#i should write that this season. as a treat

[chevelleneech]

Both Buck/Tommy and Buddie shippers are being so dramatic about everything.

On one hand, you have people acting like Buck and Tommy is written in the stars and anyone who dislikes them are being unjust and hateful. On the other, you have people acting as if Buck can’t possibly be in a relationship with a man who isn’t Eddie, and claiming he can is somehow based in racism and hatred of Eddie.

Neither is true! The problem is that prior to 7x04, Evan Buckley was not a canon queer character. He was viewed that way by fans and Oliver Stark was all for it, but that does not change the actual canon history of the character. Therefore, the writers can only fix what they feel fits the current story. They can retcon a few things and so on, but both sides are acting like they’re right, and it makes no sense.

Yes, Buddie shippers have Oliver and Ryan on their side for the most part. Yes, Oliver believes Buck has been queer all along and he thinks a lot of the headcanons about his character’s reaction to things make sense, but he is NOT saying it’s all true. He agrees Buck was likely experiencing some jealousy when Eddie first showed up, but that does not mean Tim Minear is going to make that theory canon. It’s fans and Oliver who think it, but that does not equal canon.

As well, with things being slightly retconned or adjusted to fit the story… Tommy is obviously no longer an asshole by proximity. He was rude to Hen and Chim, but we’ve seen he him interact with the two of them since in civil ways. We know Chim thinks he’s cool. Continuing to demand he apologize on screen is a waste of time. It was five seasons ago, and the story had to change to fit Tim bringing his character back. It happens.

As for Buck/Tommy shippers, y’all have got to get off the high horse of Possibility. At the moment, there are so many ways their relationship can go, and the only reason you all are so high and mighty about it, is because you’re technically never going to be wrong until you’re wrong. Which is annoying.

Yes, Tim could choose to have Tommy stick around for another season. Yeah, Buck and Tommy could be endgame. Yeah, Buck and Tommy could… any and everything is possible, but acting as if Tommy is the love of Buck’s life and deserves fan devotion is crazy. Don’t get me wrong, I like the character. He seems nice if a little cocky, but I like that. I like that he’s written as a grown man who, even though he’s changed, still has a little bit of asshole in him.

Because yes, what he did to Buck on their first date was rude. He didn’t explain anything and left him standing outside the restaurant as if he hadn’t just told him he’s never dated a man before, and as if they hadn’t just run into his best friend. It was a dick move. However, it’s also kinda realistic. So I dug it, but that’s also all we really know about him.

Tommy is an army vet, flies helicopters, was a firefighter, and is gay. Which he struggled to come to terms with, and can be a dick. The way y’all treating him like a savior is insane. Y’all are trying to rub it in people’s face that his relationship with Buck is canon while Buddie isn’t, and I don’t understand that. Buck wasn’t even bisexual three episodes ago, so where is this higher than thou attitude even coming from?

The only thing people should be focused on is the fact that Buck is now canonically bisexual. Tim liked the idea and Oliver loved it, so they finally made it happen. Now, his story has even more potential. I’d even go so far as to say season 7 is going to be a cleaning and re-establishing of all the characters, because so many of them feel a little different.

We’ve got bi!Buck, meaning we’ll get to see him in one or more relationships that he isn’t used to being in. We’ve got a new actor playing Harry, and he’s older, meaning they’re going to have to write to his strengths and build a storyline there that is more mature. Bobby and Athena almost died together for real for real, thus hopefully we’ll get to see their relationship evolve and what if it changes them in any way. Chim and Maddie are finally getting married, so we get to see them kickstart a new chapter together. Hen and Karen have a new child, which will hopefully bring them more storylines and hijinks as a family. And Eddie is dealing with forcing himself to accept a relationship he may not even want to be in. And he’s aware this time, which could result in him ignoring his fears or bowing out, then having to face what bowing out means.

Point is, there is no reason for all this drama.

Buddie is not guaranteed just because it is a popular want for fans, and an accepted theory by the actors and showrunner. They’ve all said it has to fit the overall story without forcibly gearing the writing in that direction. Which means it could happen two episodes from now or two seasons from now. We just have to wait and see.

At the same time, Buck and Tommy are not an established couple yet. They’re going on their second date, and it’s been said Tommy isn’t in the last few episodes of the season. So it’s possible he and Buck are still together, but Lou isn’t a series regular nor regular recurring, so he’s just not contracted to be on set. Which is fine, but acting like a quick breakup is also bad storytelling is ridiculous.

Fans have hated Buck’s relationships with women from the jump, and him breaking up fast isn’t exactly new. So if it happens with the first man he dates… okay. Tommy can become more than a stepping stone, but the writers aren’t obligated to make his first experience with a man something deep and profound. It can be fun and eye-opening and still have mattered, even if it ends fast.

Y’all have got to let the stories play out, and not scream bloody murder if your headcanon doesn’t become canon. Because truth be told, Buck being canon bi is the biggest flex of fan service I’ve ever seen, even if I think it adds to the depth of him. So I can’t imagine how difficult it is to be sure not to continue giving that same group of fans everything they want outright, when there’s so much more story to unfold.

Which means they can’t just make Tommy the love of Buck’s life because Buck/Tommy fans have ditched Buddie or were never Buddie shippers, and want to be right. But they also can’t have Eddie come out and he and Buck start dating, because Buddie shippers have waited five seasons. Just wait to see what happens, and in the meantime, enjoy watching Buck discover more of himself. With Tommy as his current love interest, and Eddie as his best friend.

[pettyprocrastination]

ngl but i think if a kid wrote a letter to santa about wanting an abusive family member out of the house he’d slyly send the letter down some little magical mail chute and itd end up in hell where krampus would read it and then show up to that house on christmas eve to give that kid a nice new bike and a teddy bear under their tree before dragging their peice of shit dad down to the underworld for eternal torture. 

[bottombaron]

oh ok so its the usual no-homo bullshit you always hear, good to know.

[tcfactory]

Please imagine:

[5k words of an outline for a big Bingge centric AU, mentioned QiJiu and MoShang and potentially one-sided BingQiJiu. Time travel, fix-it(?)

Warning for canon typical child abuse and torture, mention of sexual abuse, minor mention of cannibalism, Bingge is his own warning let’s be real]

Binghe goes insane from Xin Mo and abandons his humanity completely, then devolves further into a rabid beast until Mobei and the Wives all work together to put him down. Xin Mo is so entangled in him that it can’t exist past its host anymore, so it unleashes all that it has left to prevent Binghe’s death.

That’s when the reset happens.

It’s like coming back from the brink, when your head breaks the water and the dark recedes from the edge of your vision as air fills your lungs. Sanity is a cold thing when surfacing from the depths of madness, but it keeps the warm animal-hunger of bloodlust and beastly instinct on the edges of his consciousness and that’s fine.

He’s a child again when he regains conscious thought, standing in front of the tea set, about to make that first cup of tea for his future Shizun, and he can’t afford to be a beast right now. There’s a part of him that feels different, the parts that Xin Mo devoured alongside his sanity have now been returned to him, soft and squishy and human. It’s strange, coming back to humanity after so long - how long? Decades? Centuries? Time has lost all meaning to a beast that could hunt and breed whenever it pleased.

Binghe doesn’t remember how to make tea. He’s not certain he ever knew at this age, but the beast in him recoils at the memory of scalding tea dumped on his head. He looks around, as subtle as he can, to find something that might help him avoid that. Shen Qingqiu is talking to Ming Fan, rattling off the necessities they need to provide the first new disciple since Ming Fan became head disciple, but Binghe can feel the man’s attention on him. Shen Qingqiu has noticed his hesitation and he’s waiting to see what Binghe is going to do next. There’s no help to be had there.

Ning Yingying lurks around, too curious of the new shidi to stay away, and Shizun indulges her as long as she stays close enough that he can track her. She would know how to make tea. She has always been one of his smartest wives - she made the array that pinned him down and stripped him of fang and claw and poison so Mobei Jun could shove portals under his skin, drain him of his healing blood and finally unmake him.

It was an agonizing way to die. He deserved all of it and more.

When it seems like an opportune moment he quietly asks Yingying shijie how to make tea fit for their Shizun. She pretends to tie his hair for him - shidi can barely see through this fluff, this won’t do, here’s how you tie it properly - and tells him the instructions in a whisper so quiet even he can barely hear it. 

Shen Qingqiu notices, of course he does, but he pretends that he doesn’t. The tea is not great, but it’s palatable and Shen Qingqiu drinks all of it while he runs Binghe through the rules of the peak and the expectations placed on a scholarly disciple of Qing Jing. It’s such a jarring difference from the first time when he got sent away right after the tea incident that he can’t help but drift in his chaotically spinning thoughts instead of listening. This is not the kind Shizun, he thinks. So why did the tea make such a big difference? (Years later Yue Qingyuan happily tells him how he blackmailed one of the rich boys into showing him how to make tea for his own peak’s tea ceremony because he didn’t trust the adults enough to ask and couldn’t afford to seem lesser than those of higher birth and Binghe finally Gets It.)

His thoughts are interrupted when Ming Fan arrives and shoves the ‘new disciple care package’ in his arms. Binghe is still not used to being tiny again, so he tries to hold all of it like he would as an adult and can’t, dropping his manual and the writing kit in the process. Yingying immediately hops to pick it all up, scolding their shixiong for bullying the new shidi while Shen Qingqiu watches with a cold mask of indifference.

The manual has fallen open and it gives her pause when she picks it up. “Shizun, I don’t think this manual is right.” Shen Qingqiu says nothing, but he takes it from her and glances at the pages.

Binghe is certain that he’s the only one who notices how Shizun’s hold on the book tightens in anger until his fingers turn white. “It’s an older manual,” he says, neither voice nor expression giving away the rage he must feel to grip the book so tight. Luo Binghe knows even his smallest tells and the man is seething. “Go to the library pavilion and pick up the proper edition for your shidi. Dismissed!”

It’s a few days later when Binghe is trying to find a good spot in the library to practice his calligraphy - he knows how to write, in theory, but he forgot so many of these mundane little rituals in his madness that he needs to refresh the memory - when he walks into the range of a silencing array. It’s obviously a fluke that it extends into the corridor, but if Binghe puts his ear to the wall he can clearly hear Shen Qingqiu rage at his hallmasters and the head of the library pavilion because of the manual. The fake, harmful cultivation manual, one of many that have ruined and killed lonely disciples before, the ones who didn’t have friends or other support to notice that something was wrong.

Manuals Shen Qingqiu has ordered removed and destroyed when he became peak lord. Orders that the hallmasters ignored. Does Peak Lord Shen think they have the time to waste on something like this when the peak is already short staffed? There are more important parts of the collection to maintain than the beginner manuals - the only ones who would ever fall prey to the false manuals anyway are the charity cases, and they are not the ones who fund the scholarly peak. Really, this wouldn’t even be an issue at all if Shen Qingqiu didn’t let Liu Qingge goad him into taking on a dirty beggar child. Don’t they all know that things crawling in the dirt are never worth the trouble? Once filth, always filth.

Luo Binghe is almost bowled over when Shen Qingqiu storms out of the meeting, blind to his environment. The man’s qi roils, razor sharp like shattered glass, his anger driving him to the cusp of a qi deviation. Binghe has a hunch that whatever this is about, it’s not about him. Shizun would not be so angry on his behalf.

He could never figure out why the man mistreated him, could never break Shen Qingqiu open enough to get the answer he needed. This feels like an opportunity, a chance to unravel this puzzle, and it tickles his instincts to have something to chase, to press his nose to the trail and hunt.

So he starts to sniff around. People overlook children so easily, it’s almost effortless how he finds piece after piece. He learns that the people on the peak - the cultivators from his generation in particular, the pavilion overseers and the hallmasters - don’t respect Shen Qingqiu and often undermine his authority when he’s not there to personally force them to adhere to his standards. There’s an especially tense period every time after the Peak Lord leaves for the city - for the brothel, they say, to drown in his lust or to use some hapless girl as a cauldron and bolster his own mediocre cultivation - when they seem especially bold, holding his indulgence over his head like a finely balanced sword.

He learns from Yingying that he’s the first disciple to get into the peak through the selection for the last decade. All the other disciples are young masters and scholarly prodigies who come recommended by their mentors. They don’t need their Shizun’s encouragement to try and bully Binghe, even when he’s not rolling over like he did in his first life. He fights back, tooth and nail, a rabid little thing that leaves scratches and bruises on anyone who would provoke him and he doesn’t have to worry about sleeping in the woodshed because more often than not the dormitory overseers isolate him from the others as a form of punishment.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t interfere. He looks with the same disdain at both perpetrators and victim, bruised black and blue, and forbids them from leaving the peak until they are presentable again. It’s not until a particularly bad fight when Binghe takes a bite out of one of them, digging his teeth into a soft cheek and swallowing both the bloody chunk and the screams of terror with dark satisfaction, that Shizun’s hand is forced. Binghe is thrown into solitary confinement until the boy’s parents can come and demand fitting punishment for permanently disfiguring the rich brat. Binghe is grateful for these few days of isolation. He needs them to shackle the instincts screaming for blood, to calm his demon side that’s straining against his seals. It wasn’t like this the first time, but he came back as a beast in a boy’s skin so it’s not surprising.

He puts on the face of a lamb when they lead him outside, to the cold morning light and then to the punishment hall. The boy’s parents - a high-ranking official in the mortal Emperor’s court and his lady wife - look at him like he’s less than dirt, but there’s a glint of cruel satisfaction in their eyes when the stone faced Shen Qingqiu announces his punishment: by their demand, Binghe is to receive ten lashes with the discipline whip, or fewer if he passes out.

The Sect Leader came to oversee the punishment and the horror on his gentle face is obvious to all. The disciple whip is a cruel thing, one that can cripple even advanced cultivators, and will set Binghe’s cultivation back by years if it doesn’t ruin it altogether. The Sect Leader gives Shen Qingqiu a pleading look and Binghe lifts his head to tell him not to bother - when could Yue Qingyuan ever influence Shen Qingqiu for the better? - so he catches the Sect Leader’s expression when Shen Qingqiu flicks the case open and takes out the whip. Just for a moment, his expression flickers into surprise, then relief, before it turns into a blank mask. Binghe has no time to ponder what the hell that is about, because Shen Qingqiu swings the whip with the ease and confidence of practice and the line of fire down his back startles a scream out of him. He lived a whole life as a warlord and demon, but this body is that of a human child, unaccustomed to this sort of pain.

The world fades to black after two more strikes.

When he comes to, he is laying in a soft bed. The bedding smells clean, but oddly stale - like a guest bed they only air out every other day, but never use. He turns his head and the bamboo house comes into focus. It’s Shizun’s room and Shizun’s bed, but that makes no sense - where does the man sleep if not in his own bed? His cultivation isn’t good enough to forgo sleep altogether. There’s something here, a corner piece to this puzzle Binghe is struggling to fit into the big picture. Is this why Shizun keeps going to the brothels? Can he only find rest in the embrace of women? Binghe, formerly a very active master of a harem with hundreds of wives and concubines, can’t judge him for that. He already dismissed the rumors about Shizun abusing a cultivation cauldron; dual cultivation is one of the few methods to mend ruined meridians and Binghe still remembers how wrecked Shen Qingqiu’s cultivation was when he caught him.

There is yelling from the main room, Mu shishu’s incensed voice and the low rumble of the Sect Leader as he tries to calm him. Eventually a blank faced Shizun leads both of them inside and Mu shishu ignores all etiquette to rush to the bed and take stock of Binghe’s injuries. 

“These… these are not the marks of a discipline whip,” he says, confused and relieved. 

“Of course not,” Shen Qingqiu scoffs. “I don’t keep one of those wretched things around on my peak. As if those fools could tell the difference between a discipline whip and a regular slaver’s whip. All they wanted was to hear the little beast scream.” 

The Sect Leader hurriedly reassures Mu shishu that the whip strikes are painful, but with the right treatment they won’t even scar. 

“Zhangmen-shixiong, are you saying that from experience?” Mu Qingfang asks, massaging his temples and startles a little when Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan say “Yes!” in perfect unison. Another corner piece for the puzzle.

After his injuries are treated and Yue Qingyuan shepherds the healer outside, Binghe is left alone with Shen Qingqiu.

“What am I to do with you, little beast? If you don’t learn to rein yourself in, I will kick you off my peak before you can drag our reputation down.”

“He deserved it. They started it.”

“And? This is not Bai Zhan. You are in no position to make such a ruckus about things. Your stunt lost Qing Jing almost a tenth of our yearly funding. My own shizun would have beaten me to death if I pulled something so idiotic.” 

“Then why didn’t you?” He’s starting to understand Shen Qingqiu, the wretched little slave, who clawed his way up to become Peak Lord despite his ruined cultivation and digs his teeth into what’s his so nobody can take it away, but he still wants to hear it from the man himself. “Do I remind you of yourself, Shizun?”

“Little beast, you are asking for a beating.” Shen Qingqiu forgot his fan, or else he’d be hiding behind it, as always. Binghe’s Shizun has such a terribly thin face. “You have potential and drive to make something of yourself. I want to see how far it will take you. If you learn how to hide your claws better.”

Oh, Binghe knows exactly how far he can go. But he humors his Shizun and does a demonstration of his White Lotus routine. Shizun fetches a fan just so he can smack him over the head, but says that it’s an adequate act, for now. However, if Binghe can’t fool the peak into believing that he mellowed out from the punishment, then he shouldn’t expect help from his master!

They settle into an understanding over the next few years. They are not of a kind, but they are both beasts after a fashion and now that he finally peered under Shen Qingqiu’s unbreakable armor, he doesn’t resent the man as much. Is he himself not a violent, monstrous thing once you peel off his pleasant facade? What filled the human child with fear and resentment entices the adult demon that now lives in his skin. Besides, Shizun hasn’t hurt him in this life. Shen Qingqiu usually lets him be, only interacting with him as much as any other discipline, but sometimes under the guise of chores he takes remedial lessons to perfect his act. The years he let go of his humanity took their toll and he needs the guidance to set some of the details right.

“I think I might be part demon,” Luo Binghe says one day, sipping tea in the bamboo house. For two hours straight Shizun poked and prodded at his insecurities, reaching for a level of unpleasantness he doesn’t often aim at him and Binghe kept his mask of a perfect, demure youth all throughout. At the end of it Shizun poured him a cup of tea and reluctantly praised his acting. It’s a thorny thing, Shizun’s praise, but it has set a warmth in Binghe’s chest that refuses to go away.

“You are fifteen. It’s probably just puberty.” Binghe laughs at his Shizun’s expression of disgust. Shen Qingqiu is technically not wrong either, because it’s his steadily growing sex drive that keeps aggravating his demon half. “I have met men who wish they could be demons. I don’t care as long as you don’t tarnish the reputation of the sect.”

“The sect or Qing Jing Peak?”

“The sect. Drag me down with your madness if you want. I chose to take responsibility for you as your Shizun, but leave the others out of it.” 

The others in this case, Binghe has learned, means Yue Qingyuan. Binghe is not sure what ties the two men together (ten thousand arrows and a throat split open on the shards of a blade) but it’s a kind of devotion and he wants it for himself. He set this thread of fate against Xin Mo’s blade and it remained unbroken, so he wants to tangle himself up in it until he can forget that he has no thread of his own. He couldn’t find true peace in the embrace of a thousand women, but when he imagines himself sandwiched between Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan, the most resilient and the strongest man the human realm can offer, he thinks he could be satisfied. Shen Qingqiu’s sharp edges stimulate the demon part of him that wants to court with his fangs and claws bared and Yue Qingyuan’s soft brotherly manners soothe the neglected human boy he tried to rip out of his soul, but never managed. They would be perfect.

But first he has to find out why Shen Qingqiu keeps pushing the Sect Leader away and mend their relationship somehow, and a crucial step to that is making sure Liu Qingge lives. Binghe now suspects that the Bai Zhan War God’s death was an accident, but it drained Shen Qingqiu of any will to stand up for himself and he can’t allow that to happen this time around.

“When I passed Liu shishu earlier I sensed that his qi was unbalanced. He is heading to a deviation soon.” He can blame it on his Shizun that he learned to sniff out impending qi deviations, because Shen Qingqiu had them often and always, always tried to cover them up. “I know he is going to Lingxi caves for isolated cultivation and I overheard Mu shishu say that Shizun is following him in a fortnight. I want Shizun to be prepared to call for help if Liu shishu turns violent and attacks him.”

It’s a battle to convince Shizun to take the emergency talismans, but Binghe eventually wears him down. He spends the whole night before Shizun enters the caves drawing the talismans; it’s his punishment for bothering Shen Qingqiu so much in the past two weeks. Soon after, the Sect Leader leaves and Binghe doesn’t remember the exact timeline anymore, but it sounds like things are happening the way they did before; Liu Qingge’s death and the demon invasion was barely a week apart and Yue Qingyuan was absent for both. So Binghe loiters around the emergency medical team and waits.

Nobody notices it when he slips into the backline of the emergency team, keeping pace with them through the winding pathways of the Lingxi caves until something calls out to him, his instincts suddenly on high alert, and he falls behind, just as unnoticed. The side cavern is almost completely blocked off and once Binghe squeezes inside he can’t see anything, but he doesn’t need his eyes to tell what happened. Poisonous, disturbed qi saturates the cavern, heavy on his tongue with pain and fear and desperation, the rage of a dragon trapped in a bottle, thrashing to break free. He can feel the marks gouged into the walls when he touches them, can taste the blood saturating the surface when he licks along a deep crack.

A beast was trapped in here, a beast that tastes like Yue Qingyuan.

The discovery makes him giddy and he has to tear himself away from the cavern before the qi could damage his human cultivation or the sweet song of blood could awaken his demon half. Outside he finds that things happened as he expected, and to his relief both Peak Lords live. Liu Qingge seems unbearably insistent on undoing the damage he did to Shen Qingqiu’s reputation in the past, but Shizun seems just as annoyed by his attempts as Binghe, so it’s fine.

The demon invasion happens just on schedule and Binghe goes in with a plan to use the demon elder’s poisonous attack to pretend that was what awakened his demon half. It's a good plan, one that's immediately dashed by Liu Qingge, who can't bear to sit and watch when Shen Qingqiu gets to fight. For a blissful moment Binghe entertains the idea of revealing himself anyway and ripping Liu Qingge limb from limb, but he restrains himself and moves right on.

The encounter with Meng Mo is different. In the dream realm Binghe is not a child and he shuts off access to the dream before the old demon can pull anyone else in with them. Then he bows to the elder with all the respect his old mentor earned in that other life. “This Binghe is overjoyed to see Meng shushu has found him again.”

It’s strange, to explain what happened to him to someone who can’t possibly remember those events, but Meng Mo takes it all with grace, even when Binghe admits that Xin Mo trapped the demon in his own nightmare and slowly consumed him. Binghe doesn’t strictly need the grandfatherly old demon in his head - because as much as Meng Mo would deny it, Binghe has met enough demon families to now recognize him for the very typical demonic grandfather that he is - but his presence feels right and his power can tide them over until Binghe decides to break the seals.

Together they hatch a plan to trap his Shizun and his Shibo in a dream until they are forced to talk to each other. It’s easier said than done, because with Liu Qingge nipping at his heels again to demand a spar (get a hint already shishu, Shizun doesn’t see sparring as a bonding activity and you never told him that you mean it that way!) Shen Qingqiu refuses to go down to the brothel to sleep. Finally, when sleep deprivation is driving Shizun to the brink of a qi deviation, Binghe has enough and bluntly presents him with a sleep tonic. “You can take it willingly or I can hit you over the head and take you down to the city. Your choice, Shizun.”

It’s enough of a threat that Shen Qingqiu allows Binghe to distract Liu shishu with a barrage of very specific questions about an upcoming nighthunt and sneaks out to the city himself. The distance would usually be a bit bothersome, but Binghe can grasp the thread tying Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu together and pull them into a joint dream in the middle.

It’s worse than he expects. He gets a front row seat to their worst nightmares and even fully knowing that these are only memories, his demon blood burns to rip their enemies apart. Meng Mo bodily drags him outside of the dream so his enraged howling can’t disturb the long overdue reconciliation between Xiao Jiu and his Qi-ge.

“He was so cruel to me in that first life, I never imagined that he ever had it worse,” Binghe admits quietly when his rage has cooled, pale as a ghost as they watch the shade of Qiu Jianluo force himself on his child slave.

“Have you ever…?”

“No. Even I had my limits. I made sure they wanted me, even if they regretted it afterwards.” How many women did he feed to Xin Mo’s endless appetite over the years? He never counted. Meng Mo just hums and then shoos him away; the old demon can maintain the dream until the humans are done sorting themselves out and it’s probably not good for Binghe’s psyche to watch all of this.

The next few years are a blur. Binghe keeps his distance from Shen Qingqiu when it becomes clear that the reconciliation followed them out of the dream. He doesn’t want Shen Jiu to think of him as a disciple, a child, he wants to leave and return as a dashing suitor, so he watches from afar as things slot into a much more pleasing picture than before. With Yue Qingyuan’s broad shoulders propping him up, Shen Qingqiu finally gains the power to back up his words and a genuine confidence to match his proud bearing. He kicks all his detractors off Qing Jing and calls an audit from An Ding to clean up all the leftover filth before the new hallmasters take their post. Yue Qingyuan shuts down a nasty comment during a peak lord meeting about Shen Qingqiu’s brothel visits by reminding everyone that they are allowed to visit their family outside the sect if they want to, and this is everything the sect gossip talks about for the next sennight. It prompts Ning Yingying to bashfully admit to her trusted Luo shidi that her mother is one of Shen Qingqiu’s 'sisters', that she joined the sect on his recommendation. Maybe A-Luo would like to meet her sometime? He’s like a little brother to Yingying and she wants him to meet her family. 

Not everything is perfect, of course. Qing Jing is still heavy on the physical punishment, second only to Bai Zhan, because the fear of pain works extremely well on the rich brats, but Binghe’s growing restlessness sees him punished more than all the disciples put together and on him it has a very different effect. He can’t help it, his libido is out of control and the people he wants are out of his reach, so the only things he can channel his restless energy is aggression and too long nights of masturbation that leave him too tired to function the following day. At one point Shen Qingqiu even threatens him with the whip again if he doesn’t cut it out, and the thought of Shen Qingqiu whipping him bloody fuels his fantasies for the next several weeks.

It’s three months before the Immortal Alliance Conference when Meng Mo digs his heels in about the course of their future.

“We are not getting Xin Mo.”

“I need it if I want to become strong again.”

“I reviewed all of your memories and I can confidently say that’s not true. The wretched thing hurt you more than it ever helped.”

“I will never get out of the abyss without it. I need it for that long and then I will lock it away.”

“If you pick it up you will never be able to put it down again. Just like in that other life.”

“Then what do you suggest? Am I to just stay in the abyss and perish?!”

“No, of course not. Ask Xiao Mobei to teach you his portal trick.”

“... Let’s start with the obvious that it would not work and let’s not go into the logistics of how I’m even supposed to get hold of him.”

“You have actively used Xin Mo for fifteen centuries.” Was it really that long? It didn’t feel that long. “You have absorbed enough of its residual energy that with the right teacher you should be capable of learning portal manipulation. Whether the Mobei boy is willing to teach you or not is another matter.”

“We were friends before I went insane.” Before he merged the realms and accidentally destroyed Mobei’s entire kingdom and all his subjects in the process. “I think I have a way to convince him.”

Thus starts the long chase to get into Shang Qinghua’s house so Binghe can talk to him in private. It’s much easier said than done. Much as Qinghua has made his peak self-sustaining, he is still busy as hell and when he's not then he's in his leisure house which is the most well-warded building in the entire sect. They only manage a meeting with two weeks left to go before the conference.

At least convincing Shang Qinghua is easy enough. “I recently found out that I'm part demon and I want your prince to help me get away after the conference” is a clear motivation why Binghe would want to talk to Mobei and “I can see from your bruises that he's trying to court you - very carefully, by his standards, I don't see any frostbite - I can make him understand that you are not interested or how to do it the human way, whichever you prefer” makes Qinghua’s expression twist into something both calculating and flustered. The wonders a millennia lived as mostly a demon does, Binghe muses. He was too young and too human to realize that Mobei was pining hard for his little snake of an advisor the first time around. He's not surprised when it all turns into a Human Courting Dos and Don’ts 101. He's not sure if Qinghua is really interested or he's just too scared to turn Mobei down, but when he comes to finalize the details of his getaway the leisure house stinks to the high heavens of happy ice demon, so it's working at least.

He talks Mobei down from letting his entire menagerie loose on the disciples (Qinghua breathes a sigh of relief. He might be able to keep his position as a spy and not lose all his enrolled disciples after all) and shows him where to send the most dangerous beasts for a more targeted attack against Huan Hua’s adult cultivators. Binghe doesn't much care about the disciples, but the least amount of damage done against the sect, the more likely Shen Qingqiu will take him back soon once he returns.

The night before the Conference he finally visits Shen Qingqiu in his dream to show the man his true self. “I told you that I'm a demon.” In the dream Qingqiu is scrawnier and not quite the perfectly polished image of a peerless immortal. Binghe revels in tracing his eyes over all the scars he can see that have been long erased from his skin in the waking world. “I need to leave for a time, after the conference. But do not fret. When I return I will be Junshang and lay the demon world in front of you and Sect Leader Yue as a courting gift.”

He keeps Shen Qingqiu in the dream long enough that his Shizun can't talk to him in person before the event begins. It would spoil the fun to have a fight with his future intended before the hunt.

This plan, unlike the demon invasion one, goes off without a hitch. When Qinghua is portaled into Mobei’s palace a week later for one last report before Binghe leaves, the man has only good news - the sect only suffered injuries and no deaths, and as an added bonus the Iceclaw Assassin Wolf they dropped into the Huan Hua ranks took out the Old Palace Master and his most trusted people before it self destructed. It’s a better outcome than he dared to hope for.

Mobei refuses to teach him portals (for now) but gives him a token that can portal him out of the abyss if things get dicey or Binghe is done training, so that's fine as well. All is ready. Binghe is going to go into the abyss and then seven years later he’ll come back out, fully in control of his heavenly demon heritage and as much of a beast in body as he is in spirit.

The Northern Consort greets him coldly, glaring at him from under a huadian painted with Mobei Jun’s blood that leaves no doubt in anybody’s mind about the king’s devotion to his little human husband. “What took you so long?” Shang Qinghua asks, unwinding one of his many layers of fur and dropping it on the shivering Binghe. The pelt barely covers his shoulders, but it warms Binghe all the same. “Zhangmen-shixiong has been hounding me day and night about your return. Shen Qingqiu refuses to hold their wedding without you there.”

“Ah, but Shang shishu.” Binghe spreads his arms wide, showing off his new physique with a grin. “I promised to lay the demon world before their feet. I couldn’t possibly return before I was capable of upholding that promise!”

Consort Shang is unimpressed.

“Next time, just get them a stick of tanghulu to share. Much easier to get and I bet you anything they would appreciate it more.”

He might not be wrong about that. What is the demon world to a pair of slave boys who rose to the top of the cultivation world on their own power? Comfort food made by his own hand is a much sweeter gift.

Binghe is still going to conquer the demon world for them regardless. He promised, after all, and what kind of husband would he be if he went back on his promises?

[lizzieraindrops]

Liminal - Chapter 2 (2034 words)

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

Ikora is terrified of losing Eris now that she has become the Hive god of vengeance. The long tension between them has finally been driven to breaking point. Can the two of them reconcile their conflicts and misunderstandings before it might be too late?

Some good old-fashioned monster-loving.

Eris transforms.

Eris stands indomitable in the center of her spell circle, catching her breath as her body attunes to the pulse of ichor and soulfire rather than blood.

She does not turn around. The tatters of her Hunter leathers hang about her waist, girding her full-body chitin plate armor like a Hive Wizard's careless robes.

Ikora steps closer behind her. Boots sound against the stone-flagged floor like a sonar signal. Slow and deliberate, she approaches Eris' broad, spined back.

Hands close on Eris' upper arms from behind in a grip that is firm but not rigid. Eris rumbles in surprise and goes stock-still. She hadn't known Ikora's arms could reach hers, not without impaling herself upon the massive spines that have sprouted from her back and shoulders like raised hackles. Slowly, Eris relaxes somewhat into the touch. Those human hands are ungloved; she can tell by their flush, static friction against the roughness of chitin. Through Eris' modulated sense of touch through her exoskeletal plates, those hands feel different, their pressure spread more lightly but more broadly across the subsurface of her body.

The two of them stand there like a diorama within the ring of columns, unmoving except for their breath.

Stealing a quick glance over one shoulder, Eris catches a startling glimpse of Ikora's face among the forest of spines. Her eyes are closed, her head bowed. Smooth, elegant features have tautened into an expression of deep worry. Her mouth has fallen slightly open, yet her breathing is very shallow.

Eris averts her eyes before Ikora's can open, feeling like she has seen something she shouldn't. She has never seen emotion that extreme writ across Ikora's face before.

In the center of the Athenaeum, their soundlessness is wreathed by the quiet-whispering flames of Eris' spell drawn into the stone-paved floor.

"Eris..." Ikora murmurs.

"Yes?"

But that is the only word Ikora says. "Eris," she says again. "Eris." Her name is a beautiful ache in her mouth. It makes the woman who bears it both uneasy and touched.

"What? What is it, Ikora?" The layers of her new voice tend toward restless dissonance.

Another repetition is her only answer, this time approaching a muted, pained whine. It alarms Eris enough that she lays a rough palm over one of the hands on her arms, then unlatches the other so that she can turn to face Ikora in her morph at last.

The silent tears streaming down Ikora's brown cheeks shock Eris to her core. She takes Ikora's hand between both of her own and weaves her claws carefully around it in a protective net of living chitin.

"Ikora, what is wrong?! Why are you saying my name like that?"

"I am afraid, Eris." Her voice is wet, broken gravel scraping over the raw muscle of Eris' heart. Eris drops her hand with a stab of hurt which is instantly overridden by a wave of complete confusion as Ikora seizes her face with both hands, bare skin against her carapace. Eris stares back into those deep amber-brown eyes, speechless.

"I—I," Ikora says as if choking on the prospect of her own perspective. She takes a deep, ragged breath before letting the words out in a sprawl of agony sharpened by her own reluctance. "I need you, Eris,” Ikora scrapes out as if her throat is bleeding. “And I don't know if you're coming back this time. How many more times can you survive certain death?" Unable to hold Eris' aghast stare, she hangs her head. Her body tremors like a tree in a quake, steadfast yet shaking. Her hands fall helpless from her face to the upper edge of Eris' chestplate where her collarbones have fused into it.

The depth of Ikora's raw pain horrifies Eris. She cautiously circles her armored arms around the shaking form, gentle and then fierce as Ikora throws both arms around her neck and sobs with an ugly sound. Eris bends over as she holds her, as much because her morph is taller than Ikora as to bring her under the shelter of the Harbinger's immense shoulder crests. That great forest of spears points backward and skyward in defiance of any tormented past or presumptive higher power. She barely notices the rumble that emanates from her own chest, half protective and dangerous, half solicitous and soothing.

Their sounds soften as the storm blows over. Ikora's arms slacken in the just-wide-enough space between Eris' neck and the first angular spikes that spring from her shoulders. Sorrowful echoes fade, glancing more quietly off of each green-gilded pillar of the pavilion until they vanish into the throne world's haze-shawled, burning sky.

Eventually, Eris kneels in the center of the Athenaeum holding Ikora's drooping shape against her chest, bearing most of her weight. The claws of one hand dance lightly over Ikora's scalp with soft scratches. Various small creatures chirrup and buzz and rustle in the quiet patches of marsh outside the gazebo. Through it all, that vibrating thrum in Eris' chest never falters, only softens into a more comforting timbre.

Eris will stay here as long as is needed, as long as it takes for the strongest person she knows to be able to stand again.

With a brief articulated gesture of one hand, Eris collapses the glittering portal to the HELM. They need no interruption. Ikora needs her—needs Eris, for once. When she returns to caressing Ikora's head, she leans into the touch.

"Are you well?" Eris says in a rattling whisper.

Ikora's eyes open. "Don't let go," she answers.

Eris chuckles like boulders crashing underwater. She strokes the back of one claw down the side of Ikora's face, making her eyelids flutter. In this form, somehow, some unseen, unspoken wall between them has crumbled and fallen away. "You seek strange comfort. Many fled from merely the sight of my eyes years ago, much less this."

"I never did."

Eris hums a deep harmony. "No. You didn't.” Ikora has never been anything but kind to her even at her remarkably terrible worst self, and her gratitude for that is boundless. So are the depths of her affection, even if she does not act on it, and has never planned to.

In thanks, she bends to touch the crest of her brow to Ikora's forehead. That's all. But when she tries to lift her head away, fingers catch at the ridges behind her jaws. She cannot draw more than a hand's span away without wresting herself loose. She does not want to do so. Ikora's nearness is a balm, one she has never permitted herself to seek. So she gazes back at her in contentment and waits to see what she will do.

Something changes in the bearing of Ikora's supine frame within the unfamiliar cradle of her arms. Her movements become both more tentative and more purposeful. Exploring her craggy face with deft fingertips, Ikora traces the line of her chin, the pitted hollows that pock her cheeks, the bony ridge that surrounds and shelters all three eyes. Ikora's two search every feature with a golden brown gaze as darkly brilliant as sunlight struggling to seep through summer honey. Something that Eris has never seen before floats up through the depths of that gaze as if from an abandoned well. She wants to understand what it is, needs to know with a consuming hunger akin to the exponential voracity of the knife-void that has split open wide within her, clamoring to devour the entire Hive for her divinity.

Those captivating eyes dip toward her shielded mouth more than once. If not for the protective plate covering it, it almost seems as if Ikora would–

Fingers skirt the marge of Eris' mouthplate; then lips brush, once, twice. Eris trills in surprise. Both sensations are strange, yet not unpleasant.

"Ik—what are you...?"

Her fingers run along the seams of the plates of Eris' face and neck, where chitin gives way to toughened connective membrane that yields slightly to the touch. Below those thin bands, the nerves are not shielded by rigid armor. The sustained contact gives Eris chills that make her spines bristle like windswept trees.

"Trying to understand all of you," Ikora says. "Should I stop?"

"...No, but—"

"Then let me. Please." She braces one hand on the flat plate of Eris' chest and weaves the other among the jagged spikes on one shoulder like a curious serpent. She examines each one from multiple angles with both touch and sight, dedicating her every attention to the cartography of Eris' utterly inhuman body like—like—

Even in her most idle, unrealistic fantasy, Eris could scarcely imagine Ikora ever touching her like this, even were she still human. How can she do so now? With greater caution than she would approach the maw of the Hellmouth, Eris eases one palm onto Ikora's hip, slowly wraps her fingers around. Including the talons, her hand circles half of her entire waist. Ikora doesn’t retreat.

"What...why?" Eris asks, but she cares about the answers less and less every moment.

"Eris," Ikora says again, damn her. The rampant want and pain in her voice rends Eris from the inside out like a blade of bittersweet tithe.

An involuntary growl rips out of Eris as Ikora scrapes her nails against the grain of the fine ridges across her chestplate. Although less sensitive than the seams, there are far more tactile receptors beneath each plate, and any pressure activates all of them in tandem. The rattling scrape, multiply so. The combination of the unexpected feeling and their current close situation is nothing short of intoxicating.

Ikora's eyes go wide with surprise, then narrow with a satisfaction approaching smugness. That won't do.

"I-chorr-ahh," Eris says in her deepest growl. She plants both hands firmly on Ikora's shoulders. Her eyes fly open wide again, accompanied by her blown pupils. Eris presses the tips of her claws into Ikora's flesh—not hard enough to puncture skin, but enough to make her freeze. "Are you certain you want what you are asking for?"

In a subtle yet sublime implosion of effortless Void Light, Ikora surges forward and pins her acolyte morph to the floor, bent back over the spikes of its crest in the center of her own spell circle. The mouthplate drops away from the hidden jaw in an appreciative, terrifying grin.

"What I want is Eris Morn. Are you not her?" Ikora retorts. A drop of blood seeps into her pristine robe beneath the indent made by Eris' thumbclaw. With every striving sinew of her Light-suffused body, she challenges the being before her to deny it, challenges herself to doubt it. She is incandescent, powerful, passionate. Beautiful.

Like a whisper from a crypt, a deep chuckle ascends from Eris' throat. It grows louder and redoubles upon itself until she is but the chamber for a choir of pleased humor.

"I am."

The look in Ikora's eyes is both tenacious and tender. And it is completely, entirely for her, as she is.

In a sudden contraction of movement, Eris reverses their positions and fully looms over Ikora. She runs the point of one claw along the entire length of her soft, strong body. They both shiver.

With a casual hand, Eris waves a new portal open, one that leads directly to the private quarters set aside for her in the HELM.

Despite the fact that this netherworld's queen is currently dead, Eris begrudges her every iota of joy she has found in this last life of hers, and she will not share it with her throne of memory. Besides, Ikora deserves better than this accursed place. Eris' morph will last for a little while, outside of the spell circle. Long enough for the way Ikora clutches at the chitin of her shoulder crests, making the muscles attached beneath them strain with sweet pleasure.

With an earthen croon, Eris gathers Ikora up into her arms as carefully as if she were made of orchid petals the color of her robes. Then she sweeps them both away to somewhere more sheltered from prying eyes. The portal winks out in a glimmer of green sparks behind her.

[nyxofdemons]

four years for this show...

[ender1821]

brewings of a not-too-distant past

“Don’t blow up my house or like, set it on fire, okay?”

Pearl glanced up from the mix of ingredients on the table. “I wasn’t planning on that, but now that you’ve mentioned it…”

Her gaze wandered to the pile of gunpowder, causing Gem to promptly swipe it away from her friend’s grasp. “Pearl!”

(In which Gem builds a potion house and Pearl shows up with the promise of a special brew.)

[strawberry-cowmilk]

if I order myself a little treat for surviving exam season then it will maybe arrive right after the last exam

[pinktief]

i'm so beyond tired but i survived!!! i just finished work until next year 😭

[8aji]

hi 👀

[ncmcrcy]

my biggest gripe with s5 is the show wants me to think j.ohnny is suddenly ready to be a dad after NOT dealing with his shit properly and that having a new kid suddenly means that not being there for r.obby for the first 17 years of his life doesn't matter anymore and I say fuck that

[i-dreamed-i-had-a-son]

Nothing quite as humbling as looking back at your old takes and realizing that you were completely wrong

[unnecessarilygrandiose]

.

[ratanslily]

was heart of trespia meant for more seasons than 3?👀

[gothamstreetcat]

Putting under the cut what ended up being such a long sad/angry rant about Wesley and how he was treated on the show. I just want to say how I feel. A lot of this is personal and I apologize.

I’ve been thinking a lot over the past few days about how it really boils my blood that I feel there was so much pressure for Wesley to be in love with Fred. If he was not "in love" (I really don't even want to say that) with her he had to be a creep and if not that he had to be obsessed (based off of how the show was really portraying him at points). It’s almost as if he had no value unless he was in love with her or his entire being didn’t revolve around her. Like, if he wasn’t the bumbling fool for everyone to make fun off he just had to be so obsessed to the points it made him look bad. Almost as though the writers took his little "crush" from one fucking episode and decided to run a train without the tracks.

It's such a shame because this idea of Wesley being infatuated with Fred came across as though it had to be his whole personality as though Wesley himself couldn't be loved for anything else (like being smart or funny). And the entirety surrounding Fred was also used as a foil for his relationship with Lilah, which in my opinion is so stupid, because this crush with Fred was -again- so fleeting and ended so badly, yet at the same time it consumes Wesley's being.

And I know I’ve said this in the past, but Wesley during Billy was not him; and I really believe it has everything to do with his father and how he was raised and someone he was scared to become. Wesley does not come off to me as the kind of person to feel that was towards women or have monstrous/evil thoughts. Even for "dark" Wesley that's really pushing it. He's just the kind of guy "that makes the tough decisions even if he's making them alone." Not only that but Wesley constantly has moments where you know he's been abused, and for me, I see that as he's not going to be an abuser because he's already the abused, even as an adult. Even when his not-dad showed up he fell back into his old self and was suddenly never good enough. So, going back Billy it just seems hard for me to imagine Wesley ever trying again after the traumatic events that ensued for him - that also had him struggling with himself as a person. Having him be so infatuated with Fred after this - to me - is just so disrespectful to his character, especially if only to hurt him in the end and further isolate him. Wesley is not a perfect person, I know that but some of the shit he went though on the show just seemed over the top.

I don't actually know or personally understand why people even want Wesley and Fred to be together but let me say how I've been feeling that Fred is just a more loved version of Wesley - another thing that really makes me upset/uncomfortable. They were both smart but somehow Fred was smarter (during that episode when those demons came and wanted her brain instead of Wesley's) yet, at the same time everyone needed Wesley's help when he wasn't part of the team anymore. Which, of course there are different ways to smart and should be recognized but at the same time Fred was just seen as so cute and quirky for everything she did while other times Wesley was not appreciated. Anytime Fred became upset or triggered over what happened to her she was comforted and emphasized with. When she was rescued from Pylea she was given space and everyone worked with her and tried to help her. Anytime Wesley talked about his dad he was looked at as strange or talked to in such a casual manor (because the characters were so bluntly blind to his abuse (i.e when he killed his not-dad in season five). Even when he was clearly feeling a certain way after the events in “Lineage” Angel and Spike treated it as if it was no big deal and I get the assumption that when Wesley killed his not-dad it was more about protecting Fred rather then freeing himself (which is what it should have fucking been about. This man literally stood in front of him and said “don’t make me shoot you,” and I wonder how many threats were made on Wesley’s life for him to not be stunned by that.)

I will however say that when Wesley got shot he was well loved and cared for. This was, of course pre-Fred and pre-Conner but was looked after during this time (by this two best friends I might add who ended up fucking losing completely to the mess that is season 3).

Another thing I've gathered from the grapevine is that it appears losing Fred was somehow a breaking point for Wesley (but also everyone else too) and I would really like to fucking understand why. Fred is beloved, I get that but at the same time they also lost Cordelia who was very loved and had some so far as a person - and as for Wesley that man has been through some fucking shit, but why is losing Winifred some make or break for him?? Wesley literally lost his entire family because of what happened, he had his throat cut and was literally fucking dying as some homeless man dragged him into the bushes before stealing his money. He was so cut off from everyone and pretty much had the metaphorical door slammed in his face - unless of course he was needed - and I know I talk about the park scene a lot, and I know fans get mad over what Wesley did they're entitled to feel that way, of course, but at the same time - no one is going to be more mad at Wesley then the self-loathing man himself. He knows he screewed up.

On top of that, Angel, everyone's literal champion, went to the hospital and tried to fucking kill him. And a lot of people point out how Wesley never apologized for what he did, but when Angel apologized for what he did it was literally only because he needed something. And everyone was so wrapped around Angel's dick and what he wanted so nothing could be mended, mind you, this was also the man that signed them off to work for the literal Devil without their consent. Now, I get he was doing it for his son and that's admirable- he's just a tired dad trying to do his very best - but you literally didn't have to drag everyone else with you (especially since the only reason Wesley was there in the first place was to give Lilah peace he believed she deserved for her suffering. Show me a greater act of true love and I'll shut the fuck up.)

Wesley lost his best friend to the higher powers (his friendship with Gunn was so long gone at this point) and the love of his life (because the only time Wesley wasn't so wrapped up in Fred was when he was grieving Lilah) but somehow Fred had to be the be all end all. Even in his death he couldn't escape it and it still had to be about Fred and being lied to and being with her. I see a lot of fans talk about how he was in love with the idea of Fred and being a hero and getting the girl and finally being loved but in reality all those things Wesley thinks heroes get in the end are a fantasy. He's not going to be loved, Angel is not going to get over Conner and his dad is never going to love and respect him as a human being. In fact, I feel like the only thing Wesley had to resemble being a hero was the fact that he died in the end. I mean, of course he was a good person and did his best and he did help people and save them - but at the same time he went through so much shit just to die in the very end and he couldn't even have that to himself.

The Writers liked to put on this face of Wesley being happy when he sees Fred doing her little speech, and it could have easily been about missing his friends and missing people he was close to but we know that's not the case. Not only that, but Wesley went through something so traumatic and you can't always some back from that. He was literally so changed from what happened to him and he was never the same (he literally reminds me of Bruce Wayne in so many ways with the trauma and the turtlenecks and the stone facial expressions; they literally are the same person only Bruce hates guns). Even when he came back into the group or went to work for W&H and everything was erased. Yet somehow Fred just has to be what keeps him connected to something more human... and I really can't understand why when The Writers (I mean, obviously to hurt Wesley because they don't value him) would even want Wesley to be with someone who is so nasty to him.

Fred was understanding when her and Gunn were ransacking Wesley's apartment (which they didn't even clean up by the way) yet, to his face she told him never to come back and also didn't even look at him when she talked about the prophecy being false and everything being a waste of time. Telling Wesley how wrong he was but literally everyone makes mistakes (Angel literally said Conner had been smelling like food and fucking told no one until he had a meltdown). Wesley during that time was just mentally going through it and he didn't think he could tell anyone and did everything he thought he could do - and then for Fred to be upset with him for fucking being with Lilah when he was literally so alone and she was the only one to give him a crumb of human decency. She really only bothered him about the job once and every time they talked you could tell how much they really bounced off one another.

Fred was also the only one who was so mean to him after Lilah's death when he was being vulnerable and trying to open up to her. Now again, this is partly The Writers who think it's okay to compare Wesley's consensual relationship with Lilah to Not-Cordelia sleeping with Conner (which was basically Conner being raped by his unborn woman child using his mother's body), which is disgusting, but also for Fred to fucking roll her eyes and try to gaslight Wesley and his emotions when he's being vulnerable. Again, something I bitch about a lot but it's only because I know what it's like to be that person being vulnerable to their friends, only to have said friends literally roll their eyes and dismiss my feelings - it's disgusting. Wesley had literally just lost Lilah and had no one to talk to about it but he tried *twice* with two people who used to be his closest friends. But I guess that is just more of a way to affirm how Lilah is for Wesley (despite the fact that she is literally perfect for him but I don't know if I want to get into that now).

I feel like Angel never got over Conner (it being mentioned in season five) and that is what it is - I get it, but at the same time I'm also so bothered by the fact that Wesley is always going to have this big terrible thing hung over him. Gunn also made a huge mistake but that was what is was, a mistake and okay because "Gunn is a good person" (and I'm okay with that, I'm in no way trying to shit on Gunn but I am aware there was controversy surround this back when the show was on). However, I have an issue with Wesley having to be so punished for his mistake when others are empathized with. And I know what happened with Holtz was about Angelus and that Angel has a soul and he is good - but this is also the vampire with a soul who tried to fucking suffocate Wesley to death. It doesn't feel fair to entirely blame Angel for Angelus's actions against Holtz's family's, However, that's still a huge part of his past, and not everyone is going to have empathy and compassion for you just because you have a soul. I'm not trying to say that as a way to excuse Wesley's mistake but I feel that so much is always put on Wesley and him alone.

I'm sorry this post is so long and messy. I was going to spend a little bit of time talking about his relationship with Lilah, however, I want this to be more about Wesley as an individual - so I'll shut up here and save that conversation for the tags.

This was four pages long in google docs, why can't I write my fanfiction like that?

[judyalvqrez]

the way people are once again removing all the nuance and moral greyness and complexity out of the last of us, but especially joel miller’s character is kinda concerning lol