#i could talk about this for ages i find psychic type training super interesting

[apricorned]

What's your experience caring for/training an Espeon? They've always intrigued and slightly scared me eheh.

Espeon is basically a Delcatty that can knock things over from a distance. They're especially sensitive to the weather and barometric pressure (Pluto gets moody during sudden drops/rises in pressure, so we have to be mindful if traveling by plane), and they are very intelligent and good at getting into things (baby proofing cannot save you). Pluto specifically is an emotional support pokemon (I have anxiety and he's a huge help in managing it). My parents purchased him as an Eevee from a certified breeder outside of Solaceon town when I was younger and we began cooperative training pretty much as soon as we could.

With training, positive reinforcement is absolutely required. The environment an Eevee is raised in will absolutely affect their disposition post evolution, and Espeon specifically are HIGHLY aware of human emotion (which makes them great support and service pokemon!).

I think because of their level of intelligence their personalities can really vary. In my experience they are a bit independent (stubborn), but still very willing and excited to learn. Don't let the fact that they evolve through bonding discourage you from adopting either. They make excellent companions at all stages of life!

[joneswuzhere]

hello join me in thinking about some books and authors that are, or might be, part of s5′s intertextuality

5.10 in particular offered specific shout outs, and also u know i’m always wondering what might be ahead so i have some ideas on that:

- first, as mentioned in a previous ask post, i know i wasn’t alone in keeping an eye out for 5.10 parallels to the lost weekend (1945) the film that gave episode 1.10 its name and several themes - or to the 1944 book by charles r jackson which the film is based on

- s5 has not been shy about revisiting earlier seasons, especially s1. altho i feel that 1.10′s parallels to the lost weekend centered characters other than jughead (mostly betty), a 1.10-5.10 connection involving jughead and themes from jackson’s story (addiction, writers block, self reflection) seemed v possible if not inevitable

- but like,, , for a hot minute after the ep, i was really stumped on understanding how anything from the book or film could apply, even tho the pieces were almost all there

- jackson’s protagonist don birnam goes thru and comes out the other side of a harrowing days-long drinking binge that could be compared to jughead’s one-night hallucinogenic writing retreat

- but jughead is struggling primarily with traumatic memories, not addiction and self control like birnam. and tho drinking activates birnam’s creativity, it paralyzes his writing as he gets lost in fantasies; he’s never published anything. jughead’s drug trip recreates circumstances that already helped him write one successful book. even the rat that startles him mid-high doesn’t line up with birnam’s withdrawal vision of a dying mouse, symbolic of his horror at his own self-destruction thru alcohol

- and maybe the most visible discordance: in the film there’s a romantic motif around a typewriter. first it’s an object of shame; birnam’s failure to write, tied up with his drinking, makes him flee his relationship. he tries to pawn the typewriter for booze money and finally a gun when shooting himself feels easier than getting sober. but with the help of relentless encouragement from girlfriend helen, he quits drinking, commits to her, and focuses on typing out the story he’s dreamt of writing. rd goes so far to avoid setting any comparable scenario that jughead has brought a wholeass printer into the bunker so there can still be a physical manuscript to cover in blood by the end, even without his own typewriter. the subtle detail of his laptop bg image is a little less noticeable than his avoidance of betty’s gift

- tabitha might be closer to a parallel than jughead is, but she’s still no helen. both refuse to take advantage of the inebriated men in their care, but birnam takes advantage of helen, financially and emotionally. jughead refused a loan from the tate family and now has resolved to deal with his shit before he considers a relationship with tabitha. instead of helen’s relentless and unwelcomed attempts to get birnam sober, tabitha reluctantly agrees to help jughead trip safely bondage escape notwithstanding. she even helps him get the drugs.

- whatever potentials exist for parallels to jackson’s story, they were not explored for this episode. ok so why tf am i even talking about this? what was there instead?

-  i have arrived at the point

- s5 has been revisiting s1, not directly but with a twist. and jughead’s agent samm pansky is back. u may recall, pansky is named for sam lansky

- jughead’s trip-thru-trauma is a story device tapped straight from lansky’s book ‘broken people’

- lansky is like if a millenial john rechy wrote extremely LA-flavored meta but just about himself no jk very like a modern successor to charles r jackson. both play with the boundary between memoir and fiction. lansky is gay; jackson wrote his lost weekend counterpart as closeted and remained closeted himself until only a few years before his death. both write with emotional clarity and self-scrutiny on the experiences of addiction, sobriety, and the surrounding issues of shame and self worth

- i feel like a fool bc after this ep i had been thinking about de quincey and his early writings on addiction (c.1800s), but i failed to carry the thought in the other direction, to contemporary writers in the genre, to make this connection sooner

- lansky’s second book, broken people, follows narrator ‘sam’, mid-20s, super depressed, hastled by his agent to write a decent follow-up to his first book, but too busy struggling with his self-worth and baggage from several past relationships. desperate, he takes up an offer to visit a new age shaman who promises to fix everything wrong with him in a matter of days. not to over simplify it but he literally spends a weekend doing psychedelics and hallucinating about his exes. jughead took note

- unless u want me to hurl myself into yet another dissertation about queer jughead, i think his parallel to sam - who, unlike jughead, has considerable financial privilege and whose anxieties center on body dysmorphia, hiv scares, and his own self-centeredness - pretty much ends there

- But,, the gist of the book could not be more harmonius with a major theme shared by the 2 films that inform the actual hallucination part of jughead’s bunker scene: mentally reframing past relationships to get closure + confronting trauma head-on in order to move forward

- so that’s neat. what other book and author stuff was in 5.10?

- stephen king and raymond carver get name dropped. i’m passingly familiar with them both but u bet i just skimmed their wiki bios in case anything relevant jumped out

- like jughead, carver was a student (later a lecturer) at the iowa writers workshop. also the son of an alcoholic and one himself

- i recall carver’s ‘what we talk about when we talk about love’ is what jughead was reading in 2.14 ‘the hills have eyes’ after he finds out about the first time betty kissed archie (at that time he does not respond as would any of carver’s characters)

- this collection of carver stories deals especially with infidelity, failings of communication, and the complexities and destructiveness of love. to unashamedly quote the resource that is course hero, ‘carver renders love as an experience that is inherently violent bc it produces psychic and emotional wounds.’ very fun to wonder about the significance of this collection within the s2 episode and in jughead’s thoughts. and maybe now in the context of the s5 state of relationships. or, at least, the state of jughead’s writing as seen by his agent

- anyway pansky doesn’t want carver, he wants stephen king

- i have too much to say about gerald’s game in 5.10, that’s getting its own post someday soon

- lol wait king’s wife is named tabitha uhhh king’s wiki reminded me of his childhood experience that possibly inspired his short story ‘the body’ (+1986 movie ‘stand by me’) when he ‘apparently witnessed one of his friends being struck and killed by a train tho he has no memory of the event’

- no mention of that in this rd episode but memories of a train could be interesting to consider with the imagery that intrudes on jughead’s hallucination. i still feel like it was a truck but the lights and sounds he experiences may be a train

- ok now we’re in the speculation part of today’s segment

- if jughead’s traumatic memory involves trains, then it’s possible this plot will take influence from la bête humaine <- this 1938 movie is based on the 1890 novel by french writer émile zola. this story deals with alcoholism and possessive jealousy in relationships, sometimes leading to murder. huh, kind of like carver. zola def comes down on the nature side of the nature-vs-nuture bad seed question (tho i should say he approaches this with great or maybe just v french compassion). also i can’t tell if this is me reaching but, something about la bête humaine reminds me of king’s ‘secret window’ which we’ve observed to be at least a style influence on jughead post time jump

- but wow a late-19th century french writer would be a random thing to drop into this season, right? then again zola also wrote about miners, which we’ve learned are an important part of this town’s history + whatever hiram is up to this time.  and most notably, zola wrote ‘j’accuse...!’ an open letter in defense of a soldier falsely accused and unlawfully jailed for treason: alfred dreyfus. archie’s recent army trouble comes to mind.

- since the introduction of old man dreyfuss (plausibly Just a nod to close encounters actor richard dreyfuss, but also when is anything in this show Just one thing) i’ve been wondering if these little things could add up to a season-long reference to zola’s writings. but i had doubts and didn’t want to speak on it too soon bc, u know, it’s weird but is it weird enough for riverdale??

- however,,,

- (come on, u knew where i was going with this)

- a24′s film zola just came out. absolutely no relation to the french writer, it’s not based on a book but an insane and explicit twitter thread by aziah ‘zola’ wells about stripping and? human trafficking?? this feels ripe for rd even outside the potentials here for the lonely highway/missing girls plot.

- that would add up to a combination of homage that feels natural to this show

- anyway pls understand i’m just having fun speculating, most of this is based on nothing more concrete than the torturous mental tendril ras has hooked into my skull pls let go ras pls let go

[m-y-fandoms]

Danganronpa 1 Girls: adopting an abused child - Headcanons

Request: If it's okay, the DR1 girls with an adopted child that was previously in an intensely abusive living situation? The kid is extremely traumatized by the experience, and is very quiet, fearful and suffers frequent breakdowns and nightmares.

Part 2: Oh! Adopted abused child for DR1 girls anon here... To specify, headcanons.

Of course! A unique request. I’m gonna write this assuming they’ve had the child in their home for a while, maybe a few years, and you can headcanons the girls’ partners versus if they are single moms on your own. This will just be how the DR1 girls treat their adopted, previously abused child. - Mod Kokichi

WARNINGS: past child abuse implied/referenced. Trauma/panic attacks and anxiety

Aoi Asahina:

The queen of three things: sweets, sports, and positive attitudes.

She would definitely use these three skills/interests of hers to help the previously abused child she adopted.

First of all, she’d chosen this child in particular because she saw their profile and asked about them. Her big heart wouldn’t allow her to abandon a child that’s clearly been through a lot of suffering, especially not after her own experience in the killing game.

Despite whether or not she had a partner, she’d want kids when she was able to responsibly care for them. Also, her experience as a big sister would prepare her for kids a little better than an only child.

Sweets: having a panic attack? Here’s some home-made cookies. Bad day at school? Let’s strap on an apron and bake together tonight. Stayed up late with insomnia or nightmares? Well good news, doughnuts for breakfast the next morning!

Sports: being athletic and active herself, Hina would encourage her child to enter team sports to get better at socializing and just learn important motor skills, but she wouldn’t force them into it, knowing crowds or loud noises may overstimulate them.

Maybe she’d have them start small. Table tennis or private swimming lessons. When and if they were ever ready, soccer or lacrosse on the school’s team.

That’s not to say she wouldn’t love and appreciate a more artistically or mathematically inclined child. Sports or not, she’d find a way to use their inherent skills to better them. She’s not one to give up on the people she cares about.

Positive attitudes: slip-ups and panic attacks are nothing to get discouraged about! She would stay up all night with a child going through anxiety, assure them that this too shall pass, and use positive reinforcement.

Sakura Ogami:

Another mom who would seek out sports as a way to ease her child’s suffering.

But unlike Asahina, she’d see sports as more of a way to teach perseverance and self-discipline rather than social skills.

She would want them to learn some type of martial art. It would teach balance, strength, inner-peace, and erase self-doubt.

Plus, learning martial arts would help teach self-defense. She would never want her child to go out until the word helpless and not knowing how to defend themselves should they absolutely have to.

She would enjoy reading to her child at night, and talking at length with them about what was bothering them. She would let them cry onto her strong shoulders, and offer stoic wisdom. She’s like, super good at giving advice.

Loves them unconditionally, is fiercely protective and loyal. A very supportive and loving mother.

Shells out the cash for any and all therapy they need, physical and psychological. She doesn’t see mental illness as a weakness.

Celestia Ludenberg:

This mom, instead of teaching a child to ignore trauma and bullies - be they internalized and metaphorical or external and corporeal - would teach her child how to face their obstacles head on.

Bullies at school? Well we’ll handle that. “They won’t be a problem anymore, trust me.”

PTSD and past trauma? Well we will sit here and talk about these weaknesses until they become our strengths. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, and you’ll be undefeatable after all you’ve been through.”

This child will be spoiled, but not in a bratty way. They will simply wear the best clothes, eat the most expensive food, and attend the best schools.

Celestia would play endless card and board games with her child to keep their mind off of darker thoughts.

“Moooom, you cheated again!”

“Oh? Did I~?”

“Yes!” A disgruntled but reluctantly amused smile.

“Well~ I think it is simply that you don’t know how to play this game yet. But one day, you will.”

Kyoko Kirigiri:

At first, it may take her a while to open up and truly be the best mother she can be.

But she understands wanting more from a parent-child relationship, and after a while of doubting herself, would buckle down and do what she needs to do.

Wouldn’t be as pushy with talking about triggering subjects, or entirely comfortable giving advice either.

But is a terrific listener/observer. She walks in after work and sees her kid crying alone in their room. They’d remembered something scary, something they didn’t want to think about, they said.

“I see...well, do you want to talk about it?” And she’d sit there by their bedside until she was sure they didn’t need her any longer.

If single: definitely has a big house, a reputable maid, a nanny, a nice car in the driveway, but still insists on personally packing her kids lunch with a little encouraging sticky note inside.

If she has a partner: can be convinced to be more involved and slowly but surely becomes more hands-on and soccer-momish, minivan and all. Sees her partner’s own parenting skills as a challenge to step it up. Kyoko has all the makings of a great mother, she just won’t let herself see it. A partner would be just the push she needs: a Watson to her Holmes.

Toko Fukawa (I watched the anime and played the three main games so if her personality changes drastically in ultra despair girls and I’m way off I apologize):

Toko knows childhood regret, trauma, nightmares. She understands feeling isolated and different. She would be a very clingy and coddling mother.

If you ever touched a hair on her child’s head, you better just execute yourself before she does.

Sure she’s not the most confident or kind person on her own, but we’ve seen how devoted to and possessive she is of people she cares about.

She’d read to her child nightly, but only what she deemed to be the best children’s literature, of course.

Would love her child more than she loved her own partner. She would feel needed, like someone depended on her for once instead of her tagging along behind someone else.

I think as she boosts her child’s confidence and social skills, her own would grow along with them.

I know she’s getting better every day at controlling her inner demons, and her other half, Syo (I watched like two hours of UDG gameplay so I know this much) but I think she’d be extra careful and determined to have full control once becoming a mother.

Sayaka Maizono:

I think she would see music as an outlet for a hurting child.

Another girl who would have hella money, so she wouldn’t hesitate to get her kid lessons from the best instructors, be they voice or instrumental lessons.

And when her child mentions feeling uncomfortable about leaving the house for unnecessary reasons, especially for going to a public, noisey studio, she would pay extra to have the instructor come to them.

To her, music heals the soul.

When they have nightmares, she’s the most likely of the girls to sing lullabies, being the most talented and confident in her singing voice.

She would definitely want to be a mother one day, but with her time-consuming job, might find adoption easier and less compromising to an idol’s “flawless” body (her manager’s opinion more than her own ugh).

She’d use her intuitive “psychic” abilities to sense when her child was having a particularly rough day, or having more depressing thoughts. I think she’d be one of the ones more suited to deep conversations and true motherly advice.

Junko Enoshima:

I honestly don’t think she’d adopt a child for any wholesome or selfless reason.

She’d adopt a child with PTSD or past trauma in order to feed off of their despair or to teach that already hurting child to hurt others.

She’d be drawn to the more chaotic and/or mentally unwell children, but it would be a mistake to let her near them.

Junko is selfish in every way and would only adopt a child to carry on her evil lineage.

It may not even go that far. She may get bored of them or decide they aren’t worthy of becoming her protege and just dispose of them like an old play thing.

(Sorry Junko stans but I’m not about to pretend she’s just a bratty, preppy rich blonde mean girl type. She’s a selfish and abusive psychopath lmao)

Mukuro Ikusaba:

Another one who probably shouldn’t be a mother.

I do feel bad for her though. Much like Korekiyo, I think their siblings both abused and manipulated them from a young age. They never learned any differently. Still she’s responsible for her bad choices in the series.

Without Junko’s influence, I believe she would be fiercely protective of a child, much like an obsessive mother bear once she retired from mercenary work for good.

But unfortunately, she’s given her life to her abusive sister.

If she had a child, they would either be neglected because she spends all of her time serving Junko or away on dangerous mercenary missions.

Or they would be trained to be an abused slave to their aunt Junko just like Mukuro is.

Junko may manipulate Mukuro into adopting a child, saying things like: “you’re more of the mommy type than me!” Or, “yeah I totally think a despair filled child would be good for you! You could teach it to like kick ass and shit!”

This of course, was all a way to get Mukuro to do all the work of actually raising the child, while Junko warped both of their minds to her cause.

[thereinafter]

Letter for Chocolate Box 2020 (cut for major wall of text; fandoms I requested are Dragon Age, Tortall, Darkest Dungeon, Original Work)

Hello, dear chocolatier, thanks for creating something for me!  I’m thereinafter (isyche) on AO3.

I like both fic (any rating you want to write) and art (gen or romance or implied sex fine, no explicit porn), Prompts below are copied from my signup, followed by a long general likes list and then DNWs.

Dragon Age

Cassandra/Leliana: I love them and their long history/intimidating outsides/romantic insides/right hand-left hand balance a lot. some prompt ideas: a) on a mission pre-DAI and some forced-intimacy or h/c trope pushes them to admit/act on feelings b) escalating personal notes attached to official reports c) sneaked moments away from Skyhold  d) fighting back to back e) either one convincing the other to take a break and do something fun, in her own way. Or anything from my likes list you find inspiring, get-together or established. For art: I’d love them being romantic or formidable together however you want to draw it.

Leliana/Josephine: I also love their history and friendship, and how Josephine can potentially light up Leliana’s tendency to darkness, and also how Leliana is playful with/protective of her. There are a lot of established-relationship missing-scene type scenarios I’d like for them, e.g., an excursion to Val Royeaux from Skyhold, a dance together at Halamshiral, Josie waiting up for Leliana to finish spy business, distracting each other from frustrating work, managing difficult guests. Or being drawn back together when Josie comes to the Inquisition after having been in the past. Or, again, anything else from my likes you’re into. I’d be delighted by art of them as well, if you want to illustrate any of these ideas or just draw them being cute.

and some gen ideas I’ve thought about recently and would like to read:

Cassandra & Vivienne: Since Vivienne is a knight-enchanter and thus technically a melee fighter, I’m curious about how and where she trains or has in the past for that, and I’d be interested to see her and Cassandra bond in some way through testing themselves against each other.

Female Hawke & Leliana & Morrigan: These three could have all potentially met in Lothering before the Blight, so write me something about that? Maybe they all get into a scrape together and have to cooperate? Maybe it was caused by Hawke’s or Morrigan’s magic?

Morrigan & Sera: I once drew Morrigan being amused by Sera stealing templar breeches and ever since I’ve kind of wanted that fic. Morrigan is entertained by Sera’s pranks on targets she dislikes and offers to help? Sera is suspicious/scared of her but eventually decides she’s all right? (Sera makes friends with Kieran?)

Tortall

Keladry of Mindelan & Baby Griffin: Having recently read the Kel books, I was really charmed by her heroic efforts to care for the griffin baby until its parents are found, and I’d like a little fic exploring that more, or maybe it coming back to find her later on? Daine and/or Alanna could be involved too if you like. I also am pretty sure this would make for adorable art.

Darkest Dungeon

I feel like there are potential stories around a lot of the mechanics in this game: the quirks and stress and breakdowns and need to recover through drinking or sex or gambling or religion, the weird trinkets and cultist groups, why new adventurers keep showing up to get fed into the dungeon. So, with this fandom I’m interested in fic playing with those things and building on what’s implied in the game (or art along those lines illustrating some offscreen scene, or creating a shippy moment).

I picked these three pairings because I thought they made for interesting dynamics, but if you want to include other characters or enemies, go for it (and use whatever names you want).

Antiquarian/Grave Robber: bonding over an interest in treasure and desire to stay alive and out of the melee? Getting lost on an unadvised side trip in the ruins?

Arbalest/Shieldbreaker: Arbalest takes Shieldbreaker under her wing and tries to cover her in combat/patch her up/help with her nightmares?

Hellion/Vestal: opposites attract, Vestal has impure thoughts about Hellion, and/or healer/fighter h/c?

Original Work

I pictured all of these in fantasy settings when nominating them, but some could also work as SF/space opera or historical.

Female Adventurer Lost in the Snow/Female Fire Spirit: Obviously she needs warming up, however you want to take that (does the spirit warm her and let her go like a grateful one night stand? Or a darker take where the woman lets the spirit consume her and make her one of them? or both at different times in her life?)

Female Armorsmith/Female Warrior Who Needs Frequent Repairs: This could go in either a funny “why do you come in here so much” or an angsty “why do you get hurt so often” direction and I’d like either (or both).

Female Knight/Female Bath Attendant with a Crush: I like knights and requited crushes and the sort of caretaking involved in baths, and would be happy with any cute/romantic or comfort/solace or sexy take on this combination.

Female Court Painter/Impatient Princess Sitting for a Painting: Maybe the princess is a flirty rake and the painter is a serious type with no time for her nonsense but secretly charmed, or vice versa? Or they keep falling out over how the portrait should go and then making up? Or they're in a secret relationship and the impatience is because it's the only time they can see each other?

Grumpy Lonely Sorceress/Female Courtesan She Hires for a Ritual: I pictured this as a lighthearted story where the situation starts awkward and ends more fun than expected for them. Why does the sorceress need to try this particular ritual/spell? (unexpectedly necessary for something she’s researching?) does it succeed? do they decide to collaborate again? up to you.

Anchoress/Woman Outside Her Cell: I’d be happy with either a historical medieval setting or a fantasy/SF invented religion. Here for the pining and inability to touch that the premise suggests; would prefer a hopeful ending to a super bleak one.

-----------

General likes (mainly a fic-oriented list, but if you do art for me and want to incorporate something here, great):

In case you want more inspiration in addition to the above. Take from it as you wish, all these things are good alone or combined

for both gen and shipfic: Lighthearted (romantic or friendship) fluff and humor Glimpses of how the characters manage everyday life stuff in canons where the focus is more on big dramatic events Canon divergence AUs in the “what if x event in canon turned out differently” sense Casefic if the characters do cases or missions or short adventures Epistolary or “found documents” stories, and other unconventional story structures Time loop stories, Rashomon-style stories, and other kinds of variations on a theme (including “five times” fic) Worldbuilding/exploration of the canon world and backstory, especially parts unexplored in the canon; also, in-universe stories, songs, mythologies, histories, etc. Holidays and celebrations and balls, masquerade or not, and dancing, romantic or not Characters doing things in disguise, whether they’re good or bad at it Heists and rescues/jailbreaks Court plotting, intrigue, spying Road or sea trips/wilderness survival situations Swordfights, duels, tournaments, sparring, training for all kinds of fighting Characters making things for others, whether it’s art or music or crafting or food or magic or whatever, and giving gifts Artists (in any art form), artistic rivalries, artist/muse dynamics, artists inspiring each other Competence and being very good at what they do (but perhaps awkward or lost in other contexts); relatedly, learning/practicing new skills

additionally for shipfic: Angst with happy endings Pining, preferably requited in the end Repressed feelings and extended UST, especially between working partners who are busy with something more important Loyalty/dedication/faithfulness/devotion, us against the world, knight/queen dynamics (either one-way or where both consider themselves the knight to the other), bodyguarding, love conflicting with other loyalties, noble self-denial and sacrifice, courtly love Stoicism and hidden feelings/bad at feelings but has a lot, or good at feelings and good at hiding them Secret/forbidden relationships as a source of angst and/or for the excitement of sneaking around Hurt/comfort, rescuing each other, fighting beside each other Snuggling/bathing/dressing/playing with hair/other caretaking Forced intimacy tropes like bedsharing, huddling for warmth, fake dating, marriage of convenience, handcuffed together, dreamsharing/psychic bonds, bodyswap Longtime friends to lovers, old friends meeting again, old enemies who aren’t really anymore and have to admit they like each other, rivals who respect each other Ascetic/hedonist or repressed/libertine or inexperienced/more experienced pairings

for sex scenes: cuddling, kissing, laughing, eroticized hands and voices, clothed/semi-clothed sex, complicated undressing, talking whether emotional or joking or dirty, curiosity/discovery, playfulness/inventiveness, eagerness/desperation, being overwhelmed by feelings, having to keep silent or hold still, interruptions and delayed gratification and intentional teasing/drawing things out, body worship, sex against walls, informal mild kink (e.g., tying up, holding down, blindfolding, taking direction, scratching/marking, tearing clothes, mutual roughness), sexy letter writing, one fantasizing about the other, decadence, voyeurism/exhibitionism, writing/painting on skin, sex pollen, magical or magic-enhanced sex

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

DNWs: unrequested setting AUs (like high school or coffee shop), non-canonical/unrequested polyamory, non-canonical/unrequested pregnancy and kids, non-canonical nicknames infidelity (unless it’s something like escaping a forced or political marriage) sexual violence/rape (eroticized/described in detail; I’m OK with, e.g., a character being a survivor or hunting down a rapist) a/b/o, formalized bdsm, daddy/mommy kink, underage, incest, shit/urine/vomit/spitting

[theyearoftheking]

Book Six: The Dead Zone

“We all do what we can, and it has to be good enough... and if it isn’t good enough, it has to be. Nothing is ever lost. Nothing that can’t be found.”

When I announced my next book was The Dead Zone, my brother-in-law admitted to never reading it, or seeing the movie, because it felt dated. He’s not wrong. The 1983 movie felt dated when I’d watch it in the 1990′s. But that didn’t stop me from imagining Christopher Walken during the entire book. So, here’s some cowbell for your Tuesday! Sorry, I’m home with a sick kid, doing training for my job, I need to find joy where I can. 

But The Dead Zone is still eerily important. I need to stop reading Steve’s books... it’s too much... first I picked up The Stand during the Coronavirus outbreak, and now I’m reading about shitty politicians during a particularly shitty election season. 

Who hasn’t asked themselves the question... “If you could go back in time and kill Hitler- would you do it?”

Being a disciple of Ray Bradbury, I’d have to answer probably not. I read The Sound of Thunder during my formative years, and it hit hard. I’m also a disciple of Steve, and 11/22/63 taught me what a world where Kennedy hadn’t been assassinated looks like. And that fictional world is bleak, my friends. 

Let’s get into it, shall we?

When Johnny Smith was a little boy, he was ice skating, and had a nasty fall. This fall gave him mild psychic abilities. A teeny bit of The Shine, if you will. Fast forward to grown-up John, he’s a teacher and living in the quaint town of Cleaves Mills. To keep the quaint theme going, he’s about to take Sarah, a fellow teacher, to the county fair on a date. Presh, I know.

Now... this is when the book just becomes one big homage to Ray Bradbury. The county fair is straight out of Something Wicked This Way Comes; which Steve actually references at one point. The manic laughter, the spinning rides,, the smell of carnival food, and the feeling of something evil lurking just under the surface is all there. It’s a masterful tribute. 

On their way out of the fair, John stops and decides to try his luck at a Wheel of Fortune carny game. You know... the type of game you never actually win at. But his Shine comes into play, and he ends up walking away from the game $500 richer (three weeks salary according to Sarah!). But Sarah suddenly feels sick. She blames it on a bad carny hot dog, but I’m pretty sure The Shine is wafting off John like a noxious fume, and she inhaled too much of it. John gets Sarah safely home, and takes a taxi back to his apartment. Well, tries to take a taxi back... the taxi ends up crushed by some hoods out drag racing, and John ends up in a coma for four and a half years. 

Yes. 

Four and a half years. 

I’m not smart enough to do the math and adjust for inflation; but can you imagine what hospital bills for four and a half years worth of treatment must look like? I mean, I’d almost rather they pull the plug on me. It would be less painful than waking up and finding I’m going to be broke for the rest of my life. 

John’s parents Herb and Vera are thrilled he’s awake. Vera is cut from the same kind of crazy culty-religious cloth as Margaret White (Carrie’s mom); and believes there’s a holy reason why John is still alive. John needs to have some painful surgeries to have his leg muscles stretched (because, atrophy is a bitch after four and a half years in a hospital bed); and then some spooky shit starts happening. John has discovered he can touch someone’s hand, and learn all kinds of interesting things about them. For example, he touches the hand of Dr. Weizak, and informs him that his mother didn’t actually die in a concentration camp, she’s alive and well in California. Then, he freaks a physical therapist out by telling her she needs to call the fire department, her apartment is on fire. The news media gets wind of John’s new powers, and they start relentlessly hounding him. 

While still in the hospital, he gets a call from Herb, letting him know Vera has had a stroke, and is in Cumberland General Hospital (you know, just above Jerusalem’s Lot). So, Dr. Weizak rushes him to the hospital, and Vera tells him a voice will tell him what to do, and she believes in his higher purpose. Then she dies. 

Oh, Vera. She’s had a fun life. At one point, she was a member of The American Society for Last Times. “They were led by Mr. and Mrs. Harry L Stonkers from Racine, Wisconsin. Mr. and Mrs. Stonkers claimed to have been picked up by a flying saucer while they were on a camping trip. They had been taken away to heaven, which was not out in the constellation Orion, but on an earth-type planet that circled Arcturus. There they had communed with the society of angels and had seen Paradise. The Stonkers had been informed that the Last Times were at hand...”

I laughed so hard, because of course the crazy cult leaders were from Racine. I worked for a company based in Racine for several years, and one of my co-workers was of this same kind of crazy religious bend. He told me “my lifestyle” flew in the face of what God intended. For the record, my lifestyle was being one of those crazy, new-aged career gals, with a stay-at-home husband raising our two year old. It’s easy to understand what’s so offensive about that.

But the worst part was when this co-worker decided to “treat” his teenage daughters to a home-schooled prom. He rented a limo, ordered flowers, made dinner reservations... and was their date. But no dancing of course, because... religion. When I relayed this story back to my husband later on, he asked me which daughter was going to end up getting lucky on prom night with dad. Ick. 

So yes, cult leaders in Racine- 100% believable. 

After Vera’s death, John continues his life, living with his dad, healing from his horrible leg muscle surgery, and he even keeps in touch with Sarah, even an ill-advised hook-up for final closure. People keep sending him letters and trinkets, hoping he can help them find lost objects, or solve mysteries. He’s not having it. He just wants to go back to teaching, and lead a “normal” life. But alas, there is this nagging voice (it belongs to Vera) telling him he was awakened from his coma for a reason. He needs to serve a higher purpose. So, he ends up going to Castle Rock, Maine; and helps the sheriff solve a series of murders. Castle Rock is a fun place, FYI. They have a Flagg street there. 

After his face is splashed across the tabloids for helping solve the murders, his school district doesn’t want him teaching anymore, and his life has little purpose. After a few years of moping around on his dad’s land, he ends up tutoring young, charismatic, Chuck Chatsworth; and uses his Shine to help Chuck get around the dead zone he has with reading and comprehending text. 

A note about “the dead zone”... it’s a term John uses quite a bit to describe the gray area he can’t quite see through/around when he’s holding someone’s hand and telling them something important. 

John gets on super well with Chuck’s dad, Roger. One night they’re watching tv, and Roger can’t stop talking about this political wildcard, Gregory Stillson, who is running for a House seat. “The man is a clown. He goes charging around the speaking platform like that at every rally. Throws his helmet into the crowd- I’d guess he’s gone through a hundred of them by now- and gives out hot dogs. He’s a clown, so what? Maybe people need a little comic relief from time to time. We’re running out of oil, the inflation is slowly but surely getting out of control, the average guy’s tax load has never been heavier... So people want a giggle or two. Even more, they want to thumb their noses at the political establishment that doesn’t seem able to solve anything...” 

John keeps working for the Chatsworth family, and helps get Chuck into Stovington Prep... yes, the same Stovington Prep as in The Shining. At one point, Chuck is talking about his English teacher, “I like him a lot. Our teacher told us he still lives over in N.H. but has given up writing. That blows my mind. Why would someone just give up when they are going great guns?” I’ll let you draw your own conclusions, but I’m 87% sure his teacher was one Jack Torrance. 

In the meantime, Stillson wins his election. And John endears himself further to the Chatsworth family the night of Chuck’s graduation, when he has a vision of a fire at Cathy’s restaurant; where a lot of families planned on going to celebrate. John pleads with people not to go to Cathy’s. Some listen, others don’t, but he does end up saving some lives. And then he becomes a recluse, fixated on Gregory Stillson. 

Stillson is a bad dude. He’s done a lot of shady shit, and he’s had a lot of people killed. He also worked in real estate development for a while. Smirk. 

He knows he needs to take Stillson out before he becomes President, and gets the country pulled into another war. “I have to do something about Stillson. I have to. I was right about Cathy’s, and I’m going to be right about this. There is absolutely no question in my mind. He is going to become president and he is going to start a war- or cause one through simple mismanagement of the office, which amounts to the same thing.” 

 Oh, how quaint... when the biggest fear is the President starting another war... not the President getting us all killed by nuclear weapons. But, this book was set post-Vietnam, so the feeling is honest. 

John goes to a rally, and hides on the upper balcony, hoping to shoot Stillson. He gets a couple shots off, before Stillson grabs a baby to use as a shield (yeah... really...), to prevent John from shooting him again. John ends up shot by Stillson’s goons and he dies, but so does Stillson’s political career, because of a photo showing him using the baby as a body shield. So, his mission was mostly carried out. We also find out John had a brain tumor, which may or may not have caused his abilities. 

So, yeah. That’s The Dead Zone. This was a long review for a really short (by Steve standards) book. But it was fun because there were so many references to his previous five books. And yes, the book was published in 1979, but I feel it still holds up. And it has me wondering how/if Trump supporters would explain away Trump using a baby as a shield. I mean... the man has done far worse than that and has still been elected, so.... 

God damn, I really did not intend for this blog to become political, but here we are! Welcome to the new climate around election season! 

There was one lone Dark Tower reference, “He opened the paperback with the picture of the gunslinger shouldering his way through a set of saloon batwings...” 

Total Wisconsin Mentions: 9

Dark Tower References: 5

Book Grade B+

Rebecca’s Definitive Ranking of Stephen King Books

The Shining

The Stand

The Dead Zone

‘Salem’s Lot

Carrie 

Night Shift 

Next up is Firestarter. Yes, cute little Drew Barrymore. I can’t wait. 

Until next time readers, Long Days and Pleasant Nights!

Rebecca

[calleo-bricriu]

Finally, FINALLY, the author uses detail. Sort of. In some parts. But mostly not.

Continuing on...

Right, so, chapter 7, surprisingly doesn't have a time skip.

It's just Mizpra on the train with some long author monologing about how evil and twisted she is but he never really explains how or why just that "to kill, destroy, cause misery, and produce unhappiness was her life."

For a change he's briefly nice to her by saying she's clever, talented, and almost a genius but then goes on about how not really because she's selfish and gross.

"She did not understand or realise that she herself was the product of the last feeble efforts of exhausted ancestors." Wow.

Paragraph about how Mizpra is basically evil because she doesn't want to get married or have kids or have a sex life or any of that and it goes right into Leigh knowing that all because Leigh, being a genius, enabled him to realise it.

Why are we even talking about Leigh? He's not on the train.

Long paragraph about how children born to women with "nervous exhaustion" (again, not really a real thing) or to older women were basically trash that nobody should want and also makes for...infertile children somehow. This author is a doctor. A medical degree holding doctor, just in case you'd forgotten.

Few more pages rambling on and on about why Mizpra is evil and that only serves to make me still feel a bit bad for her because, so far, she hasn't really done anything all that terrible; the worst she's done so far is humiliate a student for wearing a corset and marry a guy for his typing abilities.

He keeps bringing god into it but, in all honesty, after reading seven chapters of this book he's convinced me that if one does exist it sure as hell isn't merciful.

Psychic conditions mean you can't have reasonable children.

Oh! Finally we get a description of an Evil Thing she's been at! She took a course on bacteriology which, whatever that is, would probably make her better at being a doctor than Leigh, for the sole purpose of sending Leigh's entire family contaminated mail. Cool initial thought but germs spread so she could also inadvertently cause an actual plague.

Her lab has a bunch of mouse and rat cages but, for some reason, they're not in there; they're in the bread. Comically poking their little heads and tails out of the...bread that I sincerely hope she won't eat.

Some descriptions of a bunch of dying rabbits in other cages that had all been infected with whatever disease she was working on.

Cotton tipped tubes are not going to contain pneumonia, diphtheria, typhoid, cholera, 'blood poisoning', or tetanus (sorry, lockjaw) and she really shouldn't be keeping them like that.

Oh, but this is common and "bacteriologists" just carry them around willy-nilly like that because they're--I mean, honestly, it's probably because constant low level exposure has given them immunity so, inadvertently discovering how vaccines work while not knowing that's what's happened.

We find out that, for some reason, she's particularly focused on killing Leigh's kid which is odd because there has never been much mention of her disliking that particular child, just all children. Also, it's 1901, just wait, he's got a pretty high chance of dying before the age of 10 anyway, especially living in a city.

She's a near genius level "bacteriologist" in the plot at this point and can't figure out how to spread diphtheria.

Air.

It spreads through the air.

Just powder it up and mail it along.

Or coat some baby toys with it, I guess that's the route we're going.

All right, so we've got the Baby Murder plan underway. It’s better than a few other Baby Murder plans I’ve heard over the years but, since we’re not even half way through the book I doubt Baby Murder Attempt #1 will fail.

A few scenes of her very nearly getting off to watching her lab animals die while also thinking, in a bizarre level of detail for this book, of a baby dying. Getting a little weird there, Mizpra.

How is it this author can detail that and detail all the ways the alb animals are suffering but couldn't be bothered to add any details to anything else?

Diphtheria doesn't need to enter through a slight wound, Mizpra, it just has to be present. It's very easily airborne and will also likely spread to anyone else that walks into that house until everyone is dead and they use fire as a way to clean the building.

So she goes out, gets a rattle and a whistle, goes back to her lab, files the whistle so it's likely to cut the kid's mouth then applies the "venomous bacilli" (Diphtheria is not venomous...) onto it all and wrapping it up in steralised cotton which would definitely have killed a lot of the diphtheria on there but, 1901 and nobody knows how infectious disease works.

Mizpra, we now find out when some professor addresses her as Dr. Newcomber, does, in fact, hold some sort of doctorate degree. Good for her.

He takes her back to his office and tells her, what amounts to, "Please stop leaving dead animals all over the lab, it's rude to the other students."

Long lecture about how she's coming off as kind of really fucking creepy by doing that and by being pointlessly cruel to the lab animals, she basically just rolls her eyes and asks him if he's done talking yet.

Which made him decide to fire her. She asked him again if he was done talking, and he went. off. on her for how careless she was in the lab and how thoughtless she was in regards to the other people that also had to use the lab which prompts her to start--reading--poetry out loud.

For whatever reason, despite being in Colorado, and despite Professor Ridge not being German she decides to start calling him "Herr Professor" then says goodbye in...French.

His farewell was, "There are no women of genius; the women of genius are men," so at this point, I'm kind of okay with him maybe getting diphtheria as well for that.

It hasn't been mentioned if she mailed the diseased baby toys yet but, they're all going to California now.

On to Chapter 8.

Back in New York with Obera.

There is no e in dachshund, a dachshund that is being mishandled by Obera's kid who still does not have a name, or, rather, his name hasn't been told to any of us reading.

Oh.

"Leigh, Jr." which is normal enough for about two seconds until you read on and the rest of the sentence says, "or, as he was called, Mops". The servant from the place in Hamburg gave him that nickname and that's just what we're going to call the kid now I guess.

Mops.

Obera has gone from the creepy child like girl in the "fascinating toque" to "proud and handsome in the full bloom of matronly womanhood" which is equally creepy sounding just in a different way.

Leigh is, of course, still a published author now and people love him for some inexplicable reason. I still sort of want to backhand him, he's so pretentious and doesn't even have the intellect to back it up.

"Leigh now counted his friends by the hundred". Sure.

They get into an argument about Leigh being a dick at work and Obera reminding him that he really needs to stop doing that shit before he ends up fired again and of course he lectures her on how her silly woman brain couldn't possibly comprehend his genius behaviour.

Can we just skip to the "infect the entire house and possibly city block with diphtheria" subplot here? Because I'm definitely more interested in that than I am in listening to this idiot wax philosophic and say nothing at all for dozens of pages on end.

Not yet? Okay.

Oh! No, few pages further and the diphtheria soaked toys have arrived!

Obera, having some good sense, was super suspicious at receiving a box addressed to a 3 year old, just sort of locked it in drawer to think about what the hell it might be. She assumes Mizpra sent it and that it’s probably poisoned or infected with something which I’d normally say is intuition but, she would have no way of even beginning to think Mizpra had the skills to do that (let alone the access to materials) so we’re going to go with metagaming here; Obera is clearly reading the story along with us.

Anyway, she sends the package to Dr. Bell so maybe someone else will be getting the diphtheria. Just doing a quick look up, in New York around 1900, the average fatality rate for diphtheria was--1,227 deaths in 1901, which is about a 15% rate, of the 7,726 cases reported in Manhattan and The Bronx, which is the area these people are living in.

So, her plan was kind of bad from the beginning; it had a 15% success chance IF it got to the point of infecting the kid.

Pneumonia, tuberculosis, and cholera would have been better, more likely to kill the kid choices. Cholera usually knocks over young children pretty fast.

Or just poison. You have a lab, you probably can easily get cyanide.

Not telling you how to go about your baby murdering plans here, Mizpra, just saying you're not exactly picking the ideas with high chances of success or doing it with any subtlety since they kind of immediately figured out it was from you and probably contaminated somehow.

And on to chapter 9!

Dr. Bell, probably being a real doctor, ran some tests and explained the results to Obera which, of course, made her faint immediately. She does that a lot.

So as she's sort of starting to wake up she starts screaming over and over that Leigh needs to kill her; her being Mizpra. Fair enough response to just finding out your sister in law tried to infect your entire family and specifically your child with diphtheria which had an--admittedly low death rate but still a 15% chance of it.

Leigh, in a surprising moment of clarity asks the other doctor if he knows what she's talking about, he says yes, then Leigh goes with, "NO TIME FOR EXPLANATIONS!" and tries to do medical care things on Obera.

Eventually  he goes with, "Okay yeah, I'll kill Mizpra for you."

Dr. Bell, the only sane person in the room, tries to talk him out of that and apparently a pulse of 120 is something we should know the meaning of.

So he's gonna lock himself in a room and not drink just to see what happens. What happened was he stayed awake for three solid days and that's it, only it took several pages to say that because we're supposed to feel sorry for this guy.

Several pages of a rambling story about a morphine addict not part of this story.

More pages of Leigh being mad at religion for no reason whatsoever.

Charlie listens to him ramble about how much he hates religion for the rest of the chapter then tells him he's such a well educated genius and leaves.

[shuttershocky]

The Tsukihime Worldbuilding Primer : Part 2 -  The Demon Hunters

Hey Type-Moon fans! Have you not read Tsukihime but wondered how much of the Nasuverse lore you’ve missed out on? Then this is for you! This will be an easy to read Nasuverse worldbuilding guide meant for those who are unwilling or otherwise unable to read Tsukihime, from a very big Tsukihime fan that understands that we’ll all be dead before the remake comes out. It will discuss everything from the factions, magic, connections to Fate and Kara No Kyoukai, and anything else people might find interesting. I will also avoid any major plot spoilers in case this convinces you to read Tsukihime in the future!

(Of course you could just read all this on the Type-Moon wiki yourself, but good luck in those murky waters)

WARNING: Minor Spoilers for Tsukihime and Kara No Kyoukai

For this post, we’ll talk about the four Demon Hunter families featured in Tsukihime and Kara No Kyoukai; The Ryougi, the Nanaya, the Fujou, and the Asagami.

First off, who are the Demon Hunters?

The Demon Hunter Organization is a joining of four families in Japan with supernatural powers. Their goal? Eliminate the Oni (think of them like Japan’s demons) from the land. In recent years, such demons have intermingled with humans to the point where their hybrid children are no longer capable of being bound by spells meant for the elimination of Oni kind, but are still capable of wielding the Oni’s vast powers. Thus, the families developed their own supernatural powers in order to combat the Oni, each one claimed to be a form of psychic power and so is considered separate from magic.

First, we’ll start with a very familiar family.

1.) The Ryougi

The family at the center of Kara No Kyoukai and thus the most well-known of the Nasuverse’s demon hunters (though admittedly that’s still not much), the Ryougi were a family who essentially cultivated themselves to be born with two distinct personalities (although according to the Ryougi themselves, it’s a lot closer to having two souls) in a single body. The purpose of this was to compartmentalize: each personality would master a different set of skills, and so the Ryougis could appear to be multi-talented geniuses to the point of appearing supernatural.

Due to the deceptive nature of their family magic, the Ryougis escaped the doom that befell the other families when the era of demon hunting came to an end and became wealthy landowners. Their powers however, had the tendency to drive them mad in old age, and almost all the Ryougis killed themselves as their insanity slowly took over their lives.

In their experiments to place twin souls within a body however, they managed to create a child with an origin of  「　」(nothingness) AKA the void. This led to the child having a connection to the root of Akasha (yes, that same route magi will kill each other for in Fate) and thus a viable candidate to hold one of the most powerful weapons in the Nasuverse, the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception. 

The child, Shiki Ryougi, became the main protagonist of the light novel series Kara No Kyoukai, and subsequently became one of Nasu’s biggest badasses. After losing one of her two halves, the girl found herself able to see lines around anything that, if traced, destroyed whatever object, person,or even magic they wrapped around. 

Anything at all that is capable of death or being destroyed is vulnerable to her eyes. This means that Shiki Ryougi is able to kill even extremely durable enemies with a quick cut of her knife, destroy any object blocking her way, or even neutralize powerful magic and ESP abilities with a wave of her knife or sword. Even certain beings that lie beyond the concept of death, such as Buddha’s arm, are constantly being attacked by her eyes which attempt to draw lines over them, and these only keep growing in power as she ages. It is theorized by her nemesis Souren Alaya that given enough time, her eyes might even succeed in drawing lines upon the Buddha.

2.) The Fujou

A family of magi/ESP users, the mysterious Fujou family display several abilities that all seem to center around control over other people’s bodies. The family has mostly fallen into ruin, and all we know of them are from three individuals, Kirie Fujou, as well as Tsukihime’s twin maids, Hisui and Kohaku.

Kirie Fujou, the antagonist for Kara No Kyoukai’s first story, and is, for lack of a better term, a complete monster of a psychic. A master of astral projection, the almost blind Kirie could see by projecting her mind towards locations she stayed in when she still had her sight, and was able to seize the minds of several girls, forcing them to commit suicide. She also had a second, ghostly body that she could control, haunting a commercial building the Fujou family used to own. Her killing spree put her on a collision course with Shiki Ryougi, where a battle between the last two descendants of the families determined the end of the Fujou family.

Or so we thought.

Hisui and Kohaku of Tsukihime are also part of the Fujou family (they descended from a disgraced, exiled member) who had avoided the destruction of the Fujou. 

The lovable twin maids of the Tohno mansion, the two girls appear to be normal by most circumstances. There’s just one small thing.

Although unable to perform the same kind of astral projection or body controlling magic that Kirie could, the twins have the power of the Synchronizer, which gives them the ability to share their life force with others. This leads to the strengthening of one’s supernatural abilities, as well as healing the benefactor of any malady inflicting them, whether it be physical like paralysis, or mental like insanity.

3.) The Asagami

Another ruined family like the Fujou, the Asagami were a family split into two branches, the Asakami and the Asagami. The Asakami were the major and more powerful branch, although they made the bizarre decision of worshipping the captured Oni and even interbreeding with them, until they became demonic themselves and wiped each other out. The Asagami on the other hand, quietly swept their supernatural affairs under a rug and became a family of ordinary businessmen. That is, until their old family powers manifested again in one of their children, a certain Fujino Asagami.

Fujino Asagami is an immensely powerful telekinetic, able to bend, twist, and crush any object with the incredible force of her mind. Displaying her powers at a very young age, her family began drugging her in order to sedate her abilities, but the drugs also left her with an inability to feel any pain (or indeed, any sensation whatsoever). 

She regained her abilities through a most horrible circumstance: the victim of a gang rape, one of her rapists began clubbing her with a baseball bat, and the shock reactivated and perhaps even enhanced her powers, causing her to slaughter her rapists before going on a mad killing spree throughout Mifune city.

4.) The Nanaya

The fourth and final Demon-Hunter family. While the Ryougi, Asagami, and Fujou were first shown in Kara No Kyoukai, the Nanaya did not make an appearance until Tsukihime, where the main protagonist Shiki Tohno would use his Nanaya heritage in his battles against the Dead Apostles.

The Nanaya’s original powers were having specialized eyes called Pure Eyes, which gave them vision over conceptual things. The abilities of the eyes differ depending on the individual, with Kiri Nanaya being able to see  the thoughts and intentions of people, while Shiki Tohno could spy invisible threats. They could also detect non-humans by scent, the smell of a vampire or demon filling them with an nearly maddening bloodlust.

Unsatisfied with just this however, the Nanayas developed another ability that allowed them to battle with the supernatural: Super speed. Called the Nanaya Assassination Arts, the two styles, Flashing Scabbard and Flashing Dance, allowed the Nanayas to temporarily move in superhuman speed, and also allowed them to crawl along walls and ceilings to attack from confusing angles. Doing battle with a Nanaya was like fighting a demon yourself, as their freakish abilities meant they could move faster than the eye could see, and drop down from ceilings and walls to behead you before you even realized they were there, and so the Nanaya became the most feared of the Demon Hunter families.

Kiri Nanaya in particular, was feared by the demon hybrid families. In one particularly gruesome attack, Kiri infiltrated a family of Oni, the Saiki, and killed thirty guards before dueling the head of the Saiki family one on one. Though the head of the Saiki was said to be able to kill a dozen Demon Hunters without much effort, Kiri pulled the much more powerful man underneath a table and quickly dissected him in a place where a single ordinary person would not even be able to move properly, cementing his legend as a terrifying assassin. 

Shiki Tohno on the other hand, was never trained in the Nanaya Assassination Arts, and thus has very little control over his abilities, and in fact does not know he even has speed powers. Although, several times in Tsukihime when his life or the life of someone he holds dear is threatened, he is able to call upon his heritage and do battle with terrifying monsters, occasionally even frightening them with his spidery movements and horrifying eyes.

Oh yes! I forgot to mention that point. Due to some very long circumstances in which you will need to read Tsukihime yourself to find out, Shiki Tohno’s Nanaya Pure Eyes get upgraded...

Into Shiki Ryougi’s Mystic Eyes of Death Perception.

So take Shiki Ryougi’s ability to kill anything with her eyes that literally channel the void, and put it on a boy who is able to move faster than the human eye can see, and you have yourself one of the scariest combinations in this side of the Nasuverse.

As this foolish Dead Apostle is about to find out.

And that’s all for this post! Next post, we’ll talk about the forebears of the Dead Apostles, the True Ancestors, as well as the Tohno family, and the meddling sisters that get their grubby hands into any Nasuverse story, the Aozaki!

[stipulatedconflict]

Band interview with SUCK LORDS(Portland/USA)

I do not really remember how I came across to their demo on Youtube, However, it was a fuckin’ blaster! Fast as fuck. It is like a scraped broken van which does not have brake rolling down Holmenkollen. I love this whatever, we play fuckin fast! Attitude. I felt what the heck going on with this crazy dudes? and try to find information and nothing I could really find about them. I really wanted to know what’s going on with this band then I fortunately could grab its tail somehow.

Check their demo first here

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfWuVJA6yqs

Interview starts from bewlo;

-So,who is in the band? are there any bands which any of you have played or been playing or currently playing beside SUCK LORDS?

J: Foot, Tam, Karl, myself. I was in Nasa Space Universe for eight years and currently in U-NIX. I've had a lot of smaller projects back home in California that maybe only ever played once or just recorded and never played shows. 

F(sam aka foot): In recent times I was in HEAVY HANDS, SWEATS, MONGOLOID, now I'm in SUCK LORDS and CHOW LINE.

-Is there anyone who is deeply involved in any DIY punk activities like running label, writing zines, taking pictures, designing, organising shows etc in SUCK LORDS?

J: I take a lot of pictures of shows and people that I like and respect. I booked shows constantly from 2009-2015 in Orange County and LA and did a lot of collages for flyers and 7”s or LP covers. I don't like to book shows in Portland. 

F:I do a mean zine called Not For Everyone that focuses on HC punk and skateboarding. Issue five coming soon! Anyone out there, I want to trade zines! Get at me Snukytate@gmail.com

I'll book ya a show if you twist my arm and do a lot of flyers and tape art for the bands I play in.

-Is there anyone who is deeply involved in any activities which is not any relation to DIY/punk thing? Art, Other type of music, publication, extreme sports or any other?

F: Me and Karl skateboard, other than that I work a lot as a bartender and spend my money on HC, punk, metal, hard rock, kraut rock records. The rest of my time is spent outside with my dog or watching movies.

J: Matt plays hockey. I read a lot. I like to ride the bus or train around the outskirts of Portland and look for weird stuff or people. I like collecting photography books. I mostly listen to death metal lately but I grew up on funk, soul, and oldies and got into hardcore punk when I was eight years old. I also really like old electric slide guitar gospel and delta blues- niche stuff like that; west African funk/rock.

-How did SUCK LORDS start in the beginning? How did all of you get together? Did you know each others before it started?

F: Karl and Tam were jamming and I invited myself to join them. We were all in SWEATS together. I've known john for years from touring and he had moved to town so we asked him to sing. Nothing exciting there!

J: I joined late. I was already in U-Nix with Karl and have been friends with Foot for a long time. I didn't meet Tam until the first Lords practice I came to.

-Why did you want to form SUCK LORDS?

F: We were just in the practice space a lot with other bands and it just kind of happened, but like with any band we're in the mission is to blow away all the weak and boring bands this town is polluted with! 

-Was there any specific idea of sound before SUCK LORDS started?

F: Not really, in the beginning they were all riffs that Tam wrote, I remember him saying he wanted it to sound "punk". Maybe like rancid or somethin ya know?

-How do you describe the sound of the band by your own words?

J: “faster than Gang Green”. “Fast as hell.”

F: It can only be described as "LORDS music". High speed retardation.

-Is there any specific bands gave influence/inspiration to SUCK LORDS?

F: JFA, Suicidal, Neos, Nikoteens, Stark Raving Mad, Nun fuckers

J: H100s

-What kind of elements/influences do individual members bring to the band to sounds like SUCK LORDS?

F: Karl can drum faster than shit but he still hits hard and is tight and writes interesting, non typical parts.Tam is kinda the same way with riffs, pretty weird sometimes but always ripping. I just want to play as fast and hard as possible and jump around like a moron making loud abrasive noises.

J: I wanted to have a Jerry’s Kids vocal style going on but when I heard my own voice it was more like a whiny little kid voice. 

-How did you decide the band name? is there any special meaning? 

F: when we were looking for a singer, Tam said "anyone could sing as long as they weren't a SUCK LORD".

J: Punk ran out of names and Suck Lords was the only one left. 

-How's the punk scene in Portland in general? Lot of things going on there?

J: Busy 3 months out of the year. The rest is of the year everyone is really complacent and lazy and spends their time in bars. The average punk doesn't care about the scene or put forth the effort but there's a solid handful of people that genuinely care and have cool shit going on. There are a lot of great bands and a few that stink. 

F: Zzzzzzzzzz, bring a fuckin book.

-How do you think about playing in a band in Portland? Are there good venues or squat for punk shows?

J: The venue makes all the difference in crowd reaction. People feel restricted at bars but house shows get wild. No squats here, all those buildings are now expensive lofts from what im told. It's hard for people to have fun here; they don't like to move around. 

F: It can be hard, "punks" here are real complacent, lazy, too old, or already know what super specific sub genre of punk they've limited themselves to, so getting a real gut reaction to music is a rare occurrence and can make playing gigs pretty disheartening. There have been some house shows happening which is sick because they're always more fun, I'm glad there's a few houses who have been providing that space for us and hope they last. Blackwater Bar is an all ages bar venue that is run and operated by great people, the know is another excellent bar venue staffed by people involved in or at least sympathetic to DIY punk.

-Which bands are you playing together a lot? any bands you feel sympathy as in a same scene?

F: we play with UNIX and IMPULSE CONTROL who we share members with. I sympathize with them cuz I'm always farting in the practice space. We definitley get offered gigs way less than any of our other bands, I think we've done like six shows in close to two years??

J: The last two shows we played we were the only local band. The people in this band are also in all the bands we play with. 

-Is there any bands you feel sympathy for the sound/attitude in abroad? 

F: YAMBAG from Cleveland are good contemporaries as far as sound goes, there's a handful of bands I like right now but I won't bore you. 

J: Nosferatu, Roobydocks, wild child (RIP), inservibles (RIP), the lowest form, good throb, Orden Mundial, Perspex flesh.

-Is there any good bands out there in Portland which we should keep our eyes on in these days? 

J: Hacksaw, Extraneous, impulse Control, decomp

F: and UNIX

-Have you played outside of US? Probably not yet, but is there any plan for tours in abroad?

J: I only make plans for the week. Next month is a mystery.

F: I really doubt this band will make it out of the country. Talks of a US tour with UNIX have been happening but we'll see...

-What are the lyrics mainly about? 

J: Cryptozoology, unexplained phenomena, black eyed children encounters, psychic vampires, the large number of disappearances of hikers and hunters from the national parks in the US; creepy stuff. Stuff or people that suck.

-How do you guys compose songs? some specific members are dedicated to it to bring completed song? or more like bring some riffs and developing it by jamming?

F: Me or Tam usually bring full songs to practice but I think we're at a point where we could make songs by jamming. John seems to come up with vocal patterns and lyrics pretty quickly after the songs materialize.

-You guys released tape from Edger records. But I couldn't find any information about the label. How did this happen? Who is behind the label?

F: EDGER is my thing. It's not really a label, I just wanted to be able to attach a name to the things our bands are doing. Most of the releases are funded equal parts by the band members and any money made goes back to the bands. Releases are:

NFE 001-CHOW LINE-six trax ripper demo

NFE 002- SWEATS DEMO

NFE 003- HEAVY HANDS/SWEATS west coast tour split cs 

NFE 004- SUCK LORDS DEMO

NFE 005- CHOW LINE DEMO 2 

-Why do you choose tape as format of release? was there any attachment for tape?

J: It's cheap and fast.

F: You can play em in a boom box, ya know like at the skatepark or walking down the street with your fuck up friends.

-Is there any specific goal/aim for SUCK LORDS to achieve?

J: To have the best worst band name in punk. We’ve succeeded.

F: To rip as hard as possible and be done playing before these dorks knew what hit em.

-What is the further plan for SUCK LORDS?

J: Record more and play more.

F: Go fuckin mental mate oi oi

[brood-mother]

hey, i'm super into your 'the sun sets on us' blurb/board on pinterest. can you say more about the story? it looks super interesting

of course, yeah! it’s still in its infancy so i don’t even have definite names for the main characters yet (umm let’s call the them middle sis jara, little bro elan, and big bro amal for purpose of this i guess?). i’ll put it behind a read more because i am going to go IN on this bc i don’t get to talk about it often and i am excited abt it. edit: i definitely got carried away but it felt good to air it out, thank you.

anyway, the basic premise is that in this universe, magic is an inherently destructive force. it is capable of doing fantastic, unbelievable things, but it requires a lot of energy, and typically consumes that energy in the form of life-force. magic users, if they regularly use magic, have a dramatically reduced life-span (even magic users who totally abstain from using magic can expect to live to 60 at the absolute most, a good 20 or so years less than a normal person). magic use blackens and scorches the flesh. magic users are constantly hungry, and run at unnaturally high temperatures because of the perpetual unnatural energy generation in their bodies. however, it is possible to draw that life-force from other people and even the environment around you, and as such in most places seek to eradicate magic with extreme prejudice.

the siblings live in one such country with their father; their mother, a magic user like jara, has already passed away naturally. they live in almost total isolation to protect jara from persecution (although relatives of magic users are also treated abysmally whether they show talents or not), but when war breaks out in the land, conscription is enforced, and every family must provide at least one able bodied adult to join the army. the father immediately volunteers, so as to stop anyone from sniffing around, but shortly thereafter the siblings are forced to flee their home without him or be swallowed up in the violence. 

at first they are comfortably anonymous in a tide of refugees, but eventually it becomes hard to hide. other magic users flushed out by the war are caught, persecuted. people are scared, angry; scapegoatism is rife, and an actual witch-hunt begins. with nowhere to hide and so little experience of the ‘real’ world, the siblings are forced to flee. they run aimlessly for a while until they realise the only place they could ever be safe is a secluded, insular, frozen land far to the north. most southerners only know of it through fearful hearsay and myths, but it is rumoured magic is seen as a boon, and magic users are like gods among mortal men. 

the journey there is treacherous; they must first make it to the northern coast of their own country, cross the sea, and then trek across a great barren wasteland to reach it. on the way, they encounter many obstacles, not least of all a dragon (dragons, while exceedingly rare and quite dangerous, are not devastating beasts in this world; they’re sort of on the same level as a polar bear, maybe, if polar bears could breath fire). while it should be easy enough for them to defeat with jara’s magic - she is naturally inclined to a particularly destructive type of magic known as entropy, which causes poison, decay, unconsciousness, etc -  if they work together, amal panics and freezes, allowing elan to be mauled badly enough that he nearly dies, and has to have his arm amputated, which widens the schism in their already strained relationship.

eventually they reach their destination. they spend several weeks on the outskirts, among common folk with no magic. the land is barren and inhospitable, and the eke a modest existence as farmers, labourers, hunters, etc. while not technically oppressed, non-magic users are almost seen as second-class citizens; they’re used for their superior physical strength and health/longevity and rarely raise above that station, and are often excluded from ‘magic-only’ spaces and the upper echelons of society. magic is essentially a ticket to the aristocracy, regardless of birth. jara uses this to her advantage, and tries to find a space for herself with elan and amal posing as her servants so that they are permitted where other non-magic users aren’t.

it doesn’t work, at least not initially. while she is a magic user, she is still a foreigner in a very deliberately insular country. she is generally looked down upon, mistrusted and scoffed at for being untrained and reluctant to use her magic. she eventually garners enough ire to be challenged but another young woman; they skirmish, and jara manages to defeat her, but only just. this catches the attention of a particularly wealthy and powerful man, for whom the other woman was an apprentice (rather than standard blood inheritance laws, magic-users have apprentices who compete for the right to inherit their wealth, rank, legacy, etc, and apprentices in return contractually bind themselves to their master’s service). he releases her, and instead offers his apprenticeship to jara.

jara accepts immediately. while it is obvious that the competition between apprentices is ruthless, even a failed apprentice is held in good esteem and can live comfortable lives. she sees it as an opportunity to secure a better life for her and her brothers. all is well at first: she finds the magic-users strange and intimidating, with their gold-dipped hands to hide their burnt flesh, elaborate head-dresses meant to represent their magical aura, and clothes of sheer wispy material to prove that they don’t feel the cold, but she enjoys learning and shows great natural talent. she is even surprised to find she actually gets along with her master’s other apprentice, yulia, and they become close friends very quickly.

for a while, things go very well for jara. her talents grow tenfold. she experiences a wealth of new things she’s never tried before. for the first time in her life, she is able to be unapologetically herself. for the first time in her life she is not made to feel like a burden, a liability, or a mistake. for the first time in her life, she is not hungry. she even sees many older magic-users, those living well beyond the expected age in her home country, which gives her hope and confidence.

meanwhile, without jara’s knowledge, things develop differently for the brothers. jara’s master takes a particular interest in amal. he considers amal to be a ‘perfect psychical specimen’, and appears to think very highly of him - for a non-magic user. he wants to train him to be his personal guard and assistant. amal is easily flattered, and eagerly agrees, and is naively unconcerned by the apparent need for secrecy. 

as both a non-magic user, and physically ‘deformed’, elan is largely neglected by everyone - including his own siblings, who are suddenly busy with their own training. he becomes (more) moody and withdrawn, his resentment of amal grown to toxic levels, and only finds solace in the unexpected companion ship of the master’s current bodyguard, tymo, a strange and quiet man with a creeping terminal illness. as they become closer and tentatively explore their feelings for each other, he confides in elan about his master’s horrid mistreatment of him, and the reason his morbid interest in amal: he is obsessed with the idea of “blessing” non-magic users with the gift of magic, but it can only work on those with magic already in their blood - like amal, and like tymo. he’s tried the experiment on dozens of ‘guards’ but their bodies cannot handle the strain, and the few that survive sicken and die as tymo is.

things take a turn for the worse for jara. her studies begin to tread in areas of magic that she doesn’t care to learn, namely how to siphon the life-force of things to lessen the tax of magic-use. at first it is only plants, fruits, even the earth itself. her natural inclination towards entropy means she is exceptionally proficient at it. then they move on to livestock, and finally, her master presents her with a human - a magicless member of the household staff. at first she refuses and the master tries to sooth and flatter her, insisting that even sweet yulia had completed the lesson, and yulia wasn’t nearly as accomplished as she was. jara still refused, and the master becomes enraged at that point - he needs her magic to conduct his experiments, and as his apprentice she all but belongs to him. he threatens to use elan and amal in the next lessons if she fails to comply and, terrified, she does.

she watches the damaged flesh on her hands smooth and heal. she feels stronger than she has in months, the weariness of her magic use washing away, and she realises this is what allows the mages to live as they do. their magnificent buildings, the forever-blooming gardens, even the ability to grow food in such an unforgiving landscape - it’s all beyond the reach of natural magic. they use the non-magic citizens like batteries.

jara realises in that exact moment that both she and her brothers are in grave danger, and the only way she can ensure their safety is to play along. she acts as though she finally realises the true extent and appeal of her power, and that she understands what her master desires of her. as soon as she is away from him, she begins to plan her escape. she turns to yulia, her closest and indeed only friend, for help. she knows the master has forced her to do such horrible things too, and jara wants her to escape with them. she also tells her brothers.

at first amal refuses to believe it until tymo himself explains what his fate was to be. they agree a time and a place to meet so that they might all flee together. however, when the night comes, yulia and tymo are waiting for the siblings but something is off: once they are within sight tymo cries out that it’s an ambush, and that yulia had betrayed them to gain favour with the master. the trio manage to escape, but only just, and tymo is left behind.

they make it to a safe place, but elan cannot forgive himself for leaving tymo behind. he goes back in the hopes that he can free him somehow, and is caught. however, rather than being killed or tortured for the whereabouts of jara and amal, the master offers him a deal. he will give him tymo. he will give him an amazing functional prosthetic arm. he will even use magic to extend tymo’s pitifully short life, like he had his own. 

elan accepts. he provides a location, and his granted his boon, and while the master and yulia go to collect his siblings he is told to wait in the castle with tymo. he doesn’t wait: the information he gave the master was false, and he manages to escape the guards and flee with tymo back to their true hiding place.

the master anticipated this. he put a tracking spell on tymo, and is lead right to their position. in the cold and freezing forest, they fight. it nearly kills her, sapping her strength until her entire body is tortured and scorched from the exertion, but in the end, jara comes through victorious by draining the very life from her master until he crumbles to dust, betraying herself and her morals, but saving her family. 

she then has to make one final agonising choice: does she stay and inherit her master’s vast estate where they can live in comfort in a rotten land, or go back on the run where they can never rest but will always be free? either way, she knows she must fight to protect every single day of her life.