#i think overall the 'you can watch and never interact' might actually be worse for one's mind than an endless nothingness?

[nostalgia-tblr]

hey u kno what would be fucked up?

i think the "i shall be a tree forever and it's horrible but that's okay cos i saved my besties and also the multiverse :)" thing could go very badly for everyone. because like. well for a start it just seems like a madness-causing scenario generally (fandom spotted that Loki in prison in solitary in TDW is actual torture and to me the "oh but he can see his friends :)" tree thing is like oh so he's got a television in his cell this time round??) and it'd be very easy to turn bitter if your mates dont seem bothered enough about it or when you realise that the vast majority of people benefitting from your torturous life as a tree don't even know you're doing it.

extra bonus points if you are or have been someone who tends to let resentment build up until you snap, and who has often felt unwanted and unloved, and who has been told, in as many words, that your destiny was always just to suffer so others can have better lives.

i'm not saying "villainy spiral part two but now with actual godlike powers" except no i am saying that i suppose. anyway that'd be pretty fucked up wouldn't it?

[hudson-whorenet]

Random Cars thoughts I think about all the time pt.1

It’s currently fairly late (early?) and I can’t sleep so imma talk about things in the cars universe that I think about near constantly. Ok 1 2 3 GO

Mater private eye

Dude I think about this short all the fucking time man, but do you know what the best part about it is imo?

This character design RIGHT here. DUDEEEEE ok this might just be my sheer adoration of classic/vintage cars but this bitch showed up and I went feral a bit. First of I cannot believe they created such a bomb ass character for this five minute short and he’s just never seen again but dude it fits the 1920’s theme so perfectly, the way they’ve exaggerated the front fenders to resemble the turned up collar of a trench coat, the way his roof resembles a flat cap like it’s literally so COOL MAN. I actually can’t stress enough how excited my pathetic little monkey brain got when I saw this design for the first time. The fact (In my opinion) that they were trying to mirror the car seen in peaky blinders (1927 Bentley 6.5 litre) is also extremely cool as you can see the whole gangster element really come through in the character before he’s even properly introduced RAHHHH. I’m so incredibly biased about this because this design alone hits like three of my hyper fixations at once but RAHAHRBHAHAHSBS HES SO FUCKING COOL I NEED TO OWN HIS DIE CAST AHHH

The Thomasville racers

I would just like to state my love for the thomasville racers. YES I know they play a moderate role in the third film and get plenty of screen time I guess but in my humble opinion THEY DESERVE MORE. Do you have ANY idea how hard a prequel movie/series would go (I KNOW ITS EXTREMELY UNLIKELY AND KINDA IMPOSSIBLE) I would give a kidney to see these characters in their prime, just from the flash backs of their races I just know it would be so much fun to watch. Seeing them interact with Doc would be an absolute highlight, being able to gauge their own personal relationships with him, Louise’s feelings towards him (fucking pop off babe love her) it would all be so interesting to see and I would start backflipping irl if Pixar EVER announced they were going to expand on them as characters. Also river is the best I didn’t talk abt him here because I don’t have any immediate thoughts but be’s silly and I enjoy him.

Car biology

Now there is one thing that comes to mind in this fucking fandom when you talk about car biology, and that is the obvious how the fuck do they reproduce. DOESN’T MATTER I HAVE A BIGGER QUESTION. Are their eyes wet. Hear me out here ok, cars cry, we see it happen and there’s implications at multiple different points throughout the franchise that they have tears. Does this mean their eyes are wet??? Or are they crying wiper fluid or something? I feel like that would make sense but the line between what are bodily fluids and what are yummy delicious beverages is so painfully blurred that It wouldn’t surprise me if they’re chugging wiper fluid too. The eyes are wet argument is overall kinda silly because we see lifeless car wrecks in some of the shorts and the windshield is still intact! So this presents something worse than eyes are wet, it implies that the car itself is like an exoskeleton and all the meaty important parts are on the inside! Yay! I only say this because we know they have brains obviously and it’s mentioned in some official book that I can’t remember the name of right now but it’s CANON they have brains. So are the brains MEAT? Because if the brains are meat then the eyes are probably squishy too!! But if they have windshields and we think about the exoskeleton thing are their eyes just freakish gelatinous cubes smushed behind the windshield? BUT IF THATS THE CASE WHY DO THEY NEED EYELIDS? I’m aware that this is all highly stupid and trivial but Pixar made too many decisions with absolutely no was to explain them in a child-friendly way and ultimately backed themselves into a corner about stuff like this and now there’s sleep deprived neurodivergents on tumblr dot com trying to pick up the pieces.

Anyway that’s it for this one I might post more of these in the future because it’s fun to just rant about ridiculous shit for no reason lmao

[byebyelemonpie]

byebyelemonpie's august 2023 recommendations

Wow, my picks for this month are very weak, because I didn't watch any movie that stood up to me as much as previous months, and I've really liked only one series from the few ones I've finished.

My august top 5 movies:

Seriously. These movies are so mid that I don't even want to mention some of them in my top 5. Most movies I've seen from this month are rated 3.5 stars on letterboxd, and that's mostly because of great animation or great cinematography.

Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003, dir: McG) [Rewatch after more than a decade] I had rewatched the first one recently and found it worse than I remembered, but this one was actually awesome. I very much enjoyed watching it, with its action scenes, its plot twists, and its Badass Girls Doing Stuff! It's just a very fun film, and I loved rediscovering it. -

Atonement (2007, dir: Joe Wright) [Rewatch after 9 years] I actually decided to rewatch this movie because the first time I saw it, I didn't like it at all. I get why, though: it doesn't have the best ending that 18 year old me would have loved, but 27 year old me now understands the nuances and the storytelling. I think the way it's told might be a little confusing at first, but it's interesting to see the different points of view and the lies of the person who tells the story rather than what actually happened. And my goodness, the green dress cinematography and the sound design are amazing. -

Trainspotting (1996, dir: Danny Boyle) [Rewatched after seven years] I don't even know if I liked this movie. I might have even hated it at times. I surely thought that the narrator talked way too much, but the story required it and it wouldn't be it without his redundant monologues. Every character is awful, but you can't help to root for them at least a bit: they are in misery, and it doesn't matter if they've created it for themselves or if society had a big part in that creation. What I really loved though, was the originality in depicting those abstract sequences that showed the state the characters were in when they were abusing substances: the editing was all over the place. I also watched T2 for the first time, but I personally didn't find it as good as the first one. -

Red, White and Royal Blue (2023, dir: Matthew López) [First time watch] This was fun! Definitely funnier than I expected, never having read the book before. I think the first act and a half were very fast and fun to follow, while the second half of the movie was at the same time too long with a very fast ending. I thought it was quite cute, though. -

Elemental (2023, dir: Peter Sohn) [First time watch] Listen, I love Pixar and I've loved Pixar for a long time. That's why I can say with my whole heart that they can do better than this! Of course, this wasn't terrible: I enjoyed it very much and it had my attention the whole time, but I know Pixar can and has done better movies even decades ago. The story is quite nice, maybe not the most original overall, but Pixar had never made a rom-com as far as I remember, so I'll let that slide. It's fun to see how "perfect" the elements look, of course! They're beautiful! They way they interact with each other and with other elements is very clever and well animated. I know that Pixar has strived to animate realistic things since its beginnings, but this is a fictional land with abstract characters! Shouldn't the animation, or even better, the character design be a little less "perfect"? And I'm not saying it should lack talent: I'm saying it should gain more feeling, rather. And I know that this studio can do that, if even more recently we look at things like Luca or Red, even.

The fact is that this same month I also watched for the first time Atlantis: The Lost Empire, which is a Disney film from that era of Disney that made great movies, and that had amazing animation, and the character design varied from character to character, highlighting everybody's personalities from even the smallest details. I didn't put it on the top 5 list because unfortunately I watched it while doing something else and now I don't remember much of it and that's on me, but I think it can have this small shout out anyway.

Favourite series in august:

Be My Favorite (Thailand, 2023) [First time watch] This was such a cute drama, started as a light show about a boy using time travel to make a girl like him, and evolved into a deep, quite philosophical story revolving around fixed points in time, fate, fighting for what's important even if things won't change immediately, queer rights, and making a boy like him instead. Probably one of my favourite series from this year: I enjoyed its fairytale vibes and its storytelling. It's quite difficult to write a story with several parallel universes starting up from different time travels, but I think the writers of this show managed to keep it easy to understand and fun to follow.

[byebyelemonpie's 2023 recs]

[nerves-nebula]

I sometimes feel like ppl read too much into 2012 a bit, not in a bad way or anything that exactly what fandom does. We pick apart our fav media, looking for all the subtle hints and little interactions to feed our fave headcanons and canons.

But it's back to that Steven universe killing the diamonds conversation, this is a show predominantly written for 11 year Olds 😭 and not only that it's a show that put cool fight scenes first and treated emotions and relationship dynamics as an after thought. It was also literally made in a period of time when shows were kind of mean. That doesn't mean you can't enjoy it but it just means does nuances and stuff won't really be the main focus point of the show(which I also think it's an added bonus because it gives fans so many different ways to add that nuance themselves) and at the end of the day we all will leave with different interpretations since the show wasn't so firm in expressing the overall dynamics and pushed everyone aside to make Leo the main focus alot of the time.

Like for me, I couldn't stand how splinter treated Raph. I related most to Raph as a kid and found how Raph was treated by splinter infuriatingly similar to how my mother treated me and for Leo I personally thought he had it best compared to his brothers because he had the closest relationship to Splinter but when I asked my little sister about it she said that she thinks he has it worse because splinter basically used him as his personal therapist and used him to deal with his problems. I never thought of it like that and honestly thought the worst part of their relationship was that Splinter left Leo to be the leader of the group in and outside of missions but I learnt a new perspective and I didn't immediately refute it because I didn't see it at first.

And I really think this is one of the biggest problems with the 2012 discussion. We always try to put everything into black and white, neat little boxes with best little labels. But there is always a gray area and sometimes it might not even be grey it can be fucking pink. We need to respect eachothers interpretations of the relationships and try to not be too quick to bash eachothers interpretations to a pulp.

And sometimes we are too blinded by rises awesomeness that we don't find the need to pay attention to 2012's awesomeness too and only look at the negatives.

And in a tangent too many ppl refuse to give 2012 a chance😭😭 ppl are too ready to call it out but haven't watched it in years. They use 2012 to make rise brothers look better.

I'll be looking for a crossover fic between the two iterations and the only thing I'll find is ppl writing 2012 April and Raph(and sometimes Donnie) like literal demon spawns and it honestly makes me kind of sad like we could have used that opportunity to add like nuances to their characters but instead we write them so unnecessarily mean😭😭😭 like babes stoppppppppp I just want to see the brothers be besties not rise brothers adopt Mikey because 12 brothers are evil monsters that don't care about their baby brother.

Sorry if this is hard to follow, I'm really bad with writing stuff that aren't in bullet points lol. And even tho English is the only language I know doesn't mean I know how to do it well😭😭😭

But it's back to that Steven universe killing the diamonds conversation

LITERALLY DONT BRING UP STEVEN UNIVERSE I WILL GO INSANE AUHG I CANT STAND BAD STEVEN UNIVERSE OPINIONS THEY MAKE ME GO normal MODE.

It was also literally made in a period of time when shows were kind of mean.

this is really fuckin important to note actually. its very hard to watch a lot of shows from that era, like the cruelty is the point and the joke and it HURTS to see sometimes hah. like i'll see all the brothers be absolute pieces of shit to Casey and just go ??? am i supposed to laugh at this??? it's got Sitcom disease where everyone is awful on occasion for Bits and Gags or something haha.

i vibe with a lot of what you've said here. its making me think that once i watch 2012 i could try my hand at a crossover. idk tho, we'll see.

maybe they could all take turns adopting each other (translation: they should get along and coach each other through their emotional issues)

I liked the anecdote about your sisters opinion, i think thats a good way of lookin at shit.

[peakyswritings]

Referring to what you said about Nina loving to hang out with Heaven, I got really curious. Of course they would be Tommy’s bane, and I am convinced Heaven would sincerely adore Nina’s fierce temper and rebellion. However, taking into account that Heaven is cold, blunt, often pass off insensitive and is an actual murderer would she still want to get close to her? What would she think about her? (Hope it doesn’t sound egocentric, no worry I’ll do a realistic and long-ass analysis about what Heaven would think about Nina 🤭)

Hi Shark! It doesn’t sound egocentric at all, don’t worry! OCs are part of the fandom and meant to be shared, they become actual characters that we grow to love, and it’s genuinely fun to imagine them interact with each other. It’s like building our own little world

Now to answer your question - Nina is quite a wary person, she doesn’t trust people easily, and she has to figure them out before opening up to them. But at the same time, she follows her instincts a lot, and she’s rarely wrong. If she senses a red flag, she’s right 9 times out of 10. As strange as it might sound, she doesn’t sense a red flag with Heaven - but bear with me, I’ll try to unravel the reason as clearly as I can, but I need some background first.

Like with all people, Nina would be wary at first. She’d notice of course that there’s something going on with Heaven, but despite the eerie vibes and the coldness, she wouldn’t perceive her as a bad person. Her eeriness wouldn’t scare her, quite the contrary, she’d be kinda fascinated by it. As for the coldness, she wouldn’t be too fazed - Nina herself has an ever-present frown on her face and looks rather unapproachable. And as for the bluntness - Nina always appreciated sincerity anyway. I think she’d also be really curious, although discreet, and once she’s established that she’s fine overall, she’d grow to actually like her. She’d like the way she carries herself, her strong character and the way she doesn’t take shit from anyone. I feel like Nina would have a strong feeling of respect towards her.

As for the murder part - she wouldn’t look down on Heaven for being a murderer, and it wouldn’t scare her. She grew up in a violent environment: she saw violence in the streets of the village, she saw it on women, on men - innocent and guilty, for all sorts of reasons. Sexism, power, war (when starving people during the war were literally fighting for basic survival supplies). Not to mention that her own family is a family of murderers after all, they’re in the Mafia, and even though they’ve always tried to keep her out of this stuff because she’s a woman, she’s well aware of what they do. Tommy kills people as well, she knows it. And they might be even worse than Heaven to some extent, since they kill out of personal interest, cause they benefit from it. She doesn’t condone murder in any way, but she’s coherent in that sense: she can’t excuse Tommy and her family and blame Heaven. But even though Nina is not a stranger to violence and is used to it in some sense, it doesn’t mean she’s indifferent to it. So Heaven’s ability to kill in cold blood and find some sort of “enjoyment” in it - as you’ve showed in the moodboard - would leave her perplexed, she wouldn’t really understand it and THAT might put her off. But again, she wouldn’t judge, because Heaven’s traumatised. But this aspect is something I’m analysing below cause I need a separate paragraph for that ⬇️⬇️

Now that the general stuff has been laid out, I’m going a bit into the depth of it. As I’ve said in a few occasions, Nina has a huge level of empathy and is extremely sensitive, even though she never shows that side of her as she perceives it as a weakness. But it leads her to be more understanding of people’s feeling and motives. And Heaven’s story is heartbreaking. She didn’t murder because she woke up one day and decided so, but because her family has been butchered. She watched her mother and sister burn at the stake - which is atrocious - and her father hang, and she was almost executed herself. And she was a kid. Everyone would go crazy after going through something like that. And Nina’s heart breaks for the little girl who so brutally found herself all alone in the world. So not only she doesn’t judge her at all for what she did, but she also admires her for even surviving something like that. And correct me if I’m wrong, but as I’ve come to understand Heaven kills when “triggered” (her family’s murderers, Charlie’s abductors, etc.) - we don’t see her going around and kill people just like that. And that’s further proof for Nina that she’s not bad at heart.

And lastly, Nina kinda understands how being desperate can lead to violence - she experienced it, although on a much smaller scale, when she pointed a knife at Stefano’s throat at the age of seventeen. So, again, she can’t find it in herself to judge Heaven.

It’s safe to conclude that Nina would be Heaven’s apologist n.1. To lighten up the mood, kinda like in that TikTok trend, the one that goes “What about the people he murdered?” “What murdaaa?”

And let’s be honest the little shit that is Nina would be really happy to have a partner in her mission of giving Tommy an headache

Thank you so much for the question, Shark! This was really fun and interesting to do🤍

Heaven is reader in Shark’s series Heaven in your eyes

Nina is the OC from my series Heart, Body and Soul

[getoutofmyjaneway]

Enterprise is also Leaving Netflix. What Should you Watch Before it Boldly Goes Away

So let’s talk about Enterprise shall we? The black sheep of Trek, it is very different from what came before it. And you are right, Enterprise starts off slow.  R e a l l y    s l o w.  Do not let that stop you, Enterprise has a lot to offer! How you can watch depends on how much you have to put into the show:

Option 1 - Long Option

Enterprise is primarily comprised of story arcs in its third and fourth seasons. You can see Star Trek actively starting to transition its’ form of storytelling from usually one- or two-episode stories to the multi-episode to season-long story arcs we typically see in TV today. I will also not be the first to say that Enterprise really blossoms in those two seasons. Because of this, it is really hard to just jump into an episode in the middle of a story arc without being a little lost

Your best option is to watch all of the Xindi story arc and most of the story arcs in season 4.

Start at season 2 episode 26 The Expanse and watch all the way to season 4 episode 21 Terra Prime. This is the true series finally, do not watch These are the Voyages, it is one of the most insulting series finales, like worse than Seinfeld.

Please note that you can skip season 4 episodes 18 and 19 if you don’t like/ are annoyed by the Mirror Universe. These are for-fun episodes that I enjoyed, but I understand are not for everyone. Additionally, season 4 episodes 10 and 11 are not part of any broader story arc, but I would only skip episode 11, Observer Effect. I personally really like episode 10, Daedalus, which gives insight into the history of the Star Trek Universe.

This leaves you with anywhere from 42-46 episodes to watch. Now if that seems like a lot, don’t worry! You can always watch:

Option 2 - Just 10 Episodes

Season 1 Episode 13 - Dear Doctor

Ship's Doctor and resident non-human character Phlox is on Enterprise in a type of exchange program, with a human taking his place on a Denobulan vessel as they strive to learn more about each other's cultures. Phlox writes his human counterpart a 'Data's Day' style letter in which he recounts the adventure of the day. So what's on the menu today? Oh, I don't know, just the origination point of the Prime Directive, you might have heard of that before. 

Season 2 Episode 23 -  Regeneration

Regeneration is a follow-up to the movie, Star Trek First Contact. Yes. I am serious. A group of scientists encounters a crash site where they find Borg corpsickles and so kindly bring them back. This means that the Borg's attack at Wolf 359 was actually a predestination paradox created by the same man who leads the charge against the Borg at that very battle. Yikes. Overall though, a Borg episode was surprisingly appreciated, reminding us that this is overall still a part of the current Star Trek canon.

Season 2 Episode 24 -  First Flight

The point of Enterprise was to give us a glimpse into the early years of human space exploration. While we only saw so much, we did see the beginning of humans traveling at faster than warp speeds. As part of the NX program that spawned Enterprise herself, many tests had to be made to push the maximum possible speed. Of course, being the prolific piolet he was, Archer was there. Making drama.

Season 3 Episode 8 -  Twilight

Enterprise ran into an anomaly that slams into a corridor where Archer and T'Pol are. T'Pol becomes trapped and Archer frees her. This allowed her to escape, but he did not share her fate, being rendered unconscious by the same anomaly. That was 12 years ago. As a result of his injury, he can no long-term memories and Archer has to come to grips with what has been lost during that time. This is my favorite episode of Enterprise, that invokes shades of DS9's The Visitor and Voyager's Year of Hell. In my research, I found out that this was originally pitched as a Voyager story which is now so obvious. The relationship between Archer and T'Pol is never romantic, but you can see the true care they have for each other in their interactions here.

The “Romulan Interference” Arc

Season 4 Episode 12 - Babel One

Season 4 Episode 13 - United

Season 4 Episode 14 - The Aenar

I have decided to select this three-episode arc which is defined by Memory Alpha as the Romulan Interference Arc. By trying to turn the founding members of the federation against each other, the Romulans accidentally created one of their biggest rivals. Oops. Of course, the Romulans are not the main focus, where this really shines is the interplay between the different cultures of the founding races, the humans, Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellarites. You can see that this was originally planned to be long and drawn out, but they did a good job of condensing it into a nice little arc. Andorians are at their best in Enterprise and this is the most in-depth look that we see in the series. Star Trek Legend Jeffery Combs plays Shran and of course he is amazing, his chemistry with Archer is real. As a reoccurring character, this is not the first or last time we see Shran, but probably the most focused look we have on the character.

The “Xenophobic Humans” Arc

Season 4 Episode 3 - Home

Season 4 Episode 20 - Demons

Season 4 Episode 21 - Terra Prime

Another arc here to round off the list. I had originally only planned on placing episodes 20 and 21 here, but as there is setup done earlier in the season, episode 3, so I have also included it here as it contributes to a bigger part of the story. It makes sense after all that people have been through after the Xindi war, there would be pro-isolation groups. Heck, they probably were already there, but it makes sense that here, the tension would grow. It’s kind of ironic that after all of these struggles with alien races, the climax of the series sees a struggle not among aliens, but among humans. As a premise, this is what we all expected of Enterprise, a Coalition among explorers coming together to see what is beyond their shores. This is the true ending of Enterprise.

Again there are multiple ways to watch Enterprise, and again, these are just snippets. I know I left out some episodes that people will probably enjoy like The Expanse, Carbon Creek, or even the pilot Broken Bow (which in my opinion is the best pilot episode in the pre-reboot Star Trek era). This list was composed of episodes that would best give the Enterprise flavor, and in my opinion, the effect of an episode on Star Trek mythology was one of the biggest contributing factors. Would love to know what you think or if there are other episodes that should be added. 

[tenthgrove]

Omg imagine la squadra with a teenage teammate 👀 (platonic obvs but I'm 18 and I wonder how they'd act with a team member that's a lot younger than them) cause I hc them as being in their late 20s early 30s ‼️

Okay I love love love this idea! I decided to go for the approach of a younger teenager, someone around 14 or 15 years old, and make them someone who is keen to prove themselves and be respected, but still has all the fears that would be natural for someone in this situation so young, hidden beneath the front they put on.

La Squadra Interacting with a Younger Teammate

Formaggio- The prospect of La Squadra’s next recruit being a kid is actually quite appealing to Formaggio. He doesn’t get much respect from the rest of the team, but he hopes a teenager would be more impressionable, more easy to wow. As soon as the newcomer is through the door Formaggio is already pulling out his cool uncle act. He’s always begging to show them something cool (usually just some random thing he shrunk) or tell them a gruesome story from the job. He totally forgets how naturally weary they’re going to be as someone who recently moved teams. When he finally realises how uncomfortable he makes them, he feels very guiltridden and backs away. But then one day, by pure accident, he makes them laugh. Genuinely. Things ease up a lot after that.

Illuso- Since he isn’t particularly good with kids, Illuso thinks it’s best to just treat them the same as he does any other teammate. This doesn’t go well, their interactions clunky and awkward as the newcomer is unsure how to respond. Eventually, Illuso realises too and decides he’s going to have to change tactic. What do teenagers like? Mischief? While the idea of taking the kid around the mirror world to wreck havoc on the base is tempting, it would not go down well with Risotto once he finds out. What else is there? Gossip? Yes, that could work. When Illuso finds himself alone with the kid with nothing else to talk about, he starts telling them all the dirty secrets he’s collected about his team over the years. There’s nothing age innappropriate, but it’s enough to break down the image the kid has of La Squadra as humorless, intimidating adults. The others soon notice a change in the kid’s behaviour and congratulate Illuso for helping them settle in, however it was he managed to do that. Well, that certainly wasn’t Illuso’s intention, but he’ll take the applause anyway.

Pesci- The arrival of the newcomer marks a big change for Pesci. He’s no longer the youngest of the group, both in age and in experience. While he’s glad to lose the associated teasing, it fills him with a sense of responsibility he isn’t quite ready for. Being the youngest in the group gave him a slight feeling of immunity for all his fuck-ups, both real and percieved, and that’s gone now. Worse, he sees this kid and he sees someone far newer to the game than he is yet somehow still able to face it with more courage than he does. The kid scares him, really. It feels like he is the junior member of the dynamic they have together. Then one day he finds their phone in the front room. He knows the others have a habit of pinching things like this for mean-spirited jokes, so he puts his anxiety regarding the kid on hold to go up to their room and give it back to them. He didn’t expect to find them crying there. He rushes up to them immediately, patting them on the shoulder nervously to offer some comfort. He asks them what’s wrong. “Everything. I’m scared.” At the end of the day, they really are just a child.

Prosciutto- The second-in-command doesn’t have time to mentor the newcomer to the same extent he does with Pesci, but he’ll still keep an eye on them whenever he can. Any of those violent idiots could teach them to kill, but Prosciutto’s going to make sure they learn to carry themselves right as well. For one, they need to get rid of those grungy hoodies and jeans they insist on wearing. He supposes he’ll just have to take them shopping. Overall, he can seem quite harsh on the kid, but he has their best interests at heart. He wouldn’t be paying them any mind at all if he didn’t have faith in them to go far.

Melone- As is only natural with his stand, Melone is good with kids. Teenagers are a different matter, and with little concrete memory of the whirl of heartbreak and emotions that were his own teen years, Melone isn’t as sure of himself as he would like to be. So he takes the experimental method, observes how their reactions to certain interactions in order to figure out the best way of keeping them at ease. It’s overall a good approach, and Melone becomes one of the earlier members of the team who the newcomer opens up to. The only issue is the others. They do not trust him. So, Melone takes it upon himself to prove himself. He makes a point of adjusting his behaviour, abandoning some of his more unsavoury habits for good, and not just in the kid’s present. The others are surprised, but pleasantly so. Melone is thankful to the newcomer for improving his standing with the team in general.

Ghiaccio- He is not happy. He knows about other teams getting actual children dumped on them, but he never thought it would happen to them. It makes him absolutely furious; the last thing this team needs right now is some petulant brat to take care of. Ghiaccio will give them the cold shoulder for a long time. Eventually, it takes Risotto dragging him into his office and point-blank asking what his problem is to make him reconsider. Ghiaccio drags his heels, insists he needs nothing to do with the newcomer, but then Risotto reminds him how young Ghiaccio was when he got trapped in his life. That changes things. That evening, as Risotto watches on silently from the doorway, Ghiaccio approaches the newcomer in the sitting room. “Hey… kid… do you like video games?” he asks uncertainly. The kid perks up, surprised to hear such an offer from Ghiaccio of all people. They accept. Ghiaccio invites them to play with him often after that. Risotto doesn’t need to ask him.

Risotto- Well, this is interesting. Risotto finds the kid hard to deal with because of how much he sees himself in them. They’re pretty much the same age he was when his own life went to hell. Risotto may have trouble facing the newcomer, but he’ll do it anyway for their sake. He wants to do what he can to make their own youth easier than his, if only by a fraction. For them, he’ll let down his walls and be a confidante. He’ll let them be honest about their fears with him, and he’ll comfort them to the best of his ability. He doesn’t want them to end up like him. He doesn’t want them to lose their humanity.

Sorbet and Gelato- “Sorbet, that’s a baby.” “Christ, you’re right.” Sorbet and Gelato may be devoid of sympathy towards a majority of humanity, but they at least have it in them to feel sorry for a kid. Especially a kid dumped into the closest thing the couple has to a family. Truth is, Sorbet and Gelato have long desired a child of their own, but never truly believed the opportunity would present itself. They know taking in a scarred teenager a few years off from adulthood will never truly take the place of a child to call their own, but if this is the closest they can get, they’ll take it. So yeah, congratulations kid, meet your new group assinged fathers. Sorbet is the more realistic of the two, the one who reluctantly accepts the need to prepare the newcomer for mafia life. They develop a dynamic somewhat comparable to Pesci and Prosciutto, with Sorbet becoming the primary mentor for the child when Risotto is too busy. Gelato is the one who really tries to baby the kid, trying to keep them away from their work as much as possible and always fussing over them whenever a mission can’t be avoided. The kid might be reluctant to accept it, but it is what they need. At least once in a while.

[soulmate-game]

Part 2: The same prompt, but Siblings this time

Tim paused the video on his computer, the red figure on it in mid-leap off of a building. Be rewound the video, played it, paused again at the same time stamp.

No, his eyes were not deceiving him. The video was not doctored.

So what the hell was going on?

“Hey Timmie, find anything on that Paris situation Bruce asked you to look into?” Dick’s voice made Tim startle, nearly spilling his coffee all over the keyboard and possibly deleting his hard-earned research. Rescuing his lifeblood from certain doom, he hugged his mug to his chest and glared at his older brother for a second. Dick was not in the least bothered, used to this sort of reaction from the younger detective. Dick just grinned, leaning on the back of Tim’s chair and looking up at the images on the large computer screen above them. He whistled lowly, impressed. “You’ve made a lot of progress, nice! Anything you wanna share with me before the debrief tonight?”

Tim clenched and unclenched his jaw, weighing his options. Dick waited patiently, knowing that sometimes Tim needed a minute to sort through his rapid-forming thoughts. Finally Tim sighed, setting down his mug grimly.

“Actually, yes,” he admitted. Tim’s tense tone immediately made Dick stiffen, straightening up. His eyebrows pulled down, and he returned his gaze to the computer.

“Okay, that’s your serious voice. What is it?”

“I… need your confirmation with something,” Tim turned around and looked straight at Dick. And he hesitated again, because certain… past interactions with his eldest brother once again flashed through his head. The entire Bruce-is-alive and being threatened with Arkham interaction, to be specific. But Tim needed to know the truth, it was his fatal flaw he supposed. He couldn’t back away in fear of how Dick might react.

“Ohhhhkay?” Dick just grew more and more concerned the longer that Tim took to actually speak.

“So, just to recap. There are only four people in history who have been able to do a quadruple somersault, right?” Tim asked, knowing full well the answer. Dick, predictably, shifted and grew even more on alert at the inquiry. He knew that couldn’t mean anything good. His jaw clenched, and his hands formed tight fists. But Dick also remembered the Bruce incident with Tim all that time ago, and he didn’t want to repeat his mistakes. So he forced himself to take a deep breath, and shake himself away from jumping to conclusions.

“Yeah,” Dick nodded. “Me, my parents, and my sister,” he confirmed rigidly. Tim nodded, and then rewound the video on the screen again, nodding to show that Dick should focus on it.

“Okay. But watch this,” Tim suggested, starting the video again. Dick watched as the red and black-spotted heroine of Paris, Ladybug, zipped through the air and around buildings with her yo-yo. He watched as she let go, at a height that even a normal person could manage, and executed four perfect somersaults in mid-air before landing nimbly on the ground. Tim paused the video again, his eyes never leaving Dick’s tense face.

“It isn’t doctored,” Tim said, filling the silence and preemptively answering the questions he knew he would get. “I checked. Magic is involved, but Constantine and Zatanna both confirmed it would have no hold over basic physical abilities like flexibility or… gymnastics. Only specifically combat styles used by past Ladybugs can be transferred magically to the next Ladybug, not this.”

“Tim,” Dick’s voice was terrifyingly blank. “What are you suggesting?”

“Nothing yet,” Tim was quick to hold up his hands in surrender. “I’m still doing research. It’s possible, though extremely unlikely, that she managed to teach herself how to do that. You tell me, Dick, how likely is it?”

Dick swallowed, not wanting to say it but knowing he had to look at the facts. “... At her age? Next to impossible,” he admitted. “She could learn it, theoretically, as young as seven or eight, but only if someone who knew what they were doing taught her since she was about three.”

Tim nodded again. He knew those numbers, he knew where they came from.

“Then— and this is only a theory right now— we have what I think is the more plausible scenario,” Tim swallowed. This was the hard part. “Your sister was kidnapped after your parent’s death, but the body that was found wasn’t actually her’s. It wasn’t in a state to be physically identified, so—“

“I know what state it was in, Tim!” Dick snapped, forcing himself to take a few steps back and just breath. Even now, the image of a tiny body burned beyond recognition was burned into the inside of his eyelids, there to taunt him whenever he blinked or slept and let his mind wander in just the wrong direction. She would be… what, Jason’s age, now? She was seven… only seven, when their parents died and she ran off into the Gotham streets in despair. When she was kidnapped, as is what happens in Gotham.

When Dick was presented with a body he could not say WASN’T her’s a week later.

“The DNA…” Dick tried. “They said…”

“I know,” Tim’s voice was carefully soft. “But the records on your family’s DNA were all kept by the circus back then. The Talons had access to those files. It’s very possible they were tampered with. Switched. It wouldn’t be hard for them to burn your sister’s actual medical files and replace them with forged copies that had someone else’s DNA on them. The data of the girl who actually died.”

Dick closed his eyes, shaking his head. He didn’t want to hope, it would hurt too much if Tim was wrong.

Tim had been right about more unlikely things than this, a voice in the back of his head whispered. And yeah, that was true. But Dick was still too scared to hope.

“Finish your research, Tim,” Dick’s voice was strained with suppressed emotion. He couldn’t even look at the younger vigilante as he left the Cave. “Find out who Ladybug’s civilian persona is, and then we’ll talk.”

Tim could only sigh in relief when Dick was gone. That could have gone much worse.

—*—*—*—*—*

A week later, the entire family was gathered. This was the full debrief on the Paris case, rather than the progress update that they had had to do before. Research took longer than Tim had expected, he had years of data to go through after all. But he had come away with exactly what he had been looking for.

After running through the overall situation and where the fight against HawkMoth was at in the present day, Tim licked his lips and took a deep breath. This was it, the Who-Is-Ladybug part.

“I was able to get security footage of her detransformation, just one lucky shot from ten years ago, when this whole thing began,” he prefaced. “She was thirteen years old, and untrained as far as heroism goes, so it stands to reason she didn’t know yet how to be properly careful about transforming. This is that security picture,” he carefully put the enlarged picture up on the Batcomputer, as well as sliding a physical copy onto the table for everyone to pass around.

Dick didn’t even try to grab it, his eyes glued to the computer, expression unreadable. The picture was a little grainy, but most of the girl’s face could be made out. Pigtails, dark black hair that shimmered blue in direct light, blue eyes.

But it was the next picture that Tim pulled up that pushed everything over the edge.

“These are the official pictures of her that I was able to get from Paris records. This first picture is of her at the same age at the security footage, thirteen. The second picture is her now, age twenty-three,” Tim said, before the side-by-side came up on the screen. Tim’s eyes slid over to Dick, who was frozen in his seat, just staring at the images silently. He wasn’t even breathing.

“Dick?” Bruce asked, immediately noticing the behavior. His eyebrows furrowed. “Are you alright?”

Dick’s next breath came in with a shudder, and he clenched his eyes shut in a futile attempt to stop the tears that came out. He choked out a broken chuckle, shaking his head and giving out a lopsided, watery grin.

“Heh. Another point for Timmy being right,” Dick jokes weakly, rubbing at his eyes.

“What do you mean? Tim?” Bruce turned to the younger of the two insistently. “What’s going on? Who is she?”

“Currently, according to Parisian records, she is Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Tim told them. “More specifically, her full name is Marinette Gray Dupain-Cheng. Which I believe is what she chose to change her name to after she was kidnapped sixteen years ago from right outside Haley’s Circus, and illegally transported to France,” Tim clicked another button to bring up a third picture in the side-by-side. It was of someone who was clearly a younger Marinette, but in the very familiar costume of the Flying Graysons, standing right next to a twelve-year old version of Dick. “Because her birth name is Marie Natalia Grayson. Dick’s younger sister, who until now was presumed dead. But I was able to confirm that the medical records back then for Marie were forged, and the information on them could not actually belong to her. The body that was presented as Marie’s… was a red herring to hide that Marie was no longer in America at all.”

Dick’s sob-laugh drew everyone’s attention back to the first Robin, who was now silently, openly, crying. Nobody really knew how to deal with that, and the room descended into awkward silence as Dick tried to regain his composure a little.

“Marinette… Gray,” he whispered, chuckling again and shaking his head as he wiped at his cheeks. “That idiot… her ability with subtlety hasn’t gotten any better, that’s for sure,” he was smiling now, still staring at the pictures of Marinette on the screen. Of his beautiful little sister, all grown up and not buried six feet under like he had thought for far too long.

Because this was different from Hope. This was certainty. The face, the far too on-the-nose name, the somersaults, Dick had even noticed it in the way she swung on her yo-yo. The body memory from years of Trapeze, those little quirks he recognized as belonging to his sister that he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge. But now, all together, he could admit to himself that it was her. It was really her.

Could it be a clone? Maybe. Maybe. But that was why Dick snuck out to France the very next day, informing absolutely nobody.

Because he had a test that only the real Marie would be able to pass.

—*—*—*—*—*

"How did you- No, nevermind, I don't want to know, plausible deniability and all that,” the deep, unfamiliar male voice made Marinette squeak in shock, nearly dropping the phone in her hands. She leaned so far to her right that she almost fell over, but her nearly perfect balance (that only failed her when she was nervous or self conscious) kept her upright.

Her eyes darted down to her phone screen, where an app that Max had helped her create was opened. It utilized at least five hundred little fly-shaped drones that Markov managed and kept track of to scan the city for corrupted butterflies and recognize the level of stress or other negative emotions that civilians were experiencing. It cut down severely on patrol time that the crew had to do, making it easier for them to balance their hero and civilian lives and also allowed for them to arrive at the scene of Akuma attacks twice as fast as before— along with helping with the original purpose of catching evidence to use against Hawkmoth, of course.

Marinette straightened her back, smiling sheepishly and closing out the app. She had just been making a routine check, it had only been open for a minute. How had he managed to sneak up on her in that time? Only chat could do that anymore.

That is, until Marinette turned around the rest of the way and got a good look at the man. Her eyes widened— what was Nightwing, a vigilante from Gotham, doing there?

“I don’t see what plausible deniability has to do with anything,” she replied in easy, unaccented English. She might not speak it often, but she did stay in practice. Even now a lot of her fashion notes and thoughts were in either English or Romani. “It’s just a game app that my friend created,” the practiced lie flew easily past her lips, and she was able to even smile confidently and begin to happily ramble about Max’s (public) achievements like she would in any normal situation. “It is still in the test phase of course, but it uses virtual reality and mapping technology to create a treasure hunt sort of adventure game that people can do as they walk around. Like Pokémon go, but with real-time footage of the city— with people not included besides the game characters of course— and it rewards caution as well as keeping active,” she explained their cover story for the app happily. But Nightwing only smiled easily at her with his arms crossed, clearly not believing a single word.

“Ah— but that probably isn’t interesting,” Marinette purposely stuttered, turning her face into one of (surprisingly genuine) confusion as she looked at the vigilante. “What are you here for anyway, Monsieur? This doesn’t seem like—“

“I have a riddle that a friend of mine told me to ask you,” he interrupted, instantly putting Marinette on guard. She took a step back, eyebrows pulling down at the odd request. But still, she chuckled nervously and shrugged. She had to maintain appearances after all.

“Uh, sure..? Riddles are fun, in the right circumstances I guess.”

Nightwing beamed happily, nearly blinding the poor girl. “Awesome!” His next words came out in fluent Romani though: “If a Hummingbird ever gets lost, what kind of animal will track it down?”

Marinette’s mouth went dry, her shoulders dropping. Her mouth opened and closed, the shock of the question leaving her unable to even pretend she didn’t understand exactly what was said. Nightwing’s gaze grew more intense, yet his smile got impossibly soft.

Marinette swallowed thickly, and she took a deep breath before responding in Romani: “You shouldn’t— only one person—“

“That doesn’t answer the riddle, ma’am.”

Marinette’s confusion turned into a harsh glare. “He would never tell someone else to ask me that. What are you trying to play at, Nightwing?” She hissed harshly, still in her native language.

“Listen, Marinette,” Nightwing held up both hands to try to calm her down. It did the opposite, making her take another step back. “Batman and the rest of our team has been looking into the Hawkmoth security—“ Marinette cursed, clearly seeing where this was going. “— We believe he found out who Ladybug is. But, we also found signs that your real name is—“

“Shut up!” She yelled in English, fists clenched tightly. Luckily she had gone into an alleyway to check her phone, or else they would be attracting attention by then. Her eyes sparked with anger. “You don’t get to use that name. And if you’re so smart,” Marinette tucked her phone into her purse and scaled the wall next to her nimbly, perching on the roof as Nightwing cursed and began to follow her. “Then try to predict my moves, birdy.”

It only took a few minutes and crossed rooftops for Marinette to call on her transformation and pick up speed. She knew by then that Nightwing, and probably the other Bats too, already found her out. Not ideal, but manageable. Now she wanted to show him why he shouldn’t come into her territory and dig into her past and think he could get away with it.

Somewhere during the chase, more Bats appeared one by one. Judging by what Ladybug was able to overhear, they had come as soon as they realized where Nightwing had snuck off to.

That made Marinette pause from where she hid behind a sloped roof, in the middle of a call to her own teammates. Nightwing hadn’t come on his team’s orders?

Why the hell had he come, then?

She shook thought thoughts away, focusing on her plan. Paris was her city, and she would make sure the Bats learned their lesson when it came to sticking their nose in Parisian business.

“Bug?” The soft, concerned call came from her yo-yo and pulled her from her contemplating. Max, in full Pegasus attire, was frowning at her in worry on the small screen. She just shook her head at him.

“I’m fine, Peg. Just don’t like how this feels like Gotham ruining my life again,” she remarked sourly. “But I’m fine. Start plan We’re Not Kids.”

Max nodded, but rolled his eyes and muttered something that sounded like; “even though we made this plan when we actually were kids…”

A portal opened in the air a few seconds later, releasing Honeybee in all her gold and black glory. The winged hero zipped through the air, immediately putting team Miraculous at an advantage since team Bat didn’t want to actually harm them.

It took a glorious five seconds for Honeybee to paralyze them all before Tortoise dropped out from another portal and surrounded the temporarily paralyzed vigilantes in a dome shield that kept them in just as easily as it kept everything else out.

One by one, Marinette’s teammates dropped out of more portals until Pegasus himself joined them. Ladybug took that as her que to come out, leaping over her hiding place to land in front of her friends, who had formed a half-circle in front of the trapped dome.

“Vixen,” she called to the fox-themed hero, whose ears twitched before she straightened to attention. “Create an illusion to hide us. The last thing we need are any pictures or anyone asking questions.”

“Got it!” Vixen agreed easily, raising her flute to her lips. A short melody later, and their surroundings warped. To those inside the illusion, it seemed as if the world merely ended off of the rooftop they were on, into only blankness. Outside, that very rooftop appeared empty.

It was then that Chat Noir stepped up to take Ladybug’s side, his acidic green eyes scanning over the Gotham vigilantes trapped inside Tortoise’s protective barrier.

“You can release the paralysis, Honeybee,” his order was noticeably softer than Ladybug’s clear commands. It was obvious that he was the deputy in this situation, the flexibility to Ladybug’s iron leadership. That was when the red clad hero crossed her arm, resuming control of the situation wordlessly. The Gotham heroes briefly glowed gold as Honeybee let their paralysis begin to gradually wear off.

“Paris is my city,” Ladybug’s voice was at a normal volume, but came out with such auditory steel that it was clear she expected to be listened to, or she’d know why. “If I needed or wanted your help, I would have asked for it. Now, if you had come here normally to offer aid, then we might be having a different discussion right now,” her eyes narrowed further. “But you dug into my past. You violated my privacy. And Nightwing, you crossed a line,” she would have continued if the blue and black clad hero didn’t use his sudden ability to move to rip off his mask.

Marinette’s voice died in her throat, and for a while she thought she might be hallucinating. Those eyes, that face— she knew them. She knew them, because she saw them whenever she dared close her eyes. Because the dreams she had, the dreams that made her never want to drag herself out of bed because she wanted to believe those dreams were real so badly, always contained those eyes. And that face, though it had been much younger in her memories.

She stumbled, and only Chat’s presence at her side kept her from toppling right over.

“Bugaboo?” He asked frantically, distraught. She just shook her head dazedly, pushing herself back to her feet and away from her partner.

“I’m fine, Chat. Just…,” she assured her partner, but her eyes never left Nightwing. She licked her lips nervously, before continuing; “... Bluebird,” she whispered, making Nightwing’s eyes widen. Her brother’s eyes. “That’s the answer to the riddle, right?”

Slowly, a wide smile split his face before he began to laugh happily, despite Robin slapping Nightwing’s mask back on his face with a furious grumble.

“Ladybug?” Tortoise asked, stepping up to her other side cautiously. Seeing as they were all adults now, none of them had to worry about time or power limits anymore. “Are you..?”

“Release the shield,” she ordered instead of answering, her eyes clearly damp behind her mask. “I need to strangle my idiotic older brother for scaring the hell out of me.”

That made the rest of her team make their various exclamations of shock, but Chat and Tortoise stayed silent. Chat just put a hand on Ladybug’s shoulder in support, while Tortoise zipped his wide gaze back to Nightwing before sighing and releasing his ability.

“Only you, Bug,” the green clad hero groused playfully. “Only you.”

If Marinette Dupain-Cheng suddenly introduced her long-lost brother to her closest friends and family that same night, nobody voiced the coincidence out loud.

—*—*—*—*—*

Part 1: Romance

Part 3: Bio!Parent

[alovesongshewrote]

If you’re taking requests, maybe something about Doux finding the reader absolutely delirious from lack of sleep? I may or may not have gotten literally any sleep last night and although I managed to get through my morning routine pretty efficiently I FEEL my body just wiping out. I will be comatose within the hour.

Sleep, Darling | Hisirdoux Casperan x Reader

Plot:  you’ve been awake for too long and it is not doing you any favours.  Thank god for punk wizards who care about your wellbeing, amirite lads?  (Also, the pure Irony that this is getting posted at like, 2:40 am where i am, rip me i guess)

Word Count: 2,292

Warnings:  A bit of blood is mentioned in passing, the reader isn’t human and probably has adhd or smthn.  Also, Friends is mentioned, like, the tv show, so that’s a thing!

A/N:   if you look closely, you can actually see me projecting onto this one.  I hope you got some sleep anon.

Tags:   @furblrwurblr @einahpetsyarcip @sorrels-scribbling @anxious-stitcher @alive-and-afraid @animedweeb333 @douxiesdamsel @saroski05

Time isn’t real.  It’s a social construct made to bring order to the general chaos that is human existence.  That was why you were up at 5 a.m for the second, maybe third, night in a row.  Was it healthy?  Probably not, but you didn’t need sleep, you needed answers.  Answers to what?  Who knows at this point, honestly.

You couldn’t say you were surprised when you finally noticed the late, or early hour.  You just shrugged it off and went “fuck it, all-nighter,” which was fine for the moment.  But time’s a bitch, and that moment was over pretty fast.  By noon, you were ready to collapse.  The three cups of coffee did not help.  Instead, they made you vibrate at a frequency that could quite possibly break glass.  As much as this sucked for you, it was worse for your lovely friend and co-worker, Hisirdoux Casperan.

Now, our boi Douxie was and is madly in love with you, but shhh, it’s a secret.  You also love him, and that’s a secret too.  Neither of these secrets are well kept, and the only reason you aren’t together is general stupidity.  Literally, anyone else who watches the two of you interacting can tell that you're in love.  Hell, half the town assumes you’re together already.  The other half keeps trying to get you together.  It is not working very well.  But that’s all a digression.  What you really need to know is that Douxie loves you and watching you suffer from a lack of sleep was Not A Pleasant Experience.  You were delirious, shaky, and constantly off-balance.  You could work well enough, but it was clear that your health was not in the same zone.

The final straw came when you cut your hand on broken glass.  You’d dropped a cup, and instead of using magic, you’d tried to fix the mess by hand.  That plan did not work, and you received a bloody slash across your palm for your troubles.

“Ah.  Fuck,” you said, thinking you were whispering but instead speaking at a normal volume.

“What’s wrong, love?”

“‘S nothing, I’ve got it,” you did not got it, especially not in this state, and Douxie had the good sense to figure that out.  The blood was a pretty good hint though.

“Oh, fuzzbuckets.”

“I told you, I’m toooootally fine, there is nothing to worry about.”

“Here, (Y/N), let me help you-”

“No, no, this is, this is-” it was then that your sleep-deprived brain decided to cut off your train of thought and replace it with another, more chaotic train.  You stopped talking and just stared at Douxie for a solid minute.  Or at least it felt like a solid minute.  Time isn’t real, remember that.

“(Y-Y/N)?  You alright there, darling?”

“You’re really cute, did you know that?  Like… really cute.  Steve was right, you could be a model.”

“I-”

“Also, just gonna put it out there, I freakin’ love it when you call me darling.  Like, I know you call most people darling, but it makes me feel special.  Don’t ask why, it just does.”

Douxie wasn’t planning on asking why.  He wasn’t really planning on anything.  Your sleep-deprived half-confession had turned him from a capable individual into a blushing mess in less than a second.  You always had that effect on him, but it looked like your exhausted state was giving you a bit of an edge.

“Oh, sorry, I made it weird.  Anyway, do you think if I brewed my next coffee with Monster instead of water it would wake me up?   Because I’m still tired, and it isn’t fun.”

“I- you- I’m-”

“I think I might try it, honestly.”

“Ok, how about you don’t do that,”  Archie said, swooping in, literally and figuratively, to save the day, “Douxie, can you please get (Y/N)’s hand patched up?  It looks quite painful and they’re dripping blood onto the carpet.”

You were, in fact, dripping blood onto the carpet.  That wasn’t good, “Oh, that’s- I’m sorry.”

“Don’t fret, just go do something about that hand,” with that, Archie smacked Douxie upside the head in an attempt to snap him out of his flustered state.  It was super effective!

“Ahh, yeah.   C’mon, (Y/N), let’s,,, go,,, fix,,, that.”

“Ok,”  you stood, too tired to protest, and followed Douxie into the back of the bookstore, which was literally just his apartment.  

It was a nice place.  Very cozy, very him.  It made you want to curl up and take a nap, but to be fair, literally everything made you want to curl up and take a nap at the moment.  Regardless, his home made you feel warm and fuzzy on the inside and you never wanted to leave it.  Maybe it was the interior decorating, but you knew it was because your favourite person lived there.  What you didn’t know, or didn’t realize, was that you’d just spoken your entire thought process out loud and Douxie heard every word of it.  Once again, the boy was a blushing mess.  If you were awake enough to process things, you would have found it cute.  Or you’d be dead from embarrassment, that one is a bit of a toss-up.

Fighting through his flustered state, Douxie pulled you into the bathroom and collected a first aid kit from under the counter.  While he focused on getting things done, you curled into a ball in his bathtub.  For some reason, your exhausted brain decided that sitting on the edge of the bathtub simply did not Vibe™ but sitting inside the tub was better than nothing, and so you just,,, curled up there.  Douxie was only a little surprised to see you there.

“(Y/N)?”

“D’you remember that time on Friends when Winona Ryder played a closeted lesbian?  That was a fuckin’ trip, man.”

“(Y/N), darling-”

“That whole episode is just- it’s just strange.”

“(Y/N)-”

“Hehe, Stranger Things.”

“(Y/N), love, I need to see your hand.”

“Oh, fuck, yeah, I forgot.  Here,” you sat up, extending your hand out to the wizard.  He took it, sitting on the edge of the bathtub which was fine for him to do, I guess.  Not you though, you were stuck in bathtub jail for sleep deprivation crimes.

You squinted up at his face as he tended to the nasty scratch you’d given yourself.  You didn’t have the capacity to focus on what he was doing, so instead you focused on him.  He was pretty, as you’d said before, but that was always true.  At that exact moment, his brows were furrowed in concentration, his eyes concerned and his jaw set.  His hands were steadier than yours could ever hope to be, especially since you hadn’t been sleeping.  Overall, he looked kind of mad, so you sunk down into your bath-prison, silent and waiting for him to finish so you could get back to work.

Douxie was not mad at you.  He was upset that you hadn’t been sleeping, but he wasn’t mad.  He was just worried for your health.  Your wizard did not appreciate seeing you shaking and sleep-deprived.  He didn’t appreciate it when your current state led you to injure yourself, either.

He wrapped up your hand and gave it a small pat, “Done.  Now, come on, you’re taking a nap.”

His voice surprised you.  It was gentle, calm, not at all angry like you’d suspected.  You found yourself so lost in it that you didn’t realize what he’d said until he said your name, trying to snap you out of whatever haze you were in.

“Oh, wait, what?  No, shit, I have to get back to work-”

“No, you need sleep.”

“Sleep is for the weak, I need to go-” you stood and almost fell over.  You probably would have broken something if Douxie didn’t catch you.  You hadn’t exactly expected to end up in his arms today, and despite the heat rising in your face and neck, you were not complaining.

“(Y/N)-”

“I’m sorry, Douxie, I-”

“You need to sleep.  Please, (Y/N), don’t make me use a spell on you.”

You froze for a second before a smirk crept onto your face, “You wouldn’t.”

“I-”

“You wouldn’t use a spell on meeeeee-” the smirk grew into a full smile as you let yourself go limp, forcing him to move his hands to support you better and pull you closer to him.  Was that your plan?  Maybe.  Was it part of a second, bigger plan?  Also yes.

“You wanna bet?”

“Sure.”

“I-” and then he went silent.  There was a moment of tension where you just stared into each other’s eyes, holding your breath to see what the other person would do.  Your gaze fell to his lips as his fell to yours.  For that moment, your thoughts began to wander far out of your control.  Douxie’s mind was also running rampant but in a different direction.  You were right, he thought.  He couldn't use magic on you.  As far as he knew, you were a human.  Just a mortal being who crawled their way into his life and stayed there, improving the quality of it greatly.  If there was even the slightest chance that a spell may have negative side effects, which most sleep spells did, he wouldn’t dare risk it, especially not on you.  He sighed, tightening his grip on your waist, “You’re right.”

“What?”  Oop, plan going sideways, PLAN GOING SIDEWAYS!

“I’m- not going to use magic on you,” he helped you to stand, and moved to take a step back before you grabbed his hoodie and pulled him back to you, ignoring the sharp sting in your hand.

“Ok, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, hang on there wizard boy-” you took a moment to pull yourself out of the bathtub entirely, “You can’t give up that easily.”

“Wha-”

“Come onnnnnn, make it fun, make it exciting.  Put a spell on me or whatever, just-” you went quiet for a second, but for once you weren’t distracted.  Just quiet.  You had to face facts.  Your plan had failed, and now you had nothing but the truth.

“(Y/N)?”

“Just make my brain stop.  For just two seconds.”

“What?”

“Please.  I’m running on a motor and I can’t stop myself.  I haven’t slept and I have no choice in the matter.”

“(Y/N)-”

“Look, just, take away my free-will if you have to.  Knock me out, magic or otherwise, I just want five seconds where I’m not on hyperdrive,” you were standing on your own now, though Douxie’s arms were still wrapped around you and you hadn’t let go of his hoodie, “Please.”

The bathroom was silent for a minute.  It took that long for Douxie to process what you’d just said.  You feared, for that moment, that you’d said too much.  You hadn't.  Not to him, anyway.

“Come on.”

“What?”

“Come on,” he said, picking you up, effortlessly sweeping you off your feet.

“Wait, what!?” your voice was slightly more frantic, surprise lacing through your words.

“There’s more than one way to get a person to sleep.”

“Oh-?”

He didn’t respond to your question, instead, he carried you out the door and into what you could only assume was his room.  You had no choice but to wrap your arms around his neck and cling to him for dear life until he set you down on the bed.

“Stay here, okay?  I’m going to make you some tea-”

“Wait!” you stopped him, grabbing his wrist as he turned to leave, “I’m… I’m sorry.”

“You don’t need to be sorry, my darling,” he sat in front of you on the bed, “You just need to get some sleep, okay?”

“But what about-”

“I’ll cover your shift, you don’t need to worry.”

“I-”

“Just rest, for now, love.  Please.”

“Ok,” your words were a whisper, something that Douxie could only just hear.  The next thing though, he didn’t have to strain to hear at all, “Yeah.  I meant what I said earlier, by the way.  You’re so pretty, it isn’t fair.”

He laughed at this, at you, finally seeing some humour in your shenanigans.  He relaxed now knowing that you may actually get some much-needed rest.  He stood, kissing your forehead and tracing the side of your face with a hand, rough from guitar strings and 900 years of sweeping.

“Worry not, love, you’re pretty too.”

“Hey, wait-”

“Don’t ‘hey, wait,’ me.  You are.  Now lie down, I’ll be back in a second.”

A smile crept onto your face as you followed orders.  Your emo wizard man thought you were pretty.  And he cared enough about you to let you sleep during work hours, in his home, no less.  You let yourself relax into the bed, grinning once again.  It smelled like him, like thyme and peppermint, lemongrass and sleep.  It was nice, comforting.  You could only vaguely think of Douxie as your brain finally took a fuckin breather.  It was everything you needed, honestly.

By the time Douxie came back, you were long gone, lost to your dreams and finally asleep.  He sighed a smile that matched yours on his face.  He placed the cup of tea on the bedside table before grabbing a blanket out of his closet and draping it over you.  You looked so peaceful.  Good.  You deserved some peace every now and then.

He took the cup and left you, brushing a strand of hair out of your eyes as he did.  After making his exit, he placed the still-hot tea on the counter, disregarding it for now before returning to the bookshop.

“How are they?”  his familiar asked, tail twisting in concern.

He gave a final fond look at the door before returning to business, “They’re just resting.”  And for once, you were.

[me4ml]

Why don't you like Maribat? Why do you think it's a spite or salt ship?

This is presumably because of my Adrigaminette post or the whole Maribat being on the ship list thing.

Quick disclaimer: if you read/ship/write/like Maribat, cool! This is not an attack. This is me answering why I, personally, do not like it. It’s tagged anti, and salt, so it should be filtered. Please don’t harass me over it.

Another note before we start: a lot of what I’m about to write is based on what I’ve read, fic wise or meta, and I blocked off the Maribat tag and fandom a long time ago. It may have changed over there-I doubt it, and I have zero desire to go and look-but this is based on what I’ve seen and read about.

There are, principally, three reasons I can’t stand Maribat, why I think it’s a spite/salt ship.

1). I don’t like Damian Wayne.

2). I don’t like how Damian and the DCU are written in Maribat.

3). Maribat is a mutated salt fic.

If you want to see my reasons why, the rest is under the read more.

1). I don’t like Damian Wayne.

Damian’s not just my least favorite Robin, ranking behind any of the others who have born the name. He’s my least favorite Batfam sidekick overall.

Part of this is his introduction, where he’s a violent, murderous, arrogant, entitled, snotty little brat of a thug. Lest we forget, one of his first acts is to go out, kill a guy, cut off his head, stuff a grenade into the decapitated head’s mouth, and try to blow up Tim. This is his introduction! There are a number of other occasions, including how he treats Jon, his best friend, and the rest of his siblings.

Another part is that he believes that he deserves to be Robin simply because he’s Bruce’s son, and therefore has the blood right to be Robin, to become Batman, and damn anyone else, who are all pretenders. Doesn’t matter that those characters might have a right to become Robin, or the future Batman, he’s the bio son, he deserves it!

Additionally, Damian feels.....not unnecessary, but repetitive, in his actions/characterization. There are other characters who can perform pretty much the same way for whatever storyline is necessary, without including Damian.

Trained by an abusive family to be the best, as an assassin and warrior? Cassandra.

A killer who breaks the main rule of his mentor, which causes tension and strain in the family? Jason.

Incredibly intelligent and talented? Tim.

Damian isn’t unique in what he does, and while that can make him an interesting character, it can also make the focus on him unnecessary.

As well, so much of Damian’s actions and motivations feels like he gets away with stuff, in-universe, because he’s Bruce’s biological son, and so Bruce gives him too much slack, and out-universe, because the writers let him/the fans will defend him. He gets woobified, or leather pantsed. Which leads to:

2). I don’t like how Damian and the DCU are written for Maribat.

For all his (numerous) faults, when written well, Damian can be an interesting character. For example: How does he deal with being deeply insecure? By putting on a mask of arrogance and overconfidence.

Some more examples: How does Damian act like an actual child, when he’s never had a childhood? How can he be a hero, if he’s been trained to be a killer? Can he ever catch up to his siblings, or will he feel like they’re always better than him?

Damian’s sense of being Batman’s son, of being the heir to the Cowl, slams right up against the idea of the Batfam: that there are people who have just as much of a right to call Batman their father/father figure, people who are just as talented and skilled and capable as Damian himself is, if not more. Watching Damian develop, when he’s written right, is actually enjoyable; mainly because when it’s done right, it shows Damian actually progressing and growing, becoming more of a person, with friends and interests. Most times, seeing Damian with his pets can be adorable, same with when he hangs out with Jon.

Is he still a brat? Still sometimes a bit too much of a Demon, an al-Ghul? Yes, but that’s always going to be part of him, and as long as he’s shown to try and grow, or gets called out on that, it’s less of an issue (There’s a completely different rant to be written about how DC likes to chuck character development or backstory into the trash when it suits them for a new run. Damian gets hit with this, as does Tim, or they get handed the idiot/conflict ball, but not the space for it).

Maribat hurls this all out the window. Damian’s bad traits are all “fixed” offscreen-he’s developed, matured, gotten better, whatever you want to call it. It’s basically a writer’s hand wave to make Damian into the character who will be the lead of the story, perfectly suited for his main role of being Marinette’s boyfriend and utterly devoted to her every whim and will. He’s enchanted by her at first glimpse, and defends her against everyone who hates her, because no one can understand her like he can!

Uh, what? This is not Damian Wayne. Even at his best, he’s no broody boy, pulled from his “dark path” by the love of a gentle girl. He’s a Jerk with a Heart of Gold-emphasis on the Jerk. There’s a reason his nickname usually involves “Demon.” Is Damian trying to get better? Yes. But even then, he’s not the type to immediately fall in love. He takes a while to warm up to people, for them to earn his trust, and Marinette would not be like that?

Let’s say that Robin is in Paris for a case, he runs into Ladybug and Chat, and after they explains what’s going on, Robin gives them a stare over his mask, and goes “TT! What a worthless hero, I would have caught him already.” LB and Chat would probably want to deck him, and that’s before he keeps talking.

Same with if Damian transfers to the class, or they meet on a field trip to Gotham. Damian’s not gonna care about some random French teenagers on a tour, or if he was transferred he’s gonna be trying to figure out why his father sent him to Paris, and be focused on the mission, not making friends.

Of all of the Robins, the ones that would be the most likely to capture Marinette’s interest would be Dick or Tim, not Damian. He would remind her too much of Chloe, as Damian, and as Robin, he would be dismissive of Ladybug’s abilities, which would absolutely piss her, and Chat Noir, off.

In characters that aren’t Damian, no one seems to be written properly over in Maribatland. One huge example is that Marinette is so beloved, so pure, that she can make any character fall in love with her, and reform by her pure goodness, including a fic where the Joker-THE JOKER!-becomes her “Uncle J,” and pranks Lila on her behalf.

Uh-huh. Sure. Completely and totally something that one of the biggest, most sadistic twisted, notorious villains in pop culture would do. Maribat winds up worshipping the ground that Marinette walks on, cause she’s “Teh best evar!”

Which then leads to my third and final point:

3). The whole Maribat concept is a mutated salt fic.

Most of the themes you’ll find in Maribat? You will find in nearly every salt fic.

Maybe my biggest issue with the whole Maribat idea is that it doesn’t feel like a proper crossover, which, at their best, explore how characters from one universe and their rules would interact with characters from another universe, and the rules of that one. Putting ML and DC together is a rich opportunity to play with concepts in both worlds!

And yet, it’s mainly used to bash ML characters who the writers despise, predominantly Adrien, Alya, and Lila, with members of the class thrown in depending on feeling, and potentially even Marinette’s parents! The only “good” ML characters are the ones who are on Marinette’s side, usually Luka, Kagami, a Chloe who for some reason has been redeemed and is now Marinette’s best friend, and whatever members of the class the writer decides to throw in there.

You’ll notice it’s not called “MiracuBat”, or LadyBat and Bat Noir-it’s MariBat. It’s meant as a focus on Marinette, making her-the hero of the Miraculous Ladybug franchise, someone in-story in story who is incredibly smart and talented and the leader of her team, future Guardian-even more awesome.....by beating down everyone else around her.

Marinette is simultaneously treated as an beaten-up, beaten-down walked-on carpet, and the best person to ever exist ever, go who only needs a group of new, different, better people to recognize that and save her from the clutches of those greedy and ungrateful assholes! That doesn’t include the fics where she’s the unknown child of a superhero or supervillain, making her even more special.

It’s Chameleon salt, class salt, with pointy ears and a cape on.

Some specific examples.

Adrien: Adrien is a spineless doormat who prioritizes Lila over Marinette, or an entitled bastard sexual harasser, only fixated on Ladybug, or even both. Sometimes it’ll get worse, as Adrien will threaten or abandon Marinette if she steps off of his “high road,” and Chat will be a budding rapist, stalking or capturing Marinette after he’s learned she’s Ladybug, while ignoring her prior to that. He will, of course, have his ring stripped and handed off to Damian, who is the “true” soul of Destruction and so therefore a “perfect match” to Marinette’s Creation soul. Occasionally it will be Jason, or Tim, or Dick, but the key thing is that it’s not Adrien!

While Damian’s issues are magically fixed, Adrien gets no such courtesy. Adrien has been abused, just like Damian, and while Damian’s abuse is more extensive and extreme, abuse is abuse. If anything, if Damian met Adrien, he would probably see another abused kid, and want to be his friend/have his “adopt stray person!” Instincts go off. I can much more imagine Damian dragging a bewildered Adrien into the Batcave and yelling “Father I’ve found another one for you to adopt!” than I can Damian immediately hating Adrien, or Chat, simply for breathing.

We never see Clark taking Adrien under his wing, or Bruce, or any of the other Batfam; nor any of the other Justice Leaguers. We never see Selina try to fight Bruce over the kid, because he’s cat-themed, and Selina can train him, this one’s hers Bat, get off!

Adrien’s never treated as a kid, or given actual development. A major complaint among salters is that Adrien is treated as perfect and never develops, and in fic, rather than developing him, Adrien either remains static, with his flaws narratively exploded, or is developed negatively. He’s there to be beaten up on and punished by the writers, if not actually physically beaten up by characters in the fic.

Alya: the not-so-good friend, the cheap excuse for a journalist, the awful person who abandons Marinette for Lila and her “connections.” Never mind that Alya was Marinette’s friend from the beginning, or that Marinette’s chosen her multiple times for a Miraculous. One instance of questioning Marinette about Lila, and Alya’s a backstabbing bitch.

Maribat treats Alya as neglectful, bossy, domineering and submissive at the same time to Marinette and Lila respectively, and as a journalist, the worst of the worst. She’s played as a two-bit paparazzo, and once again, the DCU is used to punish her. We don’t see Alya get mentored by Lois or Clark-indeed, if they notice her, it’s with disdain or disappointment. Often, they’re crushing her under their heel, calling her not only a bad journalist, but a bad friend/person. This forgetting, of course, that Alya runs her blog as a hobby so far, she’s only a teenager, and that she’s had Marinette’s back against Chloe and Lila.

The Class: the dupes or allies as needed. Class salt levels depend on what the writer needs. If they’re pro-class, they’re all on Marinette’s side, aside from Alya Adrien and Lila. Chloe, for some ungodly reason, is “redeemed” nigh instantaneously, and often will become Marinette’s best friend, if that isn’t Kagami already. Kagami will drop Adrien like a wet tissue, never trying to reconcile him with the clas, or encourage him to stand up for himself, or if she does, Adrien, of course, will not listen.

If the writer is anti-class, whoo boy. Openly mentally, emotionally, physically abusive to Marinette, the worst gang of people you would ever have the displeasure of meeting, they all need to be in Arkham.

We never see any of the class make friends with the Batfam, the Titans, Young Justice-unless they’re on Marinette’s side, of course. There’s no Alix stopping Selina at the Louvre, for instance, or Max hanging out with Babs. It’s all based on how Marinette is treated as to whether or not the class is portrayed as being worse than the worst of the Rogues Gallery.

Wrapping it all up, Maribat has made me dislike the entire concept of a DC/ML crossover.

Even if someone had written an non-salt, in-character crossover, I don’t know if I would read it, simply because the well has been that poisoned.

[ordinaryschmuck]

What I Thought About "Yesterday's Lie" from The Owl House

Salutations, random people on the internet who absolutely won’t read this! I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons!

Here it is! The midseason finale of The Owl House Season Two! An episode featuring Luz going back to the human realm, is hyped up to heaven about how painful it'll be for the audience, and features more anxiety by how Creepy Luz is a thing. And BOOOOOOOOY howdy were fans not ready for this. I'm sure as hell not ready for when I wrote this intro at *checks time* thirty minutes before watching the official premier. Yup, the words you're reading right now are from me in the past, when everything was still pure and simple. Whereas future me is still probably destroyed by the events that transpired. Isn't that right, future me?

Future Me: Actually, it wasn’t that bad. The ending hurt, sure, but other than that, it wasn’t too painful.

Wow, that is some neat input! At least, I think it was. I wouldn't know because I literally wrote that after watching the episode. With the words you're currently reading being written at *checks time* twenty-six minutes before the premier...this whole intro is confusing, isn't it, future me?

Future Me: Sure is.

Yeah, it's definitely confusing. In any case, let's dive into this spoiler-filled review as we find out together just how painful this episode was! Take it away, future me!

Future Me: Will do! Major spoilers ahead, folks!

Now, let’s review, shall we?

WHAT I LIKED

Luz’s Room: We only see it for a short time, but everything about it just screams Luz. The pile of weird-looking stuffed animals, the witch hat in the center of the floor, and the fact that she has bunk beds, a single child's dream (Or so I've heard). It's a small thing, but I love it.

Vee: Here she is! The character previously dubbed Creepy Luz who now turns out to be yet another new addition to the ever-growing list of characters that we, as a fandom, would give our lives for. Because holy s**t was Vee the best type of expectation subversion. Showing us all the ominous ways of how she basically took Luz's place made fans assume that Vee was an evil doppelganger. Turns out, she was just a tortured soul that was desperate to live a new and better life and lucked out in finding Luz's. What Vee does is...questionable at best, but seeing what she went through with the experiments Belos pulled on her, you understand why she would do it. And I personally love it's that same background information that makes Vee resentful of Luz of all people. Luz's life is a relative dream come true, and running away from that would be insane to someone who spent most of their existence through imprisonment and experimentation. It's an intriguing point of view, even though it's admittingly flawed given how it's mostly Camila that seemingly made Luz's life bearable. But the flaws don't matter. What matters is that you can see where Vee is coming from, and to me, personally, I think she's understandable enough to make me root for her to have some kind of happy ending. Whether as Luz or as herself, I'm hopeful to see Vee get some semblance of peace.

Camila: *Round of applause* Don't mind me! Just taking the time to love how all them sons of b**hes who thought Camila was a bad mom are now heavily invalidated. 'Cause, guess what? Camila is a fantastic mother, both to her daughter and her daughter's doppelganger! Allow me to walk you through the highlights:

How Camila looks like she’s not okay with the fact that "Luz" is clearing out her weird stuff, seemingly acting too different to the Luz she knows. Added to the fact that Camila doesn't like it.

How Camila drove Luz to camp whether than letting her take the bus

The fact that Camila takes that box of junk back in, not willing to part with the tin foil sculpture Luz made.

The way she was willing to play along with the game she thought Luz was doing, supporting her daughter's creative mind that Camila admits to being glad to see.

And, best of all, the willingness Camila had to help this poor creature, despite the lies it lived.

It's that last part I really want to touch upon, though. Because an action like that shows just how much Luz's heart comes from Camila. The kindness and generosity of helping this poor creature, who she has every right to run out on, proves how Luz learned to be everything she is today through Camila's own loving heart. Vee was scared and hurt, and the second Camila saw that she was then more than willing to help because of it. It's something that Luz would do, and it proves that even though Camila didn't exactly get everything right, she's still a great mom where it counts.

“A new life”: A perfect line.

Initially, it makes audiences think that it has everything to do with replacing Luz. It's only through future context that we know it's about escaping the s**t show Vee once lived through that it's clear she's talking about starting over. It hits us with intrigue on the first viewing, only to hit harder with the feels during a second. Really well-done.

Luz in the Mirror: A well-done surprise that makes fans curious about how this even happen in the first place. Kudos to you, writers.

The New Portal: I don't mind that they found a way to build this off-screen. Showing Luz and the gang slowly building a new portal would have been a little too tedious to watch, and it's so much better to just start this episode out with it. Besides, maybe we'll get the slow and steadier version now that we've seen how quickly building one might not have been the best way to go, given how fast that thing fell apart.

Luz Between Dimensions: I have no clue what the hell that place she was in is called, but it's awesome! The overall design of the realm is the correct type of unsettling, like it's oozing with mystery, but it's somewhere that you probably don't want to be in for too long. Whoever designed it deserves all of the credit because I don't want to even think about all the hard work that went into making this look as well-made as it was.

Luz Resisting to See Amity: What? Luz and Amity are adorable, and seeing Luz's immediate thought about seeing Amity makes my shipping heart scream with glee. Don't judge me!

Hiding Luz’s Dad’s Face: Well, that was a fun story while it lasted.

So, it turns out that Luz's dad really was a part of Luz's and Camila's life at some point, but not anymore. As for why remains to be seen, as we don't really know yet if we'll see him make an appearance. I'd say that the odds are high that he will, given how much of a point this episode made about keeping his face hidden. Shows don't usually do that unless the goal is to hype up some official reveal, and I can't wait to see what comes of it.

Luz Telling Herself to Count to Five: Hey, more evidence for how I relate to Luz! I know how it feels to be all panicky about a specific situation, and I only got better when I took the time to calm down for a bit. Sometimes, I even tried the "count to x" method that Luz used...it never worked, primarily because it made me feel worse when people told me to do it, but I still tried it! Plus, there's also some narrative foreshadowing when after Luz says five, the realm shows her Vee, or Number V, which is a pretty cool detail you'll notice on a rewatch.

Luz Helping Vee: I gave Camila praise for helping Vee in the end, but that doesn't abstain Luz from her own set of recognition. The second that Luz realized that Vee wasn't really a threat and is far from evil, our favorite human does what she can to help and even makes a deal where they're both happy. Because, of course, Luz is that perfect of a protagonist who is more than willing to help others in need. And it's why we love her so.

Looking for Magic that Eda Left Behind: A pretty cool idea that gives Luz and Vee a chance to bond and giving us an insight into Eda's past antics and misadventures in the human realm. Not much I can add to it, though.

Gravesfield: It's surprisingly not as jarring as I thought it would be to spend an episode in the human realm. I thought for sure, after all that time in the Boiling Isles, there would be something off about walking around a normal environment for a change. Turns out, it's almost easy to get used to. Or, for me, it is.

But I will say that there's this neat use of colors when comparing Gravesfield with the Boiling Isles. In Gravesfield, the coloring looks dulled down and standard, which is a stark contrast to the bright vibrancy of everything we've seen in the Boiling Isles. It's a subtle way of showing how things are different, aside from the major discrepancies we could come to expect. And I think that's why I appreciate it much more.

Eda’s Called Herself Marylynn in the Human Realm: Hang on...hang on...do you mean to tell me that the crack theory about Eda being Stan's ex-wife is actually true?

...

...What even is this show?!

Vee Making Friends with Camp Members: This shows the most apparent difference between Luz and Vee. Where we see Luz is already fearing the many ways that could go wrong with interacting with teens, Vee revealed that she adapted to her situation and had a chance to make friends. The implications of this are worth discussing another time, but for now, I'll say that it's pretty intriguing that we gain this much insight into both Luz and Vee through such a small thing.

Belos Wanting to Learn How Basilisks can Drain Magic: ...Didn't Raine say that Belos was taking away magic? If so, I think we can figure out how he's doing it. The question now is: Why?

Jacob (The Curator Guy): This guy was a riot. At first, Jacob seemed like a threat with the way he trapped Vee and was apparently stocking her, but the second he goes off about his conspiracy theories, it becomes clear what type of character he is. And was it a blast seeing how much of a crackpot this man is. It wasn't cool seeing him wanting to dissect the precious angel that is Vee, but I still chuckle about things like his "Flat Eather's Certificate." So while he's not that much of a threat, he's still fun to watch.

The Owl Beast was in the Human Realm: ...How did that happen? When did it happen? And how the hell did Eda get out of a situation like that?! Who knows, but it's still a shocking piece of news to learn.

Luz Telling Camila the Truth: Hey, she faced her fear after all! Although, the results aren't as pleasant as when Amity faced her fear two weeks ago.

Camila is a Veterinarian: ...One insignificant reveal...managed to destroy so many fanfics. I mean, we probably shouldn't have just assumed Camila was a nurse...but what the f**k else were we supposed to think?! Sorry for seeing the scrubs, and the first thing that came to my mind was "nurse" and not "vet."

By the way, that had to have been intentional, right? There's no way that Dana Terrace didn't think we'd assume Camila was a nurse. She'd had to have put off a reveal like that just to trip up her fans. And if that's the case, then that is a major d**k move...but that's why I mildly respect it.

Two Human Brothers went to the Demon Realm: Turns out we don't have to be in the Boiling Isles to learn more about it. Because now we have more information about how two humans were taken to the Isles with the help of a witch, thus setting up a grander reveal if it turns out that one of the humans was Philip and the witch was Belos. Because if that's true...then there's more of a history between those two than we thought.

Jacob has a Training Wand: This helps me believe that it's highly likely for Jacob to make a return and to have a power boost for when he does. After all, focussing all that attention on the training wand is way too convenient for it not to come up again in the future. Meaning we're most likely going to get more pain from Jacob if he shows up again.

Camila Beats the Crap out of Jacob for Vee: ...Writers, don't make me choose between Camila and Eda on who's the better cartoon mom. I know Eda's technically not a mom...BUT I STILL DON'T WANT TO CHOOSE DAMNIT!

Also, the sandal...just...

Why the f**k does Camila have a sandal in her purse? I don't know. Is it still funny that she does? Most certainly.

Camila and Luz’s Talk in the Rain: Ooooooooh, I was not ready for this...

I wasn't ready for the crying.

I wasn't ready for the hurt in Camila's eyes when she found out Luz chose to stay in the Boiling Isles.

I wasn't ready for Camila asking if Luz hates being with her that much.

I wasn't ready for Luz profusely stating how it was never Camila's fault.

I was not ready for Camila to tell Luz that she'll try to do better.

And I definitely was not ready for Luz to barely have enough time to promise that she'll come back.

This episode wasn't the twenty-two minutes of nonstop angst that I thought it was going to be...but this short scene more than make up for it.

Luz Tries to Stay Strong: Yet another thing she unwittingly learned from Camila. Camila tried to keep a brave face when Vee was with her and Luz, most likely not wanting to tear either of them down in the process. Luz does the same thing here as she avoids talking about the details of what went down in her sort-of journey back home. And seeing her clearly fake smile slowly droop into an uncertain frown, it uh...it definitely tore me up inside.

WHAT I DISLIKED

I want to say it's perfect, but there's one major issue that really bogs this episode down.

Continuity Error in How Vee Replaced Luz: Having Vee take Luz's place the same day Luz appeared in the Isles is a smart idea on paper...if it wasn't for the fact that it's impossible.

Because Eda closed the portal door the second that she saw Luz, meaning that there's no way for Vee to go to the human realm. It's a major plothole that makes no sense, and it might just be the first time ever that this series wasn't so closely knit with its story. Which ends up taking a dive in quality in the process.

IN CONCLUSION

I'd say that "Yesterday's Lie" is an A-. Everything about Luz, Vee, and Camila is incredible, combined into a story that ends in tragedy and uncertainty for the future. That plothole may drag things down a bit, but everything else is handled so well that I'm not lying when I say it's easy to forgive and forget.

(And that's ten episodes in a row without a single stinker. HOW THE F**K DOES THIS SEASON KEEP WINNING?!)

[tundrainafrica]

Note: Instead of posting a meta or a fic today, allow me to take a quick break from that because I think I really need to appreciate some people here and the fandom overall.  

February 7, 2021. 

Today, I turned 24 and my boyfriend surprised me with a gift I think I’ll be taking to heart for a very long time. 

The story behind the gift was as precious (or even more precious) as the gift itself and I thought I’d share it since it turned out some content creators were involved in this gift and I very much want to express how much this gift has defined this day for me and will place my 24th birthday as one of those birthdays I don’t think I’ll ever forget. 

Apparently, I had casually dropped both my tumblr and my ao3 account during one of our conversations and somewhere around November he had started looking through my bookmarks, my posts on tumblr and some of my interactions with people in the fandom.

I should have seen it coming. It had started with my boyfriend suddenly asking about my hyperfixation with Levihan.

Sav? Shipping? Sav? Binge reading ships and meta posts? Sav? Gushing about a fictional ship?

And I remember gushing about this with my seemingly uninterested boyfriend a long night after explaining what was oddly the most out of character thing for someone like me. 

I was sharing with him my metas and hcs and maybe, I was dropping a few of my favorite quotes along the way and it turned out he was interested. Suddenly he was asking me about my favorite fics, my favorite scenes. Suddenly, he was rereading my favorite fics with me and a few times, he was quoting those same scenes. I did find out he was looking through my blog when I got a random message from a really sketchy tumblr telling me to open my facebook. 

I suspected a few times that he could be planning something. December passed with nothing and eventually he stopped asking so I clocked that as a fevered dream or unnecessary assuming on my end and didn’t think too much of it after. 

It turned out my boyfriend had messaged my favorite authors about their fics and he commissioned one of my favorite artists (if not my favorite) to draw a few photos and bound them into a Levihan Anthology 

And it feels fucking amazing to receive something like this. To get Levihan which helped me through the worst of 2020, bound forever as a book I can just open up and read anytime. And I guess tearing up at receiving such a gift had me thinking of a lot of things at once (which were always at the back of mind) but I thought of sharing now. 

The past year wasn’t easy. Actually. don’t think it’s an understatement to say this past year was dog shit. With the covid pandemic and all plans after that cancelled, I’m sure we can all agree we had our ups and downs. 

I had a lot of my own plans completely thrown out the window for numerous reasons. I had plans of going to law school part time while building a career. And, I got a job right after college to make these plans come true. In September the law school I got accepted to (after working so damn hard the past year to get accepted) denied my appeal for night classes. I decided to drop my enrollment to focus on my career. A week later, my job laid me off. 

And for once in my life, I wasn’t going anywhere. And I lived in a house where everyone was always doing something and as soon as I lost my job I was pressured to find another one. But as we all know, searching for a job during this pandemic isn’t easy. I was still reeling after having dropped my enrollment just to focus on my job only to lose that job the week after with no prior notice. Everyone around me was busy doing their own thing. I had no one to talk to and for a while, I was falling into this pit of depression. 

My days consisted of me hiding under the covers of my bed in between the few interviews I would take day to day. Around that time, I decided to binge watch Attack on Titan as well 

I was never one to get hyper fixated in ships. In fact, this was the first ship since Royai and Victuuri which I have been so passionate. And this is a whole new level of passion. I think this is the first time I’ve ever written so much in this small amount of time. It was slow going. Just like Levi and Hange’s relationship, my fixation with this ship was a slowburn. 

Those days alone, I was reading fanfiction by the bundle, I was scrolling through the Levihan tag like a simp, leaving kudos in ao3 on a throwaway account and just scrolling through random people’s tumblr accounts. 

What happened during the one month? And when I was alone, sad, lonely and stagnant with no one to talk to, when everyone around me was living their own lives, all I had alone in the bedroom was Levi and Hange’s stories to keep me company between interviews. 

And the meta analyses and headcanons I had about their relationship were teaching me things. They were teaching me that life was never about how quickly you progress or how far you go. Maybe the real winners in life are the ones who can build good relationships, build relationships so mutually satisfying they keep each other growing and in those few moments reading, headcanoning ships, I did realize, maybe even as stagnant as I was at that moment, my life wasn’t dogshit. 

No one’s life is dogshit for a few small bumps along the way. Sometimes it just is part of the process of growing, learning to get past the worse, learning to manage relationships. And maybe it’s these relationships which make life worth living. Maybe it’s these struggles depicted in these stories and the bounce back. Maybe it’s the love, the life, the emotions so carefully described and depicted in every single story which makes life, life. 

With every single fic I read and every single fan art I scrolled through. Levihan was teaching my things about love, loss and life. 

Sometimes, these fandoms are the things which can catch people before they fall too low into something. These works and stories authors and artists shared so generously were what pulled me out of this state and are what inspired me to explore this relationship for all the potential its worth and maybe share my own stories and headcanons which people may learn a thing or two from or maybe just find some comfort and hope in.  

And these inspirations eventually evolved to writing. Writing 10,000 words in a day in between three interviews? I never was a writer but somehow, I found myself spending hours exploring the themes of love, loss and life with our favorite pairing 

I didn’t start writing out of nowhere. I didn’t start making metas out of nowhere. I needed the right inspiration, the right content to get me into this point where I could continue writing, reading, meta-ing, appreciating, headcanoning and everything in between.

And I just wanted to express my gratefulness to every single person in the fandom who had made it possible for me to pull out of that blackhole. Fandoms are underrated and I believe there are so many lessons which can be learned from the right content and from the right people. 

To the people who so willingly went along with my boyfriend’s little project: 

@faerielleart​ I saved A LOT of your art and they’re sitting in my google photos under a folder called Levihan and maybe I did share a few of your photos (the cheeks one and the beast titan one and the les miserables) ones to my boyfriend unsolicited just to show him how beautiful Levihan can be. Thank you so much for these beautiful drawings.

@lizaloveslevihan​ You were one of the first people I talked with in this fandom and dreams really was one of those stories that fucked me up a little bit, had me make a few misses on the commute on the way home one day but maybe it did have me explore the angst genre a little more, maybe it did have me explore Levi’s character a little more. 

@ariadneamare​ YELLOW. OH GOD. You know those letters? The ones which Hange left Levi at the end of the story? I ended up copying and pasting them and sending them to my boyfriend right after reading and I remember talking to him about this. We might be facing that same type of story in the future and I guess that ended up becoming a lot of foundation of our discussion and I guess, it’s just proof that there is so much to learn from fanfiction. There’s just so much to explore and fanfiction as a genre just does not get the credit it deserves.

@fanmoose12​​ I was exploring your works even before I started this tumblr up again. Maybe it was even your works which got me building my own headcanons from Levihan and writing from there. And I think I did leave a few anonymous messages telling you how I started exploring other genres because of your fics. Your works got my out of my dark place, it got me exploring a lot of other genres and for that I’m eternally grateful.

And somehow, my boyfriend picked that all up from late night discussions and one-on-one metas. Surprisingly, he wasn’t just playing along to humor his girlfriend. He was exploring the themes of love, life, loss and Levihan right along with me. (And got spoiled about Hange’s death along the way… Oops.) 

And I am eternally grateful for that and I made sure to shower him with a lot of kisses after he kept me in the loop with what has been going on these past few months with his sudden interest in Levihan.

And this huge thank you goes out to all content creators (authors, artists, gif creators, shitposters alike). Sometimes you never know who’s thinking about your work, who’s shoehorning your works and quoting them to their best friends. Sometimes, you never will find out but your work had pulled someone out of a blackhole which they’ve been stuck in and sometimes you never know that your work has been that seemingly small thing that had taught them a lesson in love, life or relationships. Sometimes, that one work turned out to be an inspiration which got them writing and sharing their own stories or making their own drawings

And I guess, the point is, keep writing. Keep drawing. Keep sharing pouring your love, passion and emotions into works of art because you never really know whose heart you touched or whose life you changed.

I have a job now. I decided to push law school a few years back and maybe take the time to work on myself now and maybe spend the next months or maybe years writing metas and fanfictions. I was pulled out of my hole. I was inspired. I have my own stories to tell and I don’t think I would have been here if I hadn’t spent the last few months reading fic after fic, meta after meta, appreciating art after art, 

So anyway, I just wanted to share some pics of my favortie fics, immortalized in one anthology, all organized by my boyfriend. And I think he made some great decisions with these.

(Bookbinding credits to @mayerwien)

[neversatisfiedwithlife]

i have more cazzie otp questions, if you wanna answer them! again, credit to the glee page i found these on lol, i saved them awhile ago :p

1. Who reads more books?

2. Who swears more?

3. Who prefers fast food?

4. Who is the one that is calm and collected while the other is angry and destructive?

5. Who is more dramatic?

6. Who keeps the other one up at night asking random questions?

7. Who plans all of the date nights?

8. Who is the bigger baby when sick?

9. Which one gets sick fairly often, which one never gets sick?

10. Who does the cleaning in the house? (When they are adults)

11. Who will punch someone out if they are rude to their partner?

12. Who is the forgetful one?

13. Who is more likely to go on a health food kick?

14. Who is more competitive with the other?

15. Who is more social?

18. Who’s more romantic?

20. Who’s most likely to lose their keys/wallet?

21. Who’s more talkative?

22. Who has the best style?

24. Who’s the bigger party animal?

25. Who’s most likely to snore?

26. Who’s messier?

27. Who stays up later?

28. Who’s more stubborn?

30. Who’s a pickier eater?

31. Who starts the arguments?

32. Who’s better at keeping secrets?

33. Who takes longer to get ready in the morning?

34. Who’s the better listener?

35. Who’s more emotional?

Most likely to:

Thank you thank you anon!! I love it!! You're a gem💜💜

The number orders don't match up but I don't think it matters much because I put the things down there.

Who reads more books: Definitely Izzie, I was really trying to study their rooms and Izzie has the bookshelf(plus the scene where Izzy is reading with her head in Casey's lap. In the couch fort casey totally chose to read to Izzie because she knows how much Izzie loves books/reading).

Who swears more: I actually feel like Izzie would, obvious choice would be Casey but I could see Izzie being fond of saying "Fuck" when things don't go right. (Casey I feel is more make an agitated sound or like groan in replace of an actual sweat word.) But I don't thick either would swear all that often.

Who prefers fast food: 100% Casey I mean she got 4? Burgers to go. (Izzie I feel like would be someone who gets like a bad tummy ache after certain fast food places-lol idk why I feel this- or just her stomach feels unsettled)

Who is calm and collected while the other is destructive: Izzie is calm and collected. She definitely is the her anxieties are happening inside. (Casey destroyed a door with an axe. I feel like though Izzie would just have to touch Casey or like hug her, tightly, from behind, to reminder that everything isn't so bad. Izzie understands Casey and let's her be a little destructive though, but not too much)

Who is more dramatic: I think Izzie, she can't help but think of the worst case scenario some times so she does get a little dramatic. (When it's over she feels kinda foolish but Casey always reassures her that it's okay)

Who keeps the other one up at night asking random questions: I feel like lying in bed at night Casey would just think of random things to ask. (Casey would be like "izzie are you still up?" Izzie would mumble something. Or Casey maybe even restless for a while until she wakes Izzie because she's can't sleep with the random questions on her mind?

Who plans all the date nights: actual planning I think Casey, just because she is Elsa's daughter. (Izzie is more let's go be spontaneous we've been cooped up too long)

Who is the bigger baby when sick: it's Casey, she would also totally love to be doted on by Izzie. (Izzie has learned to suck it up, she probably has had to take care of herself while also taking care of her siblings.)

Which one gets sick fairly often? Which one rarely gets sick: Izzie gets sick more often which she hates because she feels she takes care of herself far better than Casey does. Which leaves Casey rarely gets sicks, which is also why she's a baby about it when it happens

Who does the cleaning in the house: I think Casey makes a list of the big chores that need to get done, and they both do them together. (Little things like dishes, wiping up counters and tables after dinner Casey does, because Izzie is the chef)

Who will punch someone out if they are rude to their partner: I actually think this is Izzie, she'd be like "leave her alone asshat" and knock em out. (Casey has hopped the milkshake and pummeled Sam, but I dont think she would make it a thing to truly punch someone)

Who is the forgetful one: can I say none? They both have grown up in houses where forgetfulness is not ideal. (Obviously with Sam and Elsa forgetfulness virtually wouldn't exist, Izzie would have to keep to a viable schedule to an extent with 3 siblings she cares for.)

Who is more likely to go on a health food kick: Izzie, simply because Casey is definitely not going near that crap if she doesn't have to.

Who is more competitive with the other: I feel like Izzie lowkey is very competitive. (Game nights she definitely takes that a bit too seriously. Casey would be like "Izz calm down it's just a game")

Who is more social: I think Izzie is better at faking it in social situations, better at flicking a switch and turning on this personality (she's social but she doesn't actually make friends out of these interactions. Because that's actually not really who she is.)

Who is more romantic: Casey is more of a romantic when it comes to words of affirmation. Izzie is more romantic in regard to physical contact.

Who's most likely to lose their keys: Izzie, she totally wouldn't use the key hooks or the key bowl so she'd misplace them. (Casey would remind her everytime, gently, that that's what the key hooks are for, they're right by the door)

Who's more talkative: I feel like Izzie would gush more about random; about books she's reading, about something she's watching, just random. (Casey loves it because Izzie doesn't expect her to do the same, and Izzie always looks so happy)

Who has the best style: Izzie, both

Who's the bigger party animal: overall I don't actually think they'd be the partying type couple, but Izzie. (Every now and then she does love a stupid mindless party. I do say Casey is more of a light weight but also in general Casey just doesn't care to drink as much in general)

Who's most likely to snore: I think Izzie, idk why I feel living with Sam there's absolutely no way Casey's body would utter a snore.

Who's messier: Izzie is messier, living with 3 younger siblings you can imagine the havoc on a household, I feel like her threshold for messy is higher.

Who stays up later: Casey ends up staying up later, she loses track of time gets caught up in what she's doing.

Who's more stubborn: this is hard because with each other I feel like they wouldn't be, but probably Izzie actually. (I feel like she wouldn't want to be but she'd have like a mental back and forth about it)

Who's a pickier eater: Casey is a pickier eater, Izzie may not be big on fast food but I shouldn't classify it as being picky. (Casey would definitely be turned off by the way something looks or smells. She wouldn't feel the need to try something new when things she's already tried taste so good)

Who starts the arguments: Izzie, she is definitely the one to speak up about something that is bothering her, no reservations about it. (Shes used to actively going back and forth with her mother.)

Who's better at keeping secrets: maybe Casey only by a little

While takes longer to get ready in the morning: Izzie, I feel like she would cycle through a few outfits before deciding on one, plus deciding on how she wants to do her hair. (Ik it might be just for school, but Casey leaving the locker room with her hair just damp like that)

Who's the better listener: Casey is, not say that Izzie isn't, but Casey definitely would just give her complete undivided attention to Izzie. (I feel like izzie would talk a lot about her family to Casey which just naturally leads to Casey keeping open ears for her)

Who's more emotional: Casey is more emotional, she definitely would be worse at keeping a poker face

[actress4him]

Querencia 3 - The Facility

(Prompt #16 for Summer of Whump)

So, only like a couple of paragraphs of this ended up filling the prompt, but...*shrugs* Let me know if I missed any tags!

Taglist: @darthsutrich

Ask if you want on or off the list!

Previous | Next | Masterlist

Warnings: lady whumpee, teenage whumpee, mental hospital/prison vibes, foster care mention, fantastic prejudice, burns, touch-starvation, mild accidental self-harm

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The facility Liliana is brought to is not what she expected. It’s not a prison, as a small part of her feared, but it’s certainly not a traditional foster home, either. It actually gives her vibes of a hospital, or of the nursing home where she used to visit her abuela. 

White walls, white tile floors. A reception desk. A lounge area with uncomfortable-looking grey couches, a cruddy tv, and a couple of tables with chairs. And from there, long hallways branching off, filled with closed blue doors. 

She’s handed off to a man with a permanent scowl who walks so briskly she can hardly keep up. He rattles off a list of rules, and she struggles to keep up with those, too.

“Breakfast is served strictly at eight a.m., lunch at noon, and dinner at five p.m. If you do not show up for a meal, you forfeit it. However, if you make a habit of missing meals in an effort to starve yourself, you will be forcibly fed. And trust me, none of us want that.”

“Residents are allowed to interact with each other as much as they wish within the common areas. They are not, however, permitted to enter any other private quarters but their own, and private, secretive conversations between residents are not permitted anywhere on the premises.”

“Regardless of what your mutation is, we have a very strict ‘no touch’ policy here. If you’re seen touching or attempting to touch another resident, you will be swiftly and heavily punished. There are no second chances. If you repeat the offense, we will immediately take measures to suppress your mutation.”

Mutation. She’s never heard it called that before. The word gives her an ugly, crawling sensation across her skin, far worse than the term Non ever has. The common slang is derogatory, yes, implying that those with powers are somehow less-than. Non-human. But mutation...that’s even worse. That makes her feel like...like some kind of monster.

Once she’s been examined in the infirmary and has answered ten-thousand questions about her ability, she’s escorted to what will now be her room. The good news is that because of the facility’s strict rules about how residents interact, she doesn’t have to worry about roommates.

But as the heavy door slams shut, leaving her in a cold, stark space with flickering fluorescent lights, a narrow, hard bed, and no decor whatsoever, she starts to rethink her initial assessment of this place.

Maybe it is a prison, after all.

At first Liliana is grateful for the ‘no touch’ rule. If no one is allowed to touch, then she doesn’t have to worry so much about accidentally using her powers. She even asks for a pair of gloves, just for safety, and begins wearing them all the time in addition to the long sleeve shirts.

Besides, she still hasn’t seen any evidence that there are other good Nons out there. The other residents of the facility aren’t helping prove anything. Despite the fact that they’re allowed to mingle and converse in the lounge or cafeteria, very few actually do, and none of them have paid her any mind other than to stare at her with calculating eyes on her first day here. So she’s glad that she doesn’t have to worry about any of them using their powers, whatever they may be, on her.

Life at the facility is boring. She’s allowed to continue her studies, thankfully, though with a tutor who comes to her room, rather than actually going to school. She wonders what her friends think about her sudden disappearance. Wonders what they were told. Wonders if they miss her like she misses them.

She tries not to think about life before the facility too often.

But other than school, there’s no one to talk to and not much to do besides read and watch tv. She’s starting to wish she had packed more things with entertainment value in her backpack, but asking if someone can go back for more gets her quickly shut down. 

The only time anything exciting happens is on the day when the no touch rule doesn’t work so well. A new kid, she thinks his name might be Liam, shows up. It’s not often that they get new residents, but she’s also never seen any of them leave. She doubts adoption rates for Nons are very high, if the facility is even trying to get them adopted. 

She doesn’t think she really wants to be adopted, anyway. She still has a family...even if they don’t want her anymore.

Liam immediately seems to clash with James, an older teen who’s been there longer than Liliana. She often catches them glaring at each other. And one day, the glaring suddenly escalates into an all-out shouting match, which escalates - before any of the staff can get there - into Liam grabbing James by the arm and sending his sleeve up in flames.

Obviously chaos erupts. Residents are screaming, half the staff is tackling Liam and holding him down while the other half tries to douse the fire. As Liam is dragged away, James cowers in the corner, whimpering and holding his arm. 

“Please,” Liliana says without thinking, hovering behind a female staff member whose name she doesn’t think she ever learned. “I can heal him. You can do whatever you want after, suppress my powers or whatever, but...just let me heal him.” 

She doesn’t know why she’s offering. The thought of having her powers suppressed doesn’t bother her, they’ve been nothing but trouble. But she doesn’t know this guy, not really, and she doesn’t actually want to know what the burns would feel like when she took them. 

She just can’t stand to see anybody in pain.

“Back off,” the woman snaps. “Everybody to your rooms. No one come out until dinner.”

The next time she sees Liam, he’s...different. Not only does he not glare at James anymore, he seems to stare straight through everyone. There’s no trace of the tough kid with an attitude he was before. He just seems...empty.

Liliana is glad now that she didn’t let them suppress her powers. She’s not sure what they did to him, but it scares her.

The months drag by. It takes time for her to notice that never being touched is having an effect on her. Her family wasn’t the super touchy-feely type, but there were still hugs before school and bed, kisses on the top of the head sometimes. Now her arms ache for the feeling of being wrapped up and squeezed tight. She finds herself lying in bed at night hugging herself with her own arms, but it’s a poor substitute. Sometimes her skin itches and tingles to the point where she has to take her gloves off and scratch it. 

Once she takes it too far and ends up in the infirmary getting treated for the bright red welts crisscrossing her arms. 

By the time three years have passed and she’s nearing her eighteenth birthday, the itching has been replaced by an overall numbness, and the lack of touch doesn’t bother her so much anymore.

[scolopendress-tag]

Have some Asra n Muriel disorganized headcanons: animal themed!

Asra's most likely to answer quetzal if you ask for his favourite bird (he had a close up encounter with one his first time in nopal and had never seen a bird like it so it's a special memory), but he also appreciates all others. He also loves dart frogs and his favorite reptile would of course be perfect lavender angel baby fictional fantasy pythons. I'd also see him loving dragonflies as well.

He will see literally any animal generally and always say "they're one of my favourites!", though. It doesn't matter how many times he's said it that day or how many animals he's said it about. It's almost without fail he'll point one out and say it's a favourite.

One of his favorite animals is always the one in front of him Right Now, as a quick reference.

Plus, he loves to point animals out on travels or when out and about Vesuvia, so get used to hearing it!

He may attempt to catch critters occasionally too, or just pick them up, these will be mostly bugs usually. He just likes to cup moths in his hand on occasion and the watch them flutter out and I think he should be allowed to! Or just cradle bugs in his palm and watch them walk around for a bit. If it's a reptile or amphibian somewhere it could get stepped on or dried out or eaten he will still scoop them up and carry them to the brush.

[Cont. after cut]

Nothing he ever handles seems to get too upset or stressed, even when it's an animal that otherwise would. They just seem to be more relaxed if it's Asra who's touching them. Sometimes reptiles just come up to him (or even crawl onto his hand, as a few lizards have,) curiously enough. Though they may still refuse to be touched even then, they're notably not bothered by his presence when for others they'd run away. It's not something Asra's ever noticed to be odd, nor would it be overly noticeable to most people, but it's definitely something you can recognize if you pay attention.

Asra would also love to run on the beach sometimes, namely as a kid, maybe making himself invisible or otherwise undetectable until he's right up on a big flock of seagulls before giving them a hearty boo! And watching them all fly away all giggly. As an adult he may still stir up flocks for fun sometimes, or just to see how pretty it is to watch them all fly at once.

In general he just loves watching birds or bugs or whatever be it fly, always so effortlessly. Maybe he wishes he could fly himself. It certainly would make things easier he would come to think time to time growing up in Vesuvia.

Plus, he likes to collect the feathers that flutter down. Back when he sold masks, they were something he incorporated into them often. Then, too, he would also sit by the river after wearing himself out practicing hydromancy or what not, and a few times dragonflies would perch on him. He'd always gasp n grin all big and goofy when they did.

Muriel doesn't pick favorites really when it comes to animals (barring wolves and bears), but he does mirror Asra's 'one of my favourites' statements by saying "they're one of Asra's favorites," Occasionally.

While Asra's animal encounters or observations are typically brief, Muriel is more than content to just watch animals long periods of time. He can spot or at least know where to find some seriously elusive ones. The only one such animal Asra seems to have luck like that with seems to be foxes.

If you want to see an animal, local to the area around Vesuvia namely, Muriel can probably help you with that, granted he trusts you. This includes dens, hives, and nesting sites of course, things he will stop by occasionally in his forest to check on. His luck/skill in finding these things can't seem to be mimicked by even the most skilled animal trackers, you'd think they were practically just showing themselves to only him.

Muriel is also content to let animals do their thing and not interact with them much. Birds, butterflies and similar may land on him occasionally and he's always enchanted by it though, and will make no move to prevent an animal being on or touching him. Similar to Asra, he will also remove any animals in bad spots and put them somewhere better. He's a bit more effective at this though, as he tends to be looking down anyways, while Asra has probably smooshed a few pillbugs and snails before while doing his own thing- eyes elsewhere.

If Muriel did ever nerf a bug accidentally he would probably feel pretty damn bad, and if it wasn't reduced to a mere smear he would return its poor bug corpse to nature so that it might reclaim it. He'd get over it quick though if he was in a good mood prior, just give him a moment. If he was upset over something else already and he killed one, I could see it even pushing him to tears or rather making it worse if he was already at that point.

Asra would probably be like 'awh.... :( oof, I'm sorry lil guy...' and sweep it into nature if he could, but otherwise he would not be impacted too much.

Asra would purposely kill bugs on a few occasions even, pest bugs namely - like flies or mosquitoes or, of course, plague beetles. He may even instinctively lash out and flatten a bug that simply resembles a plague beetle enough, particularly if something had his anxiety or panic (ptsd trigger from the plague??) going. Otherwise plague beetle resembling beetles he'd be a little unsettled by, or uncomfortable to be around, but not enough to necessarily kill. He'd either move it somewhere else, try to scare it off, or move away from it. Muriel doesn't have many hang ups on plague beetle resembling bugs, though he would probably kill the real deal readily.

Any dead animals not in a wild area (like left in the city or on a road,) Muriel would move as long as it wasn't yknow. Too nasty. Birds that hit windows, starved or sickly scavengers, anything that dropped in a heatwave or was claimed by a flood, things like that, recent deaths. It pains him to see at all, but pains him more to leave them just.... There. Some he may bury, others he may leave out in places where there's animals he know will take it for food.

Injured or sick animals Muriel would try to help best he could, and he's successfully done it a few times. If it's blistering hot he'd also likely leave water out here and there for the animals of the forest, and he may enlist Asra's help with this to replenish water in natural water basins as well in droughts.

Muriel can handle animal death okay, hunting and fishing is a thing he does to some degree, it's just the preventable or senseless ones that hurt, it's worth saying here. It's just sad. He'll be okay after though, unless there's something more nefarious and upsetting at play.

Asra helping unwell/hurt animals would mostly consist of magic healing, but beyond that he wouldn't know what to really do besides bring it to Muriel or any animal experts near him. He doesn't come across these situations too often thankfully, though. Domestic animals he would take in more readily, and would let crash at the shop for a while if he can. If it's a livestock animal he'll ask if Muriel wants to take it in, or even in the case of an ownerless pet animal. If not, he can ask around. See if anyone wants a new dog or cat or... Goat. I just imagine those are the kinds of animals he's most likely to find in need, being in the center of Vesuvia.

Moving on from that....

Animal knowledge!

Asra likely doesn't know a ton about animals outside of ones that feature prominently in magic and myth, he's just good at identifying them and overall tends to appreciate their presence. Identifying animals can make for good pass times on long travels, or if he just sees something particularly neat he may simply want to know what to call it. He also probably learned most the common local Vesuvian species names growing up, probably through reading, though the bulk of his knowledge of the nature he grew up around is probably botanical- foraging can be dangerous! Plus, magic knowledge probably leans more heavily on plants than animals as well.

If Asra can't identify an animal, though, he will simply make up a name for it on the spot. If he finds out it's ID later he will still refer to it as his made up name followed by AKA/sometimes called/locally known as [real name]. He also tends to refer to tons of animals as the infamous, famous, legendary, revered, etc. Regardless of relevance, commonality or obscurity. He just thinks they all deserve such titles, and when has a little flair ever hurt?

"Ah, MC, look! It's an Abramesmerwhymsical Zadithi midnight-billed stilt-wader! Though it's sometimes also known as the famous crab-plover," Kinda shit. He enjoys it.

Muriel doesn't actually know the actual names of a ton of animals species. He knows of a few though, not to mention the Asra-given names that stuck with him. Despite not knowing their names sometimes still, he can tell most all species apart readily, and juveniles from adults, males from females, things like that. He watches animals of the forest regularly and is in tune with the local species life cycles, breeding or rearing seasons, migratory patterns, unique behaviors and everything else. Though his knowledge is probably limited to Vesuvian species, he's able to quickly pick up on other animal's traits and such when outside of Vesuvian territory, and is generally good with animals as is.

He knows what doves/pigeons and owls and vipers and mice and geckos etc are. He may not know that a specific species of such is called like, namaqua doves, omani owls, ocellated mountain vipers, cario spiny mouse, kotschy's middle-toed geckos n shit. It's not like he has NO idea, species names are weird and can be long winded so....

...He just doesn't know that dunnocks aren't actually called stripple-caped tseepers.

But he doesn't need to. <3

If he does learn the real names for them though, he is quite glad and will use the name readily. If you're looking at a Muriel who's in the city more, he will probably read up on this information himself, but otherwise he would of course treasure it if MC told him.

The only reasons he doesn't even know the names to begin with is mostly because the names you'll hear out and about most commonly only cover a fraction of species to start, and everything else youre mostly going to have to study via reading or classes. Neither of those seem to be things a young homeless Muriel would care to pursue lmao.

Annnnd

I forgot what else I was going to add and lost track so, I'll maybe add more later. I'll probably also amend this as I may find I don't agree with my own statements the next day and also I don't proofread so. I hope u enjoyed these feel free to add on or add differing opinions!

[anxiousnerdwritings]

Speaking of JSA, what kind of yandere (platonic) do you think Pat, Courtney, Beth, Rick and Yolanda are and how dark can they get?

Yandere JSA (platonic)

Pat Dugan

Pat is the epitome of the word "Dad". He's protective and he worries about you and the rest of the new JSA. He'll do anything to protect his family (including the other JSA kids). He'll always make sure that you're taken care of, along with the others.

He's slightly delusional in regards to the family dynamic that the JSA have going on. He's aware enough to understand and know that he's not your actual parent but that doesn't stop him from seeing it like that.

He'll try to insert himself in your day to day life outside of the JSA, even befriending your parents so he can be around even more. Now if you're parents mistreat or abuse you in any way then he'll push for you to stay with him, Barbara and the kids. They'll replace your old family, giving you the love, support, recognition, and affection that you deserve. He'll make sure that you're happy and healthy. But don't think that he won't go back to your parents and have a talk with him, if he feels the need to then he'll throw down with them. Either way, no matter how your parents are, he will take you in and under his wing becoming your new family, your better family.

I totally canon Pat being platonic yandere for all the kids, along with Barbara. The show already pretty much made that canon with the end of the last episode with the Christmas celebration, showing that they basically adopted the other kids and were one happy family.

Pat would definitely be very weary of anyone you're friends with or close to, he just wants to make sure that they're good for you and that they're not trying to get you into trouble. Anyone you have a crush on or are dating will be heavily scrutinized and watched, he wants you happy but only with someone he approves of and knows will be good for you. He realizes that not every one of your love interests, whether a crush or actual relationship, will last forever but that doesn't ease his mind. He definitely doesn't want to see you hurt in any way, shape, or form, especially not by someone you put your all into and trusted.

When it comes to you graduating Pat will be a whole mess. His baby is growing up and gonna go places with out. You'll get to a point where you won't be needing to consult Pat for anything. You'll be able to function and live on your own and that really gets to him. As much as he's happy he's also filled with anxiety and worry, he doesn't want you to move on from your pops and the family. He'll be the one to always call you, making some excuse just to hear your voice and talk with you. He fears that you just may forget about him when all is said and done and that really scares him.

Overall he's a good guy and means well but he just can't fathom the thought of letting you fly the coop, he wants to hold on to you for as long as he can. Please make sure to keep him in both your mind and heart or he just might worry himself into a heart attack or something.

Courtney Whitmore

Courtney's happy-go-lucky, friendly and lovable. She's just so kind and considerate, how could you not want to be friends with her? It's hard to not give in to her persistence to a friendship or when she refers to you as family. You know she means well and is full of good intentions so you never think too much into anything that she does. But if you just gave Courtney a second look then maybe you'd see just what was really going on.

She's protective to a fault, always being overly cautious with anyone you're close to or interact with. She's usually very trusting but when it comes to you she doesn't want to leave any room for anyone to put you at risk. Courtney values your trust and dependency, she doesn't want to lose that so she'll put anyone and everyone under a microscope if need be just to ensure that you'll always be safe. 'Cause in the end that's all that really matters to her, your safety and happiness, that all she wants.

You and Courtney will spend every waking moment together, doing anything and everything. She vents to and confides in you, expecting the same from you. She wants complete trust and transparency with each other, no lies and no holding back about anything.

Your probably the first real friend she makes when she moves to Blue Valley. She trusts you with everything, even going as far as telling you her blowing up Henry's car, becoming Stargirl and especially about Brainwave and the rest of the ISA. She wants you to know to keep your guard up and that things aren't what they seem but don't worry she'll always be there to keep you safe and sound.

Courtney doesn't have a problem with you making other friends or interacting with other people as long as she's #1 and no one tries to replace her or you don't leave her in the dust to be with your other friends. If you're invited to something or going somewhere in general Courtney always ends up tagging along or just so happening to be at that same place as you.

Speaking of which, Courtney is always following you around whether you know it or not. She's always worrying about you and playing terrible scenarios in her head about everything that could possibly go wrong, so to ease her mind she takes to stalking you. Your phone will be filled with messages, missed calls, and voicemails from her. She'll use any means necessary to communicate with you whether through text, phone calls, email, Facebook messenger, letters, and or a cup on a string. Hell, she'll call you through Zoom if she has to, anything that means she can still be in contact with you.

I feel like the cosmic staff would probably encourage her in her obsession for you. Pointing out wherever you may be or taking Courtney to you without hesitation, basically being a little tattletale in regards to you. It may even take a liking to you or form a little obsession in itself because of Courtney's own obsession and interest towards you.

As much as Courtney wants to see you happy she doesn't like anyone you have a romantic interest in or are dating. She honestly believes that no one will ever be good enough for you (this goes for a friendly platonic or a familial platonic). No one will be able to take care of you and keep you safe or even understand you like her, so why don't you just stick with Courtney? Besides the two of you are still young, there's plenty of time for love so why not just focus on your friendship for now.

Beth Chapel

Beth is extremely delusional, you're her best friend or her sibling, hell you could even be a parental figure to her, it doesn't really matter not for her at least. She honestly believes that your closer than you really are, you could seriously have never given her a second glance in your whole life but she already has it in her mind that the two of you are as thick as thieves.

As much as she is delusional, Beth is also very soft. She genuinely cares about you and wants to have a connection with you. She just wants to be close with you, doing anything that results in that. She'll even goes as far as getting into all your interests and hobbies just so she can feel that closeness and be able to bond with you even more. If you like anime or a band she and Chuck will do all their research into those exact things to learn anything and everything there is to know. By the time she and Chuck are through with learning everything, Beth will know so much more than you could have possibly fathomed.

If you have a favorite character in an anime, game, book or movie then that character just so happens to be hers too! What a coincidence, huh? She'll have any and or all memorabilia in regards to that character and she already knows everything there is to them and their origin or backstory.

There won't be a second that goes by where she's not talking someone's ear off about you. She loves talking about you or anything that has to do with you. She just loves you, platonically of course. She just really wants someone to be close with, to do stuff with and she chose you. You mean a lot to her, she'll tell you that all the time and you probably have no idea how much she means it. Everything she says, she wholeheartedly means no matter what it is.

You honestly don't have to really do anything to garner Beth's attention, you could have looked or even waved in her general direction and she'd be hooked. Whatever attention you gave her, whether inadvertently or not, is enough for her.

She'll follow you around all the time like a puppy, wherever you go she goes. Beth is always in distance of you and whoever you may be with, listening to everything you say and watching everything you do. She's definitely a stalker and once she has Chuck with her it only gets worse, she'll have even more in depth and intimate knowledge about you and your life.

Beth is the type to invite herself to whatever you may be doing or wherever you may be going. She'll always has a way of making the people around you uncomfortable and uneasy, whether intentional or not. She probably doesn't even know that she's doing anything odd, she's just being herself after all.

All your friends and or anyone you interact with will go through an extensive background check courtesy of Chuck. Beth just wants to make sure that you're in safe hands with the people you're around. If she finds anything incriminating about them or anyone in regard to them she'll make sure you know, whether she tells you herself or tells you anonymously.

Beth would want to around you all the time, the two of you wouldn't even have to do anything just as long as she was with you she's content. She'll spend any and all her time with you if she could.

She feels that she has to tell you everything otherwise she would be a bad friend if she didn't, she just can'tlive with herself if she lied to you for any reason. Whether you're a part of the JSA or not, you'll know everything about what's going with both them and the ISA. Beth keeps you in the loop about everything.

When she first goes down into the tunnels and loses communication with everyone, you're the first person she goes to for comfort. It really scared her being alone like that, without you and or Chuck by her side, she felt like nothing. It just showed her that she never wants to part with either you or Chuck, especially you. She relies/depends on you and Chuck for a lot, particularly in regard to her emotional connection that she shares with both of you.

Once Chuck 'dies' and is out of commission you're all she has now, at least that's what she keeps saying. You'll have her whole undivided attention and focus after everything. She'll be even more attached to your side, relying on you even more to fill the void that she has after what happened to Chuck. She'll need you all the more now and there's nothing you can do to push her away, even for a little breathing room.

In conclusion, no matter what Beth is always going be there and that's just where she plans to stay, right by your side.

Rick Tyler

Rick can be pretty aggressive and temperamental, coming off scary and unapproachable. You have no clue how he ever came to like you let alone become obsessed with you. Maybe one day he was feeling sympathetic or 'heroic', so to speak, and protected you from some bullies or something. Maybe you were just too kind for your own good, especially to him, so he felt the need to become your protector.

He's protective and possessive, maybe even at least slightly delusional. He's always trailing either behind you or beside you, keeping very close to in case anything may happen. You'll have your own personal guard dog in Rick, he's an intimidating force to be messed with and he counts on that using it to his advantage.

Rick is highly paranoid, ways looking over his or your shoulder for anything out of the ordinary, even before he became part of the JSA. He doesn't trust anyone, excluding you of course. Especially when it comes to you, he doesn't trust anyone to keep you safe or take care of, or to make sure that your happy. Rick doesn't believe that anyone has your best interests at heart, not your friends, family, and especially not your romantic partner if you have one.

Speaking of which, he won't leave any room for other friends or any love interests to come between him and you. He wants all your focus, time and attention, if he has to get his hands dirty to get even a second of anything you have to give him then he will.

Love interests and romantic relationships are out of the question with Rick, he knows that no one is deserving of you and that's just how it will stay. Even if someone was deserving or even worthy of you, Rick wouldn't let them get far. He'll get rid of them quickly enough that you wouldn't even bat an eye at their absence. He's just fine having it be just you and him against the world if it comes down to it, just as long as it's only you and him in the end. That's all he needs after all.

You'll be kept out of the loop about the JSA and the ISA, Rick just wants to protect you from all of it. If you're already involved then he'll have your back all the way until the end, getting in the way of any one trying to hurt you, taking any hits he has to to ensure your safety. You'll always be safe with him, he promises you that.

You're the only one who can calm Rick down, reigning him in whenever he gets too aggressive or murderous. You're always able to bring him back from whatever dark place he's falling into, and he wants to do the same for you if the occasion ever arises. He wants you to depend on him just as he depend on you, though he would never admit to it.

As angry and scary as Rick can be, he can also be soft and gentle but you're the only one he ever let's see that side of him. It just goes to show how important you are to him and how much he really values and trusts you. So, you know that you're in capable hands with him and how he would never hurt, not intentionally at least.

If you were to ever move whether for school or work, Rick would either follow you if he had the means or he'd be pushed to take drastic measures to keep you with him. He just can't trust that you'll be safe or in good hands without him there to be the one watching over you.

Yolanda Montez

You and Yolanda were probably close before everything went down with Henry, you were the only one to not turn your back on her and that only fueled her obsession for you and also her devotion to you. You showed just how committed you were to her and your friendship and she could never put into words just how thankful and appreciative she was of you. You were her only true friend anymore and she couldn't bare to lose you too, no matter what she had to do to keep you.

You probably encourage Yolanda to be friends with Courtney and to especially become Wildcat, and again that only adds to her admiration for you. She feels indebted to you, you've pushed her to be strong, to not give up and it's only brought even better things into her life. She thinks so highly of you and how undeserving she really is to have you by her side through everything that she's been through, everything that you've been living with her right by her side.

Yoland can't help but feel devoted to you and everything that you've done for her. You've always been right there to keep her going and she's clueless as to how she would have survived without you. She hates the thought of not ever having you around anymore, it's probably her greatest fear. You became her everything in such a short amount of time and she couldn't imagine not having you with her anymore. She'd fight tooth and nail to keep you where you are, to keep you just as you are.

Yolanda wouldn't be okay with you having other friends outside of her, she can barely stand you being friendly with the other JSA kids but putting some stranger in the mix would not be pretty. She can't stand the thought of you leaving her behind or maybe even turning your back on her because of some new face. She doesn't honestly believe that you would do that to her but that doesn't mean that she trusts the other person. They could try to turn you against her, try to make you hate her and be disgusted by her. She trusts you but she doesn't trust anyone else, you're all she really has anymore and therefore she can't lose you to anyone for any reason.

You also wouldn't be able to date or have any interest in anyone. Yolanda has a very hard time trying to trust anyone in a romantic way after what happened to her and that will bleed through to your love life. She fears that the same will happen to you and she just can't leave any room for that to happen. Yolanda will dissuade you from anyone, lying and or twisting things so you will lose interest in anyone and everyone. If she has to she will suit up to take out anyone she needs to, her claws are sharp and she has no problem using them especially if it's for you.

Yolanda is very protective already, having threatened Henry to stay away from courtney in the show but when it comes to you that protectiveness gets amped up. She's also possessive of you as well, you're all she's had for so long that she wants to be all that you have too. She has no problem threatening or getting rid of anyone she has to to keep you with her and only with her.

If Henry ever interacts with you she'll have to keep herself from shredding him to pieces right then and there.

When it comes to graduating and whether you may go out of state for college, Yolanda will work and study hard to be able to get into the same school as you and she's more then willing to put the dedication into it just to be with you. It would be nice to get away from her family anyways, especially her parents.

Hell, she would runaway with you now without any hesitation if you asked her to. As long as she has you then she knows she'll be okay, the both of you will be.

You may have kept her from falling into a dark hole before but it only caused her to fall into a much darker place with a different goal in mind. She'll be damed if anyone tries to come between the two of you, so help her, they'll wish they never crossed Yoland Montez.