#it was just a random act of cruelty | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thecrabbybarista · 1 month

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We should talk about The Lords in Black I'm gonna do that right now because I wanna talk about their trope subversion and symbolism and shit.

So obviously The Lords in Black are a subversion of Cosmic/Eldritch horror and I'm gonna explain how using an ant metaphor

So the classic ant metaphor for cosmic horror is to imagine that you're an ant encountering a piece of human technology, right? I believe it's usually a circuit board. The whole point is you're witnessing something deeply incomprehensible and unfamiliar.

The ant metaphor for the Lords in Black is: imagine you're an ant and a teenager starts burning you with a magnifying glass.

It's still incomprehensible, but not in the way the complexities of a circuit board is. If you were suddenly stricken by a scalding beam of light, the only way you could rationalize that is that it was an act of a god. You and your ant colony would invent and fear this god.

The Lords in Black each represent a kind of strange and inscrutable cruelty that the modern world offers, the cursed lasers that cut into our souls, from places we have no power over.

Wiggly is obviously the idol of capitalism. Animalistic desperation, commodity fetishization, and the exchange of money, products, and emotions. All of the things that the other Lords represent stem from elements of capitalism, hence why Wiggly is THE Lord in Black, the leader of his brothers. What Wiggly offers will never be enough. He is what leaves you always unsatisfied.

Nibbly is the idol of the consumption of human beings as products. Obsession with self image and presentability, trends of all kinds, and the beauty and fitness industries. People in the modern age are desperate to be consumable, and some would go to any lengths to do so. This is an attitude that especially impacts women, who feel that they need to wear make up every day just to earn respect. And when we feel the need to change to be respectable, the need to look appealing and to be consumable, the bourgeois eat well. Our quest to look special makes us like any other customer, filling. It's no mistake that the two leads of Honey Queen are women desperate to be noticed and respected. It makes them all the more eager to be eaten.

Tinky is the idol of infinity and repetition. Dead end jobs, middle class suburbia, and the inability to escape one's circumstances. It's no coincidence that the first time we see Tinky is at a wedding, a ceremony dedicated to eternal commitment, or that he's associated with CCRP, a company in which most of the workers do useless busywork all day. When you look at the life you have ahead of you, it can feel crushing. Will you ever have a real career to be proud of, or will you be stuck at this job until you die? Will you ever not struggle to make rent? Will you really love your spouse forever? What if you don't? Isn't it just easier to continue the routine than to address the problem? After Ted is driven to insanity by the Bastard's Box, after he discovers that he can't escape the person he's become, he becomes homeless, one of the most terrifying eternities a person can find themselves in, fully dependent on random acts of kindness to survive while your situation drives you further into insanity.

Blinky is the idol of the panopticon. Gossip, public drama, and unwanted attention. One of the first things Blinky does on screen is sexually objectify a girl who's fresh out of high school, and this plainly displays a consequence of living in a content driven world. There is constant scrutiny and interpretation given to your every action. At any moment, you could have over a thousand eyes on you, whether you want them there or not. The panopticon we live in captures us in moments of time, and turns the person we were in that moment into an object deserving anger, embarrassment, lust, admiration, judgement, or anything else a watcher might assign. But Blinky also targets another fear, the fear that we feel when we can't see the danger, and cannot protect ourselves or those we love. Alice's anxiety that Deb might cheat on her when she's not around are made manifest in Watcher World, and Bill's frustration at not being let into Alice's life are used against the family. We are inclined to both want and fear the panopticon. We hide, and we seek, and we expose.

Pokey is the idol of tyranny. Complacency, sedation, and obedience. The world revolves around the few and uses the many in service of this. We are all expected to fill some role in service to the rich, to work for a corporation and to buy the products of those corporations, and when we cannot fill these roles we are at risk of starving, or being kicked out of our homes. We must join them in their quest for profit, or die. But we must also accept their pacifiers or we will be driven insane. We must choose between complacency or despair in confronting our place in the world as a pawn, as an ant in the colony. Isn't it easier to accept the comforting lies? Your job is important. Corporations give people what they want. People in power deserve their power. People in power are using it well. We are happy. America is great.

These are the magnifying glasses that are being used to torment us, that we cannot make reason out of, that we've made dark gods out of. But this isn't the first time humanity has encountered scorching light from the heavens. When the people of ancient Greece witnessed burning rods of light, falling viciously from the heavens, they invented Zeus.

But we know where lightning comes from now. We know the science behind electricity and its place in the world. We know what keeps lightning away and what attracts it. We can protect ourselves from it.

But there's an important difference. Lightning is natural. It's existed long before we have and it will continue when we're gone.

The unorthodox cruelty of being alive today is not natural. We cannot logic our way into surviving it because it does not operate under a sound logic. But we can make things a little more bearable by focusing on what is sound, understandable and natural.

There is humanity. There are families friends and lovers who would go to the ends of earth to protect each other. As long as we have this humanity, we have hope.

That's why Miss Holloway's deal with the Lords erases her from living memory after her temporary deaths. To have the powers that she does she gave away the power most important to have under the Lord's rule: human connection. The only real thing we have left.

Alice and Bill escaped Blinky's manipulation through the love they have for each other

Emma survived the longest out of any character in tgwdlm because of the genuine hope Paul gave her of a better future

Lex snapped Tom out of Wiggly's control by reminding him of what his son really means to him

Ted couldn't escape Tinky's plan for him because he was too jaded to make a genuine connection with a woman.

Linda was eaten by Nibbly because she didn't have a loving connection with her father, because her father always made her believe that she was never good enough, because this mindset led her to take for granted the connections she did have in her life.

The world no longer cares about us. We have to care for each other. It's the only thing we have left

#starkid #tgwdlm #black friday #nightmare time #npmd #hatchetfield #pokotho #bliklotep #tnoy karaxis #nibblenephim #wiggog y'wrath

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ms-demeanor · 1 year

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i mean realistically many people do deserve to be the victims of targeted harassment campaigns. if you're being an asshole you deserve to be screamed at by everyone present until you stop. some people commit acts of cruelty and subsequently forfeit their reasonable right to participate in society until they've made amends.

the people of wendy's have a moral right to scream at the manager if said manager sprays them in the neck with milkshake every time they go to pick up their order

damn following up the last ask, ig it was someone in ur notes constructing an equivalence between @tting staff and getting nuked to yelling at a wendy's manager and getting kicked out. my bad lol thought that was part of ur main post

I mean this is something that's still worthwhile to bounce off of even though you're not actually responding to me.

First of all, no, I pretty much don't think that anybody deserves to be the focus of a targeted harassment campaign. At least not the kind that are spun up on tumblr or twitter. I generally think that targeted harassment campaigns don't work to change minds, they only work to torment, isolate, and attack people, which will often further entrench them in their positions.

Sometimes people doing serious antifascist work will make a discovery like, for instance "the principal of X school is a vicious antisemite" and will run an *exposure* campaign to get them removed from a position of power, but with very few exceptions when you see an online callout post for a random internet user it's nothing but abuse and an attempt to bully them off of a specific website, not an attempt to protect victims or inform people of a genuine threat. "ABC is the new alt of this person with a documented history of starting cults, DNI, block and move on" is very different than "This specific user who is on staff posts harry potter fanart and is why fascists continue to exist on tumblr, let's make sure they know what tumblr thinks of them."

You are trying to frame bullying campaigns as normal consequences for antisocial behavior, but the antisocial behaviors under discussion here are "user posted fanart broadly disliked by the community and associated with specific ideologies long after the initial fandoms were crystallized" and "is the CEO of a social media website that is implementing features that the users dislike."

"People deserve to be screamed at until they stop the bad behavior" is punitive and shitty and so broad and open to so many interpretations that you're basically saying "it's open season on screaming at people." I think that it's bad behavior to support neoliberal political candidates who prop up capitalism but it would be horrible for me to run harassment campaigns against everyone who says "vote blue no matter who" even though I think that attitude perpetuates real world harms. (And it also wouldn't convince those people to change their minds! The fact that I think they are doing something harmful doesn't give me the social license to send hundreds of people to harass them! And it wouldn't work! These kinds of campaigns don't effect change they just isolate people and erode trust and civility jesus fuck we need to be coalition building not posting callouts over whatever activity has been deemed "freak behavior" this week)

some people commit acts of cruelty and subsequently forfeit their reasonable right to participate in society until they've made amends.

oh buddy, I think I get where you're coming from here but considering the kinds of behavior under discussion this is just straight up fascist. You are literally saying that people should be banished from society for wrongthink because nobody under discussion here has actually committed an act of cruelty.

(one of the things that i'm putting under the heading of "tumblr conspiracist thinking" is "staff is currently and continually intentionally flagging certain LGBTQ tags and bloggers" - there is ample evidence that the current staff is working to unfuck flagging and blocked tags that was done long before this crew was working on it. People talk about "tumblr had to settle because their filtering disproportionately impacted lgbtq+ creators" and that is TRUE however that was a filter that was established under different owners with different policies and different staff; the implication that the current staff is guilty of trying to stifle LGBTQ+ content because a lawsuit started before the Automattic purchase of tumblr ended in a financial settlement is just bad, wrong, incorrect, faulty logic. And if I might indulge in a bit of my own conspiracist thinking: I actually suspect a lot of the flagging and tagging and blocking of trans women specifically might actually be targeted attacks of individual users by terfs - many of the things that are getting flagged as needing a community label are things that use tags that terfs follow to attack and if enough users click "this needs a community label" the post will get flagged - I don't know that that's what's going on but just operating on occam's razor I think it's a lot more likely that terfs are coordinating attacks on trans people than that there is a secret group of cryptoterfs on staff taking time out of their day to ensure that trans users get flagged, if only because I think that the vocally trans positive former members of the staff would have said something about it.)

So, given that my position is "it is unlikely that anyone on staff is intentionally targeting LGBTQ+ groups HOWEVER prior policies enacted harm against LGBTQ+ groups and there is visible evidence that the current staff is trying to repair that damage" I'm not seeing any behaviors here that call for individual employees or users to get targeted with harassment from thousands of users.

But anyway, back to the specifics of the ask:

some people commit acts of cruelty and subsequently forfeit their reasonable right to participate in society until they've made amends.

Do you have any idea how frequently amends are made and never circulated as widely as the callout post? Do you have any idea how frequently callout posts are incorrect, and exaggerate the things that need to be amended? I'm reminded of Lindsey Ellis, who was the victim of a years-long targeted harassment campaign and made multiple apologies over the years who was finally driven off of her primary platform because she carelessly misspoke and the people who had been targeting her for years were able to make a post that she had long disavowed and was a relic of her dealing with the aftermath of sexual violence go viral. The internet doesn't let people make amends; people see accusations. They see the first post, not the follow up. That's why starting these campaigns is shitty and dangerous even if you *personally* believe that you'll forgive an individual once they "make amends." (and the "amends" people usually demand are "i want this person gone from the internet forever and cut out of this part of their life" - that's not really something that's fair to ask of people when so much of the world is online these days.)

the people of wendy's have a moral right to scream at the manager if said manager sprays them in the neck with milkshake every time they go to pick up their order

No they don't. Straight up. If the manager of a wendy's sprays you in the neck with a milkshake you have the right to escalate your complaint right up the chain, take your business away and never come back, warn other people "hey the manager sprayed me with a milkshake, stay away," but you don't have the moral right to escalate the situation by screaming at them (and you certainly don't have that right if you happened to get sprayed with some milkshake while the manager was attempting to fix the frostee machine when you came to pick up your order, which I think is actually more analogous to what is happening here).

someone in ur notes constructing an equivalence between @tting staff and getting nuked to yelling at a wendy's manager and getting kicked out

A big point that I think you're missing here is that @-ing staff when there is a problem on a post or you see harassment is generally pretty acceptable (though much less effective than filing a support claim), but the issue under discussion isn't @-ing staff, it was pointing thousands of angry people at two specific people who are *part* of staff and holding those two individuals responsible for all the problems that users see with tumblr.

partyjockers got nuked because their post directed a flood of harassment at one staff member in a post where they had highlighted that user's URL and name:

This is explicitly saying "users like the one I screenshotted are the reason you're being attacked by terfs" because one member of staff posted fanart from two franchises that tumblr-the-userbase has deemed off limits.

(Do you have any idea how extreme a bubble this is? Do you walk into barnes and noble and sigh because the managers are fascists who want trans people dead because there's harry potter merch everywhere? JK rowling is a terf and a horrible fucking person and I am no longer personally comfortable engaging with that fandom but people posting fanart of a franchise are not personally attacking you even if it feels like they are disregarding your humanity; you cannot consider other people's participation in huge, popular, mainstream fandoms as a sign that they are plotting against you this is why i'm calling this conspiracist thinking the entire scorched earth conspiracy spawned from someone interpreting a staff member's art as esoteric signposts signalling their hatred of trans people. Do you remember when the stupid harry potter game came out and this entire website was despondent because it meant that people didn't care about trans people? That's not actually what it meant! What it meant is that the vast majority of people on the planet have neither a twitter nor a tumblr account and have no idea how shitty JK rowling is to trans people and they don't interpret "harry potter imagery" as "covert terf signal" they interpret it as "possibly the most mainstream fantasy series in the last fifty years")

This isn't someone calling out the manager after they spray you with a milkshake. The manager asking someone to leave after they started screaming that the cashier's earrings were hate speech.

This analogy got out of hand but please just understand that there's a difference between @-ing an account that people are paid to monitor as part of their jobs and that they have support and coworkers to help with and @-ing someone's personal account.

Nobody got a post deleted because the used @ staff, they got their posts deleted because they focused viral negative attention on individual users.

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mariacallous · 1 year

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The problem with judging people for their sins is that the internet makes it exceedingly easy to invent sins. In February, Buzzfeed News reported on a man filmed by a passing TikTokker, who then uploaded the footage with text suggesting he’d lied to her to get out of a date. That was false—he’d never met her—but it didn’t stop people from ridiculing him as the video racked up over a million views.

Similarly, last year, an Australian woman objected to being made the star of a stunt in which a TikTokker asked her to hold a bouquet, strolled off, and then congratulated himself on performing a random act of kindness. Sixty million hits later, his viewers were praising him for brightening the day of a woman they judged to be old, lonely, and sad. But she objected to that characterization and declared the whole affair “dehumanizing.” She hadn’t asked to have her day interrupted, let alone be thrust into a global spotlight.

And then there are those incapable of even grasping the situation. In 2022, a TikTok channel was called out for surreptitiously filming the homeless with drones. Loved ones with dementia are put on TikTok to be infantilized or have their worst moments gawked at. Parents transform their children into viral stars. Sometimes, those children grow up and call them out for warping their youth.

When people tell us it was harrowing and wrong to be unwillingly cast into the spotlight, we nod and agree. But those responsible typically offer only half-hearted apologies or remain unrepentant, while their millions of views discourage reflection. Often, moral scolding is implicit in the video and explicit in the comments: It is wrong to be homeless. It is gross to be ill. It is pathetic to be unhappy.

To be sure, crass and hateful public figures are worthy of ridicule. And we’ve been using the internet to judge strangers for as long as we’ve had the internet. But the common trait shared by much of the most obnoxious content today is that someone chose to elevate a stranger for no reason beyond their own gratification, attracting attention at a scale unimaginable in the days of relics like Hot or Not and People of Wal-Mart.

At best, these are misguided attempts to juice the poster’s social media presence. At worst, they are pointless cruelty. That cruelty can be addictive, but we can and must resist the urge to gawk at strangers against their will. It should, in fact, be considered rude, insulting, and wrong to have uploaded a stranger against their will. We would not go out into the streets and stir up a mob against a random person. Why are we so comfortable with doing it online?

Much of what we post online is innocent and will remain so. The average Facebook user has 338 friends, while the average number of Instagram followers, according to one estimate, is just 150. You likely use these platforms to follow celebrities and brands, and to interact with friends and family. These are, for most users, insular communities. Vacation photos with friends or a family portrait at Christmas are unlikely to attract trolls and creeps, and even if they do, they are clearly posted in good faith.

But some platforms, like TikTok and Twitter, are more exposed to the vagaries and cruelties of the wider world. Anything you post on them can wind up in the feed of people who don't follow you. Therefore, anyone can become the day’s punching bag. Does your relative really understand what could happen if you put your interaction with them on TikTok?

Maybe you know better than to post Grandpa on Twitter without thinking it through. We know whether our friends and family like attention and whether they understand social media ecosystems, and with this knowledge we are capable of making informed decisions as to whether and on what platforms we should post them. We do not have the same knowledge of strangers. That can be a reason to not post them, but it can also be an excuse to post them without thinking.

If it came out that an influencer uploaded an interaction with a stranger to a private Facebook page or Discord server solely so their closest friends and family could pick them apart, it would rightly be considered misanthropic. And yet uploading a stranger so millions can mock and over-analyze them is just the business of content. That business needs to change.

It’s exceedingly unlikely we’ll ever eliminate jackassery from the internet, but a social media mishap involving a friend or family member can be resolved with communication.

It is harder for a complete stranger to succeed in that endeavor, especially when “Look at this weirdo I found, please gape at them” is the text or subtext of so many videos and posts by accounts that thrive on content starring the unwilling. Such content must become anathema. Particular thought must be taken before posting an interaction with a stranger, and the consent of a stranger to be posted at all is necessary to retain an internet that is even remotely civil. If someone does post a stranger without their consent, they should be shunned, not rewarded with the attention they crave.

The vast majority of disputes with unruly neighbors are solved by talking to them. Ideally, the law only gets involved when lines of communication break down. The same can be true of digital disputes.

We have privacy laws. If I were to post your name, address, and phone number, you would have legal recourse. And yet the same is not true for your image. Today, at least, you surrender your right to privacy by stepping into public. But outdated privacy laws are catching up to the abuses of government and tech, and the issues raised by social media virality could be next.

Still, a blanket law against posting strangers without their consent would be draconian and unworkable. There are too many variables, too many circumstances, and simply too many cases. However, whole generations who have been online since birth—sometimes unwillingly—could grow up to be more sensitive to the downsides of posting without permission, prompting a normative shift.

More specific laws are already evolving to handle some scenarios raised by nonconsensual virality, specifically as it applies to children. Irina Raicu of Santa Clara University’s Internet Ethics Program points out that a recent French law entitles child influencers to demand that platforms scrub all trace of them once they turn 16. The YouTube career their parents create for them—or force on them—need not be what defines them as adults. The United States is considering a similar law; a woman who testified to a House committee said the details of her first period were turned into content.

Another law being considered in France would make parents responsible for their children’s privacy rights. Le Monde cites, as an example of fame-seeking behavior that France is hoping to discourage, TikTokkers scaring their children by pretending to call the police on them, and an Instagrammer who smeared chocolate on her 4-year-old and convinced them they were covered in feces. We will eventually wonder how parents were able to get away with this at all.

So those who cannot consent are starting to be protected. But what about those who could consent, but don’t? And what if, as some unwillingly viral subjects have found, reaching out and asking for posts to be removed is met with silence or rejection?

In reality we already practice social media consent; it is not unusual to ask a friend if they’re alright with having a picture posted to Instagram, even though the face they make as they try to cram an unusually large sandwich into their mouth is not a flattering one. And yet we continually fail to extend this courtesy to strangers, either because we think nothing of it or because it is our job to go viral at all costs.

Some of this, as Raicu points out, can be blamed on the platforms we use, which encourage hair triggers. “There are ways in which the design choices behind many websites make it harder for all of us to think about consent,” Raicu wrote in an email. She points to the sheer ease of posting and the fact that norms around social media consent have not solidified. But she notes that platforms could “introduce some friction” in the form of, essentially, reminders that other people are human before you hit Post.

Future platforms could work to curtail shaming, either out of moral compulsion or legal necessity. Much as you can report harassment to social media platforms, posts that have elevated you to infamy against your will should be fair targets.

Lines have been drawn before. YouTube banned dangerous pranks and challenges after people were hurt and complaints mounted. TikTok is trying to tweak its algorithm in response to growing concerns that young users are awash in content encouraging suicide and incel ideology. Content made from those unable or unwilling to consent is a broad category that cannot be wiped out with algorithmic tweaks, but the damage is still happening, and we have the power to collectively declare that some forms of content are unacceptable and must no longer be tolerated.

Perhaps, given the increasing universality of social media usage—83 percent of Gen Z uses TikTok—platform-embedded tools could establish consent. Before posting a video of someone, an influencer could ask their username and send them a simple, stock contract granting them permission to post. Again, this need not apply to every random photo of friends. It could be optional, or it might apply only when an account reaches a certain threshold of followers. But a lack of permission could give a user cause when they cite unwanted virality and negative attention when asking for a post to be removed.

But most of the work will fall to people. It's difficult enough to remember that the man being a bit rude in the grocery store line is a fallible human being with hopes and dreams; it can be almost impossible to remind yourself of that when viewing a contextless clip of someone halfway across the hemisphere. The internet is capable of connecting us to tremendous numbers of people, even as it makes us forget that they are human like us.

An influencer comfortable with filming themselves for thousands of viewers should be comfortable with approaching a stranger and saying, “Would you mind appearing in a video I’m making? I’m going to post it on this platform, and I have this many followers. Take a minute to check me out.” Some already do, and surely there are people who would be happy to receive a free bouquet in exchange for appearing in a TikTokker’s silly stunt. But a no should be taken as a no, just as it should in any other scenario involving consent.

It’s all too easy to skip this step today. People who speak out when they feel harmed by what an influencer did with their image receive only a tiny fraction of the attention that the original posts featuring them got. But when an influencer is repeatedly called out for exploiting strangers—or when their exploitation is obvious, such as when they prey on the homeless—they should be frozen out of the social media ecosystem, not rewarded with attention and profit.

In the future, how will we be able to see such casual cruelty as anything but unethical? Maybe stories of regret are a sign of what’s to come. Brianna Wu, one of the victims of GamerGate, says she has fielded over 100 apologies, often from people who were at their lowest and saw her as an easy outlet for their emotions. But we generally don’t take our frustrations out on people on the street; understanding that people deserve to be protected from unsolicited online fame and malice is the next logical step.

We no longer parade people through villages on a cart or lock them in pillories in the town square to shame them, as was done in centuries past. We did not stop enforcing laws and norms, but we recognized that humiliation and ostracization are harsh, counterproductive tools. Eventually, we will make that realization about the strangers we parade across the internet.

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bbrissonn · 1 year

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𝐚𝐥𝐥-𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡 - 𝐥𝐮𝐜𝐚 𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐥𝐢

summary: in which no matter how much you tried, you were never good enough for him and you decide it was time for things to get messy within the hockey team

disclaimer: english is not my first language and this is not proofread so please excuse any errors and if any words are missing add them in your head :) also this is a work of fiction, this doesn’t reflect how these boys act in real life, and it isn’t how i imagine them acting

warnings: angst, swearing , not proofread

pairing: luca fantili x reader

wc: 5.4k (including lyrics)

a/n: i gave some guys on the team a girlfriend, completely random name so don't go trying to find them lol

guts masterlist

I am light as a feather, I’m as stiff as a board

I pay attention to things that most people ignore

And I’m alright with the movies

That make jokes ‘bout senseless cruelty, that’s for sure

And I am built like a mother and a total machine

I feel for your every little issues, I know just what you mean

And I make light of the darkness

I’ve got sun in my motherfuckin’ pocket, best believe

Yeah, you know me, I

You tried, you really did. You took note of every little things he’d mention, hoping that it would be useful in the long run, hoping he’d noticed how much you cared about him. You waited and waited and waited, but it never happened. All the efforts you made to be the perfect girlfriend for him always went unnoticed, brushed to the side.

You always made sure you looked your best whenever you’d go to his game, wanting to fit the role of the stereotype hockey girlfriend, even though you were far from it. Your body wasn’t as slim and fit as the others and you didn’t have a model like face, but Luca always though you were perfect. You didn’t believe most of time, there were hundreds of girl, prettier girls, that would jump at the occasion to be his girlfriend, so why had he chosen you?

You went to every single home game, even if it’d meant you’d have to stay up late to do homework, you even went to the games at Michigan State. You were always there to support him, but he was never there for you. You knew it was hard for him to always be free, not having access to his phone for a solid three hours during the afternoon, and when he’d get back to his dorm, he’d fall asleep right away. You never really saw him much during the days, with him having all his classes in the morning, while yours were mainly in the afternoon, nights were the only time you could see each other.

Even when you spent time together, it was rarely alone. He was close to all his teammates and apparently spending all afternoon together wasn’t enough for them and they always needed to spend their nights together. You two barely ever got alone time, but you tried not to think about it too much since Luca was always more focused on you than his teammates sprawled around his shared dorm room.

His teammates liked you, you were nice to all of them the moment you met them and they could see how much Luca liked you. Some of them didn’t really understand what he saw in you, something you wish you didn’t know as you overheard them one night during a get together at the senior house.

You had been outside for a while now, talking to your mom on the phone as you walked around the small backyard of the senior house. Luca was with you for the first couple of minutes of your call, talking to your mom a bit before heading back inside and letting you have alone time with her. As you started making your way back to the backdoor, you saw a couple of figures standing there, nothing unsual. You were planning on just walking past them, smiling at them and letting them go along with their conversation until you heard your name.

“Wait, who are we talking about again?” Dylan asked the others, before taking a sip of his beer.

“Y/n.” You heard Johnny answer, and you stopped dead in your tracks. You knew you shouldn’t, it was wrong, but you couldn’t help it. They couldn’t see you since you were on the side of the porch, and no lights were they, you were like a ghost.

“Oh, yeah, totally agree with you man. Don’t get me wrong, she’d nice and all, but like she barely ever talks.” The Duke boy said, making a couple other guys agree with him.

“Exactly, what does he even see in her, anyways?” One of them said, making your smile drop.

“She’s just shy, doesn’t like big groups, that’s all. Once you get to know her, she’s always talking, it’s great ‘cause Luca leaves me alone now. She’s makes him happy, that’s all the really matters.” You recognized Adam say, making your smile grow a little. Over the last six months, you had grown quite close to your boyfriend’s little brother, and hearing him defend you warmed your heart.

“Dude, all we’re saying is he could do better.”

“Whatever, I’m going back inside.” Adam said, and soon you heard the door open and all the figures disappeared. You stood there for a while, thinking about everything that you had heard. Your feelings being hurt a little before shaking it all off and walking back inside, quickly finding your boyfriend, who was standing with his brother.

You never told Luca, or any of them that you had heard their conversation. You knew Luca would get mad at his teammates, and that was the last thing you wanted. You did realize that after that night, Adam started being even nicer to you, always telling you how happy you made your brother, and how thankful he was that you were the one making him this happy. He truly felt like your own little brother in a way.

But something in you changed that day, whenever you’d be having the smallest interaction with any of them, there would always be a voice in the back of your mind reminding you of that conversation. So, you didn’t make much effort to become good friends with any of them, clearly most of you didn’t even think you should be dating their teammate so why would they want to be friends with you?

Luca wasn’t exactly happy that you weren’t that close to anyone, but you were with Adam, so he considered it a win. He always reminded himself that just because his teammates were his best friend didn’t mean they had to be yours too, he just happy none of them hated you.

As time went by, you’d now notice some of the weird looks his teammates would give themselves whenever you’d hug Luca after their game, or when you’d be with him at a party and his arms was always around you. But you didn’t let it bother you, you were happy in your relationship, you didn’t need the opinion of other’s, and honestly, they didn’t really have a right to be judging two people for being in love with one another.

You didn’t know whether or not your boyfriend knew about how some of his best friends felt about your relationship, but you really hoped he didn’t. If he did, it would break you, that he knew what his friends were saying and thinking, but didn’t defend you like his brother had, or that he hadn’t told you about it.

That all changed one cold night in February.

You were currently standing outside of the Yost arena, Luca had texted you barely minutes before telling you to go wait outside for him. You didn’t really understand why, considering how cold it was, but you did anyways. No one else was around, all the spectators had left almost an hour ago, and all the other girlfriends were waiting inside, in the warmth of the arena.

“Hey.” You heard your boyfriends voice, making you turn around with a bright smile.

“Hi, baby. You played amazing!” You told him, rushing over to his warm body and hiding in his arms. The boy chuckled a bit before wrapping his arms around you.

“I need to talk to you about something.” He mumbled after a couple of seconds, making you pull away from his body. Your hands reached down to his arms, that had fallen from your shoulders, your mittens covered hands holding his bare ones.

“What’s up, loves?” You asked, only to be met with a sigh from him. Your smile dropped right away, what was going on?

“I need you to know that I am sorry, okay?” You nodded slightly, confused as to why he was saying that. “I think it’d be better if we weren’t together anymore.”

“What?”

“I just- I need to focus on hockey, and school.”

“Oh.” You whispered, your hands letting go of his and falling next to your body. A heavy sigh left your mouth as you tried your hardest not to cry. “O-okay.”

“So, we’re good?” His question broke you. Not you weren’t, you were far from good. The boy you had fallen in love with in early September had just broken up with you, how were you supposed to be okay with that?

“We’re good.” You lied. Luca smile brightly before giving you and small hug, and before you knew it, he was gone. You were left all alone outside in the freezing cold as he headed back to his friends, ready to enjoy their night, while you were left heartbroken.

Maybe his friends were right after all…

Forgive and I forget

I know my age and I act like it

Got what you can’t resist

I’m a perfect all-American

The next week was hell, everywhere you went, you’d see one of his teammates. It was like they had all mutually agreed to just be everywhere you were, follow you around just to make you remember every single second of every day that your relationship with Luca was over.

But clearly he hadn’t even told him, the text from Adam asking if you two had gotten into a fight since you hadn’t been to their dorm in a couple of days, and Luca was talking about everything but you. Your feelings were hurt a little, that he wasn’t even acting like your break-up fazed him at all, like everything in his life was perfect. It hurt even more that you had to be the one to break to news to his brother, scared that Adam would choose to break off all links of communication the two of you had.

Luckily for you, he didn’t, if anything, to him it just gave you an extra reason to become even closer to him. He knew how much you loved his brother and how much Luca loved you, so he truly didn’t understand why his older brother had done it in the first place. Just because you and Luca weren’t together anymore, didn’t mean you had to lose him too, were his exact words. You knew in that moment that you had a real friend in Adam, one that you wanted to keep for the rest of your life.

You hadn’t gone to any hockey game after that, no matter how much Adam begged, you weren’t ready to go back to the place where your relationship ended. But when the team had made it to the semi-finals of the big ten championship, facing off again Ohio State, you knew you had to be there. Even though you weren’t physically at the games, you were still watching from home, your heart dropping every time Luca’s name would be mentioned.

Being back felt weird, it was a place you had grown so fond off, watching your boyfriend and your so-called friends play the sports they love with each other, befriending all the other girlfriends, it was truly special. But it was so different now, you felt like you didn’t belong here anymore. Adam had tried to convince you to seat in the same seat Luca always had for you, but you didn’t want to, not wanting to face all the other girlfriends yet.

You came with your best friends, so you wouldn’t be alone, and made sure to be near the back rows, you knew the boys always liked to spot people in the crowds, and you didn’t want them to know you were here. You had made Adam promise not to tell anyone you were here, and that you’d wait for him after the game in your car all the way at the end of the parking lot. He was the only one on the team you wanted to see tonight, you came here for him and only him, and because your best friends wouldn’t shut up about going.

Unknown to you, Luca had spotted you the minute he stepped onto the ice. He hated to admit it, but his eyes still searched for you in the crowd, only he was always met with disappointment when he would not find you. Tonight was different, you were here. Part of him felt like he should be happy you were, or even sad, seeing as it was the first he’d seen you since the break-up. But he wasn’t, no he was angry. Why? He didn’t know.

After the game ended, with Adam getting two goals and two assists, your friends had gone home right away, tired from all the yelling they had done during the night. So, you waited alone in your car, making sure to park right under a street light so Adam could spot you easily, and so you could see if any weirdos were approaching.

Luca had left before his brother, Johnny and Gavin walking next to him as they walked out of Yost, and that’s when he saw your car. He knew he should’ve just ignored it, kept walking home, but he couldn’t. He knew you were here for his brother and him only, Adam had told him after Luca corned him after the warm ups. The right thing was to just leave you alone, pretend he didn’t see you, but his legs were moving faster than his brain was.

The loud knock on your window made you jump, yelping at bit at the sound. You looked to your left, only to be met with an angry Luca. You bit your lip slightly before rolling down your window enough so you two could hear each other.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” He asked. His tone was harsh and mean, something you had never heard from him before.

“I am here for Adam, so if you don’t mind, I’d like for you to step away from my car and leave me alone.” You answered him, matching his tone. If he wanted to be a bitch to you after he broke up with you, then he better be expecting the same energy back.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

“And who are you to be telling me this? Last time I checked, this is a public parking lot, so I have every right to be here.” You said, you knew that wasn’t what he meant, but you didn’t care. He had no right to walk over here, and talk to you like this.

“You know that’s not what I fucking meant.”

“Am I not allowed to cheer for my school? Is that illegal now, Luca?” You said harshly. Luca’s eyes were staring into yours, and you could tell he was holding back from yelling, which scared you a little.

“You have some nerves-”

“Oh, I have some nerves? You broke up with me, Luca, not the other way around, and your stupid if you think that’s gonna stop me from coming to see Adam play. I am not here because I wanted to see, if that’s what you’re thinking. I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for Adam. So, get whatever stick you have shoved up your ass out of it and leave me alone.” You said firmly before closing your window and going back on your phone. Luca started knocking over and over on your window, but you didn’t move. You were done with this for the night. After about a minute or two, the boy ended up sending you a text, making you roll your eyes.

Luca

ur so fucking petty omg, grow the fuck up and get out of your car

You let out a scoff before turning to look at him with a ‘are you serious’ face. If you were being petty, you didn’t even know what word was describing him at the moment. Thankfully, Adam arrived and the two of them began bickering like little children until the older boy eventually walked away, not before sending you a death glare, and the younger one joined you in your car.

You started driving immediately, neither of you talked, but you feel Adam’s gaze on you every once in a while. This was exactly why you didn’t want to come to the games before, something was bound to go wrong.

“I am sorry.” He mumbled after a couple of minutes as the car was stopped at a red light. When you turned your head to look over at him, his eyes were already looking in your direction.

“It’s whatever. He’s an asshole.”

I am light as a feather, I’m as fresh as the air

Coca-Cola bottles that I only use to curl my hair

I got class and integrity

Just like a goddamn Kennedy, I swear

With love to spare, I

About a week later, you were laying in bed, your laptop on your lap as you watched the team celebrate their win. Adam had played wonderfully and you couldn’t be prouder of him. Your heart still dropped a little every time the commentators would mention Luca, and even more when they showed the boys after the game.

You knew it was wrong, you shouldn’t be thinking this way, but you couldn’t help it. He looked so good with his slightly damp hair, the wide smile on his face as he hugged all of his best friends making you smile as well. But you quickly reminded yourself of what he had done and said, making you close your laptop in a heartbeat.

You then sent a text to Adam, congratulating him for their victory before going to bed. Well, you just laid in bed in the dark, your phone’s screen being the only source of light. Adam answered you almost an hour later, thanking you and saying he’d call you the next morning. You went to sleep not too long after answering him, wishing him a good night and a safe flight home.

It was almost noon when the younger Fantili boy called you the next day, you could tell he had gone to bed very late, well early this morning. His voice was still a little stuffy like he had just woken up, making you giggle. The two of you chated for a while before he informed you the hockey team was throwing a party that was pretty much open to all students. He hadn’t invited you directly, but made sure to state very clearly that you were always welcomed if you wanted to stop by for a bit.

You almost laughed at his words, he was a little delusional if he though you’d like the spend the night with your drunk ex who’d probably be making out with a girl the whole time. He was a little sad when you told him you probably wouldn’t come, but he understood, especially after whatever Luca had said to you last week.

Weirdly enough though, as the clock hit seven at night, you were standing in your bathroom, getting ready for said party. Why? Revenge. You knew deep down what you were about to do was fucked up, but you didn’t care. They deserved it, all of them, Luca more than the other, but they still did. All those people who pretended to be your friend, only to act like you didn’t even exist the moment you and Luca broke up. Not to mention that conversation you over heard was constantly replaying in your head since your break-up. Yeah, they deserved it.

Realistically, your plan wasn’t that mean, you’d just be ruining a night celebrating a victory they had worked so hard for during the whole season. You had gotten some information through Adam that the boys always “shit talked” some of the other girlfriends, of course without mentioning what you had heard from them. Long story short, at least one of them all had a problem with someone’s girlfriend, but they never said anything to the boyfriends. Pretty fake in your opinion, because truth be told, they weren’t really brothers like they always said, they didn’t like some at least.

When you walked into the senior house, the place wasn’t that full, but this wasn’t any surprise to you considering it had started almost four hours ago already and most people had probably went home by now. Finding Adam was pretty easy, he was in the kitchen refilling his cup when you gently tapped his shoulder. A wide smile appeared on his face when his eyes met yours and his arms quickly wrapped around your waist.

“You came?” He asked surprised as the two of you pulled away and he grabbed an empty clean cup for you.

“Got a little bored, I guess.” You told him, filling your cup with water. You hadn’t came here to get drunk out of your mind like all the others here, you came here with an endgame.

“Well ‘m glad you did. I think I saw that girl you always talk about from your English class, you-”

“Cool, I’ll go find her!” You lied before walking away from him. Honestly, you didn’t really care that she was here, your eyes not bothering to find her as you walked through the house, spotting the group of girlfriends immediately. They were all chatting between them, but quickly stopped when they realized you were standing there.

“Oh, please, don’t let my presence disturb your little conversation.” You said with a smirk, only making all of them look at you with weird looks.

“What’re you doing here?” Ethan’s girlfriend, Hailey, asked. The two of you were never really close, same with Nolan’s girlfriend, Taylor.

“I just really wanted to say how it’s so cute that you’re all able to be friends with each other and like one another, unlike all the guys. Real cute.”

“The fuck does that mean?” This time it was Jacob’s girlfriend, Bianca, who spoke. You looked over at her, sending a massive grin before answering.

“I am just saying, some of them are real good at pretending to be your friends, but then go shit talk about you to each other.” You said, before showing them the text message Adam had sent you. It clearly stated that they all talked about the other guys’ girlfriends badly, but never in front of whoever they were dating. Clearly just showing that they’re “we’re brothers” thing they’d always say whenever a new girlfriend was introduced was complete bullshit.

“How do we know it’s not fake?”

“It happened to me too. Heard a couple of them talking about me outside one night. Go ask your boyfriends if you don’t believe me.” You shrugged before walking away from them. A smirk was plastered on your face as you stood outside, sipping on your water, knowing the girls were confronting the boys at the same moment.

You were standing outside for a couple of minutes before Adam joined you, giving you a stern look.

“What’d you do?”

“Nothing.” You said, your smirk only growing as you looked inside, the house now empty of all the strangers. The only people left were the players and their girlfriends, who all looked like they were not having a pleasant conversation. Well, that was until all the guys started yelling at each other.

“Y/n.” Adam mumbled sternly, making you roll your eyes.

“I just told them the truth. About how you all talk shit about them behind their backs, but then none of you have the guts to say it to each other. I mean, why would they right, you couldn’t tell me or Luca.” Suddenly, you found yourself angry at the boy in front of you. He had let both you and Luca that your couple was loved by all of them, let you believe they were all your friends. His face turned white at your words, only making you scoff.

“Y/n…”

“It’s pathetic really, all that bullshit about you guys being like brothers, but then you pull some shit like this.” You cut him off. Right as Adam was about to say something else, the sliding door behind you opened and your body was pulled inside the house.

Forgive and I forget

I know my age and I act like it

Got what you can’t resist

I’m a perfect all-American Bitch

With perfect all-American lips

And perfect all-American hips

I know my place

I know my place and this is it

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Someone asked as you now stood infront of everyone, all the guys looking at you with angry eyes, while the girls all hugged each other, some of them crying.

“I think the real question here is, what the fuck is wrong with all of you? Talk shit behind our backs and then acting like your our friends five minutes later. If you don’t like someone, don’t fucking pretend like you do and then shit talk them when they can hear you.” You spat, your eyes looking between all of them until you spotted Luca, who was standing all alone in a corner. “Hoping that your “brother’s” goes to shit ‘cause you don’t like who they’re dating. Seriously, how old are you? How insecure of yourself do you have to be to say things like this?”

The house was silent after, all the girls were nodding at your words. The boys, well at least the guilty ones, all looked at the ground, while the innocent ones looked angry and pissed, but not at you anymore, at each other.

When none of them said anything for a solid minutes, you just scoffed and made your way out of the house. You had done what you came here to do. You started walking down the sidewalk, back towards your dorm, when you heard someone call out your name. You turned around, only to see Luca chasing after you.

“I didn’t know, I swear-”

“I know you didn’t, Luca.” You cut him off with a soft smile.

“I didn’t break up with you because of them. I really like you, I really do. You’re amazing, Y/n. But, I just… I don’t want a relationship right now.” He explained, your smile turning into a sad one.

“I get it. I want you to be happy, Lu, and if that means us not being together, then I’m okay with it.” It pained you to say it, but it was true. All you wanted for the boy was to be happy, and if that meant you having to leave his life, you were okay with it.

“‘M not saying never, though. The way I feel about you, I’ve never felt this way for anyone before. Like… I don’t how to explain it-”

“Right person, wrong time?” You asked with a slight smirk on his face, making the boy in front of you smile slightly.

“Yeah.”

“Let me know whenever the right time comes, yeah?” You asked softly, the boy nodding slightly before resting his forehead against yours.

“I’m sorry about how I broke up with you, you deserved a better explanation.” He whispered, closing his eyes as he let his body relax. Your right hand moved up, cupping his cheek and you could feel him lean into your touch.

“It’s okay, Lulu.”

“But it’s not. I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t have done it that way. And I shouldn’t have came to your car and talked to you like that. I am so sorry, baby.” He said, as snow started falling from the sky. You could tell how deeply he meant his words, his voice cracking slightly.

“Hey, look at me.” You whispered, gently tapping his cheek that you were still holding. After a couple of seconds his eyes opened and stared right back at yours. “It’s okay. It’s in the past.”

“You should hate me.”

“I don’t think I could ever hate you, Luca.” You admitted, bitting your lip gently as the boy smiled down at you. “I really need to go home.”

“I’ll walk you.”

“It’s alright. I think they need you more than I do.” You said, nodding towards the senior house, making Luca sigh a bit.

“Always have to clean up your mess, don’t I?” He joked, making you giggle slightly.

“I’ll see you around, Lu.” You mumbled before pressing a kiss to his other cheek and walking away from him. The Fantili boy stood there for a bit, a smile on his face as he watched you make your way back to your dorm. Once you disappeared at the end of the street, the boy turned around and slowly started making his way back to the house.

When he walked in, all the girls were gone, and the boys were now just all yelling at each other. Some were trying to calm the tension that was rising in the room, but didn’t succeed. Only, when Luca walked in, the room went quiet and everyone looked at him. Luca’s eyes found Adam’s, and the younger boy immediately knew what had happened out there, well almost. He for sure thought they had gotten back together, but he was close enough.

“God, don’t tell me you got back with her?” Johnny said harshly, making Luca’s smile flatten as he looked over to his “best friend”.

“Why do you care? Last time I check, who I date isn’t any of your business.” Luca sassed, making his younger brother smile slightly.

“She ruined the night!” One of the guys called out, making Luca roll his eyes.

“She said the truth. Maybe if you guys hadn’t talked behind their backs, none of this would’ve happened. I’m going home.” The boy mumbled before leaving the senior household once again, Adam following behind him.

“So, are you guys back together?” The forward asked after a couple of minutes of them walking back to their dorm.

“No. But, in the future we will, I know it.”

All the time

I’m grateful all the time

I’m sexy and I’m kind

I’m pretty when I cry

Oh, all the time

I’m grateful all the time (Greatful all the fucking time)

I’m sexy and I’m kind

I’m pretty when I cry

When summer came around, you had promised both Fantili boys you’d keep close touch with them, especially Adam since he’d be heading off to Columbus next season, which pained you a little, but you were happy for him.

As the months passed by, you and Luca talked more and more every day, something Adam noticed and was quick to bring up to his brother. Luca was smiling at his phone all the time, and overall was just in a better mood than when you two had broken up. The older brother shrugged him off, claiming he was imaginating things, but they both knew it was a lie.

You were over the moon when you arrived in Michigan, only to find that both brothers were already there, and a time to meet was quickly set. During your little hang out, it was clear to Adam that you and Luca were truly meant to be together, you both had giant smiles whenever you’d be talking to the other. For a majority of the night, it was mainly just the two of you in your own little world, but Adam didn’t care, Luca was happy, you were happy, and that’s all that mattered to him.

“Don’t fuck this up, dude.” Adam whispered in his brother’s ear as the two of them hugged goodbye. Luca had admitted to him that he was planning on asking you out soon, something that almost made the younger boy scream.

“I won’t.” And he didn’t. He asked you out, again, and you said yes, again, a week later. The two of you were just hanging in your dorm, you were complaining about how much homework you already had when he just blurred the question out. You were a little shock, but quickly agreed.

When Luca told his teammates the two of you were back together, he received some questioning looks, but he just ignored them. He thought you were perfect, and that’s all that mattered to him. He didn’t care if his friends didn’t like you, he did and they’d need to learn how to deal with you being around even if they didn’t like you.

You made him happy, and that’s all they should care about.

#bri writes #guts series #luca fantilli #luca fantilli imagine #luca fantili blurb #luca fantilli x reader #luca fantilli fluff #luca fantilli angst #umich hockey #umich hockey imagine #umich hockey angst

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getthembees · 2 months

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I'm thinking thoughts about The Winged Lion and his relationship with Mithrun, which feels very out of the ordinary compared to other victims of the demon. Namely, it feels like TWL's actions towards Mithrun are a lot more personal than they are with other characters.

It's established that TWL doesn't revel in killing humans, he only eats desires and will go along with whatever role humanity thrusts upon him if it means he is eating people's desires.

He loves humans, even, the same way someone might love steak, but he nonetheless becomes distraught at the thoughtless destruction brought upon them when a human wishes to destroy the world. He is actively interested in continuing humanity for the sake of filling his belly.

He is driven by his hunger, he's not quite 'evil,' he's just top of the food chain and has a penchant for gorging himself (especially after the initial mass destruction he commits above). He harms at the will of humans, and after he eats someone's desires he doesn't destroy their bodies at all, just leaves them on the floor in a sort of stasis that could be considered a sort of 'death.' (as we see with Thistle, and the first humans he eats at the dinner table).

So, why does he hurt Mithrun?

From the framing of the shot the destruction of Mithrun's eye seems like a symptom of the pinning, TWL is careless and focused only on devouring his prey, so he pins Mithrun in such a way that obviously is not ideal for his well-being. But that doesn't explain why TWL would tear his ears off? There seems to be no rhyme or reason for this violence, and it's only with Mithrun. He is bizarrely exceptionally cruel only to Mithrun.

I know Mithrun believes this to be the demon seeing his inner vanity and sense of superiority and was therefore punishing him for these reasons. But this also just, doesn't seem like something TWL could or would care about. If he's a creature that lives only to eat he doesn't need to teach this random elf he trapped a lesson, he just needs to cultivate his desires and eat them.

But...if this isn't just Mithrun's perspective and is actually true (and the Adventurer's Bible is a sort of 'word of god'/world-building clarification) then... why? Why did TWL choose to do this to Mithrun and only Mithrun?

It's even when they meet again, too! TWL is very mocking towards Mithrun in a way that seems personal.

I don't actually have an answer for this, and unless I've forgotten/missed something it feels like a very targeted act of cruelty towards Mithrun that is not usually part of the lions MO. Would love to hear what other people think.

#dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #dunmeshi #mithrun #the winged lion #meta #is this meta? dunno #flantalks

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duckysprouts · 1 year

Text

current bat games au lore

ok so here is part of what we have so far:

jason is no longer from district 2, he was originally a scrappy orphan from 12; he changed his name to "RED" after lazrus therapy and becoming a gladiator

Nightwing has a notorious reputation in the capitol as vain and bitchy. he constantly gets procedures done to look as young and beautiful as possible and will actively sabotage the new tributes' relationships with the capitol citizens. in reality, he is trying to protect the younger victors from being sexually exploited by putting himself on the front lines as the sex symbol

tim is the newest victor of the games. his mentor was barbara and they are both secretly working for the anti-capitol resistence.

damian is the political baby of a strategic union between talia and bruce to unite their clans without drawing suspicion from the government on why they're working closely. his parents are both big players in the capitol.

the al ghuls are the tinfoil hat conspiracy theorists of the capitol who believe the revolution is nigh. but instead of underground bunkers they prepare for the apocalypse by training their children in several warrior arts

bruce's alter ego is batman, political terrorist who is working behind the scenes to take down capitol corruption (good luck buddy)

the capitol has a capped maximum on how much wealthy citizens can donate as sponsorship because otherwise bruce wayne would sponsor all the kids in an effort for them to live

when jason was thrown into the arena, he had no living mentor and had to fend for himself. batman secretly helped him with tips and advice on how to survive

Nightwing tried to talk bruce out of sponsoring jason in the arena. it wasn't out of cruelty; he just thought it would be a better investment to sponsor a child who is more likely to live instead of a starving little boy from the weakest district bound to die. bruce sponsored jason anyway

bruce's parents were assassinated for the treasonous act of believing district citizens deserved human rights

jason's abundance of sponsorships made him a target in the arena. he got really messed up and had to go through a brutal, traumatic, and experimental rehabilitation called the lazarus project. he came out of it brain damaged and now most of his body consists of lab-grown flesh or robotic parts. (notice his fake eyes and how most of his body is covered up)

the hunger games are like the annual SuperBowl. for the rest of the year the capitol citizens enjoy entertainment like celebrity escorts (Nightwing) or gladiator games, which is basically the WWE but more deadly and no predetermined winner (RED)

gladiators all have a number that is worn by players and fans alike. most gladiators wear theirs on their armour but RED wears his as a corpse identification tag on his ear

tim purposefully makes himself seem boring and unlikable so that the capitol will allow him to go home rather than stay at the capitol like nightwing and RED.

tim is probably on like 10 different government watchlists

damian keeps nightwing around as a friend/babysitter, since he gave every other one he had a mental breakdown

damian keeps jason around as a personal weaponsmith/arms instructor (hired by talia)

talia and bruce have split custody of damian

nightwing and RED are top-celebs in their fields

bruce's name is brucellosis I'm sorry that's just the way it is

bruce stopped sponsoring for a while after jason's injury cause he blamed himself

hunger games sponsors are like gambling or horse race betting. if your sponsored victor lives you get more money back. but it is so costly with such high stakes that most people don't do it

nightwing volunteered for some random kid who he had no connection with because he has no self-preservation and is kinda self sacrificing like that

nightwing's mentor was starfire. he had a massive crush on her and she'd pat his head

RED has a tense relationship with bruce and Nightwing but also trusts them more than anyone else

there are more but they require more context and characters so hang tight. suggestions welcome! just dm me in my inbox

#nightwing #red hood #red robin #robin #batman #dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #damian wayne #bruce wayne #brucellosis wayne #batfam #hunger games #hunger games au #asks #duckytree

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tikattu · 6 months

Text

KAAMOS (the dark urge) companion edition!

APPROVAL +

kaamos likes helping those in need, open-mindedness, and snarky jokes. he appreciates using words to get out of trouble. kaamos generally dislikes violence, but may randomly approve displays of physical cruelty.

significant approval for showing him trust and support when he struggles with amnesia and the urge

picking joke dialogue options

defying authority

supporting other companions

some acts of violence (randomized, chance greatly increases if player encourages him to embrace the urge)

succesful deception or persuasion checks to prevent fights and getting access to information/places

knowledge of religious practices

being nice to wildlife and children

DISAPPROVAL -

kaamos dislikes unnecessary violence, be it towards people or any other living creature. he strongly dislikes attempts to take away his autonomy and not having privacy.

unnecessary fights prompted by the player

significant disapproval for threatening him when he opens up about his urges

using detect thoughts on him

some intimidation checks

being too open with unknown or suspicious people

siding with the absolute

recruiting auntie ethel, lorroakan, or wulbren as an ally

significant disapproval for not letting him duel orin

greetings under read more to prevent this getting too long!

GREETINGS

kaamos has a variety of different greetings that indicate his level of approval. he gets a little more talkative when he trusts the player.

some greetings are exclusive to a plot path where the player has encouraged him to embrace his urges. his demeanor becomes more agitated and distrustful over time when he lets his urges take hold of him, making the few exclusive greetings more common as time goes on.

low to very low:

[ stare, raised brow ]

[ audible sigh ]

"careful now." (dark urge encouraged)

neutral to medium:

[ curious look, head tilt ]

"walk softly"

"trouble?"

"what's the matter?"

"did you hear that? no, nevermind."

"i'm here."

[ intense stare ] (dark urge exclusive)

"pardon me, it's hard to focus. need something?" (dark urge encouraged)

high to exceptional:

[ smile, nod ]

"am i in trouble?"

"you return! not that it bothers me. it doesn't. i swear."

"whatever you need, friend."

"what's on your mind? besides the tadpole, i mean."

"trying to sneak up on me? hm. i could teach you a thing or two sometime." (dark urge encouraged)

[ uneasy smile ] (dark urge encouraged)

romance:

[ tender smile, bows head ]

"your presence is ever so soothing. is there something you need?"

"you're always a welcome sight. all is well i hope?"

"there's my guiding star." (partnered)

"hello, love." (partnered)

"there you are. where have you been?" (dark urge encouraged)

"i was wondering if you had forgotten me already. just kidding." (dark urge encouraged)

#oc: kaamos #how tf do i tag this?#durge #bg3 #baldur's gate 3

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grecoromanyaoi · 5 months

Text

just trying to organize sum thots anyways. there is this brand of. not "converts", bc 99.99999% of converts dont act like this, n these ppl v rarely actually try n seek out conversion. but "conversion curious" ppl who talk abt wanting to convert to judaism. not bc they feel a connection to judaism, or jewish people, or even good old fashion philosemitism, nothing like that. bc its almost the only oppressed minority label u can gain simply bc u want to. not bc ur born to a specific group, or have a disability, or experience ur gender/sexual orientation in a different manner. simply bc u want to.

these ppl dont seek out to convert (again, they almost never do, bc the entire conversion process is solely for the purpose of weeding out ppl who dont truly want it) bc they love judaism or jews, they want to be more oppressed. scratch that, to *look* more oppressed. and this isnt exclusive to like cis ppl or white ppl or anything. they dont respect judaism. they respect jewish people even less. the littlegreenfag example is a good one (dont wanna call them by their "chosen name" bc they p much just clicked 'randomize' on jewish names in behindthename) bc if they respected jewish ppl they wouldntve done any of that. they wouldve said 'i want to convert to judaism'. maybe even mention they have distant jewish ancestry. not what they did tho (also note how they werent even in the process of conversion). if they respected jews n our history they wouldntve made up a holocaust survivor grandma who was personally experimented on by mengele (???). they wouldntve posted thinly veiled antisemitic posts n spread them around w their gentile followers. they dont respect jews n judaism. they don't even actually wanna put in the work and convert. they want to seem more oppressed online for clout.

now ofc judaism n jewish ppl r no longer acknowledged as one of the most historically prosecuted minorities in the world, but rather something white ppl made up to sell more racism. i wonder what religion the tumblrinas will choose to ""convert"" to next. my bet is on islam or hinduism (can u even convert to hinduism? either way im sure theyll try) ("cruelty free" religions who have never oppressed anyone, ofc 🙄). anyways its like 11pm feel free to ignore all of this

#mine*

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ahllohehn · 21 days

Note

Hello! This is an opportunity for you to yap about ANYTHING you wanted to. That's it, use it however you'd like :D

Post about my Scarian Fashionista AU that I absolutely doubt I'll finish so have my draft notes of my plans before I completely gave up;

“Too common.”

“The design is tacky.”

“Now it’s too simple.”

“Grian, dear, are you even trying at this point?”

“Enough with this. If all your designs are just gonna look like this, I’d rather you already leave and reflect on this.”

Grian flinched as he watched the office door slam on his face, leaving him to glare at nothing but polished wood as he trembled frustratingly in place.

When he had signed up for a course on Fashion Design, he thought he had been overqualified for the course. After all, he already had plenty of experience in regards to fashion, so he thought that all he needed was to push through and just let his passions and ideas roam free then he’d get his degree easy peasy.

Too bad that reality is often disappointing, and often likes to humble him offensively.

Grian grit his teeth and was about to kick down his professor’s door until a voice piped up and dragged him away before he could create some long time regrets, “Woah there, buddy. Getting a lil’ too heated there, yeah?”

Pearl giggled as she held the shorter man down by his shoulders, disallowing him any opportunities of kicking down the door and potentially murdering their professor.

The future murderer squirmed under her hold for a while before begrudgingly setting his foot down, “I wouldn’t be like this if they weren’t so– so! Urgh!”

The rest of his words were lost as his emotions took over any sort of coherent thought, only having enough awareness to express his frustrations by groaning and whining. He waved his clenched fists and stomped his feet on the carpeted floor like a child throwing a tantrum.

With how he was acting, any student could mistake him for some short freshman first realizing the cruelty of college life. Fortunately, Pearl wasn’t any student and saved him the embarrassment of having to be compared to younger students.

“I know, I know. But if you were gonna get kicked out from university, I’d rather you get kicked out with an honorable reason,” she patted Grian’s back comfortingly, “And murdering a professor because you had a disagreement on some concept designs is not an honorable reason. It would be embarrassing, actually.”

Grian puffed up his cheeks and took a deep breath, steeling himself as he quickly turned on his heel to start brisk walking to a random direction, “Walk,” he announced vaguely, but Pearl was quick to understand and she followed after the other at a slower pace.

Clearly, this wasn’t their first time being in this kind of situation. In a world where standards heighten with every year, every decade, and every fad and trends, designers like them need to get ready for all kinds of heavy rejection, criticism, and judgment. Same can be said for any person who studied and worked under anything visual.

Hopes and dreams were meant to stay as hopes and dreams.

If you even attempt to express those to the world without having the bravery to back it up, it would inevitably face destruction in the hands of the high expectations of the public, and soon enough you’d be left with nothing but an empty shell that has sacrificed it all because they believe in passion over standards.

To battle the frustrations and heavy emotions that came as a result from these sacrifices, Grian and Pearl have learned to make a habit of doing simple things like strolls and walks. Because if you physically tire yourself out, then you wouldn’t have the energy to even impulsively think of rebelling against the norms of society.

And also because walks are nice. The campus gave them a lot of space to explore, so why not use it, right?

The pair found themselves strolling the halls of the building with Grian leading and Pearl calmly following behind. She didn’t make any attempts to catch up and walk beside the man because one cannot simply match an angry Grian’s pace. The shorter man had so much adrenaline from months upon months of suppressed anger that it was simply impossible to even walk with him properly without getting sore legs the next hour.

Pearl could only thank whatever god is above for making Grian as loud as he is, “Too common, too tacky– Her face looks too common and her personality is too tacky!” now starts Grian’s monthly ranting session.

“When I try to follow the current trends, she says the design is too overused and plain. But when I try to actually make something unique, she thinks it’s too ambitious and gaudy! It’s like she’s never happy!”

The brunette behind him snorted, “Maybe she wants an equilibrium? Something that’s just right?” she offered, to which her friend rolled his eyes.

“Something just right? Who is she? Freakin’ Goldilocks?!” Grian screeched and ruffled his own hair in distress, slowing down a few steps as he kicked his feet in anger.

Although this kind of reaction would probably gain him some few worried looks, Pearl herself was already too used to this scene and she simply giggled in response, “Maybe she is, you never know.”

Grian sighed out a groan and crossed his arms. His energy slowly simmered down as he eventually slowed down enough to be walking beside Pearl, “How are you so calm about this? I would’ve thought you’d be angry walking with me, but instead you’re just…. Well, walking.”

Pearl grinned wide and puffed up her chest proudly, “Well, contrary to my experiences for the past few terms, things are actually looking up for me!” Grian raised an eyebrow at this, squinting his eyes at the other with either a suspicious look or a look of envy. Probably both.

He tried to act nonchalant about it, like he’s totally not yearning to say the same thing for himself, “All because you’ve got some inspiration, huh?” His question had a teasing edge, making Pearl bashfully laugh.

“Some is undermining it. Gem has been a great source of inspiration. It’s like I’m being spoon fed a new idea everyday,” Pearl boasted enthusiastically that even Grian couldn’t help but flash a smile, “Huh, good for you then. It’s nice that you’ve atleast rekindled any sort of happiness that Professor Goldilocks may have burnt out,” he snorted.

Silence settled for a while with Pearl glancing at Grian like she was trying to figure out what to say to him. She only finally spoke up what was brewing on her mind when he acknowledged her gaze with a tilt of his head.

“Why not get a muse of your own?”

Grian’s face scrunched up at that question, “Of my own?”

“Yeah.”

Grian gave it a thought and he shook his head, “With how I am? I’m better off continuing to do things alone,” he grumbled.

He was already used to coming up with inspirations for himself on the spot. Because, unlike now, he was actually pretty passion-driven before, fueled with nothing but the dreams he’s held onto since he was young. It’s only unfortunate that he ran out of it because his professor was discouraging and hated everything he came up with, so he started living on thinking that everything he’s doing is inadequate, that he needs to improve his thinking before he could improve himself. It was a ‘he’ problem that he is more than capable of handling alone.

At least, that’s what he’s been persuading himself to think. But the more he thought about the idea of having a muse, the more appealing it sounded.

Or maybe that was his loneliness speaking.

While Grian was having inner conflicts within himself, Pearl continued to spit out encouraging words herself, “I mean, it’s not like it won’t be worth it,” she nudged the shorter man with an elbow to gain his attention back to her, “We’d need to gather models for our finals anyway.”

The blonde blinked in confusion, “Finals?”

Pearl gave him a weird look, “Our finals, Grian. The one where we’d have to get models to personally show off our designs by the end of the term.”

His expression froze along with his thought process as his brain began to file through any memory regarding his final project.

When he did finally register everything, Grian stopped in his steps to facepalm with both hands, letting out his nth muffled groan that same hour, “I… actually forgot,” he admitted with a whine before releasing his face and staring at Pearl in panic.

The end of the term fashion show. It sounded so ridiculous that it completely slipped Grian’s mind that it would actually be a contributing factor to his grades.

“Where am I even gonna get a muse, much less a model?!” He squeaked out, now resorting to pacing around the empty hallway in circles with his hands tugging on his own locks in distress.

Pearl stood to the side and couldn't even get a word in before Grian continued on with his monologue of panic, “I can’t just– Kneel and reach out for the sky and pray some god would hear my prayers!” He sounded manic.

The blonde stopped to stand at the ceiling to floor windows that decorated one side of the hallway, gesturing towards the sky through the said window in front of him, “Like, they can’t just drop down a beautiful being out of nowhere!”

As soon as he said that, his dark eyes looked down from the sky and unconsciously magnetized towards a figure outside on campus grounds, seemingly on the lookout for something.

Not that Grian was curious to know anything about what said figure was trying to do. All he knew at that moment was that they.... (I didn't finish this. Just imagine Scar just appeared lol)

#ahllohehn cant stfu #scarian au #scarian #hermitshipping #desert duo #trafficshipping #gempearl kinda

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funnyburneracct · 9 months

Text

Hi, I'm Xiao/burningrqs. this post is going to be long. Posting this from a burner so that it doesn't go down the drain when we deactivate.

But essentially, this is an apology to the radqueer community for multiple different things. I'm going to do my best to type this out as well as possible, and I apologize if I miss anything or word things poorly. I am going to explain myself to the best of my abilities, but please keep in mind that my explanations do not excuse my actions by any means.

Post under the cut.

for those who don't want to read it though, TL;DR: I was a complete asshole and I'm genuinely very sorry about it.

So, I want to start off by apologizing in general for the "burning radqueers" thing. Not only was it just not funny, but it was also really weird. I know damn well that if I saw someone pop up with a "burningmogais" blog or something, I would be pissed. So I don't know what made me think that running burningradqueers was a good idea in any sense.

My rude and dehumanizing comments did not help. Regardless of how I view people, what disorders I have, or how symptoms present themselves, it was disgusting of me to act as though I can't be held accountable for my cruelty towards others.

The targeted posts were even worse, and allowing people to just pick a random blog to "burn" was teetering on harassment. It put the user in front of so many people who clearly did not have good intentions towards them, and inherently put the user being "burnt" in danger. I wish I noticed that fact sooner. Even if I disagreed with people or didn't like them for whatever reason, I still should not have felt as though I had the right to post stuff like that.

Adding onto that, I should have never used my ASPD as an excuse for anything. I tend to get defensive when I feel insulted, which is what happened, and I decided to bite back despite being in the wrong. I acted impulsively and out of pure anger, and then tried to defend it, which I shouldn't have. When saying the kinds of things I did, I am open to criticism whether I like that fact or not, and trying to act as though I am immune to that criticism because of a disorder was disgusting on my part.

Another thing, somewhat on a similar note, is that an apology is owed for my hostility in general. Every time it was even lightly suggested I was wrong, I seemed to lash out and get angry. This really just comes down to me needing to learn to admit my wrongs. I should not have made my inability to understand my wrongdoings anyone else's problem.

Then there's also the things I said when I lashed out before deciding to drop burningradqueers entirely. I don't fully remember all of what I said as the event happened during an episode (this does not excuse my words at all by the way. regardless of my state at the time, what I said wasn't okay and should not be excused) and the posts have since been deleted. But, I do remember at one point making harassment out to be a competition of sorts when someone was simply trying to calmly explain to my why the namedropping was not a good move. I can't for the life of me remember why I did that, but I am very sorry about it. A lot of people in the radqueer community have been harassed (and likely do still get harassed constantly), and for me to act like I am the only victim of harassment was wrong on multiple levels.

I'm sure there was a lot of bad stuff I said during that episode, but as I said, I do not remember most of it. I'm sorry that I can't apologize for the specific things I said, but I am apologizing for the situation as a whole.

The entire thing started over me not being able to handle much deserved criticism, and I stood "my ground" despite having absolutely no ground to stand on.

I started burningradqueers over baseless hatred. I didn't know why I was supposed to hate radqueers, or what I was even really hating. I joined the anti community thinking that it is much easier to just move with the pack and hate what everyone else seems to hate, but hatred really isn't that easy. It's exhausting. And realizing how much the anti community really wouldn't want me if I was honest about things made me realize that. Realizing that there are so many antis who would rather see us suffer forever due to dysphoria than see us live happily after getting amputations was rough, and honestly kinda gave me a taste of what radqueers have to deal with every single day, and it felt horrible.

Without realizing it, I managed to do so much damage to a community full of people who deal with exactly the same things I do, a community that is mostly traumatized and mentally ill people who are just trying to get by. Not even just that, but genuinely just people trying to exist and be honest about themselves.

It is not my place to dictate what is and isn't valid in terms of someone's personal identity, and even more, it's not okay for me to treat a whole community like garbage just because I didn't understand it.

Again, I do not want my actions to be excused. I treated people horribly and was a total dick, but I hope that me apologizing can at least make some of you feel better about how I behaved.

#pro rq 🌈🍓#rq 🌈🍓#rq community #rqc🌈🍓#radqueer #rq please interact #radqueers please interact #radqueer please interact

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lunarflux · 3 months

Text

my dark companion (bonus chapter)

aemond targaryen x fem!reader

genre—smut, dark romance song inspo—billie eilish - lovely summary— Aemond indulges in his twisted desires with a woman who knows his every need. They meet in secret, their passion driven by his anger and her willingness to submit to his painful advances. Aemond craves her, yet despises the intimacy that follows. He questions why she always returned to him, knowing that she did not love or care for him. The cycle of desire and anger persists, leaving him yearning for more, caught in a tormented state until their next encounter. authors note: this random ass excerpt/bonus chapter was born from my reaction the awful responses i keep seeing of aemond's brothel scene

“Tell me what plagues you.”

Adiel held her hand to Aemond’s cheek, her thumb gently stroking his brow with steady motions. He was so still, and his sapphire eye stayed pressed to the pillow, nearly concealed. His breaths were slow and calm. Beneath the covers, he draped his arm across Adiel’s waist. Now that the veil of their aggression had finally been lifted, all he’d wanted was to sleep next to her. Perhaps then, he might rest without nightmares, without the thoughts that bore down on his chest. To speak so freely was the barrier he knew he’d eventually have to cross, though he still didn’t know how.

Adiel patiently caressed him. With each passing second of silence, she placed her lips on his skin, speckling his face with traceless tenderness.

When she pulled back, Aemond was looking at her, and the sadness behind his stare filled her with heartache. To know at last how in pain he was—it was not the same as it was before. She adored his anguish, just as she openly admitted, but this was different. Whatever shattered his heart so long ago remained etched between the broken pieces of his soul, and he struggled to let her see the depth of the damage.

“Whatever it is, pain or otherwise,” she kissed him again then held her lips still, “Let me ease the burden by carrying part of it for you.”

“I do not believe that the weight of what troubles me can be shared. Believe me, though I wish to allow you, I cannot.”

“If it is the weight of the world you carry, I understand. But if it is a wound that was never mended, then at least, let me try.

Aemond parted his lips only slightly, struggling to find the words to begin. Finding the right way to explain was a hurdle he never learned to overcome. The strength to open one’s chest was not an easy task. “I can still feel her—the madam.”

“The madam?”

“In the Streets of Silk,” he leaned over, rested his face against her bosum, and spoke into her chest. “I can feel her hands on me. Her voice—teling me what to do. And my brother’s face as he disappeared behind the curtain.”

“When did this happen?” Adiel’s voice slowly diminished, and her face twisted with concern.

“Too long ago.”

“Aemond, were you… You were a child.”

“To my brother, I was to be a man whether it be in time or by consequence.”

Adiel didn’t know how to respond at this revelation. She, herself, had lost her maidenhood to someone who was familiar to her, someone who cared but would soon depart. Though she did not feel heartache or longing for the now stranger, she could at least appreciate that her first was an act of warm affection and the dampest form of love between friends.

“She recognized me that day Cole and I looked for Aegon,” Aemond nuzzled his nose against her, “I could not stop myself. I didn’t know what I needed. When I was not with you, I was with her. Only for a short while. Though I did not know if it was my money or her sympathy that led me back to that place. And every time I left, I felt the filth of her on my skin. I cannot rid myself of it.”

“She claimed your virtue,” Adiel stared at the ceiling, frozen at the thought of Aemond in the arms of a strange woman.

“According to my brother, men do not have virtues. They merely gain dignity.”

“Dignity gained through cruelty is not righteous,” the anger in her voice gradually rose, “You gained nothing. She took from you—”

“—at my brother’s command—”

“—your brother is not innocent either!” Adiel sat up in anger, pushing him to the side, “Have you held this notion ever since? That what your brother did was for your own good?”

Aemond tried to argue, “My brother cares for me—”

“—your brother sought to draw you from your innocence, and in doing so, created only that which is spurned from a wound that can never be healed. Aemond, you have lived with this for years. Do you not see what his actions have done to you? That what she has taken can never be given back? It was not a gift—she stole from you! Your brother, he stole from you!”

“I had a part to play in this, did I not? I chose to go back to her. To be held, naked and exposed, where I shed my secrets, and left the face of a Prince of Westoros at the door.”

“Aemond,” Adiel took his face in her hands firmly, “Whatever comfort she gave you, that is not love. Affection can be manufactured. What you needed was warmth—home. Succor given in exchange for coin is nothing to hold dear. Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you—”

“—You weren’t here.”

Adiel froze, and the cold sweat of guilt coated her body at this brutal truth. He was right. She was never there. She never stayed, never let herself be content to lay in his bed. Aemond didn’t raise his voice, and he didn’t sound like he was accusing her. He was simply stating a truth. Her reluctance to give him what he needed past his carnal desires left him empty. She only provided temporary relief for a wound he bore in secret. Did she make him worse? Because she withheld her own affection for her sake?

Aemond reached for her, but she pulled back with silent shame. Adiel averted her gaze, staring at a blank space on the wall as her eyes started to sting. She hurriedly grabbed her robe and rushed to stand.

He followed her with timid steps, “I do not blame you. I never asked you to stay. It is my fault as it is anyone else’s.”

Adiel abruptly pivoted her heel, facing him with bloodshot eyes, “Why aren’t you angry with me? Be angry with me, Aemond. You should be angry with me. I wanted to break you, but I did so without any concern for… If I had known…”

“How would you have known?”

“I should have seen it,” she quivered with sharp breaths. She kept shaking her head as if the guilt had flooded her throat, “The way you ached. The way you hated the silence between us. You have never known a love that holds you and keeps you safe. If I had known—”

“—If you knew, you would have ran.”

“I wouldn’t—”

“—This is what scares you, is it not? Raw, naked vulnerability—that was never part of what we did in this room. What we did had no emotion. It was to alleviate the two of us of that which was out of our control. You felt nothing, so you wanted to take my pain. I only felt pain, so I wanted to use you to numb me with your torture. Neither of us could have known the other was the cure to our afflictions.”

“I wanted your pain because it was only you who dared to show it to me,” she whispered with anguish on her lips, “I swear, had I known… I wouldn’t have waited for you to be the one to succumb to us first. Aemond,” Adiel placed her hands on his neck, “What I feel, I have no shame in saying it now. What I feel is love. It is not a shallow love. It is painful—a purgatory of what I truly desire and that which I know will be my own demise. My chest burns for you. My heart aches knowing that I have so ignorantly acted to incite your pain for my selfish benefit.

“Had I not kept the wall between us for the sake of my own self-preservation, I might have seen your wound festering beneath me. Days, nights, hours, and seconds—thinking that I was using you so heartlessly because it was I who feared the wall crumbling down. How am I to live with myself? To hold the knowledge that you think you are worth nothing more than a lonely night in the arms of a woman who…”

Adiel stopped herself and studied him, the subtle inflections in his face as she spoke. His body, pale and scarred by years of training. His chest, concealing the faintest tremble beneath frail skin. It was only when he was clothed that his mask of dark allure shone, but here, alone in their room, where he stood bare and on display only for her. All that she beheld but never once truly saw in admiration—it set an unbearable sting in her core that would not dim for her guilt consumed her conscience.

How had she never seen his beauty before? What had she held in her hands the many months with him? How could she have been so blind to the man before her? How many nights had she spent clawing away at his body only to now see how bewitching he was? All that she’d held between her fingers, blinding and prepossessing, lay before her.

“Forgive me,” Adiel’s lip trembled, “I was so blind to all you tried to show me.”

Aemond kissed her forehead, “You were not blind. I shielded you from the horrors that were mine and mine alone. It would not do to drown in this torment together. It would only cast a shadow over us.”

“If it is a shadow, then I will help guide you back to the light,” Adiel nodded, “You are no longer alone. You told me we would set fire to the kingdom and watch it burn together. If you are to burn, let me burn with you.”

#aemond #aemond one eye #aemond targaryen #prince aemond targaryen #hotd aemond #aemond fanfiction #aemond fandom #aemond x oc #fanfiction #fanfic #hotd #house of the dragon #smut #mild smut #mild spice #sad romance #sad love

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under-lore · 10 months

Note

In your recent post, you mention that Chara can take control whenever they want, and that certain stuff can be attributed to frisk instead of Chara. What is/where can i find the evidence of this, and which actions can be attributed to which?

Frisk is usually the more "in control" of the two. The actions that can be attributed to Chara are the rarer and more specific cases.

The actions that the narrator attributes to "you" during battles and the majority of the cutscenes in which Frisk moves on their own are just Frisk. By default, it is usually them. (and/or the player)

There are two types of situations in which we can observe intervention from Chara.

The first are the cases in which Chara uses their ability to control the body to perform an assertive action fully independently from the wills of Frisk or that of the player. Although those ones are practically centered around the genocide route, as in other routes Chara acts more passively in comparison.

Examples of this type include among others, stepping towards monster kid, or landing the second blow during Sans' special attack.

However, the way to actually prove that those are actually Chara's actions (and not say, Frisk's) vary with pretty much every single one, going from the flavor text, to process of elimination, to even the code of the game itself among other things.

So getting conclusive evidence that Chara was the one that performed a specific action of this type is often something that has to be done on a case by case basis in order to be rigorous, and isn't that intuitive.

As a rule of thumb, though, keeping in mind that the player can control Frisk's actions but not Chara's tends to be pretty useful in that regard.

The second type is way more sneaky and are the ones that are the most often missed. They can be seen in any route, even pacifist. Those are the ones in which, the narrator's speech, betrays certain actions to have been not from Frisk, but from themself. those cases are often accompanied by circumpstancial evidence surrounding them, to give them more context and probably also to reassure that they were here intentionally and not as just an error from Toby when writing the flavor text.

One such case appears quite early on in the game.

Normally, whenever Frisk reads a sign, a book, etc... the narrator describes it in the following way :

This appears as quite in tune with everything else the narrator normally says throughout the game. They describe that Frisk (refered to as “you”) performs the suggested action. Nothing out of the ordinary here.

But there is one singular exception to this, in which the narrator rather says :

Notice that the "you" refering to Frisk is absent, and was replaced by an active "Here is" which suggests first hand action from the narrator, presenting Frisk with a so called "random page" rather than a description of Frisk opening the book themself.

And furthermore, while it may seem odd at first that Chara would take action over something so meaningless as opening a book, this actually makes a lot more sense when considering that the "random page" isn't actually random at all, and our narrator is currently being an unreliable narrator here.

The page in question just so happens to be the singular page of the monster history books that paints humans in the most negative light, portraying them as aggressive creatures to be feared and who monsters (seen as the victims of human cruelty) would have had to run and hide from, trapped.

Chara's bias here is clearly showing. They were deliberately wanting to show this specific page due to their own dislike for humanity.

Even the specific moment in the game in which this scene happens would be fitting for Chara to do such a thing. But that would be more fitting to the subject of a future post regarding the way the relationship between Frisk and the narrator evolves throughout the game.

There are a few more examples of this, of course, to give just one more of them : Here, when the player pushes Frisk to try and give Gyftrot their gold, but where once they do attempt it, Chara physically prevents Frisk from doing it and the gold isn't given. Which is then followed by the narrator berating the choice we tried to make.

By the way, for extra context, one could also note here that Chara also specifically called gold as one of the statistics they show interest in in the genocide ending, too. So one could draw a parallel there.

For this second type of cases, there is a more consistent method to spotting them. It is simply about carefully looking for irregularities in what the narrator says or does, and optionally comparing that to the wider context surrounding Chara to clarify things.

#undertale #chara #frisk

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spopsalt · 7 months

Text

Ik Rick and BoJack are random but I wanted to add on some well written characters :)

context for the character and list of some of their crimes under the cut!

Catra Applesauce Meow Meow

Definitely my most controversial pick for this list! Catra was an abused child soldier and abused her sister Adora, she was redeemed buttt her arc wasn't really...good. Her crimes: War crimes Abuse of power Corruption Reckless endangerment Psychological abuse Assault Terrorism Attempted regicide Attempted mass murder Attempted world domination Attempted cataclysm Conspiracy Mass destruction Abduction & kidnapping Unlawful imprisonment Brainwashing Theft Torture Treason Usurpation Coercion Stalking Mutilation Aiding and abetting Illegal use of weapons Espionage Crimes against peace Crimes against Etheria Altering reality (unintentional)

Next up my personal least favorite out of this list, Stolas!

Awww poor guy, forcing someone into having sex with you with holding what they need for their job over their head, his crimes took me a bit longer considering he's considered just a poor guy buttt here's a list I thought of from the top of my head: Child Neglect, Abuse of power (unsure if that's a crime) harrasment, r*pe

Next up Bojack the Horseman, Bojack the horse don't act like you don't know!

One of the more sympathetic ones, he's still an asshole but he does try to change and he is well written. He's egotistical and has a huge ego, we do get a positive implied outcome in the series finale, but it's still unclear. Here's a list of his crimes: Murder via inaction Assault Attempted murder Theft Drugging Breaking and entering Harassment Stalking Drug dealing and possession Driving under the influence Supplying alcohol to minors Corruption Sabotage Fraud Identity theft Trespassing Child endangerment Bullying Destruction of property Arson Sexual misconduct with a minor Psychological abuse

Next up my favorite, but still an awful person, Rick Sanchez!

Again, he's one of the more sympathetic ones given his past, and he is actively trying to change and does really love his grandson,the rest of his family and friends even sacrificing himself for his grandson but he is still a horrible person with a longgg list of crimes, also disclaimer ripped most of these from the villains wiki so if any info is missing or inaccurate that's why. List of crimes: Unethical experimentation Negligence Mass murder Mass genocide Mass enslavement Mass torture Mass mundicide Mass property damage Mass manslaughter Mass theoricideMass omnicide (heavily implied)Terrorism Treason Theft Trespassing Death threats Hijacking Assault and battery Psychological abuse Human trafficking Vandalism Regicide Arson Deicide Piracy Possession Hacking Kidnapping Blackmail Con artistry Drug dealing Mutilation Brainwashing Smuggling Corruption Defilement Heresy Vigilantism False imprisonment Jailbreak Sabotage Incrimination Reckless endangerment Indecent exposure Impersonation Cannibalism Aiding and abetting Disturbing the peace Child abuse Substance abuse Abuse of power Burglary War crimes Animal cruelty Forced transmutations Corpse desecrations Grand theft DUI Pollution Attempted infanticideIllicit dealings Weapons dealing Graverobbery Usurpation Public intoxication Child endangerment Evading arrest Perjury Illegal weapons development

#spop critical #spop salt #anti spop #spop crit #anti catra #spop discourse #spop criticism #antic//a #anti catradora #anti c//a #anti helluva boss #anti stoliz #anti stolas #anti stolitz

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ansbobcar · 7 months

Text

I'm ready to become a part-time lore builder of a fandom if I can't get any answers.

Seriously. Time to do some mental gymnastics again because, I LOVE TALKING ABOUT LORE (well worldbuilding lore) AND MAKING LORE IF THERE IS NOTHING ABOUT IT!!

We're back to looking at the Divine Visionaries again because, what the hell are these administration/department/subdivisions man.

Here are my rankings of most straightforward to least straightforward (in terms of what they govern) and my reasoning, questions, headcanons AND MANGA SPOILERS. Feel free to discuss!

1. MAGICAL ITEMS

It's basically quality control check of any magical tool and also acts like a museum. Very straightforward to guess. It's managing, checking the quality of new, old, or powerful magical items. We also know the most about it I think because Rayne currently manages it (idk why i trust the fandom wiki)

2. FORBIDDEN MAGICAL TEXTS

This is also straightforward. They manage forbidden magical texts from being accessed to the public. But I'd like to think that this department has to ensure that any texts which use magic, such as newspapers and maybe even children's books, abide by their printing laws and don't enter into that forbidden valley. Prevention of more forbidden magical texts is probably one of their main goals. I mean, confiscation of books and materials or clues regarding them will either be stored or burned possibly. Censorship is a possibility.

3. MAGIC SECURITY (FORCE)

Every time I hear security I think of that random post from twitter I think about how the US' whole military like thing is called the defense something or something. AND I THINK ABOUT IT. But you know atleast security makes more sense.

Current headcanon is that the magic police is under their jurisdiction but being called a magic security officer is diff from a magic police officer. The main difference is that magic police focus solely on internal and surface level, local scale magic (and lack-magic) crimes.

Magic Security is a more national/international scale, or something that involves the Bureau directly. Like a war between other magical races or those type of conflicts. The bar to being a magic security officer is much higher than a magic police officer too.

4. MAGICAL CEMETERY

The management of deceased magic users/wizards is pretty straight forward BUT what I'm tryna figure out is:

a) How many official cemeteries are under their jurisdiction? If so is it illegal to bury a deceased wizard's body on your own?

b) Do they only manage the cemeteries? If they don't does that mean that it's a law to contact their department while preparing for a funeral and burial? How early do they have to get involved?

c) Whoever was managing this division when Adam Jobs died was not good at their job. Nvm this guy's body was gone to bits. Still bad management on their part to not scavenge for that bit of flesh left over. Burn the area to the ground if you have to. Fucking Innocent Zero got his body.

5. MAGICAL CREATURES

The only reason I have this much lower than I initially intended is because there are so many fucking magical creatures in this fucking world that it should be one of the biggest ass divisions of the Bureau alongside Magical Items.

a) You need research/encyclopedias on these creatures. What their weakness is and so on, research on magical creatures (probably in conjunction with magical research).

b) Is animal cruelty a thing in this world? It probably is. It better be then there has to be a governing body for that.

c) I feel like for magical magical creatures like Dragons, they have to manage/hand out yearly licenses towards educational institutes to allow those dragons to be used. Otherwise, I think they'll be released to the wild and will be blacklisted from ever owning a dragon. (Animal cruelty act or something)

d) They probably have a national zoo which is used for both research and conservation purposes. Bet there's a bunch of endangered species.

6. MAGICAL RESEARCH

Just like the previous department/administration... this is also pretty broad. (You'll realise a pattern as we go down the list). The way I see it is that every year, they gather statistics and feedback from the people, and come up with 4-6 projects of varying scales to help. These can range from new technology for pre-existing magical tools or making new innovations and tools.

They also do research on animals, plants and probably somewhat manage the welfare of the country slightly.

What I wonder is if it's illegal to do research outside of their department? Or do they allow exceptions, like some company can pitch their idea to the magical research department who then greenlight their thing or not like Dragon's Den.

7. MAGICAL POWER

Orter and Rinka, idk how y'all even do this. Magical Power Admin according to the fandom wiki (which I think took info from the fanbook, but cannot confirm), looks into shit related to power basically (abuse, lack ofs, very magical power creatures).

My problem is that kind of overlaps with magic security just slightlyyy. I also headcanon that the magic police are governed by magic security and magical power.

So far for my fanfic (big spoilers lol):

a) Their main goal is to reduce/prevent the abuse of magic within the kingdom/country.

b) They can make and enforce laws/policies/the legal rules surrounding the use of magic which include giving penalties/punishments.

8. MAGICAL TALENT

What the fuck is Kaldo's job. I get he looks at Divine Visionary candidates before they even get to the final exam but seriously. I would like to think that part of his job is to take note of what kind of personal magic has ever fucking existed other than tryna analyse people. If his department was more like HR, I think it'd make more sense.

His department probably has the least amount of people/staff.

_ _ _

There's probably other departments as well that aren't governed by a Divine Visionary for now. My ted talk is finished. For now.

#mashle #divine visionaries #orter madl #rayne ames #sophina biblia #renatus revol #tsurara halestone #agito tyrone #ryoh grantz #kaldo gehenna #mashle fanon lore #for future reference #mashle fanfic idea #mashle oc

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