d swear up and down that being put in the house of fairness, honesty, and loyalty is where she truly belonged.

What’s their personal style?

Lucy wears a lot of early Autumn colors, usually. Lots of oranges, yellows, browns, and olive greens are kind of signature to her style. She typically wears things that make her feel cute and kind of kid-like, so over-large sweaters with skirts or overall shorts and dresses with print tops (floral or stripes, typically). She usually pairs both with comfortable boots and long socks. She wears her hair down most of the time, except when actively exploring the Vaults and when studying for final exams.When it gets cold, she’ll sometimes “borrow” sweaters from her friends to stay warm (usually Bill and Barnaby).

What are their coping strategies for dealing with everything (the Vaults, Jacob, etc.), if they have any?

Lucy has terrible coping mechanisms for her problems, unfortunately. She convinced herself early on that her brother had probably been killed by the Cursed Vaults while trying to help protect others from the curses, and is thus even more broken up when she eventually does find him and sees what kind of person he’s really become. She tries at the start of every year to ignore the signs of another Vault opening, just trying to live a normal, Hogwarts-student life, only to be dragged into it when people have already been attacked or hurt. After the incident with the dragon and Rakepick, she tries to close herself off, thinking it’s because they’re so close to her that her friends keep getting hurt. It doesn’t work, and her friends end up finding her and hugging her as she cries about everything that seems to go wrong with her life.

What electives do they take throughout their time at Hogwarts?

If she could, she would take every class available because it was so hard to choose just a few! In the end, however, she settled on Care of Magical Creatures, Divination, and Ancient Runes, because Alchemy was only for 7th years, and Arithmancy was “just magic math”. Muggle Studies was almost chosen instead of Divination, but Luc decided she wanted something a little more challenging. (She didn’t realize her patience was what would be tested lol).

Are they in any clubs or extracurricular activities?  What about Quidditch?

It’s really hard to find time to do extracurriculars when you’re trying to protect people from being frozen in ice blocks or sleep-walking into an acromantula nest. She did join the Frog Choir after third year, though unfortunately drops out between 5th-6th year to focus on her studies (and the Vaults). She occasionally goes to the music club, though is not an official member. Unfortunately, Lucy may be a decent flyer, but isn’t quite cut out for Quidditch. Besides, she’d rather be in the stands (huddled and warm) while watching her friends play instead. Sometimes she’ll help Madame Pomfrey with healing students in the Hospital Wing, but the smell of the potions and medicines reminds her of the doctor’s office, so she wouldn’t ever do it for a living.

How studious are they?  What kind of studying strategies do they use?  Do they have any study groups with their friends?

Lucy is a stickler for good note-taking, bringing a bunch of spiral notebooks and colored gel pens and highlighters with her every year to take “proper” notes to share with her friends during their weekly study sessions. She and Rowan usually lead for most classes, though Penny takes charge for Potions, Ben (and Rowan and Bill, sometimes) lead for Charms, and Charlie and Barnaby for Care of Magical Creatures. Lucy, Rowan, and Bill sometimes help some of the younger students set up study groups as well, and often let the younger Weasley siblings and Cedric join their sessions, too. Liz doesn’t always study with them, but will when she needs to, Tulip and Tonks only show up when forced or bribed, and Skye was wrangled into coming once, but got everyone off task getting into a trash-talk showdown with Andre over the Gryffindor v. Ravenclaw game the following day; everyone else either has a different group to study with or refuses to do so entirely.

How willing are they when it comes to breaking school rules?

Lucy hates getting in trouble, since it’s being put under a spotlight in a more negative context for her. The first three years of school, she tries whatever she can to avoid breaking the rules when possible. After the Fear Vault is closed, however, she starts loosening up a little bit. She still doesn’t like to break the rules, but she’ll do it with less coercing, and gets even sneakier to get away with it.

Do they hang out with any of their friends over breaks?  If so, which one(s) and what do they do?

Living all the way out in Ireland, just outside of Dublin, it’s a bit harder to get to visit her friends before she heads into London for her school shopping at the end of summer holiday. Charlie and Bill make use of the fireplace to invite her over for dinner a few times during the break, flooing her there and back without much hassle. She makes time to spend with Rowan specifically during the summer, inviting her over to spend a week or so every year, and Rowan inviting her for the same amount at her house right after. She gets an owl (a cooky brown owl that her little brother named Bernard) for her family to send her mail during the year, and uses him herself to keep in touch with the rest of her friends until September rolls around again.

After they graduate, do they fall off the map and keep a low profile?  Or do they continue to exist in the public eye?

After deciding very early on that she didn’t much care for being the center of attention, once she had the opportunity to fade into obscurity, she took it. She eventually married Barnaby and moved with him to Romania, where he and Charlie work together with dragons. Lucy decides a little later on to document some of her childhood, but feeling awkward about writing her own life story down, changes the names and some of the details to instead create a fictional book series for kids. It later gets published under a pseudonym and achieves moderate success in both the muggle and magical worlds.

How does their career path differ from what they thought they’d be doing?  Or does it differ at all?

It took Lucy her entire life to figure out what she wanted to do. At Hogwarts, when asked what career path she wanted to pursue, she was so shocked that she asked if she could “just go back to bed”. She decided to take whatever classes could be most broadly considered for a number of professions, and even then wasn’t quite sure what she wanted to do once she left Hogwarts. She decided to handle her personal life first, cheering her friends on as they found their paths, and then going with Barnaby so he could achieve his dream. It was only later, after beginning to just write things down, that she realized how much she enjoyed doing it.

Do they have any hobbies?  What about any talents or aptitudes?

She loves taking some time to just goof off with her friends, playing Gobstones or getting some Butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks. She’ll spend some gloomy weekends curled up in a big armchair in the library, quietly reading to herself (and later, helping Barnaby with his dyslexia). She’s also a major card shark, winning almost every muggle card game she’s ever played and often tricking her friends into playing with her and losing anything from candy to wizard cards to even money, on occasion. She’s particularly good in Charms class, as well as Astronomy and Ancient Runes.

Do they have any favorite spells?

She likes spells that can used to help others, like Episkey or Protego. She has a certain fondness for Expecto Patronum, of course. She also likes using Lumos, to light up her bed behind the curtains after a bad nightmare.

What’s one thing they did or thought as a child that they later look back and cringe about?

Long after she and Barnaby finally get together, they both end up hearing about the bets their friends placed on their relationship and how lovesick they apparently acted before asking each other out. Tonks and Tulip will sometimes act out their mutual pining at lunch or at the Three Broomsticks, leaving both of them flustered and cringing over just how insufferable they must've been before they realized their feelings were returned. If she could go back and do it over, she might almost be tempted to have just kissed Barnaby at the Celestial Ball and avoided the whole mess. Almost.

If they could travel anywhere at all in the world—money, time, and language not being an issue—where would they go and who would they take with them?

It's a tough choice between some very good options, travelling to historical landmarks across the globe with Rowan, getting tasty food in Paris with Penny, or taking her family for a nice, normal vacation to Disney in the States. But eventually, she'd probably decide on travelling the world looking for various beasts and creatures with Barnaby, and writing about their adventures.

If they’re an Animagus, how easy was becoming one for them?  Were they happy with their Animagus form?  Or did they want it to be something different?

Lucy studied up on being an animagus with Talbott while at Hogwarts, but couldn't bring herself to actually become one until after graduation. She remains an unregistered sparrow animagus even after Voldemort is finally defeated. She would've liked to be maybe some kind of cat, but can't deny that being so small and being able to fly are some great advantages when the second war rolls around.

Do they like what they see in the mirror?

Had it not been for her magical abilities making themselves known as she grew up, she might've gone through all of primary school unnoticed. As it was, kids often ostracized and ridiculed her for being weird and different until she finally went to Hogwarts. Between that and the guilt she carries for everyone that gets hurt by the Vaults, it takes her a very long time to come to terms with herself and her self-worth.

How good are they at taking compliments?

Lucy is pretty decent at taking compliments, so long as it's not a bunch all at one time; she gets anxious when too many people try and talk to her at once. When Barnaby compliments her, though, she gets flustered and stumbles over her words while blushing really bright, almost blocking out her freckles.

How much do they trust their friends?

Lucy trusts those she keeps close to an almost impossible degree. It can sometimes lead her to trouble, such as leaving her vulnerable to pranks by Tonks or Tulip.

Are they pretty self-reliant?  Or do they like to go to their friends for help?

At first, she's much more willing to do things as a group, having her friends' backs as much as they have hers. Later on, however, she begins closing herself off, trying to take on everything herself to avoid her friends getting hurt because of her. It doesn't last very long, however, as they all work better as a team.

Who is their favorite Weasley?  Or can they not choose?

Ginny and Ron are just too cute, from what little she's seen of them. Bill is like another older brother, and she loves him dearly. She and Charlie are great friends, but anything and everything becomes a competition with them, starting with a "who knows more about dragons" contest that she actually won in their 2nd year. They could almost have been considered rivals up until later on in Year 4. Percy is alright, she Guesses, but even she thinks he needs to loosen up a bit. And she spends most of her time trying to just keep the twins separated from Tonks and Tulip, if only to avoid the Apocalypse.

What’s the thing they like least about themselves?

She's a little stuffy about rules, she worries too much, her actions and choices keep putting people in danger, and FFS, she faced a DRAGON and still can't kill one measly little spider??

What’s the thing they like most about themselves?

She cares about her friends and family, she would never go out of her way to betray them or to hurt others. She takes pride in the lives she's helped and saved.

How bad is their temper?  Do they tend to lash out at others or themselves?

Her temper only gets really out of hand when someone she cares about gets hurt. She can usually handle someone hurting her with nothing more than a few years, but attack the people she cares about? That'll be the last thing you ever do.

What’s their biggest regret in life, if they have any?

She blames herself for far too many things. She wishes Ben hadn't been hurt and controlled by Rakepick, she thinks she could've done more to help and support him. She feels like if she had been more observant as a kid, she might've seen something going on with Nathan and could've stopped his disappearance. She's terrified about how the two of them being so involved in the Cursed Vaults with effect Casey as he grows up, and if he'll end up inheriting their legacy or not, if it might get him killed.

What kind of first impression do they tend to leave on others?

Lucy is sweet, doe-eyed, and a little naïve. A pretty face, very smart, but very open and trusting. Would apologize to you if you poured soup into her lap. Most would either want to protect the sweet, innocent child or absolutely take advantage of her trusting and kind nature.

What is the achievement they’re most proud of?

She once managed to eat an entire tin of her mom's homemade butter cookies without vomiting (her mom isn't a very good cook, and definitely can't bake). But now she's expected to eat at least some every time her mom bakes them when she's home. (Just another advantage to being away at a boarding school most of the year).

Do they like having photos taken of themselves?

She's a little camera shy, depending on who she's with; any groups larger than maybe 5 and she'll try to duck around and take the picture herself instead. But small groups, she can handle it. And she'll take any photo with Tonks, so long as she changes something about her appearance to take the main attention off of her.

What’s one big way that your MC differs from the in-game canon?

Lucy does not like searching for the Vaults. She would have been content with maybe a few of his journals and an official, personal explanation from Dumbledore. Sh didn't need this. She doesn't want to be the one fixing this, but apparently no one else knows how or cares to try, so she feels responsible. She's also not in the same house as her brother.

If they’re an Animagus, why did you choose the form for them that you did?

Lucy becomes an animagus much later than in canon. She becomes one right before the 2nd war, in order to evade detection. She becomes a little sparrow bird, small and common enough to escape notice. I chose it because of its relation to the second Fable game, whose protagonist is named "Sparrow".

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So, I hope ya’ll enjoyed! Let me know if any of you have any more questions!

(Edit: I am so sorry about the picture formatting, I know its hideous, but I have somehow lost the ability to use my mobile app to fix it (no fucking signal, my ass) but I promise I will try again tomorrow, when I am far away from the lack of signal at my house.)

[yes-kassiopeia]

A little dive into Ashton’s pinterest

I’m not sure if anyone is going to be interested in this long long loooooooong rant ... but if ever.. !

Well if it’s really Ashton’s.... Cause I can’t be 100% sure, but if it’s not him let just say it’s a very good imitation. In case it’s actually his I won’t give the link, but i don’t think it’s too hard to find anyway... (i wasn’t even really looking for it....)

Aesthetic Board Analysis

All of the Pins below are directly from a the Board called “//SOUL OF ASH//”. There is much more, and i just picked a few that sparkled my very own interest, so i wouldn’t say it’s necessarily representative, but the whole aesthetic theme is there.

The description of this Board goes as : “A misunderstood mind with the catastrophe that was his mentality, formed by stardust and in love with the galaxy. | Black and Red. Some pictures belong to me. Aesthetic board for myself. Skulls, crowns, kings, wolves, Lana Del Rey, leather jackets, spray paint, feathers, birds(ravens, sparrows, doves), cameras, royalty, polaroids, black and white photos, green eyes, motorcycles, books, glasses, pianos, roses, strong coffee and coffee shops, cafes in cities, rings, strong alcohol, crosses, occasional trench coats/blazers, chess, smoke/fog, dark hotel rooms, unfinished handwritten letters, science, sarcasm, lighters, neon”

A lot of the pins are directly uploaded by the user and a large part of the rest comes from tumblr (and Ashton said he had a private tumblr and that we would never find it, so maybe it’s actually him?), the others comes from random website or are re-pinned.

First things first, I was a bit surprised by the amount of “daddy” pins. I mean we joke about him being “daddy” all the time and all the sexual connotation behind it too, but I wasn’t expecting him to be so blunt about it and so ... into it? (Once again, if it’s really him, that is...)

Another theme that is largely present in his pins, is this tormented love. Kinda trapped between ardent desire and unrequited feelings. Although the pronoun ‘her’ is present a couple of time, i notice some “he/him” as well, but i don’t know if he’s referring to himself or someone else.

There are quite a lot of dark messages spread around this board too. like “I laugh with many but don’t trust any” or “Pain is fuel”, “Endure & survive”, “LOST”, “I’ve been having a bad day for the past several years”, “we grow from the worst”, etc. Which sounds like him quite a lot, in his dark hours, and this board is pretty dark.

A few Pins also acknowledge his fear of being or becoming addict to alcohol, but also a pessimist state of mind like ‘fuck this i’d rather been drunk’ and present aesthetic pictures of strong alcohols...

A couple of coffee related Pins as well, because hey, it’s definitely not Ashton if there’s no mention of coffee somewhere.

You also get he wants to be a good man, but don’t want his kindness to be taken for granted or abused. So it’s like a battle in himself between being good and being strong.

‘Ashton’ (once again not 100% sure) refer to himself as a wolf and a lone wolf a lot in his Board. And there not a lot of people in it. There are aesthetic picture of him in black and white (that have been seen elsewhere, so it’s no proof). But there’s only two pictures of him with other people. One at a party with Ivy Levan and Zakk Cervini. And the other... Is this famous Lashton one :

I grouped it with a couple of other pins that made me think about Luke or Lashton. And we know since Nikki’s (lashtondaydream) fanart that Ashton does like this picture a lot. Plus, while all the other pins have no caption at all, this one does. and say “// my brother //”. And that’s why i think it might actually be Ashton’s account. And i’m really glad that he pined this!

Last, but not least !

He has another board which is called “// dances with tears in his eyes //”, that remind me of Luke a lot. The aesthetic is pretty different from the rest, it’s GOLD. I’m pretty sure i’m not the only one who associates Luke with gold... The Board is very small, only 6 pins, but there’s a lot.

A YSL golden logo on black background.

A white and gold angel wing

Golden neon saying “GOLD IS THE NEW BLACK” on black background

A hand-lettering of “Heart of Gold” in gold on black background

Two red roses (btw this pin don’t match the aesthetic at all...)

A white message on black background “some night you dance with tear in your eyes”

So the title directly come this latter pin, but he changed the ‘your’ into ‘his’ which accentuates my believes that it’s about Luke. And I think it’s really cute that he has like “capsule of luke” on his board. (and of course, he doesn’t have one for anyone else) and that it features two red roses...! just saying

There are other board with other topic, one about “geeky stuff” like comic and tv shows, another one about fashion and style, one with only cute animals! etc. but it doesn’t serve my speech here so i won’t comment it. There’s a board with quotes from books that can be pretty interesting, but it’s also very cryptic.

This is already too long. I don’t know if anyone has read it up to here ^^’ i’m sorry. I had quite a lot of fun digging into this account and i wanted to share it with you. Tell me what you think about it? Do you think it’s his account? Let’s talk ! :)

[citruscloudsandmoon]

fandom asks, Z, Y, M, N, I, P, S, V, F, B

Z - Just ramble about something fan-related, go go go. Hmm, i suppose i could begin with L being called a frog. I never got the hang of it. Dude had dark circles under his eyes. We are missing an opportunity of calling him a panda or raccoon for that matter. Plus these both animals binge so it is certainly fitting on him when it comes to sweets. Y- A fandom you’re in but have no ships from.Legend of Korra. M-Your favorite fanart or fanartist. These are coming at my head at the moment; Skm4, Luleiya, B-griveros, Bianca, Rboz, Hotaru,Km92, Viria, dymx, Papabay.  There are more, but i can’t recall their names at the moment. N - Your favorite fanfiction or fanauthor. Gigglesworth and Zulka from beyblade. Princess Kitty1, EspadaIV, Jk Robertson and VeritasEtVita from Bleach. And moonlight Shimmer from Digimon. I-Has tumblr caused you to stop liking any fandoms, if so, which and why.Naruto. For a while, i grew distant from it. The petty fights were always breaking out over which pairing is superior, which girl is superior. And i was like, children please, can’t we all get along together? this is supposed to be fun. P-Invent a random AU for any fandom (we always need more ideas).   Hmm there are many but they are mostly part AU and part Canon. I think i got one. Inspired mostly from Supernatural. Angels vs Humans in death note. It works like this; The Angels are the bad people here and your Kiras in the canon universe are these said beings. The Angels all have wings and carry scythes. Also they have superior strength as well. Rem and Ryuk are btw beasts in this universe. The former belongs to Misa and the latter to Light. The story is that the Angels are ruling over humans and their reign is tyrannical. A group of humans consisting of L, Wammy boys, Rest of SPK, Wedy, Aiber, Watari and Naomi are aiming to bring them down. The King, Light Yagami comes to know about them and sends Misa and Mikami to kill them. Before they could do their jobs, these band of humans capture Misa by bruising her wing. Still have yet to decide what happens next but Misa starts working with them. Some sort of love triangle forms as well of Misa x L x Naomi.. And i am really sorry if this was lame, but i really want to see Misa in Suspenders and wielding a scythe, so dre. S-Show us an example of your personal headcanon. Such a vague question. I can’t understand this one so i can’t answer this one. V - Are you one of those fans who can’t watch anything without shipping.No. Not really. It’s more like when i watch the show and if i happen to see any pairing whose dynamics are interesting and there’s potential, i happily board it. It’s actually a plus to the shows. I am mostly concerned with plot lines. F - What’s the longest you’ve ever been in a fandom.  Beyblade, for 5 years. B - A pairing you initially didn’t consider but someone changed your mind. Maiko from Atla. I wasn’t too keen on it until i saw the boiling rock episode. Once i watched that, i knew i fell for them (Zuko x Mai) Thanks for asking :) Fandom asks

[littleawkwardmess]

What they don't tell you about adulthood.

6 months into adulthood and it’s already baffled me how ill-prepared I am for this new phase of life. But that is not all…

I was never excited about adulthood. There’s something about that word that triggers nothing but a tinge of fear in me. I guess I’m just too used to the comfort of having things simple and easy. I’m a person of routine and certainty, and adulthood, although is routine, never is certain enough for me. Think of it this way: when you were in school, there’s always a rather clear path– be it finishing a project, or completing an exam, or simply just making it through another lesson. And there’s summer, there are parties and all sort of things that keep your head above the clouds for a while.

But there’s no predetermined path in adulthood. There are so many ways to make it (or not make it) in life that it confuses us. I remember the first time sourcing for houses a few months ago, starting with zero experience. I remember going through houses and houses trying to find the right fit. Some houses were terrible. Some were okay. Some doesn’t even look like how they were on the photos. But no one ever really told us what to look for in a rented house. I guess we were lucky enough to find one that we thought was the ideal house (of course, we didn’t know how to negotiate and check before buying, so we did run into minor issues when we actually live there for a while). After all, we really just did go with our gut feel, and despite minor issues, I guess now we know what to do and what not to do.

Next comes the first few months of work (and the disenchantment of routine). I know I said I’m the person of routine, but ironically, I’m not a fan of repetitive work. I guess when you started your first job; there are tonnes and tonnes of things you don’t know. People tend to underestimate what fresh graduates can do, and because of that, we as fresh graduates sometimes underestimate our own power. We forgot that we’ve spent years in school going through arduous late night projects, pulling all-nighters to get an assignment done or juggling 5-6 projects all the same time. We forgot we are as capable as we believe we can be. And just because the world sometimes treat us as if we were incapable, we should never let that determine our fate. I remember the first month of doing repetitive design work, just because someone above me told me so. I remember saying ‘yes’ to everything because I don’t trust my own guts. I remember struggling to love my job because the things I did were neither what I truly love nor (most of the time) agree with. Only when that ‘supervisor’ was gone and I had to step up and exert my own opinions did I realize they were actually valued. Only at that point in time did I realize I have it in me to make a difference to how I feel about my job every day. I can’t say I’m excited to wake up every day and go to work (because some days are just not my days), but I can safely say there are more days of excitement at work than there are of boredom and disenchantment. But I was lucky. Who knows what had happened if that chance to step up did not just fall from the sky? So if you are a fresh graduate like me who got disenchanted by your job, maybe it’s time you give your self a push and believe that you have it in you.

Now comes routine – the good one that keeps life in order. It takes me at least 2 months to get the right rhythm to my everyday life. Time is always in demand, but the truth is, adulthood makes it so much harder to manage. Every day we spend on average eight to nine hours at work. Some people had it easier (like me), and some people had it worse (shout out to all the all-nighters, the night-shifters, the ones in the ‘wrong’ time zone). Ideally, another seven to eight hours should be for sleep, so we only have eight hours left every day for the rest of our routine. It sounds like a lot, but minus off the commuting time, we are probably left with six hours for eating and resting (some people don’t rest either…). I used to have plans to study language (and many other skills) once I graduated. I used to believe I would have more time once I started working but boy I was so never so wrong. The first 2 months into adulthood, it dawned on me that I truly have very little time every day for anything. I struggled with squeezing in workouts,  meal-prepping, meeting up with friends (hardly ever did), and simply getting some downtime to watch my favorite shows. That was when I realize routine is what’s going to make it easier. So I start setting up meal-prepping day, resting day, 1 hour every day after work for working out. It was tough at first, but eventually, once I got the rhythm of it all, things start to fall into place and I find myself more at ease, and even have time to play some board games with friends or binge on my favourite shows. So do establish your own routine. It may sound boring, but it’ll definitely save you time for more exciting stuff.

Lastly, love, friendship and other things in adulthood. The only thing I can say is to treasure people around you. When we were still in school, we didn’t realize how big our social circle actually was. We can have up to 20 friends whom we meet often. We spend the most time in class, at the canteen, and even after class. It was easy to maintain friendship with, let’s say, with at least 10 people then. (Some people have a lot more than that in their social circle but I was very much an introvert so yes I will be humble with the number).  But in adulthood, your social circle shrinks and keeping friendship requires effort. Again, I was lucky enough to be staying with some of my friends, so it requires a bit less effort to keep in touch with them. But for the rest of that 10 people I mentioned above, arranging meet-up alone is just a pain. We have our busy schedule, and believe it or not, we all have a ‘going-out’ quota every week too. Some people can afford to go out 6 days a week; some only 2 (I belong to the latter group btw). So it becomes incredibly difficult to keep in touch if we don��t put in the effort ourselves. Same with relationship. Treasure the short moments you have with your loved ones. Treasure those dinners, those weekends lazing around because both of you are too tired to go out (but occasionally please go out, it freshens the relationship). Forgive people if they are late. Forgive people if they complain too much, or if they look gloomy. Chances are they are fighting a battle (at work) you may not know of. Drop them a message randomly if you haven’t heard from them for a while. Be the one to initiate meet-ups even if it sometimes gets nowhere. Truth is, we all just need to know that we are remembered.

There is much more learning to do. I haven’t even touched the area of financial planning (because I’m guilty of delaying it for too long). And then there’s the topic of ‘when will you get married?’, which I also prefer to talk about only when I totally figure it out (I still get a shock whenever I hear someone of my age or slightly older is getting married, so obviously I’m not that used to this topic yet ><).

Adulthood is never easy, but comes with it a lot of space for growing. It’s bizarre to see, but also a wonder to witness how a few months can change you so much. And that did not just happen to me; I saw it in people around me as well. If you are struggling with adulthood, I hope this was helpful, or at least comforting to know there’s a fellow struggler here too. But I do believe we can all make it.

Until then, happy adult-ing!

[gutterdreams]

Can I request number 24 with Billy please and thank you! Btw, I love your writing in case you haven’t noticed yet 💕💕💕

124. “I only have good memories of you” for this babe

It was hard to stay in touch over two thousand miles away. Billy had no idea what any of his friends lives were like now. It had been six months since he drove away with his dad's new family. Foolishly, he assumed that everything would stand still like in a photograph and just wait until he returned to resume. Looking around at the other faces in the church, all solemn in a way he had never seen them before, he realized how far out of the loop he was.Billy anticipated his friends limbs clawing at him, old hook ups to press their bodies tightly to his, but since this was a funeral, people just waved and lifted a single corner of their mouths to welcome him back. This was not the time for keg stands and skinny dipping. Billy and his group always liked to raid their parents liquor cabinets. They got high in each other's basements and cars. It seemed harmless. The occasional bump off someone's knuckle or the back of a debit card felt as dangerous as dipping your toes into the ocean. Billy figured they were all messing around the same way. He hadn't been around to see Justin Moody become a walking coke addiction. When Billy left town, his friend was still hellbent on being drafted to the MLB one day. Everyone assumed that with his arm, he would. Next to him, a pink haired girl sobbed as if she was being paid to. Billy just clasped his hands between his knees and kept his arms to himself narrowly. Other people's emotions always made him uncomfortable, probably because he had such a hard time expressing himself. He didn't know her, but she was cuddling up to Christina Adams on her other side, so Billy figured that he would if he had stayed back in Oceanside. Christina's house was where most parties or after parties took place since she had a sauna, pool table, and incredible tequila selection thanks to her Dad who owned a chain of Mexican restaurants. Wayne slid Billy further into the pew right before the service started, the two boys squeezing each others shoulders and then exchanging sorry expressions. "Your old man here?" Wayne checked, glancing over Billy's head, but only seeing the girls there. "No. I came alone." If it hadn't been Susan telling Neil how important it was for Billy to go, Billy would have been in a world of trouble being back in California now.There wasn't a single one of Billy's friends who wasn't scared shitless of Neil Hargrove. Billy's house was always off limits when they were looking for a place to hang out even if it wasn't to party, but just to lay low and watch TV. If Neil was there, they all tried to keep their distance from the mustache man with a gridlock grip and tamale hot temper. Wayne nodded to confirm that he heard and then pulled a folded Klennex our of the inside of his blazer that he borrowed from his older brother. He reached behind Billy's head to offer it to his crying friend, but Christina took it instead and mouthed 'thank you'. The funeral had begun, but Billy couldn't concentrate. He couldn't begin to fathom that Justin was dead when he could barely accept that Wayne wasn't hitting golf balls off a roof and that Christina wasn't lathered in baby oil and drinking tequila from a Big Gulp thermos. He spent every day in Indiana waiting to return to Oceanside, but it didn't feel like home now. It felt like somewhere he didn't know or belong, like Hawkins. Billy made it to the end of the service, but he didn't know how. The picture of Justin grinning from ear to ear in his Oakland A's hat at the head of the church had his eyes stinging, but Billy was proud of himself for not crying. Wayne let a few tears stream down, but nothing like Joshua West. He was up at the front near the family, choking on his own emotions. It was to be expected, Billy supposed, from the person who found Justin dead and covered in his own vomit of bile, blood, and Lucky Charms. As soon as everyone started to leave, Billy pushed his way through the crowd. He needed fresh air and he needed a smoke. Quickly, he was on the first cement step of the church where he was met by a few other smokers, offering one of them his lighter for a second. He was letting the inhales relax him, his stressed heart beginning to find a regular beat while he kept to himself on the crowded stair.Right in front on the church was the unmistakable glistening red Mustang. Billy couldn't begin to guess how many times he had sat in the front seat, throwing his head around to Black Flag while Justin drove through the night. Billy only drove it once when Justin really wanted to win a drag race against these two douchebags from St Vincent High School. Billy saw his first pair of real life tits in that car, Lisa Womack's, even though Christina bitterly told anyone who would listen that Lisa's were not actually real. They had hot-boxed in that car, they had filled the floor with empty cans, and Hell, Billy slept in it a handful of nights when his dad had booted him out.He was drawn to the car, pulled in by a force of nature. It wasn't until he was a couple steps away from the beautiful Mustang that Billy saw that the windows were down and you, Justin's little sister, were sitting behind the wheel. You had grown up from the girl forever stuck a year behind them, drowning out their circus with her bedroom door shut and headphones on. The mirror was down and you were dabbing concealer under your hurt eyes with your fourth finger when Billy leaned in. He tossed his cigarette onto the road before folding his arms over the open window and started looking over the interior of the special car."You're pretty lucky to get this car." He assumed correctly. There was no way you were letting anyone else drive it or your parents sell it to the highest offer. "She's a babe." He admired.It wasn't until the latter comment was made that you looked Billy on completely. He couldn't avoid the obvious sadness, dry, in your eyes that were running a sleep defecit. You were supposed to be in the reception room with your family accepting sympathies, but you needed a second to yourself."I know you probably think I'm an asshole." Billy certainly did. He had abandoned his friend when he obviously needed someone around. He was all the way in Indiana while Justin was veering down a complicated path. It wasn't just that fact though. Billy had never been nothing, but a party animal when around. He wasn't at your dinner table politely thanking your mom for a delicious casserole. He was passed out on a floating lounge chair in your pool or high watching MTV in your basement. "Justin was my friend though.""I know." Nodding, you told him very plainly. "My mom was surprised you made it in, but I wasn't." His brows rose as you had peaked his interest with your kind, but misguided faith in him. "You and Justin were friends since like grade two." You couldn't be certain, but you knew Billy's curly head of hair had been bouncing around your house for a long time. The memory provoked a bright smile on his face, the first non bittersweet one of the day. "I only have good memories of you." Pushing up the mirror, you told him with a sniffle and then tightened the lid on the concealer dish on your lap. "You always made sure your friends were okay when you guys partied," which was constantly. "You kept Christina from leaving with assholes all the time, you ate my vegetables when my parents weren't looking, and you always fixed everything you broke in our house." The list trickled off your tongue effortlessly, but Billy had never realized any of the memories. He was too wrapped up in surviving at light speed to realize that he wasn't a total piece of shit."Still, I should have been there." Bowing his head to you, Billy mumbled with evident guilt."Well, I was here and it happened really fast." Threatening to cry again , you mumbled mostly to yourself. The road stretched out in front of you was a long one and with so much grief in the passenger seat, you weren't sure how enjoyable the journey would be. "Justin knew you didn't have a choice, but to leave, Billy. He wasn't mad." You tried to be assuring. It silenced Billy for a few seconds, his mind void of the right words to say. Nothing felt good enough. He didn't know what you were supposed to say in a moment like this. He was only five when his mom died. He just remembered people constantly telling him that this was the way God intended it and that she was always watching him. Billy hated those sentiments, but now he loathed how they were sitting in his mouth."Do you want to go for a drive?" Bringing his blue eyes back to you and your hands on the steering wheel, you asked. "Don't you have to go in there?" "You think Justin would be shaking hands and eating finger food if one of us died?" Billy grinned ferociously at the answer. He knew his buddy would be cruising with the windows down, listening to sports highlights or Black Flag, and recalling all his favorite things about the person they were supposed to be honoring.With curled fingers, Billy opened up the car door and slid in. This was the only car he would be okay riding shot gun in. It felt right actually. He liked that he was adding to your positive memories of him, driving around Oceanside in the prettiest car on the road; thinking good thoughts.