#it's like. making your own mistakes and then examining where you went wrong and the mechanism of it is THE ultimate personalized lesson plan

[unionizedwizard]

funniest thing ive learned (and that's coming from someone who had debilitating perfectionist tendencies) is that making your own mistakes is actually thrilling and really fun because it really feels like gaining xp and leveling up but irl. like ah shit i see. well i'll know that's a soak marker next time kinda deal

[wrenaspun]

OMEGAVERSE

Ok listen - my dark secret is that I've spent years going Oh I don't know, I don't think I'll ever write omegaverse... and you sent this in to clown on me but GUESS WHAT! when I try my hand at something I take it SERIOUSLY. This is 6k. It has scene breaks. Bon appetit -

Laurent hated his annual checkups. This was not a quality he appreciated in himself, but it was difficult to reason the feeling away. He saw Paschal in a old house converted to incorporate a homey front-room office, nothing like the old cliche of white walls and antiseptic, but there was still the indignity of being poked and prodded, the feeling of being under examination, the crawling flush of humiliation whenever he flinched from a harmless touch. It was unpleasant. He didn’t like it.

He had always made a point of getting in and out as fast as possible; there was no reason why this appointment would be any different. Except, when Paschal clicked around on his ancient-looking brick of a desktop computer and said, “I’ll renew your suppressant prescription for next year, then,” Laurent found himself tensing.

The word bubbled out of him before he could think: “Wait.” He heard himself as though from far away; it took a moment to register that something had come from his mouth. Paschal blinked once, twice, and then turned to Laurent with his eyebrows raised halfway up his forehead.

The silence stretched out to fill the room. Laurent wanted to say — nevermind, forget it. It was on the tip of his tongue. It wouldn’t quite come out of his mouth. Eventually Paschal was the one to say, “Yes?”

Laurent said, “You’re the one who’s always saying I should cycle off them. Have you just been saying that for fun?” His voice was snappish, too aggressive.

Paschal knew him too well to react. “No, of course not,” he said slowly. “I still believe it would be good for you.”

Laurent waited, half-hoping and half-dreading that he would continue, would say something prevaricating: but you don’t have to, or, you’ve never even entertained the idea before, or even just, what changed?

Paschal offered none of these escape routes. “All right,” he said mildly. “I’ll adjust the amount on your prescription. If you change your mind, you can always make another appointment with me.” It was as good as a taunt, Laurent thought resentfully. They both knew he wasn’t coming back here any sooner than he absolutely had to.

And because no good deed went unpunished, he had to sit through an extra five-minute explanation on how to cycle off his current weekly dosage before he was finally released, clutching his adjusted prescription, blinking and stumbling down the stoop like some new strange creature who hadn’t ever lived in the world before. The paper in his hands felt oddly heavy, weighty. There was some part of him which believed it couldn’t be that easy, and another which wanted to turn around and say to Paschal that there had been a mistake, that it’d been a joke, some strange trick. It wasn’t — he wasn’t —

He kept walking. It was done, he told himself. There was no changing it now. He would have the requisite conversation with Damen tonight, and then he could direct his mind elsewhere until —

Even now, he shied away from thinking about it. Events would unfold of their own accord. There was no point worrying about it. He got his prescription filled and tucked the innocuous little bottle into an inner pocket of his bag where he wouldn’t have to look at it.

—

That evening, he said, “I have to talk to you,” over dinner, “about the checkup.” And then the words dried up; Damen’s interest became concern and then outright worry.

“Is something wrong?” he asked, a little tentative, his broad hand a little too tight around his fork. “Laurent, don’t keep me in suspense.” It was half a joke and half a plea.

Laurent shook his head. Forced himself to say, “Paschal recommended I cycle off my suppressants. At least once. Since I’ve been on them for so long.”

Damen was so lovely that, absurdly, it made the words difficult to say. Any other alpha would accept it without question — would be eager, even — if Laurent had said to them that he needed to go through a heat. Those were exactly the kinds of alphas who’d be put off by Laurent’s first date declaration, I’m never cycling off my suppressants, ever, it’s not even on the table, who’d roll their eyes and walk out on him muttering about frigid bitches —

Not Damen, who had just nodded. All right, he’d said, so unquestioningly open that Laurent had found himself saying more, I don’t like how it feels, except that Damen had only smiled again and said that he didn’t have to explain.

Perfect, at the time, but now he looked worried, and Laurent didn’t know how to reassure him. “You have to?” he asked. “Is there — some kind of problem —?”

“No,” said Laurent. “It’s precautionary. It’s just letting my body reset itself.”

“Right,” said Damen. The silence stretched out, awkward, between them. Neither of them were eating anymore. Finally, Damen said, “Do you want me to — go somewhere —?”

“No!” Laurent barely stopped himself from snapping, that would defeat the whole point, idiot. He felt his jaw twitch. If Damen didn’t want to heat with him — it would certainly be one of Laurent’s graver miscalculations. But this was Damen. The thought that he’d want to leave Laurent alone through a heat was inconceivable.

When Laurent finally looked up, Damen was watching him, brow furrowed. “Laurent,” he said.

Laurent’s cheeks felt like they were on fire. “Are you going to make me say it?” he demanded, and Damen’s face opened into a hesitant little smile that did strange things to Laurent’s stomach.

“Sweetheart,” he said, “I’d be honoured.”

For a moment it was difficult to breathe. It was as though there was something inside Laurent’s chest, blocking his lungs, blocking his throat. He turned back to his food, staring down at the blue florals. “Good,” he said. And then, “It probably won’t happen any time soon.” His body was too used to the suppressants.

“That’s good,” said Damen. “If you change your mind —”

“I won’t change my mind.” Sharply.

“All right,” said Damen, voice soft. Then he reached over and twined their fingers together, under the table, and said nothing when Laurent’s hand tightened as though clutching a lifeline.

—

It took four months, in the end. Long enough that Laurent had stopped thinking about it, for the most part. He didn’t even realise — what was happening, when it first started. He thought he was coming down with something. The ecology textbook he was meant to be editing didn’t seem to make any sense; the words on the page in front of him were swimming slightly. His face felt flushed and overheated, maybe feverish. He tried a few times to put his hand to his forehead, second-guessing the way it felt.

It was confusing mostly because he hadn’t had the chance to get sick recently — it’d been a quiet few weeks, mostly nights at home with Damen. The textbook had him a little stressed because he didn’t know the first thing about ecology, but it was no worse than any other job that the publishing house had pushed on him. But that was how sicknesses worked, he supposed. Random unlucky encounters while they were out running errands. They’d done the groceries — was it last weekend? He couldn’t focus properly.

He kept going anyway, mostly because to curl up in bed sounded a little too tempting, and there was the hope in the back of his mind that he’d be able to fight through it by sheer force of will. He did take a couple of the emergency paracetamol that Damen had stashed in his desk, but he didn’t feel much effect.

“Honey, I’m home!”

Laurent startled and looked at the clock: sure enough, the rest of the workday had ground by. He’d been working overtime for half an hour, actually. What was wrong with him today?

He shook his head just in time for Damen to poke his head into the little office, a frown already on his face. He started, “What are you —”

“Don’t come near,” said Laurent hastily, attempting to roll his chair backwards to little effect — the desk was a rather immovable obstacle. “I think I’m getting sick.”

Damen was looking at him wide-eyed. He’d trailed off, but his mouth was hanging a little open. Laurent wanted to kiss it. He wanted to get up and wrap himself in Damen’s arms and get rid of their clothes, fast, the better to have Damen over him, skin-to-skin…

“Sweetheart,” said Damen, “I don’t think you’re getting sick.”

Laurent still didn’t realise, not even then. It was only when Damen inhaled, a long, slow, indulgent breath that would lay Laurent’s scent thick and heavy on his tongue, that the pieces clicked.

Laurent said, “Oh, fuck.”

He’d been such an idiot. The signs had all been there — the irritability, the flushes of heat, the lack of focus. The way his mind kept returning, like a dog with a bone, to thoughts of Damen’s naked body, the way he’d look pressed up against Laurent, the way his hands would feel… Laurent loved Damen’s hands, broad and capable, graceful and gentle.

“We can still get you on suppressants if you want,” Damen offered, quiet. “They have the medical-grade ones for late-stage preheat. We still have enough time to drive to the hospital.”

There were medical-grade suppressants that could stop a full heat in its tracks, even. The offer hung between them, tantalising.

“No,” said Laurent. “Don’t think you’re getting out of it this easily.”

Damen’s mouth ticked up, which usually would have sent a little thrill through Laurent’s blood and which now made him feel on the point of explosion. He stood up so forcefully that his chair was propelled into the desk behind him, crashing unpleasantly against the wood — Laurent couldn’t bring himself to care. He was darting into Damen’s arms. Damen caught him up without any effort at all, and Laurent buried his face into Damen’s neck where the scent of him was strongest, the earthy, deep smell which was nothing but a comfort.

“Laurent.” Damen’s arms tightened around him, and Laurent felt a little of the tension leave his body. Oh, it’d been such a long day. “Laurent.”

“Hmm?”

“I — we can’t, yet —” and the arms began to push Laurent away, which was awful. “Laurent, please.”

“Don’t you want —”

“I want,” said Damen fervently. There was a hint of a growl in his voice. Laurent realised, in an abrupt moment of clarity, that he was wet. “We need to prepare. You need to take your heat leave,” nodding at the computer behind Laurent. “I’ll email my work. And then I need to get some meals ready.”

“Some meals?” echoed Laurent.

The look Damen gave him was heated. “I’m not letting you out of bed for three days, sweetheart.”

“I — oh.” Even through the faintly feverish texture of preheat, Laurent could feel himself blushing.

Damen tipped his chin up with one finger and kissed his lips very lightly. “You can prepare the bedroom while I’m in the kitchen. I’ll be up in no time.”

“All right.” Laurent could hear the sighing breathiness of his own voice. Damen kissed him again, still light, which was a mercy; Laurent didn’t think he would survive it, if Damen had kissed him properly only to pull away.

“Soon,” said Damen, in the tone of a promise, and then he was pulling away, and then he was gone.

Laurent stood uselessly in the doorway for a full five seconds after Damen had ducked into the kitchen and out of sight, blinking hazily, focusing entirely on resisting the urge to follow Damen like a little duckling.

Email, he thought finally, and tore himself away from the threshold. He tapped out a cursory notice to the publishing house, cc’d his client, slammed the laptop shut.

He was preoccupied as he made his way upstairs, thinking about Damen, about the abnormal sensations within his own body, and so it was only once he had entered the bedroom that he realised he had no idea what Damen meant when he’d said Laurent could prepare the bedroom. What did that even entail? Laurent regarded the room with some bemusement. It was decently clean — neither of them were particularly messy — with a few belongings scattered about on the dresser and bedside tables. Laurent took a breath, but it was difficult to think. Did Damen want the room cleaned before they spent three days rolling around in the sheets? He had never been particularly fussy about such things before. Was there something he wanted, or was it more of a general expression, to prepare the bedroom? Laurent could practically feel the gaps in his knowledge taunting him. Was there a wrong way to prepare a bedroom?

He didn’t know how much time he wasted just standing there, looking over at the bed. Finally, the thought struck him: sheets, obviously. Damen had gone and bought a nice set of mattress and duvet protectors after Laurent had cycled off his suppressants. They were meant to go under the normal sheets, because everyone said the same thing, that heating was a messy experience, that it was hell on bedding. Laurent went to the linen closet on light feet, feeling almost like he was floating from the relief of having found something to do.

He hadn’t actually seen the protectors before; Damen had just called on his way home one day and asked whether Laurent preferred one brand or the other. Laurent didn’t care, didn’t want to think about it, so Damen had made the decision and put the package away when he got home.

Laurent should probably have paid more attention, if only to curb Damen’s tendency to extravagance. He’d bought — it didn’t even seem possible that a single box could hold so many sheets. It was at least twice the amount of bedding that one would find in a standard set. Probably three times as much. Surely heating wasn’t that destructive.

He took what he needed and returned to the bedroom. It took a little longer than usual to change the sheets — they usually did this together, if only because the mattress was ridiculously large — but he managed finally to get everything where it was supposed to be. He was too nervous for it too feel like a real achievement. There was a raw, jagged feeling under his skin, a physical sort of ache. He wanted Damen. He couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something he’d missed.

Just as the crest of impatience was tipping over into a crisis, Damen’s footsteps echoed up the stairs. Laurent, dignity abandoned, leapt to the doorway, looking out. Damen was carrying a bag, one of those reusable totes from the supermarket, heavy enough that his biceps were straining a little with it. Laurent felt his heart pulse irregularly. He was halfway down the corridor, wanting the heady elixir of Damen’s attention and focus.

“Hello,” he said breathlessly, when Damen smiled at him. The smile widened. Damen’s dimple was a lovely tease.

“Hello,” said Damen, bringing his free hand up to cradle Laurent’s cheek. “Do you want to eat now?”

A quick glance down revealed that the tote bag was full of tupperware, all of it steamed up from being freshly cooked. But — “I couldn’t,” Laurent admitted. It was true. His stomach was in knots.

“It’ll keep,” said Damen. “Can I come in?”

Absurdly, Laurent realised that some part of himself wanted to say no. He quashed it carefully and said, “Yes, of course.”

He was watching Damen’s face as they walked; that was why he saw the quick flicker of surprise, of dismay, which crossed his expression as he came into the room. Laurent blamed his hormones on the fact that this felt like being stabbed. He felt himself flame up red, blood rushing to his face.

Damen was looking down at him uncertainly, which was terrible. Then he said, gently, “Laurent, are you sure you want —?” which was worse.

“Of course I want,” snapped Laurent.

“We can still go to the hospital —”

“Shut up.” This was more painful than being stabbed. “I said I would, and I will. I want to — I — why would you think otherwise?” And under the force of Damen’s gaze, Laurent heard himself say, “What did I do wrong?”

The bag of food dropped inelegantly to the floor. Damen was taking hold of Laurent around the waist, still a warm and comforting presence. “It’s not wrong,” he said. “I misspoke.”

“But there was something,” said Laurent, and forced himself to step back. Damen hesitated. “Damen, just say it.”

Damen said, “I thought there would be a nest.”

It was so unexpected that for a moment Laurent’s mind did not compute it. Damen might as well have said, I thought you would grow an extra limb. “What?” he said. “Why?”

A helpless look. “I don’t know,” said Damen. “I suppose it must be more common in Akielos.”

“But nests are —” Laurent hesitated. The words from his adolescence bubbled up, but felt somehow wrong to say. Unhygienic. Primitive, backwards, unsophisticated.

Damen’s expression flickered, as though he was hearing the words anyway. Laurent changed courses and said, “You’ve heated with others before. Other Veretians.”

Now it was Damen’s turn to hesitate, eyeing Laurent carefully as though nervous he would burst into flames at the thought. When this did not occur, he said, “Yes. And there was always — so I suppose that’s why I assumed.” And then, quickly: “But it doesn’t matter, obviously. We can do what you want.”

He stepped forward, but Laurent stepped back, thinking — he felt like his mind was overheating like a faulty computer. He was thinking about books, about movies, the way that the height of romance was always a nest. At the time, he’d thought it was cheesy, mawkish, a cultural signifier more than a gesture real people would be likely to make, the same as covering a mattress with rose petals or turning out all the lights to have dinner by candlelight. And he was also thinking about how the voice in his head was his uncle’s, cold and amused. The extra sheet protectors, Laurent thought, with another flush of embarrassment. It wasn’t overly-stocked out of generosity or even out of extravagance. He was supposed to have used them in his nest.

“Laurent,” said Damen, “I’m sorry I raised it —”

“How,” said Laurent abruptly, and Damen cut himself off, “do you build a nest?”

Damen briefly looked like he was struggling to speak. After a moment he said, “You don’t have to.”

“If I wanted to,” said Laurent. “How would I?”

Damen said, “Have you never…?”

“Never,” said Laurent. And, absurdly, a flicker of anger crossed Damen’s expression.

But all he said was, “You start with the heavier things,” voice even, “and work your way to the lighter blankets. You shape it around you. It’s meant to be comfortable. There’s no wrong way to do it, really, except that going from light to heavy can be less stable.”

Laurent said, “Show me.”

Damen looked at him a little helplessly, but he at least did Laurent the favour of not asking yet again whether he was sure. “Wait here,” he said, and went off to the linen closet, came back with what looked like its entire contents heaped in his arms.

Something about the sight — Damen’s strength, his bulk, harnessed for the purpose of carrying around piles of cloth — tugged fiercely at Laurent’s heart. “Damen,” he said.

Damen said, “Don’t come too close, sweetheart. We don’t want your heat to set in yet.”

It took a moment to understand what he meant; Laurent was not a fan of feeling this slow, this stupid. It was fairly well known — and there were studies to back it up — that preheat would graduate to full heat much faster in the face of skin-to-skin contact with a partner. It was awful, to stay back. Damen knelt on the ground to separate out the different blankets, and then looked up at Laurent.

“It might be better if you sat on the bed,” he said. “I can pass you what you want.”

Laurent went and pushed the single duvet aside and sat. It felt — stupid. It was hard not to feel self-conscious, sitting on an almost-empty mattress and looking over at Damen. “Give me the heavy one, then,” he said.

Damen did. Laurent tried to hold it in his hands, but it was too large to be contained, and tumbled eventually to pool around his legs. Damen was watching him.

Again he said, “It doesn’t matter how you do it. There’s no wrong way.”

Easy for you to say, Laurent wanted to snap, but he restrained himself. He didn’t like feeling this way, hot and angry and resentful.

Damen said, “Do you want me to go?”

“Why,” said Laurent, unable to keep the jagged edge from his voice, “would I want you to go?”

A swallow. Damen said, soft: “It’s an intimate thing, to build the nest. Even more than being invited into it. If you feel uncomfortable —”

“Shut up,” said Laurent. “Shut up.” And he shoved the duvet to one side of him, kicking it into a rough curve around his left side. “Give me the other one.”

Damen shut up and obeyed. Laurent put it along his other side, mirroring the first.

“Next,” he said, and Damen obliged him again. The next blanket was a little lighter. Laurent said, “Take that end and hold it.”

Damen did. His eyes were a little wide, in the manner of one who hadn’t expected this. An intimate thing, he’d called it, and his tone had been soft and reverent. Laurent tamped down on the emotions in his chest and tucked the blanket demonstratively over the top of the duvet beside him, nodding for Damen to do the same.

The worked together, then, layering the blankets around Laurent, the nest slowly building in shape and solidity. Damen’s hands were so — wide and capable, manipulating the fabric, making sure everything fit together, taking time and care with every movement. Laurent heard his words again, an intimate thing, and this time he couldn’t stop himself from saying, “Who did you build nests with, then?” He felt hot and jealous and uncontrolled. He wanted to go find whoever it was and tear their throat out with his teeth. “Jokaste?”

A surprised look, which melted into something like a smile. “No,” said Damen. “She didn’t like heats either. She was on suppressants most of the time we were together.” And then, when this clearly did not satisfy Laurent, “When we heated, she built the nest. Alone.”

“Who, then,” Laurent gritted.

Damen grinned at him, wide and dazzling. “My mother,” he said. “In Akielos — we nest as a family, when the pups are young. It’s very common. And she always let me help.”

The knot of jealousy abated. Laurent felt his jaw twitch, humiliation warring with satisfaction. From a distant vantage point, some small part of his remaining sense decided that he was being foolish. But Damen was grinning at him still, his scent rich with pleasure, and it was impossible to feel too badly in the face of that relentless happiness.

“Hurry up,” said Laurent, and he could hear the way his voice came out — nowhere near as sharp as he had intended. He sounded sappy, a little shy. Very stupid. It only made Damen smile harder. His dimple was trying to dig its way through his cheek.

“Yes, sweetheart,” said Damen, and he was the one who took the last blankets and settled them over the edges of the nest, shaping the construction carefully. He looked at Laurent, a little quizzical, and then said, “Lie down.”

Laurent did. It felt — it was difficult to describe how it felt. He’d never known this was an option. Carefully, he turned his head into the soft bedding, inhaling, smelling the detergent they used. It was good, he thought. It was soft, warm — even though he knew it was a simple pacifier to his baser instincts, the appeal came through loud and clear. It was primally, viscerally satisfying to lie in a nest of his own creation, safe in a way that very little else had ever been. Absurdly, he had the thought that he wanted to add curtains to the bed. He wanted to shut out the rest of the world, to have it be just him and Damen…

Damen said, “If you don’t like it, we can push it off and go with your original way.”

“I didn’t say that,” Laurent muttered.

“Speak louder, baby.”

“Come here,” Laurent said louder. Damen’s hand brushed against his wrist.

“Yeah?”

“Hurry up,” snapped Laurent. Damen laughed a little and levered himself carefully into the nest, and oh —

All of a sudden, it was perfect. It was as though Damen had been the only thing missing. Laurent launched himself forward, arms going around Damen’s neck, breathing in, wiping out the rest of the world so that Damen was the only thing that existed, Damen’s warm steady body, Damen’s scent — Laurent inhaled and inhaled until he was faintly dizzy from it. Damen was murmuring into his ear, sweetheart, you’re so lovely, you’re so good, words that made Laurent want to bite him.

He could, he thought dizzily. There was no reason not to. Damen made a pitchy, breathy noise when Laurent’s teeth closed against his neck, and then graduated to a long groan.

“Laurent,” he said, “Laurent —”

Laurent was too busy to reply. Damen’s hand came to cradle the back of his head. Laurent’s whole body felt like it surged in response to the touch, his breath crushed from his lungs, his heart hammering in his chest. Damen groaned again, but this time there was a new timbre to the noise.

“Oh, there you are,” he said, running a hand up Laurent’s side. “Do you feel that?”

Feel what, Laurent almost said, and then realised — he was in heat. Full, proper heat now, roaring through his veins.

It was fierce, all-consuming, and yet it felt nothing like Laurent had remembered. His first heat had set upon him like a wild creature, digging teeth and claws through him. It had been an experience chiefly significant for its pain, for the way he sweated and cried and shook his way through it, the way he had felt fever-hot and thought his heart would burst for hammering. That’s it? he’d thought, in the aftermath, that’s what everyone goes wild for? It was an insane thought to him that anyone would choose to go through it again. He’d arranged to be put on suppressants as soon as he could walk again.

This felt nothing like that. This wasn’t even hot — it was warm, like sitting just slightly too close to a fireside, and it ran through his veins like liquid gold. Everywhere that Damen touched, he felt himself respond, but there was no pain to it, none of the fierce shrieking need which he had suffered before.

Vaguely, he heard himself murmuring, oh, oh, Damen… Nonsense sounds, mostly, interspersed with Damen’s name, and every time Damen acted as though he’d shared the secrets of the very universe, cooing back with his whole heart. Laurent took control of his mouth again and said, “Damen, please. I need you.”

“I’m with you,” Damen murmured. He was working Laurent out of his clothes, fingers fumbling around the same buttons he could have undone in his sleep last night. “Laurent, I’m here. Oh, look at you…”

Laurent looked. Damen was looking at the slick between his legs, the dampness across his thighs. His gaze was bright and eager. Laurent said, “Don’t tease me.”

Damen’s eyes flickered up to search his face. “No?” he asked.

Laurent bit his lip. He was already red and flushed, he thought, which at least camouflaged his reaction. “Not — as much, then,” he said. “Unless you want me to die here,” and Damen grinned. It felt obscene, the wholesomeness of the expression, his peeking dimple, when one considered what he was smiling about.

“Noted,” said Damen, and brushed a finger over Laurent’s hole. Laurent heard himself make a sound like he was dying.

Before Damen, he’d never liked being teased. He’d never liked drawing it out; even when it was just himself in the bedroom, perhaps especially then, he’d used to bring himself off quickly, efficiently, and then box up the experience without dwelling on it. Damen was — the opposite of that. He loved to touch; sometimes he would touch Laurent aimlessly, all night, drifting his fingertips along Laurent’s shoulders and collarbone and neck, his sides, his stomach… And in bed, he would touch Laurent everywhere, light touches and long caresses and cruel little pinches and everything in between. He loved to draw it out; he loved for Laurent to lose himself to it, surrendering his tightly held self-control to start pushing back mindlessly into everything, to make soft noises with his mouth, to say yes, yes, Damen and please, right there.

Even the first time, when Laurent felt most strongly that he should have hated it, he didn’t. He couldn’t. There was something about the way Damen looked at him, awed and sweet; and there was something about the way that every touch became a promise, the tease itself becoming a token of Damen’s intentions.

Damen didn’t break his word. There was something horribly satisfying about begging, knowing that everything one wanted would come. It became a pleasure in itself to say Damen, please, I need you inside, and to be briefly denied, knowing that Damen would do everything, fulfill every promise. Damen would probably fight a god to make Laurent feel good.

“Ah, sweetheart, your scent,” Damen groaned. And then he put his face against Laurent’s neck and just inhaled, long and luxurious. It was like Laurent had been kicked in the stomach, the sudden blow of arousal.

“Damen,” he said, not sounding like himself at all.

“I know,” said Damen. “I know — just let me —” and he moved down, nudging Laurent’s knees apart, inhaling again, god — like it was bliss, like Laurent’s slick was —

And then his mouth was on Laurent, hot and wet and ravenous, and Laurent’s mind went utterly blank. Damen’s touch — his tongue — Laurent came like that, a brutal wave of pleasure that wiped everything else away, the whole rest of the world. All that mattered was Damen, the way he groaned, the way his hands tightened around Laurent’s thighs, the way he kept going and going and going —

Laurent had to push him away after the second peak — had to use far more force than usual. The whole lower half of Damen’s face was wet when he finally raised it, and he was breathing hard. Laurent could feel the movement of those broad shoulders in his thighs.

“Damen,” he said dazedly, all of a sudden finding it difficult to remember why he shouldn’t just let Damen lick him through the whole rest of his heat.

“Laurent,” said Damen, with a grin that was absolutely filthy. He rose to his knees and came up the bed towards Laurent, and he was truly just — a magnificent specimen, all broad shoulders and rolling muscle and strong shoulders. Laurent could have just watched him in that moment and been happy for the rest of his life.

Except not, obviously. Damen kissed him and desire ran through him like a shockwave. He was saying — something, he didn’t know, his mouth was utterly out of his own control —

“I know,” Damen was saying now, lining their bodies up, “you don’t have to beg, sweetheart, I’ll give you everything, anything you want,” and clearly he meant it because he was pushing inside, and Laurent heard himself make a noise he didn’t think he’d ever made before. “I know,” said Damen, biting his neck gently, and the resultant wave of pleasure was so great that it was like coming, just like that.

It was all Laurent could do to grab his shoulders and hold on. His whole body was torn between the urge to melt underneath Damen and the desperate need to move against him, to drive them to go harder and faster.

“Like this,” Damen murmured, kissing Laurent again, holding his hips and pushing inside in just the right way. Laurent’s head fell back helplessly. It felt so good. His mind was breaking apart, almost unable to comprehend it all.

“Knot me,” he said then. His voice was raw; he’d been moaning, he realised belatedly. “Damen, please —”

“I know,” said Damen again. “Sweetheart, you’re so good, you’re so perfect. Like that, yes, Laurent —”

His knot was starting to swell; it was all Laurent could feel, the whole of his awareness narrowing down to that single point between them.

One of Damen’s hands slid to the inside of Laurent’s thigh, pushing his leg outward, making everything feel more sensitive, more overwhelming. His knot was almost too large now, taking real effort to shift in and out of Laurent’s hungry body. Laurent was grasping desperately at Damen’s shoulders, panting, open-mouthed, as his pleasure built impossibly high and then crashed over him like a wave, knocking him off his feet, sending him into unfathomable depths.

“Inside me,” he begged then, feeling beyond his own limits, as though he had been broken into pieces. “Damen, please, I want it —”

Damen groaned and kissed him desperately, their mouths open to each other, and then he finally thrust in properly, tying them together, stretching out the last aftershocks of Laurent’s orgasm.

It was like nothing Laurent had felt before, the way that everything was drawn out — even more than regular knotting, the fact that his body was in heat seemed to mean it was grabbing, greedy, at every chance for pleasure. And Damen was moving slowly, crooning into Laurent’s ear, telling him how lovely he was, how sweet and warm and wet, and Laurent was shuddering helplessly against him.

But even once that wave had crested, and they came back to themselves, it was still new and wonderful; Laurent reached out with one hand to touch the side of his nest, the sheets which were sheltering and protecting him.

“I want curtains,” he said blurrily, his own impulse control too thin and worn to check his words. “On the bed. Around.”

“Yes,” Damen said. It was almost a groan. He was nosing at Laurent’s neck, inhaling. “Anything, sweetheart. Whatever you want.”

“I want you,” Laurent said breathlessly. “Kiss me.”

Damen did, open-mouthed and luxurious. And then — he began to move, shifting his hips in tiny, infinitesimal motions that crashed through Laurent’s sensitive body like a tidal wave. The huge bulk of his knot was overwhelming when it was still. It felt impossible that he could fuck Laurent on it. It felt absurdly good.

Laurent wound his arms around Damen’s neck, ran his fingers through the beloved dark curls. “Damen.”

“Once more,” Damen murmured, kissing Laurent’s neck, his jaw, the corner of his mouth. His hands were skimming along Laurent’s sides, the kind of light, gentle touch which drove Laurent utterly mad. “Come for me one more time, sweetheart.”

“I’m already — I’m close.” The heat was lurking under his skin, pushing him closer and closer to the edge.

Damen kissed him again, brought one hand down to caress the inside of his thigh, and Laurent was gone. The pleasure was so intense that it was like blacking out, his vision growing spotty, ears ringing. He couldn’t hear the noises he was making, only knew they were coming out because he felt the way Damen’s kiss to his throat vibrated.

They were both panting afterwards, both holding very still, too sensitive. Every time Laurent tensed around the knot inside him, Damen would react, shuddering or groaning or both.

“I lied,” he said eventually, and Laurent was too pleasure-soaked to feel even a flicker of concern. Damen nosed at his jaw. “It’s not going to be just the once more.”

A breathless laugh. Laurent wound his arms around Damen’s neck, kissing his cheek, his eyes, his lovely nose. “It better not be,” he said. “Didn’t you promise me three days?”

[urcrowley]

Floral Flame

— Florist!Touya X Reader —

(NO QUIRKS AU , I NEED TO HEAL 🤚🤚🤚)

YOGiNotes: I can’t believe I’m writing this but here we are!! We need more male reader fics guys.. I feel left out /j

(EVERYONE LITERALLY DRAGGED ME TO THE DABI BRAINROT!1!1! STOP THIS MADNESSSSSS)

Completely made this in a rush and out of boredom! I apologize for any spelling and/or grammar mistakes. It is a bit short for my liking but I do hope you still enjoy! 🙏

Warnings: some swearing ig (?) ; very unfunny author ; angst will cook soon (not in this chapter though….)

“My flower…”

Y/N muttered to himself, staring at the now-wilted flower. With a gentle touch, he reached out and tapped one of the fragile petals, watching as it detached from the wilting bloom and fell to the ground.

“I should probably ask that old hag for some advice again, huh?”

He was talking about the older yet amicable woman who ran the flower shop just a few blocks away from his apartment. He regretted not remembering her name. With a less-than-careful tug, Y/N detached his backpack from the corner where it had been gathering dust and carelessly dumped its contents onto the bed, each item making a soft thump sound as it hit the mattress. Y/N cautiously placed the flower pot into his bag once everything was out and grabbed a random coat from the rack beside the door. As he walked out, he tried to tie his shoes while keeping up with his pace.

Almost causing himself to fall.

Well, almost.

He strolled over to his locked bicycle, hopping on it shortly. He rode his bicycle to the shop. But when he arrived..

He was not greeted to the usual ‘good day’ of the kind old woman; rather, a man who didn’t look too far off his own age.

‘This guy definitely listens to mcr..’

Y/N thought to himself, as he waved at the guy. Putting up a front, smiling politely.

“Excuse me? Do you know where—“

“She’s not here today.”

…okay, rude?

“Oh.. When will she—“

“Next week.”

This guy was getting on Y/N’s nerves if he was being completely honest.

“Who are you anyways?”

Y/N was only met with silence and a cold blank stare. He stared back because— well, to be Frank, he didn’t know what else to do.

“I work here.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

He could hear the man click his tongue in annoyance.

“I don’t have to answer to you,” he rolled his eyes, “now, do you need help with anything or something?”

“Is that how you usually treat your customers?”

“…yeah? So what?”

“Nothing, just saying it’s a big.. contrast to what I’m used to.”

The man's gaze fixed on Y/N with a steely glare, his eyes narrowing as if affronted by Y/N's audacity to utter such a statement. “Whatever.. just tell me what you need so we can be done here.”

“Right.. so um..”

Y/N withdrew the flower from his backpack and gingerly placed it on the counter of the checkout. He then glanced up at the man, a sheepish smile playing on his lips.

“I don’t know what went wrong.. I did what I was told and kept managing my watering time..”

Dabi, as indicated by his nametag, meticulously examined the flower, leaning closer to get a better look. It was clear the flower was already dead, leaving him to ponder Y/N's actions beforehand. Y/N, however, contemplated if Dabi was thinking something profound like 'this plant hadn't received the precise amount of water it required,' or if it was something stupid simple and meaningless like ‘I wonder what I’ll have for dinner later.’

Jokes on him, Dabi was thinking of both.

Dabi let out a sigh and rolled up his sleeves, revealing the tattoos on his arms. Y/N was tempted to take a peek, but quickly reminded himself not to be nosy. However, despite his best efforts to focus, he couldn't help but sneak a quick glance at the intricate ink designs on Dabi's skin.

‘Shittt.. that’s sick.’

Y/N thought before quickly snapping out of it.

“Did you make sure your flower gets enough sunlight every day?”

“…what?”

“Your flower?? Gets sunlight?? Hello??”

“……”

Dabi slowly shifted his gaze towards Y/N, his face betraying a mixture of disbelief and surprise. His expression seemed to convey a silent question, as if wondering what on earth Y/N was even doing to this poor plant.

“Are you fucking with me right now?”

“…no.”

The two stared at each other…

After a moment of silence, Y/N spoke up again. “How was I supposed to know this flower needed sunlight?”

“Google exists.”

“I’m a busy man!”

“Busy doing what? Being uneducated?”

DAMN, that hurt more that it was supposed to.

“Okay.. okay, it’s a dumb mistake on my part. Can I buy another one to try again?” Y/N puts his hands on his hips, waiting for Dabi’s answer. “Well.. I don’t have a choice I guess.” Dabi said, the sound of defeat evident in his tone. He walked away to find the same flower as Y/N stood there.

Y/N found himself strangely familiar with the odd man before him. There was something about him that he couldn't quite pinpoint, and it frustrated him. Crossing his arms in annoyance, Y/N observed Dabi carefully examining the flower selection. He realized maybe he should cut the newbie some slack since he just started working here after all.

Dabi finally located the specific flower Y/N had requested and assisted in transferring it to a fresh pot. He then helped Y/N carefully tuck the potted flower into the latter's backpack, gently securing it in place.

“Thanks, I appreciated the help.”

“Ugh, please never come back.”

Y/N snorted at that, almost unable to hold his laughter. He handed his payment to Dabi, and waved goodbye.

“Unfortunately for you, new guy, I’m a regular here!”

He said as he walked out of the store.

Dabi— no, Touya exhaled a frustrated sigh once that idiot guy was gone. He hated working at the flower shop but knew he had no choice. His current situation forced him to hide, and this job was a means to keep a low profile. He longed for a better life, but for now, he was stuck here in this cramped shop, surrounded by fragrant blooms.

Welp, that’s the life of a man on the run he supposed..

YEEEE HE HAS EDGY BACKSTORY WOAHH 🫵🫵😮😮😮😮

This chapter is just me trying to get the idea out of my head, I swear I’ll cook better in the next one ☹️☹️☹️💥💥💥💥

This was supposed to be an artwork idea but I couldn’t really draw rn

Also, mind you, I’m posting this at 3AM in my timezone, PLEASE PLEASE EXCUSE THE BADWRITIGNNFNF 😭😭😭😭

(I am ashamed of myself 😞)

[oldwritingm]

Hello, I was wondering if you could do like a fic about the future where Lloyd and fem reader are getting married? Please.

Sure thing! I tried to keep descriptions pretty vague so that y'all can imagine your special day however you like. Also some Nya content in here bc we can never have enough of her <333 okay I'll shut up now

Word count: 1k

Ninjago - Your Wedding Day with Lloyd

You leaned in closer to the mirror, turning your head this way and that, scrutinizing every inch of your face. Pursing your lips anxiously, you focused so hard on your own reflection that you didn’t see Nya approaching from behind you.

“Here,” she said, startling you. She placed her fingers under your chin, turning your head so you were face-to-face. She cocked her head as she examined you. Then, with a smile, she plucked a stray eyelash off your cheek. Holding it up to your lips, she waited for you to blow it off.

You puffed, launching the eyelash into obscurity. 

“Did you make a wish?”

You nodded.

“What was it?”

With a coy smirk you turned back to the mirror. “I’ll give you three guesses.”

“Hmm… did you wish that you won’t have a wardrobe malfunction?” She tugged at your clothing, making sure everything was fitting as it should. You remembered going out with her, buying the clothes that you were to be married in. How your heart soared when you saw yourself in them for the first time. If you were flying then, you were floating in space now. With each miniscule adjustment Nya made, your image in the mirror somehow became even more perfect; no, it surpassed perfection. 

“Thanks,” you said as she gave one last tug on the fabric near your waist. “But that wasn’t my wish.”

“Did you wish away your pre-marriage jitters?”

You looked at the ceiling, chewing your cheek thoughtfully as you assessed your own feelings. Your reflexive response was “I don’t have jitters,” but you slowly realized that you did have jitters. The fluttery feeling in your stomach wasn’t just excitement. You were afraid, too.

What if things went wrong? What if you had a wardrobe malfunction, or you tripped while walking down the aisle, or if you accidentally said “I don’t” or—oh. Oh no. What if this was all a mistake? What if you were left at the altar, or abandoned on your honeymoon? What if one of you wanted a divorce after two weeks? A year? Ten years?

The image of your soon-to-be husband flashed in your mind suddenly. The vision of him in his neat tuxedo, smiling, telling you it would all be okay, chased your worries away. Funny how he could comfort you even when he wasn’t in the room. Yes, he was perfect for you. And, as he told you almost too often, you were perfect for him. You two were made for each other; nothing else mattered.

With a sigh, you felt your muscles (which you hadn’t realized were tense) relax. “Didn’t wish for that, either. One more guess.”

“Really? Ooh, I’ve got it!” She placed her head endearingly on your shoulder, making eye contact with your reflection. “You wished for a long and happy marriage.”

You clucked your tongue, shaking your head. “I don’t need to wish for that.”

Nya’s eyes sparkled. You knew she was a sucker for romance; she must’ve been absolutely feasting these past few months. But her obsession with your wedding wasn’t a one-sided relationship; actually, she had proven to be a fantastic planner. There wasn’t one detail she didn’t think of, and she wouldn’t settle for anything less than fairytale-esque sublimity. Without her, this day wouldn’t be the happiest day of your life.

“Humph,” she straightened herself, putting her hands on her hips. “Well then, you’ll have to tell me after your honeymoon. Now come on, I hear the music starting.” She took your hand eagerly and hurried you out of the room.

The aisle was lined with arrangements of your favorite flowers, their scent filling the venue. You felt your cheeks darken as everyone stood, their eyes fixated on you. For a second you were frozen there, bouquet in hand, air trapped in your lungs. You felt a little silly as you realized that these were all your friends, your family, the ones most important to you. The looks in their eyes—proud, overjoyed, a little misty—brought a smile to your face.

You proceeded slowly, the (f/c) petals on the ground getting crushed under your pristine shoes. You weren’t looking at your shoes, though. You looked each guest in the eye as you passed, doing everything you could not to cry as they shot you the most heartfelt looks.

You finally made it to the altar. Lloyd held his hand out. You felt your heart skip a beat when you took it, as if it were the first time you’d touched.

You remembered that day. You remembered the first time you held hands, the first time you kissed, the day he asked you to be his partner—and, more recently, his spouse. 

He looked just as beautiful as the day you met. Thick platinum hair framing his angular face, green eyes brimming with wonder, he was your dream boy. And the way he smiled… Now you were really trying not to cry. He gave your hands a reassuring squeeze as the officiator read his script. You smiled back at him, blinking your tears away and preparing to say your vows.

He was first. “I do.”

The words hung in the air, surely keeping the audience in suspense, but all you felt was bliss as you waited for your chance to echo him. “I do.”

“You may now kiss.”

The audience erupted into applause as your lips crashed together. Your eyebrows jumped high on your forehead when Lloyd surprised you by dipping you low, prolonging the moment.

You broke the kiss, bursting into laughter. You stood there for a few more seconds, holding each other’s faces, laughing, foreheads pressed together. 

As your laughter died down but the audience still hooted and hollered, Lloyd whispered, for your ears only: “I can’t believe how lucky I am. How beautiful you are. I’m going to treasure you forever.”

“As I, you.” You brought your lips together again, delight flowing through you electrically. 

But what about your wish? I wish that this will truly be the happiest day of my life. Well, it’s safe to say that it came true.

Thank you for this wonderful request!! Also, thanks for reading! Take care of yourselves my flowers <33

(divider by saradika)

[andreaheartscats]

Ellie Williams

tw! mention of sh

-> Ellie Willams comforting reader about self harm.

-> modern AU.

a/n: this is rather long and im sorry guys if it was bad and if it has any grammer mistakes!! i tried my best fr :')

It was winter, your favorite time of the year. Maybe because of the cold air that would hit your face when you step outside or maybe the fact that you could wear long sleeves without anyone saying "how are you not hot?!" or "arent you sweaty and hot under that hoodie?"

It was the weekend. You were in your dorm you shared with one of your very good friends, Ellie. She didnt know about your problems, mostly because you thought she doesnt care about them. She was just your best friend and also smoke buddy.

Oh but boy were you wrong.

Ellie was out, buying some stuff for dinner. It was already dark outside. While she was out, your feelings got the best of you and all of your stress and anger bolied up till it exploded.

Few little tears slid down your face as you open your box that was mostly empty besides some random stuff you had and your blade.

The drom room was pretty heated up so it would sometimes get too warm. Thats why you were in a short sleeve shirt while Ellie was out.

Bringing the blade to your wrist, you went across it rather harshly. One, two then three times you did that when you heard the door open. "baack! got some chips for the movie"

You heard Ellie say, but you were unable to form words at the moment. Quickly rushing, you put your blade in the hidding spot and throw on a zip up hoodie as you step outside your bedroom to greet her.

Your eyes were stained with tears and you put up a weak smile for her when she faced you. Of course Ellie noticed that. She alwalys does. And she saw those healed up scars, of course she has. But she never pointed them out because she didnt want to make you feel uncomfortable.

"Hey.. you good?" she asked you in such a sweet tone as her eyes frown a little. Shooting you a rather sad smile with concerne over her face. Taking some time to process what she just said you nodded with your head "yea. 'm good."

As she heard your words she knew something wasnt right. You werent really yourself for the past few days to be fair and she had every right to be worried.

Placing the bags on the counter she walked towards you. A soft smile spread across her face as she put her hand on your shoulder.

You looked at your shoulder where her hand rested and then back at her. "you know, you can tell me anythin' babe." those words echoed through your ears as she said them. And something inside of you snapped. You felt safe with her, you always did and she made sure you knew that.

A tear dropped from your eye, then another and another. And finally you were full on sobbing as she brought you close to her hugging you tightly while you cried into her chest.

Ellie didnt mind that, she didnt care if you stained her shirt with your tears. All she wanted was for you to feel better. After you let it all out and calmed down a little she pulled away her hands gently rubbing on your upper arms as she looked at you.

"come on"

she said in a low and soft vocie as she gestured to the couch.

For a moment you two sat i comfortable silence while she examined your face for sime kind of a answear and patiently waiting for you to speak up. But all you did was stare at the ground while tugging onto your sleeves. The stinging of your fresh cuts made you uncomfortable, it burned.

Your eyebrows frown together as the burning sensation got worse. Ellie noticed your face and she grabbed your hand to hold it gently. Her hands were rough but they felt nice.

"whatchu making that face for.."

She said a little worried. She noticed you tugging at your sleeves a lot and so she let out a deep sigh out that felt like it was trapped in her forever.

"bae..are you hurtin' yourself ?"

she always used pet names even if you were just friends. but she finally decided to ask you. of course she knew the answear to her own question but all she wanted was to mske sure she was right, she didnt want to make assumptions.

And when she asked you that, it felt as if the whole world stopped for a bare moment. you squeeze her hand as you nod your head, scared to even say anything or look at her.

Ellie lets go of your hand and squeezes your cheeks as she makes you look at her. "its okay that you do.." she pauses for a moment "well..its not but you know what i mean."

Ellie lets out a little chuckle making you yourself laugh a little as she caressed your cheek gently.

"i just want to help you, alright? please let me help you."

after you heard her words she looked down at your wrist as if waiting for something. you finally understood and lifted your sleeves reaviling your scars, some healed some not.

Ellie quickly runs to the bathroom as she took a wet paper towle and some bandages. She cleaned the cuts gently as you wince in pain slightly. After she cleaned your cuts, Ellie wrapped the bandages around your wrist not too tightly but not to loose.

"thank you Els..i-"

she cut you off as she hugged you tightly. you gave into the hug. it felt safe and warm. You felt safe and warm with her. After pulling away she looked at you with a smile on her face.

"how 'bout we watch a movie, yea?"

of course you agreed and for the rest of the night you were cuddled up close to her while she traced gentle touches across your bandaged wrist.

[rise-my-angel]

Heart of the Great Wolf

The Lost Chapters of Jon Snow

Pairings: Jon Snow x F!Baratheon!Reader (Slow Burn), Robb Stark x F!Baratheon!Reader

Length: 15.5k

Warnings: angst/hurt comfort, character deaths, graphic descriptions of blood and violence, rape, forced sex acts, abusive/forced relationship, sex under threat of death, male victim of female sexual violence, suicidal ideation, visions of smut & visions of p in v (between Reader and Robb)

Notes: Did you ever wonder what Jons story looked like during the chapters he was not a main character? These are snapshots into how the events of Heart of the Great Wolf effected Jon, that we did not previously get to see in this story. Series Masterlist Here

“Being me a horn of ale, Snow. And pour one for yourself.”

Jon should have known right away that something bad had happened, but in no way did he understand what the world looked like down South enough to guess. Night hadn't even properly hit and already one thing after another piled on top of each other, what was one more thing to add to it, he thought.

He and Sam had said their vows. Brothers of the Nights Watch they were, and yet to start off, from the woods beyond Ghost came trotting out with a human hand in his mouth. They had all went to seek where he found it and two rangers laid dead not far away from the Weirwood beyond the wall. Yarwick had quickly identified them, Othor and Jafar Flowers but with no hint of where his Uncle Benjen may have been, it felt less morose in Jons chest then it did unsettling. If his uncle was simply gone, then why were two of his company back here all alone?

There had to be more to it he thought, and maybe there was. Sam had mentioned that there was no smell to the bodies at all, and at this point there should have been. Lord Commander Mormont's attention had been called over a raven from Kings Landing, and so he made his way to his office, ordering the rest of them to help move the bodies so Maester Aemon could examine them. All Jon thought as he walked into his office, was of his uncle. He didn't at all realize, it was the wrong family member which was to be his newest fear.

Jon was hesitant as he poured, and he could sense the Old Bear was choosing his slow spoken words to him very carefully, sitting at his desk going over what news the raven had brought. “The King is dead.”

Pausing in his movements, far too much to choose one thought, passed through Jons mind. The air in the room felt thick, and he knew that the conversation was not about to end with that as the worst of it. Not quite turning to him, he had no idea if the words came off as calm as he was attempting to sound. “Is there any word of my father?”

Moving to place the ale on his desk, Jon was told to sit. Already he felt sick, he'd rather not sit he'd rather just be told what happened here and now with no lead up. Get it out of the way and maybe Jon could stop the nerve wracking pounding of his heart. Eyes wide, he did as he was told but what came out of the Old Bear's mouth was not at all what he was bracing himself for. “Lord Stark has been charged with treason.”

If that sentence did not make sense to Jon, the next one made even less.

“They say he conspired with Roberts niece- your brothers wife, to deny the throne from Prince Joffery. They both have been arrested as traitors to the realm.”

On instinct, Jon held his hand out. Needing to read the words himself but still it made no sense in his head every attempt. His father wasn't a man who did things like that, his father was the most honourable man Jon's ever known. If a mistake hadn't been made, then something else very wrong had led to this, he knew it.

The only so called treason his father ever committed was rebelling against injustice done to his own family over twenty years ago, but you? You were smart. A good girl. Someone who, insult or honour, always did what you were told. Not a conspirerer in a game of kings. He read the words again and again, and for some strange reason he recalled something the other day.

He thought of you often, he dreamt of you often, but only days ago Jon could recall having a strange image in his head of you somewhere he's never seen next to his father and he had done what he did any other time he imagined such a thing. Threw it away in his mind of simply a yearning to see again the girl he never would.

Not a clue where he was even moving towards, Jon stood up. Making his way to the door he could suddenly see all of them. Leaving on the Kingsroad and the realization that if his father and you were being charged as traitors, what about-

“I hope your not thinking of doing anything stupid. Your duty lies here now.” Stopping mid step, Jon didn't really look back at him. No, not stupid, necessary, but what was that? All Jon knew, was he had to get out of this room. He had to do something, he couldn't stand by and let this all just happen.

His voice was weak, and he knew it was a plea the Lord Commander would not accept but Jon had to say it anyways. Someone had to be thinking of them. “My sisters were in Kings Landing too.” And he was right, it wasn't anything the man accepted. He just told Jon, he was sure they'd be treated gently.

Jon couldn't stop that feeling of anger as he walked about Castle Black. His duty lay here, but if his father and you were rotting in a dungeon, who was now doing the duty of protecting his sisters? Arya and Sansa were just girls, young and naive in their own ways and the gentle they'd be treated with didn't feel like it was going to be the same definition Jon would have of it. It was Joffery and the Queen, who was there to stand in between them and his little sisters if there was no one left there to do it, or care?

What was the point of honour, if it meant Jon had to choose what honour was supposed to mean more over the other?

It didn't get better as time passed. People were awkward around him, people whispered and either looked at him strangely or avoided his eye entirely. He didn't want to think about what they were saying, Jon didn't have time for it. Or the patience.

Standing in the kitchens, he was distracted. Quieter then normal and looking nowhere but where the knife in front of him was cutting and the sights in his head he was being told to abandon the idea of protecting. Giving Arya a sword didn't mean Jon trusted her to be safe with it. She was young, short, small, and too quick and snarky for her own good and even if she knew how to use it, that wouldn't protect her against the power of a crown calling her father a traitor.

The last time he saw her, the way as they always had for years, she jumped high into his arms for a hug and nowhere in that city would a girl barley eleven years old find herself safe enough for long enough for- for what? For him to go get her?

For Jon to leave the Nights Watch and find his sisters? If Arya wasn't safe with a sword, Sansa was even less safe without one. She didn't understand violence, she wouldn't have anything or anyone to protect her without their father, but again, what was Jon supposed to do? Hope his little sisters assumed Jon just didn't know the danger they were now in? Did they believe the treason the crown claimed you and their father had done?

Would Arya and Sansa hate him more or less, if they realized Jon knew they weren't safe there, but had to stand here and choose not to do anything about it? His family weren't traitors, his father wasn't a traitor and neither were you. But Jon could only stand there, and feel that helplessness grow into anger at being told to do nothing for the people he loved.

At least, do nothing actually productive. But he sure did something with that anger, only it helped no one, including himself. The second Jon heard Ser Alliser's voice his muscles tensed, trying not to look or focus but he spoke right at him, walking right up beside him. “Now there's a rare sight. Not only a bastard, but a traitors bastard.”

The worst of it all, was that Jon knew it might have been less of an offence if he reacted right away.

Ten, twenty, maybe thirty seconds had passed. Sam, Pyp and Grenn all taking their turns glancing over to Jon as he stood there in complete silence. His eyes looked up to Ser Alliser, who condescendingly nodded for him to go back to work, to stand there and let the man insult his father.

Too bad for both, his father meant more to Jon then not reacting to that look in Ser Alliser's eyes. In a second, Jon flipped his grip on the knife and felt not a shred of regret going for him. Anger and red hot rage flowing through his blood, but he'd rather see it pour out of wherever he stabbed the man then let it fester silently inside his own mind. Instantly, his brothers reacted.

He could hear Sam and Grenn yelling, “Jon, stop put it down-” Right as he came close, Pyp moved to haul Jon away as Grenn tore the knife from his hand. Every part of him felt as if it was screaming to let him finish the job and damn the consequences, but the three of them knew Jon better then to let it happen.

Leaning angrily into his person, Ser Alliser all but hissed at him. “Blood will always tell. You'll hang for this, bastard.”

Jon couldn't do anything to help his father, couldn't do anything to help you, and couldn't do anything to help his sisters, and now he wasn't even allowed to be angry over it. The Old Bear didn't hang him, but it was clear to Jon as he was confined to quarters, that he had more coming his way. More then just that night, setting an already dead man on fire.

It was days later the next news of a raven came. Funny thing it was, how it was almost a skill the degree to which Jon could go from such an easy mood to something intense and far too angry raging deep in his bones. Sitting next to Sam, he was trying to pry out what it was he claimed he couldn't. “I'm really not supposed to say.”

Tilting his head in amusement, Jon prodded him a little more in jest. “And yet, you really want to say. You want to say that..” Leaving the air open for Sam to pluck up the courage and spit it out already, but just as days before, Jon almost wished he never heard it.

“There was a raven. I read the message to Maester Aemon.”

By the weary look in Sams eye, Jon expected it to be more of his father. But, it was somehow even more conflicting for Jons resolve. It was about Robb. Robb and you. “Someone helped her escape Kings Landing in the middle of the night, a Kingsgaurd. She's reunited with your brother, they're heading South together. To war.”

Every lack of luck in Jons life, the only thing he's heard of you in months, and twice now in days both things left him torn of too much. On paper, he should be happy you escaped. But it wasn't your freedom which left Jon's blood chilling inside him. It was his lack of freedom now. You had fled and joined Robb, going to war with him even beacuse if it wasn't duty you did, it was always trying to do what was right and now Jon had to sit there and do the opposite.

Robb was heading South declaring war on the Lannisters with you at his side, and Jon only had one breathless thought as his eyes drifted to nothing at the surmounting pile of useless he felt. “I should be there. I should be with them. Both of them.”

Jon had imagined you in his head more time then he could count since being at the wall, but it wasn't until he sat there in the hall with Sam, did he realize. Maybe he wasn't imagining you. Jon should be there, with Robb, but maybe, something was forcing Jon with you. It was too detailed, too unknown, an image he had not the creativity to pretend was his imaginations capability. He should be there with Robb, but it wasn't until that day did Jon finally come to understand, something in his mind, was keeping him with you.

Both in armour as you stood in an unknown land next to Robb. His silver and heavy, yours thinner and black almost something like scales as it sat lighter on your person. A shattering of nerves left just a distant heaviness in both your eyes as across was blood on yours and Robbs person, all he could see was Robb twisting his arm to hold at your wrist, and you returned the gesture right back, before the vision was gone. If you and his brother left for war, Jon started to wonder if he was watching it.

Guilt, anger, and confused shame all swirling in his mind, but maybe if he had one thing to hold onto, it was that just perhaps the gods had granted Jon one grace. If there was one hope he clung onto as everything told him to abandon this duty and go to his family, it was that you were not gone from his life entirely.

If Jon was seeing you standing beside Robb at war, he couldn't help but wonder, how much more of you would he finally be allowed to see again. He felt angry and useless here, but if he was seeing visions of you, it might be of some comfort.

Were anyone to hear Jon say what was happening in his head, they'd think him out of his mind no doubt. It was cold beyond the wall, and too easily someone could argue that the cold can mess with the head a little bit. Not even Sam would believe him if he said what was really happening.

There was not a shred of doubt anymore to Jon however. He knew he was seeing you. For a solid fact, Jon knew he was seeing you. First it was dreams, then in waking days he thought he was making things up because he missed you but it was impossible to deny now. He saw things of you that came true, and he continued to see things of you that were happening along the same war path he was not following.

Robb was King in the North now, which meant you stood beside him as his Queen, and Jon desperately wished it was that which he was seeing. Show him his brother growing into a leader, or your rule together, but don't show him this. It wasn't battle and strategy Jon saw. No, Jon would see, hear, and sometimes, somehow, feel only the moments of quiet he never got to.

What Jon had with you, before you had Robb, was minimal in the grand scheme of things. He knew a bit of what being with you felt like. He knew in great detail what your kiss was like, he knew what a truly beautiful sight your bare body looked like, and he knew some bits of how you felt against him. It was supposed to be enough, he'd lay awake at night at the wall and those small parts of you were his only comfort.

Eyes shut in the dark of his quarters, and he could just barley feel your soft skin under his hands or hear your gentle, high pitched sigh in his ears and Jon would fall asleep just a little easier. He would never have you the way he wanted to, the way Robb had you now, but what Jon did have was supposed to be enough.

But then he'd see you, hear you. Not just you, not just alone or in memory.

As he sat close to the ground, back up against a tree, Jon almost dropped his sword as soon as he heard it, and he nearly cut himself by accident as soon as he felt it. Your high pitched sigh in his ear as your breathe trailed along his neck like a phantom. If he closed his eyes, maybe he could feel you actually pressing your lips there. But if he closed them, he may stop seeing it. And Jon couldn't tell if he wanted to stop seeing you like this quite yet. No matter how awful it made him feel.

It was in front of his eyes as much as the crowded yards of Crasters Keep was. He could see both, and hear both. But it was not himself in a memory of you he watched. It was Robb. Robb taking you, the way Jon dreamt of being able to do with you for years.

The room you were in, some war tent no doubt fitted just enough to be fair of a King and Queen, but without the pomp he imagined many others might have wanted. In terms of luxury, Robb was as humble as you were and it made Jon swallow harshly at how easily you matched his brother. Once, he thought it was himself you were made for, but now he wasn't so sure. Robb touched you easier then Jon ever did even after six years.

You were gorgeous this way, eyes barley keeping open and your mouth parting with breathless begs and pleads, but it burned Jon everytime it was “Robb” he would hear you sing. At the mercy of his brothers touch, you moved just the way he wanted and never protested how thrown around he'd toss you about.

Watching as if before him, Jon could see the way you were moulded perfectly to Robbs demand, and Jon, aggravatingly, almost could feel as if he was the one inside you. His brother had you on your hands and knees, your back arching into each thrust as you barley gasped for air before Robb took it away again. It was rough, the way his brother fucked you, but gods help him, Jon could tell you took Robbs cock as if you were born for it.

Barley a word you'd mutter out, just begs for more, begs for Robb to do whatever he wanted, and promises that you'd be good for him as you cried into the air. So perfect it sent shivers down Jons spine more then any winter winds out here. None knew, none could hear, not your cries nor Jons thoughts but you were so effortlessly loud without being obnoxious.

Just the sounds that couldn't be contained, but he would've. Forced to sit there, eyes dark and narrowed, Jon watched and knew he would've by now, flipped you onto your back. Covered you with his body, pressing you into the sheets and stolen every last breathe with his lips. Kiss you so only he could feel your cries and none would hear it.

Robb would mutter filth at you then groan and Jon somehow knew you were clenching around him so tightly, but he couldn't help the wonder on his own as he watched. Jon wouldn't talk to you that way, and clearly you couldn't get enough when Robb did, but Jon would make up for it. He'd slow down, take you so every inch dragged along your sensitive walls and pull your needy cries that way instead of seducing them with words.

You reached a hand back, and Robb pulled you up. Knelt upright on the bed, your back against his chest as he fucked up into you, and muttered low in your ear as you begged for him to finish inside you. And you were perfect for it, beautiful for it. Jon would never get the chance, but every insecurity left his head as he watched you in his own wide eyed silence.

You begged for his brother, begged for Robb to spill inside of you, but Jon wished it was him. He'd keep your lips pressed to his, you'd barley be able to beg, beacuse he'd spill inside of you before you could go too long without it.

So, imagine the true cruelty, as the image before Jon shattered out of nowhere. Left back in only the cold of Crasters Keep and you were gone. He was used to it by now, he supposed. Without much due, Jon picked Longclaw back up, and returned to properly taking care of it. He saw you enough that he could go about his business and none would know what he watched. But too often, Jon knew it was such an intimacy he never had that he was being forced to witness you have with Robb.

It didn't make it much better, when minutes later Sam came walking up to him with one of Crasters wives standing wide eyed next to him. “What are you doing?”

“This is Gilly. She's one of Crasters..daughters.” The fact that both terms were used interchangeably was vile, but it wasn't the girls faults for that. It was however, Sams fault that he spoke to one of them in the first place, when they definitely weren't supposed too.

With a bit of a shortness he glanced to her, “Hello Gilly.” Eyes flying back to Sam with the same quiet, even tone on his words to allow him to explain himself before Jon lost it. “What are you doing?”

The girl, Gilly, tried to implore to him first. Saying that Sam had told her Jon could help, and he couldn't fathom what in the world Sam had gotten himself into now. Trying to shoot it down, that they weren't even supposed to talk to any of Crasters daughters, Sam interjected. “She's pregnant.”

Oh, Jon was going to throw Sam head first into the snow. Slowly letting Longclaw fall into his lap, he turned his head up to look at him in disbeleif. Talking to one of these girls was one thing, but Sam managed to find one to talk to that just so happened to already- gods help him, Jon already didn't like the feeling he got around Craster and this was not making it any better.

Quietly, Sam managed to get to the point. A point Jon would've rather been anything else but what it was. “We have to take her with us when we leave.”

“What?” All but slamming Longclaw down onto the snow, Jon stood stepping towards Sam as he tried to keep his voice from all but yelling at him. Saying he knows the idea sounded mad, Jon felt as if he was losing his mind. “No, it doesn't sound mad. It's impossible.” The two of them arguing back and forth, as this was the last thing Jon wanted to deal with at that moment.

Gilly interrupting with a more gentle approach then either of the two men before her, “Please Ser, please. I can still run if I have too.”

That did not make Jon feel any better for arguing against it, knowing she seemed desperate for someone to help but she and Sam were asking for something that had no solution from him. His tone quieter, trying to be fair to the girl and staying calm as he looked to her. “It's just not possible.”

Jon couldn't change his mind, but she certainly implanted something there which he suspected she didn't actually mean to do. “I'm going to have a baby, if it's a boy-” Before cutting herself off, mouth agape as she realized how close to a mistake she got.

But Jon wouldn't let that one go. It was one of his first thoughts as they got here. Craster had countless daughters, but not a sign of a son anywhere. No boys were in Crasters Keep which were not men of the Nights Watch. His eyes darker as he looked to her, something less kind and sliding into more demanding as he asked, “If it's a boy, what?” But she wouldn't say. Opening and closing her mouth before choosing the answer of silence, Jon inhaled deeply. Turning to properly look her in the eye, he felt his patience wearing thin over this. “You want us to risk our lives for you, and you won't even tell us why.”

Either shock, or upset, or disbeleif, maybe even a bit of fear Gilly looked between them as she ran off without another word. Sam beside him now louder and much more indignant then he was trying to be in front of the girl, all but scolded him. “Why do you do that?”

Turning his head to look back at him, Jon was back to wanting to shove Sams head in a snow bank as the irritation rose once more. “Do what? Ask her a question?” Sam tried to argue that he was cruel, and that time Jon let his voice raise more to a shout. “Cruel? Sam are you in such a hurry to lose a hand?”

Shaking his head, Sam defending himself as if it really made a difference. “I didn't touch her,”

What he wanted was worse Jon knew, and he was blunt with him about it. The man had said anyone who touches one of his wives loses a hand, and Sam was coming to Jon with something about a hundred times worse. “No, you just want to steal her. What do you think Craster cuts off for that?”

If he wasn't so frustrated over far too much in his life, Jon might have felt bad for the unintentional comparison he put forth as Sam whispered, “I can't steal her. She's a person, not a goat.”

But once more, there was too much on his mind. His father was dead, he didn't know if Arya and Sansa were safe or even alive, he didn't know if Bran and Rickon were safe, and to top it all off he almost every day it felt like, had to watch his brother be King with the woman Jon loved. And if he had to have a vision of you and Robb fucking once more time, he might lose it.

But in fairness, he knew none of that was Sams fault. He came to Jon trying to help this girl, and Jon had to address that without taking his frustrations out on him with it. Collecting himself, Jon knew Sam didn't respond to arguing well, but he did with logic and reason. “We're heading deeper and deeper into wildling territory. We can't take a girl with us. Mormont wouldn't have it, and even if he would, what would we do with her? Whose going to deliver a baby? You?”

Quite literally any answer was the right one except for what Sam actually said. “I could try.” Turning his head away as Jons brows narrowed at him, Sam moreso he suspected was trying to just plead his reasons to himself, he already knew what Jon was saying. “What? I read about it..a bit..”

There was little Jon could do about anything in his own life, let alone this one girls own. It didn't make him feel good, but Jon was as honest as he could be. “I'm sorry, Sam. We can't help her.”

Though, Jon certainly thought to himself later, that he wished they could help. But he wouldn't tell Sam that, beacuse it would mean telling Sam what he saw that night, and every bit of it made Jon feel sick. Realizing Craster was taking his newborn sons into the woods, to seeing one of them walk up and take the child, to the stunningly unsettled revelation that the Old Bear knew about it already.

Jon could only say it to Lord Commander Mormont exactly as it found it in his mind, close to that of a yell in shocked anger, “He's murdering his own children, he's a monster.” But nothing could compare to the inhuman dread building inside of him as Jon gave his own honesty once more, but a strained mutter with something fearful behind it. “I saw it. I saw..something take that child.”

Both men wished it weren't true, but the Old Bear was right as he spoke just as quiet and feared of the unknown about it. “Whatever it was, I dare say you'll see it again.”

In his moment standing there on his own, Jon wondered if you were seeing things as Jon was. If you watched parts of his life now, as he was yours. He hoped not. He didn't want to have seen what he saw take that child, and away at war you had far more to be concerned with then things far north you couldn't possibly understand.

Besides, as twisted as it felt for Jon to watch you and Robb the way he was forced too, he didn't want you to have the same conflict. He could tell you loved Robb, and Robb loved you, that much was certain from the visions in Jons eyes. It tore his heart a bit to think it, but Jon was glad you and Robb had each other, he truly was. And as much as the selfish side of Jon wanted to know if he was still part of your life even as a figure in your mind, he didn't want to get in the way.

He told you that night before your wedding that he wanted you to be okay with the fact that you were going to be Robb's. And that still hadn't changed. His brother deserved to be loved, and so did you.

But these visions Jon kept having, it just made that feel all the more needlessly complicated.

As if things weren't bad enough, as if he wasn't already grappling with what Qhorin Halfhand was about to make him do, Jon was getting the increasing urge to turn around and fling this girl into the closest body of water. He was immensely fed up, but this was his punishment for hesitating too long.

Taking a life like that, his first real one like that of an execution, that wasn't something Jon had done. He fought and killed a wight but taking a human life like that was new. It wasn't as easy as men pretended it would be. But, Jon decided instead of forcing himself to do it, he'd try mercy. So he took the wildling hostage and it all led to this.

They came back looking for him, and it got them captured and killed and now it was only Jon and the Halfhand left. The plan was the same, someone needed to get inside Mance's army and both of them knew they'd boil the Halfhand alive before ever letting him escape with his life. But the man argued that they might be able to trick the wildlings into trusting Jon, and the only way to do that was coming.

Jon still hadn't taken a life. But he was about to, and he was struggling to accept it.

Or, he'd be struggling to accept it more were it not for the bane of his existence making him miserable behind him. Acting as if she was so much better then him, when all she had done was make things worse for Jon. He ended up most nights having to have Ghost sleep in between he and her, beacuse she would try making advances on him in the middle of the night.

Whatever she thought this was, it wasn't. But she was loud, and rude, and hypocritical and wouldn't listen and so Ghost had to protect him at night. She was tied up, and still, Jon didn't really feel safe being asleep around her, so Ghost had to be there. Now that the positions were flipped?

Shockingly, none of the mercy Jon showed, was shown to him. He many times had to almost silently implore Ghost to stay out of it, he needed to do this, and so he needed to put up with this. Thankful, there was something about he and his direwolf that was almost beyond needing words. Ghost understood what was in his head right now, and let it happen, and kept his distance, but were Ghost any closer, Jon knew he'd be able to hear him growling at her.

If her non stop loud talking wasn't the thing giving Jon a headache, it was the way she quite literally, was smacking him with the flat edge of his sword. Smack after smack she would hit him with it and it was really testing him. Ned Stark did not raise his son to hit a girl, but gods Jon would've been about to turn around and hit this one if it wouldn't also immediately get him killed.

“We should be there by sundown. Won't be a fun night for you. Mance knows how to make crows sing. If you know what to say, you might just make it through the night.” Jon never once said anything about the things which would happen to her when he reached his brothers, but there she walked behind him, the glee in her voice about what Mance Rayder was going to do. What torture Jon was to endure come nightfall, as if it was going to be the best part of her day.

Besides hitting Jon in the back of the head for the hundredth time. When did he ever hit her? Right, never. He felt his temper rising, and for the rest of their sakes he hoped not all wildling girls were this obnoxious.

“Not talking's not the way to go.” He had been silent, not any interest in speaking to her, but once more she hit him again.

So Jons patience ran thin, and so did his ability to control the short temper in his words. “Careful with that, you might cut yourself.”

As soon as he said it, he knew it was only a matter of time. Qhorin Halfhand had the advantage of where he walked being able to see the right opportunity, and so Jon knew he was going to have to start attempting to create ones for the man. It had to happen, and just maybe, he'd get Ygritte to shut up for once while doing it. As if he hadn't been training with a sword since he was old enough to hold one, she acted as if it was this easy.

Only, Jon had used a sword that long. Ducking in an instant, he turned to move behind her. Eyes all found them, and Jon needed to keep them on him. As long as it wasn't happening, Jon could work up to what he was going to have to do without quite thinking about it. It wasn't real yet. So he kept the eyes off the Halfhand, and on him instead. “Never swung a sword before, have you? You look like a baby with a rattle.”

It was an easy target he knew, mocking Ygritte with how he knew in a fair fight she'd stand not a seconds chance against him. But she was easily riled up as if she could ever deny it, and so she turned to him in anger as he did her. A brief thought in Jons head that the girl hadn't done anything anywhere near enough to prove that the bravado she held, was earned.

Jon thought however, that it was you who did earn the right to hold that sort of superior attitude, but never would you come close to it. In a sword fight, Jon knew he'd be able to cut a smug, over confident Ygritte down with ease. But Jon knew one thing for certain, you were one who could take Jon on in a sword fight. He taught you not just how to fight, but how to hold your ground against Jon himself and you both always sparred with a playful fun in your eyes. Even this far away, gods help him beacuse Jon could still see bright as ever how beautiful you looked, in memory and in visions of now.

Ygritte just looked like an angry child who wasn't getting her way.

But the Halfhand took the opportunity, knocked down the one holding him captive, stealing back his sword and making his move. Knocking Jon down to the snow, Jon had to find the mindset right away. This was their only chance, Jon had to make this convincing no matter how much he didn't want to do this. But he had to, yelling for him to stop, the Halfhand goaded him into the right mindset like they both knew he would. “Why, traitor? So you can give Mance Rayder an invitation to Castle Black?”

Rattleshirt yelled at the wildlings holding both men back, yelling them to let them fight. Being allowed to grab his sword, Jon and the Halfhand fought. He was good, and he was convincing at seeming angry, but they still both knew, Jon had to be better, beacuse they would never trust the Halfhand. Back and forth they swung, trying to find the grounds to get this right.

But, the Halfhand was smart and knew exactly what needed to be done to force Jons hand into winning this fight, and played right into a weakness. Yelling at him, “Your traitor father teach you that?” Jon moving onto the attack only for the Halfhand to parry, and the final nail in the coffin was landed that had Jons blood boiling just the right amount of steaming red to find the strength, hearing the man yell at Jon, “Or was it your whore mother?”

That anger swam right through him, enough that he swiftly was able to knock the sword from his hand and then in a moment of silence, they both stood staring at each other knowing Jon had to do this. Running his sword right through him, Qhorin Halfhand looked right into Jons eyes with a conviction and trust that they were making the right decision, barley whispering to him almost as a reminder of why they made this sacrifice, “We are the watchers on the Wall.”

Falling dead to the ground, Jon heard nothing around him. No words, no conversation. The wildlings spoke, some maybe to him even, but Jon heard not a single bit of it. All he could do was stand there seeing and feeling how plunging his sword through Qhorin Halfhand felt, and a horrific ill crept up in his throat.

His first kill was a good man, a man who did nothing wrong, who died beacuse Jon failed to kill a single wildling. One of his own brothers of the Nights Watch. The first red staining Jon Snow's hands was a man he wished he never killed, just to convince these people to trust him.

Looking back to see them burning the Halfhands body, Jon wondered how long it was going to take until this sweeping guilt came up from the earth and swallowed him whole.

The guilt wasn't allowed to stay long, before he knew it, he was in their army camp. One hundred thousand wildlings and Jon was being led there to meet Mance Rayder, the King Beyond the Wall. It was now or never, it didn't matter how much Ygritte and Rattleshirt trusted him, Jon needed Mance Rayder to trust him or none of this would ever matter. Ghost slunk silently in the background, keeping his blood red eyes no where but ensuring he was always paying attention to where Jon was. His only protection left, the only tie to who he really was left, beacuse Jon was entering that tent as nothing but a lie.

To be honest, he wasn't what he expected at first. Large and imposing, yes. But there was something rumbling and unhinged in the mans demeanour. Hair a wild orange and a thick beard to match as he ate, not looking up to him yet. His voice was low, and Jon suspected were he to yell, it would rumble the earth like thunder. “I smell a crow.”

Rattleshirt spoke behind him, “We killed his friends.” Jon worked hard to stand there in stillness, keeping his breathing even. He had gotten them killed, it was no ones fault but his for not killing Ygritte when he should have. “Thought you might want to question this one.”

Still, he didn't look at him. “What do we want with a baby crow?”

Ygritte coming to a defence Jon didn't want, “This baby killed Qhorin Halfhand. He wants to be one of us.” Jon was at the very least glad someone bought it, beacuse Jon felt such drowning guilt it felt as if it was painted all across his very face.

The man felt even larger as he stood, Jon looking up at him, blue eyes staring him down harsh with not a hint of impress. “That half handed cunt killed friends of mine. Friends twice your size.”

But that didn't scare Jon, he even had seen a giant out in that camp but every one of them were men, they were all made of the same things. Looking with no more intimidation in his eyes, Jon spoke with a rough truth, “My father told me big men fall just as quick as little ones if you put a sword through their hearts.”

This was an imposing man, not a single ounce of care in his eyes as he rumbled deep in kind. “Plenty of little men tried to put their swords through my heart. And there's plenty of little skeletons buried in the woods. What's your name, boy?” Jon answered, but in a second did it clue in, who he was clearly speaking too.

It wasn't anything but everything he was taught and valued, but he kneeled, “Your Grace.” And everyone in the room laughed. The man before him, found it the most amusing.

Arms reaching out with a bright glint in his eyes as he jested to the others, “Your Grace? Did you hear that? From now on, you'd better kneel every time I fart.”

Then, he stood from the corner of the tent. Tall just like the man before him, but there was a serious air about him that was more then just the orange bearded ones intimidation. “Stand, boy. We don't kneel for anyone beyond the wall.”

Looking at the real Mance Rayder face to face, for a single second Jon thought to himself it was odd that in a way, the man looked as if he'd somehow seen him before. Even worse though, and even though it was impossible, Mance looked Jon in the eye with the confidence no stranger beyond the wall should've had. “So, your Ned Stark's bastard.”

No one here should have known that. Ned was his fathers nickname, bastards weren't even a concept for children here beyond the wall, he'd never met this man before. And suddenly Jon realized, there was something more dangerous about the King Beyond the Wall then he ever knew.

As the others left, Jon had no idea what she wanted at all, but the simple fact that Mance had caught Ygritte giving Jon a look as she left the tent was enough it seemed. “The girl likes you. You like her back, Snow? That why you want to join us?”

Even if he could even slightly tolerate her, Jon would consider himself an utter disgrace of any kind of man, either as man of the Nights Watch, or a man with Stark blood in his veins, if meeting one girl was enough to make him betray his brothers. The other man, found only amusement in the comment that Jon cared not for. “Don't panic, boy. This isn't the damned Night's Watch where we make you swear off girls.”

No, he thought. Jon only swore off one girl.

And right here, in that tent as the only girl these men spoke of was Ygritte, Jon wished you would appear to him here and now. He didn't care what he would have seen, he wanted to see you and only you. Don't lump Jon into the kind of men who jumped from girl to girl as they fancy, he thought.

Jon had a girl. He'd only ever have one. His first girl.

But, he managed to convince them to trust him. Mance knew right away, Jon didn't care about the girl outside, or being free, or anything of the sort. Jon convinced him with the truth. That he had seen one of those things, one of the Others take a baby boy away in the woods. That the Lord Commander already knew. “I want to fight for the side that fights for the living. Did I come to the right place?”

Simply telling him, they would need to get him a new cloak, but Jon did not miss the fact that Mance Rayder, had not actually answered his question.

Jon felt worse then he ever had before in his life. He was miserable, and lying, and everything felt wrong. Who in the seven hells was he anymore? Being with you never felt like this, it never made him feel uneasy, it never made him hate himself, it never made him hide from the truth beacuse it felt sickening.

But he had to lie about it. Beacuse he knew the word. He knew what word was to describe what had happened, what was happening, but he couldn't accept it. Jon was a man. A strong, capable man. He shouldn't be allowed to say that happened to him. He should be a better man then that beacuse everyone would laugh and mock him if he said what he was thinking.

Everyone but you. You'd see through it right away if you saw the way Ygritte was with him, and you'd know the truth Jon was painfully hiding from. You, and Ghost. He had to send Ghost away. She demanded it. It was the only way, they all knew if Jon walked out of that cave without doing it, they'd know he was still loyal to the Nights Watch and they'd kill him faster then he could come up with an excuse.

Ghost wouldn't ever have let it happen, and he almost didn't. His direwolf let a lot happen at Jons order, but this was not one Ghost would stand back from. He would have torn her apart if Jon didn't send him away, and he hadn't seen his direwolf since. It made it all the worse. What he had to do, what she made him do, and how much he felt disgusting for it.

Jon never felt such a deep hatred in himself when he was with you. He'd have you on his bed, perched on his lap with your soft lips against his, part of your dress falling down your shoulders almost exposing your breasts were you not pressed tight against him. He'd guide your covered hips along his covered cock and it was a heaven which was found in your touch together.

So why did he feel dirty, filthy? Like his skin was so covered in a grime he'd have to tear it off just to get it all clean. But he couldn't. He did what he did, and whatever forced pleasure his body found, only made Jon want to scream.

He didn't care that you married Robb, he didn't care about any of that. Even if he'd die without it, Jon would have waited that entire lifetime to share it with you. That belonged to you, just like his heart but Jon let Ygritte take it and it was only a miracle which Jon didn't break down that day.

He had seen you in the middle of it. A vision like before, but this time, his vision was of you telling Robb you were pregnant. The glee shared between you both and the way his brother took you after as Jon was forced to watch as he himself was taken, but by force. But Jon was still here, and so were the wildlings and now he had to pretend he was part of this.

Jon had to pretend Ygritte was who he wanted, and he had to pretend he didn't feel fear now everytime she came close to him, not knowing when she'd just take and take what Jon didn't want to give all over again. He lied to himself, and said this was normal. This was how a relationship felt. In fear and avoidance.

So why, did Jon sit there terrified at the thought that you could see this? If this was real, why did you knowing about Ygritte scare Jon? Why did the idea that you thought Jon moved on, make him feel as if he was nothing but a low life who was betraying you? But now they all thought Ygritte and Jon were with one another, and Jon had no choice other then to pretend like it was all okay.

He couldn't think about how much he missed you, and how desperately he wished you were here instead of her. Being with you felt like Jon and you were born to find one other, being with Ygritte made him feel like a stranger in his own mind.

He knew too, his father would be horrendously disappointed in who Jon had become.

“But I'm your woman now, Jon Snow. You're going to be loyal to your woman. Don't ever betray me.” Sitting next to him she said it with such conviction. But if that was how it was, why did Jon dream of you every single night without failure, why did he still see you in visions day after day and wish he could reach through them and return to you?

But he couldn't say that. She'd kill him here and now. So he just said, “I won't.”

She kept talking, and threatened him as if it was cute and Jon sat in silence feeling ill. He had to love her, he had to. He couldn't do this otherwise, he couldn't think of you. It had to be her, beacuse Jon couldn't handle feeling like he was betraying your love.

You and Jon teased one another, so he had to tell himself, Ygrittes threats and insults were essentially the same thing. You were strong willed, and Ygritte smugly saw herself with a superior opinion, that was the same thing, right? Your touch was gentle, and selfless, and so unbelievably loving, and Ygrittes was selfish and forceful and mean.

Maybe, Jon thought, if he just didn't let her touch him anymore, he could lie about the rest until he believed it. He had nine hundred feet of the Wall to climb, so maybe he could spend that, telling himself his love for you didn't matter anymore, beacuse his survival was dependant on loving her.

But then they got to the top, and Jons world shifted. He could see here and elsewhere, but it wasn't a scenario he watched. Just you. Standing out in the woods, green all around you with red watering eyes and something devastated in them that made Jon want to pull you into his arms, but then you looked up. You looked at him.

Wherever you were, you could see Jon as he saw you. You were so upset, and Jon realized you had seen exactly what he didn't want. You had seen him too, and he wanted to lash out. You looked at Jon, shocked you both were seeing the same vision of the other at the same time, but you also had seen what looked like Jon moving on. It looked to you, like Jon didn't love you anymore.

As soon as you were gone though, Ygritte moved to kiss him. But he rejected it entirely, twisting from her and just walked away, damned the looks they all gave him for it. You had seen him, and now you thought Jon didn't love you anymore and he hated it. He hated this plan, he hated he had to kill Qhorin Halfhand for this plan, and he hated that he gave up the only thing he had left that belonged to you, to her.

Jon never felt more alone then ever.

He always remembered something his father told him. It was after the first time he had gone with him to witness his father carry out an execution. He had told Jon something that stuck so heavily with him every day since.

“The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. If you would take a man's life, you owe it to him to look into his eyes and hear his final words. And if you cannot bear to do that, then perhaps the man does not deserve to die.”

Jon since that day, even more so now as a man, tried to live by those words. And today, he had a growing feeling deep in his gut, that it was all coming to an end. The words of his father he lived by was about to clash with the free folk and what they demanded of him. All knelt behind a stone fence, waiting for Orell to return from scouting, and the news he came with only made that prediction of Jons that much stronger. “Only one old man, and eight good horses.”

Tormund turned to Jon, asking why one man would have eight horses, and he was honest about it. “He breeds them for the Watch.”

Discussing what to do, Jons eyes once trained on the grass intently, raised up in a deep protest as Orell whispered with the larger man, “He's got some gold in there, and proper steel. Let's carve him up.”

He knew what he was doing, Jon knew exactly what they were all about to think if he said it but not for a second was any of this right. Roughly he hissed out, “We just take the horses and go. The old man's no threat.”

Jon had gotten good at detecting when Ygritte was putting on a soft tone to manipulate him, and there was no patience left for it in Jons body. He too knew, mercy, was not something she cared about, not with the dangerous blood thirst that ran through her veins. “He’s an old man. A spear through the heart’s a better way to die than coughing up your last with no one but your horses to hear.”

A better way to die he thought, was when the gods fated it too. Not being slaughtered beacuse they wanted to plunder his own livelihood. Not even sparing her a glance, Jon kept his attention on Tormund instead. “The Watch might send a few men looking for a horse thief. They’ll send a lot more to hunt down murderers. “

The strange thing was, Jon at the very least, found it in him to respect Tormunds honesty. He didn't manipulate or lie, he was blunt and honest about his intentions and goals without care of what others thought. But regardless, as he leaned into Jons space and spoke, Jon knew he wasn't going to let these people do this to an innocent man. “I hope so. Killing crows in their castle is tough. Killing them out here in the open, that’s what we do.”

All jumping over the edge, the group made the run across the field and Jon came up with a plan in the seconds it took him to reach it. He knew horses well, and he knew how easy it was to spook them. Not a soul saw him do it but the gods, and that was the only eyes he cared about. Slamming his sword down onto a passing rock, the clink echoed enough to reach the horses ears as they neighed and shifted.

Enough together it would grab anyone's attention. Stepping outside to see what the ruckus was, the old man spotted the group running his way, and moved thankfully quick. Jumping onto one of the horses, the man begun to make his escape as Jon had one last thing to do.

Raising her bow up to shoot an arrow into him, Jon angrily called Ygritte's name. Just enough of a distraction to throw her aim off enough so the man could escape. Her head whipped around to glare at him, and Jon could only avoid her eyes and walk passed her in silence.

If this was love, why was a deep part of him, still scared of her?

By the time they caught up to the old man, it was pouring rain, and getting close to dark. Jon couldn't help the uncomfortable thought, that they had spent a lot of effort hunting down one innocent man.

Ygritte and another shot the man down by plugging his horse full of arrows, sending him flying to the soaking ground as the group all walked up on him. Tormund approached from the opposite side to face him, and the man still with a tough resolve, pulled a knife out and pointed it at him. Jon, turned his head slightly away.

This was who the free folk had hunted down, an old man with but a knife on him and nothing more, just defending his right to be alive. He felt sick.

The ironic thing to him once more, was that it was Tormund who showed the man respect. Man to man, he didn't lie or soften the blow, but was respectful and honest as strange as it seemed as he simply took the knife and tossed it away to the side. “Where were you riding?”

“Doesn't matter now, does it?”

Tormund agreed calmly, that it didn't matter. But, it was the angry yelling of Orell that made Jon feel even worse. “Cut his throat, or he'll tell the crows we're here.” His heart sunk more in his chest, how could he stand here and be part of this, the man didn't deserve this.

Pulling his own blade out, Tormund spoke with a raw honesty, “You understand.”

The old man holding a hand out, looking up to him with one last request. “Let me stand at least. Let me go with a bit of dignity.” Despite everything, Tormund held his hand out and helped pull the man up on two feet, himself.

But Orell, was the one there, who could sense what was going on. He knew what was going on in Jons head and he had poked and prodded at him about not being on their side and it seemed tonight he was going to press the issue just as Jon felt he was reaching his breaking point. “Make the crow kill him.” He moved to get right in his face, voice low and both men knew, that the other knew the truth. “You're one of us now. Prove it.”

But Orell didn't want Jon to kill him, he wanted to expose that Jon was lying once and for all.

Jon knew, if he didn't kill him, he was fighting his way out of here and it would be one against too many to be able to escape easy. Pulling Longclaw out, he let it rest gently at the mans neck. “She looks sharp.” Jon could only nod, maybe, if Jon could do it, it would give the man some solace knowing the blade was good enough to be clean and quick.

But then he'd have to do it. Jon stood there, keeping the sword there as the rain poured around them all and he couldn't stop looking at the man instead of his blade. He was an innocent man, and he stood there hearing his last words, watching him pray to the same gods Jon prayed too. A swirling devastation rose in his mind and in his eyes, why should they get to do this to an innocent man? Why was this who Jon was supposed to become?

Jon looked him in the eye, and heard his final words. So why hadn't he moved yet? They all goaded him. “Do it.” Ygritte was seething anger as she looked at him, and it felt horrible. This was who she thought Jon was, and this was what she thought was worthy of such anger, Jon hesitating to kill one, innocent man.

Jon shifted his grip, as if that was the problem. Tormund yelling at him, “Come on, boy. Go on,” So he raised his sword above him, and Jon knew, this wasn't who he was. Jon looked him in the eyes and heard his final words, but still, he thought, the man did not deserve to die.

His sword fell loose in his grip, as he accepted it was all over. The mask had slipped for good and putting it back was impossible. But just as he did it, Ygritte unceremoniously shot the man dead with an arrow and hell all broke loose.

The fight was chaotic, and just as Jon was almost overwhelmed, multiple men going for him as Orell yelled with an attacking swing, did a figure leap passed them both taking a man to the ground. Turning in shock, Jon saw a wolf, a direwolf and a darker one just as large attack another.

His brothers wolves?

But he had no time to think, Jon fought Orell off, and no hesitation that time, plunged his sword right through the mans chest. Rasping with the most confidence Jon had felt in years, “You were right the whole time.”

The mans eye's turned white in his final moments, and as quick as he fell, did Orells eagle screech. In the mind of his own bird, he attacked Jon, knocking him to the ground and tearing at the skin on his face, trying to go for his eyes before Jon gathered his bearing and knocked him harshly away.

In seconds, Jon climbed up onto a horse, and rode away from them all without a single regret. Only a day later, as he gathered his bearings to plot his path to Castle Black did Ygritte find him. He tried one last time to hopefully get away without issue, playing off what he knew she felt for him, and all it did, was get Jon shot full of arrows so much he felt faint even just riding away from her.

He hadn't had a vision or dream of you in days. Jon could only think in that agonizing ride to Castle Black, that he never wanted to see Ygritte again, and how much he desperately wanted to one day, find a way to see you instead. See you beyond just visions that told you lies. You loved Jon for who he was, and he was a fool for ever thinking he'd love someone who wasn't you.

Ygritte only loved someone who was never real, but you loved Jon Snow exactly as he was. That, was the woman he wanted to see again. And maybe if he were lucky, he'd find a chance. But, when Jon woke up in Castle Black, Sam came to him with news. News of Robb, and news of you, shattering his heart.

Jon knew, he would never get that chance ever again.

“Three dozen bodies with slit throats tossed off the top of the Wall. Seems like that would be a good lesson.” The men all shouted and slammed fists against tables, but none of it helped. None of their eagerness to right the wrong, changed what happened.

As soon as the boy arrived, Jon knew right away, he'd never forget the day Olly came to Castle Black. A boy of twelve telling a horrifying story of losing everything to him. The massacre they had committed and likely he was the only survivor. A hand firm and as comforting as could be sat on Ollys shoulder, as Jon did not hide the way his eyes shined with something unshed. It wasn't the same way or how, but he knew. Jon knew what losing your entire family and home felt like.

He knew what being left alone in the world felt like, and Olly was too young. It wasn't fair.

The worst part though, was that they didn't just do it to do it. They did it beacuse they knew it would cause this reaction. They knew, it would lead to the men rallying for justice. For once as Jon stood there, hoping to be a pillar of any support to Olly, did it feel strange that for once, he agreed entirely with Ser Alliser.

Without Mormont there anymore, Ser Alliser was acting commander. Standing in the middle of the hall, speaking loud and clear the exact thoughts Jon was thinking on his own. “If we go after them, we'll be giving them what they want. They want to draw us out, pick us off a few at a time.”

Maester Aemon sat with the same wisdom as ever, with more then any of them combined it sometimes felt. He was quiet, and all fell even moreso to listen when he spoke. “We have just over two hundred men. And that's including stewards and builders. And me. We can't afford to lose a single man. We must remember our first responsibility. We are the watchers on the Wall.”

Jons head sunk, but not once did his disagree. Qhorin Halfhand did not sacrifice himself to Jons blade so they could sabotage themselves for the sake of justice. No justice could be found if they died before they could protect anyone else. He already had enough of failing to protect the people he loved.

He couldn't protect Robb, he couldn't protect you. So Jon would protect the only thing the gods graced him with left in this world. The Watch and the Brothers now remaining to him.

Admiring Pyps spirit, he insisted there had to be something they could do. But in the quiet, Ser Alliser turned to Jon, both for a serious answer, and he suspected, to test the loyalty remaining in him. “You're a champion of the common people, Lord Snow. What do you say to Brother Pyp's proposition?”

Loyalty however, was all Jon had left. Loyal to the things which truly mattered, and the Nights Watch was not going to be able to protect anyone if they let the free folk slaughter them all. “Mance Rayder is coming. If the wildlings breach the Wall, they'll roll over everything and everyone for a thousand miles before they reach an army that can stop them.”

Robb already lost his Kingdom to the Boltons when they took his life. Jon couldn't let the free folk come and ravage through what of his home, his brothers home, his families home, was left. Jon couldn't save Robb, but he could protect what was left of his Kingdom from this one thing if none else.

Just as Ser Alliser spoke of shoring up Castle Black, did the horn bow. One blast, rangers returning.

And suddenly they all scrambled to get to the tunnel. Only two figures came through barley standing on two feet as they dragged each other. Others helped, some grabbed Grenn and Jon grabbed Edd.

It might be, he suspected, the first time in years that Jon actually, genuinely laughed as Edd strained out in pain, “Thought you'd have blue eyes by now.” Leave it to Edd to be the one to get the first laugh from Jons miserable life, seconds upon his return.

Sitting them both down, freezing and in pain Grenn showed the red marks of the chains that kept them so long from coming back. Edd telling them that they were kept at Crasters by the mutineers, the brothers who killed Craster, and killed Lord Commander Mormont. But the terror hit Jon, leaning down to Edd he rasped out “Are the mutineers staying?”

The answer was what he expected, but also the worst case scenario. Grenn explaining “They're not going anywhere. They've got Craster's food and his wives.”

Edd muttering morosely of the fates that likely were finding them. “Poor girls. Never thought they'd miss their daddy.” Grenn explaining that it was Karl running things, and Jon instantly knew what kind of men that stayed there. Those girls had been through enough with Craster, he couldn't imagine what torture they were finding with men like Karl Tanner keeping them hostage.

Taking a step away from the group, Jon ran a hand over his face realizing what they were going to have to do. They couldn't stay there, they'd be met by Mance Rayders army and they'd sing faster then drunks in a tavern. Once more, Jon thought of the Halfhand. He died for this, the men he was with died for this, that innocent farmer died for this.

They couldn't fail now. Turning to Ser Alliser, Jon's tone was deep and urgent as he cut through the discussion around him. “We need to ride north and kill them all.” Ser Alliser trying to tell him that justice could wait, but Jon interrupted once more, raising his voice as his heart raced. Eyes wide and full of the same dread they all were beginning to sense. “It's not about justice. I told the wildlings we had over a thousand men at Castle Black alone. Karl and the others know the truth as well as we do. How long do you think they'll keep that information to themselves when the wildlings are peeling their fingernails off?”

Voice dropping as his face twisted and narrowed, they were risking too close to the line of loss as he looked up to Ser Alliser. “Mance has all he needs to crush us, he just doesn't know it yet. As soon as he gets his hands on them, he will. Then he'll throw his full strength at us.” Turning to the rest of the men, he let his voice raise, they needed to know how urgent this was has Jon felt. “And even if every one of us kills a hundred wildlings, there's still not a thing we can do to stop them.”

What was worse, was that in a horrible way, it didn't matter that Jon had led men to end the mutineers, beacuse still more death came. This time Jon felt the guilt just as someone else did. But Sam didn't deserve that guilt inside him, and Jon sat next to him that night feeling horrendous, feeling that dark rooted anger twisting inside of him that they couldn't do anything.

They had hit Mole's Town. The closest place North before the Wall, a little run down town where it was mostly known as a place the brothers would sneak out at night to and visit the brothel. It also, was the same brothel where Sam had taken Gilly. Not for that, not even a chance, in fact it was that sort of act which he was protecting her from.

Knowing the kind of men Karl was, or Rast, men who in their free lives outside the wall were killers and rapers, still were in the walls too. And Gilly was one, defenceless girl with a baby who despite the sometimes amusingly quick and sharp attitude she held, was nothing of a fighter. So Sam made a deal with the brothel owner, Gilly would live there and in return she'd cook, clean, and look after the other working girls babies as long as they gave her no other work.

But after Ollys village was attacked, Jon was the one who was the guilty party, not Sam. He had talked him out of going back for her, once Ser Alliser ordered none of them to leave the castle and now that the free folk had rolled through it, Jon knew no one was left. Including the brothers who still snuck out that night.

Jon tried weakly to tell him, “You couldn't have known.” But Sam was grief stricken, and it made Jon feel so much more guilty. Gilly and Little Sam didn't deserve that, none of those girls in Mole's town deserved that, no one did. Sam didn't hide the tears in his eyes, as Jon sat trying to keep down that gut wrenching anger brewing within, which Grenn was not able to hide.

He paced back and forth, shouting the rage that Jon felt inside. “We're just cowering here while they slaughter our brothers?” Edd more calmly behind tried to argue that they were supposed to have been in the Castle, but Grenn grew angrier. Edd and Grenn both had a point, but maybe it would help letting it out as opposed to Jons silence making him feel worse. Maybe not. “Oh, so it's alright then? Black Jack, Kegs, and Mully chopped to pieces 'cause they broke the rules?”

Edd stayed calm at least, “I didn't say it was alright. I'm saying they shouldn't have been there.”

It was a strange time to think it, but Jon could recall the morning after he tried leaving Castle Black to find Robb and you after his fathers death. How easily the Old Bear called him out for leaving, only to placate his fears. “Don't look so terrified. If we beheaded everyone that ran away for the night, only ghosts would guard the Wall. At least you weren't whoring in Mole's Town.”

Sam next to him cut the wound even deeper as he muttered “She's dead because of me.”

Grenn still enraged pacing back and forth, “We pledged to guard the realms of men. We can't even guard Mole's Town.”

Jon had to interupt, he knew Grenns rage, he truly did. But the truth no matter how hard, had to be accepted. The two men hated each other, but Jon knew Ser Alliser was entirely right in ordering all of them to stay within the Castle Black walls. “We can't go after them, you know that. It's what they want.”

Gods help him, he hated that he knew how Sam felt. “Little Sam..as if I cut their throats myself.”

Oh Jon knew too well what that pain was, and it made him feel heavy for not having any words to comfort him over it. Little Sam wasn't his baby and Gilly wasn't his wife, but really, for Sam they still might as well have been. Jon still dreamt every night, a vision of you dying in a pool of your own blood. And he could always see the wounds in your stomach, right where he saw you gently guide Robb's hand to, when telling him you were with child.

Not all of those free folk were bad people, many of them, men like Tormund were just acting as soldiers doing what they knew, what they were told, but it didn't make it any easier. In fact, it made it harder to accept. How on earth did Jon ever trick himself into thinking he could've been one of them.

The mask slipped beacuse Jon refused to kill one innocent man, but by now? How many innocent men, women, and children had been slaughtered since? Olly had described a woman with red hair who shot his father dead, an expressionless look on her face as she walked away. Jon thought to himself, how many have you killed since I left, Ygritte? Is that what she wanted him to become?

You always looked at Jon too highly, always saw him as a better man then he was, but you also always pushed him for more. You saw his potential and supported him no matter what beacuse you believed in him. You never pushed him to be someone he didn't want, never forced him into anything.

You always had a soft spot for children too, you helped raise all of his younger siblings on and off. This would have utterly horrified you. His gut twisted, knowing that you didn't just die that night, but you were slaughtered like an animal right in the stomach where your own child was growing.

Around him, Jon could hear the others trying to assure Sam she might have gotten out, might have escaped somehow but Jon couldn't convince himself to say anything. If Gilly was dead, Jon didn't want to give Sam the pain of false hope. That was equally as cruel as the bloody truth. But as he sat there, it clued in his mind.

Brows narrowing in thought as he connected the dots of the maps he knew like the back of his hand. “If they hit Mole's Town, then we're next.” Looking up with an unnerved distance in his eyes, Jon looked despite knowing he wouldn't see them. Not until they wanted to be seen. “Mance's army must be close.”

Finally, Pyp asked the most pressing question. “How do two hundred men kill a hundred thousand?”

The silence was his answer. Edd circled around to them, pouring ale into each of their mugs as he spoke grim. “Whoever dies last, be a good lad and burn the rest of us. Once I'm done with this world, I don't want to come back.”

All five of them drank together. Their days were finally numbered.

He was trying not to get angry, it wasn't Sams fault. He didn't know. No one knew. He explained it that day the only way someone like Ser Alliser would care about, and from they point on he just let them all say what they wanted about it. None of them would've believed him, and even if they did, they'd mock him for it. Everything Jon was capable of, and yet they'd torment him for not being able to defend himself against one wildling girl.

As if it was that simple. Jon didn't need to be held down to be forced into it, it was far more complicated then that, but no one cared. The only person who would've cared was you, and you were dead, so why should Jon care anymore about people knowing the truth?

But Sam kept trying to ask. “I want you to tell me what it was like to have someone. To be with someone. To love someone and have them love you back. We're all gonna die a lot sooner than I'd planned. You're the closest I'll ever get to know it.”

His hands tensed and untensed, trying to keep himself calm. His men needed him to be calm and in control tonight of all nights. Jon loved you, and you loved him. That was it.

“You know right? Even if I don't say it?”

If Jon could go back and say damn it all, he would've just told you how much he loved you if he knew how this was all going to end. You died thinking he didn't love you anymore, and now Jon was facing death where everyone would wrongfully assume he loved someone who wasn't you.

He tried very hard to divert the question to anything else. “So you and Gilly never-”

They went back and forth about vows and what not but in truth Jon didn't really care. Not now. As they walked, it was only when Jon found themselves alone for half a moment when he finally got fed up enough and turned to Sam. “I didn't do it beacuse I wanted to Sam. I did it to keep myself alive. I don't know what being with someone you love in that way is like.” Your name came from his lips for the first time in months, and it stunned Sam silent. “She died before I could find out. Ygritte is nothing like her. Not even close.”

That ended the conversation. If they died tonight, or tomorrow as they all expected, he wouldn't do it with no one knowing it was you he wanted to be with. Just one person had to know what he had with you was the only real thing he's ever felt. Someone had to know Jon only ever loved you, beacuse you died, thinking that he didn't.

All beacuse of what Ygritte forced him to do.

The barrels all rolled into place, Jon found himself standing next to the man himself. “That's the last of the oil, Ser Alliser.”

Both men stood there, looking out into the darkness as he asked what he already knew. “A hundred thousand you say?” Jon confirmed once more, feeling the same motivated dread he did. “You can say it if you like. We should've sealed the tunnel while we had the chance like you suggested.”

But Jon didn't want to say it. He didn't agree, but he understood why he refused. And pointing out who was right or wrong about what didn't matter now. They were here to do the same thing, defend the same place and people. Hating one another or not, tonight Jon and Ser Alliser stood on equal ground fighting for what they both knew and felt in their bones, was the right thing. “It was a difficult decision either way, Ser.”

“Do you know what leadership means, Lord Snow? It means that the person in charge gets second guessed by every clever little twat with a mouth. But if he starts second guessing himself, that's the end. For him. For the clever little twats. For everyone.” Mormont had tried to help Jon become a leader, and it was him who says he first needed to learn how to follow. “This is not the end. Not for us. Not if you lot do your duty for however long it takes to beat them back. And then you get to go on hating me and I get to go on wishing your Wildling whore had finished the job.”

In truth, Jon wished she did too. Then he wouldn't have to experience the painful reality of knowing what living without you in this world felt like.

When it mattered most, Lord Janos Slynt was exactly what Jon knew he was. A coward. They looked to the fire and the army of Mance Rayder as they stood high on the wall, and the man was the only one of them who panicked. “No discipline. No training. Gang of thieves, that's all this is. I commanded the city watch of King's Landing. Those men obeyed orders.”

What in Seven Hells was this man even going on about? Jon turned to him, yelling without a care for holding back now. “We can't just let them attack the gate,” Janos babbled something about the steel as he lost more and more of his own command. Jon gesturing out, yelling in the cold wind to the sights coming for them. “Those are giants riding mammoths down there. Do you think your cold, rolled steel's gonna stop them?”

If they all made it through, Jon made a note in his mind to thank Grenn later. Coming to him, he leaned over to Slynt with an easy lie on his lips. “Brother Slynt, I've just got word that Ser Alliser needs you below. You're the most experienced man he's got, he said he needs you.”

So he left like a coward, and Jon knew the men up here still needed a commander. He had learned how to follow, and he felt the call to action as natural as it ever had come to him. It was time Jon lead.

Watching as the fight raged on, two giants came down from their mammoths and the worst begun, if they got through it was all over. They used their great strength to begun pulling the gate off and open with ropes, and Jon knew if they did one thing it was they needed to hold that gate closed. If Mance's army got in, it was over, for them, the watch, and everyone who the free folk would rampage over in what was left of Jons home.

Turning to Grenn, Jon couldn't have known how much he was going to regret choosing someone who meant that much to him. “The outer gate won't hold. Take five men, hold the inner gate.” Grabbing his arm before he left, Jon muttered roughly “Hold the gate. If they make it through...”

But Grenn was a fighter if Jon had ever seen one. Not a doubt in his mind as looked back at him. “They won't.”

The night raged onward, and it was a strange sight in the carnage to see Sam coming up behind him. “What are you doing up here?”

An urgency in his voice as Sam relayed the dire state below. “The Wildlings are over the walls. Ser Alliser has fallen. The castle walls can't stand much longer.” One leader high, and one leader low. But now? It all fell onto Jon, he needed to be the leader fighting for the only purpose that mattered. Giving Edd command of the Wall, Jon turned to make his way down the path.

Grabbing Longclaw, he it pulled free with a yell to his men, “Come brothers, now fight with me,”

For a split second, Jon feared it was all over. He stood there, knowing he couldn't kill her faster then she would kill him. Ygritte was angry, upset and kept Jon at bay with an arrow pointed right at him, but this wasn't who she thought he was.

This was the man he always had been, the one he wanted to be. Ygritte forced him to love her as someone else, but he wasn't that falsehood. Jon Snow stood for better then the destruction and bloodshed she raged in favour of.

But perhaps, he used it for once, to manipulate her to his advantage. If he stood there, risking her shot, letting her think he wouldn't or couldn't kill her, then Ygritte wouldn't turn around. And she wouldn't see what was coming her way, just like how Ollys father never saw her arrow coming his way.

The boy stood with a bow in hand, and as she thought it was her Jon was looking at, Jon made eye contact with Olly. He was a good shot, and Jon trusted in that. The nod was to him, not to her, and when the arrows flew, Jon found himself uncaring, as the memories of what she forced him to do flashed before his mind.

Maybe it was cold or cruel, but Jon could feel the filth she made him cover himself in when she would force from him what he never wanted to give her, and he couldn't find it in himself to care when she fell to the ground dead. Jon Snow already lost the woman he loved, and your name sure as hell wasn't Ygritte.

He didn't want to think how many brothers he lost that night, but Jon forced himself too. Pyp was gone, an arrow through his neck and the gods were cruel enough that Jon knew she had done it. He should have killed her that day beyond the wall, he should've just killed her when Qhorin Halfhand was still alive. Beacuse then Pyp would still be alive. The brothers all around him would still be alive.

Tormund was the only one left, the men surrounded him but he was angry and a fighter with rage flowing through him and they all stood back in a degree of fear, instead of fighting him. But Jon, for once, finally didn't care about how Tormund saw him. Walking over with a crossbow in hand, Jon yelled to him. “Tormund. It's over. Let it end.”

Gruffly spitting at him, “This is how a man ends-” But Jon had no more patience for it. Raising it up, Jon shot Tormund in the leg, and just as he yelled out, Jon kicked his blade out his hand and to the ground. He had been the only one with the bravery to get anywhere near the wild man.

“Put him in chains. We'll question him later.”

Jon turned and walked away as his brothers dragged him off. Tormund yelling and spitting in rage, “I should've thrown you from the top of the wall, boy.”

Rasping quietly to no one, Jon didn't really care if he heard him or not. It didn't matter. The dead were all still dead and there was no changing the past. Most who Jon cared about, were still gone after all.

“Aye. You should've.”

It was a terrible idea, but every idea everyone had left was a terrible idea.

Qhorin Halfhand had said it the best all those years ago. “Sneak in, kill Mance, and scatter them to the wind.” And he was right. But no one here was willing to do it, beacuse it was a plan that ended in death for the brave soul who would end him.

Jon had lost his father, brothers, sisters, family, home and you. He had nothing left in the world outside, all he had left was the watch and the brothers who died, after turning to him to lead in the darkest part of the night. As he approached Sam, he knew it would be the last time he saw him too.

But no one here was going to make this sacrifice. Which means it was Jons responsibility, and truthfully, Jon felt as if it was the only path left for him that made sense. Do one last thing, beacuse Jon had nothing else left.

Sam called it a great victory, but he rasped roughly at him the hard truth. “Great victory? Mance was testing our defences. He almost made it through. He has a thousand times as many men. They'll hit us again tonight. Maybe we can hold them off for a day or two, but we can never beat them.”

Walking away Sam realized what Jon was thinking, trying to argue with him not to do it, but Jon kept walking anyways before being told it was a bad plan. In honest, Jon sort of smirked. They were all full of lots of those these days, weren't they? “You're right. It's a bad plan. What's your plan?”

Grenn lay dead, he held the gate just as Jon told him too. Add another person Jon cared about that this was going to be for. Jon was doing this for him now too. He deserved better.

Pulling off Longclaw, he handed it to Sam. “I promised Jeor I'd never lose it again.” Taking it gently, the two looked at each other. The only person Jon had left, and he was about to walk away from him too. “In case I don't come back.”

“Jon. Come back.”

He knew he wouldn't. But Jon walked through the gate anyways. He had one last stand to make that no one else would. Beacuse he was taught to be a leader, and sometimes, leaders had to be the ones to throw themselves on their sword to save the rest. And just maybe, Jon couldn't do any of this anymore anyways.

Walking into that camp, Jon felt little care left for the life he was about to give up.

Only as he stood in Mance Rayders tent, as the two men realized Jon was there to kill him? That's when it all changed. That's when it happened.

Moving outside, men on horseback charged into the camp. More numbers on horses then the free folk knew where they came from, and they had come north of the wall too. Taking down men left and right, Jon knew right away these were not men of the Nights Watch, and they weren't free folk either.

These were soldiers. Real soldiers.

Mance in minutes realized they stood no chance, and yelled a surrender to his people. “Stand down, I said my people have bled enough and I meant it.”

Standing next to him, Jon watched as two riders in the distance approached. The banners he realized, weren't just normal Westeros banners. It was inside a heart set ablaze, but Jon knew the sigil all the same. Beacuse inside that burning heart, was a Stag. A crowned Stag.

Climbing down from their horses, Jon knew it was no coincidence men had come to their aid. Sam and Maester Aemon sent pleas to whoever remained in the Seven Kingdoms to help them, and at the last minute, only one King answered that call.

Without seeing him before, without even hearing a name, Jon knew who came to their aid. Older, much more rough and serious in every way, but he could see it clear as day. He knew what was coming, yet still wasn't prepared for it. It was still too raw.

The man looked at both of them, and found Mance Rayder's gaze. “You're the King beyond the wall. Do you know who I am?”

Sensing nothing that Jon was about to spiral into a meltdown from, Mance simply jested, “Never had the pleasure.” But it was Jon who felt his heart sink in his chest at the truth of who came to help him in the end. It was a connection to the one thing Jon would never let of again. The second man spoke what Jon already knew, but he still felt stunned in his heart hearing it.

“This is Stannis Baratheon. The one true King of the Seven Kingdoms.”

[avameller]

𝟓. 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐑𝐨𝐨𝐦

ᖭི༏ᖫྀ 𝐒𝐏𝐀𝐂𝐄 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 ࣪𖤐

Posted on the 31th of july 2024

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆: none.

𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘: You get to explore your new room and try on your new clothes when ellie comes over and you guys have a little chat and it seems like the chemistry is allready striking

(special) 𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐈𝐌𝐄𝐑: Aisha is a realitvely skinny character, IT IS ONLY because of the realistic perspective of an apocalypse people didn't have that much food/ had to save food so there were technically really many people that didn't have that much body fat on them, don't get me wrong. everyone is perfect in their own way. but this is for the purpose of the story's reality. if you are not comfortable with it I am very sorry to disappoint. Love to everyone out there <3 And thank you for reading this :) (remember to drink water! <33)

Spelling mistakes are to nicely be pointed out. <3 1292 words

(!read the disclaimer! above before continuing, yes. I am forcing you cause it is very serious.)

₃₅ I looked around my room staring in dead silence for a moment taking it all in, before letting out a shriek mini jumping around the room clapping my hands before jump sitting on the bed, which was now gonna be the bed I was gonna sleep in! I was overly excited and started to open small drawers and my closet, it was filled with different clothing, "What- is all of this for me? its like they knew they would adopt a girl?" i asked myself in shock by all the different materials

outfits are in the range of this aesthetic:

(If you don't like this aesthetic just imagine other clothes :)

₃₆ I took out a shirt holding it up in front of me scanning the material, "This is cutteee" i started finding random pieces of clothing mix-matching to find some good sets (like displayed above) and found some pieces that would look good together, after trying almost everything there was I grouped up different outfits by hanging them close together in the closet, so I would remember which ones I liked best, 

₃₇ An hour had went by with nothing but trying on what top goes with what pair of pants, looking around the room because everything felt surreal and looking out the window a couple times getting familiar with the new surroundings. There was now only one shirt left I hadn't tried or paired that was laying in the very back of the closet.

(just a basic teen top that is a little cropped you can imagine your own)

₃₈ "Ooooo, I like this," I say talking to myself as I flip it around in my hand examining the materials "It feels nice too" I add as turn around, my back facing the closet/door, I start to take off my shirt, throwing it on the bed as a knock was heard from my door, I quickened my actions "Wh-who is it?" I asked struggling a little to get the fabric over my head

- Ellies POV -

₃₉ I went down the hallway to where they said her room was, Joel had given me a whole lecture about when I was the new kid in Jackson and I had to make friends Blah Blah Blah.. so I decided to give her a chance, I let out a sigh as I ended up in front of the door, as I was about to lift my hand to knock on the door I stopped myself as I heard some ruffling behind it, I decided to knock anyway, knock knock the ruffling became a little hurried and loud "Wh-who is it?" she half yelled.

₄₀ "Uhh-" I was unsure of what to say "It's me, Ellie." I said as the silence got loud "Oh.." the voice from the other side answered sounding kinda disappointed "Can I come in?" I asked "Yeah uhh, for sure come in" I opened the door to Aisha standing with her arms crossed over her belly, she looked embarrassed "Hey," she said as her lips curled up to a thin-lipped smile "Hey," I said doing the same.

- Aishas POV -

₄₁ We stood there for a moment in silence just staring around making eye contact once every few seconds "Uh-Uhm you can sit on my bed if you want" I said a little hurried to kill the silence "Thanks.." she replied taking a seat and resting up against my headboard, I went over to sit at the end of my bed across from her, i sat down with one leg resting on the bed the other hanging off of it, "Soo..." I said "What do you like? of like stuff.." I looked at her awkwardly fiddling with my hands not knowing what else to say "Uhh I mean I like the outer space.." she replied her voice dipping a little low "Are you like a big fan? A total Space Girl? I mean it's totally cool-" I said with a little chuckle that was awkwardly cut off as her gaze went to my face trying to hide a tiny smile.

₄₂ "You think?" she asked me "Yeah it's pretty cool, I like space too," i said laying down completely putting my hands over my belly, Ellie looked at me examining me, "I like your top," she said "Thank you" I smiled tilting my head up to look at her "How did they fetch that?" she asked "I have no fucking clue," I said starting to laugh a little as she let out a chuckle herself "Are you allowed to curse?" she asked thru a choked giggle "Yeah! of course I am," I said laughing a little again "god, joel scolds me every time i do" she giggles

₄₃ "-Wait how old are you?" she asked sounding like it sparked her interest a little too much... I looked at her locking eyes with her immediately "I'm 17.." I said in a much sweeter tone than intended, she looked at me and smiled "Cool.." she said breaking eye contact as I looked back up at the ceiling, "You have to tell me your age now" I said even tho I already knew

₄₄ "I'm 18.." she said her head shifting back to me catching my attention as I look back at her "Cool.." I said copying her cold reply as she let out a scoff grinning, "Soo... are there any hot Boys or Girls? -in this town" I asked her head shot back to me "Girls?.." she asked me as I sat up on my elbows again "Yeah?" I asked quirking an eyebrow sitting up sideways leaning on my elbow "Uhmm..-" she said as I saw a faint blush on her cheeks "Well, Yeah- I mean sure there might be someone your type out there" she said denying eye contact looking into her lap

₄₅ "You like girls?" she asked me quietly "Yeah..?" I said a little nervous as I looked at her face searching for any emotion to rely on, "Do you?" I asked her "I mean.." she said as she motioned her hands down her body looking at me again "Okay, maybe, just maybe, it was a little obvious but I didn't just wanna guess, I wanted to hear it come out of your mouth before I was sure.." I said as an excuse 

₄₆ "I am kinda shocked to be honest.." she said with a nervous chuckle looking at her fingers fiddling with them "You don't look that lesbian to me it's hard to guess on you" She said as I looked her in the eyes "I mean I like both but yeah" I said with a shrug as my eyes automatically shifted to her lips for a second, she seemed to notice since she looked at mine after, the silence in our eye contact was deafening between us...

[muninnhuginn]

12, 22, 30!!! ❤️

Thanks for asking!

12. what’s some good advice you want to share?

Thought I'd go for something I've been trying to hold myself to personally here. I have no idea if this is particularly applicable to others to the same extent it is to me, but eh. Basically, it's incredibly easy sometimes to get fixated on your own mistakes, to try and mull over how you could have done things differently, to try and examine from all angles how it went wrong. The "what if"s essentially. And, don't get me wrong, you can often learn lessons from previous mistakes. And it can be healthy to vent or wallow occasionally. But oftentimes, it's just an excuse to wind yourself up further over what you could have done. To trip over yourself in guilt rather than looking at the present, which then just means you end up making the same mistakes -> why did I do that, I should know better -> rinse, repeat. So, if you're stuck on what-if scenarios and it's a case where you're not actually getting anything constructive out of it. (Namely, stuff like if you need to give an apology, if it's better to just leave it be, what you intend to do in a similar scenario if it arises, etc) If all it's achieving is making yourself feel worse? Stop. Just literally stop ruminating over it. And I know it's a lot easier to say that than *do* it, but the key thing is to catch yourself when you're doing the spiralling thing and just acknowledge that that's what's going on. Then try and move on. But at the same time, if you're not able to shut it off immediately, don't beat yourself up over it. Just recognising when you're in that zone is progress in of itself.

22. say 3 things about someone you love

This is more "loved" than "love" but I say it counts. So, my cat. - When it got cold in the winter and I was working from home, she would always come and sit on my lap and let me stroke her whilst I was doing stuff. Sometimes, she would get onto my lap by peeking up through the shelf intended for a printer and other times she would go straight over the desk. We had a system where when she wanted to leave, I'd spin the chair over to the bed and she'd walk from the desk over my lap to the bed to curl up and sleep. - One year, we got her a cat 'Christmas stocking'. It had a load of different things in it, but most importantly, it had these cat treats she really enjoyed. Unfortunately, we didn't realise she would be able to sus out what it was, so one day we got home and found the whole thing ripped open and scattered across the sides. After that, we made sure to hide any presents for her very carefully. - The only one of her toy type things we got her that she would actually use was the scratching post. If something had catnip in she'd get all big-eyed over it (which, no surprise, led to scratches), but anything else she'd just plain ignore. She was picky like that. I miss her.

30. what’s one thing that never fails to make you happy/happier?

I don't actually have any cheat code for this one. No guarantees so much as mitigations, but let's see. Hm. I think getting away from home for a bit is a big one. Just to change the environment up really (this applies doubly in autumn/winter when the weather and short days mean I spend most of my time inside). I'll often go find a nearby place that does hot chocolate and go sit there for a bit, listening to music if it's on in there or bringing my headphones along. If I've thought ahead I'll bring something to read as well. If the weather is nice there are some local areas to explore as well and some places that are fairly quiet. In the summer, you can head to the nearby graveyard and there's this abandoned chapel type building (unfortunately you can't get into it but you can go around it :<) and loads of crows and squirrels. I also as a general kinda happy thing rather than a cheering up kinda deal tend to like watching stuff with friends.

[knitmeapony]

I'm pretty sure you are lashing out, as you didn't actually process anything that I said in my last post. Anything that I say here is likely going to be taken in bad faith and you're going to make another snarky post with the same kind of insulting language that reactionaries and accelerationists have been using for the three decades I am aware of, and historically speaking much longer. (Although it's worth noting that's not where brainrot comes from.)

I'm going to answer anyway because I genuinely hope that you will think about what I'm saying and surprise me.

Words do have meaning. I'm not trying to *shame* anyone into voting. I'm trying to *convince* people to vote. If you feel shame, that's not my intention, but it's worth examining that feeling and figuring out why on your own time.

Professionally speaking I come from a world where no fault analysis is important. When you are looking at secure systems after an intrusion or a breach, it's important to foster the kind of environment that doesn't make people want to hide their mistakes. If you can't figure out the root cause of a problem, especially because everybody's busy covering their own ass, you'll never actually make your systems more secure.

But you do need a root cause analysis. You need to sit down and take a look at what could have potentially improved the situation, and what may have caused a situation. This isn't about figuring out who is at fault, we are not Catholic about this. This is not about figuring out who's the bigger sinner. At the end of the analysis, nobody gets punished. This is about doing the math and figuring out what your best actions are moving forward, and what actions taken in the past would be best to avoid.

When voter turnout is high, there are fewer opportunities for fascists to hijack the election. When voter turnout is high, it is more likely that candidates who are elected are folks who will push the Overton window toward the left. When voter turnout is high, progressive causes tend to get bolstered. It is easier to get a centrist candidate to listen to your left of center ideas than it is a right-wing/conservative candidate. You are setting yourself up for less resistance in the future as you campaign for the things that are most important to you.

On the flip side, conservatives actively attempt to suppress voter turnout. They particularly attempt to suppress voter turnout among the young, among women, and among non-white voters. They do so because when those types of folks vote, it's good for progressive causes and bad for conservatives. They also do so because they don't believe in the wisdom or humanity of a lot of people and would like to treat them as lesser than in general.

Voting is a very handy tool. It takes very little time out of your day, much less your year. Once you've done your due diligence and marked your ballot, with the other 364+ days in your year you can do a tremendous amount of good working for other causes, participating in mutual aid programs, whatever feels most productive to you. In terms of both risk/reward and work/benefit ratios, you're looking at very little cost for genuine benefits, especially at the state and local level.

This is just an analysis of best outcomes and best practices. Nowhere am I talking about virtue, much less some kind of fancy virtues. This is sheer practicality and efficiency of systems. If you want to work for more progressive causes, you want to see the government be more leftist, getting out the vote is one of many moves you can make. It's quick. It's tactical.

I used two examples where voter suppression and voter distraction benefited the conservatives. In the analysis of what went wrong both of those years, there are many things that you can say contributed to the problem. I am not denying that - and those are conversations that activists have been having for years now.

But in terms of moves we can make to prevent similar problems in the future, voting in numbers that will keep us out of recount territory and help win not just the popular vote but the Electoral College as well... for very little work, we get a reasonable reward. I would much rather fight with a center left person about removing means testing from the social safety net programs that we have then I would want to fight with a right-wing person about whether or not we should even have a social safety net.

I don't want a violent revolution (or the system overturned suddenly, which is more or less saying the same thing.) I don't believe I have ever heard of a violent revolution that properly takes care of disabled folks, poor folks, vulnerable folks in general. If your planned coup includes the idea that some innocent people are just going to have to die, probably the weak ones, I am deeply uninterested. If you've got some other idea, one that includes an actual detailed and functional plan to get through the transition period with everyone intact, feel free to send me a link.

We have lived through this before.

People said Gore wasn't good enough, that he was Bland and uninteresting and middle of the road and something had to change. So they voted third party or they didn't vote at all. And the Democratic party didn't wake up, and we got George W Bush and all the absolute hot garbage that came with him.

And they said Hillary Clinton was the wrong candidate, that she was middle of the road at best and conservative for the Democrats at worst, that she was entitled and they were going to vote for a third party or they didn't vote at all or worse yet, they voted for the other candidate as a joke because it's not like those votes change things, you know? And the Democratic party didn't magically wake up, they didn't majorly change, and we are still dealing with the fallout from that.

And that's not only twice in my lifetime, but twice in my voting lifetime. One of the important things you learn in therapy is that you cannot change other people, and you cannot set your expectations based on how you think they ought to react to certain things.

If you are refusing to vote, or voting third-party because of what you think it's going to make someone else do, please reconsider.

If you want to make the liberals or the centrists or whatever you want to call them wake up, you're going to need to do something that hasn't already been done twice in the last 20 years.

[dino-fart]

Heartbreak and Headaches | Chapter 1: The Proposal

Pairing: No Outbreak!Joel Miller x Female Reader

Genre: Comfort, Angst, Fluff, Smut

Summary: You have had the week of your life and finally have come downtime. Too bad life had other plans and your neighbor’s fence breaks. You hire a contractor to fix it and it seems like he can fix more than the fence.

Summary | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

Like everyone in this world, you had made mistakes in your life and fixed them. Now you finally felt at peace, you’ve climbed up the corporate ladder to where you are now the COO. Your job was to make sure the company and its branches were running smoothly. It was a stressful job but seeing the results made it worth your while. And the salary that came with it helped relieve your financial worries. 

During your journey, you had focused on your career and you barely opened yourself up for relationships. You had one years ago that lasted only a month, you were the one that broke it off after realizing how busy you were becoming. After that, you took on some lovers for your physical needs and for some time you were content with just that. Until you met Jacob...He owned a coffee shop by your work and you had met him when he memorized your order. 

He was charming, goofy, and fun. You found him amusing and he always did his best to make your morning before you walked into work and you appreciated how hard he tried. Finally, one day he asked you out and you took a while to get back to him. He was the exact opposite of you and frankly, you were nervous. You said yes, giving him a chance, he was cute after all. 

On the first date, he shared that he had been in a six-year relationship with his ex and planned to marry her until he found out she was cheating on him with his best friend. You felt bad for him and you became nervous by this, worrying he was going to compare you to his ex. Eventually, you forgot about it as he proved you wrong. He was faithful and encouraging, a perfect boyfriend...So you continued to tell yourself. 

It’d been two years and your relationship was still strong. But you could feel the cracks getting bigger. You were able to distract yourself from thinking about it as you moved from your apartment to your first house in a nice neighborhood. Your home was beautiful, it was what you had wanted this whole time. Sure it had a few renovations but it wasn’t anything major. 

Your neighbor gave you a number to a contractor she uses. Joel Miller. She wouldn’t stop talking about how great of a job he did and how nice his ass was. You humored her and decided to call this Joel to help with your porch. The first thing you noticed was how strong of a Texas accent he had then you noticed just how polite he was. He told you he could come by in the evening to check it out. 

The evening came and you had just got home. You were dressed in your work clothes which were a long-sleeved blue satin blouse, a black pencil skirt, and black heels, and your hair was in a braided bun. You set your purse down when you heard the doorbell ring and your dog, Piper, barking. “Piper, shush!” You hushed your dog as you went to the door. You opened it and there stood a man with short dark hair and a beard wearing a navy blue shirt, and denim jeans.

 His eyes met yours and he gave you a small smile. “Evenin’ ma’am, I hope now is still okay for me to check out the porch?” He said. Ah, this was the infamous Joel Miller. You should’ve guessed when you noticed your neighbor sitting on her porch watching. 

“Evening Joel!” She shouted. 

Joel turned to see her and waved, “Evenin’ Mrs. Hudson.” 

You chuckled slightly at your neighbor and turned to Joel, “Yes, now is still fine, um, would you like some water?” 

“No thank you, ma’am. I’ll just take a look and be out of your hair soon.” He gave you a nod. You nodded back and stepped inside, leaving the door open. Piper sat at the entrance of the house and watched the man begin to examine the boards. Some time went by and you heard Piper begin to whine and bark. You got up from the couch and walked to the door, you saw Joel in his truck, taking out some tools. 

“Be nice, Piper.” You said but the dog began to bark louder and its tail and ears were on alert. You furrowed your brows and carefully stepped around the broken boards of the porch to step into the front yard. You looked around trying to figure out who was there. You weren’t scared though, your neighbors were out and Piper was on alert. Suddenly you heard boards breaking and turned around to see Jacob tripping over your neighbor’s fence. 

He fell on the other side and down came the panel of the nicely painted fence. “Oh jesus!” You shouted. 

“What in the world?!” Mrs. Hudson yelled and ran toward Jacob. 

Jacob grumbled and got up with a bag in his hand and a six-pack of beer in the other. Right behind him, another man walked over with a pack of beer. Jacob finally turned to you and smiled widely, “Babe!” 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” You shouted. 

“Oh shit, sorry babe! Mike and I were trying to watch the game at my apartment and the TV went out. So I thought about my super sexy, super smart, and super-rich girlfriend and realized we could watch the game at her place!” 

“While breaking the fence of my neighbors and causing disruption everywhere? A neighborhood which I just moved to Jacob.” 

“Oh...I’m so sorry, ma’am, I’ll pay for the damages.” Jacob said to Mrs. Hudson. Mrs. Hudson did not believe him and stared at you. 

You were embarrassed and sighed in anger, ‘Why didn’t you just drive here, why did you come from the backyard?” 

“My car is having issues and I texted you to come to get us but I know you’re busy. So we took an Uber as far as we could and then snuck in the back.” Jacob said and felt Mrs. Hudson’s eyes bore into him. 

“It’s because it’s a gated community...You know what. Go inside.” You scolded. Jacob and Mike and Mike weren’t paying attention and stomped on the porch and broke more boards. 

“Oh shit, stupid porch!” Mike hissed in pain and made it inside. Piper wouldn’t stop growling at the two of them. You pinched the bridge of your nose and let out an angry sigh. 

“I hope that’s not going to be a pattern.” Mrs. Hudson said. 

“It won’t I promise. I will pay for the damages.” You reassured softly. 

Mrs. Hudson relaxed and shook her head, “I wouldn’t put up with that.” 

You just nodded, your cheeks red with anger and embarrassment. You headed back to the house and bumped into Joel accidentally. “Oh shit, sorry...I wasn’t paying attention.” You apologized quickly. 

Joel shook his head, “It’s alright, seems like you got...Company.” 

“A nuisance more like it.” You whispered. 

You carefully went back inside and shut the door. “Babe, do you have chips and dip?” Jacob asked while looking in your pantry. 

“I’m on a diet, remember?” You said trying to be calm. 

“Oh, you look fine.” 

“It’s to stabilize my weight for my condition, it’s got nothing to do with my looks.” 

“Oh okay.” 

You didn’t respond. 

“I got chips and dip!” Mike shouted while pulling it out of his shopping bag. 

“Sweet! Babe, come join us!” Jacob walked over to you. 

You glared at him, “I don’t like sports.” 

“I know but come sit next to me, I love your shoulder massages~” 

You rolled your eyes and walked over to the fridge to get out your wine bottle. 

“Damn, the whole bottle?” Jacob laughed. He walked over to the couch and patted the cushion to invite you. You walked right outside with Piper. 

“Dude, I thought you said, she’d be cool with it?” Mike asked. 

“She is, she’s probably had a rough day.” Jacob shrugged. 

“You should check on her.” 

“She likes to have alone time.” Jacob opened the White Claw and began to drink it. Mike scratched his head but then watched the game, he wasn’t going to get involved. 

A few hours later it was 10 pm and your eyes were getting heavy. You were waiting for the game to be over and once it was you would kick Mike out and have a few words with Jacob. Joel had left a few hours ago, telling you he’d text you the quote for the porch and for your neighbor’s fence. You got up from the chair and walked inside. 

The TV was finally off and Mike walked out of the house, waving goodbye to the both of you. “Hey babe, you look like you need rest.” Jacob smiled at you. He was sweeping the floor and putting the dishes away. You raised a brow at this, you let it go, you were too tired to argue. You just nodded and made your way to your room. 

“Hey babe...Thanks, it won’t happen again...Also, I have a surprise for you tomorrow, come by the shop.” Jacob smiled at you. You yawned and just nodded. You walked up the stairs and got into bed. Piper joined you and curled by your feet. You fell fast asleep and part of you was disappointed that Jacob didn’t come to check in on you. You decided to indulge in his request. You would definitely have to think about your future with him. 

The next morning, you had a horrible headache from the wine and you were exhausted. You made sure you looked professional but the dark circles under your eyes were obvious. You texted Jacob that you’d be by the shop after work, you didn’t want to see him first thing in the morning. You made it to work and your assistant tried to use her undereye brightener to hide your dark circles. You appreciated her help as it did make somewhat of a difference. 

You attended your first meeting and your headache was killing you. You had to excuse yourself and your boss waited for you outside of the bathroom. You were surprised by this and expected a scolding. Instead, he held out two small pills. “I hate hangovers.” He simply said. He gave you a gentle smile and you took the pills. “Black coffee helps.” He said and walked away from you. 

You thanked him and felt blessed to have a boss that was understanding. He had become your mentor and always had your back. You took the pills and drank some coffee and you were good to go after an hour. The rest of the day you were determined to stay productive. So much so that you worked late and forgot about Jacob. 

You made it home and saw Jacob standing in the front yard. “Is your TV out again?” You simply said. 

“No, I’m here to meet my beautiful girlfriend and give her a surprise!” He said enthusiastically. 

“Oh?” You smiled a little. 

“I got tickets to the game tomorrow!! And they’re front row!” Jacob ran over to embrace you. You frowned and patted his back. “Aaaannnddd you and my family are joining me!” Jacob finally said and pulled back to show you five tickets. 

Your brows were raised at this, “What’s the occasion?” 

“I’m opening another store!” He smiled. You forced a smile and nodded. When you had been promoted and got a new house, you celebrated alone. “Tomorrow at 3 pm!” Jacob said snapping you out of your thoughts. 

“Tomorrow at 3 pm.” You just said, figuring maybe it would be a good time. You liked his family, you bonded with his little sister. 

“Okay, I gotta go, babe, see you tomorrow!” Jacob said and rushed over to his car. You watched him leave and sighed sadly. This weekend you would end things. You had to. 

The next day, you left early for the game and you were surprised to see your boss leaving for the game as well. The two of you rode separately and met up after check-in. The two of you searched for your seats and your boss invited you to dinner with his family after the game. You agreed, enjoying his company more than your boyfriend’s. Speaking of your boyfriend, you found your way to the seats and Jacob greeted you by putting on a sports jersey over your head. 

“Put it on! You can’t wear your work clothes at a sports game!” He smiled and then turned to his dad. You slipped the shirt on over your blouse and sat down next to him. What surprised you both was seeing Jacob’s ex sitting in the seats in front of them. You said nothing, focusing on the game but Jacob was focused on the beautiful ring on his ex’s finger. Half time came and the announcers began to move the cameras to the audience for the ‘Kiss Cam’. 

Lots of couples were smiling and kissing each other. You sighed sadly seeing it and missed the days when you and Jacob were intimate, it had been months... As if on queue, the camera was on you and Jacob. Everyone around you was shouting and cheering. You noticed Jacob’s ex on the camera was simply staring. 

You turned to Jacob, waiting to see what he’d do and you honestly wished he didn’t do anything...Because what he did was so much worse...Jacob stood up and waved to the camera, he walked over to the end of the aisle of seats and gestured for you to follow him. You were confused but did so. Jacob took your hand in his and you braced for the kiss, only he didn’t lean in. 

He held your hand and went down on one knee. Your eyes grew wide in horror at his actions. “Babe, we’ve been together for two years and it’s been the best two years of my life...I want to spend the rest of my life with you. You’re way better than my ex, like twenty times better. Also, I don’t have a ring right now but I’ll get one. I know I’ve made mistakes but I’m going to fix them...Like the broken fence of your neighbor’s. So would you give this fence breaker the honor of being your husband?” Jacob smiled and people around him laughed at his joke. You didn’t know what came over you, the headache was coming back and all you could hear was ringing. You felt your heartbeat faster and your palms were getting sweaty. 

You shook your head, you were not about to have a panic attack in front of everyone. You yanked your hand back aggressively and glared at him. “No.” Was all you struggled to say, you were not about to lay into him, not here. You felt tears form in your eyes and ran up the bleachers and into the passageway of the stadium to leave. Jacob was left there on his knees, in complete shock. 

The announcers sympathized with him and the mascot came over to comfort him. His ex shook her head and paid attention to the game again. 

You didn’t answer your phone all day, you couldn’t speak properly, and you were too busy trying to stop crying. You lay there on your bed, the sports jersey was in the living room trash can, wincing in pain from the headache and the heartache. It was late when you woke up and you sat up on the bed. You answered your text messages from your boss who was worried about you. You then answered the texts from Jacob’s sister and his mother. 

You appreciated their kindness. You set your phone down and went down to the kitchen to grab snacks. You sat back on the couch and turned on the news. You sighed in relief that no one was talking about the game...Well you spoke too soon. 

The sports segment came on and at the forefront was what happened. You turned the TV off immediately and heard your phone buzzing. You grabbed it to see a text from Jacob’s mother. A text you wish she didn’t send but appreciated it nonetheless. She told you that Jacob had been talking about his ex for the past week after he bumped into her at the store. 

He then found out she was married and had been obsessed with the idea. Which explains his impromptu proposal. You weren’t an idiot, you had put two and two together when you noticed how intensely he was staring at his ex’s ring. You shut off your phone and went to bed, thankful that it was going to be the weekend...

Tagging: @deepbatched, @vikingqueen28, @leonkennedyslefthand, @stewardofningishzida, @icytrickster17, @onlinecemetery, @marki-moo0, @absolute-not-original, @creamecafe, @scrubb, @nightingal3-tales, @alliethedaydreamer, @strangesthirdeye, @alexa-33, @zombiedixon89, @sunnsettee, @deliciousfestsalad, @kiaradaniell, @freyafriggafrey, @criticalroleobssedperson, @avengersfan25, @lunamoonbby, @androgynouspersonapricotfan, @foxcantswim, @namorkawaiiwife, @starkiller-queen, @kyuupidwrites, @luciamajer, @renatas10, @ayamenimthiriel, @gaiagurl05, @dipsylou, @pinkthick, @hansai, @andywinter16, @iambored24601, @3-cheese-tortellini, @cumbrbatchbenedict, @ironstrange1991, @aribas-stuff, @rianumochi, @vibaracal, @lostpirateinwonderland, @ninebluehearts, @moonlightdivine, @kittenlittle24, @walkingintheheartbreaksatellite, @tuquoquebrute, @grunge-pun-kat, @stl4315, @sadimusprimee, @mrknightt, @the-jackals, @demimaree, @still-wanna-be-corrupted, @memester-png, @keep-beating-my-dear-heart, @ellenmunn, @dreamingoffall, @thepizessamcedian, @blueturd16, @owod3, @giraffefej, @xuniverseofbeachesx, @aleatoria2000, @lordofthundersstuff, @fanfictionaddiction99, @wildwollff, @blue-430, @shmaptainshmerica07, @chershirecat000, @aestheticangel612, @narlinj, @marantha, @xattislc, @jenna-m, @rock-candysweet, @eh-nothanks, @benigndoll, @batgurl42, @sketcherperson, @bowie-frommars, @notarealscorpio​, @middwestkidd​

[beautyofattolia]

Jake and Lo’ak (Avatar: The Way of Water)

Warning: this post contains spoilers for Avatar: The Way of Water! Do not read if you haven’t seen the movie yet, are planning on watching it, and you want to go into it blind. I will be discussing a LOT of things that go on in it.

This post is going to be a discussion/exploration of both Jake and Lo’ak as characters with a deep dive into their relationship. I loved a lot of the character development that went on in this movie and wanted to pick apart Jake’s arc in particular. I also thought the relationship between him and Lo’ak was one of the most interesting and well-developed ones in the movie and wanted to not only examine it closer but also make some predictions about where it’s going to end up in future movies.

Just to warn you now, this is going to be a LONG post (I have SO MANY THOUGHTS Y’ALL), so I’m including a “read more” tab. I don’t want to see this entire monster on my dash every time I look through my tags and I especially don’t want people who have no interest in this topic to have to deal with my ramblings while casually scrolling.

For those of you who want to come explore with me though…let’s dive in.

(I am so sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

Introduction

I do want to start by saying that I have seen the movie twice. This analysis/exploration came to mind after the first time I saw it, but I wanted to watch it again with this idea in mind to double-check myself. I wanted to make sure I accurately remembered all the scenes I’m going to be discussing in this post. I’m not perfect and I’m sure there are things I have still managed to misremember or misquote, so please feel free to let me know if I’ve made any mistakes!

Honestly, I would love to see the movie two more times, AT LEAST, but I have no idea when that is going to happen and I wanted to get this done sooner rather than later.

There are also a few things I want to make very clear before I start. First, I absolutely adore both Jake and Lo’ak, so if you don’t and you’re looking to read something that completely bashes either one or both of them…this is not the post for you. Second, this post’s goal is not to convince you that you SHOULD love them or that how you feel about them or their relationship is wrong if you don’t agree with me. It’s not! Your feelings and opinions are completely valid, whether you like them as characters and their relationship with each other or not.

This post is simply a deeper exploration into why I think these characters behave the way they do in this movie and why I believe their relationship is the way that it is. I have seen people claim things like “Jake doesn’t love his kids” or “Jake doesn’t love his sons” or “Jake doesn’t love Lo’ak” and I, personally, think all of these statements are false based on what the movie presents to us as viewers and this post is an explanation of why I believe that.

All that to say, if none of this is up your alley, please stop reading now. I’m not here to hate on anyone’s feelings or thoughts or opinions. I’m only here to share my own, explain why I think the way that I do, and break down and explore two characters I love and the relationship they share (which I also love), in a movie that I adore. I deeply enjoy engaging with and analyzing media that I love. I can’t make fanart and fanfiction is very hit or miss for me (when I’m writing, I love reading it), so this is kind of the only way I have of showcasing my love for a fandom and series that has held my heart captive since I was fourteen.

“Jake Doesn’t Love His Kids”

I think this claim kind of goes hand in hand with the “Jake is a military dad” claim. While I do think Jake does have military dad moments in the Way of Water, I would hesitate to consider him 100% a military dad. Mostly because there is clearly a huge difference between him as a dad before the humans return and him as a dad after the humans return. I will be the first to admit that we don’t have a lot of footage from those first fourteen years, but from what we do see, it is clear there is a difference between pre-humans Jake and post-humans Jake.

Now, I consider pre-humans Jake to be who Jake really is as a dad. He’s much softer, much warmer, and overflows with love for his family. Every single moment of that sequence shows that. The look of awe when Kiri grabs his finger, how patient he is while teaching Neteyam how to fish, the way he holds Lo’ak against him when he and Neytiri tell the story of how they met, how he measures his kids’ heights on a pole in their home, even the way he breaks up the fight between Lo’ak and Kiri. It’s all consistent behavior that shows this is who Jake is as a dad naturally, without the world falling apart around him: soft, warm, loving, gentle, patient.

Then the humans come back.

Sometimes, when reading what people say about Jake as a dad, it feels like they don’t understand why there’s a change between pre-humans and post-humans. Why after a year of war, there’s a difference in how Jake parents his children, and how he behaves as a dad. Why he has become harder, someone who falls into moments of the military dad mentality.

And I don’t think the movie could be any clearer about why this happens.

They are now in the middle of a war and Jake is scared out of his mind.

Fear changes you as a person. You are not your best when you are scared, instead, you often become a version of yourself that you do not recognize and do not like. And the truth is that Jake is terrified out of his mind after the humans return. In order to cope with the fear he is now feeling, he falls back on the marine mindset because he thinks that is what is going to protect the people he loves.

Remember, that’s his whole thing. “A father protects his family. That’s his one job.” That statement is literally Jake’s core belief about what it means to be a parent and what his responsibilities are to his kids.

Now, I’ve seen this statement criticized for being sexist. Like, “oh fathers protect, but what do mothers do? Stay home and twiddle their thumbs?” and I think this misses the point entirely. Jake is not saying that at all. He does not think Neytiri is weak or somehow lacking in her ability to protect their kids because she is their mother. I mean he literally goes to her at the end and is like “I need you. I cannot rescue our children alone.” He needs her because they are mates and partners and these children are THEIR children and she is the most badass badass to ever be badass on Pandora and probably in the universe. And Jake knows that! He loves that! The man looks at his mate slaughtering people and is like “oh my God babe YES!” His statement is not that fathers are the only ones who protect. He states that it’s the parents’ job to protect their children, but he is making it personal for himself. His role in this family is the father. He refers to himself because he is making himself focus on his failings as a parent. He’s basically saying to himself “your one job as their father is to protect them and you are failing it.” He is judging himself, saying he himself has fallen short and failed, not saying that mothers can’t or shouldn’t be focused on their children’s protection.

This mentality, that a parent’s one job is to protect their kids, is why he is terrified when the humans return. Or at least one of the reasons. I think Jake is a really complex character with a lot of baggage and while not all of it is explored in the Way of Water, I think most of it is and the rest is at least hinted at. The movie focuses on his fear of the humans hurting his family, but there are other reasons why Jake is scared too.

When you think about it, Neytiri and the kids are the only family Jake has left. They are all Jake has. He has no one else. Tom is dead and while we don’t know much about their parents, we know they aren’t in the picture for one reason or another because Jake doesn’t consider them at all when he leaves. The life he has built with the Na’vi is the only life that he has. They are his whole world: his family, his friends, and his people. And the humans have the power to take that away, to hurt the people he cares about more than anything else in the world. I can’t help but think back to the first movie, in the extended version (the BEST version), where Jake says “all I’ve ever wanted was a cause worth fighting for.” And guess what? His family and the Na’vi people are now his cause!

So we have his fear of losing his family driving him, but I think we also have his fear of letting down the Omatikaya people as well. I think Jake deals a lot with guilt and I think part of his desire to fight the humans comes from feeling like he still has to make up for what he did in the first movie. Like he 100% loves them, but I do think he is still trying to prove that he belongs, that he is sorry for what he did, and that he is on their side. Jake is afraid of losing his place with the Na’vi, of not only losing the people he loves, but the life he loves too. The community he loves. The world he loves.

He is full of fear and the humans returning brings all of that fear right to the forefront of his mind. And as a result, he lets that fear take over and whenever you let fear take over, you become a lesser version of yourself. And Jake’s lesser version of himself, the one ruled by fear, is harder, colder, and not the kind of dad his kids needs or that he wants to be.

I want to make it very clear that the movie does not present this behavior as healthy or right. In fact, the movie makes it clear that Jake is making mistakes in how he handles his children, specifically Lo’ak (we’ll talk about that specifically in a bit). Neytiri herself is the voice of reason for Jake when she tells him “you are too hard on them” and “this is not a squad, it is a family.” I think this again provides a little more evidence that this is not how Jake was as a dad before. If Neytiri is troubled by his behavior now, there is no way she would have let Jake parent their children like this for fourteen years. Neytiri is not afraid of speaking her mind, especially not with Jake. She would never sit back and let something she disagrees with happen, especially not for YEARS. I do think in this instance, she understands why Jake is acting the way he is (they are bonded after all), which is why she reminds him throughout the movie of how he should be behaving gently and not flying off the handle at him. 

Back to the “family, not a squad” scene though, Jake answers he was afraid they had lost Neteyam and Lo’ak, and again that shows how scared he is of losing the children he loves. It highlights Jake’s fear. The movie is saying “Jake is making a mistake but this is why he is making the mistake.” That’s Jake’s whole arc throughout this movie! Him making mistakes with his kids and then realizing he was wrong the whole time. The movie makes that very clear! So I do get a bit frustrated when people criticize the movie for having Jake be a military dad when the movie very clearly shows that lots of Jake’s parenting choices are wrong.

But just because he makes mistakes doesn’t mean he doesn’t love his children. In fact, the reason why he makes those mistakes is because he loves his kids so freaking much that he is consumed with the fear of losing them and that fear turns him into a person who is so bent on protecting them that he pulls away from them emotionally and becomes someone harder and colder than he was before.

I also want to take a second and mention how much I appreciate that Jake is never physically hard on his kids. I think one of the stereotypes of the military dad persona is corporal punishment and that is honestly never a thing for Jake, which is a huge relief to me. Obviously, he is much more physically affectionate in the pre-humans era, but even in the post-humans era, he is still physically gentle and warm with his kids. He holds Tuk when she asks for it, he is physically supportive of Kiri when she tells him how she feels, he hugs Neteyam and Lo’ak when he saves the two from Quaritch at the beginning, he cups Lo’ak’s cheek at the end, he hugs both Lo’ak and Spider after the battle. Even when he is angry with Lo’ak and grabs him to pull him away from Tonowari and Ronal, he is still gentle. His touch is never shown to be aggressive or painful or a punishment. His kids never flinch away from him. Even when Jake is upset with them and leaning into the scared military dad persona or the angry commanding officer persona, his kids do not fear his touch. And I think that is so important because it shows how much he loves them, how much they love him, and how Jake really is a warm, gentle dad who is just scared out of his mind and desperately trying to protect his kids. The movie shows him making a lot of mistakes in this movie, but the way he is physically there for his kids is not one of them.

I think the movie does an incredible job at comparing and contrasting the dad Jake really is (pre-humans) and wants to be with the dad Jake becomes when he lets fear consume his life (post-humans). He isn’t a military dad because he doesn’t love his children, he loves his children so much that he thinks becoming a military dad is the only way to save them. And the movie straight up says “no Jake, that’s wrong and here’s why.” Parents are people who make mistakes and who have to grow and change to be better people and better parents. Loving your children doesn’t mean you don’t make mistakes, but it does mean that you need to constantly be aware of how your choices are affecting your children and make changes when needed. And I think Jake’s entire arc throughout this movie is him realizing he is wrong and then making that change at the end of the movie to be better.

“Jake Doesn’t Love His Sons”

A lot of people have been commenting on the fact that there is a difference between how Jake treats his daughters, Kiri and Tuk, and how he treats his sons, Neteyam and Lo’ak. Specifically, they claim that Jake loves his daughters more than he loves his sons. Again, I do think this is proven wrong by the movie. Now, I will say, there is definitely a difference in the post-human treatment of the girls vs. the boys, but I don’t think it has anything to do with how much Jake loves them. I don’t even think it has anything to do with their gender!

I think it’s the direct result of Jake being Olo'eyktan and the one leading the Omatikaya into battle since Neteyam and Lo’ak are both young warriors. After all, Jake has no pattern of treating women differently than men throughout the movies. He doesn’t look down on Neytiri in the first movie because she is a woman. In fact, he is totally okay with her being his teacher and while they do fall in love (something that probably wouldn’t have happened if it had been like Tsu’tey teaching him instead), there is no point in which he views Neytiri less of a warrior because she is a woman. Jake also doesn’t respect Grace any less as a scientist than Norm or Max and he doesn’t think Trudy is any less of a marine than Quaritch or the other male marines. Jake even shows the same level of respect to Ronal as he does to Tonowari, similar to how he shows the same level of respect to Mo’at as he does to Eytukan in the first movie. Jake is not sexist. He has never had a problem with women in positions of power or authority. He does not treat women any differently than he treats men in any situation.

So no, I don’t think the reason why he treats his sons differently than his daughters has anything to do with sexism or even toxic masculinity, another thing I see people mentioning and which Jake has no history of ever displaying. I think the reason why he treats them differently is because his sons have roles that require him to approach them not as their dad, but as their commanding officer. The girls do not. THAT is where the difference lies.

Being a warrior/hunter is an important part of being part of the Omatikaya clan and Neteyam and Lo’ak are the only two children who fall into that category. Kiri does not, even though she is old enough. Much like Mo’at, who also doesn’t seem to be a warrior/hunter and instead seems to be more focused on healing (although being a Tsahìk doesn’t seem to mean you aren’t a warrior since both Ronal and Neytiri are, but throughout both movies we never see Mo’at assume a warrior role), Kiri seems to be more of a healer. A spiritual leader. There is never a moment where she appears to have any interest in being a warrior/hunter the way Neteyam and Lo’ak do. I do not believe she has gone through that process the way the boys have. She doesn’t even have a weapon at any point during the movie even though the boys have both bows and knives and even Tuk has a knife at the end. Tuk obviously isn’t a warrior/hunter either as she is still too young. That may be in her future, but at the moment it is not.

But Neteyam and Lo’ak are. Or at least becoming? Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but it looks like maybe they both have completed their Iknimaya since they both appear to have their own ikran. I’m a bit iffy on that since there is no real confirmation either way, but the evidence does seem to lean toward the fact that at the VERY LEAST, they are warriors/hunters in training close to becoming full-fledged warriors/hunters. Regardless of official status, it is clear that they both are given some responsibilities when it comes to fighting alongside the older warriors. And as Olo'eyktan, Jake is their commander. He is the one who leads the warriors into battle and I think this is what causes him to treat the boys differently.

He is no longer just their father, he is also their commanding officer, and I think he struggles to find the line between the two. He tends to lean more into the commanding officer side, ESPECIALLY when it comes to chastising them for disobeying his requests as their father and his orders as their commanding officer. And again, I think the movie shows that this is a mistake on Jake’s part. He should be more focused on being their father than their commanding officer. I think in his desire to protect them from the horrors of war that they are very much involved in as members of the clan, he is falling back into treating them how he was treated as a marine to try and prepare them. Train them. Give them, in his mind, their best chance of survival. Again, I think it’s important to remember Jake’s background and that the only knowledge he has of how to be a commanding officer is the ones he had as a marine. That’s his entire fighting background! That’s what he knows and understands and can pass on to his sons. So that’s what he gives them.

I still don’t think he ever goes all the way there. I think about how he ALWAYS checks with Neteyam and Lo’ak to make sure they’re okay before anything else every time something happens to them. That’s the dad part of him coming out, making itself known and fighting against the commanding officer side that comes out when he is upset with the boys when they make mistakes. This is also where I think the “sir” comes from. You never hear the kids refer to Jake as “sir” in the pre-humans era and you don’t hear the girls use it at all. But the boys do. And the boys only do it when Jake is in commanding officer mode, giving them orders or chastising them for disobeying. For the majority of the movie, they refer to him as “dad.” It is only in those specific situations that “sir” comes out. I think the movie again leans into this being a mistake on Jake’s part, a way that he has failed the boys in the post-human era by disciplining them not as a father, but as a commanding officer.

One interesting note about the “sir” thing though, Ao’nung and the boys also use it in reference to Tonowari as well. This makes me wonder if it is the English translation of a word in Na’vi that is being used to show deference to the Olo'eyktan. I don’t know enough about the language to say for sure either way and I think my point above still stands either way as it is still Jake being more of a leader to his sons than a father, but I think it’s an interesting detail. One I would love to have some other thoughts on!

The main point is that Jake loves his boys as much as he loves his girls, but because his boys are warriors/hunters there is definitely this line he has trouble treading between being their father and being their commanding officer in a way he doesn’t have to worry about with the girls. He doesn’t have to balance two roles with them, they are simply his children while Neteyam and Lo’ak are older and have more responsibilities. They are warriors/hunters fighting alongside the other clan members whether Jake likes it or not because that is their right and duty as members of the Omaticaya. And so Jake struggles, losing sight of who he needs to be with them because he has to take on this extra role to keep both them and the other fights under his command safe. Because this is the only way he knows how to fight and he is scared that if he doesn’t prepare them, they are not going to survive. It is not an easy line to tread and while it does not excuse Jake, I think it makes it easy to understand why he is the way he is with Neteyam and Lo’ak vs. Kiri and Tuk.

“Jake Doesn’t Love Lo’ak”

And now we get into the main part of this post, which is insane considering how long it took to get here. I’m sorry. Except, you know, I’m really not. I had fun discussing the rest of it! And I am freaking excited to discuss this part too. This is the relationship that made me want to write this post, the relationship that I personally think is one of the most important ones in the entire movie.

The relationship between Jake and Lo’ak.

Now, I do want to first mention that how well you get along with someone is not always an indicator of how much you love them. Or more like, you can love a group of people equally but get along with each of them differently. For example, I have two sisters and I love them both equally, but I get along with my youngest sister better than my middle sister. My middle sister and I have personalities that clash more often so we fight more than I do with my youngest sister. But I would still die for either of them. And that’s the thing, you can love someone and still not always get along with them. That’s just part of being a person.

And I think that applies to parents and children as well. Parents can love all of their children equally, but that doesn’t mean they are going to get along with them all equally. There are going to be some that they clash with more often than others simply because every personality is going to be different and relate to each other in different ways.

And that’s the reason why Jake gets along differently with Neteyam than he does with Lo’ak. It has nothing to do with how much he loves them, it simply has to do with the fact that Jake and Lo’ak’s personalities are way too similar and they clash way more frequently as a result of that. That’s the heart of why Jake and Lo’ak have the kind of relationship they do: Lo’ak reminds Jake of himself in a way that none of the other kids do. And to a man who is already scared out of his mind for and about his children, seeing himself in Lo’ak scares him even more. 

They do such a great job throughout the movie showing the similarities between Jake and Lo’ak. There are so many scenes that draw a direct parallel between them, emphasizing their similarities. From the scenes played back-to-back in this movie showing Jake and Lo’ak trying (and failing) to ride the water creatures in the same determined (and cocky) way, to Lo’ak being attacked in the water in a way that parallels Jake being attacked by the thanator in the first movie. Then there are the little bits like Lo’ak flipping off Quaritch and the little speech he gives before decking Ao'nung that are so very much things Jake would have done himself. Even the parallels between Lo’ak bonding with Payakan as an outsider and Jake bonding with Turok also as an outsider to the way Lo’ak falls for his teacher, Tsireya, in a similar way Jake fell for Neytiri. The movie is purposefully and repeatedly showing us how similar Lo’ak is to his father.

They are both impulsive, headstrong, and quick to anger. And Jake sees all that, sees all the negative traits because at this point in his life, with all of his guilt and fear swirling around inside of him, that’s all he can see in himself as well. He has trouble seeing the good in himself, the strength of character, the desire to protect those he loves, and a heart open and willing to fully give for those he loves. All of which Lo’ak has as well, but because Jake fails to see the positive traits he himself has, he has trouble seeing the positive traits Lo’ak has, and therefore Lo’ak struggles to see the good in himself as well.

And I don’t say this as some kind of “Lo’ak is exactly like Jake” or something, because he’s not, but the movie does a lot to show how they are similar and how those similarities are the driving force behind why their relationship is the way it is.

I say all of this to explain why there is more tension between Jake and Lo’ak than between Jake and Neteyam. Lo’ak scares Jake more than any of his other kids because he sees in Lo’ak the same things he has in himself, things that led to him hurting others and, ultimately, himself. And I think Jake is terrified that Lo’ak is going to make the same mistakes he did and so he is harder and stricter with Lo’ak as a result. Again, I don’t think it has anything to do with how much he loves him. If anything, Jake loves Lo’ak so much that he’s determined to protect Lo’ak from his own faults and to prevent his son from following in his footsteps, and doesn’t see how that is hurting Lo’ak.

It’s so interesting to me that Jake tries to use the same tactics on Lo’ak that were used on him in the first movie which directly led to him rebelling against them even harder. And I know some people are going to be like “isn’t that stupid? Shouldn’t Jake KNOW those things won’t work on Lo’ak because they didn’t work on him?” And that’s what makes it so fascinating because it emphasizes the thing I think to be very true of all people: we are never more blind than when it comes to ourselves. Jake doesn’t know how to deal with Lo’ak in the way Lo’ak needs because he has no idea how to deal with himself. Because all he can see are his mistakes, his failures, and the way he has hurt people, and as he looks at his son whom he loves, all he can see are those things being repeated, and that terrifies him. And that fear once again, as is the continuing arc for Jake in this movie, overwhelms him and blinds him to what he needs to do.

Jake gets along better with Neteyam not because he loves Neteyam more, but because Neteyam’s personality is much calmer and steadier and because of that, Jake trusts him in a way that he can’t trust Lo’ak because he cannot trust himself. He’s still scared for Neteyam, but not because he’s scared Neteyam is going to do something stupid. He trusts Neteyam to think things through and be logical in a way he doesn’t trust Lo’ak to be because he himself isn’t logical. And I know that’s not fair, it’s not supposed to be fair. But here’s the thing: relationships aren’t always fair. We are constantly bringing our baggage and insecurities and personal failings into our relationships and even though it is so important to try to be fair and not let those things affect us, the truth is we are all people and we are all going to make mistakes. And this is one of Jake’s. One that the movie very clearly points out. It is not necessarily fair that Jake trusts Neteyam more than he trusts Lo’ak, but he does. And I think that lack of trust is what drives Lo’ak to act out and then results in Jake trusting him even less. It’s a cycle built on them seeing themselves in each other and failing to realize how to deal with it.

Now, bear with me for just a moment because I’m going to go a bit off-script and discuss a headcanon of mine. None of this is canon and while I think there is evidence for it, there is no proof or confirmation. My argument works perfectly fine without it, but I do think it is interesting to bring up simply for conversation and thought.

I think that Neteyam reminds Jake of Tom. And I know we have no real evidence of what Tom was like or what his relationship with Jake was like, but I’m sure James Cameron does and while he may not explicitly say it in a movie that is already super filled with information, I wouldn’t be surprised if he sprinkles in hints here and there. And I personally think Tom and Jake had a relationship very similar to the one Neteyam and Lo’ak have. Again, there is no proof of this, but it would make sense thematically from a movie standpoint for this to be the case. Since there is such a heavy emphasis placed on how similar Jake and Lo’ak are, it makes sense to me that Tom would be like Neteyam, the one who attempted to keep a younger Jake under control. Since Jake is twenty-two in the first movie and had been discharged from the Marines for a least a while, he would have had to have enlisted pretty young. My guess is right at eighteen. I also think Tom probably tried to talk him out of it and Jake, being Jake, refused to listen. This would be a direct parallel to how Neteyam tries to keep Lo’ak out of trouble and Lo’ak refuses to listen. This would be another reason why Jake encourages Neteyam to watch out for Lo’ak and tells Lo’ak to listen to his older brother. Another way he tries to keep his younger son from making the same mistakes he did. Again, none of this is canon, but it is a very interesting idea that I personally really like and I think fits really well with the story being told about these characters.

Another reason Lo’ak believes his parents, and especially his father, love Neteyam more than him is because he thinks they see Neteyam as the perfect child. While I don’t think they think of him as the perfect child, I do think they see Neteyam through rose-colored glasses because he is their firstborn child. Canonically, Neteyam was what gave Neytiri hope again after her home was destroyed and her father was killed. I want to dive deeper into Neteyam in a separate post (he deserves his own), but it’s definitely something I want to mention here because it does play into why Lo’ak sees himself as a failure and Neteyam as perfect. He’s not and I don’t think Jake or Neytiri think he is (or love him more) I simply think he is a symbol for both of them of redemption and hope and proof that after something terrible happens, good things can still happen too. Definitely not an easy thing to live with for either Neteyam or Lo’ak, but something that I think is relevant and needs to be discussed when dissecting these relationships. 

Again, this is not fair. But again, relationships aren’t fair. Parents are people too. They are not perfect. They are flawed, they make mistakes, and they stumble. The movie does not glorify this behavior, it simply explains why it is happening and then shows its negative effects.  

I think it’s ironic that Lo’ak talks about feeling like an outsider and tells Tsireya that his dad wouldn’t understand when I believe Jake is the only one who would ever understand. Mostly because I believe Jake still feels like an outsider, still feels like he has to earn his place among the people and that’s another reason why he is so filled with fear and even guilt. From what I’ve seen from the movie, even in the pre-human era, I don’t think Jake talked to his kids much about what it was like to be human. I think Jake is so determined to prove that he has left all that behind that he doesn’t help his kids understand that part of their heritage. And while I personally think that comes from a place of love and a desire to protect them (he doesn’t want them to feel different or like outsiders the way he does), it only serves to confuse Lo’ak who has the most human qualities. He doesn’t understand why he’s different and Jake hasn’t taken the time to teach him how to deal with and embrace those human qualities. Again, I don’t think it’s done purposefully, in fact, I very much believe that Jake thinks he is helping Lo’ak, but this is another way that the movie shows us that while Jake’s heart is 100% in the right place, he still makes a mistake. He still cannot understand how to give Lo’ak what he needs.

Jake struggles with guilt and is constantly trying to prove himself to the people. An example of this is when Neytiri argues with Ronal about how Jake was Toruk Makto and lead the people to war. Jake is clearly embarrassed by this and noticeably winces. He doesn’t like being referred to like that and I believe it’s because he still feels guilty. It would be like someone praising you for building them a new house when you were the one who burned down the original. You didn’t rebuild the house out of the kindness of your heart, you did it to fix the mistake you made. It is penance. And I think Jake views his time as Toruk Makto not as some great thing he did, but as him simply trying to fix his own mistake. Penance. Redemption. Correction. And I think it is so ironic that both Neteyam and Lo’ak are trying to live up to his ideal of the perfect warrior, the great Toruk Makto, that they see in their father and yet it is something that Jake is ashamed of. He doesn’t want his sons to follow in his footsteps, he wants them to be safe. But there is this critical lack of understanding between him as a parent trying to protect his sons and his sons as children trying to be like their father, not realizing that is the last thing he wants for them. It is a standard they can never meet because they are striving for the opposite of what Jake wants for them and it causes friction, especially between Jake and Lo’ak. It is another reason why Lo’ak constantly feels like a failure and Jake is so hard on him. They cannot See each other properly.

Their entire relationship and its push and pull comes to a head when Neteyam dies.

I know there are a lot of people talking about Jake blaming Lo’ak for what happens to Neteyam, especially since Jake tells Lo’ak “you’ve done enough” when telling him to stay behind. I want to make it very clear that I do not think it is ever okay to say that kind of thing to your child. And I 100% believe the movie makes a point of showing how that was totally not okay of Jake to say. But here’s the thing: I don’t think Jake ever for even a moment actually blames Lo’ak. Jake blames himself. He failed to protect his children, his whole family really, and Neteyam dies as a result. To add insult to injury, the only reason Neteyam was on the ship was to save his siblings because they were being held in order to capture Jake. That I think this is driven home when Quaritch literally tells Jake it’s his fault Neteyam is dead AS HE STANDS OVER HIS SON’S BODY! I also can’t help but think about Neteyam saying “I want to go home” right before he dies and how horrible Jake must feel about being the reason why his son was taken away from his home. And what is Neteyam’s last word? “Dad.” I believe Jake wonders about that last word and if it was a plea or an accusation, both of which would be heartbreaking for a father to consider.

Jake blames himself, in so many different ways, for Neteyam. For failing Neteyam. For not protecting Neteyam. For not being the father Neteyam needed. And that blame that he heaps on himself oozes out onto the person he sees himself in: Lo’ak. Again, this does not make this behavior okay. It simply explains why this behavior is happening. 

All of this leads us to one of my favorite scenes in the entirety of the movie: the scene where Lo’ak rescues Jake. I absolutely adore it because I think it’s the climax of everything that these two have been through together and individually.

Before I get into it, I do want to make a note about the beginning of the scene when Jake calls out Neteyam’s name. I’ve seen some people use this as evidence that Jake loves Neteyam more, but I disagree. I think this is the direct result of Jake thinking he is dead and waking up in Ewya with Neteyam. Once Lo’ak tells him who it is, you can see Jake snap back to reality and realize he is still alive and stuck in a sinking ship. And I want to talk about this next bit very carefully. Lo’ak apologizes for Neteyam’s death and even says something along the lines of “I’m so sorry, Dad” and then corrects it to “I’m so sorry, sir.” I believe the “sir” makes an appearance here because he is, in this moment, appealing not to his father, but to his commanding officer who he feels like he failed. You can see his shift from talking to Jake like a son to talking to Jake like a soldier and yes, this scene is heartbreaking and it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to hurt you. It’s supposed to make you recoil a bit. It’s showing you how exactly Lo’ak is feeling and how exactly Jake has failed him as a father in the last year. Lo’ak is not reaching out to Jake as a son who has just lost a brother, but as a soldier who has just lost his fellow soldier. I’ve seen some people say that because Jake doesn’t tell him “it’s not your fault” he still blames Lo’ak. I disagree with this. Jake tells Lo’ak to “focus” and to “not think about the past” not because he still blames him, but because he is going into protective dad mode and is realizing that he is in danger of losing the only son he has left. And Jake is not going to let that happen. His next words are asking if Lo’ak knows the way out, showing that he is thinking about his son’s safety and his life. He doesn’t want Lo’ak to focus on something he cannot fix or change, he wants Lo’ak to focus on getting out and surviving. At this point, Jake isn’t planning on surviving as well, but he has to make sure that his son will. He is refusing to let another one of his children die. You can almost see the thought running through his head that he may have failed to save Neteyam, but he is not going to fail to save Lo’ak.

The next bit where Jake basically tells Lo’ak to leave without him and let him drown is also absolutely heartbreaking. I think Jake has given up at this moment because he thinks he has killed Quaritch and is sacrificing himself to pay for his sins. Again, Jake blames himself for everything that has happened and I think he believes that he deserves to die. For failing Neteyam, for failing his family, for failing the people. For not being enough. I’ve always viewed his taming of Toruk in the first movie as Jake being willing to die to make up for his mistake. The taming of Toruk was dangerous and could have easily gotten him killed but he knew it was the only way to prove to the people that he was on their side 100%. And once again, after putting his life on the line to save his kids, to kill the one hunting them down, he is ready to die to pay for his mistakes. This whole movie has been, on Jake’s side, an exploration of how he has tried and failed to keep everyone safe to the detriment of his relationships with his children, Lo’ak specifically, up to this point.

And then here comes the moment that made me well up and cry (again) in the theater. Lo’ak tells Jake he cannot lose him too. I think this is a purposeful word choice on Lo’ak’s part. He doesn’t say “the family can’t lose you too” or “the people can’t lose you too.” He says “I cannot lose you too.” What a powerful, beautiful moment where Lo’ak is vulnerable with Jake and admits that he, personally, needs his father, especially after losing his older brother. And you can see at that moment Jake SEEING Lo’ak and realizing that while he may have failed Neteyam, he can be and do better for Lo’ak. That is what makes him fight. That is what gets him going again. He decides at that moment to be there and be a better father for Lo’ak.

I know some people are going to be like “but he didn’t say that!” And to that I reply, it’s freaking subtext bro. Not everything has to be spelled out to be true. It’s in the way the characters act, the decisions they make, and the things they say. It’s the way that Jake chooses to fight after Lo’ak says that. The way he listens to Lo’ak as his son teaches him how to breathe. The way he puts his life in his son’s hands and finally does what Lo’ak has been wanting him to do this whole entire movie: trust him. Honestly, it is such a powerful moment of non-verbal storytelling, of Cameron showing us how their relationship is starting to change and evolve and become better. It’s that moment of trust between these two that allows Lo’ak to save Jake and then when Payakun shows up and saves both of them, Jake gets to see his trust in his son pay off. It is confirmation that Payakun is on their side, that he taking care of Lo’ak and the people, and that Lo’ak was right about him the whole time. 

And I’m sorry, but if you didn’t start to cry when Jake cups Lo’ak cheek and tells him “I See you, son” then you may not have a heart. Like, damn, that one really hit me. What an incredible, beautiful parallel to the scene in the first movie when Neytiri saves Jake and they tell each other “I See you.” Absolutely gut-wrenching in the best way. I know some people are going to say “that’s just a catch-all phrase!” And I mean, yeah, it kind of is, but it’s been set up to be that way. It was always used to express heavy emotions that were hard to put into words in the first movie and it is being used in the same way here. It is a moment of apology, of acknowledgment, and of acceptance from Jake to Lo’ak. A moment where Jake finally Sees his son for who he is, that he is more than the parts of himself Jake sees in him. That he is his own person, strong and capable and worthy of trust. Yes, Lo’ak pulls some stupid stuff, but it has always been because he is trying to prove himself to his dad and now Jake Sees him and accepts him and loves him.

I’m getting kind of emotional just thinking about it, holy hell. 

I think this moment is Jake apologizing for how he has treated Lo’ak, acknowledging that Lo’ak has grown and matured and become his own person, and accepting the person Lo’ak has become. Jake is giving his son his love and his trust and his pride. He is so proud of his boy, y’all! You cannot look me in the eye and tell me that there isn’t a stupid amount of pride in Jake for everything Lo’ak manages to do. He was proud of him for beating up Ao’nung, even though he didn’t want Lo’ak to know, and he is proud of him here at this moment. I think this moment is also about Jake realizing that he needs to do better. He needs to be better, for Lo’ak and the other kids. That he may have lost Neteyam, but he still has children left that he needs to be there for. Be better for. That he can no longer let his fear consume him because by letting fear rule his life, he lost one of his children. Not that it’s Jake’s fault really, that 100% rests with Quaritch and the other humans who are trying to slaughter people and take over an entire world, but I definitely think this is what he feels. And gosh that family hug at the end, with Jake holding on to Lo’ak, and then later when he pulls both Spider and Lo’ak close for a hug once again shows how much he loves his kids. All of his kids.

To kind of wrap up this section, I do want to mention the really interesting parallel that’s set up between Spider and Quaritch and Lo’ak and Jake. Spider and Quaritch start the movie on shaky ground and then grow closer throughout the movie. Then the village burning, the Tulkan hunting, and the final confrontation happen and their relationship is put to the test. Spider still chooses to save his dad, but he leaves him afterward, choosing to sever their relationship, at least for the time being. In comparison, Lo’ak and Jake start the post-human era of their relationship off to a shaky start and throughout the movie, it is strained more and more. Then Neteyam dies and their relationship is put to the test. And like Spider, Lo’ak chooses to save his father. But instead of their relationship being severed, Jake chooses to embrace Lo’ak and there is a beautiful moment of healing and acknowledgment that things need to become better. A direct contrast to how Spider and Quaritch’s relationship ends in this movie. 

All this leads to what I think is going to be coming up next, specifically for Jake and Lo’ak. 

The Future Movies

Considering we left with Jake realizing that letting fear rule his life has hurt his family and he can no longer live that way, I think we’re going to see a return to a more pre-human dad Jake. I believe he is going to go back to being softer, warmer, and much less of a military dad. I mean don’t get me wrong, Jake is still going to be fighting the humans and kicking ass, but his entire arc was him realizing how he failed Neteyam as a father and now he will be striving to be better for all his kids. Especially Lo’ak. 

I definitely think we’re going to see them become closer in the next movie. Since the Way of Water focused on the strife in the relationship, I think we’re going to see the next movie focus on the healing in their relationship. The way they complement each other in comparison to the way they clashed in this. Jake has accepted Lo’ak as his own person and while their similarities are still going to cause some tension (because they are people who make mistakes) I definitely think we’re going to see them grow stronger and Jake really take Lo’ak under his wing. I would also love to see Jake help Lo’ak come to terms with his human heritage and what it means to feel different from everyone else. I think it’s possible since this movie focused on how Lo’ak feels like an alien and focusing next on how he isn’t alone in that feeling would be an incredible way to complete his journey to understanding himself. I also really think these two are going to bond over their grief about Neteyam and I would LOVE to see them discussing the guilt each of them carries and work through it together. I know that’s a lot I want to happen and I don’t know how long the next movie is going to be and how much it’s going to have to cover. I am confident about them getting closer and their relationship being a cornerstone of the next movie, but as for how much we see of Jake and Lo’ak discussing being “other” or their guilt is harder to say. I think it would be great though and would fit so well with the story Cameron is telling about these two characters.

I also think we’re going to see more comparisons between Spider and Quaritch and Jake and Lo’ak. I think Jake and Lo’ak are going to be the positive father/son example, not because they’re perfect but simply because they have come to an understanding in the Way of Water and are learning to be better together. I’m not sure if Quaritch is going to get a redemption arc or not (I kind of don’t want him to since the things he has done are pretty unforgivable) but with Spider added to the equation it does give him a reason to try to be better. If he does, then I imagine their relationship will parallel Jake and Lo’ak’s. If not, then I think there will be a really interesting contrast between the two. Especially with how much Quaritch mimics Jake during the Way of Water, which is setting them up as foils to each other for the rest of the series.

But those are just a few thoughts about what I think will happen in regard to these characters in particular. I’m considering doing a theory post that contains all my theories about the future movies, but that would be a separate thing if I end up doing it. I’m just really curious to see where we go from here. I think they are setting up a lot in this movie in regard to these characters and I’m honestly so excited to see it pay off. This is kind of where I think it’s going to go after everything this movie set up, but I am well aware I could end up being dead wrong. Either way though, I am so excited to see what Cameron has in store! Especially since it’s almost all but confirmed that the Way of Water made enough money to greenlight movies four and five.

Woohoo! 

Conclusion 

I love these characters. Like, seriously, Jake and Lo’ak are two of my favorites in this whole series. And I adored their relationship. Not because it was perfect or even good most of the time, but because it was complex and interesting and real. I’m always going to be a sucker for a good romance (Jake and Neytiri literally have my whole entire heart and I’m a big fan of Lo’ak and Tsireya), but I enjoy familial relationships the most. Their complexity fascinates me. The way family members, whether blood or not, choose each other and would die for each other but also sometimes tear each other apart. The way they showcase the idea of legacy and inheritance and how we are shaped by those closest to us. The way they exemplify the idea that we can love people with our whole entire hearts and still hurt them more than anyone else. People always bring their own baggage into their relationships with others, but I think that baggage affects our family members more than anyone else. And I believe that to be especially true between parents and children since our baggage often is what makes us who we are and who we are affects who our children become, for better or worse. The way our parents shape us and the way we shape our parents. The burning, ripping, tearing way we love each other. How there is nothing a parent wouldn’t do for their child and how often children are blind to that. The way that love can also be so healing, so warm, so soft, so gentle. The duality of it. I just…ugh. I wish there were more complicated, real, powerful parent/child relationships in media like this. Ones that aren’t completely negative or completely positive. Ones that are a combination of both because that is so often how actual relationships between parents and children are.

I am so glad this movie had it.  

But listen, I’m not here to tell you that you have to like these characters. I’m not here to tell you that you have to think Jake is a good dad. That is a loaded opinion and everyone is going to have different ideas and beliefs regarding what it means to be a good parent. I personally think a good parent is someone who protects their children at all costs and puts their children’s needs above their own. And I think Jake does that. But the movie clearly shows us that there are problems with how he does it. He makes mistakes. He is flawed. And that ends up hurting all the kids, especially Lo’ak. And Jake’s big character arc is learning that and realizing he has to do better. And choosing to try. To change. 

I know some people are going to be frustrated with the fact that Jake never verbally says the words “I am sorry” or “I will be better.” But I truly do believe that “I See you, son” included an apology. And the decision to be better is subtext from watching him at the end of the movie. Watching him choose to trust Lo’ak. Watching him embrace his son. Watching him grieve and mourn Neteyam. And hearing him talk about how he can’t live in fear anymore. And since that fear was what was pushing him to be harder on his kids, harder on Lo’ak, then deciding to no longer give in to that fear shows him making that first step to being a better father to his kids. I believe Jake thinks he failed Neteyam and he is determined not to fail his kids anymore. The first step of fixing a problem, after all, is admitting you have one that needs to be fixed. Jake will be striving to be better next movie and I firmly believe Lo’ak will be right beside him the entire time. This is a duo I think is going to play an important role in all the movies to come. 

So yeah guys. This is my post exploring my thoughts on these characters and dissecting how they grow and change throughout the movie. Looking at how the movie presents them and how it explains the decisions they make. I’m just here to interact with a film I adore and characters I would die for. And yes, I am here to hit back a bit against the “Jake doesn’t love all his kids equally” rhetoric. Because I do believe it to be false. And this is my insanely long-winded explanation as to why I think that.

I have a few more posts in mind. The one I mentioned about Neteyam and his role in the movie as well as the one I mentioned about all my theories about what is going to happen in the next movie. I also would like to do one about Spider and maybe even one about Kiri. I also think one just going over the parts of the movie I loved would be a lot of fun. But I haven’t settled on anything yet! I’ve been working on this monster since I saw the movie for the first time on December 15th so who knows when I’ll be ready to do another one, ha! We’ll see what ends up happening. 

Anyway. After an INSANE 10,000 words (a total that is more than any essay I have ever written), we are finally at the end. That’s how much I love this movie, these characters, and their relationship. So much so that I wrote this monster for absolutely no reason than my own enjoyment. I regret nothing. My English major self really came through strong here. For anyone who managed to get to the end of this…holy hell, my friend. You’re the real one! I hope you enjoyed reading my ramblings and exploration as much as I enjoyed writing them.

Till next time.

[todoscript]

how he would ask you out

request: pls some headcanons of how the boys (shinsou/tamaki/shouto) would ask the girl they like out 🥺

characters: shinsou hitoshi, amajiki tamaki, todoroki shouto

genre: fluff

word count: 3.3k+ total, 900-1200 per character

tags: pining, confessions, fem!reader

author’s notes: sorry if this sounds rushed?? i can’t write 

copyright 2021 todoscript, all rights reserved. i do not allow my creations to be published or translated anywhere else.

SHINSOU HITOSHI

two years after his enrollment into the hero course, shinsou had finally came to terms with the feelings he’s been holding for you for quite some time now.

what began as just friendly encounters and kind gestures felt like something more to him. after all, you were one of the key people that led him to transition smoothly into the class, with your helpful demeanor and coming to his aid whenever he was stressed and troubled by the new environment.

you went out of your way to organize study sessions and small arrangements to mingle and get to know the other students better.

you reiterated to him that if he ever had any questions about anything, he could always come to you.

initially, shinsou thought he was being a burden—that he was just heavy baggage that tied you down.

however, you assured he was anything but, and stated that you were more than happy to help him, even going to say you enjoyed spending time and getting to learn more about him.

at your response, shinsou was appalled at how genuine you were.

appalled… but also very grateful.

eventually, there came a point when he realized there was no mistaking the affection he felt for you—not when he subconsciously noted every one of your habits and intricacies, able to tell whatever emotions were running through you at a simple glance, or when he would stop to admire the way you decided to style your hair differently or changed your look, thinking you seemed even more charming that day by the confidence you exude.

no, at that point, he’s sure it was painfully obvious. so obvious, in fact, that kaminari and mina had chosen to skip today’s group study session in favor of letting the two of you have your “alone time”. whatever that could mean.

shinsou had grimaced over their excuse of “being too busy that day” when you had told him the reasoning they gave you over text, despite knowing their next exam was only a couple days away. recalling just how nosy and enthusiastic they could get when involved in these kinds of affairs, he had an inkling of what exactly those two were planning. you, on the other hand, seemed completely oblivious to their schemes.

however, what did latch onto your mind was the thought of spending the day with only shinsou, in his very room, sitting across from each other with your textbooks open in front of you. though you should be more attentive to your studies, you couldn’t help the palpitations beating loudly in your chest and your wandering eyes that snuck glances at him after every question you answered.

unbeknownst to you, shinsou mirrored your actions all the same, reciprocating the flustered behavior, albeit a bit more subtly.

keep calm, hitoshi. why are you getting all worked up? he would say to himself, putting on his usual facade.

although he came off as relatively calm and collected on the outside, it’s difficult to keep his emotions in check when actions never lie.

that was especially true as he reached his hand out for the eraser you two were sharing between each other. with his eyes continuing to gander down at his notes, he hadn’t noticed that you were lunging for the same thing—not until your fingers had suddenly touched and you both pulled away at a speed equivalent to making contact with fire.

his stare unfaltering, shinsou was surprised to discern the embarrassed look on your face that immediately fixed itself as you rummaged through your pencil pouch. a second later, you pulled out another eraser, one that was notably smaller than the one you were sharing.

“um.. i’ll just use this,” you offered, and shinsou rubbed the back of his neck, the whole situation more awkward than it needed to be considering you never had any trouble sharing your supplies with each other before.

through some examination of your demeanor, shinsou had made a… bold enough claim, thinking that maybe—just maybe—you held the same kind of affections for him as he did for you.

it’s like he recalled earlier—actions never lie—and shinsou didn’t let the quiver of your lips or the intense concentration at your work to avoid meeting his gaze go past his head. that’s what spurred him to finally act on his desires.

without warning, he leaned forward on his seat to lay his hand over yours that caught your attention. you met his eyes, astonished to say the least, but more so concerned by how your eyes widened before you were about to open your mouth to ask him what was wrong.

the violet-haired male beats you to your words, voice resonating firmly, “y/n.”

you blinked. “y-yeah..?”

“i know this might be a bit late coming from me, but,” you could feel his hand tighten atop yours, “after exams, do you want to catch a movie together? just the two of us?”

shinsou fought the urge to look away, bashful at how he made his declaration for your time. the warmth surging under his skin was alleviated at the smile that slowly curled on your lips as you rotate your wrist, your palm touching his. the expression washing over your features told him you’ve been waiting for him to ask you this for a while now.

“i’d love to.”

AMAJIKI TAMAKI

ever a shy and introverted individual, tamaki has never had the heart to ask you out despite years of harboring a crush on you.

every time the thought had crossed his mind, he’d reason poorly with himself that you wouldn’t be interested in him in that way.

it didn’t help that his low self-esteem only deepened that thought that had now rooted itself in his brain.

at such a prestigious school like u.a., you were bound to find someone far more compelling than him—someone with guts, confidence, and great social skills. not a guy like him who conjures the image of potatoes at every anxiety-inducing encounter he comes across.

he was relieved enough to settle himself comfortably as just your friend—a title that allowed him to stay close and keep within your circle, all the while subjecting him to simply admiring you from afar.

but his eyes that held a hidden longing for more weren’t overlooked by a fellow student of his. or to be precise, the ever curious and free-spirited, hadou nejire.

always aware of his surroundings, it was hard not to notice that peculiar stare she’d aim at him during moments where he might’ve just finished speaking to you, or when you’d pass by and his head would naturally drift in your direction.

it was like she was picking apart every detail laid on him and it made tamaki absolutely restless.

tamaki’s suspicions and anxiety were later raised during one instance at the lunch table. he was at his usual seat next to his other big three companions, mirio and the aforementioned nejire, who was eyeing him with a gleam in her eye.

even with his self-consciousness, tamaki did his best not to pay any mind to the undesired attention and munched on his plate of takoyaki—the octopus nestled in the batter sure to come in handy later in training that day.

to his dismay, you passed by their table with your tray of food in hand, and nejire did not waste any time calling you over in that cheery tone of hers.

she invited you to sit down with them. you gave her invitation some thought before ultimately placing yourself in the free spot next to mirio, with nejire and tamaki already seated across from you.

the girl was all smiles and hums while tamaki was in a state of distress, both at his friend’s odd behavior, which was starting to spell trouble, to having you pulled into all of this. mirio was just being mirio, welcoming as always.

you greeted everyone at the table, making eye contact with mirio and nejire, but tamaki evaded your line of sight. he simply waved his reply without breaking away from his balls of takoyaki.

luckily for him, you didn’t give his lack of words much thought and started digging into your own lunch. it was then that nejire found it appropriate to start up a conversation.

“y’know, y/n, i’ve been meaning to ask you this, from one girl to another,” she mused, finger waving around playfully, “are you interested in anyone here?”

upon hearing her question, tamaki almost choked on his bonito flakes, his cheeks puffed and eyes blown. meanwhile, your chewing slowed as you gave your answer some thought.

“uh… well–”

“i’d say fujita from class d is quite the looker! think you’d be interested in them?”

after swallowing the food in his mouth, tamaki began to subconsciously listen in on the conversation. he paid close attention to your responses with bated breath, a small part of him anticipating your answer highly.

“fujita’s nice and all, but i don’t think we’d really get along as a couple.”

tamaki mentally sighed, relief evident all over his face. it was then that mirio had started fitting the pieces together after watching his close friend’s brow wrinkle throughout the entire exchange before finally relaxing at your words. crossing his eyes with nejire’s only confirmed his suspicions as the girl sent him a wink.

as a friend, mirio wasn’t about to let nejire’s operations fall flat. getting up from his seat, he motioned tamaki to come with him.

“i heard they have extra yakisoba bread right now! we should go check it out!” he said as a guise to give the other two time to themselves, free from tamaki’s prying ears.

unaware that mirio had caught on so quickly, tamaki didn’t object to tagging along with him. mostly because he thought of this as an opportunity to get some fresh air and calm his racing heart, finally feeling the effects of the blood rushing to his face.

with tamaki supposedly out of earshot, nejire was free to go about her questions however she wanted.

“okay then, if not fujita, then who? there has to be someone, right?” the girl scooted further in her seat out of pure curiosity. “tell me, is it perhaps someone in our class?”

it was your turn to be stricken by her boldness. you tried picking at your food, stuffing it into your mouth to avoid answering, but nejire’s tenacity outmatched you.

finishing your lunch, you opened your mouth to speak, “actually, the person i’m interested in is pretty close to you…”

nejire feigned ignorance, innocently placing a finger under her chin. “who? mirio?”

“ah no, it’s tamaki, alright?!” you ended up blurting, voice hushed but frantic.

bingo. hearing exactly what she wanted, nejire returned to her original position, a triumphant grin plastered on her lips. replaying what you said out loud in your head, you buried your warm face in your hands.

unbeknownst to you, tamaki had ended up hearing the whole exchange around the corner coming back to their table as mirio lightly snickered at his revelation of an expression.

the blond patted his shoulder. “go on then, you know what to do.” he threw tamaki an encouraging thumbs-up.

the boy gulped in response before inhaling a deep breath of air to prepare himself for what would arguably be the most important yet stress-inducing moment of his life so far.

noticing you getting up to discard your tray, tamaki—through a final push from mirio—went to make his move.

hearing him suddenly call out to you, you were caught off-guard. after admitting to your crush on tamaki to nejire, you felt your cheeks get hot just seeing his face right afterward.

“oh hey, did you get your hands on those yakisoba breads?” you scraped up a way to start the conversation.

“right... that… mirio managed to get the last one in the cafeteria,” he answered. then he brought his hand to rub his elbow, fidgeting in his spot as he found it difficult to look you in the eyes again.

“tamaki? something wrong? are you upset that he got the last yakisoba bread?”

he shook his head. “no, i… it’s just… i’ve been meaning to ask you this for a long time now, but never had the courage to say it to you because i didn’t think you ever liked me that way. but…” he finally mustered the determination to face you head-on. “would you go out with me, y/n?”

at first, you were speechless—absent of words as you relayed his request in your mind over and over again. then, your eyes softened, lips easing into a smile as you reached out for his hand.

“i thought you’d never ask.”

TODOROKI SHOUTO

it’s no surprise to many that when it came to asking someone out, todoroki didn’t exactly know the first thing to do.

mostly because he’s never asked anyone out to begin with.

you were the first person he’s ever felt these kinds of emotions for, and to be frank, he wasn’t sure what to make of everything that had been going through him when that root of infatuation had started to bloom inside him.

rather than sulk or contemplate on his thoughts for too long, he surmised it was best to simply come clean and ask for advice.

but when he confessed to what had been on his mind lately, he wasn’t expecting such a vigorous response from his friends.

“i’ve been thinking about asking y/n out.”

there was a layer of uncomfortable silence amongst the group before all hell eventually broke loose.

midoriya, uraraka, and iida immediately sprung from their seats in the common room, yelling “what?!” in unison. tsuyu and her frog-like mannerisms were more idle, but still surprised nonetheless.

todoroki was unfazed by their reactions, actually expecting it to go that way considering he’s never brought up any topics of that nature before. at the very least, he’s thankful he decided to say this when it was just the five of them. compared to what the whole class’s reaction would have been like, this was incredibly tame.

todoroki was used to always listening to what others had to say and never being the subject of the conversation when it came to dating.

but now things were different. he was openly admitting to them that he was regarding someone romantically. that he possibly sought a relationship with this someone—wanting to be committed to them and become the very best person he could be right next to them. to the four, this was coming completely out of left field.

after everyone simmered down and let the news sink in, the dual-haired boy resumed his thought,

“but i’m not sure how to do it.”

though the entirety of the group never had any experiences when it came to dating, they knew enough from media and pop culture to get an idea on how to help him. more than todoroki could imagine on his own anyway.

“i know! how about we go with the romantic and suave approach!” uraraka suggested. the rest asked her to elaborate.

“it’s simple! it starts by you leaving a note on her desk right before class, saying to meet you on the rooftop of the school! before the designated time, you should wait there for her with a bouquet of flowers, and then when she arrives, confess your feelings and ask her out!”

midoriya rubbed a finger against his cheek, skeptical. “i don’t think that sounds as simple as you’re making it out to be.”

tsuyu chimed in beside him. “those kinds of ideas usually only work well in books, ochako.”

pursing her lips, uraraka gave her plan a once-over, and realized it did seem a bit more involved and out of character than what todoroki was used to.

despite sharing a few more ideas with one another, they couldn’t narrow it down to any perfect one.

that was when iida clapped his hand, bringing everyone’s attention to him.

“alright, i think we’re starting to blow this whole ‘operation’ way out of proportion,” he said.

“if you’re honest about the way you feel about her and show it sincerely, i’m sure she’ll consider your feelings. you don’t have to do anything extravagant when it comes to asking someone out.”

listening throughout every word, todoroki nodded. meanwhile the other three were astonished that their class representative could be so whimsical when it came to romance, which in turn, iida was conflicted by. however, at the very least he was glad they could help out a friend. and so, todoroki went about his day with their discussion in mind.

he found that in many occurrences, whenever he crossed by you and thought of it as a chance to ask you out, there would always be someone to come in and take your time away. leaving him to stand there awkwardly before dismissing the fated question for later.

eventually, the sky dimmed and evening arrived, and by then, the whole class was already back at their dormitory and about to have dinner.

through some rather convenient circumstances, you two were actually assigned on kitchen duty that night.

“it’s been getting pretty cold lately so i was thinking we should cook up a hot pot for everyone.” you gave your idea to him as you pulled out some ingredients from the fridge, waiting for his reply, but it came a few seconds later than you were expecting.

“right. sounds like a good idea,” todoroki answered a tad late. upon realizing it was only going to be the two of you making dinner tonight, his mind was occupied by what he and his friends spoke about earlier.

that was when he started overthinking the situation and absentmindedly half-assed his work.

“todoroki, the cut on the tofu is slightly uneven.” you reviewed his cutting board. looking down, he saw the inconsistent slices of tofu limp in front of him. if bakugou were the executive chef for the evening, he would’ve had to hear an earful from him.

“sorry…” he apologized quietly, reaching out for another cube of tofu to cut.

“is everything okay? i know you’re still learning how to cook, but i’ve seen you show some significant improvement on your knife skills recently.” you voiced your concern for him.

the white and red-haired boy stared at the white bean curd while hearing your worried tone and couldn’t find it within himself to continue the task. it was now or never he thought. he laid the knife flat on the cutting board.

“actually, i wanted to ask you something.” he turned toward you. “do you… want to go out with me?”

nothing but the sound of the fire running on the stove could be heard in the kitchen. todoroki didn’t move his eyes away from you, watching you nearly drop the plate of siu choy and shiitake mushrooms out of shock as your mouth was hanging open.

when you caught onto your bearings, you let out a small laugh. “oh… i… wasn’t expecting that,” you admitted honestly, placing the ingredients on the counter safely.

the boy furrowed his brows. “is that a no?”

“n-no! i mean that isn’t my answer! i–” you fumbled with your words, cheeks warming up now that his confession had finally sunk in. in the meantime, todoroki found your reaction quite amusing. the corner of his lip quirked into a grin.

“what i mean to say is that yes, i’d love to go out with you.” you accepted the offer wholeheartedly. todoroki would be lying if his heart wasn’t throbbing from anticipation. he’s glad he’s able to rest and put that aside.

“now let’s continue making this hot pot together!” you cheered, smiling widely and he found comfort in your words before resuming slicing the tofu.

[ladystardustinblackjeans]

I really relate to this problem, and thank you for your advice! If i may add on in the hopes that it's helpful:

What helped me with getting confident in my own decisions:

Start small. Sounds silly but i was so terrified of doing something wrong unless i ran it by someone else, that i didn't even post comments on the internet or held opinions on discourse fandom stuff i didn't get from someone else. Start smaller. It helps to practice, and also practice getting over the panic that at least for me often set in after expressing an opinion, or thinking i did something wrong. And when i actually wasn't happy with my decision, it wasn't that serious because it was anonymous fandom wank and i could practice strategies for processing mistakes and applying what i learned to future decisions in private over not very consequential incidents.

Get practice! I already mentioned fandom wank and i implied media analysis. I further recommend reading aita posts. It helps you see what other people do about various life situations, and you can develop an opinion on things and also examine it from various perspectives from the comments of other people who read them.

Start taking charge of small shit in your life! What posters do you want to hang up? Tell someone confidently your favourite band. Develop a favourite bird and colour and way to eat potatoes. And tell people about it. Practice making decisions where you don't ask anyone for advice (or, what that amounted to for me functionally, permission). Voice your opinion to your parents on small inconsequential stuff that won't get you in trouble. Get used to the fact that the world doesn't end when you do it.

Do something forbidden. Not illegal, not something that would get you in trouble. But something that breaks a rule your parents actively or indirectly set up. Or someone else set up, whatever works for you. It's helpful if that is about your living environment or your body.

Related to that: you don't have to tell them everything. Goes extra for breaking a small subjective rule they set up. You can just do it anyway and not tell them. And it's important for autonomy to not report every detail to whoever is held in a place of authority over your personal life by you. Because that person should be you. And until it is, let's work towards that goal step by step.

Stop second guessing your own decisions. If i thought "oh i could go for a glass of water right now", i would often think right after "do i really need it? There is several factors to consider of why that might be inconvenient (when it really wasn't). Am i sure i need that glass of water, am i sure i want it that much?" Like hello it's a glass of water. It's an awful experience to be at the point where you do this kind of shit to yourself. Make sure you trust your own physical and emotional feelings.

You will make mistakes and regret and be unhappy with decisions you take. Just as you are probably unhappy with stuff your parents decide for you. This is inevitable, and part of growing up. It's fine. You're learning. You can't learn without making mistakes. And don't think you're too old for this, this should have been your teenager phase but it didn't happen like this, so you have to play catchup. Happened to me too. My method for dealing with mistakes: apologise if possible, make amends wherever possible, and analyse where things went wrong so you learn from it and don't make the same mistake again. And then don't ruminate more on it, it won't help.

I’ve found a lot of your posts about autonomy and infantilization helpful.

Do you have any advice for how to break out of self-infantilization, especially when you’ve been sheltered?

I grew up with strict parents and always thought I’d figure out how to be confident and independent when I went off to college.

But for a number of different reasons (including the pandemic) , I socially isolated myself and talked myself out of going out and trying new things, ex. I put off driving until I was 23, which limited where I could go.

And now for financial reasons I live with my parents while looking for a job.

I feel very immature for my age, like I don’t know how to start making decisions for myself without always asking for advice from someone else. I feel like I’m struggling with the transition to independence that most people go through from 15-18.

I can relate to some of this, and yeah, the aspect of financial and material dependence makes it difficult. One thing I would point out is that there's noting wrong with asking for advice, including from your parents (if you trust their advice!). Being autonomous doesn't mean figuring everything out on your own. Outside perspectives are good! But if you're asking ME for advice, I would suggest just being mindful of the difference, in your mindset, between asking for advice and asking for permission.

I think a lot of young people, even when they physically separate from their parents, get stuck in the "needing An Adult's Permission" mindset, and basically turn their boss/landlord/professor/doctor/therapist/partner into their substitute parent. And then if you do live with your parents as an adult (which I did! I still do, despite interludes of being elsewhere!), it's even easier to slip into the childhood mentality of submitting and needing permission. And it can take time and effort to break out of that mentality.

So I think my advice for keeping your advice-seeking from slipping into self-infantalization would be: -seek advice from multiple sources and use your own judgment to filter through it -seek advice from sources other than older people and authority figures. seek advice from people younger than you! -interact with people both older and younger than you as peers. tumblr is great for this! I never check anyone's ages, so I interact with 15 year olds and 50 year olds equally! I volunteer to be your middle-aged friend! -try to decouple money from decision-making in your mind. this is hard, because we live in a classist, capitalist, economically exploitative world. this was hard for me as a broke, dependent, unemployed young adult -- to break free of "I'm not a real adult yet because I don't have money" (an attitude actively encouraged by my family at the time) to "I don't have money to do most of the things I want, but of the things I can do, the things I don't actually need money for, I deserve to be in charge of." -if you don't have kids (you don't mention having any, so I'm assuming you don't), go make friends with people your age who have kids. offer to babysit, if that's something you're into. it's hard to think "I'm baby" when your peers have actual babies. That's all I can think of for now, but I mean, this is really hard. Life transitions are always hard, but we live in a world that makes this especially hard. And expensive. And that constantly lies to us about it. So just. Stay strong. Be yourself. All that good stuff. Oh, and one final thing: As you get older (which is inevitable, because time passes) do not forget everything you learned about ageism and youthlib. Older people have such selective memories and lack of empathy for their younger selves. To fight ageism, we have to align with our own younger selves.

[aboutapeachparty]

Stray Kids | bringing your child to the doctor for the first time

reaction | hyung line

genre ➸ romance, fluff, husband & dad! au

disclaimer ➸ This is a work of fiction. I don't own any famous character(s) - like idols - and my writings are in no way meant to show these people’s real nature and/or offend them in any way.

chan.

You have just been out of town because you and your friends agreed to go on a little girl trip. You have been very busy with motherhood since you and Chan had your baby girl. Your friends were last for a long time. But for your birthday they gave you a weekend at a spa and you were really looking forward to it. But it was also the first weekend for Chan alone with your daughter. And that night the little girl got a fever. High fever. At first, Chan thought that she couldn't sleep because you weren't there. After all, she was most used to you. But her face grew redder and redder and her body glowed. "Do you have a fever?" Chan stood in front of her bed in a panic and talked more to himself because the little girl just cried more and more. "Okay, where was the temperature monitor?" He would love to call you, but he didn't want to ruin your weekend. When he looked in the corner, he saw a box on the shelf that was labeled "Medicines". Immediately he ran over there and rummaged around and found something. "Thank God your mother is a neat freak," he said with a grin and went to his daughter with the temperature monitor. And as he had feared, she had a fever. The display read 39.5 degrees Celsius, but Chan couldn't do anything with it. Was it high or just increased? When does a baby have a fever? Slowly he panicked and didn't quite know what to do anymore. His daughter kept screaming loudly and he couldn't just leave her here. "Okay, come to Daddy," he said then gently and put his girl over his shoulder. But she didn't calm down. He picked up his phone and looked for the symptoms and found that this temperature is relatively high for a 6-month-old child and immediately decides to take her to the hospital. He dressed his daughter even when she was hot because he was still afraid that she would catch a cold. But that makes her scream even louder. She was hot from the fever and the jacket didn't make it any better. He took it off again and tried to put her in the child car seat.

"Hold on. We're going to the hospital in a moment." He tried to calm her down, but the little girl was too sick to notice her daddy. Chan drove off and he was glad that the nearest pediatric hospital was close by. After parking, he grabbed his daughter, held her tight to his chest, and ran. "I need a pediatrician, right now!" Chan was out of breath when he arrived at the reception and the receptionist looked at him in surprise but smiled gently when she saw his daughter. She was quiet now because she was so exhausted. She tried to cry now and then and to cling to her father, but she was already very weak. After all, she hadn't slept in hours and the fever was exhausting her. "Oh dear, is she sick?" Asked the woman and smiled. "She has a high fever. I read on the Internet that it is dangerous and I don't know ... my wife is not there and ... What do you do when a baby has a fever?" Chan was in a panic and hoped to be able to help his daughter soon. The woman nodded gently and smiled. "Everything is fine. I'll call a pediatrician right away." Chan thanked her and stood aside. Again and again, he stroked his daughter's back gently and hummed something to her. The girl became calmer, but she kept whimpering. Chan saw how exhausted she was, but she still fought so hard. "Christopher Bang?" He heard a voice and immediately turned around. A doctor had come and Chan immediately approached him. "My daughter, she has a high fever," he said immediately and the doctor immediately looked at his girl. But he could see right away that it wasn't anything serious. "At first, come in," he said with a soft smile and led the two of them into the practice. The pediatrician examined the child and he quickly came to his conclusion. "Fever is relatively normal for children. It can happen sometimes. It doesn't seem serious. She now needs special care and attention, bed rest and let the child drink about every half hour." The doctor smiled and Chan took his daughter back onto his lap. "Not more?" He was quite surprised. "It's all good. But please don't wrap your daughter so tightly in warm clothes." The doctor pointed to the jacket that Chan also had in his hand. "Oh, I didn't know ..." Chan was completely mistaken, that was all quite a lot. "The first child?" Asked the pediatrician and Chan nodded. "You learn with time. Everything is fine, but if the fever persists, just come back tomorrow." "Thank you, doctor," said Chan and let out a sigh of relief. Then he said goodbye and went out of the room. "Mummy will be proud of us when she comes home that we did it so well," said Chan and kissed his daughter on the hot forehead, who slowly closed her eyes.

minho.

"Y/N." Minho came into the bedroom with your daughter in his arms and looked at you seriously. "Mhmm?" You actually wanted your peace and quiet because your day was incredibly stressful. All-day you had been waiting to watch your favorite series and were glad that Minho put your daughter to bed. "We have to take her to the hospital. Her rash is getting bigger and bigger." "It's not serious," you say and look at Minho, shaking your head. Then you look back to the television and turn up the volume. "Can't you stand behind us? Our daughter is sick!" Minho looked at you in disbelief and didn't believe how indifferent you could be. But the truth was, your girl had rashes many times, and you've told Minho a hundred times not to worry. "Good, then take her to the hospital," you say with a shrug and make yourself comfortable in bed again. "Unbelievable," said Minho with a sigh and walked out of the bedroom. He was always very overprotective with his daughter. So he drove off and rushed to the hospital. When Minho arrived at the hospital, he was immediately sent to the nearest pediatrician. Probably more because he caused stress to the whole workforce. But after a short examination, the pediatrician was able to give him a diagnosis. "She has no fever and the rash seems to have subsided again. I'll prescribe an ointment for her and it should be fine again." The doctor started to write something on a pad, but Minho was not satisfied with it. "Just a rash? Look at it? Look how red it is." Minho pointed to the red spots on his daughter. "Yes, that happens a lot with toddlers." The doctor smiled but Minho immediately dressed his daughter and pulled her to him. "Have you even studied? Are you a doctor at all?" Minho was a little too worried about his daughter. That was exactly why you didn't come with them. "Excuse me?" The pediatrician was really perplexed by the cheeky answer. But Minho already had his daughter in his arms and ran out of the room. He had to find another solution, but it was quite late now. Then it occurred to him that his cousin, whom he didn't like, was also a doctor. Actually, he avoided him, because his mother always wanted him to send his daughter to him and he thought that he was annoying. But now his daughter's health was more important. After a long phone call, Minho persuaded his cousin that he could come over with his daughter. However, he reluctantly agreed. "I know I called you late at night and threatened to kill your dog, but thanks for coming," Minho said and walked into the apartment. "It's not like a doctor needs sleep," said Minoh's cousin annoyed, and sat down on the sofa. "She has a rash and the idiot in the hospital said it is nothing." Minho gently removed his daughter's shirt to show his cousin the rash. He examined everything, took her temperature, and listened to her breathing. But he had to say the same as the doctor said in the hospital. "She has a harmless rash. Many children of that age have that." The cousin could no more determine. "I knew you were an idiot," said Minho, taking his daughter back. His cousin sighed but was too tired to say anything. Minho immediately ran out of the apartment and got back in the car with his daughter. Even though he was angry that no one was taking his baby's symptoms seriously, he decided to go home. "How was it?" You ask when they were back in your bedroom. "The doctor was an idiot, then I went to my idiot cousin, but he's an idiot too," Minho said defiantly, looking at your daughter. "You were with your cousin?" You ask him with a laugh. "Biggest mistake of my life. He will accuse me of that until his death." Minho rolled his eyes and leaned back into the bed. After all, he was pretty tired after the whole tour. "You're a good dad," you say with a smile and give him a kiss. Then you grab a cream from your drawer and start applying it on your daughter's rash. "Look, that helps her," you say and look at your daughter, who is now fast asleep. But when you don't hear any more reaction, you look over at Minho and see that he was asleep too.

changbin.

"Daddyyyyyyyy." Changbin heard his son crying from his room. It was still early in the morning and actually, he was usually still sleeping at that time. "What's wrong?" He asked when he saw him come into the kitchen. The little boy had glassy eyes. "Ouch." The boy pointed in his mouth and Changbin crouched down to take a closer look. "Oh, it's all red." He felt his son's neck and found that it was completely swollen. "It hurts so much, Daddy," said the boy and started to sob. He wiped away his tears with the palm of his hand and tried to be brave. "Well, let's call Mummy then." To be honest, Changbin didn't know what to do. So he immediately picked up his phone to call you. But you've already been to work and in an important meeting. So you couldn't answer immediately. In the meantime, your son sat on the floor and cried silently. He held his small hands to his neck and he looked at the floor. Changbin looked at him and took a deep breath. "Good. She's got the pediatrician's number somewhere here." Changbin went through the apartment and searched everything. "Daddyyyyy," the little boy continued whimpering. Changbin was starting to get stressed and he knew he had to react quickly. "Yes, yes. Daddy is already looking for a solution." He looks desperately through the apartment, but then there was a glimmer of hope. There was a note on the refrigerator that said "Emergency". Immediately he went up to it and could already see the number from the pediatrician. "Yes, this is it," he said happily and immediately typed the number. "Daddyyyyyy," the boy continued to whimper, and Changbin sat down with him and let his head rest on his lap. He continued to cry softly and Changbin gently stroked his back. "Practice Doctor Yen." A female voice answered. "Hello, my son is in pain and has a red throat. Do you still have an appointment?" Changbin found himself using his rapper voice and talking way too fast. "Yes, of course, you can come over right now," said the woman kindly and Changbin breathed a sigh of relief. After he hung up, he looked at his son. "We'll get you dressed now and then we'll go to the doctor," Changbin said quietly, but the little boy didn't want that. "No doctor," he said and cried even more. "But you are in pain and the doctor will help you," he tried to explain. "But the doctor stings," said the little boy, sobbing again. "No, he doesn't sting. You won't get a vaccination. He just looks into your mouth," Changbin told his son and gave him an encouraging smile. The boy nodded and so the two were ready to go to the doctor. Changbin became more and more nervous along the way. He wrote you a message so you would know and hoped that he would manage it all. At the doctor's, the little boy was almost braver than his father. While Changbin almost fell off his chair because of his nervousness, his son was very calm when the doctor examined him. "His tonsils are swollen and sore. I'll prescribe something and everything should be fine." The pediatrician smiled and stroked the child's head. The little boy smiled, and Changbin was so proud of him that he was so brave. Almost braver than himself. "And because you were so good, there is a reward," said the doctor and took something out. "LOLLIPOP!" The boy yelled excitedly, his eyes sparkling when he saw the candy. "It's for you." The pediatrician handed him the lollipop and the little boy grinned. As if his pain was completely forgotten and Changbin was just glad that everything went well.

masterlist.

[writingwithcolor]

Blending Mythos Respectfully

@sapphicq submitted:

Hi all! I’m trying to write an urban fantasy that explores oppression in a world that is basically the same as ours, except with magic, while incorporating magical systems and mythologies of multiple cultures. I’ve done an okay amount of research on each one that I’d like to include (still need to do more for sure, especially considering how colonization has effected mythologies). However, I’m struggling a bit on how they should coexist, since in the world I’m writing about they’re present and tangible. One example of this is fox spirits in East Asian mythology. Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Chinese mythologies each have a nine-tailed fox, and though my research says that the myth originates from Chinese mythology, it also says that each of the fox spirits carry different connotations of malevolence, benevolence, and how widespread they are, depending on which culture’s mythology is being referred to. 

The same sort of thing has been popping up quite a lot in a lot of my research. I started to wonder if I could explain these similarities within world as “different cultures have come up with different names and customs surrounding the ‘same’ thing,” considering mythology in the real world from an anthropological perspective. However I don’t want to overgeneralize, especially considering that these different mythological figures are meant to be present and tangible. If I went that route, I wouldn’t want to say something like ‘actually, benevolent fox spirits do exist, and Korean mythology about fox spirits is wrong since Kumiho are pretty strictly malevolent,’ which would obviously be an implication. All this to say: do you have any tips for multiple mythos coexisting in a way that respects the various cultures they come from?

Avoid Round Pegs in Square Holes

A mistake you sometimes see Western authors make when dealing with mythology in urban fantasy settings is to confine the universe’s worldbuilding to a particular mythology or force the rules of a single culture’s folklore onto other cultures. For instance, here at WWC, we get a lot of questions asking how to represent supernatural creatures from multiple cultures respectfully alongside fae from Western Europe, and it's fairly obvious that the author plans to treat all supernatural creatures as fae. Urban fantasy based on Greek mythology or Christian mythology often falls into the same trap. 

I think a writer can demonstrate greater creativity by embracing these differences. I think a potential way to deal with contradicting mythos between cultures is to come up with compelling reasons why differences exist. What world-building systems, philosophies and real-life phenomena allow for a framework that explains the simultaneous existence of commonalities and differences? As you know, in anthropology, there are theories that emphasize cultural diffusion as a way to explain similar customs within the same region, but there are also theories that hold that multiple cultures can develop the same traditions and principles independent of each other (See: existence of 0, lost-wax bronze casting, astronomical calendars and the use of wheels). The answers I’ve given are mostly technological. However myths and belief systems serve very real social functions as ways to keep people together and cultivate norms and mores. Lesya expands on the utility of intentional cultural diffusion below.

Similarly, within evolution, there are instances of species having common features because of a shared ancestor, but also instances where species without shared ancestors evolve to have similar features because they exist in the same environment. I believe flippers are examples of both types of evolution in marine animals.  Thus, I think you need to question your assumption that “different cultures have come up with different names and customs surrounding the ‘same’ thing.” As the world is daily proof, they sometimes do, but they also sometimes don’t. 

-Marika

First, props to you for sending us this ask. You have been thinking about this a lot and have done research into building an urban fantasy that doesn’t do the thing of putting all Asians under one umbrella. 

Second, I’m going to agree with Marika here. Rather than go for the generalization route, revel in everyone's differences. It's a way for you to acknowledge the variations in the mythology, that not all have the same origins though there may be some similarities. Instead, they may have reached the same conclusions. My advice for blending mythologies is to lean into it, and not create a homogeneous umbrella. You can make something amazing with that. 

-Jaya

Hybridity Through Diffusion

So a myth originated in China. This does not mean Chinese tellings have the monopoly on what a telling is. Marika and Jaya have gone into a possible solution, here, but what I’m going to examine here is a mental framework that a lot of people get stuck in that is actually ahistorical.

Cultural appropriation as we know it is shockingly recent when it comes to history. In the modern day, ownership boundaries of myths have become very strict because of primarily European colonialism picking and choosing everything it likes about a mythos, and, this is important: not letting up on the oppression of those peoples. There’s also a strong preference to kill those colonialism deems “wrong”, instead of creating a hybrid culture.

Historically, this got a lot more fluid.

What happened historically was primarily cultural diffusion, wherein open trade, intermarriage, and shared borders made it that myths, customs, and cultural practices were (mostly) freely exchanged without massive power imbalances happening, and then modified to fit local beliefs.

Key word: mostly. Because yes sometimes it happened that one place took over another place and imported all of its customs (see: China, Rome, the Mughals), but… often* the ruling power either backed off, was fought of, or otherwise left the region, leaving the common people to do whatever they wanted with the carcass of what had been imposed on them. Or sometimes, even, the imperial forces would actively create a hybridized culture in order to better rule others.

* in places where the ruling power has NOT backed off on oppression and assimilation, even if the colonialism is very old, then this is invalid and the power dynamics of appropriation are still at play.

Because, historically, there was a lot less incentive to simply genocide the peoples you took over (which is what made armies that did destroy all they took over so noteworthy). People were needed to keep providing food and materials, even if the new person got the resulting taxes. 

This meant there were a lot more common people to play with the stuff imported by the imperial culture. And there was a lot more incentive to hybridize your customs to the common people’s customs, leading to the sometimes-hilarious situations like “Rome assigns an equivalence in their pantheon for literally every mythology they encountered, which was a lot.” 

This also explains early Christianization, because it was a lot safer to simply adapt what you already had to make it better for your own ends than curbstomp everything that was “wrong” to your worldview. Ireland’s mythology survives in huge swaths, because it was either Christianized wholesale, or it was about “historical humans” and not fae. Norse mythology was similarly adapted for Christian worldviews, which means we unfortunately have no idea what the pre-Christian myths were.

So instead of thinking in terms of ownership, think instead in terms of diffusion. 

Myths get imported along with food, cloth, or anything else necessary for life. Myths were, historically, a way for people to explain the world around them, both in place of and alongside science. “Ghost marches” are really common, globally, because if you have wind howling in the forest, it’s going to sound like predators, and predators mean go inside and lock the door. Weaving goddesses are also common, because weaving was so necessary to survive the elements.

Sometimes trade relationships soured, and you get bad associations with the imported stuff. Sometimes the relationship stayed great for long enough it got completely adapted. This doesn’t mean any one myth is “right”, nor does it mean you have to erase historical trade links. It just means you look at the historical context, understand that cultural exchange often used to be a lot more two-way than it is in modern appropriation times, and figure out what that means for your worldbuilding.

~ Mod Lesya

[jasmine-the-fox]

Down you go

Before you all read this... I want to make one thing clear to you all (what i’m about to bring up happened on ao3)

Never EVER! Ask me when the next update is going to happen before or after you make a salt request! It’s very rude and I will ignore you and or block you if you do this!

Anyways... Enjoy the salt fic! This request was made by @pinkskeletonsharkdeputy

It had started off as a normal day... Until it went down the hill... Literally, Marinette was having a great day! She had spoken to her girlfriend for a bit this morning which made her happy, then Lila was quiet this morning... Save for a few glares from her classmates, she aced three tests that Lila tried to claim she cheated... Resulting in Lila getting three weeks of detention for false accusations with lack of proof and her girlfriend called her to say she sent her a gift!

And then it went bad...

Turns out that when Mari was at the bakery for lunch (like always) and to see her gift... Lila claimed to the class that Mari pushed her down the stairs to try and make her stay away from her Adrien (even though Mari is a lesbian and she told the class before Lila even came to school) then warned her that if she tried to get near Adrien... She would be in a worse condition then this, she cried and claimed that she was hurting (she had no bruises, no cuts or even a bone either dislocated or fractured) so the class decided to get back at Marinette by making her go through the same thing... Even though Lila lied to them.

Mari got back to school to hear her classmates whispering her name, she thought it was strange but decided to wait and see what will happen next, the day continued with Lila going back to lying in miss Bustier’s class... As it was the only class she could get away with it, Mari completely ignored her and simply focused on using her new tablet that Jasmine bought her as a gift, at one point Caline ordered her to give Lila her supposed “stolen” tablet and apologize (Lila claimed that her mother bought it for her a week ago) problem was... The tablet was a new model that came out three days ago and she only got it this afternoon.

Mari even showed the proof that it only just arrived...

Everyone was quiet at this info... But Lila still lied her way out of it and claimed that she must have believed it was her’s by mistake, the class then went back to ignoring Mari and listening to Lila instead, Mari went back to using the tablet to draw and work on a few personal things that made her smile before saving them to her computer and tablet at home, she packed up as the bell rang and then left the classroom when it happened... Lila purposfully bumped into her and stole her tablet, then as Mari took one step down the stairs.

Alya pushed her to fall down... And the class laughed at her...

They claimed she was trying to be petty when she screamed and cried for help, they claimed she was joking when there was blood and they scoffed as she was placed into the ambulance that miss Mendelieve called, police did a quick investigation and reviewed CCTV footage before taking Alya by for to the station to ask her what she was thinking that would happen after pushing Marinette down the stairs.

Sabine called Jasmine about what happened and the girl rushed over in a panic, when Mari’s bags were handed to them, Tom was shocked when the tablet wasn’t there, police came and it was Jasmine who revealed she had gifted it to Mari... And then revealed it’s last tracked location... Lila Rossi’s bedroom. They rushed over and searched her room to find it in her trash can... Broken, Lila claimed she bought it yesterday and Marinette destroyed it, but Jasmine’s tracker said otherwise, so Lila was arrested for lying to the police, theft and destruction of another’s property... Also was forced to by a new one.

Lila’s mother refused to help her, claimed that Lila was on her own now and instead gave the police permission to search there home and to question Lila fully... Without the rights to a lawyer, Lila was shocked at this but her mother simply left the apartment to go do some shopping... And use her daughter’s money to buy a replacement tablet for Marinette, Lila tried to fight back, claiming she had nothing to do with Marinette being pushed down the stairs... She only stole the tablet... This confused the police since Alya claimed it was all Lila’s idea because Marinette did the same to her.

Lila denied it fully, Marinette never pushed her down any stairs, she admitted that Mari didn’t like her because of her lying disease that causes her to lie about anything and everything... She accidentally got triggered and lied about Mari pushing down the stairs, she tried to tell Alya that it never happened but by then Alya had already pushed her down the stairs, the class was laughing at Mari and claimed Mari was faking it up till she got to the hospital, the two officers now understood that Alya was lying to them... And then Lila continued, she revealed that her teacher, principal, Marinette and her parent’s knew about this... But no one else knew.

This told them everything in an instant...

To make sure Lila had friends, the principal and teacher agreed to keep this info about Lila a secret from the class... Not caring that it might cause problems if someone was accidentally targeted by Lila’s lies, since Marinette was more then likely the main target, the teacher and principal did nothing to stop the class from bullying Marinette... And now they would suffer from there choices, they decided to place an investigation on the two adults, and asked Lila to come to the station to answer a few more questions... Lila agreed while secretly smirking at the fact that she would get away with this by putting the whole blame on Alya.

Meanwhile, Marinette woke up to find her worried parents and a relieved girlfriend, Jasmine helped her to sit up and explained her condition and how long she would stay at the hospital and then at home before even thinking about going back to school, Mari sighed in relief... But then panicked at the fact that she couldn’t find her tablet anywhere “Lila stole it from you, she claimed it to be her’s and you destroyed it but I had a tracker on it just incase, so she needs to buy you a new one” Jasmine explained as she pulled out a new one “Her mother came to drop this off, she explained Lila was to be questioned and went to get it for her daughter” she added making Mari nod as she then turned it on.

“I had it configured to your previous tablet, so you don’t need to set anything up” Jasmine said making Mari smile, she then pulled out the pen and began to sketch, a doctor and police officer came in together, the doctor got to examining her before explaining her whole condition and what she might need to go through, then explained that the Cesaire family will need to pay for all the treatments as it was Alya who caused all of this to happen, once gone, the officer began to question her, Marinette told the officer everything... And by that...

I mean about Lila transferring, her lies beginning, her leaving for a while, her return with more lies, her threat towards Mari, her attempt of getting Mari expelled, her expulsion canceled with Lila claiming she has a lying disease, Lila lying to the class about Mari bullying her and the class turning against her to bully her in return the supposed bullying she caused to Lila...

The officer was shocked by all this information, so much more different from what Lila Rossi and Alya Cesaire reported... The officer could tell that only Marinette Dupain-Cheng will tell the truth in the end, the officer then thanked her and then left to report all of this, Mari relaxed with Jasmine helping her when she could, her parents then left to take care of the bakery, Jasmine waited for a bit before she sighed “I really think you should switch schools... Even if Lila is gone... The class won’t apologize for there actions... They won’t admit to being wrong until they suffer from there actions... And then hope that you will save them” she explained making Mari nod.

For a week she rests in the hospital before being allowed to rest at home, where she stays there for two weeks, during that time Alya told everyone to blame Lila for the whole incident... While Lila cries to her mom as to why Alya would lie and accuse her of causing Mari to be in the hospital... While the police look deeper into Lila Rossi, Jasmine was at Marinette’s side the whole time she was at the hospital and at home... While no one in the class came to visit her, they all believed she was faking it... All the while they got a new principal and teacher after the investigation the police did on the school.

Now all that was left was Marinette’s classmates...

When Mari returned to school, the whole school minus her classmates welcomed her return to school... Some came to visit her to see how she was doing in her recovery, she was happy to have visitors checking in on her like that and Jasmine was relieved that they were so kind towards her girlfriend... But she was worried about her going back to school, because of the fall her legs needed time to recover so she needed some support for them thus she needed a crutch, the school was informed and students were told to help Marinette when they could and to not mess with her crutch.

That didn’t stop her class though...

When she walked into class, Alya was the first to snap at her for cause her parents to get mad at her, how was she supposed to know that the fall was serious, she kept yelling at her until there new teacher came and told her to stop or she would get detention, Alya tried to defend herself but there was nothing she could do about it, she was to blame for forcing her parents to pay Marinette’s medical after Alya pushed her down the stairs... Now she had to face her actions... Not long after class started, the police came to speak with Lila for her lies about everything... And to Alya for attempting to try and blame Lila for everything.

Both girls tried to defend themselves but there teacher forced them to follow, once outside the class, the two girls began to fight... Well if you can call Alya screaming at Lila for causing everything and Lila crying as she tries to defend herself a fight... Then sure, anyways the police didn’t care and forced them to follow them to the station to be once again questioned... When asked why they replied with them needing to help fill out some holes in the story... Both girls agreed... Without knowing that the police caught them right where they wanted them.

Once at the station, there parents watched as the two girls lied about what happened... And never bringing up the past of when it all started when the officer asked about it... They simply acted like the question was never made and continued explaining everything, there parents refused to help there daughter’s and asked that the rest of the class get’s questioned about all of this... Believing there was more to all of this and one of them might be able to help with the whole situation... The police agreed to the request.

And there answer... Was in none other then Adrien Agreste himself...

When he was asked to answer a few questions he agreed... But at the station he claimed to have the whole story on Lila and her actions, they sat down with him and talked... About everything, including the deal he made with her to bring Marinette back from expulsion, the police was shocked and asked if he did anything to help Marinette, he explained that his father ordered him to stay away from Marinette and to make Lila happy... Meaning he had to follow her around, go where she wanted to go and even agree with whatever she said.

The police was furious about all of this, as a result... Lila Rossi, Alya Cesaire and Gabriel Agreste were arrested... For different reasons of course, the rest of the class were given fines while Adrien was sent to London to live with his aunt.

Meanwhile... Marinette transferred schools to be with Jasmine... She changed her number and anything else connecting her to her old class, so even if they tried... None of them but Adrien can contact her.

It was there own fault for going down the way they did...