#i just can’t bring myself to talk about it with anyone beyond a surface level because as soon as I try everything just starts unraveling

[bubblegumbeyotch]

ending the day the same way i started it: sad and smoking about it :)

[jogabogi]

do not perceive me. aha unless... jk jk.

This shit probably isn’t going to make any sense the way I’ve written it, but I promise that it will (hopefully) make more sense by the end.  One of the greatest tools in life is perception. The way I mean the word in this case is: the ability to view information as it is, and then subjectively decide how to interpret it.  Optimism, pessimism, realism -- these are all byproducts of perception. Turning what could be seen as negative into a positive, or vice versa, is also perception. I don’t need to explain the concept, I know, but I thought it important to lay down the foundation of what I mean by default, so that I can expand later. There are two ways that the above definition can be used. From a first person perspective: I consider myself optimistic. I choose to see this situation in a positive light. From a third person perspective: They are a pessimistic person. They choose to see this situation in a negative light. Alright, here’s where it gets weird. With this definition, there is no second person perspective. Sure, I can tell “you” -- someone I’m having a conversation with -- that you seem like a realist. That you’re viewing this situation realistically. But in a greater sense, “you” is not just someone I may be having a conversation with. It’s everyone else in relation to me. “You” is inherently tied to me. I can only use the word “you” because it has something to do with me. I wouldn’t be saying it otherwise. “You” implies a connection between someone else and myself. Because *we* are having a conversation. Because *you* are talking to *me*. Otherwise, I’d use he/she/they etc. So, if we look at “you” as everyone who has some kind of connection to me, then it doesn’t make sense to say “you” are optimistic. Because that has nothing to do with me. “You” could view my situation optimistically, or vice versa, but now there’s not a connection. Those are our first person views of third person people. Make sense? So what would it mean to have a second person perception? How can “you” perceive *me* in a way that makes sense, that implies connection? It’s not just how “you” see *me*. It’s how “you” see *me* in relation to yourself. It’s a two way street, in a way. It involves both of us.  But it’s not *really* a two way street. Because I will never truly know how “you” see me in relation to yourself. “You” will never know how I see you in relation to myself. Because communication can only go so far. We can’t read each others minds. So, what’s the point of second person perception? Does it really exist, if we can’t know it? Well, what do we do when we don’t know something? We guess. Second person perception is necessary by the virtue of the existence of perception itself, but it means something different. It’s not about optimism or pessimism, positive or negative, it’s me guessing what you think of me, in relation to yourself. And that’s terrifying. I have no real control over it. I can try to make impressions, or impact your perception, but I will never know how I’m doing. Do you see me as better than yourself? Worse than yourself? I can only guess. I will never know these answers. When I think about this, it just makes me not want to be perceived at all. I don’t want you to look down on me. I don’t want you to put me on a pedestal. I want to live my own life, and I want you to live yours, and let our connection be one of exchanging information, exchanging memories, and thinking nothing more of each other beyond a third person perspective.  In fact, I don’t even really care much anymore about what others think of me on that third person, surface level. If they see me as ugly, fine. If they think I’m not doing enough, fine. But it’s when they bring in themselves to the situation that it terrifies me. They can tell me what they think of me, and it can be honest. But even if they tried to tell me how they see me in relation to themselves, there’s no way for me to know the truth. I’m not in their head. I don’t and can’t know anyone on a deeper level than they know themselves. And so I can only guess.  I think it’s that lack of control bundled with the lack of true knowledge that makes it so scary to me. I can’t control it, and I can’t know it. No matter how much I try to do either, I will always fall short. So I don’t want “you” to perceive me. Perceive Aria however you want. But leave yourself out of it. But of course, even if you agreed to that, I can’t stop you anymore than you can stop yourself. You will always view me in relation to yourself. I’ll be doing the same to you. It’s not something we get to control, either. And that’s probably scarier than anything else. So what do we do? If we can’t stop each other, and we can’t stop ourselves, what do we make of all this? I’d like to say I’ll just stop myself from caring. That I won’t think too much about it. Easier said than done, though. I also can’t just pretend that you aren’t doing it, because I know I am. Right.. I am too. That’s the thing I can control. And that’s the only thing I can focus on, right? So I’ll do my best not to see you as better than me. As worse than me. Even if it takes some effort, and even if I can’t do it completely, I will do my best to only see you as you are, to remove myself from the equation. And perhaps if I just keep on doing that, if I embody it -- then others will too. It’s nice to think about, at least.

[ruesbike]

Something that really annoyed me in season 2 episode of Euphoria is when Jules get jealous of Rue and Elliott because she thinks Rue has a crush on him. I look back a episode 7 (I think it was) and think to myself "Jules, Rue just having a crush on someone is 1000x better than having sex with them like you did with Anna" like literally in the s1 finale while Jules does rue's makeup she talks about her weekend and straight up talks about Anna and says her kissing and biting her felt amazing you can tell Rue is uncomfortable and Jules just continues to talk about her and it's like she doesn't give a shit about Rue (i guess since Rue is really chill and she saw how happy it made Jules and didn't want to say anything) If this had been reversed Jules would probably get all jealous and shit with Rue but it'd be more obvious. I don't feel sympathy for Jules when she cries in bathroom (bitch that's how you made Rue feel and she didn't do anything yet). I'm really hoping they do bring Anna back, especially since Jules think she and Rue would get along well together, if they brought Anna back and Rue wasn't okay around her and Jules realizes that and what she did was shitty I think that would redeem her a little (or if Rue just straight up called her out on it)

Hello I'm asking various Euphoria accounts this cause that scene of Jules meeting Elliott really rubbed me the wrong way this is just my opinion so please feel free to respond on whether or not you agree/disagree

Hey thanks sm for this ask I love asks like this.

Okay there isn’t really a question in here ��, but I’m guessing you wanted my take ? It’s long! So buckle up. (And like yours my answer is opinion based and heavily based on how I interpreted their actions )

The general consensus seems to be what you just said, “Jules can’t be upset because she suspects rue likes someone else because she liked multiple people last season and even had sex with one.” Jules is not her manic pixie dream girl and ppl hate it bc she was written as one in the first half and refused to do the job.

I disagree, and when I say this I don’t mean Jules is “right” or “wrong”, I just find the whole topic to lack any actual depth. It’s just more “you should’ve been the perfect girl for her despite what you were going through” discourse. (Again, this doesn’t mean I wasn’t also irritated or thought she had the right to do anything, when Jules was doing all this, I was livid pretty sure I have a post abt it i specifically mean ppl acknowledge it and in the same breath treat her reaction as a intentionally malice normal action for her). In short what you said makes perfect sense at surface level, if my friend randomly told me abt this relationship, I'd 100% agree with this take irl. But this is a story and we actually get to know everything and because of that, although I agree with the initial thought I don’t actually find it to be a valid reason to deny her something like jealousy over this situation.

So season one we ALL know Rue is head over heels for Jules, she’s our main character we see everything she does and feels most of the time. We empathize with her more because ultimately this show is made to shed light on rue and the stuff she struggles with, we don’t want to see her as someone capable of being flawed beyond being addicted to drugs. We all want her to make amends, we want her to have the girl she wants, we want her to enjoy her life, and even when she relapses we don’t want anyone shitting on her for it. We’re set up to be on her side no matter what. She’s an unreliable narrator, the way you and a lot of people feel abt Jules doing that in season two stems from us adopting Rues feelings and world view from season one. In season one we see her obsession with Jules, we see how much warmth and love and good intention is behind it , but in my opinion that’s why Jules seemed extra insensitive season one. We think she’s this manipulative person for “ignoring rues feelings” when it was actually shown to us again and again that Jules was always hesitant and not sure about this relationship WITH GOOD REASON but Rue is the one who doesn’t care. She just wanted her and we all thought

“well why can’t she have her they’re close enough.”

Immediately after they meet Jules started talking to Tyler for like a month or two and was at that time very clearly not going to date Rue, still Rue was in love with her. Rue liking Jules in silence while she lives her life shouldn’t count. And I only bring up Tyler to make the point that jules didn’t blatantly shrug her off for half a season, Rue just ignored the relationship Jules was building with someone else and so did we because we knew it was Nate and ultimately not going to happen. Jules had no obligation to Rue’s one sided feelings at that point. Even when Rue kissed her Jules is shocked (and still very much in to Tyler like she had been from the start)

After the festival is where it got confusing , they kiss each other and once again the audience assumes the role of rue and assumes this is now a thing. That’s what I thought as well and I still find it pretty confusing, if I was Rue I would assume the same thing. But like Ali pointed out, they never spoke about it, they were both not communicating feelings to each other after the festival. Rue legit tells her mom they’re a thing while Jules shys away from this with her dad because she had no clue I’d she wants that. Yes at that point they both knew they liked each other and it’s revealed Jules has been considering the possibility for a little bit in her episode but Jules still did not owe Rue a relationship. We all wanted a relationship but that doesn’t mean she’s wrong and horrible for not wanting one with Rue who had been a confusing weight on her chest since they met.

The second Jules meets this girl she gains a best friend and like Jules states she had never even been that close to a girl before. Their relationship was something very new for her, she didn’t take Rue as a love interest at first meanwhile we took everything she did as romantic or flirting because Rue is our lens’s and she liked her. But to Jules Rue was just this person she felt really comfortable and close with, she let her take her nudes for ffs. Then halfway through when rue finally kisses her she realizes oh...I have a crush on a girl. It’s always been a little more than platonic hasn’t it ? . She packs that up for whatever reason and still goes to see Tyler that night.

I like to think she does that because again it’s a very new realization and Tyler is already established, & easy to understand with no complex feelings. she chooses the relationship she built over what could be confused feelings for having the friendship she always dreamed of. (But she knows somewhere in there that yeah she does like rue like that). After the shit Nate pulled the last thing anyone including rue should have thought was “okay let’s hop in a relationship with rue who is in love with you” 💀. That relationship would not have helped or fixed her rue would be the only one benefiting from the romance. And it wouldn’t last long bc Jules was not okay.

Anyways, who gives a fuck about Anna ? 😭 let’s be serious. Jules Actually gets emotionally manipulated (which everyone claims she did to rue) + even more cruel shit and shuts off and leaves town. She meets a girl who feels like a happier and stable Rue(this is opinion based. Her telling rue later anna reminded her of rue is why I think we’re supposed to view her as a version of rue) , goes to a club drugged out and has jumping visions between , Stress free Rue and Nate hooking up with her. She’s clearly not okay about Tyler and is trying to free herself by moving on with someone else, that person just can’t be the real rue because the real rue isn’t okay , she can’t tell the real rue anything and she has to keep the real rue alive and well. She can’t do that as a girlfriend because again Tyler is a fresh wound and she doesn’t want to be that to anyone right now and also rue is a lot to handle just as a friend. but if she makes herself unavailable although she does like rue maybe a better time will Come. So yeah she hooks up with Anna, and yeah she tells Rue, and she also admits for the first time that she loves rue as well. She spends the whole season finale subtly begging for rue to be the rue she saw in Anna. This is a story we’re supposed to read in to shit so I believe Jules behavior in the last episode is her trying to make rue into the version of her she saw in Anna. Jules legit comes home with this new love and gives Rue a makeover to make her a little more like the girl she met over the weekend. The version she can ask to run away with her to the city and party because that Rue isn’t anxiety ridden or severely depressed or struggling to stay clean because whether she does or doesn’t is dependent on Jules being mentally sound enough to I dunno not ask her to do exactly this.

The whole Jules and Anna thing to me at first read as exactly what you’re saying. Then I thought on it some more after the special episodes and realized well it’s not really that is it. It’s not simply “I love you and Anna” it’s more so “I love Anna because I love you and she is what I wished you could be but you’re the real thing. I want you, Rue Bennett, to kiss me”

Does that mean all is forgiven and that wasn’t confusing as fuck emotionally? No it just means all in all Jules telling Rue (who she never expressed interest in being in a relationship with Vice versa) about it doesn’t get to be hung out to dry because Rue wanted to date her while she was clearly interested in other people. Nobody gets to hold It against her that she sought out relationships and one night stands with other people while Rue liked her and she knew bc she was SINGLE and simply did not pick Rue it doesn’t matter that she liked her back she still did not pick her romantically. To be fair Rue is supposed to be unreliable and we see that because Jules was actually very clear abt how she felt in some of her scenes. Specifically when Lexi tells her rue is happy because of her Jules asks her to not repeat that. She doesn’t want that on her plate. When she picks rue up and states she’s not trying to be friends with someone who’s trying to kill themselves. She’s repeatedly setting that boundary even though we know she wants to cross it because she loves her and Everytime she gets too close (the pool, the station, the kiss after the festival) she’s never in her right mind and the next day she steps back for her sanity. And if a simple let’s not cross that line isn’t enough, her reasons for pulling a will they won’t they are. She loves rue, but rue comes with a lot of convoluted emotions she will constantly be sorting through. And they’re not the simple teenage things either.

It’s am I a bad person for fighting with her because she might relapse ?

Can I talk to my partner about shit going on with me ? Because she has a lot going on I can’t add to that.

Can I be someone’s reason for sobriety ? Am I evil for not wanting to ?

What if she dies ?

What if it’s like this forever

Is this like mom?

SHES SEVENTEEN. Shit nobody could even handle this shit at 20. It will always be stressful no matter what. But in high school ? You’ve barely figured your world out yet.

Liking Jules when Jules liked Tyler ≠ Jules ignoring Rues feelings

Kissing Rue while distressed and never talking abt it ≠ relationship

Jules hooking up with Anna ≠ cheating on a significant other

Knowing someone likes you a LOT does not mean you owe them anything. Imagine if rue was a boy this would legit be on the nice guys Reddit.

So to answer the it initial “why is she jealous when she liked other people season one” ...

I know I’m saying it a lot but RUE IS UNRELIABLE, she is the one to say Jules is jealous , but Jules in her own words says the reason she feels weird about Elliot is because of how rue acted when they were introduced( I know she said rue has a crush on him but we hear her say in an episode preview that it’s actually because she thinks Eliot is not telling her something...I rather go with what actually came out of Jules mouth in her own scene with someone rather than what rue remembers bc evidently, Rue remembers things how she wants to). But if we use the crush line, Jules saw him the night they reconnected and rue was clearly using, she doesn’t know if he was someone rue got intimate with and now doesn’t want to tell her. Rue would act the same way if she had met Anna (she actually does feel this way bc of what she said in the car) and BOTH ARE VALID, they can’t be wrong for being jealous of ppl their partner had something with when they weren’t together and that person is still around 😭. You’re gonna feel a way no matter what even if one told you up front about it while you smiled and the other tried to hide it behind their back.

Jules doesn’t need to be redeemed, last time I spoke about her and the things she did season one I said if she acknowledged it and apologized that’s redemption enough, she does apologize for the train station to rue and she sheds a lot of light on her season one actions all in one episode. She’s not a villain , and she did her part to make amends. Rue is never gonna apologize for placing her sobriety on her, placing them in a unspoken relationship Jules isn’t ready to get in to. But that’s because rue is still actively going through the wringer and Every time she’s done and back to her right state of mind, she does apologize and attempt to make amends. She hasn’t been okay since we met her because staying clean is not the only thing weighing her down mentally. This season is her outward spiral and how she will redeem herself Jules’s spiral is over and she’s righted her wrongs.

[lilydalexf]

Old School X is a project interviewing X-Files fanfic authors who were posting fic  during the original run of the show. New interviews are posted every Tuesday.

Interview with Dreamshaper

Dreamshaper has 54 stories at Gossamer. Her stories often feature Mulder and Scully exploring their feelings in ways you really, really wish you could’ve seen on the show. I’ve recced some of my favorites of her stories here before, including Found in Memory, Just By Existing, Purpose, and Promise. Big thanks to Dreamshaper for doing this interview.

Does it surprise you that people are still interested in reading your X-Files fanfics and others that were posted during the original run of the show (1993-2002)?

I'm not at all surprised people are still reading X-Files fanfic! There's a deep catalogue of good and interesting fiction there, and the X-Files still has cultural significance. And of course there were the recent seasons to bring it back to mind. I think if you had asked me in 2000, I might not have supposed that it had this kind of staying power. So now I'm thinking of this interview as a time capsule--what will my answer be in 2040?

My own fic was not designed to have staying power. If anyone is reading it now, bless them, they are kind and patient. I would only recommend probably reading the first and last things I posted just to see what kind of growth is possible. The first time I ever posted fic, someone told me to never write again. I was a teenager. I was crushed but I went on writing anyway, and I worked hard to improve.

What do you think of when you think about your X-Files fandom experience? What did you take away from it?

I think of two things. As for the show itself, I still think of Mulder/Scully as the ultimate in romance. I can still picture certain moments from the episodes, from the movie. I look for pairings with tension that reminds me of theirs--an almost-regency level of UST, but with a modern element of danger.

As for the fandom itself, I grew up in it. My entire online life and the core of how I participate in fandom was formed here. I was 17 or so when I started writing and posting MSR. I was 18 or 19 when I started meeting fans in real life. I was fortunate enough to fall in with people who were equal parts gracious and nerdy, and while my own nerdiness is innate, I remember and emulate the kindness which was shown to me.

I have an entire side post to this question about how strongly I disagree with the current age stratification in fandom--this idea of not interacting across artificial age divides is tragic to me.

Social media didn't really exist during the show's original run. How were you most involved with the X-Files online (atxc, message board, email mailing list, etc.)?

ATXC, and mailing lists. I don't actually remember the names of all the mailing lists! I can picture myself sitting in my kitchen on my computer, and what the emails looked like--the font, the signature lines--but not the names. I can even remember specific conversations we had! One of them must have been Scullyfic, because I remember the first meetup being planned. Is that right? Was it the Scullyfic meetup? [Lilydale note: Probably was Scullyfic. There was a big email flurry when the first Scullyfic mailing list meetup was being planned.] My mind was absolutely blown by the idea of a fan con. Now I've led panels at a dozen of them.

I remember some of the arguments, too. It's funny that some of them are the same arguments I still see here and there, like whether or not criticism of a fanwork is valid. Real Person Fic being this unbelievably shameful thing you had to ask to be shown, and the doyennes of the fandom would have given you the cut direct at Almack's if they'd found out, you know?

This was also the era of AIM and ICQ. mIRC too, right? I spent a lot of time in channels. I absolutely loved when people started to be more open about themselves in chats. I was always so interested in how fandom fit into people's lives. Some people I talked to were moms, college students, people who had interesting careers, and they all just found ways to make fandom work for them. They had a need and were meeting it, despite the pressures of their offline life.

I don't know how to explain the impression that made on me, but--it normalized fandom. That seems obvious, maybe, but I hadn't known this was something you could integrate into your everyday life.

It also normalized the idea of women taking their own needs as primary, in a way that went beyond what I was exposed to in my home life, or through the feminism of the 1990s. There was this wild intersection of the--the domestic and intellectual life of women, and the playful life of women, just making itself known to me in a way I'd never seen before. That was enormous. Absolutely a foundational experience for me.

My experience was that ATXC and email lists were like, these surface-level interactions where people figured out, roughly, if your mind ran on a similar track to theirs, and then you were invited to make deeper relationships in more private corners of the internet. Social media filled both functions at once, I think, for a while. But the privacy was missing. I'm not surprised that Slack and Discord are starting to fill that private corner gap--everything old becomes new, etc.

What was it that got you hooked on the X-Files as a show?

UST and monsters. This is still an unbeatable combination for me!

What got you involved with X-Files fanfic?

I loved romance novels--I read so many of them. Somehow, before we even had a computer at home, I started to tell myself romance novel stories with Mulder and Scully as the lead characters. This was how I talked myself to sleep--I wasn't a good sleeper. Then when I got online and did whatever search led me to ATXC, I was just shocked. Shocked! Can't do the surprise justice, in this era where fanfic is relatively mainstream. Other people had also independently invented this thing I loved! But they wrote their ideas down! I jumped on the bandwagon immediately.

What is your relationship like now to X-Files fandom?

It's like my relationship to my childhood, frankly. Foundational, but I don't think about it all that much on a daily basis, right? I smile and reblog gif sets. I get nostalgic. I get embarrassed by social mistakes I made. I feel the way many of us do about memories from our teenage years. I wouldn't be who I was without it, but I'm not still in it.

Were you involved with any fandoms after the X-Files? If so, what was it like compared to X-Files?

I was. I've spent 20 years in fandom! I did some beta work for someone who'd started writing slash--The Sentinel. The actual Sentinel, not just an endless loop of Sentinel AUs based on Sentinel AUs based on etc. I had some idea at the time that I was queer, but this was my first real exposure to romances that weren't straight. So I tore my way through the early 2000s slash fandoms as they developed: The Sentinel, Due South, Stargate Atlantis. Popslash, where a mix of good writing and absurdity ruled. Bandom, where I met my wife. Since then, many smaller fandoms.

It's hard to compare any of these things to each other, let alone to the X-Files. In each one, I was lucky enough to find a circle of women who were strong beta readers and good friends. I never wrote as much or for as long as I did in the X-Files.

Do you ever still watch The X-Files or think about Mulder and Scully?

I watched the new episodes. I've shown friends important episodes--I remember that a few years ago, another friend and I tried to hook a third friend on the show by binging some favorites--mostly shippy MOTW, so it was like, Arcadia, Triangle, Bad Blood. Fun stuff!

We finish watching and I'm like, well? And? And she says, that was fine, but I'm more of a man-pain, secret babies kind of person? I'll never forget it. She had no idea but she'd hit the nail on the head! We were wheezing with laughter. We went back and watched mytharc episodes, which was much less fun for me, but much more interesting to her.

Do you ever still read X-Files fic? Fic in another fandom?

I don't read X-Files fic often. I look at new things sometimes, and I've reread a few old classics, but my reading taste has changed so much. I still love straight romance, but it needs to be fast and sharp in a way that is hard to find.

I read fic in other fandoms when I have time. In the past few years, I've finished a degree, had a daughter, renovated a small Victorian and then sold it and bought another one during this pandemic--so time has been short. Currently I read some Untamed fic, some Good Omens fic, Magicians, Schitt's Creek...a sampler. Whatever friends are writing, whatever they recommend.

What is your favorite of your own fics, X-Files and/or otherwise?

I never have a favorite of my own fics. I'm never satisfied. The second I post something, I'm always full of regrets. I've written fics that did very well and still hated them a month later. People have asked me over the years to move more of my stuff off Livejournal and onto ao3, but I do it really reluctantly and only by specific request. Everything's ephemeral! Let the old works diminish, and go into the West!

Do you think you'll ever write another X-Files story? Or dust off and post an oldie that for whatever reason never made it online?

I have no oldies to dust off. I do periodically think of X-Files stories I would tell, but I don't have enough time for current interests--and so it goes.

Do you still write fic now? Or other creative work?

I do. I was most recently writing in The Magicians fandom. I posted a couple new stories in an old fandom last year--I'd written Good Omens fic fifteen years ago, and then again for the Amazon adaptation. I have a pile of original novels in various stages of completion, but I'm never happy with them. One day I'll figure myself out, perhaps, or I'll just keep writing myself this and that and leaving it all in a drawer.

What's the story behind your pen name?

So AOL had a character limit for user names--I think it was 10. I was a teenager at the time I was coming up with the one I'd use for fandom, so I went with Dreamshaper. It was kind of literal, in the sense that I was going to share the stories I'd been telling myself to help me sleep. But the character limit meant I went with Dreamshpr, which I later liked because of the alternate reading of Dream*shipper*. A reminder to the younger fans that we were the original shippers!

I would also come up with new pen names when I wanted to experiment with a fic that didn't fit my usual style. I don't remember any of them. I probably did that a dozen times, so, sorry to those poor completely abandoned stories.

Is there a place online (tumblr, twitter, AO3, etc.) where people can find you and/or your stories now?

Giddygeek on tumblr and ao3. I'm most active on twitter, but largely about my domestic life with dips into fandoms or original writing; message me on tumblr if you're an old friend who'd like to reconnect elsewhere.

Is there anything else you'd like to share with fans of X-Files fic?

Just gratitude--I'm so glad that I found people to share an obsession with, and that they were good people, at a time in my life where that made a significant difference to me. I don't know where I'd be now without my time and my growth in this fandom!

(Posted by Lilydale on December 22, 2020)

[roosterschick]

clueless

pairing: jj maybank x reader

warnings: some angst, profanity, i think that’s it

summary: two dumbasses pining over each other. that’s it. that’s the fic.

It happened again. Just as it always did. JJ had found some touron to mess around with for the night, as he always did at these parties, and you were left to just watch it unfold. You’d think by now you’d be used to this feeling, but the jealousy and the hurt never eased up. If anything, it only got worse. Each time you had to watch JJ flirt with some random girl, each time you had to watch them sit in his lap and play with his hair, each time you had to watch them disappear into the guest room at John B’s house, it got worse.

This time it was some pretty blonde girl who was just completely infatuated with JJ. There was no ignoring them when she kept laughing at everything he said. They were in their own little bubble, ignoring the party and speaking in hushed tones. You watched as his hand rested on her thigh as he gave her his signature smile that made hearts melt.

She leaned into him and you quickly turned away, not up for witnessing what would come next. You walked away from the bonfire, the ache in your chest worsening with every step you took. Parties weren’t even fun for you anymore because every time you’d have to watch some random girl cling to him all night. Yet, you couldn’t bring yourself to stay home. Somehow, it seemed worse to just sit at home wondering what JJ was up to. At least this way you knew. Or maybe you just liked to torture yourself.

Being in love with your best friend was like a curse. He was so close, yet so far. So reachable, yet unattainable. He was right there and yet you couldn’t have him. It felt like whatever higher power there was wanted to make you suffer.

It didn’t help that every day you found something new that you loved about JJ. You thought you’d discovered everything, that nothing could possibly make you love him more, but then he’d do something or say something or make a face at something and you’d realize that loving him was endless. It had no boundaries. It constantly surprised you, the depths that you loved that boy.

His smile and his dimples, the way his hair curled when it was really humid, his stupid big black boots. And that barely scratched the surface. His loyalty and his bravery. The way his voice would rise in pitch when he was stressed. Him. Just him. Always him.

You reached the shore and slipped out of your sandals, letting the water brush against your toes as you wriggled them in the sand. The crashing waves muted the sounds of the party and you closed your eyes as you tried to block out the images of JJ and that girl.

You didn’t even notice John B had followed you until he nudged your arm with his. “Whatcha doing over here?”

You shrugged, kicking some water up and avoiding eye contact.

“You okay?” he asked softly. Even though you never flat out told him, you were pretty sure John B knew how you felt about his best friend. In fact, you were pretty sure everyone but JJ was aware of the feelings you had for him. Or, maybe he knew and just chose to ignore it in order to avoid hurting your feelings.

“I’m fine,” you answered, finally turning to him. You gave him a small smile that you knew he saw right through, but thankfully he didn’t press any further.

“Come on, let’s get you another beer,” John B suggested, holding his arm out for you. You smiled, hooking your arm through his and made your way back to the bonfire.

--

JJ had completely missed the last thing the girl had said to him as he watched you and John B come back to the fire, arm in arm. Normally he didn’t get jealous of his best friend, but watching you giggle as John B spoke quietly to you made a nasty feeling churn in his stomach. JJ knew you and John B had a special bond; both having lost your fathers in untimely manners. Although John B was still in denial about his father’s disappearance, but that was a whole other issue. Naturally, the two of you understood each other on a different level than the rest, but lately it seemed like you two were attached at the hip. JJ knew he was being selfish, wanting you to give him all your attention again, but he couldn’t help it.

He’d gotten used to you always coming to him first for everything. He liked that he was the one you’d call when you were sad and that he was always able to cheer you up. He liked that you’d choose to sit with him over everyone else. He liked that you’d share the hammock with him, but kick anyone else out who tried to get in your space. Lately though it seemed like you had backed away from him and averted that attention to John B. Fuck, he was an asshole for being a bitch about it considering what John B was going through, but he missed feeling like he was someone’s favorite person for once.

The girl, he was pretty sure her name was Cassidy, noticed his attention was no longer on her, so she put her hand on his thigh to try and pull him back to her. He tore his eyes away from the pair, turning back to the girl, but struggling to stay focused now.

--

“I can’t do this,” you murmured, standing up abruptly. The bonfire was winding down and you knew everyone would be ready to head back to the Chateau soon enough. That meant that you’d have to watch JJ pull her into the guest room while you’d try and fall asleep on the pullout couch, all the while knowing exactly what was happening just a few rooms away. You wouldn’t put yourself through that tonight. You couldn’t. This had become beyond unhealthy for you and you couldn’t torture yourself for yet another night.

John B trailed behind you as you made a silent exit from the party. “Where are you going?” He asked, picking up his pace to keep up with you.

“Home,” you grumbled, crossing your arms over your chest. You turned your face away from him, not wanting him to notice your watery eyes. You felt so dumb for even letting yourself get emotional over this. JJ and you had nothing more than friendship, and that’s what it would always be. You needed to just accept that and learn to live with it.

“You’re not walking home,” he said softly, grabbing you by the elbow. He turned you to face him and you saw the concern on his face grow as he took you in.

He said nothing, just pulled you into a tight hug. The two of you stayed like that for a bit as you let the tears fall freely.

“At least let me drive you home,” he said, pulling away from you.

You nodded, wiping at your cheeks with the palm of your hand.

The two of you made your way to the Twinkie, completely unaware of the blonde boy who watched the whole exchange from a distance.

--

John B just got back from dropping you off at home and was instantly met with an irritated looking JJ. His jaw was tight as he looked around John B as though he were waiting for someone to come up behind him.

“Where’d she go?” he asked, obviously referring to you. JJ’s voice was clipped, and John B sighed, running his fingers through his hair.

“She just wanted to go home, man,” John B explained. He noticed that the girl JJ had been talking to all night was nowhere to be seen.

JJ nodded, working his jaw. “What’s with you two anyway?” JJ asked, struggling to sound nonchalant “She’s been all over you lately.”

John B was taken aback by his friend’s words, confused as to what JJ was even referring to. “Nothing is going on with us. She just didn’t wanna be here anymore.”

JJ laughed humorlessly. “I’m not stupid. I can see what’s going on, did you forget the rule or something? No pogue on pogue macking.”

The confusion subsided as John B came to the realization that JJ had convinced himself something was going on between you and him. He was jealous. The funniest part was JJ was the last of the pogues to care about the “no pogue on pogue macking” rule. He had flirted with both you and Kiara more times than John B could count on both hands and feet, and he knew for a fact that JJ thought the rule was bullshit.

“Dude. There’s nothing going on between us. Come on, you know that,” John B reassured his best friend who was very unamused by the smug look on John B’s face.

“So why’d she leave without saying bye? She always says bye,” JJ said, his eyes darting around as he tried to work it out in his brain.

John B fought the urge to roll his eyes at his oblivious fool of a best friend. “You seriously have no idea, do you?”

JJ’s eyes snapped up to John B. “What are you talking about?”

John B shook his head, huffing out a laugh. “You two are impossible,” he muttered.

JJ was getting irritated again by John B’s non-answer responses. “Forget it, I’ll figure it out myself,” he said, shoving past John B.

“Yeah, good luck with that!” John B called after him.

--

You were lying in bed, admittedly, being pathetic and sad while the 1975 played in the background. This was your sad teenage dramady moment, you had decided. Hopefully this meant that things would turn around after this moment.

You continued to wallow in self-pity until a sound outside startled you. You pulled the covers over you a little more, feeling a bit more safe hidden under them. You peeked your eyes over the blanket and yet again, heard the same sound. It sounded like someone was walking right outside your window. Suddenly overcome with bravery, you threw the covers off your body and marched over to your window. You pulled back the curtains, coming face to face with someone on the other side of the window. You yelped, jumping back and nearly falling on your ass.

“Stop screaming, it’s just me! It’s JJ!” you heard the muffled voice say through the window.

Relief flooded through your body as you moved toward the window again, opening it for him. JJ had done this plenty of times and you had hidden a plastic crate in the bushes near your window for him to get easy access through your window. You put it out there months ago and he had used it whenever he’d show up in the late hours of the night when he couldn’t handle being at home anymore and didn’t feel like going to the Chateau.

You had to admit though, you were confused as to why he was here. Last you saw him, he had a touron hanging all over him, yet here he was, climbing into your window.

You sat on your bed, watching as he landed on his feet.

“Hey,” he said awkwardly.

“Hi.”

JJ’s palms were sweaty, and he wiped them on his shorts as he tried to think of what the hell he had even planned on doing once he got here.

“What are you doing here?” you asked, not unkindly. You couldn’t lie, a part of you was satisfied at the idea of him leaving the touron he met to come see you. You weren’t even sure if that’s what happened, but that’s what you were going to tell yourself.

“I uh… Why’d you leave?”

You raised your eyebrows at him. “You came all the way here to ask me why I left the party?”

JJ looked around, pondering over the situation and realizing how ridiculous this all seemed now. “I… guess I did, yeah.”

“I just wasn’t in the partying mood,” you replied, picking at a loose thread on your blanket.

“Bullshit,” he started, “was it John B? Did he do something?” he asked, the anger rising in his voice.

You snorted, looking at him like he was insane. “No, John B didn’t do anything. What are you talking about?”

His shoulders dropped, becoming less tense at the reassurance. You narrowed your eyes at him, not used to this kind of behavior coming from him. “What’s going on with you?” you asked.

JJ started pacing back and forth, running his hands over his hair repeatedly before stopping and searching for his Juul in his pockets. You waited patiently as he hit it once, twice, three times before pacing again.

“Oh my god, JJ, relax!” you exclaimed, standing up and grabbing him by the shoulders to stop his endless movements.

He looked at you, blue eyes clear and wide. His tongue darted out to wet his lips as he debated on what he was about to do. Your eyes searched his face for something, anything to help him get out whatever it was that he needed to say.

“I think I like you,” JJ blurted, his face instantly heating up at the confession.

You opened and closed your mouth a few times, not knowing what to say. “I… like you too?” you said, not fully comprehending what he meant.

He shook his head furiously, moving away from you and pacing once again. “No, you—you don’t understand. I think I like you. Like… fuckin’… heart racing and butterflies ‘n shit,” he said, and you had to replay his words in your head to process them. 

It didn’t make sense. He was hooking up with girls left and right and never once acted like he felt anything more for you than friendship. Sure, he could be flirty sometimes, but JJ was like that with everyone. You never once considered that he actually meant any of it.

“Can you fucking say something?! I’m sweating balls over here!” he exclaimed, his voice reaching a higher octave than usual.

You looked over at him, a smile making its way onto your face as you took in the slightly disheveled boy in front of you. You decided to say fuck it and throw all your worries and hesitation away. You took three long strides and grabbed his face in your hands, kissing him fully on the mouth. It took only two seconds for JJ to respond, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling you close to him as he kissed you back hungrily.

It wasn’t perfect. It was a little clumsy, and you weren’t exactly sure what to do with your tongue but the two of you figured out a good rhythm. You pulled back, only because you needed to breath, and found that both of you couldn’t contain your smiles. You giggled, he laughed, and the two of you kissed again.

“I like you too,” you whispered against his lips.

“Yeah, I kinda got those vibes from that kiss,” he said, giving you one last chaste kiss before picking you up and spinning you around.

You couldn’t contain your giggles, the ecstatic feeling overwhelming you as he spun you around before gently placing you on your bed.

“Guess we got a lot to talk about, huh,” he said, leaning over you. You looked up into those blue eyes of his, so full of the love and adoration you had never noticed before. Your heart raced at the thought of what this meant for the two of you. He was right, there was a lot to talk about. But you had all the time in the world for that now.

You nodded, pulling him in by the back of his neck for another kiss. “Later,” you mumbled against his lips.

Right now, you just wanted to kiss the boy you’d been in love with for years, without a care in the world.

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Dragon Song

The 3E exam was Toyama’s most difficult day. Afterwards, he always had to do a difficult counseling and comfort session with all the students about their visions. And for some who didn’t make the cut, his sessions would include brainwashing and memory wiping to make them forget everything about Cassell so they could go home and continue their lives, ignorant of everything they experienced here. 

He made his way back to his office and sat behind the desk.

He sighed and cleaned his glasses while he waited. No one ever knew what was going on in there. Only those who were monitoring with the cameras namely EVA. Whatever happened, the medical team was ready to take care of it.

But he felt the muscles in his neck were tense and his heart was beating faster than normal. His analytical brain told him he was worried about Tigre. Even though he told himself it was pointless to worry about him, that his fate was with the College now, he couldn’t stop.

So he spoke to himself in casual calm language. “I think its time to admit, that your care for that boy has gone beyond what is professional.” He slid the glasses onto his nose. 

“You could barely leave him there properly without tears coming right? That’s why you left so abruptly. Right now the test is starting and his dragonblood is waking up. He might attack the students inside once he realizes what he is. And then he has no future. You tried. You did all you could. But it’s possible he was doomed from the start.”

“But the heart will do what it will do. Heh... you’re not immune, Toyoma-kun.” He chuckled to himself. “But you cannot drink. Your students will need you now more than ever. You can go drink later.”

The phone, a traditional rotary, rang loudly in the silence. He picked up. “Toyama speaking.”

The raspy inhale told him who was speaking. Schneider’s voice came over the earpiece, “I can patch you into the feed. I would like you to watch.”

“Watch the boy turn into a monster? I don’t think so...”

“That’s not what’s happening. I’ll send the link to your cell.”

Toyama’s cellphone let up and he cradled the landline against his ear while he clicked the link provided.

The video feed showed the classroom. 

Normally the 3 E was absolute mayhem as each of the students’ minds were lost in the sound, like listening to a favorite song, the mind wandered and the body followed and they were compelled to write down their visionary inscriptions on the paper or on whatever other surface they could find. But what Toyama saw made his jaw drop in shock.

Tigre was singing.

He wasn’t just singing, he was singing with a smile of rapturous joy, tears pouring down his face. He wasn’t writing down his answers, he was singing them, speaking each dragon word in turn. As the dragon verses shifted, he would listen briefly and his eyes closed and he would hold in hands to his chest, his face beaming with joy before belting out a full throated perfect rendition of that Yanling.

Toyama felt his eyes burn and quickly blinked away tears for a moment. Relief washed over him like a flood and his smile started to echo Tigre’s. He felt proud that Tigre was succeeding. He wasn’t just performing well on the test, but he wasn't being violent. Quite the opposite. He was joyous, happier than Toyama had ever seen him.

But then in the next moment Toyama’s blood ran cold.

Dragon language wasn’t just words. They were commands. They could impose a rule upon an area to control the elements. They could command a forest to burn. They could command a storm, a drought, a flood, an earthquake, or lightning. Some abilities were so strong, they would destroy the user. If it wasn’t for the restriction placed on the use of this sacred speech by the College’s alchemical array, Tigre would have joyfully sang out and destroyed the entire college and possibly all of Chicago.

“Dear... God...” Toyama whispered. “Is he a Dragon King?”

“No. If he was, we would have erased him and shoved his body in the Ice Cellar. But he is a hybrid of Dragon King level resonance. He’s different from the other hybrids in other ways too. We’ve run other tests. Nothing about this man is natural... and yet everything is.”

“Is this why you have brought him here? Why you were interested?”

“I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you. We’re still studying. In the meantime, you should probably go out to meet him. He doesn’t have anyone else to talk to.”

Schneider hung up the phone. Toyama was brought back to reality. Yes he did feel fond of Tigre... but he was still a doctor and Tigre was his patient. He would have to carefully maintain his mind so he didn’t go berserk and bring ruin to the college. He stood up and made his way back to the library. When he came back outside, the thunderstorm had intensified. Lightning cut across the sky and thunder roared, as thought the sky itself were cracking apart. The trees swayed heavy in the wind.

----

When Tigre came out of his trance, his throat hurt, his jaw hurt and his face was sticky with tears. He was shaking and exhausted. He wasn’t at his desk any more but standing in the middle of the room. He wanted to see Toyama and tell him that he wasn’t mad at him for leaving him alone. So when he found him waiting outside, he ran up to him and hugged him, babbling uncontrollably all sorts of silly things while Toyama told him to get some rest while stroking his hair. 

He suddenly realized after that that other students were filing out. All the other students looked exhausted and limp. He turned to them with a joyous face, but they all just flinched away from him, looking at him with tear streaked faces. Even Porsche, who seemed vibrant and sassy before, hugged her two sisters while crying uncontrollably. Celeste glared at him accusingly and Tigre flinched away. 

“Don’t mind them. Most people don’t experience joy like yours.” Toyama pulled him away from the other students. “I will have to go help them with their feelings.”

Tigre was confused. Why would anyone be sad about what he’d just heard? “Toyama-san, I saw something amazing. You knew right? You knew what I was!”

“I had no idea exactly what you were.” Toyama said patiently. “No one did. Your vision is one that’s personal to you, something deep in your heart.”

Tigre reached up and touched his chest. “But... I don’t have anything there.”

“Maybe that’s...” Toyama wanted to say ‘for the best’ but he didn’t finish his sentence. “I have to go. You’re a student now, so you’re free to roam about as you like. Stay out of trouble. Okay?”

“Okay...” Tigre said meekly and watched Toyama walk towards the three sisters. Only Celeste wasn’t crying, she only looked extremely angry.

No one was happy, except for him.

He walked out to stare at the pouring rain in the entrance. He looked up at the sky that also seemed to be sad. But why? Those voices in his head were still ringing. He could recite every single word. But he whispered them, staying quiet. He continued to whisper those sacred words into the grey. They were still beautiful in his ears.

“Do you not have an umbrella?” 

His dampened mood rose again! “Chu Zihang!”

Without thinking he hugged the flinching man who just tolerated it. 

Tigre released him quickly. “Oh... I’m sorry.”

“It’s normal to be emotional after this. I’m happy you made it. The results will take a few hours to process, but Schneider sent me to congratulate you. He’s my mentor.” Chu Zihang’s eyes were dark and not the yellow he remembered.

“You wear contacts too.” Tigre realized.

“Yes. Toyama explained?” Chu Zihang raised his umbrella. It was large enough for both of them as they walked. He was calm like a granite stone. Tigre was a raw nerve of emotion.

“Yes. I remembered looking into your eyes and feeling something through them like what I heard today. No wonder I recognized you! You  really are my brother! But for the other students, they were very sad. I don’t... understand why...” He looked back at the Library that was shrouded in the rain.

“You’d have to ask them personally. I can’t speak for them. When my dragonblood awoke, I saw a very disturbing image myself. And then something tragic happened. So that memory is sad for me too.”

“Is that why its raining?” Tigre mumbled.

Zihang tilted his head. “I don’t think emotions can effect the weather. Though many people associate rain with sadness. In truth a tropical wave has been pushed up from the gulf by the jet stream.”

“Oh.” Was all Tigre should say, understanding nothing.

“You’re still shaken up. Let me get you something to eat. You’ll be hungry.” 

"Ah! You’re right! My stomach is growling a lot!” Tigre said in shock.

“You must have resonated very strongly. You were just standing there in the entrance to the library staring into space and now you didn’t realize you were hungry...”

“It was wonderful.” He breathed. “I wish I could listen to it again. I’ll listen to it forever.”

Chu Zihang glanced down at him and didn’t comment.

“Have you been out of the hospital long? Why didn’t you visit me?” Tigre bounced along deliberately splashing in the puddles.

“I was recovering still and then after that, Schneider kept me updated on your progress. I couldn’t visit you because visits were not permitted while you adjusted to life outside of prison.”

“Oh... we’re going to your dorm?” He asked recognizing the residential building. 

“Yes. I want to introduce you to a few of my friends. One of them, Lu Mingfei is also looking forward to seeing you.”

“Oh Okay... neat.”

Chu Zihang opened the door to the dorm and there were many people there! It was like a party! When he saw all these people. He was moved to tears again! He covered his eyes with his arm. “Sorry!”

One of them, a dark haired Chinese boy chuckled. “Don’t worry. Everyone cried at my 3E. You’re fine.”

Chu Zihang introduced him. “This is Lu Mingfei. He’s the president of the Student Union...”

“Kinda sorta... really I just kinda hang out here while other people do things for me.” He said bashfully.

A tall muscular blond grinned. “I’m Finger Von Frings.”

“And I’m Susie. Congratulations. Sounds like you passed.” She was a petite Chinese girl, making her the third Chinese in the group.

“I’m Zero. Pleasure.” Said a soft spoken blond girl with a Russian accent, who looked bored to be there.

“This is for you.” Chu Zihang handed him a small box covered in paper and a ribbon, like one of those Christmas gifts he’d seen in pictures.

“Thank you... can I open it?”

“If you want.” Chu Zihang mumbled.

Tigre pulled the ribbon and then opened the box after carefully shredding the paper. Inside was a brand new tablet computer. “It will be useful for studying.”

“Wow... thank you!” He laughed. Then he paused. “What is it?”

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Protea (Part 17)

She doesn’t come home that night or the next. So Mai caves, partially under the pressure of Ursa’s rising anxiety.

“She’s probably at ‘er factory.” Mohi shrugs.

This does little to alleviate Ursa’s concert. “Her what?”

“It used to manufacture war machines.” Zenyul remarks.

“An abandoned factory!? Those are...they’re unsanitary and full of blades and broken beams.”

“She always goes there when she’s upset.” She cuts Mai a pointed glare and just like that she recalls the woman’s warning not to hurt her daughter. “Been goin’ ta that factory fer a long while now. Ain’t nothing to worry ‘bout.” Mohi assures.

“She’s been gone for…”

“Only a day.” Zuko cups his hand over Ursa’s. “Azula can take care of herself. She’ll come back when she’s ready.”

“Girl jus’ needs time ta clear ‘er head s’all.”

“I’ll go check on her.” Mai grumbles. She is certain that she will come to regret this decision. Whether Azula is withdrawn or furious she is in for a difficult and tedious time. Really she shouldn’t go at all. But, frankly, she’d do just about anything to keep Mohi from glaring at her with that much hatred.

“Boy, ya git  on up ‘n go find your sister!”

Both Kaz and Zuko rise.

“I ain’t talkin’ ‘bout ‘choo.” She jabs her finger at Zuko.

“He doesn’t have to come.” Mai grumbles.

“He’s a goin’.”

The argument is settled. It doesn’t matter. She doesn’t have to talk to him. And she doesn’t. It isn’t out of hatred nor dislike. It isn’t out of anything at all in particular. Perhaps it is just less awkward. They reach the factory and she leaves Kaz to do the calling. He tries Snapdragon first and after getting no answer he tries ‘princess’ and then ‘Azula’.

Mai finally speaks directly to him, I’ll look inside, I know where her nest is. You can check around outside.”

“Yeah, that werks.” He agrees.

The building has a certain chill to it now that Azula has left it vacant for some time. She is twice as hesitant to ascend the ladder, it seems to sway more than ever and when she reaches the top, she finds no reward. Azula isn’t in there picking through her hoard.

She climbs back down and takes the stairs to the upper levels. She is beginning to speculate that Azula isn’t here. She wouldn’t put it past her to have run off to find the Forgetful Valley a second time.

With a drawn sigh she takes the fire escape. This is where she finds Azula and her stomach has never plummeted faster. By Agni’s fire, she wishes that the princess would have just run off into the jungle again. She is so still, so nauseatingly still. And there is blood.  Too much of it.

Spirits, has she been here all night. She feels queasy beyond compare. She nearly hurls over the side of the railing when she sees Azula’s legs. She takes a deep breath, “Kaz!” Her voice strains, she isn’t used to yelling so loudly. “Kaz!”

“Ya find her?”

“Yeah, and I need your help.”

She is scared to feel for her pulse. She reaches out regardless. It is only faintly reassuring to find a subtle beating. She rubs her hands over her face. She shouldn’t have kissed Kaz. Spirits, what was she thinking.

Snapdragon’s goofy lopsided smile appears in her mind, accompanied by that delighted and loud laugh. Her face is so still, her expression so pained. It doesn’t sit will, not on Snapdragon. On Azula, sure. But not on the face of joyful Snapdragon.

.oOo.

Her head hurts. Her legs hurt, what she can feel of them anyways. Everything just hurts.

She forces her eyes open, expecting to see the sun glaring mercilessly down upon her. She doesn’t remember when she had passed out. She recalls that she had been trying to stop the bleeding and then nothing at all.

But she is not strewn out on hard metal. She is back in the infirmary and wrapped in more bandages than when she had left.

There is no one around, no one save for a healer. She swallows, the really are all angry with her. She tries to sit up and the healer is by her side in an instant, gently coaxing her back to the mattress. “Not yet.” She says gently.  “At least wait until your food gets here.” She hands her a cup of water.

Some fifteen minutes pass and then another five. And Mai enters. She sets a small bento box in her lap. “I’m not a very good cook. Kaz and Zenyul did most of the work.”

Azula nods and heaves herself into a sitting position. She feels so dizzy and tired and her fingers fumble with the box. Mai helps her pry the lid open. She picks at the rice first and then a small helping of noodles.

“You didn’t have to jump.” Mai mumbles.

For a moment she doesn’t register the weight of the remark. When she does, she shakes her head. “I was just trying to get to the top. I figured that I could do it now that I have my bending back…”

She supposes that she won’t be doing much of that anymore. Her face pales; she can’t climb, she can’t do parkour, she can’t even get to her hoard. She can’t do anything that can help take her mind off of things.

Mai looks profoundly relieved. “You really did just fall?”

She holds out her sprained wrist, “I hurt it more trying to catch myself.” She thinks that maybe if it hadn't been so bruised prior, she might not have hurt it so badly. She wonders if she’ll be able to walk again. She inquires as much and the healer comes to her with a small pin. She pricks Azula’s thigh and then her calf. She winces with each.

“You’ll be fine as long as you let your legs heal right.”

Azula lays back, it is more than a relief.

“Kaz helped you make this?” She gestures to the box.

Mai nods.

“He’s still mad?”

She nods again. “I don’t think that he will be for long.”

“Are you?”

“I want to be.” Mai sighs. “I really want to be...”

“But…”

“You just fell off of a building and you look like a kicked rabaroo. It’s kind of pathetic.” She laughs.

Azula frowns and crosses her arms. “Where is mother?”

“Which one?”

“Both of them.”

“I can get them for you. Zuko will probably tag along.”  

She starts to stand but Azula catches her by the wrist. “Stay with me.” With a sigh, Mai sits back down.

.oOo.

Azula still doesn’t let go of her hand. Likely she thinks that she is going to try to leave again. She exhales again and brushes Azula’s hair out of her face. She rests her hand on her cheek. “At least you don’t have to worry about any new scars, they’ll disappear when you get your real face back.”

“My face, not my body.” Azula replies. “I don’t think that my body changed.”

Mai shrugs, the last fragments of her anger fall away when Azula looks back at the bento box and mutters, “you forgot the marigold.”

“I wasn’t sure if you’d still eat that.”

Azula quirks a brow. “I had my memories when we opened up the new shop.”

Mai doesn’t know how her brain had managed to gloss that one over. “Are you trying to tell me that, that wasn’t part of trying to pretend like you didn’t have your memories?”

Azula clears her throat, “the taste grew on me.”

“Spirits, you’re a feral little beast beast.” Mai rolls her eyes. She really can’t hate her. Not anymore. Not when the line between Snapdragon and Azula is so blurred. Not when it becomes so outright that they are one and the same. She carefully lifts Azula’s bandaged hand and, with a moment of hesitation, offers it a little kiss before putting it back down just below her chest. Azula cradles it in her uninjured hand.

“Who do you think is going to have the better lecture; Mohi or Ursa?”

“Honestly, I can’t wait to listen to both.”

“Did Zuko cry?”

“It was more like this look of distress and concern.

“Good.”

“Good?”

“People care about me.” She clarifies. “I didn’t think people cared about me.”

“Of course we care about…”

“Everyone cares about Snapdragon. I...I didn’t think that anyone cared about me.”

Mai bites the inside of her cheek, she probably hadn’t helped any in that regard. “That’s why you became Snapdragon, isn’t it?”

Azula nods, “I was tired of being alone. A new face was my best chance.”

“You didn’t think to try to apologize?”

Azula cringes. “I’m not good with that. I don’t think that I would have felt loved if it was given to me...no memories came with no...trust issues.”

Mai rubs her lips together and tenderly strokes the back of Azula's hand. “I guess that it would have been difficult to just apologize and move on.” She can’t even promise the princess that she would have given her a chance. She has an inkling that Azula knows it too. Of course she does, she wouldn’t have run off if she hadn’t.

“Well, maybe it’s a good thing you did leave.” Zuko shrugs. Mai isn’t sure how long he had been standing there; Azula’s cringe tells her that she isn’t sure either.  

“Why’s that, Zuzu?” She mumbles. “So you could have a break from me?”

“That too. But also because…” He ponders for a moment. “Because I think that Snapdragon is a part of you. The part that you’ve been afraid to show everyone. A new face gave you the chance to do it.”

Azula’s cheeks color ever so subtly. “That’s not…I’m not some feral...”

Mai holds her pointer to Azula’s lips and quirks a brow. “You don’t have to repress yourself. Trust me, it...its tiresome.” Maybe she ought to start surfacing her own bizarre interests and odd habits. The ones that her mother would chastise her for.

“We like you better when you don’t refine and polish yourself. You’re easier to talk to.”

Azula nods. “You guys like me.”

Mai sighs. “Yes we like you, Azula, not just Snapdragon.”

She opens her mouth.

“Not just the Snapdragon parts of you. All of you.” Zuko adds.

“Even the part that is going to laugh at you for crying over me.”

Zuko cringes. “You’re pushing it.”

“But you’re still going to bring me a cup of tea?”

Zuko rolls his eyes. “Fine, I’ll get you a cup of tea.”

Azula smiles and nuzzles her head into her pillow. She closes her eyes.  

Mai wants to get up and fetch herself a scroll or knitting supplies, or something to occupy herself with while Azula rests but she told the princess that she wouldn’t leave. She supposes that it wouldn’t hurt to have a rest for herself. It had been a stressful few days.

.oOo.

Azula feels as though her life has come to a bleak standstill. She can’t climb nor scramble, she can’t firebend to her liking, and she can’t go out and reclaim her old face. Though it is rather nice to have Mai caring for her; bringing her meals and laying on the bed with her. She sits as close as she can without risking damaging Azula’s legs worse. The princess is dissatisfied to find that Mai usually keeps a foot or two between them, despite insistence that she isn’t that fragile.

Mohi and Ursa check in frequently to the point that she thinks they are hovering. Were her speech written, Mohi would be pages into a multi-part lecture on climbing safety and not doing anything bold and risk at the height of anger. It doesn’t matter how many times she insists that it would have been relaxing had she not fallen.

Ursa is softer, but equally as annoying. It is all forehead kisses, babying, and doting. But she doesn’t want to push her away again, so the woman gets away with it. She finds that Zuko is, to her shock and dismay, the most pleasant company.

He brings her things to keep her busy; lets her help him work through some of the more tedious and tricky contracts and proposals that the council presents him with. It keeps her mind sharp and makes her feel useful. Other times he will bring a Paisho board or other strategy games. Sometimes he just sits and tells her stories while she and Mai listen. One day he tells her that, by the time she heals fully, TyLee should be around to vision. Her heart flutters at this. She wonders how the woman will take her relationship with Mai.

.oOo.

It is good to see Azula getting fresh air again. She seems happier for it, far less grumpy. In general, being at the flower shop seems to soothe her. She has taken to opening all of the windows, letting in a breeze that has the petals and leaves in a constant state of rustling.

She watches her engage in conversation as she hands over a bouquet of iris, clover, and foxglove. She is certain that it is doing Azula well to speak with the general public; if there is one thing that Snapdragon and Azula share it is that they both stumble through basic conversation in some way or another. She wonders if Azula will continue working at the shop once she gets her own face back.

Mai watches the customer leave, the last rush of the day has finally come to a close. “I think that this is the most you’ve talked to anyone...ever.”

Azula swivels her wheelchair around to face Mai and shrugs. “I am tired.”

Mai sighs, “you did good.” She rubs the princess’ shoulders and gives her a soft kiss. Azula puts her hands in her lap. “How is your wrist feeling?”

“Sore.”

“And your legs?”

“Right now, they aren’t.”

Mai chuckles. “Do you want a cup of tea? I’ve been saving some leaves so you have plenty of choices.”

Azula nods and rummages through her collection and picks out several flavors. “Any of these will do.”

.oOo.

She isn’t much help with closing duties; she can’t reach the cleaning supplies from her chair and it is rather hard to hold a broom and wheel herself around at the same time. It is just as well, she really doesn’t like cleaning anyhow. The messes have always been funner to make. She can see it in Mai’s eyes that she is relieved that she doesn’t have to clean up a counter full of dirt, the sort of mess that she used to leave behind when Snapdragon would scoop up handfuls of dirt just to watch it sift out of her closed fist. Granted she still does this from time to time when she grows bored, but she keeps her space nice and tidy. There is something relaxing about watching dirt fall, something about the feeling of it shifting in her palm.

When she is through she withdraws her hand and ignites a small flame to burn away that which is still stuck to her hand. “You ready to go?” Mai asks.

“Yes.”

“I suppose that you’re going to have a bath when you get home?”

“Correct.”

She isn’t sure what kind she will have under orders to not get her casts wet. “You are going to have to help me.”

“Why don’t you have one of your serving girls--”

Azula shakes her head, “that’s...uncomfortable.” She paues. “I trust you.”

Mai smiles. She thinks that that is what implores her to roll her eyes and agree to help. Undressing is such a tedious task one that is sprinkled with questions like, “how did you even get these pants on?”  And answers like, “with effort and an hour or so.”

“I am going to have Yora get you a robe.”

“Yes. That is what I wear to bed.”

“It’s what you’re going to wear in the day too, so we don’t have to struggle like this again.” Mai carefully lifts her out of the wheelchair and sits her upon the edge of the spring and hands her a towel.

She finds that bathing is no longer a relaxing endeavor, it is a constant fight to keep her casts dry.

“A little water isn’t going to hurt it.” Mai insists as Azula brings the towel to wipe away the water that has made its way into her lap for, well she has lost count of how many times now.

“It would be helpful to have a water bender to just shift it around and create a space for my legs.”

“Well we don’t have any waterbenders on hand.” Mai replies and hands Azula a bar of soap. She scrubs herself with both haste and efficacy and dries herself just as quickly. She waits for Mai to disappear and come back with her robes. She dresses herself and Mai helps her back into the wheelchair. She smells, once again, like Snapdragon and Firelily. And for it she feels like herself again.

Mai helps her into bed. Though it is a lot cozier, she finds that she doesn’t need her nest when Mai chooses to spend the night in her bed. Mai is just as warm as her softest pillow and is much better for conversation. Sleeping isn’t exactly comfortable, consider her preference for sleeping on her side or stomach. But Mai makes it more bearable by either rubbing her arms or stroking the back of her hands.

Mostly, this coaxes her to sleep. And it is nice to wake up to a slumbering Mai still holding her hand.

[monsterlovinghours]

yes hello could i get (1) beetlejuice in heat to go? musical beetlejuice going through like a blood red moon and it’s just h e a t time please and thank you i love the work you provide to the people

okay so heads up? it’s soft momther hours over here. i am incapable of being feral right now, so behold the softest heat fic anyone has ever written. sorry if that isn’t quite what you were looking for. 

“You...it’s...what?”

He rolled his eyes, still perched like a strange bird in the rafters of your attic, the place he could be as far from you as possible without actually going outside the house. Obviously, you had heard him, and you knew you had heard him correctly, but regardless, you needed to hear it again.

“Heat, babes. I’m going into a heat. Started like,” he cocked his arm and consulted the six or so watches he had strapped to his wrist, “twenty minutes ago. So I need you to go, lock the attic behind you, and just...ignore any noises you might hear up here, okay? It’s gonna be a rough few days.”

You didn’t think he was joking. He already seemed to be sweating, his limbs shaking, a strange glow in his cheeks as if he were flushed and feverish. All experience told you that biologically speaking, he shouldn’t be having anything resembling a heat. But, you reminded yourself, he wasn’t human. The biology you knew meant exactly nothing in regards to him. Still, you imagined by the way his pupils were blown and the noticeable bulge between his thighs, his heat remained true to the definition you knew. Something about the concept, the primal, animalistic urge of it all sent a tremulous frisson of heat through your body, and despite his warning, you didn’t leave the attic.

“Would you...maybe like some company?” His brows arched, but he didn’t say anything, and you asked without thinking, “Have you ever had someone to get through your heat with? Does it help?”

“Yeah,” he answered in a low voice. “It helps, but...babe, I don’t think you want that. Trust me, I know the thought of banging me for days sounds appealing, but it’s no walk in the park.”

“I can handle it, Beej, just let me have ten minutes between rounds to hydrate and-”

“No, no baby, you don’t get it.” He sighed, sliding off the rafter and landing on his feet, only wobbling a little bit. “You’re not built to handle this. You’re...y’know, alive. You’re more fragile than you think you are, and I…” Beetlejuice sighed, scratching the back of his head and looking as if he’d rather be anywhere else in the world than here, doing anything but having this conversation. “I don’t have a whole lot of control when I’m like this. I’m barely holding it together talking to you now.” Now that you were listening, you could hear the strain in his voice, as if he were fighting to keep his tone level. “I could hurt you. Like, really hurt you.”

“You won’t-”

“Baby.” His tone was low, solemn, almost authoritative. “I’m not talking about pulling your hair too hard or leaving some bruises. I’m a demon. You forget it sometimes because I don’t act like it around you, but I’m dangerous. I’m what you’d call the next step on the food chain, and you could end up-” His sentence cut off, as if he couldn’t give voice to the possibility of him losing control with you. “I can’t take that risk, no matter how much I would love to fuck you through the floorboards right now.”

You took a deep breath, taking in everything he had told you. True, you did tend to forget his demonic nature at times, because he craved your softness, indulged in it, basked in all the cuddles and kisses and lovely things he had never experienced before, Even in the bedroom, when he bit into your skin and his sharp nails left red furrows down your thighs, it was balanced with sweet words and passionate kisses. But deep down, you knew who he was, who he tried to hide from you, that part of himself he kept locked away for fear you would be revolted by it, by him. You wanted him to know that beyond the lust and the idea of being fucked within an inch of your life, you loved and accepted even the darkest parts of himself, the parts he’d deemed unloveable. Slowly, you moved closer, noting the slight twitch in his stance, as if wanting to take a step back but not quite able to bring himself to do so. Your fingertips brushed his cheek, and he pulled in a shuddering breath.

“I’m not scared, Bug. I know the risk, and if it was just fucking, I’d take your advice and leave. But listen to me.” His dark eyes were pinned to yours, his hair violet, fading to magenta, with an unnerving shock of blue above his brow. “I love you, sweetheart. Okay? And because I love you, I want to be here for you; if having someone with you during your heat will shorten it or make it easier to bear, then I’ll take that risk. We’ll put some safeguards in place, we’ll establish a routine so I don’t get too tired and you don’t get too deep inside your own head, but we can make this work, baby. Just...please, let me be here for you, okay?”

He was quiet for a few moments, just listening to your breathing, your heartbeat, and you wondered if maybe you were wrong to press the issue. Then, he lifted a hand to curl over yours, pressing your warm palm to his cheek as he nuzzled into it. “Okay. I hate how fucking soft you’ve made me, but okay.”

Quickly, you two had a conversation about safe words and non-verbal signals, agreeing on signs for “keep going,” “slow down,” “I need a break,” or “stop.” Once agreed upon, he took your chin in his hand and lifted your eyes to his. “One last thing before we do this,” he rasped. “If I lose it, if you give a safe word and I don’t stop…” He paused, a pained look flickering across his face before he continued. “You need to say my name three times.”

Your brow furrowed. “But...won’t that banish you?”

“Yeah, babes, that’s the idea.”

Something icy coiled in your middle, and you shook your head. You had promised him so many times that you would never say his name more than once, that you would never send him away. How many times had he woken you up in the middle of the night near tears because he’d convinced himself you would banish him in the morning? “Beej, no, I can’t, I promised I’d never-”

“It’s okay, this is different. I’d rather be in the Netherworld myself than accidentally send you there.” The corner of his mouth curled up, but it was humorless. “Just...send me away, wait a couple days, then call me back.” For the briefest moment, you saw the sheen of unshed tears in his eyes, and you realized how much trust he was putting in you to summon him back, how hard it was for him to accept the risk that you might not. Your hands cupped his cheeks, stroking over the slightly glowing fever-patches, and smiled. 

“Okay, Beej. Cross my heart.”

He sighed, relieved, then that sheen in eyes was gone, replaced by the dull shine of feral need. “Now that we got the logistics out of the way, babes, you have exactly five seconds to get naked before I rip ‘em offa you.”

You grinned. “I only need four.”

It started slower than you expected, mostly in part because you assumed he was still holding himself back. Perhaps he didn’t want to tire you out too early. Once you were naked, there were hands all over you, more than just the two he normally sported, some attached to human arms, some sprouting from the ends of striped appendages that curled around your middle. He pulled you close, the tiniest slices of amber visible around the dark, vacuous pupils. Beetlejuice dragged you into a dark corner of the attic, and you shivered at the parallel of a predator bringing its meal back to its den. There were old blankets and stained cushions piled there, and you wondered how long he’d had this little nest set up for only a moment before he descended on you. His kisses were enthusiastic, but no more so than usual. So far, so good, you thought.

Then, you began to notice not only were there multiple sets of hands on you, but it seemed multiple mouths as well, wrapped around your nipples, cool tongues stroking along your skin. You reached for where you thought his head was, grateful to find the familiar texture of his hair between your fingers, and a grating sound rumbled to life at the touch, a sound that was both growl and purr. Something squirming and prehensile probed experimentally at your entrance, a pleased trill leaving him when your hips canted up toward it, and then it slid deep, curling inside. You weren’t sure if it was one of his appendages, a striped tongue, or his cock, but the pleasure of having him invade your body quickly erased any curiosity you might have had. As he was reduced to his most basic, primal form, so too were you, a moaning collection of nerve endings surrounding a molten core of pure need. 

The first six hours were slow, comparatively gentle to what would follow, more or less the foreplay round of the marathon the two of you were about to endure. When the timer on your phone went off and you gave the signal to stop, panting and trembling and sheened with sweat, the multiple limbs retreated into his body, and a more or less human-looking Beetlejuice sat before in his nest. He helped you downstairs to take a quick shower, brought you water and a snack and let you rest while he paced, the surface of his need barely scratched. You set your bottle of water down and eyed him, a satisfied little smile on your face.

“You know, this might be more comfortable if we moved to the bedroom.”

Almost immediately, he shook his head. “Huh-uh. Don’t wanna break your bed, sweetcheeks.”

You laughed softly, oddly touched by his consideration. “Alright, if you say so.”

When your thirty minute break was up, he all but bum rushed you back upstairs, wrapped you up so tight in his darkness, like a fly caught in a spider’s web, and you began to quickly understand why he had such fears about breaking you. His teeth sank into the back of your neck as he turned you over on all fours, slamming into you so hard it knocked the breath out of your lungs. Something cold and wet curled around the front to tease you, stroking and circling, coaxing a steady stream of orgasms out of you as he growled and hissed in the dark, the only light the glow of his eyes. His disembodied voice floated around you, sometimes snarling wordlessly, sometimes praising your body, your resilience, sometimes spewing mindless filth, and sometimes murmuring in a language not meant for human tongues. He drew blood, healed the split skin, only to wound it again, fucking you open without mercy or restriction. He knew you were his in every way, in every way he wanted you to be. His warm hole to rut, fuck, and spill into. His lover, to pleasure and tease. His love, to hold and cherish.

At the end of it all, his heat reduced to a mere thirty-six hours instead of a full week, you were utterly spent, weak as a kitten, hardly able to string two coherent words together. Lucky for you both that you were working from home now, because you definitely weren’t going to be able to get up for at least a day. He laid you out on the ripped remains of his little attic nest and licked you clean as best he could, taking extra care to be gentle, before gathering your limp form in his arms and carrying you back down to your bed. You were asleep before he finished descending the attic stairs, and stayed so for at least eighteen hours. He didn’t leave your side for an instant, curled up and purring in the bed beside you. 

[adventures-in-poly]

0 Posts in 2020

You’d think that I’d have something Very Profound to say about the interactions between the pandemic and poly, but it turns out I haven’t wanted to write about that subject very much at all. I won’t say that the pandemic has sucked all the inspiration from my brain, just that it has shuffled inspiration around in unexpected ways and away from writing.

The pandemic has felt like it’s pressed the pause button on my poly life. My husband (M) can’t go out on dates because OTHER PEOPLE ARE DANGEROUS. I also can’t go out on dates for the same reason, but moreover, I choose not to go on dates because I’m just So Damn Exhausted. I’ve seen my boyfriend (Crow) only three times this year: once before the pandemic and twice since, and that’s only possible because his house has this large porch where we can do social distancing outside. I haven’t kissed him since January and I’ve only hugged him once, masks on and faces turned away, and I held my breath the whole time. I haven’t had sex with anyone in over a year, and I can’t even “blame” that on the pandemic. It’s a choice. Guess I’ve gone full asexual, and I say “guess” because, while asexual is an accurate descriptor, I still don’t feel really great about adopting that as a personal identity. I’m not even upset about the no sex part though. I’m happy about it. My Magic Wand knows exactly what I want and all the nuances of my body and it’s much less painful than skin on skin.

The pandemic is NOT a good thing. It is NOT a good thing that millions of people have died, and it is NOT a good thing that we as a community are touch-starved and relationship-starved and can’t seem to figure our shit out.

That said.

I’m going to be honest. It has felt nice not having to worry, poly-wise. I hate that that’s a thing that I feel, but this blog is and has always meant to be about honesty. It feels like a relief knowing that I am not going to be in a situation where I have to watch my husband drunkenly and sloppily hit on other women at parties that we are meant to both enjoy. It feels like a relief knowing that he isn’t going to tell me, “I’m going to meet someone that I’ve been talking to on Tinder”, that the bomb isn’t going to fall on me. Because that’s what it is. “I came in like a wrecking ball.” The fear that someone else will enter our lives - my life - and I’ll have no control over it, and I’ll hate it, and I’ll lose myself.

I have a lifelong fear of being replaced. Of being “not good enough”. I hesitate to call it a fear of being unlovable, because I’ve never doubted that people love me and like me. I think they do. But the fear is that, when my needs butt up against someone else’s, theirs will always win. As a child, my parents taught me all about caring for other people, being generous, being self sacrificing, being kind. They immigrated to the US from England a few years before I was born, and as a result, I was brought up with a European mindset (others before yourself) in an American environment (look out for number one). And, as a result -- even though my parents were extraordinarily caring, even though I was an only child, even though they were generous with their time and attention, even though I had a very happy childhood -- I somehow learned that I would always be second place. Always the one to sleep on the floor at sleepovers so the guest or the host could get the bed. Always the one to get a boring piece of cake so a louder and therefore more deserving child could get the piece with the flower. Petty shit like that that translated into real adult problems. Just two nights ago, on New Year’s Eve, I had told my husband I’d wanted us to change the sheets, and as I ascended the stairs to bed I forlornly reminded him that we hadn’t changed the sheets - terrified and fully preparing myself to be let down because he was having a good time at an online New Year’s Eve party and of course that meant that my needs would subside. (They didn’t. The world doesn’t work like that. My husband shows me over and over again that my needs are important to him, and yet I Still Never Learn.)

I can say with full honestly that I am no longer really jealous of my boyfriend and his wife anymore. I used to be, a little. I used to be jealous that he would want to visit her at her shift before he came over for dates, or that he’d want to bring her to casual outings with me, or that at any point the two of them could decide they’d want to move back to San Diego and that would be that. I don’t feel those things anymore. I haven’t for a long time. It’s some sort of consequence of she and I becoming legitimate good friends, plus me and my husband moving an hour away, plus just being too damn old and too damn tired to give shits anymore.

Then again, their relationship was never the kind that was going to prick my skin up and put me on guard. I was the new person, not her. I don’t have a complex about older, more established relationships.

But the idea of my husband finding somebody new, even though our relationship is solid? Sends me into chaos. Even now. I wish I could say that it’s changed in the 5 years since we opened things up, but it hasn’t. It hasn’t really at all.

I’d wanted this blog to document my journey from new to seasoned poly, from a jealous wreck to someone who had learned to love herself and meditate through the pain. That’s not what happened. I’m not sure if it’s ever going to happen. My husband hasn’t had enough actual relationships to give me practice experiencing the very discomfort that makes me want to scream until my insides explode out, and the few times it has happened, I felt like I was living in a shock chamber and turning into the kind of person I don’t want to be.

I wanted to evolve, for the sake of my readers, into someone who fully accepts a poly lifestyle. To show that it can be done. No -- to show, specifically, that I could do it, that I could logic and reason my way through all the shit and prove myself to be better than my jealousy. I don’t think that’s what’s going to end up happening. I think it’s no secret at this point that I don’t really love this whole poly thing. I am still actively choosing it, but not always for reasons that I endorse. What if I decided I didn’t want to do it anymore? Would I lose my husband? Would I lose my boyfriend? Could I ethically give up my relationship with my boyfriend to create monogamy with my husband? Could I ethically ask my husband not to go on dates while I still retain my relationship with my boyfriend? It’s all shit, really. None of it is a good outcome. And the pandemic has allowed me to stall my non-decisions for a year because it’s not like we can see other people anyway. And isn’t it great when some external force gives you a reprieve from the things you’re afraid of.

But while the pandemic has put my poly life on pause, it’s put my healing and growth around poly stuff on pause as well. Sure, it feels fucking great on the surface, but it’s not actual growth. I’m not forever in a place where I will feel secure. It’s going to end eventually (vaccinate me, babyyyyyyyy!!!), and the parties will start again, and the dates will start again, and my terrified introvert ass is afraid that everything collectively will swing in the opposite direction super hard. Free love! Casual sex everywhere! Everyone wants to hang out all the time! How could you possibly want to be alone at a time like this! And that fear extends beyond poly stuff and beyond just me and my husband - I’m not ready for the world to become a giant party. I don’t want that world. I don’t want to live in that world but I also don’t want to miss out on the collective bonding experience that is almost sure to come from the end of Covid. So the reprieve I’m feeling now is only surface level great because it’s a pause, not an end, and I don’t feel any more equipped to deal with my jealousy and my social anxiety and my feelings of not being good enough than I did at the beginning of this damn pandemic.

Part of me wishes I could “get over my shit”, and part of me wants to cling onto my shit and defend it. Like why am I the one who has to change, why am I the one who has to evolve, what’s wrong with feeling the way I feel? Why is this a “my shit” thing, like I’m alone and all my problems are caused by my own feelings? Why do other people NeEeEeEeEd to go on dates and have sex. Why does my husband need that. Why am I not good enough. Why is the problem that I feel jealousy and insecurity; why is the problem not that he feels [insert whatever he feels here. unsatisfied? no, that’s not it. incapable of being fully satisfied by a single person? that seems extreme. incapable of surrounding himself with platonic friendships in the way that comes so naturally to me and many of my women friends, and much more able to connect with people he is in a romantic/sexual relationship with, and so needs to create many romantic/sexual relationships to fill that void that otherwise would be filled with friendships - which is not actually something I believe about him, I think he could make really great friendships with the right tools, but is something he’s expressed to me and is also something that’s pretty common around people raised as men? is that too harsh?]

I’m trying to look for a good ending for this post, but, like an explanation for my feelings, I don’t think I’m going to find satisfaction here.

[mnthpprt]

Chapter 37: The Thrill Of Running Away From Oneself

[TRIGGER WARNING: allusions to rape, blood and gore, violence]

I decide to walk home instead of taking a carriage. Well, to the mansion. I guess it is my home now, isn’t it? The walk takes over an hour, but I don’t mind. The cool night breeze feels pleasant against my skin as I make my way back. The outskirts of Paris are much darker than I am used to, completely lacking in artificial light beyond a couple gas lamps down the road.

I hear footsteps behind me. When I turn, I don’t see anyone, but the sound does not stop. It follows me from afar, amplified by my condition along with the chirp of nocturnal birds and the rustling of wind through the trees. I stop on the side of the road and wait, and soon enough, two men appear from beyond the point where the path curves. They must have been following me for a while to come this far out of the city.

I decide to ignore them and keep walking, slowly as to not trip on my untied laces. I should have known better than to give those men the chance to catch up to me.

“What are you doing out here all alone, mademoiselle?” one of them says, grabbing my shoulder. I brush his hand off and keep walking.

“None of your business,” I deadpan. “Leave me alone.”

He laughs, putting his hand on my shoulder again, this time more brusquely.

“Oh, but you see, we can’t do that, mademoiselle.”

“No, we can’t,” the other one chuckles. “It would be a shame for something to happen to you, all alone in the middle of the night like this.”

He joins the first man and forcefully grabs my arm. Now that they are up close, I can see that both of them are young. They look only a few years older than myself, on their late twenties at most. Still, their intentions are clear. I am overcome with the instinct to fight back and scream for help, but then I remember I am much stronger than I used to be. Meanwhile, these two are merely human, I have nothing to be afraid of. As they drag me towards the bushes on the side of the road, I let out a bored sigh.

“This? Really?” I chuckle, throwing them off. They look surprised for a second, but their grip on me remains tight. “Of all the nights you could have picked to attack me, this is by far the worst. I am not in the mood for this shit.”

“Shut up, woman,” the first one barks. He pushes me against a tree and reaches for my skirt as the other holds me down. I wait until he lifts the heavy fabric all the way up my leg to kick him in the shin, making him cry out in pain. The other hold me tight as he recovers, making sure to keep my arms still. “You’re a feisty bitch, aren’t you?” he growls before lifting his hand above my head. I give him a look of warning, but he ignores it, striking my cheek in full force. 

I laugh through the stinging pain as the man grabs my face and forcefully turns it to kiss me. I don’t budge when he does, ignoring the disgusting feeling of his wet sloppy lips on mine. The other’s hands move to my breasts, forcing them out of my corset to squeeze them painfully. However, my arms are free. A big mistake on his part.

I reach up to pull the first man’s head to the side by the hair, exposing his neck, and swiftly bite into his jugular. I wasn’t supposed to like it as much as I do. It was merely a way to fight back. But the abundant flow of fresh, warm blood that comes out, soaking both our clothes, makes me think otherwise. I feel powerful. And hungry, oh so hungry. Behind me, I hear the other man scream in horror as my victim falls to his knees. I let go of him and kick him out of the way, wiping the blood off my chin. Not that the gesture helps in the slightest; there is blood everywhere. 

“Do you have a toothpick, by any chance?” I merrily ask the other one, who seems to have frozen in place. “I think there’s some of your friend stuck between my teeth.” 

To emphasize my deceivingly lighthearted statement, I smile innocently. I can’t imagine what it would look like to him, my fangs bared and stained red from taking his fellow rapist’s life. He begins to scramble away, but I grab him by his coat before he manages to get too far.

“Please, please, don’t kill me!” he cries, falling to his knees. I let go of him and crouch before him so my eyes are level with his. “Please, mademoiselle! I didn’t mean to, I’m sorry, please!” he continues to babble. Fuelled by the rush the other man’s blood gave me, I tilt his chin up and delicately wipe his tears with my thumb. He grows quiet, seemingly calmer, although I am sure I can smell piss on his trousers.

“You should have thought about that when I warned you,” I point out. My voice comes out playful, musical, even. It doesn’t sound like my own. It belongs to another Anaïs, one that is thoroughly enjoying this massacre. I let her take over.

In an instand, I find myself straddled over this poor man’s body, ripping his throat out with my teeth. The blood continues to pour out long after he stops breathing. I drink every last drop of it I can manage, not stopping until I am satiated to the point of feeling sick.

No, I don’t think that’s the reason. As I come to my senses and my breathing slows to its normal pace, I look down at my hands. At my blood stained dress, at the man I have just murdered. I hastily stand up, horrified by my own actions. Shit, is this how Isaac felt that night? I can’t stand it. My brain is flooded with the image of two mauled corpses wearing suits, discarded on the side of the road in a puddle of their own blood. The gravelly path has been dyed red, as have my dress, my hair, and my hands. In the moonlight it looks almost black. I stumble away, but further down the path I am forced to lean against a tree to puke my guts out. Their guts. Someone’s, I can’t remember whose anymore. I retch and heave until nothing comes out, and once I catch my breath, I start running.

I sneak into the mansion through the kitchen, after having made sure that Sebastian is not there, and proceed to take my shoes off to avoid making any noise. It takes a lot longer to get to my bedroom, having to hide behind every corner of the hallway whenever I hear someone approach. I can’t let anyone see me like this. Le Comte will be furious. I rush down the hallway, only to stop in my tracks when I see Arthur standing in front of my door, preparing to knock. Shit.

Okay, I’m still fairly far, maybe I can leave before he sees me. The floor decides to creak when I turn on my heels. Apparently, I cannot.

“Anaïs?” he calls out. Shit. Fuck. He saw me. I slowly turn around and give him an awkward smile in a futile attempt to distract him from the fact that I look like Carrie. “By Jove, what happened to you? Are you alright?”

“I-it’s not my blood,” I mumble. Arthur, who was rushing to help me, stops in his tracks upon hearing the words.

“Anaïs...” he carefully enunciates with the parental tone that one might speak to an unruly child with, “What did you do?”

I sigh and push past him to walk into my bedroom and then to the bathroom. He patiently waits by my side as I remove my soiled clothing and open the faucet for my second shower of the day.

“I did something bad, Arthur,” I lament as I begin to fervently scrub my skin under the cold water, too impatient to get the blood off to wait for it to heat up. I start crying, but my tears mix with the stream washing over my head. “I fucked up. Like, really badly.”

“Where?” he asks from the other side of the curtain.

“What?”

“Where did you leave the body?”

He knows. That does not surprise me, though. It’s Arthur, of course he knows. But he has a point. If someone finds the men I killed, they might trace it back to the mansion. To us. I take a deep breath to try to calm myself so I can remember.

“They’re about a mile from Will’s house,” I manage to answer. “On that road that goes by the oat field.”

“They? Christ, Anaïs.” I don’t blame him, I would have reacted the same way. Through the shower curtain, I see his silhouette move. “Wait here. I’ll be back soon.”

“Where are you going?” I ask, holding back a sob.

“To take care of it.”

The second I hear the door close behind him, I fall to my knees on the tiled surface. I killed those men. I’m a monster. I’m no better than William. No, I’m worse. He schemes and endangers people’s lives by playing stupid games, but I just murdered two people in cold blood. And I enjoyed it.

By the time Arthur gets back, I am sitting on the edge of the bed in a bathrobe, my face still puffy from crying. He brings tea and a bottle of rouge, which I decline, at first, but the pang of hunger in my stomach forces me to take. I quickly chug it down and discard the bottle on the tray, taking a cup of tea instead. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” he softly asks. I shrug. I might as well address the elephant in the room, especially after he had to clean up my mess on the road.

“They tried to rape me,” I simply say before taking a sip of tea. It tastes richer than it used to when I was human, washing away the sweetness of the rouge. When I look up from my cup, I see pity in his eyes, and I am compelled to wave it aside. “It’s okay, it’s not the first time it happens. Women in my time might be able to vote, but we don’t have it much better.” I find changing the topic helps alleviate the tightness in my chest. However, I must keep talking. He deserves that much. “I usually carry a knife, or a brass knuckle, or something to defend myself with, but here... Well, I didn’t have any of that. I only had my fangs. And I was angry, and starving, and...” I can’t force myself to continue. I break down crying.

“Shhh, my dear, it’s alright,” Arthur comforts me, sitting beside me on the bed to rub my back. “You didn’t do anything wrong. They attacked you, you just did what you had to.”

“No, you don’t get it,” I complain. “I liked it, Arthur. I liked tearing their throats out with my fucking teeth, I liked feeling their bodies go limp in my arms as life left them. I enjoyed it too much, I-”

“I know, dove,” he interrupts me. By now, tears are flowing freely down my face, heavy with the hatred I feel for myself. “I know.” I lay my head on Arthur’s bony shoulder as he begins to stroke my hair.

“Does it ever stop?” I whisper. If this is what life as a vampire is like, I don’t think I want it. I am beginning to understand Jean more than I ever thought possible.

“It gets better. Those urges you feel now, they’ll become weaker. You’ll learn to deal with them.”

I notice how Arthur didn’t answer my question, not exactly, but I weakly nod anyway. My tears and wet hair are soaking through his sleeve, making it stick to his skin. I focus on him, on his warmth, on the mole I can see on his arm through the wet fabric, on the smell of coffee and lemongrass soap. On anything that helps me forget what I have become.

“So...” he begins, quietly, once I have stopped crying. “What were you doing at William’s house?” I exhale a deep breath when he brings it up. “Does it have to do with what happened last night?”

“Kind of,” I mutter. I let go of his arm and throw myself back on the bed. My eyes stare at the ceiling as I think of how to explain the situation. “I figured he might know something, so I went to find out... but I was wrong,” I lie. Arthur scrutinizes my face in search of a tell, but I am too tired and overwhelmed to have any sort of expression.

“Alright,” he finally decides before laying down beside me. “I’ll take your word for it. But let me know if you discover anything.”

I hold onto him, nodding into his chest, and he wraps his comforting arms around me. After laying for a while in silence, I remember something.

“How did you get rid of the bodies so fast?”

“Sebastian is no stranger to this kind of thing,” he explains. “When he first arrived, Isaac had a similar incident. He’s gotten used to dealing with unsavoury messes like that.”

“Oh.”

Soon after that, I drift off to a dreamless sleep, aided by the steady rhythm of Arthur’s breath, the raising and falling of his chest rocking my consciousness away. I truly do not deserve him.

[tammyhybrid21]

Sara Deserves Better

It's six in the morning, and I am mad!

Mad because of a small thing admittedly, but you want a sum up?

I'm mad because I hyped myself up to write a MSA/Tadeo Jones crossover oneshot that would basically be Vivi being excited to meet an actual living Mummy, with other things, but the majority... and then started thinking beyond that small scope of fun and just-- got frustrated.

Because here's the thing... I made a post about Vivi and her glasses, and then started thinking about the crew in Tadeo Jones and--

Like here's the deal, my brain... just... completely forgot Sara has glasses. I remembered Tiffany's glasses. I remembered the PHOTO with glasses-- but the first ten minutes of Sara's screen time being spent with her in glasses? NAH--

Sooo that's not actually what this post is about. Just a small annoyance with myself. So what is this post about-- well the obvious is look at the title, Sara Deserves Better.

Also, not just shipping wise... but mainly shipping wise, because GOD DAMN IT. Let Sara break free of the Love Interest box PLEASE. Because for crying out loud, it's been two movies and this is one of the most painful flaws I can see. Also-- just as an aside, I really, really want to like Sara but right now... she's stuck in that box so much she's honestly kind of... bland and boring to watch.

Also just--

In general. I want to say something that's just, my BIG gripe and the reason I come bearing this rant but...

Vivi.

VIVI is why I'm making this RANT!

And you want to know why? It's because in the approximately 16 odd minutes of the Mystery Skulls Animated vidoes we get-- SO MUCH information about who she is and what she stands for as a character. WE HAVE SO MUCH TO WORK WITH. Hell even in the brief flashback sequence, there's a lot to analyse and unpack-- she's not just reduced to-- Lewis' former girlfriend despite how easily that could have been the case. Which-- I mean, I have... a number of rants for Vivi in the works... beyond just my MBTI analysis that's already up...

BUT conversely... and maddeningly-- I can't say the same for Sara. Between the two movies if there is one character who feels kind of... empty aside overtures, or rather underdeveloped... it's Sara.

Which is a crying shame. But there's two movies of content and I still only have the vaguest idea of WHO she really is as a person. Oh I know who she is. But... I don't really know Who she is.

Like, seriously... the closest we get to some glimpses is this opening of movie 2, some scenes in movie one, and her moment with Mummy.

Which... I have other things to talk about regarding this... a more proper analysis regarding her verses Tadeo on these events... BUT THAT'S ANOTHER ANALYSIS.

Also what moments from Movie 1?

How's about priorities?

"But first tell me if ANYTHING you told me was true!"

ALSO, I have some things to say about Tadeo's response to this... but that's ALSO deserving of it's whole own analysis and it really wouldn't be fair... And aside this... well again... moments.

Which... I still don't actually have much, but these are sort of... the moments with the most character from Sara. OH, aside from when she's with Tiffany, and arguably-- when alone and kidnapped with Rackham... which, huh-- That would bring me to another point honestly... but this isn't actually my "Making your Villain Memorable" rant. ALTHOUGH-- The Rackham stuff and Tiffany will need to be addressed.

I want to talk about the moments I currently have first. Which aren't... precisely in order, but I think they're in order of the impact for me.

Which first moment is when Tad's sacrificing his father's cufflink, his greatest treasure. Giving it to Mummy, and again-- I have many words... but what's telling is Sara's reaction and how that kind of ties into the significance there. Because overall it just says-- well, it says how deeply she's affected seeing it as well-- Which isn't something you see much in these movies unfortunately.

The next moment I would like to call the "I sense bullshit radar". Considering how she finds Tad's story initially a bit flawed, also laying out the law, starting to plan. Sara has a head on her shoulders and is NO FOOL.

UNTIL SHE IS.

And I think only HALF of this final highlight moment can be blamed on the situation because heyyyy--

Let's circle around to the Rackham stuff. And... other movie 2 stuff.

Which, I know this miiiight be arbitrary or not really something that can be linked. BUT there's a difference in how she handles these moments... And hell, I would also add the opening to movie 2-- but Sara has... levelled her head A LOT more when it comes to handling potentially life threatening danger between movies. In what information she grabs(opening) and then in the above scene, what she actually lets the villain learn.

Which also, anyone else get a short circuit feeling from that?

And hell, even as much as I have issues with the whole sequence of events and a SPOILER filled rant about it...

Even here, again. Pretty chill, pretty level. At best/worst it's really stunned silence. But this scene has a number of issues and I have a rant that will go up after a fic(if I can just keep myself long enough to WRITE that fic...). And just... well--

Then the last thing is-- well Tiffany.

Also... just generally on this second screencap here, I like to just-- talk about the moment before as well-- since there's something just... Really wild in what leads to it.

Like... why does she look SO CONFUSED?! Like-- I don't know if I'm the only one who sees this, but when Rackham first shows up... she looks so confused, like how could he get there so quickly?! And then Tiffany steps out and there's that shocked expression and it gives off this sense that just-- When Tiffany stormed off Sara knew but she didn't know. Like you ever have those moments-- where you know someone's going to make a bad decisions... and yet-- you're still SHOCKED by how bad a decision they make?

Yeah, that's Sara here... and she's... been trying with Tiffany.

But still... yeah.

And what does all this ultimately add up to?

Sara still being too broad in the long of it.

BECAUSE IT TOOK ME A GOOD HOUR, OR TWO, Of ranting and discussing this with some friends for me to dig out these moments and I STILL don't have a solid, solid character for Sara. And do you know why?

Because of the one FATAL FLAW...

Forced

Romance

...And when I say forced romance, I really, really mean it. Do you know what one of my BIGGEST COMPLAINTS of movie 2 is. It's that when Sara gets mad, or feels like she should be mad, it's not allowed to hold. It's just glossed over. And then of course, complaint two is the other obvious thing. Sara feels... as if she's just there to dispense the plot and then to be kidnapped.

She spends the first two and a half quarters of the movie kidnapped, and even after only gets the barest amount of screen time. Hell she had MORE to do in movie 1, and that's probably because the plot was broader and gave them all time to shine with action, even if she still felt-- hard.

Like seriously, does-- any of these moments stand out on their own? Without a number of rewatches and forcing my focus to actually be on Sara to analyse... not really. It all blends and blurs because of one big thing that EATS up her character and forces it into that kind of bland box.

She's forced and pushed to fit the lens of the love interest. With Tad's chasing-- and how that impacts the story.

And I'd also like to complain about ANOTHER thing in this similar vein but...

In movie one there's a sequence I... haven't really brought up in this rant, along with in general how Sara is there-- because here's the thing. Aside the glimpses... she... really feels like a PROP a lot of the time. In both movies. But-- in movie 1 there are a few moments specific.

And the first is actually the train moment with Kopponen. Sara was definitely NOT going to hand the tablet over...

But of course, Tad had to SCREW UP trying to be a hero... and for the rest of the sequence it feels a lot like Sara's only purpose is to more or less be grabbed and damselled again... And even later on, it feels like Wasted Potential--

Like, she's used to motivate other characters--

Which okay... I'm not going to say that Vivi is excused from, since that's who I'm comparing her with... BUT there's a DRASTIC difference of character agency in HOW and why they are used as motivation between them.

Might not on the surface seem like much of a difference--

Especially in the immediate context that's offered here with how Lewis is using the picture in his locket and the implied additional angle to his attempted revenge against Arthur-- which, mind you-- there's a HELL of a lot more going on there... BUT-- When it comes to the ACTION... not just that moment up higher... but when there's actual ACTIVE danger...

Come Hellbent... And Shiromori...

Meanwhile with Sara the best we have across both movies... is moments. She handles herself in the opening of the sequel and-- well we actually have the climbing sequence to the final temple... which... I have-- words about as well, but the big ones right now is actually in the choice of lyrics playing over what--

But...

Sara actually only gets the "Now I'm Invincible" stuff-- or the Majority of it. There might be the more romance stuff, but for the most part-- she's pretty much being defined as "Invincible on her own" which also... yeah. It's true. The strongest moments for Sara are those moments when she's on her own, and away from the Tadeo drama... or even when she was used to motivate her Dad's actions in the first movie.

Which... actually makes me circle back to something that just... doesn't fit.

"It's been the most amazing adventure. All these days with you. I wouldn't trade that for the world. I... I love..."

WHICH LOOK

Isn't Sara supposed to be the expert on the whole of what this movie is about? King Midas' Collar and Golden Touch, this was her long term project. So why is it that in this scene she's forgotten all that she's supposedly studied and why they're even here? Like does anyone else get death confession vibes from this, which... considering Sara should know this is supposed to be reversible?!

Because forced romance plot.

I mean, I have more to say, but honestly... at this point I'm running out of ways to properly articulate my points. But in the end... what can I say about Sara now that I'm at the end of my rant? You know, beyond FREE HER FROM THE ROMANCE PLOT....

Well, actually a lot more than I expected or thought at the start... And that's because now I've been through and watched with focus on her. Although some of it still had to be informed and given to me.

Which yeah--

Sara is an expert in her own field, supposedly anyway. Which, let's be fair, that's not her fault, that's plot mandated information failures.

She's Peruvian, which, I think is established in the first movie, that's her home. And where she's grown up, but it's really not made clear in either movie. Or at the least, not as clear as it should be. PLEASE GIVE HER MORE PERUVIAN PRIDE I SWEAR--

She is clearly much, much more impressed by Tadeo when he's being humble and honest. Like just damn. Those are the traits she respects and what's to see.

Sara actually respects and listens to other people, she's patient with them and hears out what they have to say. And this... isn't just with Mummy in that scene, but also she's patient with Tiffany and-- I do have more to say on that... but again, another post.

She is definitely in this for knowledge and awareness than necessarily results. She's not chasing fame.

Honestly, she shines so, so much better when there's NO ROMANCE, and really is a strong women on her own. Doesn't need anyone.

Has chased after her father's recognition, in the same field, to having the same issue of leaving behind those she cares for... Time is limited you know.

Which yeah... okay. Sara, definitely deserves better!

[munsonsduchess]

So. I re watched The Magnificent Seven again because I’m at home self isolating until my housemates covid test comes back in a couple days so I made some notes. Presented below as I watched the film … again

Teddy looks like he wants to say something to encourage Matthew not to speak but like he just can’t find the courage to speak up

Everyone turning to stare at Sam as he rides through the town. Like they aren’t used to seeing a man of colour make something of himself.

The bartender who tells Sam they don’t serve ‘that kind’ as a direct insulation that they don’t serve Sam’s kind. Which could have just been because Sam is a lawman and the barman is an outlaw but could also be more than that

Faraday isn’t as stupid as he looks. He knows exactly who Dan is and what Sam’s purpose was. He could tell something was happening and was ready in seconds with a gun drawn to help Sam.

He sticks around after everyone runs out because he knows Sam’s occupation and seems to want to know more.

Emma has obviously been searching for someone who could help for a long time. Teddy stopping her from talking to Sam and her acceptance seems to imply that they’ve spoken to people before but that no one has taken them seriously. Maybe because Emma is a woman

Emma is clearly ready to offer up anything she can to find ‘righteousness’. It also seems like she’s more than ready for a fight.

Sam had decided upon hearing Bouge’s name that he would take the job and then when Emma shared her convictions he knew he could pass off his intentions as unselfish if anyone asked

Faraday cheats at cards and is scared of the dark confirmed. He’s also clever enough to use his wits to get out of a situation when he’s seemingly at the mercy of two other men

Faraday has issues around killing people. He clearly shows remorse for his actions. He doesn’t seem to like violence but he’ll use it to get what he wants if he needs to

Does Faraday know who Joan of Arc is?

He’s also apparently willing to throw his life away for strangers

Emma is not here for your shit

Teddy is a good boy and he’s here to help his friend on her vengeance quest as all good friends should

Vasquez wants Sam to know that he’s not the type of man who kills in cold blood. He uses Emma as leverage because a white woman’s death will look worse for Sam

Sam offers to tear up the warrant to get Vas on his side but I have the feeling he would have done it anyway

Vas taking a minute to decide and figuring if he works with Sam there’s a possibility of him going free and not having to run anymore

GOODY! That hip swagger

“That’s ok son you just pay me double” Goody is a respected member of the community and his reputation proceeds him so there is a level of fear there at offending him or anyone associated with him

Faraday is clearly interested to see how people react to or behave around Goody. To see how the man stacks up to the story

Goody very interested in who Faraday and Teddy are and what they have to say. Putting them off their game by speaking in the middle of the saloon while he’s getting a shave

“I keep him employed and he keeps me on the level” clearly Billy has been helping Goody with his demons far beyond what we see later

Goody and Sam being friends warms my heart

That good old southern breeding. Goody can’t resist being charming

“Ain’t no such thing as a Texican” that’s one hell of a loaded statement right there

“This is not going to end well” couldn’t have said it better myself Goody

The Famous Pigeon Brothers who weren’t famous for very long

“I believe that bear was wearing peoples clothes” Joshua the man was snuck up on in the dead of night, had a boulder smashed over his head and has been tracking the culprits for two days. I don’t think you’d be in your right mind either

“Don’t call the alligator big mouth till you cross the river” Goody just has all the best advice

IT’S MY BOY!

There’s obviously something Faraday is trying to drown in all that whiskey and Teddy knows it which is obviously why he tells Faraday to keep it

Emma doesn’t trust Farday at all

Goody knows what’s up although he’s not one to talk about the battle behind him

MY SON! HE’S SO PRETTY I WANT TO CRY

Sam giving Vas the gun so he’s less threatening to Red. Same way he left his gun outside when they went after Vas

I love that Martin cut his hair off to be historically accurate but damn what I wouldn’t have given for a long haired Red in this movie

Peace offering or trolling? Both? Both.

“Yeah ok I trust you now”

Can I also say I love how Martin learnt to ride bareback for the historical accuracy? Like historical accuracy is my jam. Now I just wonder how accurate the costumes are

“Oh good it’s a black man and an Asian man quickly call your children inside for who knows what havoc they might bring”

I do love how the racism is never as overt as someone using a slur but it’s always there just under the surface

“Manservant? Really?”

Did they practice how they were going to come into town and look imposing or do they all just instinctively know how to pose? I know Goody does anyway

I cannot keep a straight face when Farday calls himself the worlds greatest lover

Sam has no time for these Blackstone men and I am here for it

Sam’s horse is just called Horse

Goody having PTSD flashbacks before the shooting even starts since he’s clearly triggered by just the situation

A western staple where the bad guys always miss and the good guys never do

At times like this Mal Reynolds comes to me speaking words of wisdom “shoot the man not the horse, a dead horse is cover, a live horse is a whole lot of panic”

Faraday and Vas being very gay and poor confused Red like “tie him up what?”

“Lincoln like the president” and goody just “oh damn”

Someone please give Emma a better shirt. She’s gonna spill out of that one

“Seems I was the only one with balls enough to do so” damn right you were

Emma just breaking down when there’s no one around to see her use she has to be strong

“Fame is a sarcophagus” “what’s a syllable?”

TABLE MANNERS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD TABLE MANNERS

Goodbye to the working girls the town isn’t the same without them

Emma has a better shirt! She still looks like she’s gonna spill out though

Shooting lessons with Goody and Faraday

“The way of northern aggression”

Billy’s class just running away because he’s way too good

“Make me some eggs”

“GET SOME GRAVEL IN YOUR CRAW!”

Faraday trying to goad Goody into proving himself. Sam’s wariness and Goody turning around and showing Faraday just why he got the title he did despite the reasons why he doesn’t pick up a rifle anymore

Do any of them know what Jack is talking about?

“So far so good”

We’re to assume it’s Goody picking off Bouge’s men at the mine since he’s the only one who could make those sorts of shots which means Sam has talked him into doing it even though he’s seen what happened to Goody during the initial fight

“I’ve always wanted to blow something up”

The look on the faces of the people who live in town as the miners come through. They’ve always lived separately from these men and now they’re forced to look at their faces and see just how they’ve all been living

Sam putting the dynamite in the hotel like it’s no big deal

Poor Peter Skarsgard. He’s the bad guy or the poor Dad in a horror movie while his dad is spooning Colin Firth on a boat in Greece

“I worked for my money. I wasn’t given a million dollar loan. I’m a good guy”

Emma can shoot just fine. She does not need you Faraday

“I had a father thank you” “I didn’t” proceeds to show off as if to prove himself

“They say the nightmares never go away” no they really don’t ask Goody

“Avenge me!” Yeah faraday it’s not that hard

“I am to fight” “it comes to that and we’re all dead” excuse you Sam but Emma is the one who brought you here and she’s the one who’s been raring for the fight since the beginning but sure put her with the women and children

I’m also so mad they cut out of the scene of Vas and the school teachers kid talking

“I have three Maria’s!”

I’m afraid of owls too goody you aren’t alone

TABLE MANNERS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD

How long had Bouge been in Rose Creek and making the residents live in fear? That it had to be the seven who were able to show them how to live their life again

Those loose white shirts though 👌🏼

Squinting into the sun as the realisation dawns

Sam knows Goody better than Goody knows himself and Goody knows Sam better than Sam knows himself

Sam doing his best to help his friend with his PTSD but Goody just can’t

“It looks like he’s started to drink” that’s because Goody was his friend his best friend and there are untold emotions and god knows what else between them and now that man had left but not just that but left him behind is torturous

“I’m hungry” You little shit!” Red Harvest. Professional Troll

Sam seeking refuge in what’s left of the church. Feeling the proverbial noose tightening as he clutches at his neck

Emma reminding us what this whole endeavour is for. How it all started. How it’s going to end

Bouge sitting back because he’s sure his hired men will be enough. He’s never faced opposition before so he’s confident he still won’t. Or at least that his money will solve all his problems

Also if Red only wears his war paint for special occasions and if he was tracking the group prior to joining them does that mean he put his war paint on specifically to talk to Sam

Another man in Goody’s spot in the bell tower because presumably he’s the second best shot with a rifle or the only other person they could trust up there

A+ use of Fox holes though

Jack reciting his prayers as he goes absolutely feral

Faraday’s happy little smile when he finally gets to blow something up

Jack trying to help as many men as he can, men who are fathers, husbands, good honest men

Bouge who doesn’t seem to care one ounce that the people in the village are being slaughtered and bringing the battling gun out just for extra overkill

“You ok güero?” “So far so good”

“We still have men there sir” proof that Bouge does not care one single ounce for human life that isn’t his own

That rebel yell

“The devils breath” I can only imagine how a Gatling gun got that name especially from a war vet who’s likely seen countless friends allies and enemies alike be blown down by this devil

Faraday being concerned for the children even though he’s injured himself

Jack protecting Teddy at the cost of his own life. Defiant of Denali to the end But accepting his death with a sigh believing in his faith that he’ll be rewarded in heaven and reunited with his family

“I knew you’d be back” Billy has so much faith in Goodnight and I’m gonna cry

Emma with an empty gun putting herself in front of an injured man between the injured man and Denali

Denali ain’t shit!

“You’re a disgrace”

“My daddy used to say a lot of things” these two I cannot cope

“I might need a new vest” Faraday you reckless idiot

“Hit the steeple”

“I got him!” “Oh Goody” I’m not crying you’re crying

I know there’s a lot of talk about Chris Pratt being the worst Chris but he was so good in this movie I swear. Which yeah I know doesn’t change anything but when you see him playing Faraday in that last scene where it’s all down to him. I can’t

“I’ve always been lucky with one eyed jacks”

Nope definitely not crying. Not me

Bouge’s complete disregard for human life as he surveys the town

Bouge V Sam

“If god didn’t want them sheered he wouldn’t have made them sheep” says a man who feels no remorse at all for the blood on his hands

This time it’s Bouge who’s going to feel the noose tighten and I am here for the cinematic drama of it all

God won’t save you now Bouge. Run into the church you like. It’s not going to help

“Ask for forgiveness” The reveal of the rope mark. What Sam has been doing in Rose Creek this whole time. Why he took the job at the mention of Bouge’s name

[cruzrogue]

The Letter

Bruce Wayne/Original character featuring Alfred Pennyworth

Sitting in a massive home office. The tick tock of a grandfather clock keeping the room from ever being silent. The shelves across a wall filled with hardcover books. Sitting upon the offered chair centered to the desk before her. The grandness is not lost on her.

Rich. Masculine décor.

It’s the small portrait of a couple that has her stand and slowly walk to it. Her eyes glued on their gazes. It’s as if they are with her as they promised they’d be. A practiced speech written by the once patriarch of this estate. She’s heard plenty say may he and his wife rest in peace since arriving in Gotham. Their deaths politicized as she heard it on a television set being broadcasted at the lobby of her hotel.

Her hand reaches up towards them. A nervousness of being here makes her forget to regulate her emotions. The woman she is becoming lost in the moment. Those very same eyes haunt her. A constant barrage of expectations. She’s back to being that eleven-year-old that woke up screaming only the arms of these two soothing her nightmares away. Now awake. A survivor. A witness.

With an intake of breath and the rhythm of the steady grand clock has her once again taking a seat. Her eyes keeping from viewing the Wayne portrait again. Trying to find a focal point. A fountain pen in its holder. Simple and elegant. Perfect chosen distraction. Waiting diligently for the very sought out man she came to take a meeting with.

The curt butler returns with a tray. Containing a cup and with its matching saucer. He’s placing the hot beverage by the extended side table as he says a few words that explain why his master is behind schedule. Amanda doesn’t show any sign of irritation for the man in question as he is beyond forty minutes late.  

The subject of why she is here is secretive as the channels to get this meeting were done between Wayne’s butler and the chamberlain of her own uncle. Two men that run their master’s estates. There is a brief wonder. Does the elite man behind the wealth of this family have an inkling why she is here? It is not common to have gossip between two houses run by duty, history, an unyielding tradition. Chatter is left to the lower level servants. Ones who know nothing but what is asked of them.

Alfred Pennyworth glances at the still woman who thanks him after taking the offered cup of tea.

Noticing that she is not dressed as a socialite stands out. Simple. Plain. Not a feature that he normal sees here at the house. He can’t recall of another niece of the mogul living now in Wyoming a former Californian. The girl he remembers is one laid up in a coma for years until she vanished around what would be her eleventh birthday. He thinks foul play. The girl awoke and simply disappeared.

She is not unattractive. Simply just basic. Not thin nor tall like the normal women associated with his careful pressed care. Alfred knows that they’re being watched. The woman is under surveillance as keystrokes in a cave work to discover all that can be learned.

Her frank words as Alfred excuses himself to take the tray and the few contains away, “It seems an audience with me is undesirable.” Her eyes don’t waver from the focal point. She doesn’t need any more silence of words. The tick tock of the clock strong as ever. “He has made it clear; my presence is not welcomed.”

“Ms. Alexandre, allow me to show you the gardens.”

“Thank you, Alfred.” She rises from her chair making sure not to look at the few personal items that make powerful statements. “I must decline. Taking your time would be rude of me.”

She takes the leather satchel she carried into Wayne manor and slightly squeezes it. Leaving it upon the grand desk. The contents within the bag are meant for Mr. Wayne’s eyes. She was hoping to at least meet with him once before he’d deny her request. It was not meant to be.

“Thank you for your hospitality.”

Alfred nods and dutiful replies in his stoic voice as he helps her to the front door and watches her get into the awaiting car. Watching as it leaves the grounds.

It is that precise moment Bruce makes his appearance.

“Standing her up is not a gentlemen thing to do.”

“Perhaps. She’ll get over it.”

“She is said to be the niece of ailing man worth fortunes. A man who mourned the loss of your parents.” Turning to continue bringing the tray to the kitchen adds one final sentence, “Also recently losing his only child to violence.”

Bruce approaches the laid-out leather briefcase. A simple envelop placed on top. Taking it. Unfolding the few stationary sheets, he begins reading her message.

Hello Bruce,

I figured you would not meet with me personally. I get your reservation on my reappearance. Who am I really? Where have I been? Why would you even care? Why am I here? What do I want?

I want to start off by saying how sorry I am. On the loss of your parents. How truly sorry I am. It may not mean anything to you but learning of the occurrence broke my heart.

I am merely a shadow of a girl of a massacred family. Lone survivor. Disappearing to the wind and never talked about until now. Now an adult woman who will enter your home and if I leave this letter it means you have abstained from taking this meeting with me. Even if I understand. The resolve it took me to come here is lost on an empty gesture. Yet, I still write needing for you to understand just a fragment of why I am here. I mean why I came here.

If you’re wondering why I have surfaced. Now of all times. It is in some detail within this satchel.

He looks to the leather satchel laying upon his wooden desk. Only the tick tock of the grandfather clock breaking the silence of the room. He knows Alfred will not disturb him for a great while. They both share a certain drive of keeping occupied within these old walls of his ancestral home.

Like you, I have started on a journey parallel to yours. With that famous quote: A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step… I started off running. Running from the culprits who seemed to think my awaking would cause trouble. I ran and kept on running as reasons changed but my mission to find myself became a priority.

It was always just the beginning. What I do know is that I have stopped on many occasions not far from where you stood on your own voyage. That alone might be concerning to you. A stranger a continent away following similar steps like yours.

It is concerning he thinks. How would she even know about what he was doing. That would make no sense. Then he allows himself to continue to read. Maybe it will make sense somehow.

I hope you had many happy childhood memories to fall on when the days were hard growing up. I only have serene memories of my childhood. Like you before it all came crashing down. Where nightmares took their hold. I survived when my family didn’t. When I awoke from my coma. A lone witness to the faces of evil. I was alone for so long. Hidden in corners scared of the boogeyman.

He stops reading. Deciding to leave the bag here but he’d like to be more comfortable. Be able to check the computer systems of accuracies. There is a lot yet to read. He folds the simple yet elegant stationary she uses to write back into its intent indents. Holding it beside the envelop.

Passing a few quiet rooms until he reaches the family room where the grandfather clock waits for him to press the hands to have a passage slide open just behind the massive wooden structure. Climbing slowly down the steps he feels the weight of these sheets start to weigh more than the few ounces it really weighs. The woman he observed behind a screen seemed so reserved. A sadness he knows well radiating as she waits patiently for the master of this estate. To only be stood up and the woman’s facial features held no evidence of anger. She was already resigned for this outcome. This isn’t something he normally has dealt with. Anyone who has been in her situation has had a few choice words. Alfred the master of deflection promptly always leading the defeated individual off the premises. Yet, with Ms. Alexandre he offered her to a walk around the garden. The woman… he can’t yet say her first name. She declined the invitation. This letter is intriguing and holding some sappy dialogue. He remembers her enough. She and her older brother Collin. He was four years older than himself. Stopping at just shy of another five steps. Bruce exhales as a memory does permeate at how strong those emotions fill him. He had so much fun with this family.

Making his way to his chair in the cave he places the envelop on the console before sitting. Unfolding the sheets as a curiosity that is steadily developing. He needs to read more. Skimming the beginning parts that has been read but making sure to reread the last passage. She was on the run. He understands that the men who were responsible were never found and a lead into the investigation ended to another dead body. Doing the math, he finds that she was eleven when she disappeared from the medical institution that was caring for her. Making him a thirteen-year-old at that timeframe. Like she said, happy memories became living nightmares. He wants to know how she survived. A child alone in the world is no place to be. Beginning to read as he silences his mind allowing her words to speak for themselves again.

It took until I heard the from a radio on some ledge. A name I knew well from my early childhood. As much as a scared twelve-year-old could understand. I thought… I may not be so alone after all. Planning to meet up with the blue-eyed wonder. A boy of my dreams.

You left Gotham at fourteen to study abroad. You came back to England.

That is when I had my first tranquil dream. I woke up happy well as happy as a lonely child can get. As the eager me wanted to see a friendly face. It took some time. I found that academy. Looked for you. Kept from being noticed and I saw you from a distance. You were reading under a tree. I knew in my heart that was you. My nerves of introduction than faltered as I just watched. You have no idea how much of a foolish idiot I felt to be so close yet so far. That is when I heard those two boys taunting about you being an orphan. I fell to my knees to shed some tears. In my own anguish I didn’t see what happened next, but you weren’t sitting under a tree no more and I had to leave as it seems I brought unwanted attention upon myself. A few months later you transferred out.

She can’t be talking about… No. That is just nonsense. If this is true. He remembers a girl a few yards away crying into her hands. The taunting boys irrelevant because once an administrator came to the girl’s aid the boys left him with nothing but the usual taunt of being an orphan. He hated. The feeling of anger bubbling at the surface. He would have made things worse as fighting wasn’t permitted. She saved him the turmoil of getting into trouble. Her breakdown saved him and he didn’t even realize… he doesn’t know what he would have realized. Hindsight is that he’ll never know. Not until this moment. He thought she tripped and fell. He had better things to do than watch a silly girl get pampered for having two left feet. He had real pain to deal with. His reading session helped keep him out of his own mind.

He looks up records of an earlier time that connects to her. From waking up from a coma to her fifteenth birthday there is nothing. He finds that she is reunited with her uncle. Her education a priority. Records of her schooling pop up. No immediate pictures until… until she graduated medical school at nineteen.

Zooming the picture to take in her young face. She holds a smile but the smile never makes it to her eyes. She’s a doctor. He knows there is a lot more to read but he’s enchanted. Right now, he wants to see what medical field was her studies. He is surprised that she’s really focused on traumas. Saving lives in the field. This woman is becoming a pleasant enigma. Looking down to the unread sheets he picks it up again. He wants no needs more.

Since I knew I didn’t have the gumption I never tried to approach again. You seemed to prosper, and I seem to keep to the shadows.

I just lived in my dream recalling the few memories I shared with you. A time where I would gladly follow you and my brother around like some devoted puppy. That is until you pulled one of my pigtails to get a rise from me. I was around six and you were well it didn’t matter back then. I now know you are two years older. A concept a child like me wouldn’t factor in. It’s laughable as I look back at that timeframe. The young careless children we once were… I went to rebuff your actions for pulling my hair that is when you kissed me telling my younger self that I was to be your wife. Something silly that you must have overheard from one of our parents.

He huffs. Yet again. Placing the unread sheets down. His mind overactive as he can see one of those times as clear as day. Playing with Collin on the grassy hills of their estate. A beautiful English manor on top of hill. They were being followed by a bouncy pigtailed girl. She would follow them everywhere. Since learning to walk really.

He remembers a few tidbits of his parents talking about their close-knit friends in England. Telling him that Collin had a new playmate and how he was… he was jealous. Collin was his friend. They were going to visit soon and he’d have to fight for attention. Oh, that made him jealous. That is until he saw who his enemy really was. A pink little baby. A baby her mother softly placed into his two-year-old arms. He doesn’t remember much about it. He wasn’t angry or super happy for those memories to infuse deep in his mind. He just sees her as another member to the family. A happy family consisting of two loving parents with their young children.

He huffs again. How a letter can evoke emotions he has buried deep for so long? It is unbecoming though he is reveling on wanting more. He needs to see this through. He just hopes it doesn’t make him go through old trunks to find relics of his past. That would be too much. He snickers. He doubts that will happen. He’s beyond halfway through and taking a deep calming breath he continues on.

I remember a few visits to the Americas. You let me share your bunny until the last day of my family’s visit. You gave it to me. That is when I kissed you. I heard my daddy say he’d have to keep an eye on you. That was the end for me. An innocence lost. No matter how I try I can’t recall how many weeks or months from there before I became a statistic. A home invasion that made the headlines for some time. I will never recall those moments as I guess fighting for my existence was critical and I wasn’t meant to join my family in the afterlife. There are days I am jealous that they are free while I stay behind to mourn what I lost.

I wonder if you feel the same. They call that survivor’s guilt.

Yet again, he needs to stop. He has had many moments since the years of losing his parents that has made for some rough times. A sense of dread at the past he finds all these little breaks in-between reading has him cautious. The bitter sweetness of these memories. The still have a hold on him. Will always have a hold on him. He was an only child. He recalls it perfectly as they were leaving to go home. He looked at the bunny he adored. Glanced at the girl who he shared his prize with. Telling her how much this bunny meant to him. He handed it over because he saw how much it meant to her in such a short span and how she took to the stuffed animal. A nervousness in him at losing a cherished toy. He gave it to her. In a burst of happiness, she kissed him. Just a child kissing another. No harm of it. It’s the adults who mention a future.

A future he’s heard many times just from his father. That seeing her the mention of marriage was always over their heads. So much so that he may have casually called her his wife. It doesn’t help that Collin made kissy faces towards them. Childhood innocence pure and simple. Maybe if these two families continued to live on. Life would have… Life that was taken. There is no point thinking of what ifs. Only harsh reality exists. Bruce knows this well enough. He also knows by reading this letter so far. She knows.

I suppose there should be a point to this letter. To finally say why I am here and to get it over with what I’m asking for. Is that what you’ve probably been asking before even reading this letter? Memory lane is one thing but getting to the objective is what you just want.

You are probably aware of my cousin’s passing. He was a great guy. Good businessman but even better son and heck of a great cousin. Always going out of his way to connect to me. My uncle isn’t fairing well with his only child’s death. I am the only living heir now. He needs me to settle down.

I need a husband.

Oh, oh.

That’s right, what I am asking for is the sun, moon, and stars. It’s a huge request. One that I know you’d never take lightly. One I know you won’t accept.

My uncle agrees that the likelihood that my pick would not pan through. I still needed to ask. I hope you understand. Still in that satchel is my dowry. That is preemptive of what my uncle will also bring to the table.

I know it’s a lot to ask of you. To ask you to intertwine your fate with mine. If you got this far into the letter. Thank you. If not, why would it matter. I’d never know. You can rest assure you’d be free of me.

sincerely, 

        -Amanda Alexandre

He looks at the letter. Rereading about her uncle’s misfortune. Elliot was a good man indeed. They say the good die young. He is proof.

Hearing the power to the elevator he knows Alfred is on his way down. The young boy in his charge is still at prep school. Folding back the sheets of paper in a careful manner. It seems this letter is already a huge significance that isn’t something to tread lightly.

Turning to see the leather satchel in the man’s hand as he approaches.

“Sir, I though it be best to bring it down with me.”

“Alfred, I don’t know if I should open that.”

“Why not, sir?”

“It’s actually… It’s actually her dowry.”

“Master Bruce?”

“She wants marriage. Something I am not willing to even entertain.”

“I see.” Alfred still places the old leather holding what seems a dowry down before Bruce. “I should have it sent back though maybe its contents can share some light on Ms. Alexandre. She is a mystery after all.”

“I doubt that there is anything in there that will cast an interest.”

“I would believe that sir, if you weren’t holding that letter in that protective manner you seem to do with anything you consider important.”

Bruce shakes his head but looks down to how he really is holding the envelop holding the woman’s letter. Closing his eyes as if he has been caught being an indescribable child. Why does Alfred get to play him this way?

“I don’t see why she would need to show her worldly goods. The commotion of her being at her cousin’s funeral already stirred up an estimated net worth.”

Bruce flatly states, “Her being rich isn’t the problem.”

“You did stand her up. She may not be your usual taste. There could have been a spark.”

“Alfred.”

“I will not apologize for wanting more for you.” He taps the leather sack. “Are you not a little bit curious about why she would come here. Leave her finances with a practical stranger. Think you’d take a payout.”

Bruce shaking his head. He will put this subject to rest and open this bag and show Alfred that the woman is just the run of the mill socialite that wants a certain husband.

Pulling the tied buckles off and unzipping Bruce pulls out some notebooks.

“Not what I expected.”

Bruce placing a few on the console he flips through one of them and his eyes are wide. He also can take by Alfred’s intake of air that the man is surprised. Not in the wildest imagination would they ever think that this would be the conclusion. There are also some disks.

Alfred regaining his posture he looks at the younger man and clears his throat. He pulls out an invitation he carried downstairs with this leather bag. An invitation to a grand ball hosted by the man looking to see that his niece finds a mate. Bruce had no intention in going. This invitation was sent before… before she came here personally. Does her presence and the letter persuade him? If he weren’t the vigilante maybe he would entertain the idea. Now with this satchel opened to him. Not even that is an excuse he can use. She’s not just asking to marry Bruce Wayne.

“The gathering for this invitation is in three weeks. Do you want to RSVP?”

[mtg-thrill-of-possibility]

A Reflection on Magic, the Pandemic, and the Dark Side of Arena

Hello to all the readers who may stumble upon this in the search for new Magic content. I wrote this mostly to fill a void in my life that has opened up over the last year and more of a mental health thing than some form of Magic related advice but since it is about that, I thought they’d go hand in hand. I love Magic. Or at least I have loved Magic? It’s hard to tell. Like nearly everyone on this planet, I’ve been shut off from in-person Magic and it had/has me left down. I normally volunteer at my LGS and help them organize their tournaments and judge the events and generally whatever else they ask me to do because I really love Magic. I love playing with my locals who don’t spend hundreds of dollars and craft GP/MF level decks. I love watching a group of people playing draft chaff and off beat home brews and where adults and teenagers can compete with one another on that level. I enjoy sitting off to the corner on the store’s EDH night and listening to games and drawing tokens for games in my own corner while I wait for my own games or sometimes my ow turns. I also love traveling with my wife to cities and go compete in GP/MFs where we usually both scrub out of the main event by round 3 or 4 and then hit the vendors and side events as well as explore the cities for new restaurants. I miss Welcome Days where adults bring in kids and I show them the ropes. I love meeting adults who poke their noses in and ask me “Magic is still a thing? I played that in high school” and show them the changes. I can still remember the Theros Beyond Death prerelease last year and thought how much fun it was to not work the event for once and just play. And looking back, boy am I glad I entered the THB prerelease.

February was the start of the downturn. Our EDH night was slightly less full but I just figured it was due to the weather since the winter usually has a downturn in the attendance for every event. But then the rotating cast of 10-15 FNM players was 6; Pioneer on Saturday had 3. The next week, the EDH crowd was down to from the usual 6-8 pods to 2. FNM and Pioneer failed to fire. The news that COVID-19 was starting to creep into the Midwest prompted me to ask the store what precautions we wanted to take and when we were going to stop in general.

I work in chemical research and I have a background in pharmaceuticals and once (or twice) studied the MCATs and considered going to med school. I was definitely concerned but in February it hadn’t reached my state (yet) and I wanted the store to be ready for the imminent shutdown and continued downtick in participation (my LGS and I had been strategizing how to move up in events and the store ranking on the WPN). But it’s a red state. Science denial must be a recessive trait that the Midwest incorporated into its identity for a long time and I was told that I had some freedom but to not go crazy. I thought I’m a volunteer. I’m not spending what little money I have on stuff for you guys. So, I did the best thing I could think of for free, I started a Discord server. I was really excited at the prospect. I had just bought a webcam in case my workplace started working from home and thought how cool it would be to be able to organize events in Arena and talk through Discord when the store wasn’t available. I asked if we could hang up a flyer and tell all the Magic customers that they continue with tournaments and Magic if they joined the Discord I set up in the store’s name.

My LGS asked how much this was going to cost them and I said exactly as much as it costs them now if not a little less since we don’t need the store’s utilities or a cashier behind the counter in the after hours to work the tournament. They were happy and I got the greenlight. Things worked okay at first. Those with Arena accounts showed for a few weeks. Others I knew were interested were convinced that we were overly sensitive to the virus and FNMs continued to limp along with 4-6 people until everything ground down to a halt.

Come mid-March, COVID had finally reached the state and the city. Cases were light, a few hundred people tested each day, single digit cases detected but I again was worried. My workplace had already begun educating everyone on how to wash their hands properly and disinfect every surface and everyone was issued a bleach spray bottle with their name and a serial number on it. While the mayor and governor hadn’t ordered a shutdown yet, I advised strongly that the store go ahead and if they wanted to continue that I wouldn’t be there to assist until the curve was sufficiently flattened.

I’m not sure why but they trusted me and listened. I was glad and I pushed again for people to join the Discord server. Players were reluctant but I assured them that this may be the future for some time and if they get on now, they can still get the Ravnica intro quests and start building up their Arena collections. I got more on my side, we had 8-10 and got them all to try and hook anyone else they knew to join us. However, by the end of March, my workplace had moved to 100% virtual and with my extra time, I had begun to unwittingly shift the power dynamic in the store by accident. You see, I really love Magic. I was now working from home for a job that required me to have direct physical access to hundreds of thousands of dollars or sensitive equipment that need recertification when they get moved 12 inches down a work bench and dangerous chemicals I don’t want near me unless I know there’s an inspected chemical shower nearby. When the campus shut down, I got very bored. I did what research I could from my home portal, attended virtual conferences and webinars every day, but I had tons of down time. That meant watching my wife play Animal Crossing, playing with my dogs, marathon sessions of Civilization but most crucially, I also began grinding Arena.

My local meta had been defined by the understanding that none of us were really Arena players. I had played when the Kaladesh and Amonkhet closed betas were happening, but I was turned off by the fact that all my playing of those formats amounted to nothing when it launched with Ixalan and I would start from square one. Everyone in the group typically shied away from tier 1 tournament decks because to all of us, it was more fun to goof around with RG auras and Tilonalli’s Summoner decks than it was to grind Esper Hero or the new Uro decks. And the limitation that everyone didn’t have all the shocklands meant we were all playing on roughly the same card pools with some variation due to our play styles. So when I suggested we all start playing Arena to replace the tournaments, it worked because it meant we all played the same dumb decks we’d play in person with a few exceptions of having less than perfect mana bases.

But I would find myself grinding Arena everyday where my friends and locals were not. Even though I jumped into Arena at mid-March, I finished the Theros Beyond Death mastery at level 78 when Ikoria began to creep around the corner. I had just begun to get back into Magic when Fate Reforged hit and didn’t realize how much I love wedge color alignments over shards but boy did I love Abzan in Khans standard and now I was in love with Abzan again in Ikoria standard. Grinding the way I did meant I drafted most afternoons for the first month of Ikoria (and forced Temur every time) and started climbing the ranked ladder in the evenings. Ikoria would also mark the first time I spent money on Arena. I’m notoriously spend-thrift in video games and anything you can free-to-play I do religiously because you shouldn’t make a game grindable over the course of years if you give me that option. But drafting took gems and I really love drafting but most people at my LGS are too concerned about rares than learning to do it properly and a lot of younger players feel lost when I draft a zero rare deck and go 4-0 and collect my prizes. By the end of April, I would reach Platinum in constructed and Gold in limited. But now my LGS was far less inclined to play with me. I didn’t brag about any of my rankings but the skill disparity had begun to creep in as well as the difference in our collections. Having played so much Arena, I could see the tells the software gives away that paper Magic doesn’t. I learned to read when the game would hang up on the beginning of combat and end steps because they’re holding potential responses. I began to do the full control shortcut to bluff counter spells and removal. In paper Magic, if my opponent would sequence things wrong or tap their mana wrong, we’d make jokes and rewind it because it’s one of those human errors that we all make and redo it the right way.

But Arena was different; some learned the hard way to not trust the auto-tapper, some didn’t realize that the way they normally stack triggers in paper is backwards and too late to fix after a spell or ability resolved. And I couldn’t help them. And I let them make their mistakes because I can’t change Arena. If they use the auto-tapper and they realize that Arena doesn’t tap the Castle Vantress even though they couldn’t activate it anyway and they lose a dual source, I couldn’t help them. If they have the lethal Explosion in hand but forgot to hit Control in their second main so they can stack the Wilderness Reclamation triggers in their end step, I don’t concede out of pity.

In May, I try and keep the Magic going by suggesting that we shift the format to a draft limited but they’re unconvinced of the website that allows you to simulate an 8-person draft and then import the drafted card lists to Arena. Why? Because they don’t have the cards already and I’ve changed the dynamic. They know I’m much more skilled at Arena and Ikoria drafting. The news has also been reporting that the curve was flattening, and our state was lifting restrictions on gatherings. They want to play EDH and paper Magic, not this digital intangible game. I reluctantly agree but keep grinding on Arena anyway. My friends didn’t want to play Magic on Arena and I couldn’t understand why. I was getting burned out on drafting at this point and the drafts were harder to fire off a month and a half later, work was returning on a limited schedule where I was onsite 75% and virtual 25%, it really did seem like things were returning to normal.

In June I finish the Ikoria mastery and at this point my wife had begun to show more interest in playing on Arena and trying to get her account a little more stocked since our normal paper system is I aggregate everything we typically need and I make her desired deck and hand it off to her to wreck people on FNM but since I didn’t have to judge, I got to play and we couldn’t both play from my account at the same time. I casually start hers and I get the wild hair that maybe I should make a loaner account in the store’s name and if anyone says they don’t have the cards, they can borrow the store’s account for the tournament. I make the account but put the pipe dream on hold when Wizards announces that in-store play can resume with the Core 2021 prerelease. I could read between the lines and see that the curve was trending the wrong way and thought it was a bad idea but at my insistence, everyone would have to wear a mask at all times and hand sanitizer was available every 15 feet and the store had lots of space for players to spread out. The turnout was low which helped as well, and I had everyone who showed up at least aware that I was trying to keep the Discord going and that in case there’s another shutdown that there was another avenue for them.

Well, I got my wish because within a week of the launch of Core 2021, my state had regressed, and cases were exploding and gathering restrictions were sent back in place. Shortly after that, Wizards suspended in-store play again and with that I created the store’s Arena account. At the time, things were pretty good. The locals weren’t playing as much and my server was still fairly empty but most of the Magic Twitch community I interacted with had strongly adjusted to the new paradigm. EDH streaming was commonplace, I had my new Arena account to focus on building up as well as my own. Pro level events and Opens were being held on Arena and the expansion of Amonkhet Remastered gave me hope that Magic was on the mend. But I also think it was with Core 2021 that things started to slide into the negative for me. Grinding the second account was frustrating me a lot. The lack of human interaction was tilting me out for no reason. Some days the server would have me wait a whole minute (the horror?!) for a game and then my opponent would be the world’s slowest red player where everything seemed delayed. There would strings of games I would play where I couldn’t get a third land drop after a mull to 4 and other times where I’d flood out and would have won if it weren’t for generic whiny reason why everyone says they lose.

Maybe it was when I began to see that Arena is not Magic the Gathering as much as it is a video game that it began to really sour on me. For those of you who don’t play a lot of Arena and instead interact with humans over webcams is that Arena is designed for you to not play off beat home brews except in direct challenges with your friends. The game is meant for you to play the best combination of 75 cards and for you to help it machine learn through millions of matches what is and what is not the correct play pattern based on the available information you have. It wants you to play the very best decks in a format against the other best decks. I started to see this in Ikora standard when decks would scoop if you were on the play and went turn 2 Agonizing Remorse. Decks were and still are so linear that they can’t handle that kind of disruption or it’s a matter of the players know it’s faster to accumulate wins by scooping than grinding out a long game.

If you need evidence of whether or not this is true, you should play Arena now and see how often people scoop against the double Ruin Crab opener with a Fabled Passage back-to-back. Or if an opponent against your Lurrus Auras deck will time out when they know they can’t win. In paper Magic, when you drive 4 hours to a major venue, pay your entry fee, you never see your opponent rage scoop unless it’s Legacy and you know what your opponent’s on and you mull to zero so you can see what’s in their deck. You call a judge to your table if they start stalling. Nothing is more annoying that an opponent spamming “Good Game” at you through a match when it’s obvious that you’re not killing them that turn but they’re empty handed and have nothing relevant on board.

I’ll admit myself that what my wife calls “Wizard Chores” for the Daily quests, if I’m 1 red spell short of finishing a quest, I’ll log in for one more game and Boulder Dash my opponent’s creature or cast Shock to face and immediately scoop. Who is that helping? I’d spend the week at work in my down times thinking about what dumb cards I hadn’t played with from a set, start making a list, furiously find the cards on a Friday afternoon and grab dinner with the wife and then race to my LGS for FNM.  Magic used to be something I only got to do twice a week with people in a shared setting and we’d unroll our playmats, shuffle up our jank, and laugh and generally have a good time for three to four hours. With Magic at my fingertips, Arena is a distillation of efficiency at spell slinging combined with the minor rewards system we’ve come to recognize the free-to-play traps to “encourage” us to play different things. If I want to play 100 matches in a day, all I need to do is sit at my computer long enough. If I want to play my old jank on Arena, I can’t even count on the Casual play channel to help since it’s always filled with people with 55 of the 60 cards that make the best deck learning how to play before they commit the wild cards for the deck.

Zendikar Rising has been a pretty dark point for everyone on Arena I believe. It seems like a lifetime ago that Omnath was printed and that I had immediately cashed in four mythic rare wildcards for the deck I would get to play with on Arena for 2 weeks before Wizards realized their mistake. Honestly before I had started writing this in the week before Kaldheim will hit Arena, I forgot that Omnath was part of the most recent set as all I can remember Zendikar Rising giving us is the extremely irritating Ruin Crab and Soaring Thought Thief. The few locals I had left on my Discaord server when ZNR released had lost interest in Arena since they enjoyed the Ravnica standard that was rotating out and Pioneer was not yet available for Arena. I’ve encouraged nearly everyone I know from my LGS to buy webcams since October given that the current state of the COVID world is not likely to go away and the new culture and channels that have opened up in the world to fill the void of EDH has some level of benefit even when in-person play resumes. Not many people play and I’ll search for an occasional game on the official Discord when the craving strikes. Some of my friends have been taking advantage of the webcam world and started playing older formats with me over webcam such as Pioneer and Modern to rekindle their love for Magic and the hope that we can start playing tournaments over webcam. Finishing up the ZNR mastery passes on my two accounts and my wife’s account has been giving me a much-needed break from Arena and honestly, it’s probably done the most to lift my spirits.

I’ve been taking a lot more time to reflect on why I love Magic and I plan on doing in the future. The first thing I know I’m going to do and stick to is not get a Mastery Pass for mt LGS store’s account. They don’t pay for all the work I put into the one already grinding multiple accounts is not good for my mental well-being. The second thing I know I am going to do is relearn how to have fun in Magic again. Not really hinted at in this article so far is the fact I love the art in Magic and I’m often inspired by my own crazy mind to illustrate my own works or reimagine my favorite cards with my own art. Since the release of Rise of Skywalker, I had been working on a personal project of creating a second expansion to the largely underground Star Wars the Gathering card game and ended up making 200 unique, draftable cards. I wouldn’t call myself an artist because I’m still learning and I don’t necessarily aspire to an artist but I would love to improve my skills and one day make a piece that’s so good someone wants on a card. Over the last two years, I’ve been deeply jealous of how amazing and hard working the Magic cosplayers are and that I should put my art to good use and make my own cosplays. And then there’s the playing of Magic. I miss the Gathering part of Magic. So this brings us to the bedrock of this piece. I hope to continue this blog steadily as time moves forward. I’m rarely ever satisfied or have my attention on any one project for too long but 2021 is a new year. And I hope that the title is a hint to the future. Whatever it is; whether it’s deck construction, art alters, or Magic cosplay, story, general discussion, that’s what I’m here for. It’s the Thrill of what I might work on next and I promise because I’m terrible right now at doing so, I’ll be sure to take pictures and try and stream when I can to keep myself honest about the whole deal. I hope you’ll all join me or at least join the Discord to yell at me.

[sr-023]

Feeling the Big Decay  v 0.6

Despite her position of seniority within Valorant it’s rare that Viper leads operations in the field.

Command naturally falls to Brimstone, and in his absence they’re seldom without one of Sage’s calm and steady judgement, Cypher’s peerless intelligence or Breach’s hard-hitting tactics and bullish confidence to pick up the slack. There’s enough accumulated experience and competence between them to allow Valorant’s co-founder to consolidate her stranglehold on R&D, and Viper all too gladly leaves them to divvy out the grunt work. Why should she waste her efforts on trivial matters that someone else can handle?

It takes something more exceptional to draw her onto the battlefield: a desire to document and further refine her latest toxins; close-quarters engagements that demand her ability to clear a room at minimal personal risk, third-parties more receptive to those like herself and Reyna than their more clean-cut peers. Atlas.

Today it is Atlas, and so, with Brimstone offering support from reserve, she leads.

---

Smoke rising from the blacksite is still high on the horizon even though they’ve left it long behind. Raze’s work is messy in its artistry but undeniably effective, and any rebuilding effort is bound to be costly, slow. That enough of their records survived the fireworks to give Cypher something worth poring over is just the cherry on top. It’s about as ‘clean’ an operation as one can hope for with the Brazilian on the team, and that’s notable enough to be a thing worth celebrating. Small wonder then that Brimstone caved and let her choose the in-flight soundtrack for the journey home.

Her music thunders through the hold - Se o papo é racista, dedo médio, fuck you – almost loud enough to have Viper gritting her teeth behind her mask. There’s no escape from the noise even far back by the cargo doors, and were she not well acquainted with working under extreme duress it would be all but insufferable. If anything it’s worse than the chaos of the battlefield. At least there she’d have objectives, a gun in her hand, and licence to give someone else a short sharp splitting headache.

Viper slips her bag out from beneath her chair, takes out her toolkit and sets to tinkering with her emitters. She knows well enough that they’re in no need of maintenance but it isn’t necessity guiding her hand. It’s a simple rote activity, calming in its familiarity, and between it and the steady rattle of breath through her respirator she slowly lets the world fall away.

Perhaps it’s no surprise then that she doesn’t even notice Brimstone’s approach until his steel-toed boots enter her vision.

“Viper. This a good time?”

Warm as ever, but it doesn’t take a genius to recognise that he expects to be heard out. She’s about the last person anyone would turn to for small talk.

Viper leaves him hanging. Her work is delicate and she can hardly down tools a moment’s notice. She makes sure that everything is properly secured before looking up, considering, and finally directing him to the seat adjacent with a slight flick of her head.

Though he sits himself down heavily, Brimstone keeps his arm tucked in to offer her a wider berth. He glances to the front of the plane, to where Phoenix, Raze and Jett have set themselves up with a deck of cards, a crate for a makeshift table, and a few cans of ungodly cheap soda, and in that instant he wears all his years and more. He sinks further back into his seat with a sigh. It’s more a sound of satisfaction than exhaustion.

“Young blood did good today,” he declares, leaning a little Viper’s way. “Sometimes I wonder whether they’re even listening in the briefings, but then they go and find a way to surprise me. Maybe it comes with being Radiants; give someone an arsenal like that and they’ll always be one step ahead even if they don’t take the time to look before they leap. Not much normies like us can do against that kind of firepower. Not when they don’t even see them coming.”

Brimstone huffs a dry little laugh. “Wouldn’t think they used to be civvies, or that Raze was home taught. Would’ve been glad to have her in...”

The words die on his lips as he turns to find acid-green eyes boring through him. At some point during his little spiel Viper has slipped her respirator free and now it hangs loose and dead around her collarbone. Even now he still can’t help but let his eyes flit down to her sharp jawline, almost as if it’s still a surprise to him that there’s but mortal flesh and blood behind that mask. Her lips are tight and thin and anything but amused by his rambling.

“Spare me the sentimentality, old man. We both know you’re not here to play proud parent.”

Guilty as charged, Brimstone can only offer her a tired smile. As long as he’s known her Sabine has never had never had much patience for anything that cuts into her valuable brooding time.

“If that’s how you want it” he cedes. A click of the tongue. “Today was your op: your plan, your command. You’ve heard enough of what I think of the newbies, so give me your review. I want to hear it from someone I know won’t go soft on them just for putting on a good show.”

There’s a clear scepticism in the look Viper gives him, like she’s still searching for some ulterior motive behind the question. And then there isn’t. The tension doesn’t fully leave her – it never seems to – but she scoffs and lets her arms hang a little looser at her side. “Where to start?”

“As one they’re arrogant. Jett thinks she’s fast enough to always take the first shot, and one day she’s going to be dead wrong. We need her on a leash. Phoenix believes his own hype. He considers his abilities an excuse to show off because no one mistake will keep him down. They’ll both take any foolish chance you let them, and when they come out alive they’ll laugh off any lessons they should have learned. Idiots with the power of gods.”

“As for Raze, calling her a liability would be too kind. She was more of a threat than anything Atlas could bring against us - no subtlety or sense of self-preservation.” She leans forward to look past him at the three down the other end of the dropship, and while her expression doesn’t exactly sour Viper hardly looks pleased with what she sees. Something like scorn finds her tone. “You should be glad my toxins scare them more than bullets. The same walls that screen their flanks keep them from taking stupid risks. None of them understand the value of patience and care.”

She leans back and can’t help but bristle just a little at how closely Brimstone is watching her. If anything she’s said has left any real impression then it doesn’t seem to have reached his face, but Viper knows him more than well enough to sense the wheels turning. After a moment he shrugs her words off.

“That may be so, but you made it back without a scratch. Shows what a firm hand can do with that raw talent. Give them time and you’ll-”

“Save it,” she cuts in coldly. “This mission was nothing. I could have handled it myself if you had only authorised it.”

He levels her with his gaze. “You know that was never on the table. Not after Venice.”

It’s enough to immediately get her back up.

That operation is a still-raw wound, one that has been slow to heal even with their tacit agreement to leave it well alone. Certainly it marked Valorant’s first true high profile failure, a city ‘saved’ in only the loosest of terms, but beyond that it forced those long-buried faults to the surface and exposed the cracks in their show of unified purpose. That the true fault for that particular catastrophe lies elsewhere hardly matters. Brimstone hasn’t forgiven her and Viper has yet to show even a sliver of remorse.

[inheritedfang]

My Opinions on Dynasty Warriors Characters #1: Ding Feng

"When I write poetry, my heart is at ease, like a clear stream flowing through the mountains."

I absolutely love Ding Feng. He’s one of my favourite members of the Wu cast, which for me is a hard competition to beat, and in general he’s one of the more standout characters in the game. However, it actually took me a long time to come round to liking him, for various reasons that I’ll get to. Let’s start with his design.

Ding Feng’s appearance alerts you to one thing right away: he’s powerful beyond belief, he strikes terror into the hearts of the most stalwart of men, and he’s absolutely bloody colossal. The Wiki lists his height as 210 centimetres or 6’11”, a height that dwarfs basically everybody. But honestly this is exactly what pushed me away from him at first. I’m not sure why, but I’ve never been interested in characters who are hulking titans of muscle, tearing their way through battlefields effortlessly. I can definitely see the appeal, but it was never for me. So yes, I took Ding Feng at face value, judging him before he even had a chance to show off what kind of character he was. Based on most of Koei’s other characters, I can’t say I was expecting there to be much beneath the surface.

Needless to say, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

I’m going to try to avoid going into the historical side of these characters because as much as I think I know, I’d probably just make a fool of myself, however it was partly what I’d read about Ding Feng that finally got me to start paying more attention to him, and I have to say, Koei seems to have done a pretty good job with him. Other than just that, though, it was also Ambition Mode in 8 that got me interested in him. Yeah, that one strange side mode that barely anyone talks about started my interest in one of my favourite characters. Go figure.

I blitzed through the first half of Ambition Mode with Lu Xun (already having him at near level 150 with his 6 star weapon), but when it came to the second half, I decided to go in with Zhou Tai. Basically for those who’ve never gone into Ambition Mode (I don’t blame you, it’s not particularly interesting outside of just being bored of the Story modes), in the first half you collect officers, fame and materials to build up your palace to invite the Emperor to your kingdom. In the second half, a false Emperor appears, and most of your officers leave excluding a few that seem to be set depending on the character you pick. I picked Zhou Tai, and the officers I was left with were Sun Quan, Lianshi and of course, Ding Feng. He was automatically set as the Commander who I’d have to protect in each mission, so he was there from the beginning right up until the end, and the interactions with him around the village tipped me off to there being something more interesting about him.

Despite how terrifying he seems, he’s a very poetic, eloquent person, and he shows it through just about every single sentence he utters. As someone who writes poetry themselves, it’s a very enjoyable trait to me. I suppose the best way I can put it is that while I don’t have the strength to keep up with someone like Sun Ce and those like Lu Su would dance circles around me with strategy and intelligence, I feel I could sit down with Ding Feng and talk poetry with him and be completely comfortable. It’s endearing, and it’s always nice to have a character you can connect with in a game about magic and Ancient Chinese mass murder. There are other characters that I’m endeared to because of similarities they share with me, but none quite connect with me the same way Ding Feng does. Honestly, I’d love it if they did some sort of promotional material that was made up of poems Ding Feng had written on the events he’d lived through during his time serving Wu. Koei would never do it, but Ding Feng may have experienced a lot of Wu’s major battles, so hearing his perspective on the events in poetry would be incredibly cool to read. Maybe that’s something I should work on myself.

His voice acting is fine. The VA does a good job at the hulking monster side of Ding Feng, but I’d personally prefer it if he sounded a bit softer to better represent the poetic side of him. Further on the subject on things I’m mixed on, his weapon doesn’t do a lot for me either. It’s definitely a fun moveset, but like some other weapons a few of the moves have some oddly awkward animations that just make the weapon less satisfying (Pang De’s mace especially comes to mind). I can say that I love his mounted heavy attack, though. That thing carves through peons as if they were nothing, especially if you’re atop Red Hare, or a different horse with the penetrate skill. 

If there’s one thing I’d definitely want changed, it’s how much he interacts with the other members of Wu. He has some nice interactions that show his deep respect and trust for those around him, but there aren’t many characters who he’s shown to have proper conversations with. He really needs some friendships to help build up his character, and considering how unique he is, it’d be great to see him bring out different sides of the characters around him that we don’t often see. If Koei wanted to go even further, they should add some figures from later Wu for him to interact with him. I’m sure it’d please a lot of people, me included, and would help the Jin stages against Wu be less of just fighting Ding Feng and the NPCs.

Overall, despite my initial dislike for his design, I think all his aspects come together to form one of the more unique characters in the roster. While there are certainly those who share the brutish strength he has and those who share the gentle eloquence he has, none of them talk or act quite like him. I’m always interested to hear what he’s about to say next; what expressive words he’s going to string together. I love this tall, tall man.