#i don't know how to write little kids

[astrobei]

hi suni astrobi my beloved dear suni ❤️🫂

sending you a valentine's day prompt because i can annnnnd.

i challenge you to write miwi bc i need more miwi in my life. you can do whatever you want with this, but i want to see little baby will making a valentine's day card for his best friend, mike. bonus points if it has like paladin mike and dragons and all that other good ole fashioned dnd goodness.

hi andi andiwriteordie my beloved dear andi <3 happy valentine's day !! as a special present for you, here is my first ever attempt at writing miwi :^)

On Sunday night, Will’s mom brings home a bag of candy.

This, obviously, grabs his attention before anything else– brightly packaged somethings that crinkle loudly when his mom puts the bag down on the kitchen table. He can see them peeking out through the thin white plastic of the Melvald’s bag, and immediately perks up.

“What are those?” he asks, because it’s not rare for his mom to bring stuff back from work– especially on late nights like this, when she knows that Jonathan is busy with homework and no one’s had a chance to cook dinner, not when she’s been out all day and his dad is– well. His dad sure isn’t about to cook dinner, and Will has learned how to heat stuff up in the microwave but they’re currently out of everything that he can stick in a microwave. Will expects her to whip out a couple of TV dinners, and he kind of hopes she will, because it’s late and he’s hungry.

He peers over the long end of the table, trying to catch a glimpse, because the TV dinners don’t usually look like this– all pink and red and crinkly. His mom laughs, then holds the bag open by the handles so he can look inside. “Candy,” she says, “for your class Valentine’s Day party tomorrow.”

Will stopped listening after the word candy. He doesn’t know what Valentine’s Day is, and he doesn’t really care, because the bag is full of the brightly wrapped candies and chocolates that he saw in the store the other day when his mom took him inside. “Whoa,” he breathes out, and reaches out to stick a hand into the bag, even if just to make sure that what he’s seeing is real. A whole bag, full of candy. The wrappers crinkle some more, loud under his palm, and he pulls out a heart-shaped lollipop, flat and an almost aggressive shade of red. “Is this for us?”

“Oh, no way,” his mom laughs some more. “This much candy? All your teeth are going to fall out.”

Will grins. “My teeth are already falling out,” he says, pointing to where he’d lost his first one just a couple of weeks ago. He’s still not used to it, the strange space in his mouth where there didn’t use to be one before. He sticks the tip of his tongue into the gap there, and his mom rolls her eyes good-naturedly.

“Maybe that’s because of all the candy you ate at Halloween,” she says, and leans over to ruffle his hair. “It’s not good for you!”

“Danny in my class already lost three teeth,” Will mopes, “and he got three dollars from the tooth fairy, so maybe if mine fall out too–”

“The tooth fairy will refuse to give you money because you let your teeth rot on purpose,” Joyce says, and Will slumps into the chair next to her, pouting. “It goes against the tooth fairy laws.”

Will might only be six, but he knows that there’s no such thing as tooth fairy laws. There can’t be rules just for one person. That’s ridiculous. He tucks the lollipop from earlier into his pocket before his mom can see, though. Just in case. “What’s the candy for?”

“It’s Valentine’s Day tomorrow,” his mom says, walking over to the kitchen and opening the fridge door. “Your class is having a party, and these are for your friends.”

Will frowns. “What’s– Valentine’s Day?”

“It’s a holiday about celebrating the people you love.” Joyce emerges with a loaf of bread and a few slices of cheese. “Grilled cheese okay for dinner?”

They’ve had grilled cheese for about four days in a row now, but Will doesn’t mind. His mom makes them perfect. He nods. “Yeah!” 

“You have to eat the crusts this time,” she says. “Don’t think I didn’t see you throw them away last time.”

Shoot. So close.

“Fine,” Will agrees, then leans over to pluck another candy out of the bag. It’s pink this time. He thinks it might be strawberry-flavored. Will isn’t the biggest fan of strawberry, but candy is candy after all.

“I heard that,” his mom chides, back still turned to him, as the candy wrapper crinkles loudly under his fingers. “Put the candy back, Will.”

No! So close again. Will scowls at the traitorous sweet in his hand and tosses it back in the bag. “How did you even hear that?”

“I have superpowers, remember?” Joyce points to her ears and shoots him a wink. She’s probably right, Will thinks glumly. His mom has ears on the back of her head– or whatever it is they say.

“Why do my kids in my class get candy and I don’t?” 

“They’ll give you candy too,” Joyce assured him, flipping a sandwich over in the pan. “That’s the whole point! You trade candy and Valentine’s Day cards.”

Cards? “What kind of cards?”

“You can look in the bag. I picked some of those up on the way back from work.”

Will sticks his arm bag in the bag and shuffles it around, until soft cellophane gives way to the sharp edge of cardstock. He pulls one out– “Be mine,” he reads aloud, then wrinkles up his nose in confusion. “Huh?”

“Cheesy, huh?” Joyce slides a plate in front of him, and smiles. “Speaking of cheesy–”

Dinner! Will’s stomach rumbles, and in the face of a perfectly made grilled cheese sandwich, thoughts of Valentine’s Day slip instantly out of his mind. 

—

They don’t stay out for long, though.

“Jonathan?”

Jonathan’s room door is open, and he has his back to the door, but he turns around as Will peers through the doorway. “Oh. Hey, Will.”

Will shuffles his feet, hesitating. Is this a stupid question to ask? Surely Jonathan won’t think he’s stupid. Jonathan never thinks Will is stupid, even when Will asks dumb questions or says dumb things or acts super annoying. “What’s Valentine’s Day?” he blurts out.

Jonathan raises his eyebrows. “Huh?”

Maybe Jonathan doesn’t know. That’s a weird thought, though, because Jonathan knows everything. He’s in third grade now, which seems big and grown up and far away. It’s old enough for your grade to have an actual number. Not like kindergarten, which Jonathan says is, like, zero grade. “Valentine’s Day,” Will says again. Mom had been so vague about it, and he’s still not sure what’s up with the lovey-dovey stuff. Maybe Jonathan can help. “What is it?”

“Um,” Jonathan says. “It’s– the holiday of love, I guess?”

Oh. That’s lame. “Ew,” Will says, making a face. “That’s gross.”

“Tell me about it,” Jonathan sighs. “Why are you asking?”

“I have to celebrate with my class tomorrow,” Will sighs. “And mom got candy but I’m not allowed to eat any.”

Jonathan makes a sympathetic noise. “Lame.”

“I know!” Will exclaims. “And I don’t even– love anybody. Gross.”

“Well,” Jonathan says thoughtfully, “it doesn’t have to be love love. It can be, um. Any kind of special somebody.”

“Special somebody?” That’s a weird thing to call someone. “Huh?”

“You know. Is there someone special to you? Someone you really like?”

Will likes a lot of people. His teacher is really nice. He likes mom’s boss at the store, because sometimes he lets Will pick out a piece of candy from the display. He likes Jonathan, and he likes his mom, of course. But people who are special–

“Mike,” Will decides immediately. It’s an obvious choice, because Will hadn’t ever had best friends before Mike came into his life earlier this year. They do everything together– playing at recess, eating lunch, sleeping over at each other’s house. The other kids in the class even talk about them like they’re one person– MikeandWill– which makes Will smile. It’s nice to feel like he’s a part of something. Mike is special. Mike makes him feel special.

Something funny happens to Jonathan’s face, super fast, and then it goes back to normal. “There you go,” he says, then nods. “You can make something for Mike.”

“Like what?”

“Um, I don’t know. Draw him a card?”

“Mom already bought cards,” Will sighs.

“Make him a special one,” Jonathan shrugs. “Because he’s– um. Your special somebody.”

Will grins, wide enough that he knows his missing tooth gap is showing. Sue him. He thinks it’s cool, even if Jonathan has, like, five of them and doesn’t care. “Thanks, Jonathan!”

“Uh, yeah!” Jonathan sounds a little confused as he calls after him, but Will is already on his way to his own room. “You’re welcome!”

When Will gets back to his room, he pulls out his crayons and his paper, sits down at his desk, and–

He stops.

Oh no.

What is he supposed to put on a card? For Mike, especially, who’s one of the coolest people Will knows. What if he thinks it’s lame? What if he doesn’t want a card? What if whatever Will makes is so boring and awful that Mike laughs?

Will shakes his head. No, he thinks. Mike won’t laugh at him. Mike would never laugh at him, and that’s why he’s so special– everyone else laughs at Will, sometimes, about his clothes or his hair or the way he talks. But Mike doesn’t. Mike thinks he’s cool, and Mike thinks he’s fun, and Mike likes all the same stuff as he does– the kind of stuff that everyone else in their class thinks is lame but Mike doesn’t.

Will stares down at the blank sheet of colored paper. Blue, because Mike likes blue. And Will’s got a twenty-four pack of crayons and he doesn’t know what color to draw in, but everything else, the candies and the cards in mom’s bag, had been red or pink, so maybe Will should draw in red or pink too. And– everything else had, like, hearts on it, so maybe he can start there.

“For Mike,” Will says aloud, slowly and carefully, as he writes the words at the top of the paper. He’s pretty sure he spelled it right. He knows he’s got Mike’s name correct, at least. F-O-R. For. 

Yeah. That looks okay.

The heart is next. Will tries to make it big enough to take up most of the page, where the paper has been folded in half down the middle. It’s a little lumpy, but– yeah. You can totally tell it’s a heart.

Probably.

He opens the card to the inside, and pauses again. Great, he thinks, because what is he supposed to write on the inside? He’d already drawn a heart on the front, and it would probably be a little lame to draw another one on the inside.

“Think,” he groans out loud, putting the red crayon down and peering into the box. Half of them are broken, and some others are worn down to nubs, so it’s not even like he has a lot of options here.

What sort of stuff does Mike even like? Mostly the same stuff Will does, but then maybe that would be like Will is making a card for himself, and not for Mike. He looks at the paper some more, like maybe something will appear on it, fully-formed, if he stares long enough.

Nope. Nothing. 

Will sighs, and thinks harder.

Mike had liked that book they read in class last week– something about a knight rescuing a princess from a tower. Will hadn’t really been paying attention, because it was kind of boring and, like, sappy and about love, but Mike had been totally into it. Will had looked over during group reading time and his eyes had been huge and his jaw had been, like, on the floor. Will didn’t really get the appeal, because, again, it had been totally cheesy and sappy and gross. But Mike had found a stick at recess an hour later and brandished it like a sword, and Will had been too busy laughing to properly express how lame he thought the whole thing was.

It wasn’t lame when Mike did it, though. That’s why Mike is special– nothing’s lame when he does it.

Will picks up a crayon. He has an idea.

—

Don’t think it’s lame, Will prays, fighting every instinct in his body that’s telling him to squeeze his eyes shut and hold his breath. Please don’t think it’s lame.

Mike hasn’t said anything yet. Maybe he really does think it’s lame.

Will is starting to wish that maybe the asphalt of the playground could just open up and swallow him whole. Mike totally thinks it’s lame. Maybe Mike didn’t even want a card. Maybe Mike is weirded out. Maybe Mike–

“Did you really make this?”

Will blinks. Mike doesn’t sound weirded out. He sounds– impressed? Maybe?

“Um. Yes,” he says anyway. Mike’s eyes are wide where he’s staring at the card in front of him, and Will holds his breath after all– just a little– for one second, then two, then–

“Will!” Mike says, face breaking out into the biggest smile Will has literally ever seen him smile. “This is awesome!”

Oh, thank god. “Really?” Will can’t keep the relief out of his voice when he asks.

“Yeah!” Mike nods rapidly, never once taking his eyes off the paper. “This is awesome!”

“You already said that,” Will points out, but he’s smiling now too. “You really don’t think it’s lame?”

“No way!” Mike points at the crayon outline of a figure against the blue paper. “Is that me?”

“Duh,” Will says, pointing to where he had drawn an arrow and written Mike. Just in case there was any confusion. “It’s you as the knight. From the story.”

“I love the knight from the story,” Mike announces, and Will immediately feels like a million pounds of weight has been lifted off his shoulders. Thank god. 

“I know,” Will giggles. “You almost killed me with the stick you were waving around.”

Mike gasps. “Excuse you. It was a sword.”

“Sure,” Will says. “Okay. It was a sword.”

Mike looks like he’s going to say something else, and then he stops. He shakes his head. His voice is quieter now when he says, “You really made this for me?”

Will doesn’t know why they keep coming back to this. Obviously he made this for Mike. That’s why he’d labeled the drawing with his name. Mike. He’d meant for that to help, in case there was any confusion, but maybe he hadn’t labeled it well enough. Maybe two arrows next time. Or maybe he should add Mike’s last name, just in case Mike thought he made it for the other Mike in their class. “Duh,” he says again, because he isn’t sure what about this Mike isn’t understanding. “It’s for– Valentine’s Day.”

Mike goes a little pink. Will’s not sure why, because they’ve been sitting in one spot for all of recess so far, and Mike hasn’t been running around at all. “Really?”

“Jonathan said I should make a card for someone special.” Will tugs nervously at the zipper on his jacket. Why is he nervous? It’s only Mike. “And I think you’re special.”

Mike’s mouth drops open. He closes it, then opens it again, in an excellent imitation of their class goldfish Bubbles. “Really?”

Maybe Mike’s words just aren’t working today. Will feels like that a lot. He gets it. “Duh,” he says, for the third and hopefully final time. “You’re my best friend.”

“Wow,” Mike breathes out. “You’re an awesome artist, Will.”

“Really?”

Okay, maybe it’s Will’s turn for his brain to stop working. He’s not sure what’s so awesome about his drawing. You can barely even tell it’s Mike.

“Um, yeah,” Mike stares, like this is obvious or something. “You can totally tell it’s me! No one else in our class can draw this good. You should do it more. I think you could get, like, famous or something.”

Will doesn’t know about all that, but something warm and fuzzy is swelling up inside him anyway. Surprised and pleased at the praise. “Oh. Thanks, Mike.”

“I wish I made you something,” Mike says sadly, still staring down at the card, like he’s trying to absorb it with his eyes. “My mom just made me get the ones from the store for everyone.”

“It’s okay!” Will smiles. Really, he doesn’t need a card from Mike. He’s just happy Mike liked it.

“You can have my Reese’s,” Mike offers. He doesn’t fold the card up and put it in his pocket like Will thought he might, but holds it carefully in both hands and looks over at him, eyes wide. “Someone gave me one for our candy exchange, but I think you like them more than me.”

Will grins. “Okay!”

Mike hesitates, then suddenly, moves forward and throws his arms around Will’s shoulders. It’s sudden enough for Will to stumble backwards, a little caught off-guard by the puffy weight of Mike’s jacket and body against his. “Happy Valentine’s Day, Will,” Mike says. “You’re my best friend too.”

[swordsofsaturn]

early seasons spn homophobia is actually so crazy because they literally do not look gay. hamfisted gay jokes when the characters look straight as hell. "you look the type" they literally don't. is the thing

[eastbluecrewed]

things you can't get back

aka i've been waiting so patiently to see kidd get his ass beat by shanks (affectionate)

[evilkitten3]

naruto crack au where kakashi manages to successfully drill the "never abandon your comrades" thing into team seven's heads

so when sasuke deserts naruto and sakura immediately desert with him. like he gets to the village gates and they're just waiting for him bags packed like "what took u so long we doing this or what"

he tries to get them to go back bc of course he does. "no you losers this is about me i'm going to kill my brother. also i'll have to kill my best friend for the super sharingan and you two are like the only people i talk to". but they do not listen. teamwork sasuke we will defeat your brother (OUR brother #communism) with the power of teamwork. just like kakashi-sensei said

suddenly orochimaru has to deal with three horrible little goblins with an even more codependent relationship than his old team

[eveningrainstorm]

People often talk about Rio Ranger as if he's the doll version of Sei but what I find super fascinating is that he isn't, not in the same way Fake Reko or the Dummies are replications of their human counterparts.

Ranger resembles Sei on a surface level — same physical appearance, just an unclear amount older; same way of speaking. But he is unmistakably different. Ranger is an incomplete being, missing his positive emotions, but even the true Ranger is Rio Laizer rather than Sei, because there's still something different.

Rio Ranger is, fundamentally, inhuman and yet desperate to be human. He was created to be jealous of humanity and despite his hatred for them, humanity is what he is always striving for. But it is something that he doesn't possess, and is forced to steal instead. He takes clothes from the dead and uses drawings on cards to feign emotion; he is the Dress-Up Doll, Rearranger, not possessor of anything of his own.

While the other dolls based on humans in the game have identity issues based on their personhood being defined by someone else, being merely a copy of another person, Ranger is not even allowed Sei's identity to base himself on — it's very likely he doesn't even know who Sei was. He does not have Sei's clothes — nondescript and tied to Asunaro as they are — and he does not have the capacity for expressing emotion that Sei had.

When comparing Ranger and Sei in terms of personality, differences are obvious. There are similarities, naturally — besides the abrasive way of speaking, there's the jealousy and desire for validation. But in Ranger, these are present to an extreme — they're all he has. (And, ironically, this is what Gashu claims to believe makes him so human, even when Ranger's inhumanity comes through most clearly in this lack of anything else.)

In Sei, on the other hand, these traits are tempered by logic, to put things in YTTD's beloved logic vs. emotion dichotomy. Despite his outwardly emotional nature, from what we see of him he appears realistic and focused on survival in a way that Kai isn't. He's aggressive and overly casual about killing people, but he doesn't express the glee at violence that Ranger does, only a fierce desire to prove himself and survive. Sei is jealous of Kai and desires Gashu's affection, but also has an understanding of the situation he's in that both Kai and Ranger lack — he can tell that Gashu doesn't care about him as much as he does Kai, and recognizes that the way Gashu treats both of them is wrong. Ranger believes Gashu truly loves him, a fact proven blatantly false by his eventual demise at Gashu's hands. Ironically, this blindness is more similar to Kai as we see him in his minisode, rather than Sei.

Of course, this understanding isn't simply a part of Sei's basic nature, but rather the fact that unlike Kai and Ranger, he has past experience to go on. Sei wasn't born into the Satou family — though his exact origins are unclear, based on his grief for his birth father and how he talks about Asunaro ("all this shady organization crap"), it's possible he wasn't even born into Asunaro at all. Before being sent to Gashu, he had his own father, one who we don't know anything about but whom he apparently loved. He doesn't accept Gashu's treatment of him and Kai the way Kai does because he has known a different father and a different way of life. This doesn't free him from Asunaro's influence — he still accepts the role of assassin they give him and resigns himself to becoming a killer. What choice does he have, after all? But he carries no illusions about Asunaro or his role in it. He knows that the training is cruel, that he is viewed only as a tool, that Asunaro is wrong even if they are also not worth resisting.

This is a major part of why Ranger isn't Sei, why he cannot be; because Asunaro is all Ranger knows. They are his creators, who he was literally built to serve. In Ranger's mind, he is not only Gashu's son and heir, but his creation, his masterpiece. And of course he wouldn't have been created with Sei's memories — why take that risk? Why give him any sort of knowledge of a life outside Asunaro or reason to be disloyal to them?

Ranger is not Sei — so why model Ranger after him? Because Ranger is the idea of Sei, what Sei was meant to be: a counterpart to Kai, a rival, a second choice. Gashu preferred Kai, once; Kai won out over Sei. But Kai has proven himself a failure and betrayed Asunaro, leaving Gashu with no choice but turn once more to Kai's long-dead competition. Ranger is, like Sei, the opposite of Kai, temperamental and vulgar while Kai is stoic and polite, and perhaps more importantly, capable of murder while Kai steadfastly is not.

And yet Ranger isn't Sei. Sei was jealous of those — specifically Kai — he saw as superior or at least as being treated as such; Ranger is this idea taken to its natural conclusion. Sei had lost everything he had outside of Asunaro; Ranger never had anything else to begin with. Sei was a human; Ranger will never be, doomed to forever long otherwise. Ranger is Sei only in the ways Sei was useful — desperate for recognition, willing to kill, a perfect rival to Kai — but something entirely different, an inhuman machine, in all the ways Sei was a liability.

Sei was human, and he knew that he deserved to have that fact respected. Ranger isn't human and gets only the wanting, desperate to be as good as a human even humanity itself is unattainable. Of course, it isn't being a doll that is actually Ranger's problem — it's Asunaro, who view humans and dolls alike as disposable. Sei's humanity didn't make him any less of a tool as far as Asunaro was concerned, it only made him more difficult to control. All Sei wanted was to be seen as an equal to Kai, a person worthy of respect — and this is what he gets, in the end: his face and voice used as a base for one of Asunaro's weapons, while his true identity and personhood remains forgotten.

Ranger has nothing to hold him back from doing his duty for Asunaro, nor does he have anything to hold onto outside of it. In that sense, Ranger is an ideal asset for Asunaro — at least until the very jealousy and hatred Gashu programmed into him goes too far, and he is, once again, deemed a failure. Ironically, Gashu shoots Ranger for attempting to kill a participant, when willingness to kill was perhaps the one true advantage Sei had over Kai.

In the end, Ranger is offered no more humanity in his death than Sei is — they are both merely pawns of Asunaro, set to die at its whims. But while Sei dies in the arms of his brother, receiving one final act of kindness as Kai refuses to kill him, Ranger has no one in either of his deaths but his creators: in his death as Rio Laizer the dubious kindness of Tia Safalin, making his final moments full of agonizing guilt, and of course in his first death, as Rio Ranger, nothing but Gashu's coldness, the bullet in his head a sort of culmination to the favoritism Sei found weighed against him, and a demonstration of just how far Gashu has come from the father who once genuinely cared for Sei. Sei was human, Ranger was not, but as far as Asunaro is concerned, they are exactly the same: tools, easily thrown away as soon as they stop being useful.

[feroluce]

Belobog was my fave main quest but a lot of it is so. Contradictory. It's like they had multiple groups doing different shit and none of them checked in with each other for consistency. And you see this so much in Gepard's profile.

So in the main quest, they made him unfailingly, unquestionably loyal to Cocolia. Gepard's character arc is him learning to question authority etc etc. And this isn't even a bad thing; that's a story worth telling! It makes good conflict between him and Serval! And I love that we got Gepard as a boss battle and I get to see him all the time in SU!

But then you look at his character stories and it's like. The complete opposite.

According to his profile, Gepard has already HAD this awakening, long before the Astral Express, and he'd already decided Cocolia sucks. Even outside of his stories, there's a pretty damning readable between him and Pela.

He even disobeyed direct orders right in front of her- he has been disobeying orders for a while now!

So I've decided I'm marrying the two different sides of this into a 1.5k fic-ish thingy, because I think there's some fun potential there with Gepard not trusting Cocolia, but still having to pretend to be a good obedient little soldier.

Anyway. I love to think of it as like. Gepard knows Cocolia has sunk into her apathy. He can see it in her eyes every time he looks at her. She doesn't care. Not about him, not about Pela, not about all his soldiers on the frontlines giving their lives to protect the citizens. And that's... It makes him bristle a bit, but ok. Gepard can deal with this. Even if Cocolia no longer cares, as long as she does her job then it's fine. Having compassion behind an action doesn't matter as much as the action itself. If Cocolia's heart is no longer swayed, then he'll just have to care twice as hard to pick up the slack. He considers it part of his duty as a captain of the guard anyway. It's fine. Gepard can deal with it.

And then, Cocolia starts coming down to the restricted zone. Issuing direct orders.

And Gepard realizes he is in way over his head.

Because Cocolia orders him to stay back and issue commands from the ramparts, away from all his comrades, away from where he can protect them.

Gepard had thought nothing could be as bad as watching a fellow guard die right next to him. But the first time he watches someone struck by a killing blow, so far away, it hurts. Every defensive scar across his arms itches, his fingers curl in want of a weapon, the cold cannot numb his hands enough as they desperately ache for his shield. It hurts.

Gepard tries to find any reason to stay. Because surely... He knows Cocolia has lost her love for her people, but surely... She wouldn't...

One day, Cocolia orders for their gunners to advance 20 yards. There are no survivors. She almost looks like she smiles.

Gepard doesn't sleep that night.

Pela brings him the report at the end of the first month; and then the month after that, and the month after that. A significant uptick in losses, and all of it started on that first day Cocolia started overriding his authority and issuing her own orders. The ends of Gepard's pens have all been nearly chewed off. Pela outright calls Cocolia an idiot, and Gepard corrects her. Cocolia isn't an idiot. Gepard had known her through Serval, knew her through all her college years and then some, and he knows how intelligent she is. It's not that she's stupid, and it's not that she's inexperienced, it's nothing of the sort.

Cocolia knows exactly what she's doing.

She must, there's no way she could make such a horrible mess of things so badly by accident. And Pela, quick as a whip, sharp as a tack, always too smart for her own good, catches onto the meaning behind Gepard's correction without any further prompting. The tent goes deathly quiet, nothing but the wind howling outside.

"...She's trying to kill us," Pela whispers, her voice swiftly suffocated by the silence.

Gepard swallows. He can't bring himself to correct her this time. There is nothing he could say that he would actually mean.

His gaze drops, back down to his desk and the reports on it. The names aren't listed, just the numbers, but Gepard knows them, knew them, and there must be something wrong, something he's missing, because why, why would she-? What could this possibly accomplish-?

“Gepard! Focus!” Something snaps right under his nose, and Gepard startles, eyes instantly honing in on Pela's irritated face as she leans over his desk. She holds his gaze for a moment before she huffs and begins to pace, wedges a knuckle between her teeth and bites like Gepard hasn't seen her do since cadet school.

Pela angrily strides from one end of his tent to the other, words hissed between her grit teeth. “What are we going to do?” In the dim lighting, Gepard can just barely see the damp spot of blood weeping under her gloves. “We need a plan.”

“A plan?”

“Wh- Yes, a plan! Unless you want more people to die!” Pela rounds on him then, all the wrath of a blizzard, winds roaring and snow sharp enough to cut.

“We don't even know-”

“What does it matter?! She killed-!!” Pela cuts off with a garbled noise when Gepard leaps up from his desk, hastily shoves his hand over her mouth. The prosthetic, not the flesh one, because he knows better than to assume Pela won't seize the opportunity to leave teeth marks in his skin.

“You're right. I'm sorry, I'm sorry; you're right. But you need to keep quiet.” Pela quirks an eyebrow at him and Gepard can read the question in her face. “Because we both saw what she did to Serval,” he hisses.

It's amazing the snow plains haven't thawed out yet, the amount of heat Pela can put behind a glare. The mere mention of Serval, and the smoking ruins Cocolia had made of her life and career, have her bristling up like a riled cat. The sudden hot breath she takes fans fog across his metal skin, and Gepard wisely keeps it in place until Pela finally sighs and reaches up, taps her fingertips against the back of his hand.

The second she's free, Pela bats him away and then her knuckle is right back between her teeth again, Gepard leaning back against his desk with his arms crossed to watch her resume her pacing. “If we spread the word, she'll have us discharged and make sure we can't even touch the frontlines,” Pela's voice seethes like an open sore. Gepard nods but keeps his silence. He knows better than to get in her way.

“And if you and I are both out of the picture, Belobog is fucked.” A little harsher than how he would have put it, but there's no denying that they're both important to the city's survival. Pela has the restricted zone running as efficiently as ever, and Gepard had become the youngest captain on record for a reason. “We need to keep this tight under wraps, at least for now… It can't leak to anyone higher up the chain.” Another nod. “Serval might know other discontents…” Another n-

Gepard's head snaps up. “No.”

“No what?”

“No. We're not involving Serval in this.”

Somehow, even the same tone that leaves entire squadrons shaking in their boots has never worked on her. “You're not deciding that for her, Gepard.”

Pela hadn't seen the worst of it, though, back when his sister had just been banned from the Architects. Serval's pride hadn't allowed it. Pela wasn't the one to find her passed out bottle still in hand, hadn't been the one to wash the sick out of her hair or carry her to bed. 

Serval still has trouble thinking clearly when it comes to Cocolia, still can't quite bring herself to be objective. And Gepard maybe doesn't want her to be purely objective- but he would worry a lot less if she thought twice before she acted more often.

“At least let me be the one to bring it up to her.”

“Whatever, fine,” Pela gestures affirmatively at him as she paces past, and Gepard sighs. Good, at least that's one thing he can help.

From there, it's a lot of hemming and hawing and frustration. Cocolia has them under her boot, and Gepard and Pela both know it. Even with the way she's been cracking down on freedoms lately, Cocolia is still, overall, liked by the people. It's unlikely anyone would believe them. They don't even have solid proof, because most people don't know Cocolia as well as they do and won't see the clues in the same light. 

The Fragmentum has been ramping up in recent years, too. Everyone is struggling just to survive as is, they can't afford a fight on two fronts. Gepard is a damn good captain, one of the best for that matter. But they're at a massive disadvantage, his experience is narrowed to fighting a defensive battle against monsters, that's all he's ever done. That's all anyone there has ever done. He has no way of finding first-hand knowledge for taking the offensive against a human opponent, and if he goes at this blind, there's no way he'll get everyone out unscathed. He's going to lose people. He's going to lose a lot of people.

He'd never thought before that Cocolia would have it in her to have someone killed. And with this new knowledge, he has no guarantee she won't go after Serval or Lynx if she decides to retaliate.

Gepard has to remind himself to breathe when he realizes this.

Pela writes down every name the two of them can come up with. Lists and lists of names and groups and anyone they can think of who might be an ally in all of this. They memorize every bit of it, make their plans of who to talk to and when. Gepard watches the sparks reflect off Pela's glasses as they burn the evidence together.

Pela finally leaves, far too late to make it home, but says she wants to stay in the restricted zone anyway to investigate. Gepard watches her make her way in the direction of Dunn's tent, watches her back until she's out of his sight and squashes down the urge to follow and keep an eye on her. His tent feels empty.

In the morning, Gepard is up before the wake up bells. He drags himself out of bed, leads his soldiers through their morning training. The same people gravitate to each other everyday. Friend groups and training partners. There's an ongoing rivalry between a few squadrons that everyone bets on. Some of them have lockets around their necks, keepsakes, mementos. Some of them wear wedding rings.

Gepard is suddenly, painfully aware of something acidic clawing at the inside of his throat, of a heavy weight low in his chest that blooms, takes up room until it threatens to spread his ribs. His mouth tastes of bile and blood.

He rearranges the schedules. Puts himself down for every open patrol into the Fragmentum, makes sure he'll be on the frontlines every single time Cocolia visits.

He only hopes that it's enough.

[askblueandviolet]

hey ever considered if. MAYBE the mayor likes you. that’s why they stick around????💀

MASTER POST

Asks Start 💜

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[spotaus]

Thinking about Orchid and her connection to my take on Gender (because this was meant to be about her and the Crew but it just devolved into a character analysis kinda??? More trauma-dumping maybe???) This is very much an oc/personal rant so feel free to ignore it 🫡

So, Orchid started off as a character I didn't really think much of (hear me out this is going to be relevant) because I wanted to add a 'girl' character but didn't know what to *do* with her, y'know? She was always going to be the strongest one there, she had the odds stacked in her favor with her parents. She was always going to be the gloomy side-character to match Reset's energy. But I think she's gone through every stage of Generic Woman I could possibly find.

At first she was angry and abrasive (think Fell!Sans) where every other word was a curse and she was likely to throw the first punch then laugh as she kicks her enemy while they're down. This was when Reset was a cartoonishly self-centered villain whose goal was simply to prove others wrong. Then Orchid became a sort of sisterly figure. This was short-lived, but she was the one comforting people who Reset would torment, but would ultimately follow his orders, because at this point he was actually a danger and sadistic. And then there was the phase where the story mellowed out and she became the token Goth Girl who, yes she was strong, but was heavy on the 'whatever' energy. Then there was her Era of deep self-loathing and anxiety about her worth that held her back and made her a much more timid and meek character who would only lash out on occasion.

Now, Orchid is the best of those iterations I've written yet. She's calm, level-headed, and a natural leader. Her father raised those traits into her. But she's very reactive, and can be silly, and when she's comfortable it's likely that air of importance transforms into something more comfortable and familiar. She laughs loudly and grins wide, she likes loud video-games but loves to read in the quiet. She's extremely disciplined, and normally no one can get through her tough exterior besides her best friend, Reset. She does what she does for her own enjoyment, sure, but she's thought of every angle and makes her choice to help Reset and control the others with her whole chest. She still worries she won't live up to her invisible expectations, and that and her loyalty are her two driving forces.

I know that Orchid is important to me because she's the longest-running female oc I've had. I have a rough relationship with womanhood/girlhood and I know looking back that Orchid recieved every ounce of my distaste for being a woman that I could shovel into her. That never made her less of a character, she was actually always one of my favorites, and rarely was she a 'punching bag oc'. I just... projected onto her a lot. And she's a good sign of how I've learned who I am. I've decided that my own femininity is something I could live without. I'd rather not associate myself with it, and I'd like to leave it in my past, focusing on a future where I'm not tied down with any gender roles or expectations. That won't happen, but I've come to terms with it myself. Orchid though? I figured out through her that I don't have to hate women characters. My own distaste for my circumstances doesn't mean I have to push it onto my characters (on God I've never expressed anything rude to actual people, that'd be rude as hell and uncalled for, but I have a bad habit of disliking fictional women in media). So, Orchid is a well-roubded character finally. She has motivations abd goals and a *lot* more depth than I ever expected her to. She's happy with being a woman, she's content. She's not treated differently for it in unfair ways by those she cares about, so she doesn't mind it. She likes to wear pretty outfits and lets Reset add bows to her ribbons. She doesn't let being a woman hold her back in the slightest.

So, yeah. Orchid is one of my babies. If I ever leave this Fandom behind for good, she's one that's coming with (Ichor, Orchid, and Pretender all have human designs I can use elsewhere lol-) but in the meantime I'll just rotate her around in my brain for a while longer.

If I'm right, she's been with me for nearly 5-6 years and I went through a *lot* with her as an outlet. So, she's kinda just like an old stuffed animal. A lil ripped, matted fur, maybe a stain or two, but there's a story there and that makes it important beyond belief.

[nearestend]

sorry but i'm going to need everyone to stop writing autistic / "gifted" (in quotes because i hate that term) characters who were little baby geniuses that skipped grades and graduated as valedictorian and were every teacher's pet because it's the most unrealistic shit ever and kind of just perpetuates this ableist misconception when in reality most autistic / gifted kids are more likely to be abused and exploited and bullied (both by peers and teachers), especially if they are not rich and especially if they are not white

[welcometoteyvat]

arlecchino's official title is "father" when house of hearth members refer to her ......... please just one chance please please

[iftitah]

vivi s recent substack made me want to write about bcg and ive been wondering since morning why haven't i already written about him. when i first had a crush on a friend, i was 6 and i needed to get it out of my chest so i told mom im gonna marry vaibhav and she laughed and said sure. i laugh when i remember that. when i had another crush in 2nd standard or in 5th or 6th or 7th or 8th or 9th (do you think i was a whore lol?), i wrote about each and everyone of them in my dairy, the way they were, the reason i liked them, the reason i got over them. when i got attached to this 22 year old guy i met on omegle at 16, even though i wasn't naive and was aware it wasnt right but i felt inclined towards him in the loneliness of lock down, i wrote my first ever poem for someone and even though it sounds cringe reading it now, i wrote it in 10 minutes based on the conversation i had with him at night. it made me feel so invincible. but with bcg it's different. i casually just called him the basic crush guy and made a hell lot of deal on tumblr posting about him because i thought he's just going to be another crush right? and now when things progressed and i have way more to talk about him than i ever had for someone, i want to keep quiet. not to mention i haven't written anything past 18 months. i realized writing about him is going to create a romanticized version of him in my head. isn't it funny i don't want to romanticize the one person i romance with? i romanticized my friends, i romanticized my agony, my sadness, my loneliness, my mutuals, i romanticize my hostel, my life, my curtains, my favorite fruits and my bed but not him. just for once in my life i want to live without romanticizing this one thing and see it for how it is. it's exactly like wanting to add filters to every other picture but just not this one since it's naturally so pretty. i blocked my scared, overthinking pessimistic self to be able to live him without having regrets caused by my melancholic personality. and often than not, it surfaces and i cause a quarrel but i love living this in reality. i can daydream anytime i want, but when is reality so beautiful?

[pinkaditty]

hmmm

just saw a bimbo!reader x incel!idia shroud...

...what if i did something self-indulgent...

haha jk!!! ...unless...?

[mushroom-for-art]

I was having feelings and thoughts, uh pretty sure I didn't actually get my thought dialogue into this but hey ho XD i tried, little mewtwo, Meau and Noe belong to @phlurrii

Discussing Amber

Slightly away from the anomaly the ancient mew and her counterpart conversed in hushed whispers discussing what needed to be done as Noe occasionally glanced passed Meau simply to keep an eye on the foreign visitor to make sure they didn't try escaping.

The darker hued adult mewtwo stood, tail swaying and swishing blue faded fur shifting in the motion and breeze. He was watching the strange mews as much as the dark one watched him. His hand touched at the metal armor still fused to his body at his wrist unconsciously, a cold comfort of sorts as he could make out the eyes of the darker one watching him closely as though suspicious or not appreciating him being there. His own eyes fell into a tired glare, the corner of his lip lifting into a mute sneer flashing a bit of teeth. If they wanted to have issue with him he'd rather they said it to his face so he could smash their judgementful false innocent expression into the dirt. He could feel his fluff prickling in assumed malice.

"E-excuse me?" a small voice, he turned his head quickly downwards onto the small Mewtwo that looked up at him. He looked over their features quietly for a moment, despite this not being his world and this other two looking vastly different to him, smaller lighter different patterns, he could tell it was himself, just a different form. Usually he'd be a lot more hostile with other mewtwo and he knew he should've chased the little one away but they looked up at him with such earnest soft inquisitive eyes he couldn't help heave a sigh feeling as though he was looking at a curious mewphew or mewiece.

"Yes small one?" He paused to cringe at his own voice and tone, not having meant to come off as so impatient, he steadied his breath moving instead to rest on one knee lowering himself to the younger twos height, his voice softer as he repeated, "yes, small one?"

He could see them watching him with big eyes as they fiddled with their hands seemingly thinking up the correct words.

"Mewma said, well I heard her say something about us being the same?" the small one asked and he nodded his head slowly.

"Something like that, yes." He could see the small one look at him up and down, frowning a bit to themselves, "but, I'm not from here, so I'm not a future vision, you won't end up looking exactly like me." He noted the relief and for the aches in his bones he didn't blame them. "I think it was something more, we have similar stories similar origins of sorts but we still branch off from one another becoming different individuals."

He watched them blink as they nodded their head seeming to understand what he was saying.

"Did, you know Amber?" They inquired, he could hear a little plea in their tone as he blinked more than a little startled that that was a common detail, but by their expression he felt even that interaction was different.

"I did, yes."

"Do you remember what she was like? Can you tell me about her? Is, is she okay?" He felt a level of guilt at their tone, clearly they did differ severely. He sighed a bit to himself glancing over unsure if the other mews would come to stop him.

"She.." he in honesty struggled for words. He didn't hold the same admiration for her that the small one clearly did, his Amber could've been completely different to the one from this world, he didn't really want to spin a false tale. He looked away with his eyes, "she was Amber, she seemed smart I guess, knew things about towns and cities I didn't.. I'm sorry little one I don't really have anything else to say. My memory has been made quite unreliable since, what happened to me..and I have my own personal gripes I'm sure you don't want to hear." He wasn't lying about his memory issues.

The little mewtwo blinked at him tilting their head, "did, you not get on with your Amber?" He could see the confusion across their face and he didn't really want to tell them the truth. With a soft grunt he moved into a sit, his legs not thanking him for the kneeling especially not with his armor.

"It's, more complicated than that I guess, I think I met my Amber in a different circumstance to you meeting yours.. I have mixed feelings on her but that's because of what I went through.." He glanced away before glancing back at the smaller two, "but don't let my bad experience sour your Amber okay? Yours was probably nice huh? Did she show you towns and street lamps? Did she show you her favorite field?" He watched the small one blink as they processed his words before they nodded, moving to sit down on their knees in front of him paws in the dirt nodding along wanting to hear more from him as they made an absent-minded, "uh huh uh huh she did."

Despite his usual temperament he continued to amuse the smaller one, recounting what he could recall at times stopping to struggle for words and finding the smaller one filling in blanks on what was shared. He could see their tail swishing slightly, despite the difficulty they seemed to enjoy hearing someone also talk about Amber.

"Your fur reminds me of her, it's blue like her hair was," They mentioned casually at one point and he had to fight the expression he was going to make, suppressing that down offering a slightly wonky smile.

"I guess it kinda is like her blue hair.." Not having the heart or the malice to tell them how right they were, they didn't need to know.

By the time Noe had figured out how to send the foreign Mewtwo back to his home dimension the smaller two had fallen asleep with their chin on his leg, having been previously mumbling incoherently about flowers from the previously mentioned field and drifted off thinking of Amber and sunflowers. The larger two wouldn't have usually allowed the touch let alone from another two but something about this one made him a bit gentler, his hands gently slipped under the sleeping two as he lifted them up off the ground and his leg uncertainly handing them off to the strange large pink mew. Noe watched the hand off and upon receiving a confirming nod from Meau that the young one was fine they pulled their digits down through the air and rippling through the realities of space time opening a shimmering portal gateway. The adult two stood and after an awkward nod to both the still strange to him mews he stepped through the shimmer to return to his own world, Noe sighed closing the rift.

"Those really need to stop opening." They grumbles as Meau quietened a giggle for the sake of not waking the baby. Noe drifted close casually and Meau leant to reach them nuzzling her cheek and face against them fondly letting out a soothing purr.

"I know, but you did an excellent job." Noe would've huffed in play had they not been so distracted by nuzzling Meau back and purring in turn. Once they finally settled their nuzzling Noe moved and touched the sleeping twos forehead who breathed heavier but stayed asleep.

"At least the little one had a good time.. That other one had me worried.." Meau nodded at Noes words glancing at the sleeping angel and smiling moved to take them to the nest with Noe following closely behind.

[blujayonthewing]

I've thought a lot about the several thousand year old gnome druid we met who was just bitter and jaded and had spent most of those millennia sitting in one place not doing anything in particular except mourning her tiefling wife who'd died millennia ago, and how disgusted and infuriated with her melliwyk is, personally but also as a gnome herself-- and I'm thinking about it again like. honestly I think it goes beyond general cultural values; that level of willful ongoing stagnation and joyless nihilism is probably completely seriously a gnomish sin

[whattraintracks]

90s Raphael’s characterization between the first movie and the next two is interesting. Could make for a good fic.

I love Raph's characterisation across the 90s trilogy.

There are so many little things I could point out, but overall, I love that he's a little guy with big feelings! He doesn't always know what to do with them given he's a teenager with sensory issues and trauma. I love his strong convictions about right and wrong and justice and helping others and protecting his family and bystanders. I love watching this kid who spent fifteen years in isolation discover what he wants and fight for it.

Splinter tells him and his brothers their whole lives (as gently as possible) that the world above will never understand or accept them, but Raph carves out a place for himself anyway. He must have brought home so many strays growing up, and then he brings home three humans who change their lives. As he gets to know April, Casey, and Keno, he learns that he craves connection, a wider social circle than his family can offer. He wants people to know he exists. And we see how much he wants, but the price to have it is too steep. Because he can't reveal himself to the whole world and protect his family; he can't live in ancient Japan and have them, too. Despite so desperately wanting more, he chooses his family every time. I love when tmnt media and fandom explore these aspects of Raph.

My 90s fics tend to focus on how Raph is harmed by their conflict with the Foot Clan.

Sunset is my take on some of the missing hours between Raph's capture and rescue from Foot HQ.

Wrestling imagines how Raph might've broken down after the first two movies given everything he went through.

Thanks for the ask =)

[turtlemagnum]

when i was younger and hung out around my uncle a lot more than i do now, i remember whenever he referred to things regarding his native heritage, he always just called it "indian". called himself an indian, called the words he taught us indian, so on. since i was a little kid who didn't know any better, i didn't know that "indian" in the context of indigenous americans was a very broad, frankly bastardized term to paint a vast variety of cultures spanning two whole damn continents with one brush. it only occurred to me as i got much older than i was at the time that there'd be more than one "indian" language, and up until now since i had no idea what tribe(s) he even is i couldn't even begin to know where to look unless i found a download of every goddamn interlingual dictionary available and painstakingly checked every godddamn one for what their word for "thunder" is

the word he taught us meant thunder was hiloha. i didn't even know how to spell it until now, because he only ever said it aloud. literally just a few minutes ago, i decided to ask my grandma (his sister) if we knew what tribe(s) he belonged to. and apparently he's a mix of choctaw and makah. which gave me a lead, which led to me finding a dictionary on libgen, which led to me word searching "thunder" in the choctaw to english dictionary. it's the only word i remember him teaching us, and i'm unsure if he ever tried teaching us others. but it was his dogs name, and he was a damn good boy, so i remembered it clear as day. though, they normally shortened it to "hilo".

so, i guess what came out of this is that i now know a bit more about my uncle's heritage, and where to look for more research. so, if you're gonna have a takeaway from this, i'd appreciate it if you remembered the word "hiloha". it means thunder. and aside from being the name of a very good boy who deserves to be remembered, i think it's even more important to remember the histories, cultures, and of course the languages of all the indigenous folks who came before us and did their damndest to preserve their cultures in spite of it all.