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teaveetamer · 9 months

Note

Fully understand if you don't care. Please ignore if you don't.

Vaush isn't and has never been far right. My recollection of the Noncompete/Vash debate regarding the Holocaust wasn't Vaush trying to gotcha Noncompete into having said the Holocaust was valid by 'his logic', it was him trying to point out that if the response people kept giving to the "well, jews were over-represented in banking and that's why-" was "no they weren't" if a nazi ever cites "well, according to these extenuating circumstances, they WERE" they wouldn't have any recourse to fall back on.

Vaush' point was that you need to have such a strong moral framework that you can still, undoubtedly say it was the wrong thing to do, arguments over details like "jews were over-represented in banking" being true or not. i.e. It doesn't matter if they were or weren't, that wasn't a justification for anyone's actions. Falling back on arguments that can get disproven or at the very least challenged locks you into a debate on the far-right's level instead of just broadly condemning them regardless of the details. What happened as a result of people believing this to be true does.

The debate got so poisoned and aggressive that no-one managed to convey their points properly, and NC left early before it got anywhere productive. Vaush had to explain where he was trying to lead the conversation in a stream afterwards bc the debate got full of so much stupid posturing that they never got that far.

He's a smart guy, but doesn't always say things in a way that's easy to follow in the moment. That's burned him more than once - rather severely. His overconfidence doesn't help.

Should probably point out that in a conversation with Vaush regarding the Debate Bro video Noah Samson released, Noah ended up walking back almost every point and I wouldn't be trusting his analysis of the situation anyway. This is also extremely niche community stuff, but there is actually this weird... debate bro vs video essayist schism in the online leftist sphere that's resulted in a fucktonne of well poisoning on either side.

I probably seem defensive, but that's mostly bc I've been watching both the right and leftists that don't like him twist the things he says into absolute pretzels to make him look like a terrible person. Not to say he's never done anything wrong or stupid though.

First off, I'm not saying that Vaush was a right winger, or that he ever made right wing content. Just that he, as a white (persumably cishet) man, has more than likely fallen into socially conservative ideology at some point in his life. Which isn't a dig at him, it's just how our culture is set up. We all need to deconstruct from societal brainwashing. Cishet white men just usually have the hardest time with that, because it means leaving behind a system that inherently advantages them.

Second, there's a lot we need to unpack here.

I rewatched the clip in question and in my interpretation, what I said in my other post about this is what I saw happening. But okay I concede that I didn't watch the entire stream so we will set aside my interpretation for a moment and go off of yours.

See, here's the thing. Based on what you said happened, I still think Vaush was dumb. Why? Because engaging with the right's false claims on any level still gives them the power to control the conversation. That is something you need to be acutely aware of every time you platform something like that.

When you platform a false argument you are, in essence, giving it equal validity to true claims. Your first priority after bringing it up should be explicitly discussing why it does not deserve equal validity to true claims. Vaush platformed an alt-right talking point, but did no work in attempting to deconstruct why people shouldn't believe it.

If you cannot do that effectively, then it is probably better if you don't bring it up at all. Because if you bring up a point and don't deconstruct it, you just platformed it for your audience who might actually believe it. Which is exactly what happened.

You have to keep in mind that even if that's not what he meant to do, his audience did take that claim from him and perpetuate alt-right misinformation in trying to defend Vaush from people who were calling him out for it. You have leftist spaces uncritically parroting a Nazi talking point with no understanding of why that claim is false or why it matters. And when they parrot that point then other left-leaning people might pick it up and repeat it, and on and on and on and you've basically just done the right's work for them.

The power of the right doesn't lie in their ability to make actual claims. It lies in their ability to manipulate rhetoric. Deconstructing rhetoric should have been the focus of that point, not "can you make enough smart boy arguments to get around stupid right winger claims" because alt-righters will always have a dumber claim to refute you.

If you can identify their rhetoric then you can poke their buttons and they will make your argument for you.

Vaush, stupidly, made their argument for them in doing what he did how he did it.

Because the debate broadly seemed more about posturing and "being right" than having an actual conversation about an issue.

Like I said there are ways this conversation could have taken an educational or productive approach from the start. Like, instead of just throwing the alt-right claim out there you could ask "how would you respond if someone said 'Jews controlled the banks, therefore Nazis felt they were oppressed?'"

Not everything needs to be an argument. Sometimes you can just have a conversation. If you frame it like an argument and then use an alt-right talking point, you basically just argued for the alt-right.

He's a smart guy, but doesn't always say things in a way that's easy to follow in the moment. That's burned him more than once - rather severely. His overconfidence doesn't help.

I also have to say... is an unplanned, unprepared, off the cuff live debate really the best place to be bringing up these issues, especially for someone like Vaush who is, apparently, prone to sticking his foot in his mouth and largely outside of the groups affected (to my knowledge)?

I don't mean to be a bitch, but the entire role of debate is to be able to clearly and accurately convey your points in an argument. If he can't effectively do that and has a tendency toward posturing and "winning" rather than the exchange of ideas, then he's apt to do more harm than good.

I'm not saying that these livestreamers don't have their place, but video essays are invaluable precisely because they can take the time to do research and present arguments in the most clear, nuanced manner. If you are ignorant on stream then you are ignorant, and you're going to present that ignorance in the moment. Most people will go with the first thing they hear from you no matter how hard you try to backtrack or correct it down the line, so it's vitally important that you get it right the first time. ESPECIALLY when the misinformation can fit into a punchy soundbyte and the explanation is buried in a 7 hour stream no one watched.

Should probably point out that in a conversation with Vaush regarding the Debate Bro video Noah Samson released, Noah ended up walking back almost every point

I am aware that's Vaush's framing of the situation.

I still think the video makes valuable points, and clearly Noah does stand by the points he made since the video is still up and he made a followup video addressing it and his conversation with Vaush. I actually like the followup video better for explaining some of the concerns I have.

Here's the thing... When you are not part of the cishet white male majority, then everything you do is scrutinized and picked apart. You are never, ever just representing yourself or your own views. If a gay man does something bad then the cishet white male hegemony will use it as an excuse to say all gay men are bad. Everyone who is part of a marginalized group has experienced this to some degree.

The way Vaush is getting picked apart is the way everyone from marginalized groups is picked apart constantly.

If an ally represents us poorly, then that is going to be far worse for us than it is for the ally. Vaush got some backlash for his ironic misogyny thing, but ultimately the people most hurt by it were women and trans folk, because the right pointed to that and said "SEE we told you! This is why you shouldn't listen to the left about these issues!"

That's why when someone purports to represent us we are going to hold them to a standard that is as high (if not higher) than the standard we ourselves are held to. Because their missteps will result in consequences for us. And unlike cishet white male allies, we can't just walk away from those consequences if it gets uncomfortable for us.

#cw america #cw transphobia #cw antisemitism

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sillypinkboy · 4 months

Text

Too Late To Say I Love You

Charcters: Joe Fixit, Bruce Banner, Jake Lockley, Leonard Samson

Relationships: Bloody Protectors (Joe Fixit x Jake Lockley)

Word Count: 785

Tagging: @goodoldfashionedengineer

Notes: Hey it's angst I wrote after the last issue of the main moon knight run. So. Yeah. Major character death. Sorry in advance!

──────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Callused hands gently grazed scared skin. A single breath hung on hot air, ash and coal fell around them. The night was as dark as it could get in such a big city. Originally two faces just meant to - that just wanted to blend in, they’d grown into more. Both knew to keep their heads down. Both knew the danger they were putting themselves through. The thought never could stop them.

Electricity danced between their hands, dying with a sudden wind. Silver eyes dragged against tanned skin, desperate for something. A pulse. a wish. a word.

Both knew death wasn’t something they should deal with - or they did.

Joe had seen the explosion, or at least, the aftermath. He knew that he was supposed to be there. He moved as quickly as he could. Nothing.

Shouldn’t the cabbie be back? Why is he just laying there? Why won’t he breathe?

Joe begged for anything. Just a sign. A small movement. Something to say he was still there.

Nothing came. Nothing changed. An unfamiliar panic bubbled up behind his throat. In his chest. Tears burned in the back of his eyes, but didn’t leave.

Just a bloody corpse. No, a lover. Someone that he didn’t want to lose. Someone he shouldn’t have been able to lose. Someone that he should be able to have lunch with, someone to keep close.

Someone special left to just another body. Just another number. Someone to be forgotten by anyone that knew anything.

It’s not Jake’s name to the body. It’s Marc’s. It’ll be Marc’s funeral. Maybe Steven’s. But not the unknown cabbie.

Why? Why did he have to do this?

Why couldn’t he have stayed out of it for once?

Joe sat silent. He knew it wasn’t Jake’s fault. Dying came with the business.

The heroes won’t remember who Joe won’t forget. He knows that. Tears threaten to pour.

They feel like a fire against his skin, enough to hurt and hurt until you can’t take it. He holds the body close, before he falls. And falls and falls and falls.

Bruce woke up, eyes burning. A familiar hero in his arms. Ash sticks to blood soaked fabric, turning a gray into a red.

His chest beats heavily and he tries to figure out where they ended up.

A destroyed building. A grave site. There’s a desire to leave that pulls at the logical side of his brian. A knowledge to alert the other of what’s happened. His reasons for being there sat unknown, but he tried to leave. But, his body betrays him.

It sits unable to move. Unable to stand. Unable to register what has fully happened.

Blood seeps onto his hands.

He stays unable to move.

Why had Joe brought him here? They’d never been close to the vigilante, Moon Knight. Was it something about the person behind the mask?

His hand twitched.

Recognition set in. Jake. The guy Joe had been seeing.

His throat tightened at the thought of losing someone that close. He took a deep breath - like Leonard had taught him. He took another. And another.

Eventually, he gained control over his movements. A control to leave them. To tell the others. To try and plan for the aftermath.

Bruce gently moved the body off him, laying it face up. He stood up slowly, his body still shaky.

He sent a simple alert- just one to the other heroes. He hoped it reached. Knowing he needed to get out, he left the beeper behind, tucked into the vigilante’s hood. Then he left.

He tried to get as far as quickly as he could, not that it mattered. He just needed to get out. To try and find someone, anyone to help them.

He sits tucked away in a coffee shop, dialing their closest friend.

⋆��⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

Months passed, days blurred. Concern had been sparked in everyone. Joe never seemed to let himself be alone. He stopped reaching to be in charge - instead choosing to hold himself to the side. To being a passive viewer.

The change was welcomed by Bruce at first. It was one less fight in his head. One less problem to worry about. The joy of it wore thin, eventually.

The worst of it all was the worry that Leonard had towards it. There was a call. It was late into the night. Unexpected, even. The doctor had asked if Joe was still there, if he had been heard from. The worry for Joe was somewhat unexpected, keeping in mind how much he had been a problem. Bruce had been honest. Told the doc what he knew. The call wasn’t much of a long one, but enough to leave something sour behind.

#bloody protectors #pink writes

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ceo-of-sloppy-men · 11 months

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I love dragon age inquisition. It was the first dragon age game I played and it will always hold a special place in my heart. But something that never sat right with me after playing through all 3 games, is that Cullen is the one trying quit Lyrium and lead the inquisition. And Samson is the one who joined Corephyus.

So here's a long-winded argument as to why I think they should have been reversed. I love the game nonetheless, but the ball was fumbled here (in my opinion. If you disagree that's perfectly fine). Before I start I want to say I love both Cullen and Samson. I also discuss the infamous "quit or don't quit lyrium" scene quite a bit, and I want to say that no matter what it's still problematic.

Now, there are two major things we have to address before I can get into this:

Cullen's fear of mages would make him really not want to trust Corephyus, and additionally, having first hand experience with Darkspawn would make him even less likely. HOWEVER! This would only really be relevant if darkspawn were integral to Inquisition. Which they're not (for some reason).

Samson is a nobody, who either winds up rejoining the Templars or remains on the streets in Dragon Age 2.

Now the address:

Cullen's fear of mages might work fully in reverse, making him see the Templar order as the only way to control Mages and if he can restore them to glory with red lyrium that Corephyus claims to control, then it makes him even more likely to think Corephyus is the only option.

Samson being on the street AND having dealt with Hawke and Varric make him even more likely to meet Casandra. Why? Because Varric could make an off-handed comment about Samson being the more likely choice to rehabilitate templars because he already has first hand experience from lyrium withdrawal and he's sympathetic to mages. As opposed to Cullen who spends the whole game being relatively hostile and only really switches sides at the very end of the game when he sees how extreme Meredith has become. Especially with a Mage Hawke being canon because Varric would have seen first hand how Cullen views mages, not to mention how templars view mages with Merril and Anders.

Samson makes a more logical choice for the Inquisition's resident ex-templar.

He's mage sympathetic

while he would still argue for getting the Templars to seal the breach (due to wanting to save them from their fate), he would be more understanding of why the Inquisitor chooses Mages, and probably provide a more compelling argument other than "the templars are good because I always wanted to join them"

he's already in the first few stages of lyrium withdrawal

it would create a weird friendship between Varric and Samson if Varric was the one to convince Casandra to take him (Samson thinking Varric saved him)

Samson has the motive of atoning for his crimes of selling mages into slavery to help them escape Kirkwall/feed his lyrium addiction by finding a way to safely absolve the templar order so mages never have to go through that again

the whole "quit or don't quit" scene would be profoundly more impactful because you could string in Samson's time on the street as extra motivation to why he thinks he can't quit but loathes the feeling of despair taking lyrium brings.

we even see in the game that Samson is only helping Corephyus to give the Templars a "proper death". If faced with an alternative, he would probably gladly take it (so long as there was hope, something he's starved for, which is how Corephyus took advantage of him in the first place)

there could even be a whole quest where they take Templars from Corephyus's army and attempt to turn them from Red Lyrium! Whether this fails or not it would still be profoundly impactful, with a fail making Samson lose all hope and triggering his "quit or don't quit" scene, or a success giving Samson that needed encouragement that quitting lyrium is the right thing

Not to mention Samson reacting to the Titan Blood reveal would be seriously hilarious (but Cullen doesn't even get that post Descent DLC).

I say safely absolve because rather than just leaving them to become mindless husks, he could offer his own home remedies for improving lyrium withdrawal quality of life, using himself as an example and a test subject for any treatments before the men. He would still have the overworking aspect we get with Cullen, because he would feel as if he has to prove his worth to the Inquisition. And his connections in undergrounds and Tevinter could help Lelianna (and other wartable missions), not to mention have him sympathize better with Dorian, making their friendship stronger, since he would have to know somewhat about Tevinter and their customs, and one could even make an interaction of the two of them discussing former Kirkwall mages whereabouts in Tevinter, with Dorian pulling strings to search after them.

Cullen being a villain would have worked, playing into a tragic villain arc and being supported by his backstory.

Cullen was deeply traumatized by mages in DA1, which is never resolved or fully addressed in 2 or 3. It is swept under the rug, with him still holding that trauma in DA2. He sees mages as super dangerous, and needing to be controlled or they will turn to blood magic no matter what. Thus, Corephyus could easily play into that, sympathizing with his fears, recounting the Tevinter Magistrates ascent to the Black City as a tragedy, and presenting the rift in the sky as the result of evil mages. Thereby manipulating Cullen into thinking that Corephyus understood his fears, supported them and would help work to achieve his goals

Cullen has seen first hand what a red lyrium addiction does to people, but he's also naive. He could think that in moderation, like all blue lyrium, red lyrium effects could be mitigated. And that Red Lyrium could make templars even stronger, thus better to control mages

Cullen's disgust for Samson the mage-sympathizer could also contribute to him thinking he's doing the right thing. Because Samson is just doing what he always does: worming his way into safety and showing even the "most dangerous" people (in Cullen's eyes) compassion. Especially if the inquisitor sides with the Mages

A Templar siding Inquisitor could even have Cullen in their ranks, most likely through a side mission, because seeing an inquisitor care about Templars more than mages would align his world views more with theirs (especially since Corephyus is a mage)

Cullen is complicit. We see this in how he ignores Meredith's condition during DA2. So long as he believes in a cause he isn't going to abandon it, or question it. So, if he sees Templars turning to monsters from Red Lyrium and Corephyus gives some bullshit reason as to why, he wouldn't question it, until its too late. At which point, you could even say he gives himself over willingly to the inquisition, rather than fighting them at the end of the game

You could even have Samson's questline revolving actually confronting Cullen, with the two of them arguing over Samson's time on the streets and disgrace of the Templar order while Samson insists Cullen can be saved, despite how far he's fallen. Culminating in a "I haven't fallen, I'm saving the world" retort from Cullen who believes he is in the right. Making his eventual capture and judgement that much more impactful, when he finally admits that maybe he was wrong. Samson would 100% have a different reaction during Cullen's trial than Cullen during his, feeling pity and compassion for the disgraced templar, rather than anger and betrayal. Samson might even see himself in Cullen, leading to him suggesting or volunteering to take full responsibility for Cullen, rather than Cullen's begrudging acceptance of responsibility over Samson.

No hate to the writers of Dragon Age or anyone who likes the story as is. This was just a fun little analysis I had to work out of my system.

#dragon age inquisition #dragon age inquistion spoilers #dragon age spoilers #raleigh samson #cullen rutherford #dragon age thoughts

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joseopher · 9 months

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When Olivie Blake said, "Atlas Blakely was a rakish vagrant with wild natural hair and an insuppressible grin."

When Regina Spektor said, "Your hair was long when we first met"

When Olivie Blake said, "Ezra’s theory was that they were merely cut from the same indigent cloth, the unwanted castoffs of a dying earth. The other four candidates were educated, well-born, and therefore bred with a comfortable cynicism, a posh sort of gloom. Ezra and Atlas, on the other hand, were sunspots. They were stars who refused to die out."

When Regina Spektor said, "I loved you first, I loved you first"

When Olivie Blake said, "You have to kill me. Believe me, I know. I understand. I can see how the path of logic takes you back here, to this room. To this moment."

When Regina Spektor said, "You are my sweetest downfall"

When Olivie Blake said, "You want to hate me, Ezra. But you don’t."

When Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me the secret of your great strength and how you can be tied up and subdued.”

#beloved nemeses #ezra x atlas #ezra fowler #atlas blakely #the atlas six

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ericleo108 · 1 year

Video

youtube

Lupe Fiasco & Chris Webby vaccine Twitter debate summary NOTES by Eric Leo 108

Wed Jan 11th 2023 2 hour twitter convo

youtube

These are my thoughts and summary of what I heard. The timestamps in the description

Samson reaction video, Webby Tweet

Most of These rappers have no idea what they’re talking about.

Lupe is actually quite intelligent and defining his terms.

The definition of government and establishment is not the same.

As Voltaire would say, if you wish to quarrel with me, define your terms.

It seem Chris it’s getting his thoughts and feelings from his tribe, but when he’s analyzed he can’t definitively express those feelings which makes him adjust his opinion because it’s not thought out

Like how Chris says Lupe shifted his stance without ever being able to articulate what he was talking about

Chris seems like a well intentioned decent gentleman but really needs too educate himself and not listen to the news.

24:15 from 2 hr

Chris is talking about how he doesn’t trust the world economic forum but doesn’t see how that relates although what Lupe is saying is their not an authority

“The people who control the official narrative on the vaccine are the people that research and make the vaccines”

You get the gist that Chris Webby really just doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

It seems rand Paul’s anti-Fauci product campaign has infiltrated the mind of Chris Webby.

35:10 Robert malone

This is indicative of other people, but

I love how Chris has no common sense

He doesn’t understand the vaccine

And instead of taking the recommendation of the overwhelming majority of doctors

Chris webby is clinging to the one scientist that regrets it

Like 99 out of 100 doctors are telling you to get the vaccine and can prove its effectiveness and you cling to the minuscule 1 after never understanding how vaccines work, how they made, or who stands to benefit correctly.

Again, he can’t find his terms he thinks secondhand information is first hand.

I agree with Lupe, Chris is a good guy but has no idea what he’s talking about.

The reason Chris can’t get out his whole statement is because it’s so demonstrably false, misleading, or vague Lupe forces him to clarify which triggers webby.

This is a true example of how to negate your opponent.

You have the premise and subject. What most people have is the subject based off a false premise, that’s how propaganda works. Lupes tactic here is to attack their premise with its fundamental in making a cogent argument.

41:50

Missing details

That creates a false equivalency

Chris thinks adverse effects means terrible repercussions when it really just means regular procedural affect and mistakes.

Chris says there’s a lot of things he does know, but this discussion was evidence that when pressed he can’t articulate facts.

He’s getting this false information from the right.

Vaccines are like global warming in that there is no reason to deny the science, it’s clearly happening & shots are clearly effective

Basically the best way to tell if you deny global warming is to ask their political association.

The reason people don’t believe is gop political affiliation which represents faith & “freedom” (ie recklessness) & investments in carbon fuel

I did this whole thing to show how stupid the average person is.

Just because You have a bunch of followers and can regurgitate incorrect Republican talking points doesn’t mean your right.

We need better education. Debunking conspiracies and formal logic in schools

And reinstate the fairness in reporting doctrine

48:00

Sudden adult death syndrome conspiracy

Scientists rarely change the fundamentals

The details, methods, and understanding get updated

When people say, the Earth is overpopulated, it’s not that the Earth is overpopulated, it’s that the resources we consume, aren’t renewable and contribute to the decline of the biosphere.

We’re bad bacteria on the earth that adversely affects other life the larger our population.

Chris Webby gets caught multiple time saying he doesn’t know to pivotal questions and interprets this as Lupe not letting him talk.

The fact that Chris says he’s not an anti-Vaxter, but just had a problem with particular vaccine coraborates my point that he’s not representing the science and facts but rather a wrong political ideology

This is what I’m talking about with the political stance. Chris trusts vaccines but not the one that republicans have made talking points for people to think their right about.

1:25:00

Chris wants a black and white answer when he needs to be making a risk management analysis.

The chances of you getting COVID and the repercussions are higher than the possible side effects you might experience from the vaccine.

1:32:00

I’m glad they finally got into the weeds on affects.

Again Chris clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about when he doesn’t understand the words and their meaning.

Lupe Is literally asking Chris to define a word that he is using in the premise of his argument. Who’s subject is the vaccine is dangerous. And Chris says it’s a loaded question.

It’s clear Chris isn’t highly educated or even been to a debate.

Unlike MaDonald, who I think does this for clout

Chris just believes his own ignorance

The line of questioning that Lupe presented was required to extract the truth and Chris misidentifies his ignorance as not allowing his side to talk.

Chris didn’t bring anything credible to the table to argue, and then they did argue, Then Chris can’t define his own words and accuses Lupe of not addressing which I’m also addressing here.

Ignorance reigns which is why almost half America is republican

I’ll tell you what doesn’t make sense Chris

Sudden adult Death syndrome makes about as much sense as spontaneous human combustion and probably happens just as often.

The risk assessment you did for getting the vaccine

That you don’t understand basic medical words but have to the audacity to condemn fauci

Lupe handled himself like an adult and did what he was supposed to do while Chris felt attacked for not defining his argument.

Chris is an example of how ignorance and the republican agenda hurts America

In Summary

Lupe: you’re either trusting COVID or your trusting a vaccine which is safe and effective

Thank you donating to that wildlife foundation Chris.

News recommendations

Mother jones Democracy now Philip DeFranco

#lupe fiasco #chris webby #hiphop #rap #rappper #sociologist

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beauty-of-fear · 7 months

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Chapter 2

It was September 2021, I didn’t have a job. Well, I did but I quit it. I was working the most comfortable job you could possibly have at 21: A cafe job, making lattes for 12 hours a day. Eventually, I got tired of the smell of coffee at 6 am, I got tired of serving the same faces 5 days a week on their way to work, and I was tired of my boss. I needed a change, and so I left. But I had nothing else going for me, I was not in school. I was lost. I did not know what I wanted to do with myself. Covid had just passed, and 3 years of my life flew by. I was 20 one day, and then 23 the next. I needed to get out of my comfort zone. So, Samson, my boyfriend of a year at the time, and I boarded a delta flight to San Diego. In a few days we’d be crossing the Mexican boarder into Tijuana, and then taking a flight to Loreto. This trip there would be a lot of firsts for me: My first time going to the west coast. My first time crossing the boarder. My first time going into Mexico. And, so during the 6 hour flight I promised myself I was going to say yes to everything and try everything at least once. You see my logic was, I didn’t know the next time I was going to be able to experience San Diego or Mexico. But, still I was horrified at the thought of saying yes to everything, so I knew I had to do it. I was tired of my old self, and my old life. This was the first step to change. Operating life through the lens of fear can be exhausting, and I was exhausted.

So here we are in San Diego, the first leg of our month long journey. The west coast sun beating on my skin. The palm trees, the fresh air, and the mountains. Even though I’ve never been here before, I felt like I was home. It was time to reinvent myself. To gain the confidence I always wanted and knew I had in me, but could never get out.

My first fear to overcome was going into the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Ocean is nothing like the Atlantic. The Atlantic Ocean is manageable, every wave was anticipated. It was predictable. But, the Pacific Ocean was a new beast. Waves bigger towering over my head. You could not bury your feet in the sand when the waves got too strong, and sharks. The thought of sharing the water with sharks, and you have no idea where they are, and if they’re hungry or not, terrified me. Watching the lifeguards, actually guarding the water, instead of tanning like they did on Rockaway Beach. Hearing them whistle constantly when someone got too close to the deep end. Of course, I was scared, horrified. I didn’t know what to expect. But, I took three deep breaths, and counted to 10. 5…4…3…2…1… Feet first, and then under the water I went. I didn’t give myself the time to think, if I did, I would back down and let fear win. I remembered the promise I made to myself on the plane. It was freezing, chilling through my bones, and salty. Very salty, but I did it. I walked out felt alive. This was the first time I looked fear in the face and kept going. The first time I blew out that candle, and understood that fear was just a feeling. It was not a final destination.

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knowlesian · 2 years

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since i haven’t seen anyone else bring it up and i think it’s a key piece of understanding the show as a whole, i wanted to do a quick spotlight on why olu and frenchie’s names themselves are part of the next level commentary on race and colonialism this show is making.

okay: first, let’s take olu. oluwande boodhari, if you’re absolutely in love with him because the way he says cake sends you to another plane of existence. (i’m not going to get to make a lot of jokes this post without it being ghoulish at absolute fucking best, so that’s me shooting my one shot here because samson truly did do wonders, there.) both his first and last name are african (most modern day oluwandes seem to be from nigeria, unless google has led me astray), and he shares a last name with “a pioneer in the genre of somali love poems” named elmi boodhari from the 1900′s.

(i’d never heard of him before i did some googling to solidify my facts and make sure i’m not talking out my ass in a few places here so i can’t say more than that, but i plan to immediately track down everything i can.)

we can draw a couple conclusions from this: if olu wasn’t born somewhere in africa himself (which seems likely, but i don’t want to claim it’s a slam dunk), he was abolutely born somewhere his people were still allowed to speak in their own language.

i used allowed on purpose: one of the very first tricks in the colonizer’s and thus the enslaver’s toolkit is to go for the sacred things first. once the bloody slog of conquest is more or less done, and they’ve settled into the centers of power so they can get to work putting down anyone left alive who has the audacity to think they shouldn’t be grateful for these good works and the god they say demands these things. i don’t just mean replacing any indigenous religions with christianity, although that is a huge part of it. the more pertinent part of it here is that they went for language; names, places, the very structures of how the people they invaded defined their own realities.

it’s practical, if you’re an absolute fucking demon: when you don’t allow and harshly punish if not just straight up murder people who attempt to speak in a language you don’t understand, it’s harder for them to do what is good and right and try to fucking kill you down to the last stupid asshole still left kicking around. it’s also a form of psychological warfare, and it was done on purpose. we have the receipts! this shit was planned. like izzy said: you don’t get fed when you get invaded, and you live at your invader’s pleasure. (“back to work, you useless fucking fuckers”, he said. this show is just... so fucking good. i’m genuinely blown away.)

which brings us to frenchie. like i said: colonizers and enslavers went for language right away. that meant a bunch of people needed names in a language that was in the process of being shoved down their throats. there were a lot of bible names, of course, because White Colonizer Jesus will have his due, and a lot of family names taken from enslavers, but also a lot of place names. port cities, but also countries.

so we have frenchie, who was “in service”, and in a blink and you miss it moment, tries to tell everybody exactly what the french call the misfortune that follows the demons who follow the crystals what are contained within women. whether or not that means frenchie has been in france himself, it makes it a pretty logical assumption his life (or one of his fairly recent ancestors’) was impacted by france’s involvement in the history/legacy of enslavement.

i’m far from an expert on that so i’ll leave it there at the “these are the history facts i know” angle, but i will say if you’ve never looked into this stuff you should. real fucked up, and real important to know about if you want to be a thoughtful member of the world.

i want to close on this: though this is not my lane, it feels like malpractice to not mention it alongside their names and the different histories they evoke. i would direct people to the many, many black writers out there right now talking about colorism because the fact that olu’s skin is darker than frenchie’s is also important to the commentary at work here. i don’t feel qualified to do more than acknowledge i think it’s necessary to know about if you want to really understand this show and say “the people who live that experience are the ones who should be explaining it, not me” but it’s absolutely there.

#our flag means death #ofmd spoilers #oluwande boodhari #frenchie #joke tags feel pretty tasteless here so instead i will just say: this show is really important #i'm so glad it exists #i really do urge everyone who doesn't know this stuff because they have to to look into it #my ofmd meta

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spectorsjewishboyswag · 2 years

Text

Steven Grant; Thoughts

written predominantly for female identifying reader, these thoughts are in reference to comic verse Steven

He refers to you as “Lady.” or “Sir.” depending on identity, at random points in conversation. He means it as an affectionate nickname, you can see it in the way his eyes light up.

Despite attending formal events, he is a bit of a teasing rebel. Often standing to the side with a singular glass of champagne or whiskey he will call you over, gently resting his arm on your waist whispering teasing comments about the event into your ear.

He loves having you visit him at work. Like he will stop everything to welcome you into his office and have you seated in his lap while he tells you everything about what he is doing. He does not believe in keeping business secrets from you; compared to Marc or Jake he is more honest.

He can be more intellectual and struggle with emotional outbreaks; he is caring and affectionate but very much the brain and soothes you via logic and reminders of his love.

Steven loves having his partner adore him. Especially as he adores them equally. Being a self-made man, he lights up when he sees you smiling at him, eyes burning with pride and mention his skill. It gives him a strong sense of fulfilment

Protective of you during events, he presents himself in presence. He may not be as physically intimidating as Marc or Jake, he still has a strong build and assertive nature. Just because he would try to diffuse it first doesnt mean he won’t protect you by any means necessary.

Biblical references/nicknames are a must for Steven, be it Delilah, Judith or Deborah and it will change depending on the situation. The man will melt if you refer to him as Samson or David or any other. He likes the idea of it, even if he is more “gentle.” than his alters.

Oh to go art buying with Steven. He takes you past the gauche sections and lets you pick what you like, no matter if its a new artist or an established “worthy of spending.” one. He cares for personality and attachment in art only, no matter who made it. Steven will simply walk with you arm and arm asking your thoughts, as attentive as if you were the most important financier in Hollywood or Wall Street. Frankly you matter more to him than all of those.

Steven loves it when you adjust his tie in the morning. He would actually let you chose out what it is he should wear or allow you to shave his face in the morning. It makes him feel like he belongs to you and seeing you take such care in selecting the right tie or making sure not to scrape his cheek...well he melts. He has been known to try and kiss you while covered in shaving cream. Accept it, he isnt going to stop until he captures your lips in his.

After a long day he craves nothing more than to place his head in your lap or against your chest, his lips kissing your wrists or fingers as you run them down the sides of his face. It is here that he reminds you how much you mean to him.

Steven can get distracted, be it work or be it working on finding leads for Moon Knight. Inventing, people chasing, movies or stocks he can be mentally and physically gone working on a problem. He doesn’t mean to ignore you, its just his interests make him single minded hence his success. This is why he encourages you heavily to join him in a partnership or pursue equally what you enjoy.

He does make it up for you with kisses or arranging a private tour around a art gallery or museum, but he knows thats not the point. Hence why he will sit adoringly by your side as you explain him your ideas, your interests or even query him about his distractions. He wants you to know he adores you above all, even if he isnt always there to show it,

#Steven Grant #Steven Grant Comics #Moon Knight #Moon Knight Comics #Moon Knight Headcanons #mine #my boy #you either stan Jake or Steven fully #and I admit as much as I love Jake im a Steven girl

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yeenybeanies · 3 years

Text

Pieces of the Puzzle

continuation of my first gtms piece!! gtms belongs to unicornofgt, which you can (& should) read here!! (note!! this is just fan-work & not part of the canon!! i just think it’s a neat world & wanted to have some fun with it!!) gt mech suits (ocs) | samson rosales & ricky salem 3,460 words language & mentions of death warnings thanks for reading!! reblogs > likes!!

“Jesus Christ… You seein’ this shit, Condori?”

“Considering the fact that I’m standing right next to you, yes. I see it, Tellier.”

“Don’t be a smartass.” The mech’s head turned to look up at the other one towering over his crouched form. That mech shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant, but there was a stiffness to his movements.

Condori wanted to say “Better than being a dumbass.” That was what he would usually say. Right now, though, he couldn’t muster that much smartassery. He sighed, the sound ringing through his mech’s speakers. He stared down into the canyon. They both did, overlooking the scene below. Scattered in the bloody dirt at the bottom were pieces of mech armor plating, looking like it had been ripped off.

“Think the monster did this?” He asked, though he was skeptical of it himself. From up here, the plating looked pretty dinged up, but it didn’t look like how he would think that it would if a monster were pulling it off. It was also strange that there weren’t any support structures amongst the debris, or any internal machinery that he’d expect to see in a giant robot.

There was also the fact that the rest of the mech was missing, and its pilot, Kruger, wasn’t answering their hails.

“Probably,” Tillier answered. They didn’t sound nearly as skeptical. “Let’s check it out.” He pushed off of the ledge and slid down the wall, into the canyon. Condori followed closely behind. Together, the two of them started picking through the wreckage.

Condori’s suspicions only grew. He examined a pauldron, turning it over in his hands––or rather, in his mech’s hands. Its underside was smooth, and lacked attachments in any logical places. It also lacked significant clawing and chewing. The dead monster up the canyon didn’t look like it had the hands to wrench machinery off like this.

“Ho-ly shit,” came Tillier’s voice. “Condori, come look at this.” They held up what looked like the head of a mech, albeit with a smashed-in faceplate. Condori dropped the pauldron and took a knee next to Tillier to better inspect the find. He furrowed his brows as he zoomed in. The head was hollow. Condori was no engineer, but he was finding the apparent construction of these mechs to be increasingly odd.

Tillier pointed to the cavity in the faceplate. “This… doesn’t look good.” Blood and viscera coated the exposed cockpit, and dripped down the front. It wasn’t completely dry yet.

“That’s too much blood to lose,” Condori said, more to himself than to his partner. Kruger was dead. No one could have survived… whatever this was. Monster attack. Condori averted his gaze from the grizzly image, feeling a wave of grief rush in for his lost comrade. For just a moment, it managed to drown out his confusion with the situation, but it wasn’t a long moment. Something else caught his attention. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a patch of earth that looked out of place. It was a mound of dirt, freshly churned.

Condori knew a grave when he saw one.

He reached over and pushed his mech’s fingers into the dirt, gently brushing it aside. Underneath about a foot of loose soil was a solid shape. A body. Kruger’s body. Condori hissed through his teeth. His mangled corpse certainly matched the mess in the head.

“Found him,” he said grimly. He lifted the body from the dirt. Just behind him, Tillier whistled.

“Shit… that monster got him good,” he muttered.

“Monster? You still think a monster did this?” Condori stood up, cradling Kruger’s body. He didn’t want to damage it further.

“I mean... what else could do this?”

“He was buried. Monsters… they don’t do that. And the mech… where could it have gone without a pilot?”

It was Tillier’s turn to shrug. “I dunno. Maybe some rogues happened upon the scene before us and did him the courtesy. Maybe another monster came along and dragged the mech away.”

Before they got here? This fight couldn’t have taken place too long before they arrived. Everything was still so fresh. He wasn’t convinced of Tillier’s theory about the mech’s disappearance either. Condori frowned, but didn’t voice his doubt. He glanced up at the sky, noting the changing colors.

“We should get going,” he said with a sigh. They’d have to track down Kruger’s mech later. It wasn’t safe to be out at night, even with the two of them in their mechs.

“Yeah… Poor guy,” Tillier mused. “Hopefully monsters don’t mess the mech up too much before we find it. Or scavengers don’t completely strip out the machinery. These things are expensive, I imagine.”

Condori didn’t respond. He started walking, but paused when something else caught his eye. Footprints. Huge footprints. Mech-sized impressions.

Did the mech… walk away? How? There’s no way––

No. Not tonight. They needed to get Kruger back to base. He deserved a proper burial. His loved ones deserved to know about his death. The mech could wait.

***

Once she felt like she was a safe distance away, Ricky ducked behind a group of rocks jutting out from the ground. Her heart was pounding. She pressed her back to the rocks, only distantly thinking about the scorpions and snakes that might be hiding in the cracks.

Truth be told, a couple of mechs probably wouldn’t pay a lone human any mind, but, given Ricky’s history with the Alliance, she didn’t care to take any chances. On the off chance that one of the pilots recognized her, they could easily reduce her to another stain in the dirt. And if they didn’t, her presence at the scene of a mech fight could still be called into question.

Regardless of the numerous ways it could play out, Ricky didn’t want to be present to find out.

When the rumbling footsteps stopped, Ricky dared to peek out from behind her cover. One of the mechs had crossed the canyon, so they both now stood on the far side, looking down at the space where the giant man had been. Hopefully he’d taken off like she’d told him too. Judging by the lack of any reaction from the two mechs, she assumed he had.

Ricky couldn’t help but stare at the mechs. She watched how they moved. She’d never noticed before how… uncanny their movements were. Until today, she’d never even considered the possibility that giant… people might be encased inside those metal titans.

What the hell was the Alliance doing to these people? Did people volunteer to become these things?

The giant man had seemed so lost…

It left Ricky with a feeling of terror.

One of the mechs dropped down into the canyon, out of view, and the other followed. Ricky propped herself up a little higher and pursed her lips. Her eyes drifted along the canyon ledge, towards where the giant man likely would have run.

She shouldn’t get involved. She really shouldn’t. Her brain was telling her that this had nothing to do with her. Ricky leaned her head back and ran a hand through her braids, exasperated.

“Fucking––!” Shit. After a few moments of internal arguing, she stood up, bag secured, and started jogging.

If she found the giant man, she rationalized, and she helped him, then maybe he could help her out too. He could certainly provide some excellent protection against the monsters out here. How many people could say that they had their own personal giant bodyguard?

Yeah. That made sense. That could be a good reason to get involved.

***

Nothing was making any sense. Rosales stumbled. He planted one hand against the canyon wall for balance, and scrubbed the other through his hair. He pulled at a fistful of the salt-and-pepper strands, as if it might help jog his memory.

What did he know so far?

He knew his name. Rosales. He was wearing some sort of mechanical suit. There were others in these suits, too––or so he assumed.

There were tiny people. One was inside the helmet he’d been wearing. For reasons unknown, he’d felt the need to bury the little man. And then there was the little woman. She’d warned him about the… the “mechs.” She’d told him to run.

Rosales looked to his surroundings, to the rocks and the sun-baked vegetation. Everything looked so small.

Or maybe… he was big. Maybe those tiny people weren’t tiny at all; Rosales was the big one here.

A dull pain bloomed just behind his eyes. He grimaced and pressed his knuckles to his brow. Behind him, in the not-far-enough distance, he could hear more chatter between the two mechs. He needed to keep moving. He pushed off of the wall and continued on, doing his best to ignore the growing headache.

The sun was nearly set by the time he came to a stop. Breath heavy, he allowed himself to fall to his knees––which he instantly regretted. Not only did his still-armored legs make a horribly loud CLANG that echoed through the canyon, but the sheer force of his weight coming down on his aching joints sent a jolt of pain through his muscles and bones. Rosales growled, teeth gritted, and bowed his head. The adrenaline in his veins was waning, taking with it the pain and exhaustion suppression. Rosales scanned the endless rock around him. He felt exposed. Shelter would be nice, if he could find some place big enough to sequester himself into.

But then… what the hell was he going to do after? Where would he go next?

With a heavy sigh, Rosales pushed himself back up to his feet. Several pops and cracks accompanied the motion; he wasn’t sure if they came from his joints, or from the machinery still clinging to his body. He hadn’t been able to take much of it off before he was forced to flee. Now, Rosales looked down at the armor with disdain. He hooked his thumbs under gaps in the chest plate and pulled, pulled, pulled, until it gave away. He tossed it to the ground without a second thought, and moved on to the next piece. Bit by bit, he tore metal from his person. He paused at his forearm, finally noticing the bayonet-like instrument mounted there. Something told him that it could be useful. He did his best to be delicate in removing it, and set it aside.

Piece by piece, Rosales stripped himself of metal. The sun had long since sank when he pulled the heavy boots off, thus ridding him of the last of it. He stood tall and looked down at himself, now only wearing a tight, black bodysuit. He felt much lighter, much more free. With his newfound mobility, Rosales stretched his aching body. Every movement came with a symphony of crackles, thus answering his unspoken question from earlier. He rolled his shoulders, tugged his neck this way and that, twisted his back––

“––Ghh!” Fuck! Pain shot up his spine, hot and electric, enough to make his eyes water. His legs trembled and slowly gave under him, leaving him to collapse awkwardly to his knees. His breath came in gasps as he tried to get a grip on himself. It took a few minutes for the pain to dull, but it wasn’t going away fully. Rosales pressed his fingers to his eyes, a heavy sigh leaving his lungs. This was going to be a problem. He knew without needing to try that even standing would be miserable, let alone walking. He peeked between his fingers, aimlessly scanning the canyon walls and floor, the discarded armor, when his eyes landed on the pieces that had covered his abdomen and back.

A lightbulb flicked on in his head.

Teeth gritted through the pain, he leaned forward and gathered the pieces. He held the back piece in place with one hand, and manipulated the front piece until their clasps came together with a click! The relief was instant. It didn’t fully alleviate the pain, but it made it bearable, dulled it down to blend in with the rest of the aches he felt. He could work with that.

Rosales leaned back against the rock wall, head tipped up, and breathed. He studied the skies, the stars, absentmindedly tracing patterns in his mind.

Stars…

He couldn’t pinpoint why, but staring at the stars filled him with a sense of longing.

Best not to dwell on it right now. He should keep moving, find shelter. Rosales tentatively stood up, testing out his makeshift back brace. Satisfied that it would work for now, he grabbed the bayonet, and started off again through the canyon.

Shelter came to him in the form of an overhang. It was low and cramped, but it left him feeling slightly less exposed. Rosales settled himself beneath the rock, warily eyeing it with thoughts of whether or not it would collapse.

Sleep did not come easily, nor did it stay peacefully.

The sky was pink when rocks skittered down the wall, bouncing off of his overhang. The noise startled Rosales awake. He breathed in sharply and scrambled to his hands and knees. His heart thudded in his chest, anticipating an unknown danger. More rocks tumbled down, now to the side of his shelter. His first thought was that the mechs had found him, but then he would expect much more of an avalanche under such titans. No, whatever––whoever––this was, they couldn’t be very big. Rosales watched the cascade, guarded, nose crinkled in the beginnings of a snarl, waiting for the unknown being to come into view.

When they did, he, surprisingly, recognized them. It was the woman from yesterday. She wore a hood and shawl that he didn’t remember her having, but it was unmistakably her face peeking out from the fabric. Their eyes locked, Rosales’ bewilderment meeting her startle. She stumbled with a yelp, nearly losing her footing on the loose rock.

“––Fuck, dude!” she shouted. She muttered to herself things that he couldn’t quite pick up as she made her way down to the canyon floor, then took a moment to dust herself off. “You gonna say something?” she asked, glancing up at Rosales.

He lifted a brow, but did not respond.

“Strong silent type. Got it. I know you can speak, though. You did yesterday.” The woman finished her dusting and set her hands on her hips. She looked up at him, far more confident than Rosales would expect. He was sure he wouldn’t be this bold if he were facing a being so much bigger than him.

“Well!” she continued, “nice little… shelter-thing you’ve got going on here. Looks cozy. I’m Ricky. Ricky Salem. Nice to meet––” she held out her hand as if she were offering a handshake, but paused when she realized just how ridiculous that was. Her hand went back to her hip. “––Er… nice to meet you. Got a name?”

A name. Yes. He’d been clinging to it all night, a part of him afraid that he might forget it. It was one of the few things he remembered.

“Rosales,” he said. His voice came out raspy and low, still very unusual to him. When he spoke, Ricky’s demeanor changed, if only for a moment, to show some of her nervousness, but she quickly corrected it.

“Just… Rosales?” she asked, looking skeptical. He nodded. “Really? That sounds like a last name. No first name, big guy?”

He… didn’t know. There was so much missing from his mind. When he didn’t answer, Ricky moved on.

“Okay, Rosales it is then.” She shrugged. “So, you’re––you were––one of the alliance mechs, hunh? I didn’t know that they put… giants into those things.” She gestured to Rosales, making him glance down at himself.

Well, that solidified his theory that he was the big one.

Was he even human anymore? Had he ever been human?

“How’d you get to be so, erm, big, anyway? The Alliance do that to you? Did you volunteer for it?”

He didn’t know. He didn’t know. Frustration bubbled in his chest.

“What do you want?” He said, cutting off Ricky’s questioning. He regarded her with a hard stare.

She swallowed before answering. “Um… to help you.” Her tone suggested confusion, as if her intentions were obvious. Rosales didn’t trust it.

“Why?” His eyes narrowed.

Ricky shifted her footing, but to her credit, she held her ground. She didn’t shrink back under his scrutiny, didn’t break eye contact.

“Because you look like you need it.”

Rosales’ nose crinkled further.

“...Because––because the Alliance and I have some rocky history. Because no one knows that their ‘mechs’––” she made air quote gestures with her fingers, “––are actually people. We all just thought they––you––were machines they built to fight the monsters. But you’re not.”

“‘We’?”

“Humanity. What still survives, at least.” Ricky pressed her lips together and breathed out through her nose. “Do you… do you not know what’s going on? What’s happened?”

Rosales tightened his jaw. He’d gone over in his head a thousand times what he did know, but there were still so many unanswered questions.

“The Start? The portals? The monsters? The collapse of civilization?” Ricky tried, but nothing was jogging his memory. He shook his head slowly. She slouched, dejected. “Damn… they must have done a number on you. Do you remember who you are, at least?”

Rosales abstained to answer, but that in itself answered her question.

***

Talking to the big guy was like pulling teeth. Giant, deep-rooted, impossible-to-remove teeth. He clearly didn’t trust her. That was evident in the way that he looked at her.

And boy, if looks could kill.

It wasn't malice in his eyes, but his stare still triggered her fight-or-flight instincts. It was all Ricky could do to hold her nerve under his gaze.

And his voice. There was an inherent, underlying growl in every word he spoke. It rumbled in her marrow.

She’d already slipped up a little bit, which she berated herself for, but she was determined to get through to this guy. He was more lost than she’d initially thought. He didn’t even know his own first name, let alone current events.

“Do you know how long you were in that suit?” She figured she should stick to present matters, and press on more personal information later, once he warmed up to her.

Rosales shook his head.

He really wasn’t giving her much to work with. Hell, it didn’t seem like he had much to offer her. Ricky sighed and scratched at her head. The poor guy was fucked.

Rosales moved, making Ricky backpedal a few steps. Dammit. She kicked herself again for flinching, but corrected her brave face and watched the giant. He’d grabbed what looked like a mech’s arm bayonet, and was scooting out from under his overhang.

“Woah, woah, hey––!” She ran forward a few steps, and followed his retreat, though she was careful to keep out of his immediate reach. “Where are you going?”

“Away,” he said flatly.

“Yeah, but where?” Ricky paused when Rosales stood. His joints popped, sounding like cracks of thunder. Her heart skipped a beat or two. From up above, he’d already looked huge. Staring at him now from down below, Rosales was just massive. There weren’t enough words to describe just how overwhelming his presence was. So caught up was she that she almost missed his answer.

“Don’t know. Just away.” He turned on his heel and took a step. Ricky swallowed her fear, suppressed the thoughts telling her that this was stupid, and ran after him.

“Wait! Hey!” She shouted, waving her hands. Rosales’ piercing gaze fell on her again. “Big guy! I’m trying to help!”

“I don’t need help,” he growled. Christ, how was she not shitting her pants right now?

“You definitely do! You don’t know what the world’s like! What’s out there! I do!” Ricky sprinted forward and stopped in his path. He paused, much to her relief.

“Go away,” he said, eyes narrowed.

“Come on, man! I helped you once already! Warned you about the other mechs. And there are monsters out here!” She said, breathless.

Rosales lifted a brow, looking like he was considering it, then lifted his foot. Ricky couldn’t stop herself from shrinking back and covering her head as it sailed over her. It touched down several yards behind her, sending tremors through the ground.

Her chance at a giant bodyguard was walking away.

He did need her help. She knew he did. He just didn’t want it. So she had to convince him.

Undeterred, Ricky adjusted her satchel across her chest and followed. She couldn’t keep pace with him, but she could track his giant footprints. He would have to stop eventually.

Hopefully before she did.

#g/t #g/t writing #g/t fiction #gtms #samson rosales #ricky salem #caiya condori #gina tellier #giant old man can't catch a break #hyena writes #hyena ocs

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angellesword · 3 years

Text

SAVE ME | KTH (14)

Summary: You were determined to kill yourself, but what would happen when instead of ending your life, you ended up summoning the devil of death?

Alternatively:

The Devil: I’m here to ruin you, I’m here to save you.

Genre: Demon au, e2l, angst, fluff, roommate au

Pairing: Devil!Taehyung x Doctor!Reader

Word Count: 2.5k

Warnings: stabbing (this is the last time promise) kissing, oral sex (m. receiving.)

Note: Guys if you can, please listen to Samson by Regina Spektor while reading this update.

SERIES: CHAPTER 13 | FINAL CHAPTER (15)

"No. It's not enough."

His response was like a broken record, it kept playing inside your head.

It was too much—too painful.

You had to leave now. You had to leave before your tears started to fall.

It was too late.

Hot tears cascaded down your face as you pushed him away, refusing to be caged any longer.

You didn't know if he saw you cry.

Maybe he did.

Maybe that's the reason why he tried to stop you from leaving.

"It will never be enough." He paused for a second just to swallow thickly, "because kissing you isn't greed in the first place."

It worked.

You halted your steps, slowly turning to face him.

When you looked at him a few breaths ago, you felt like you were being burnt.

You even turned into ashes.

However, that feeling changed when he brought out his phone. He was talking to his virtual assistant while looking directly at you.

"Hey PD-nim," he started.

You and Taehyung were only five feet away from each other.

"What does it mean when someone is always in your thoughts? When you're sad when she's sad? When you have this...strong desire to touch her—no." He shook his head as if the last thing he uttered was completely wrong.

"I mean...it's fine if I can't always hug her or hold her hand. I guess I just want to be near her...to feel the comfort and warmth she's emitting,"

Taehyung chuckled lightly. His smile was big, eyes crinkling.

"I also want to stay alive," his eyes suddenly darkened, causing your heart to sink.

"It's not because I want to save myself..."

You felt like you couldn't breathe as you waited for the next words he's about to say.

"But because I want to protect her."

Again, you turned into ashes—

"I'm one hundred percent sure that feeling is called love," the virtual assistant answered.

—but like a phoenix, you rose again.

"You are in love with her."

Taehyung wasted no time when he heard PD-nim's response.

He closed the gap between you two. The fire in his eyes was scorching, it was the only thing that could melt your cold, cold heart.

"Our first kiss doesn't mean greed," Taehyung cupped both of your cheeks.

He was done pretending. He was done trying to be logical.

It was time to admit the truth.

"It means love."

When he said this, you felt like the missing piece of the puzzle was finally found, completing the gap in your heart.

Everything made sense now.

Taehyung still needed to tempt people because he didn't satisfy his capital vice in the first place.

Greed was a sin.

Loving you was redemption.

Unfortunately, he couldn't be saved by the love he felt for you.

Love was a good thing and Taehyung was evil.

His sole purpose in this world was to spread hatred and bitter meanings.

He wouldn't survive by doing good deeds.

"Y-You know..." Of course you would stutter just as when you thought you could finally voice out what you felt.

Regardless of this, you still tried to speak.

"I was hesitating to tell you how I feel about you." You weren't lying.

When you realized what Taehyung had done to the girl at the flower shop, you thought that maybe you made a mistake.

Perhaps you didn't have feelings for him. Maybe you were just caught up with how perfect his mouth felt when it was crashing against yours, or maybe, just maybe, you were deceived by him again.

You were in denial.

You knew you weren't perfect. You had hurt so many people before—even now.

But it was all unintentional.

Taehyung was the only one who hurt people deliberately.

You hated this about him.

But as said, his confession changed your mindset.

Some people were forced to do things they didn't want to do because they needed to survive.

You knew this all along; however, you didn't fully understand it.

The missing puzzle you were talking about was what made you understand.

Some people were forced to do things they didn't want to do because they needed to survive, and that's okay. We just have to find grace with our decision.

"But you made it so easy, you know?" You weren't stuttering anymore. You even found the courage to also caress his cheeks.

Taehyung closed his eyes, relishing your soft touch.

"How can I deny my own feelings when the one who isn't supposed to feel anything sincerely admitted what he feels for me?"

Taehyung pouted his lips.

"I've been in this world since the beginning of time, love." He was saying that he saw how things started and ended.

He knew that the main reason why people were miserable was because they refused to accept things as they were.

They lied, always underestimating or overestimating things.

Taehyung didn't want to repeat the mistakes of people. He rather named his emotions than lose you for not doing it when he had the chance.

"I asked this device—" he raised his phone in the air "—to tell you how I feel because I thought you won't believe a devil like me."

You nodded in understanding. You were blinded by anger just a short while ago.

You really believed that he wanted to hurt people for fun.

"But I do, okay? I do love you and it scares me."

You could see in his eyes that he was truly frightened.

You bit your lip, allowing him to explain further.

"I'm not scared of loving you even if it's new to me. What frightens me is your reaction. I-I have no idea if you're going to accept me..."

It hurt when he looked away from you.

"Tae, listen to me..." You gently grabbed his chin, urging him to look at you.

"We're both scared. As in hella terrified." You laughed as you told him that Ji-hyo was actually the one who convinced you to talk to him.

Your best friend claimed that running away wouldn't do you any good, but for you, running away from your problem was easier. You could play thousands of scenarios inside your head, wondering what could have been if you only confronted him.

Facing your problem was the complete opposite of this. When you confronted him, there would only be one answer.

The answer was final. It couldn't be twisted. You wouldn't be allowed to imagine scenarios in your head because you already knew the right answer.

You wouldn't be able to escape it even if you wanted to. At least with the thousand scenarios, you could still change it if it turned out that you didn't like how it was playing inside your fucked up head.

But you were glad.

You were glad that you decided to face your dilemma.

You were glad that you were now nodding your head as Taehyung asked if he could kiss you.

"You don't have to ask, silly." You grabbed his face, initiating the kiss.

Taehyung giggled in between the intimate act.

He liked this feeling better. He liked kissing you in this narrow alley. He liked kissing you now that he was free.

The only thing he didn't like was when the counter pager inside your pocket buzzed, indicating that the dumplings you ordered were now ready to be picked up.

"Damn," Taehyung's nose wrinkled right after you pulled away from the kiss. "I wanna keep kissing you."

He was acting like a child, making you laugh.

"You can kiss me later." You winked at him as you pulled him towards the dumpling store.

You and Taehyung ended up eating one dozens of mandu while watching some boring netflix show.

You called it boring since you weren't really paying attention. Your mind (and heart) were busy fooling around with Taehyung.

"You feel so good," Taehyung grunted, eyes darkening as he watched you suck him off.

You were kneeling between his legs, looking so sexy and small. He swore his hard cock was bigger than your face.

You enjoyed rubbing it on your cheek before wrapping your tiny hands around his shaft.

You gave him a few pumps before taking him in your sweet, sweet mouth.

Taehyung kept his hands at the back of his head, allowing you to take control.

This was already so difficult for him. Touching you would only drive him crazy.

Joke's on him because he was already crazy. God. You were amazing. His stomach was contracting when you pressed the flat of your tongue over his tip, gathering his precum until it stained your mouth.

You sank your mouth down his full length, not stopping until your forehead hit his pelvis.

Taehyung's head fell back against the couch. You wanted to focus on his pretty face, but the tears in your eyes made it hard.

"Ah,"

Your pretty moans were what pushed him over the edge. He exploded in your mouth without a warning.

"You're lucky I can swallow," you chortled, attempting to wipe the remnant of his load on the corner of your mouth.

Taehyung grabbed your face lightly, stopping you from doing so.

He leaned closer to kiss you, tasting himself as he whispered "Wanna make you feel good too..."

Taehyung scooped you up, making you sit on his lap.

"Please," he kissed the base of your throat while you grind on his cock.

You shook your head.

"This all about you, Tae..." Your words were in contrast to what you really felt. Taehyung could feel how wet you were through your soaked underwear.

You wanted this. You wanted him so much. This wasn't about you. He was the one who deserved to feel good. He had been through a lot.

"Trust me, baby. I'm on cloud nine right now," the corner of his mouth quirked up before sucking bruises on your neck.

"R-Really," you whimpered, running your hands through his soft locks. "Is that why I'm on cloud nine too?"

You remembered your conversation with him from almost a year ago. His life was connected to yours and vice versa. You couldn't breathe when he was mad, and now that the pleasure was overwhelming him, you felt really good as well.

What he felt, you felt too. Taehyung froze upon remembering this.

"What's the matter?" The lust consuming you instantly boiled down to confusion.

Why did the devil look like something epic just hit him right in the face?

"I meant this in the sweetest way possible," Taehyung touched your back.

The scissors tattooed on your shoulder blade materialized in front of him. He was spent. He couldn't use his power after this anymore.

Taehyung was holding the black scissors now.

"Can you please stab yourself?"

The normal reaction should be to freak out—to get mad. However things were different today.

You understood what he meant.

He was testing a theory.

And so you participated.

Heaving a deep sigh, you stabbed your palm using the scissors.

You yelped in pain.

Taehyung held you, kissing your forehead.

It hurt. It hurt a lot.

But you didn't know what hurt the most.

Was it your injured hand? Or was it the fact that Taehyung's palm wasn't bleeding like yours?

It only meant one thing.

"Our lives aren't connected anymore." He confirmed what you already knew.

You were aware that you should be rejoicing. You were finally free. He was finally free.

"I can go back to hell now..."

There was no reason for him to stay here. He simply went to the world of the living to protect you and to tempt people. Doing the latter only took a short period of time.

Taehyung always went back to hell right after corrupting the minds of humans.

In hell, he was safe.

If he was there, he wouldn't have to tempt innocent people just to survive. Hell was his home, it was where his powers became stronger.

"Yeah," your response was too late.

Silence was engulfing you for quite some time now. You were in a state of shock when he said that he could go back to hell any moment from now.

He had no reason to be with you.

"I have all the reason to be with you," but Taehyung believed otherwise.

He didn't want to leave you alone. He just admitted he loved you. He couldn't love you and then decided to leave you.

"Don't be silly, Tae." You buried your face in his chest so that he couldn't see the tears forming in your eyes.

"You have to go. You served your purpose already. You save me,"

You were no longer suicidal. You felt a lot better now. His presence helped you a lot. He made you realize so many things.

"The best thing to do is to leave me."

"But it's not the right thing to do..." His jaw tensed as he embraced you.

"I don't want you to die, Tae." You hugged him back. "I can't let my selfishness become your downfall."

You are my sweetest downfall. He wanted to say, but he kept his mouth shut.

He didn't want to die too.

Dying meant he wouldn't be able to see you again.

He had to save himself so that he could continue to love you.

Taehyung loved you.

He kissed you once more just to show it to you.

You kissed him back to imply that you also loved him.

The kiss wasn't like the first time. It wasn't the same as the second kiss too.

This time, the kiss felt more intimate, hungrier, hotter...

He kissed you like it was the last time he would be allowed to do so.

"I love you, Taehyung..." You cooed, wrapping your legs around his waist.

He didn't respond. He only kissed you deeper.

He brought you to his bedroom.

You let your bodies talk. The tension and the frustration were released through kissing your complexion.

Taehyung made love to you to make up with the time you lost and the time you would be losing.

He had accepted his fate.

"How does it feel to be there?" You asked as he collapsed beside you.

"In hell?" Taehyung moved closer to you, embracing your naked body.

You nodded.

He was silent for a while, like he found it hard to answer your question.

Moments later, he finally spoke.

"It feels like everything is..." He stared at the white ceiling of the room, "dead."

It was your turn to keep your lips sealed.

Your heart was aching, luckily Taehyung knew the right words to make you feel better.

"But here, I feel alive..."

It was reassuring to think that you were one of the reasons why he felt happy to be here.

But here, I feel alive... you kept repeating these words inside your head until you fell asleep.

You liked to think that you had a good sleep.

But you wished you didn't sleep because when you woke up, he wasn't by your side anymore.

#taehyung angst #taehyung fluff #demon taehyung #devil taehyung #taehyung demon au #taehyung devil au #taehyung roommate #taehyung roommate au #taehyung fantasy au #taehyung fantasy #taehyung x yn #taehyung x you #taehyung x oc #taehyung x reader #ficswithluv #taehyung enemies to lovers #taehyung e2l

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iridescentmemoria · 3 years

Note

Every even number for Inky asks please! <3 and tell me their name and looks!!!

Pfhew! that was a lot of them! but i'm super happy i received this ask! i've been aching to talk about my inquisitor to someone <3 My main inquisitor would be Brenna Lavellan, She's a Dalish mage, pale skin with a dark green vallaslin. She has black hair, long, long enough to have to braid it and pull it into a bun behind her head. She wears several dreads too, with jewelry in them, but alas there's no mod for that. ( i use the mod dreads of the wolf on her ) She carries on her left cheek a scar that cuts through her face and onto her ear, she got it in a fight with a shemlen who'd tried to light their aravels on fire in the woods one night when she was only a youngster.

2 - How did they decorate and structure skyhold?

She decorates it with various trophies from their adventures through thedas, but the heraldry is mostly a mix between the inquisition and the dalish + elven designs. Some ferelden dogs, and an Avvar throne. 4. What are their views of the Chantry?

Fuck the chantry. That's basically her attitude. She understands faith is important to the people of thedas, they need hope, but the chantry is an outdated, cruel institution that practices nothing that they preach. 6. Who did they romance and why?

Solas. She fell for him quickly, his wit and charm and endless stories of the fade and the ancient elvhen empire. she loves him, with whole her heart. Where usually she would be wary of strangers, solas was one of the exceptions. She felt an instant connection with him and it didn't take long before he skillfully broke down her walls and made her fall deeply in love with him.

14. Who is their favourite and most trusted adviser?

If we're talking only the advisers she adores leliana, they cultivated a strong friendship. If we're talking the entire inner circle, that would be dorian, solas, cassandra and cole. 16. How do they react to the corruption of the Wardens? Why? She is apalled by their actions. For an institution to fall so low and resort to tying themselves to demons.. it was just too much. She banishes them from orlais. 18. Do they enjoy Wicked Grace, or don’t they? Not only does she enjoy it, she is also good at it and loves to challenge everyone in skyhold for a game or two. 20. Do they trust Morrigan? Trust? No. She's smart enough to realize Morrigan is in it for her own gain. She respects her and her magical abilities and likes to converse with her ( when she's not bragging about all the knowledge she supposedly possesses about elves and their heritage ) But she doesn't trust her. Morrigan is power hungry, and their debate at the well of sorrows shows that clearly enough. 22. What is their biggest regret?

Ironically, Not realizing Solas wasn't who he said he was. If she'd figured it out sooner, she might've been able to change his mind.. 24. How did they react when they found out about Blackwall/Thom Rainier?

Oof. Yeah that was a big reveal there. She had some suspicions about blackwall but would never have thought him to be a murderer. She pardoned him. But remains distant. Despite their friendship. 26. What makes them trust someone?

Seeing them standing up for what they think is right, standing up for people who cannot defend themselves. And those who do good deeds without wanting anything in return. 28. Did they disband the Inquisition or maintain it?

It was a tough decision. The inquisition was her everything, but seeing the state of thedas and knowing the truth now, that the entire organisation was infiltrated with spies and reeking of corruption... She disbanded it. She was angry and upset, but determined to work towards saving solas from himself. It would be easier with a tight knit group that doesn't involve all the politics and discussions in the winter palace. She also gladly went to kirkwall to live there after varric offered it to her. 30. How did they judge the prisoners? Alexius, Servis and so on. Specific a character.

Alexius was made to serve the inquisition, in researching arcana. But he will not be gaining his freedom. Servis was made to smuggle artefacts. Florianne was killed, and her box was used for community service. Livius Erimond was executed. Ser ruth was sent to the deep roads to achieve what she wanted. Samson was remanded to Kirkwall for judgement of his crimes, though if she was given the chance she would have executed him for all he did. 32. Who did they leave in the Fade, and why?

Stroud. To her it seemed the more logical solution at the time. besides, she loves varric dearly and couldn't take his best friend from him. 34. How do they cope with the stress of being Inquisitor?

Powering through. Trying her best to maintain her sanity by taking breaks on her own when she can. Also elfroot. A lot of it. 36. What was the most difficult choice that had to make?

Whether to disband the inquisition or not.

38. Emotionally, what was their reaction at Sahrina Quarry? The realisation made her nauseous to her core, the poor people there didn't deserve all that and she wishes she could have helped them sooner.

40. Do they get Cullen to start taking lyrium again? Why or why not?

Absolutely not. She supports his decision and provides him with counsel and comfort when he needs it. They are devoted friends, And seeing him overcome his addiction makes her proud. She trusts in him, she knows he can continue his work without the lyrium.

42. How do they view Tevinter? Oof. Yeah.. well considering she is an elf, she doesn't much like the place at all. The only good thing to come out of it is Dorian, who she loves dearly.

44. How do they think their race plays into being Inquisitor? It definitely does. A whole big deal. She is a dalish standing for all peoples. No matter their origin. She is the proof that everyone is worthy of respect. And she openly wants to use her power to advance the elves. 46. Which companion/adviser makes them think twice about their choices, if any?

Dorian. His voice is one of reason and she takes his counsel constantly. Also they have fun little outings that involve a lot of vintage wine and gossip. All the advisors are important to her, she listens carefully to josie cullen and leliana. Also cassandra. And cole. I think the only one she doesn't listen to is viv. ;) 48. What do they think about the Hero of Ferelden?

She doesn't know much about the hero of ferelden. Before the inquisition she kept to the clan and their worries, but she reads up on their story later in the library and finds herself feeling some level of connection to them, they both stand for something better after all. 50. Are they proud of what they accomplished? Yes. Despite everything. She feels like being a part of this whole inquisition took a lot from her, almost everything, but she is proud of what she has accomplished and the changes she's made to the world. Bonus! here's some pics of Brenna for the long wait!

#oc lavellan #ask game #ask game response #dai #dragon age inquisition funny #solas dragon age #dragon age: inquisition #da:i #solavellan #solas #fen harel #trespasser #the descent #solas x inquisitor #solas x lavellan #dorian pavus #varric tethras #da4

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i-did-not-mean-to · 3 years

Text

Never say never - Chapter 13

Here's a new chapter of my main story (I forgot to go on posting lol)

Fandom: RPF- Richard Armitage

Characters : OC x RA

Rating : Mature

Warnings : RPF (and factually incorrect and very soppy)

°13° ~Victoria~

She had expected questions and intrusive crowding, but her friends and their friends, sat motionless around the table still. Victoria saw that they had unpacked every single book and movie she had bought and put them into piles, though she could not discern the logic governing the separate piles.

“Have a nice chat?” Liza asked after a moment of Victoria just standing in the door, wordless, chewing on her lower lip.

Victoria, in turn, gave an assenting grunt and handed Martin back his phone with a grateful smile.

“More information, please?” Angie demanded, crossing her legs, and putting her folded hands upon them like a school mistress ready to listen to the recitation of a particularly hopeless student. Victoria bristled.

She had to dig her heels into the floor to keep herself from turning around and fleeing the room. Adulthood somehow boiled down to the absence of the heavy, constraining hand at the back of her neck, and Victoria had a tendency to bolt every chance that she got. Afterwards, she always felt ashamed because she knew that she had not solved anything by just leaving a situation in which she felt uncomfortable, but she had not learned how to face her instincts and overcome them.

For her, it had always been a matter of being able to follow her reflexes or being forced to go against them.

It pained her to discover that her instincts were all wrong and, what was worse, not only did they neither soothe nor protect Victoria herself, no, they also usually ended up hurting someone else.

“We…we talked. I said he’s welcome to come here if he cares to. He said he’d help me set up any other furniture I might need.” She felt and sounded sheepish, Victoria knew, but she didn’t know how to make that very normal conversation sound like the outrageous exchange of dark confessions the others apparently expected.

“Oh, so I’ve been made redundant? And I had hoped you’d let me watch the movie with you.” Hiddleston winked at her.

Big breath, Victoria told herself, this was good, this was healthy, don’t run, stand your ground.

“You’re welcome here, little fairy-lord. You can come watch the movie with me.” She said in a tiny voice.

“Oh goodie good good, we have made piles of movies we want to watch along with you…on your fancy new TV…” Angie clapped her hands and, finally, Victoria understood the piles. “You naughty girl, you.” Liza laughed.

“Naughty?” Victoria blinked. She did not see why she would be naughty for watching movies. Had her father been right, and they corrupted the impeccable morals he had tried to instil in her? Were movies the devil’s dark corruption after all?

Martin had called it “porn”, she remembered, and a cold shiver ran down her spine.

“What are you talking about? Have I done something wrong?” Panic seeped into her voice now and she was starting to feel a little dizzy. She knew that Liza sometimes made crude jokes, but up to this point, she had never been the butt of these jokes.

“Liza!” Angie hissed, rushing to Victoria’s side to soothe her with shushing noises and tender caresses. “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.” She said, but Victoria could hear that she was lying, as noted before, Angie was a terrible liar.

“Yeah, low blow, I’m sorry. So, what else does Armitage say?” Liza lifted her hands apologetically and leaned back in her chair, knowing that Victoria would most probably shrink back from her if she was to approach right now.

“He wanted to go over some comments in the script with me. We might meet up if he finds the time. I gave him my number.” Victoria narrated in an emotionless voice; her mind still occupied by the accusation of being a naughty girl.

Angie threw a look at her wife that was so earth-shatteringly severe that Liza didn’t even dare make a face at that. Unfortunately, Jenna had not picked up on it and so, still snacking on the pizza crust, she asked: “Really? You gave him your number? Cute.”

Victoria stared at her for a solid 2 minutes; her mouth was bone-dry, and her tongue seemed to be glued to her teeth. She barely heard the warning hiss Angie gave her employee. Her head was spinning; she was entering territories of supposition and innuendo she was painfully unfamiliar with, and it scared her.

“Cute?” She gasped, feeling the tears of helpless perplexity burn behind her eyes, ready to spill over. Victoria had never given this number to any man, because the last time she had given a man her private telephone number, she had had another number, she had lived in another city, she had led a very different life.

“It’s not like that. It’s professional.” She tried to defend herself weakly. It was true, she had met that man twice in her life, and both times, it had been with Liza in the context of that ludicrous side-job she had accepted to keep busy.

On the other hand, she was a single woman and, as far as she knew, he was a single man. She was a recent divorcee; he had never been married. He had slept with a thousand and one nameless women in his life…and she had only ever had one sexual partner and had never expected having to think about another one.

“Fuck.” She cursed. There were no Saints that came to mind to call upon in this situation. She should have trusted her gut feeling and pull out of this whole story while she was ahead; she should have left this first evening right away and never return to that damn room. She should have kept her door closed tightly.

“It’s okay, I’m sorry…I’m sure that he knows that it’s strictly professional.” Jenna tried to calm her, but her eyes were wide and worried now.

“OH! Will he? I’ve invited the man into my home, haven’t I? Like Delilah to Samson, oh Lord…” Victoria groaned, all of her compounded trauma harrowing her to the brink of tears once again. What would he think of her? Did he believe that she wanted to throw herself at him like a common prostitute? Did he expect that? Would he be violent if she refused?

If he thought that her intentions had been indecent, surely, he would not try to contact her in any way or form, would he?

“Like…Vic, do you intend to seduce him and cut his magic…hair?” Liza mocked, but when she saw the expression Victoria’s face, she fell silent instantly. She waved Hiddleston and Martin aside, feeling that they should not draw attention to themselves.

“Vic,” she pleaded, “look at me, girl. It’s okay, you’re safe. It was a dumb joke, nothing more.”

Liza knew that she had gone too far too fast; Victoria was in her living room while it was dark outside, together with 4 people who were attracted to women and yet, she had only made the connection once Armitage had been mentioned.

Devout and faithful, Victoria had only ever known the man she had married, in the biblical sense, and it had been overzealous of her to believe that she might take another lover so easily. There were too many things to unravel before.

“What have I done?” Victoria sobbed and the dam broke; hot tears broke their way out of her system, and she cried pitifully for a few minutes straight, shaking so much that her teeth clattered as if she was standing naked in the snow.

“Victoria? Is there anything I can do for you? You can talk to me.” Hiddleston offered and his calm demeanour managed to pacify her enough to shake her head slowly. “I have acted abominably. I…just can’t do anything right.” She croaked.

“That is not true. You’ve been frightened and overwhelmed at first, but you’ve been a kind hostess tonight. We had fun this afternoon, didn’t we? What is it that upsets you so?” Hiddleston took her hands and brushed his thumbs lightly across them in slow, gentle circles.

“What does that poor man think of me now? He will believe I am completely insane!” Victoria lamented, tears still running down her cheeks in regular intervals. “No, he won’t. He’s not a monster. We all can see that you’ve been through some things, but we’re here to make it better. And, as you said, it’s strictly professional. I’m sure he knows that.”

Hiddleston exchanged a look with Martin. Richard knew, but that didn’t prevent him from maybe hoping that one day, it wouldn’t be so. As far as one could make any assumptions based on Victoria’s erratic behaviour, she seemed half scared to death that it might turn into something that wasn’t all that professional anymore as well.

“You’ve had a stressful day, why don’t we leave you alone? I’m surprisingly free the next few days, so if you want me to, I can swing by tomorrow and while I go have my picture taken, you can choose some more furniture. And then, we finish the movie? What about that?” He coaxed her into calming down until a puffy face and a pathetic hiccup were all that remained of her passionate outburst. “Yes, I’d like that. We can go have cakes in the afternoon?” Victoria replied.

It was easy to like Hiddleston, and that discovery surprised and amazed her. He was kind and unobtrusive; he had a good sense of humour, and, most importantly, she was in no way attracted to him.

Oh, he was glorious, there was no denying that, but he reminded her too much of that friend she had dreamt up as a child – when she had lain in bed, lonely as can be – to be in any way titillating to her. He made her wish that she wasn’t an only child; he made her long for siblings, for someone to go to for advice and solace.

Never would she look at him like Jenna did: with big, longing cow-eyes that were starry with wordless adulation.

Vic’s mind slammed on the brakes again. Jenna did stare at that man like he had literally just fallen from the sky and, when Vic had proposed to go to the tearooms, her breath had stumbled for a second there.

Jenna had a crush on Liza’s friend.

Victoria was utterly baffled. Were things that easy in the normal world? Did people just meet someone handsome and kind, and then allowed their heart to leap into their eyes? Victoria could not fathom being that brazen and reckless.

“He’s right. Let’s retreat. I’m sorry, Vic.” Liza shooed the others out of the room. “Good night, dear Victoria. Thanks for the pizza. I hope we can be friends now.” Martin spoke gently as if to a sick child or to a fretful mare.

“Sorry for being such a mess. Yes, sure we can be friends. Thank you so much for the poppets.” She picked them up gingerly as she followed the others out of the room and turned off the lights in the living room.

“Not the kind of plastic dick people usually keep next to their bed.” Liza mumbled under her breath, which made Victoria skewer her with a scandalised, speechless look. “Sorry, it was too good to miss out on. You know, because…”

Victoria lifted her eyebrows in an expression of annoyed impatience; the joke went completely over her head.

“Richard is abbreviated Dick. You know…” Liza wagged her head from side to side to make very clear that she was only making a very tasteless joke and not attacking Victoria in any way. “Funny.” Victoria commented, her face so stern and forbidding that she would have given Armitage and Macfadyen a run for their money.

“They will not be kept next to my bed…once I get the proper décor for them.” Victoria then snarled. “Décor?” Martin was interested by that comment, his hand on the doorhandle already but his face turned to Victoria, eager to hear how she would proceed.

“I guess I’ll have to go to the pet shop to get a proper set-up where they’d feel at ease.” Victoria shrugged.

“They’re inanimate dolls.” Liza cried out, horrified at the idea that her friend would procure a cave and a hobbit-hole for two toys. “They’re the only friends I have now.” Victoria shot back with a dark smile.

“Ah, come on. I love you, girl. You know that I love you, don’t you? I’d never want to do you harm.” Liza smiled warmly, hugging Victoria to her chest, and breathing in her warm, clean smell. “Go to bed.” She breathed and left.

And so, Victoria went upstairs with her poppets, laying them gently on the pillow next to hers before getting ready for bed. She brushed her hair and her teeth, applied creams and serums, and put her clothes in the laundry basket…only to return to an empty bedroom. For all anybody cared, she could have gone to bed dirty and dishevelled; nobody would ever have known.

Shaking her head, she dispelled those thoughts forcefully. She had made progress today, she had opened her home to other people, and she had taken two different, hasty, and informal meals with them. She was not sure that her friends were aware of the fact that she had never lived alone before in her life and that those experiences were completely new to her, but she felt the excitement of having had acquaintances over.

A couch, she would buy a proper couch for her little sanctuary so more people could come and enjoy movies with her.

She was on the right track, she could feel it, and so she fell asleep, her poppets next to her, with a blissful smile.

~Richard~

He was an idiot. He had nothing to do the next few days, but he had made it sound as if he was terribly busy.

She had assumed that, and he had been too proud to clear the misunderstanding up, which made it only fair that now, the ball was in his court, and he would have to contact Victoria to plan a…meeting.

He would not call it a “date”, because first of all, it wasn’t a date, and second, he didn’t want to play into the hands of Martin and Elizabeth who had been aiming for that kind of thing apparently.

She had sounded breathless but not as hostile as before tonight. She had given him her number and he couldn’t stop fidgeting with the paper; by now, he had saved her number in his phone and on his laptop, just in case that he reduced the poor note to dust by handling it so much.

What would he say though? Should he give her a call or just text? He had said he’d text her, but he wanted to be on the phone with her again; it seemed that they were doing alright on the phone even though she frequently checked out of the conversation to talk to other people.

By now, the others were certainly gone…No, he would not call her again when he had nothing new to tell her. He wondered if she would have reached out if she had his number; women were usually better at that than men.

Sexist, cool, he was going insane at a rapid pace. Pictures of her, kneeling on the floor and praying to her various saints to protect her from whatever it was that haunted her so, rose inside his mind; he wondered if she slept in long, flowing, weirdly anachronistic nightgowns or if she went to bed in an old ratty sweatshirt. Both had their own appeal.

God, it was late, and his mind was wandering in all the wrong directions. He would not think of her in bed, he had no reason or right to do so, she had not given him any cause or encouragement to take that path down a very slippery slope, but he could not forget the small moans he had caught now and again.

Of course, they might have been groans of exasperation and impatience, but even so, there was something within him, deep beneath the parts of his mind he had any control over, that had responded ferociously to the breathless sound.

Maybe, he should just get it over with and send her one of those texts that only informed her of his number…

#fanfiction #richard armitage #never say never #rpf #longfic #romcom #friends to lovers #ao3 fanfic

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paragonrobits · 3 years

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i feel distanced from the pulse of the marvel fandom as a whole but I think there’s probably a trend, that I’m not informed about, that treats the charactesr in ways directly counter to what Disney has been doing with them, and some examples of what I’d do in fic would be:

> a greater emphasis on Hulk. It’s not very surprising that the complexity, horror and trauma at the root of Hulk stories has led to him being severely deemphasized in the movies. it’s good they have the other Avengers... uh, actually treating him like a friend, but Bruce Banner is a fucked up bundle of trauma, hatred and misery and everything about him (opposing the military, his leftist views, the point that his entire background is an exercise in child abuse) makes him unappealing and hard to make wholesome. run with it, I say! Hulk is ugly and complicated and unsettling and that’s really dang cool though.

> more mutants. It’s, it’s obvious, you know?

> focusing on the found family trope by having all the marvel heroes be a broad collective group of friends that support each other. This CAN be played for conflict in the style of Civil War (these are powerful beings with strong opinions who can easily fall to infighting, even if they would prefer not to), but the idea is that everyone is friends, to some degree. For example, Invisible Woman might not know the Hulk family personally, but she’s not acting like a Karen towards them.

> Related to the above, all the Marvel heroes know each other in a general way and help each other out, and the specific teams are a mix of groups of friends in the same wheelhouse, and those specialized for specific tasks or locations. For example, Excalibur being based in England and considered a branch of the X-Men, but in theory anyone can come about. It’s a much more fluid thing than what we usually see, and its why popular characters show up on so many different teams.

> The X-Men and the Brotherhood are the same group. The Brotherhood does less pubically acceptable things that harms those trying to do damage to mutants, while the X-Men present a publically acceptable face. It’s a big psy ops operation to protect mutantkind while also convincing humans to trust their kindred more.

> on that note, the Inhumans are considered here to BE mutants, ones artificially created through Kree engineering in the distant past; it would be implied that something like mutants appear in all sapient races past a certain point of cultural development, and no one is sure why. The Skrulls, with their shapeshifting enabling ALL potential powers, are the logical endpoint of that. Ultimately this means that mutants and Inhumans are essentially the same sort of being, and something is funky with the Mists.

> Thor and the other Asgardians would be treated in much the same way as the actual Norse myths, though the in-character relationships wouldn’t change. Thor and Loki aren’t adopted brothers, but Loki is his blood brother and is treated as such, and the same vibe of brethren is present. Thor looks the way he does because he incarnated as a normal human man and still retains the body he had then; Donald Blake (His human identity) simply looks the way Thor is usually depicted as in the comics.

> Tony Stark and his tech squad (Rhodey, Pepper and the cast associated with the Iron Man vibe) are garage-dwellers, he cast his company off and went off to do his own thing, free from the restrictions of his family and blood money. he makes all his stuff out of trash, garbage and scrap, and loots the rest from villains. emphasize the mad science angle here.

> the younger generation of heroes (the Runaways, the Young Avengers, and most prominently Kamala Khan and Miles Morales) are a sort of broad group of friends who are probably the initial viewpoint characters towards all this. They have also inexplicably gravitated towards Bruce Banner, who has no idea how this happened. Essentially they’re the modern version of the Teen Brigade from the earliest hulk comics, with vibes of the leftist protest movements that take Hulk as inspiration.

> Thanos is still an incel. This does not go unobserved by the younger heroes.

> (Everyone gets therapy. So much therapy. Doc Samson has his hands full.)

#marvel #too many to tag #fic ideas

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