#just from this you can infer what kind of student they all were

[starmocha]

Their reaction to wearing a school uniform is very on brand of them. 👌

[voxofthevoid]

Like I said in my preliminary post about the chapter, my initial impression of JJK 268 was positive but lukewarm—kind of “okay, that’s decent but full of holes.” Then I made the mistake of thinking about it too much, and now my opinion is more like “that’s ass actually.”

Unflattering assessment of JJK 268 and the current state of the story to follow—stop reading here if you don’t want to see that.

There were two things I liked—and still like, to a certain extent—about the chapter: Yuuji’s final conversation with Sukuna and Gojou’s final letters. But past the initial approval, I’m finding severe issues with those as well.

The Letters

To tackle the lesser evil first, the letters are quite in character for Gojou, and the one to Megumi is on point. It’s perfect. The one to Nobara is where it falls apart. Her mother is a non-entity; her entire flashback has focused on her friendships, with Saori in particular. Her family is absent from the page/screen, and all we get are passing mentions hinting at her family dynamics. So why the fuck is that what Gojou’s letter focuses on?

I know the answer; there’s nothing else for him to tell her. They’re not close and barely know each other, so there’s no substance to their relationship the way there is with Gojou and Yuuji or Gojou and Megumi. What would have made a good letter to her was Saori’s address/number—but Gojou can’t reasonably give her that because there’s no feasible way he’d have known about Saori. Nobara sure as shit wouldn’t have told him. So it feels like Gege tacked on information about a random absent mother because the letter had to say something and this complements Megumi’s letter. It just falls flat as fuck because nobody cares, least of all Nobara herself.

What I think could have worked without having Gojou act out of character was a joke or some bullshit about her coma—something that shows his faith/hope that she’d wake up and be well without becoming emotional or trite. They weren’t close, but she was still a student he cared for. There are ways to show that without pulling a random family member into the equation.

Sukuna and Yuuji

Where do I even start?

In isolation, I adored the conversation they had at the end. It allows both of their personalities as well as their relationship to shine and stay true to themselves while delivering a powerful final exchange. There are several angles to it that fascinate me, especially the contrast between how nightmarish Yuuji's offer truly is and how tenderly he proposes it.

But how the fuck did they get there?

Specifically, how’d Yuuji go from trying to rip out Sukuna’s heart at the end of JJK 260 to being willing to give Sukuna a second chance to be his prisoner/companion until their mutual death? JJK 265 and even 266 lay out his reasoning, but how and when did he get to that point? Yuuji’s final attitude toward Sukuna has both empathy and sympathy: (i) he realizes that he and Sukuna were both shouldering curses out of their control and that it may have been nurture as much as nature that made them what they are, and (ii) he believes that Sukuna deserves a chance to be more than a cursed existence.

We never see why or how he develops these beliefs. A throwaway line from Sukuna about being a wretched child isn’t enough for Yuuji to write Heian era fanfiction in his head; frankly, Yuuji’s not the type. The only option is the much-referenced but so-far unused “resonance” giving Yuuji actual insights into Sukuna’s emotions or backstory, but we don’t see that. We don’t even get hints of that. Yuuji’s willing to tear Sukuna apart and then he’s willing to coexist with him. Forget missing steps, there’s an entire missing floor here.

I’m all for stories that require the reader to engage in inference and analysis, but you still need solid material to prompt such conclusions. JJK is lacking that. There are hints of it. You can squint and see the building blocks of Yuuji’s eventual mindset. But it feels like entire chapters are missing between his attitude in 260 and 265 and also between 265 and 268.

The Fingers

You know how Sukuna’s death only being possible via a vessel has been a driving factor behind the entire plot? Well, I guess we can just ignore that. Just pull him out and let him disintegrate as a lump—problem solved. Even the remaining finger isn’t a problem anymore! That’d have made sense given it’s still only one finger—although even one-finger Sukuna is immensely powerful and might be an issue in the future, if the next generations are weaker than the current one. But instead, it’s framed as that finger not even having the power to connect to Sukuna’s soul at all. Even that’s acceptable in isolation, except this entire thing contradicts how the fingers and Sukuna’s existence have been framed until this point.

Just a few chapters ago, Sukuna was vomiting up fingers as the connection between his soul and Megumi’s body was assaulted. Hell, he swallowed them right back. The natural conclusion here would be that tearing him from Megumi’s body would result in four fingers—Yuuji’s little finger and three original Sukuna fingers—containing some 95% of Sukuna’s soul/power. It also meant someone would need to die to vanquish Sukuna because a vessel was necessary. The question was whether it’d be Megumi or Yuuji.

The answer, apparently, is that you don’t need a vessel at all. Yuuji’s offer to him is framed as him giving Sukuna grace—sure, he’d be caged in and then die with Yuuji sooner or later, likely sooner, but Yuuji's still offering him a longer life. And then Sukuna dies without a vessel. So what was the point of it all? The change is flimsily justified while contradicting the very premise of the story, and not only does it make Sukuna’s end underwhelming, but it also cheapens all the pain and horror until this point.

Tonal Dissonance

This chapter feels like two halves of two different chapters stitched together. Compare the aftermath of the Shibuya Incident to this aftermath—where’s the gravity, the grief? The end of the battle doesn’t get time to settle before the trio are back together, healed and happy.

Happy endings and tragic endings are both good endings—when they’re well crafted and cohesive. And JJK hasn’t ended yet, but the battle with Sukuna did, and we jump right into an aftermath that has no respect for the severity and devastation of the fight that preceded it. Seeing Yuuji, Megumi, and Nobara happy makes me feel nothing; it doesn’t even seem part of the same story. We see no hints of Megumi or Nobara really acknowledging everything that happened while they were possessed and unconscious, respectively. There’s no real sense of consequence either, which is just jarring after all the character deaths and associated emotions in the previous chapters.

The thing is, I think this could have been mitigated by shifting Megumi’s waking and what follows into a new chapter. It wouldn’t fix the timeline issues—it looks like Megumi’s waking several hours, maybe a day or two max, after the fight ended—but it’d be less abrupt. Follow Uraume’s death with a long pan of Shinjuku and maybe snapshots of what the survivors are up to: Yuuji gathering up Megumi’s conscious body; the state of Yuuta, Toudou, and Hana, as well as the remaining sorcerers who were involved in the fight; a quick look at the colonies and the incarnated/awakened sorcerers Kenjaku didn’t manage to kill. Just something to let the end of the fight sink in—a proper transition.

Honestly, I feel like Gege’s ticking off a few boxes in their outline to get this story done with. Maybe it’s burnout, maybe it’s loss of interest; I don’t know. But the end result is that there’s the shape of a story—an arc, an ending—that could have been incredible but is instead a sad, disintegrating lump on the ground, much like Sukuna was in the end.

There are three more chapters, so I assume some of my remaining questions or issues will be addressed, like the terms of the Kenjaku–Sukuna binding vow, the state of Japanese society, the fate of the surviving CG players and the CG itself, the Tengen fetus that’s presumably still inside Megumi, etc. They may even address some of the inconsistencies and ambiguities raised above. But this entire arc has already suffered from an excess of post-hoc explanations, and more of that won’t really make it a stronger or better story.

[sarahowritesostucky]

📖"First Taste"

Rated: Explicit

Pairing: Steve Kemp x reader

Tags: doctor/patient, medical kink, body image issues, oral sex (f!rec), fingering, dub-con, pussy worship, (inference of background cannibalism (b/c it's Fresh), but nothing to do with the plot or reader)

Summary: Steve Kemp sees a new patient for a consult about a rather ... intimate procedure.

Steve gets into the office at his usual time, coffee cup in hand as he catches the elevator. He sees Cassie jogging in from across the lobby in her colorful scrubs and holds the door for her. They greet one another amicably and ask how each other’s weekend was. She tells him about her new kickboxing class, he tells her about the pâté he made on Saturday.

“Liver?” She says dubiously as the two of them enter the office. She’s wrinkling her nose and laughing at him. “You’re some kind of Chef, Kemp.”

“I prefer the term gourmand. By the way is that Barbie on your—”

“Yep.” She goes behind the nurse’s station and hands him a clipboard. “Your morning appointments. Dr. Hickory went into early labor at like four am, so you’ve got some of hers.”

Steve’s eyebrows raise as he takes the clipboard and gives it a look. “What is she, thirty-eight weeks?”

“Thirty-seven.”

“Should be fine,” he mumbles. He frowns at one of the patient slots on his clipboard. “I see I have an FGM consult at eleven,” he says, eyes flicking peevishly back up to Cassie.

“Don’t be so dramatic,” she says, checking on her computer. “Yeah, Ms. Moreau. Be nice, she’s new.”

Steve narrows his eyes at the info. “You know I’ve tried to get away from doing those anymore,” he says, giving Cassie a look. Everybody in the office knows how he has a problem with the fact that Hickory’s turned their office into such a chop shop. Steve would’ve thought a woman would know better. Female solidarity, progressiveness, autonomy, kumbaya, whatever.

Cassie rolls her eyes at him. “Yeah yeah. Dr. Brendan the activist.”

“Hey, I told you, it’s—”

“‘Pathologizing the pussy’,” she recites with finger quotes. “We know.”

“Mm,” Steve grunts, assumes the ‘we’ is in reference to all the nurses at the practice. Those girls share a level of groupthink that is frankly eerie.

Steve works in plastics. He’s a vain man himself, so he knows he shouldn’t have gotten involved in a career field like this if he wasn’t prepared to be surrounded by other people’s body insecurities 24/7. It’s just… not how he pictured it.

Good thing he’s got this new side business venture going. He’s hopeful about it. Just last month he’d been able to send in the final payment for his student loans. Pretty soon he’ll have enough to get a house. He's entertaining the idea of a custom build, still scouting properties south of Portland. “I’ll see you later,” he tells Cassie. “Send my nine o’clock to exam three when they get here.”

“You got it.”

You arrive early for your appointment, plunking yourself down in the waiting room chair after the long walk from the train. You feel unpleasantly sticky underneath the cotton of your sundress. The office is cool, but it’d been hot outside. The near-boiling summer temperatures made you work up a sweat as you made your way across the city for this appointment.

Now, sitting in the chair, you can feel the sweat that’s formed on your body. It’s at your hairline, between your breasts and at the creases of your inner thighs. You worry about it, because soon you’ll be baring yourself to the doctor and you had specifically showered right before leaving for your apartment, used a pH balanced feminine hygiene product, just in case you were somehow scent blind to your own body. You didn’t want to be sweaty and gross when Dr. Hickory was going to be looking down there.

“Miss?” The receptionist smiles at you, holding out a clipboard from over the desk. “You need to fill this out, please.”

You stand, hurrying to go get it and the pen that she offers you as well. “Sorry,” you murmur. They’d told you that you would need to be there fifteen minutes early for paperwork. You return to your chair, feeling like such a hot sweaty mess, whereas the receptionist lady is so pretty and poised. You tuck some of your blonde hair back behind your ears and cross your ankles in an attempt to be even a fraction as put together as she is, you powder blue espadrilles knocking together as you prop the clipboard on your lap.

The office’s air conditioning is making the perspiration cool to your skin now, clammy and unpleasant. You read over the intake forms and fill them out. The second page has a line drawing of a naked woman’s body, front and back. It asks you to circle the areas you’re there to address. You bite your lip and circle the drawing’s pelvis. The anxiety you tend to get creeps back up on you, but you take a deep breath and let it out. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Dr. Hickory does this all the time. It’s her speciality. She will have seen it all, and you’ll be nothing new to her.

The door to the waiting room opens and a younger woman in hot pink scrubs peeks her head through. “Ms. Moreau?” she says brightly. She has café au lait skin, wild curly hair, and a genuine smile that helps put you at ease.

“That’s me.” You stand up, the only person in the waiting room. “Obviously,” you chuckle, grabbing your purse and following after her.

“I’m Cassie,” she introduces herself. “Hop on up here and let’s get your weight.” You step on the scale backwards and open your mouth to tell her that you don’t need to know the number, but Cassie cuts you off with a wry look. “Don’t worry,” she says, thumbing at her own chest. “I know how it is, girl.”

You flush and nod, glad that you don’t have to veer into that explanation. She records your weight on her clipboard and tells you to follow her to an exam room. Inside, she hands you a painfully thin paper gown and tells you that you can change. You fidget uncomfortably. “Um, actually I wore a dress so that she could just…” you make a gesture, “ah, dive right in. Is it alright if I just stay like this?”

Cassie nods and doesn’t try to foist the paper gown on you any further. “Have a seat,” she tells you. “The doctor is just finishing up with another patient.”

“Okay,” you whisper, getting up onto the exam table. After Cassie leaves, you look around the room, taking everything in. You’ve never been in a plastic surgeon’s office before. Everything looks just like any other doctor’s office would, except that instead of posters talking about BMI and heart disease, there are advertisements for laser therapies and Botox.

You spot a tray of breast implants over on a counter and can’t stop yourself from going over to look. You pick one up and poke at it, feeling it wobble in your hand. You giggle a little, before bringing it up to hold in front of your chest. Your own breasts haven’t ever bothered you much. They’re small-ish but have a good shape. One of your exes had complimented them excessively (though other parts had received thinly-veiled criticism). You pick up another of the implants, this one bigger and more viscous, and hold the two shapes up to each of your breasts, trying to imagine what it would look like…

“I wouldn’t recommend either of those for you,” a male voice cuts in, and you nearly jump out of your skin.

You spin around. You’re still holding the implants near your chest, startled as you blink at the man who’s entered the room. He’s wearing a doctor’s coat over scrubs, and his nametag says Brendan Kemp, MD. The bigger of the two implants rolls out of your lax hand, landing with a comical ‘plop’ right by your shoe. “Oh jeez. I’m sorry!” you say in a hurry, feeling like a child who’s gotten caught doing something bad. You rush to bend down and collect the implant from the floor. “Sorry I was just—”

The man steps closer with a smirk on his lips and gleaming eyes. He seems amused at you. “Everybody wants to grab the boobies,” he says, gently taking the implants out of your hands and setting them back onto the tray on the counter. “You’re fine, Ms. Moreau.”

You blink at him, stuck in place. He knows your name. “Oh,” you say, voice hushed, still embarrassed. This doctor is very good looking. He has a commanding presence, too. Something about his eyes draws you in, makes you want to be the object of his attention. He smiles warmly at you, perfect teeth flashing for a second, and you huff at yourself and try to laugh off your foolishness. “Yeah,” you mutter, rolling your eyes. “Guess I was just curious.”

“Hey, at least you weren’t juggling them. I walked in on that, once.” He winks. “What’s your accent? French Canadian?”

“Ah, y-yeah. I’m from—” You watch as he barely listens to your answer, his eyes sliding down to the level of your chest and staying there, assessing. You flush under the scrutiny. But you don’t feel like you can move away without being rudely dismissive. You squirm, uncomfortable. “Um, I’m not—”

“I’m Dr. Kemp,” he murmurs offhandedly, still staring at your chest. You see his hands twitch, as if he’s thinking of touching, but stopping himself. “A woman with your frame wouldn’t look right with ones that big,” he says, meaning the implants you’d just been holding.

You feel the need to defend your own taste. “Oh I know that. I wasn’t—”

“These,” he says softly, taking one of the more modestly sized implants from the tray and holding it up in front of you to see. You’re caught looking more at the sight of his strong, elegant fingers than you are the implant. “These would suit you better. Though I honestly wouldn’t recommend augmentation for you.” His eyes finally return to your face. “Your breasts are lovely.”

You feel your lips part in shock. “Um…” you feel an odd combination of flattery and confusion. Is it normal for a doctor to talk to a patient like this? Maybe it’s different with plastic surgeons, you think. They are paid to focus on their patients’ looks, after all. Comments on what is and isn’t aesthetically pleasing must be par for the course, here. “Thank you?”

But then there’s his gaze, the way he stares at you. It feels like he’s not just looking at your body for his job, but also looking for himself, as well. There’s too much interest there to be purely professional. Your breath catches when you feel your nipples starting to tighten beneath your dress, and sure enough, when you glance down they’re very visible through the fabric. Shit. You see Kemp’s eyes look back down.

“Sorry,” you say in a rush, turning away from his assessing gaze. You should’ve worn a bra, you chide yourself. You try to take a deep, stabilizing breath while you have your back to him. “I’m here for… for something else.” You look down at your pebbled nipples, which aren’t softening as much as you’d like, and you sigh in defeat. No doubt Dr. Kemp has seen plenty of nipples in his day. You need to just get over it. You turn around and climb back up to sit on the exam table, the paper crinkling under your butt as you settle. “I’m just waiting for Doctor Hickory,” you explain. “For a consult. They said she’s with another patient.”

Dr. Kemp sighs and holds up his clipboard. “Actually, that’s why I’m here. I’ll be seeing you today.”

“What?” You sit up straighter, alarmed. “But…” You’d specifically sought out a woman doctor for this. The idea of a man looking critically at you, there, is mortifying. “But, but Dr. Hickory—”

“Is having a baby,” Kemp says. “She went into preterm labor this morning. But we hear everything’s going well.” He smiles at you, as if this is good news. “She’ll be out on maternity leave for at least six months.”

“...Six months,” you repeat weakly. You hadn’t even known she was pregnant. They hadn’t said a thing to you when you made the appointment. You’d been counting on her being your doctor. And now this guy, this Dr. Kemp, was stepping in? You swallow nervously, uncomfortable with a man (let alone a very, very handsome man) being your doctor. Not for this. “Um, well I…”

Dr. Kemp is already looking over your chart on his clipboard. He’s going to see what you circled, you realize, mortified. You watch helplessly as he reads all of your private details. “Dr. Kemp…” you say meekly,

“You're here for a consult for…” he reads, eyes scanning further down the page. “Oh. You’re the Labiaplasty.”

You flush bright red at the word coming from his perfect mouth. You squirm uncomfortably. “Um, well… yes.”

“Don’t worry,” he tells you, placing a hand on your knee as if in comfort. He pulls it away before you can process it. “I’m more than familiar with the procedure. I trained down in L.A.” He says this like it’s supposed to explain something, and he winks at you again. It’s… upsetting.

You swallow thickly. “The thing is, I’d been hoping for a female doctor.”

Kemp’s eyes fly to your face as he realizes how uncomfortable you are. “Oh, Honey. I see.” You blush and he gives you a tender look. “You’re shy? That’s understandable.”

“Thank you, I—”

“But I’m sorry to tell you, Sweetheart, there aren’t any other women doctors in our practice.”

“Oh.” Your heart sinks. Getting this consult appointment had taken months, and you’d wanted to go to a place where you knew they were very good, very experienced. This place had been recommended as the best. “I see.”

Dr. Kemp looks pityingly at you. “Did you want to reschedule your appointment?” he asks gently. “Dr. Hickory won’t be taking new patients until after her leave, but I can have the receptionist take a look at next year’s calendar.”

You look at him with wide eyes, disappointed. “Next… next year?”

He makes an apologetic face. “Yeah, sorry.”

Sighing, you try to put on a brave face. You’re an adult, you tell yourself. Buck the fuck up. You’ve put up with male gynos before, after all. None of them ever looked like Dr. Kemp, but you shouldn’t hold the man’s good looks against him. He’s just here to do his job, to help you. “It’s okay,” you say, trying to approximate a friendly smile. “It’s fine. You can… you can be my doctor.”

Dr. Kemp’s eyes flash in satisfaction, but there’s something about it that’s more than just professional. “Good girl,” he says, and he says it all chipper and like it’s a normal thing to say to a patient, like it isn’t supposed to make your panties feel a little bit damp (and honestly, the sweetheart’s and the honey’s and the your breasts are lovely’s has probably contributed to the situation in your panties, too). “So,” Kemp says, sitting down onto the physician’s stool and rolling over. “Why don’t you tell me what makes you want this procedure.”

He’s giving you his full attention. He’s not even holding the clipboard anymore, and you find that it’s nearly impossible to meet his gaze for long. You look down at your lap instead, at your clasped hands against the white fabric of your sundress as you tell him, “Um, well I guess I just don’t, ah, don’t really like how I look… down there.” You nearly whisper the last words, ashamed.

“What don’t you like about it?” he asks softly.

“It just doesn’t look right,” you say, echoing the things your boyfriend had told you, things that you couldn’t help but to come to see as true. “It’s too much. Too big. It looks like…” you can’t even bring yourself to say the words that he’d used. “It’s just not pretty,” you whisper, cheeks burning in shame. “I want it to be prettier. Like other girls.”

“Other girls,” he repeats. “What other girls are we talking about?”

You scoff quietly and frown at your lap. “Like… you know. Like what you see in, in—”

“Porn?” Kemp says, voice tight. When you look up you’re struck by his darkening expression. He looks pissed off. “Let me guess,” he says, jaw working. “Boyfriend?”

You gape at him. “Ahm… no. Ex-boyfriend,” you murmur. Dr. Kemp looks very displeased, and you shrink back into yourself. “Is it… isn’t this like, a common procedure?” you ask meekly, wary of the man’s expression. “I looked at the website. There were lots of before and after pictures.” When you don’t get a response, you prod, “Doctor?”

“Steve,” he says, his expression lightening up somewhat. “You can call me Steve.”

You glance at his name tag that says Brendan Kemp, MD. “But—”

He scoots forward and puts his hands on your knees, rubbing over them. It pushes the hem of your dress up by the barest degree, but you ignore it. He’s looking you closely in the eyes. He looks sweet, and kind. And because of how handsome he is, how sure of himself too, it’s intimidating as hell. “Why don’t I have a look first, hm?” he says. “Give you my professional opinion, before you go deciding what needs fixing.”

You gulp and manage a tiny nod. “O-okay.” This is the part you’ve dreaded. Dr. Kemp (Steve, he’d told you to call him, but that just makes this whole experience feel more uncomfortable, more personal) scrutinizing your most private place.

He pulls out the stirrups from the end of the table and instructs you to put your legs up. “Take your shoes and underwear off and get comfy,” he says, smiling nicely at you as he says it, as if “comfy” is something you could possibly be while doing this.

He scoots away on his rolling stool to go over to the room’s counter and don latex gloves, giving you an illusion of privacy as you untie the laces of your shoes and slip them off your feet. They land on the floor with a muted ‘clunk’, and you slide your panties down your legs and tuck them under your lower back. They have a little wet spot on them that you don’t want Dr. Kemp to see. You slide down the table and put your feet into the stirrups, getting into the familiar, yet never-not-humiliating, position. You feel impossibly exposed, the cool air hitting between your legs and making you want to close them. As a useless, last-ditch effort, you straighten out the fabric of your dress so that it covers you to your knees, serving as a sort of barrier between you and him. “...Ready,” you say quietly, when it seems that he’s not going to return without your say-so.

He sits on the stool and rolls up close between your legs. You start trembling a little and you shut your eyes to try and calm down. “...Hey,” Kemp says, getting your attention. When you open your eyes again you see him standing over you, looking at your face instead of between your legs. “Honey,” he says gently. “You seem really nervous.”

You wince. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” He looks kindly at you. “I just wanted to double check. You didn’t indicate any history of sexual assault on your intake form.”

You blanch. “Oh! N-no I— nothing like that.”

“Okay,” he says gently, patting your knee again. “Just wanted to make sure.”

You’re struck by how sweet that is of him, and you try to relax to show him you’re grateful for his care. “It’s okay, it’s fine,” you tell him as he sits back down on the stool. “This just… sucks, you know?”

“Mm.” You gasp as his gloved hands appear on your ankles and give an indicative tug. “Scoot down closer to the end of the table, Sweetheart.”

Heat floods you as you do as you’re told, putting your ass right to the edge of the table like he wants. It’s so humiliating. You want to cover your face with your hands, only refraining by gripping the edges of the padded table instead.

“Shh. Good girl,” he praises you, and you feel your belly clench at the words. Below you, he chuckles and self consciousness floods you as you think of what he must be seeing. You’re suddenly, horribly curious if you’re at all wet. Good God, you hope not. But your panties had been damp, that one little wet spot on the crotch… You tense again as Kemp’s hands appear on the inside edges of your knees, pushing them apart. “Open up for me now.”

You realize you’d been closing your legs together somewhat. “S-sorry,” you whisper.

He rubs your inner thigh—close to the knee but still shocking. “It’s okay. I know this is hard. I can tell you’re a woman who doesn’t spread her legs for many men.”

Your lips part as your mind reels, offended and horrified that he’d say that. Nevermind that it’s true, or that it sounds like he’s praising you, like he’s just calling you a ‘good girl’ in a different way. You seal your lips shut to keep yourself from scolding him.

The next thing you feel is him leaning closer. You swear you can feel his breath down there, but surely he wouldn’t be getting so close. You grit your teeth and try not to let your mind run away with itself. “So,” you say to try and make conversation, to try and prove to him and yourself that you’re a mature woman who can handle this. “So y-you can see. See what I mean.”

“Mm, still looking,” he says thoughtfully. You inhale sharply when he touches you, but you quickly slam your eyes shut and try to take calming breaths. You knew going into this that you’d need to be examined. He drags his fingers over your mons and down the puffy outer lips of your pussy. It’s extra sensitive to you because you’d shaved yourself completely bare before this appointment. Silly, maybe, but you’ve always thought that hair down there was unsightly, gross, and you didn’t want Dr. Hickory to have to deal with it.

Not that she’s dealing with you at all, now.

You bite your lip as you feel him exploring you slowly, with the barest of touches. He’s touching you in a way that feels more like a lover than a doctor. His thumbs gently dip into the crease of your outer lips and pull them apart, baring everything between. “Look at that,” he whispers, and you nearly cry out in mortification. You must whimper or something, because Dr. Kemp pauses and checks, “Still okay?”

You nod, eyes squeezed shut tightly. “Fine,” you say breathily. Deep breaths. He does this all the time. It’s no big deal to him. Just take deep— “Oh!”

He’s stroking the hood of your clit with the pad of a finger, just the barest, gliding touch. It’s slippery with something, and you feel halfway sick as you have to wonder if it’s a medical lubricant he’s somehow fetched, or your own arousal that he’s gathered up and is using to explore you. No, you think, it couldn’t be. He wouldn’t…

“You have a gorgeous pussy,” he breathes from between your legs.

“I… ex-excuse me?” you stutter. This time you can feel it when you clench and slick comes out of you. Dr. Kemp groans as if he’s seen it happen, and you feel your face flame. “I’m sorry,” you apologize, humiliated that you’re getting wet from this. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Shh sh sh,” he hushes you, one of his gloved hands smoothing over your inner thigh, this time much further up. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Your body’s just reacting naturally to being stimulated.” His gentle explanation does absolutely nothing to help with your situation, and you feel your belly tighten again in arousal. You whimper helplessly, somehow wanting him to comfort you. And he does. “Honey,” he breathes, going back to tracing the hood of your clit. His fingers move down, following the line of your inner lips, spreading them out and gliding over the thickest parts of them. Shame curls in your gut as you remember the words you ex had used:

“Fucking luscious,”

You blink at the ceiling tiles, shocked. Those had most certainly not been the words he’d used. “Um,” you start to say, but he interrupts you in a firm tone,

“Baby, listen to me, okay?” You’re frozen, unable to respond so he takes your silence for compliance. Between your legs, his fingers trace up and down the wet folds of your cunt. There’s no interpreting it any other way now—he’s caressing you. “This?” he says, whispering the words what feels like only inches from your skin. “This is your labia minora.”

You exhale shakily. “I—I know that.”

“Mm.” He keeps tracing them, keeps gliding around in the wetness that’s now becoming obscene. “It’s natural for you to look like this.”

“I just…” you stammer, still trying to bring this examination back into the realm of productive. “I th-think they’re too big. There’s too much…” you tense up at another wet stroke over your clit. “Too much...meat,” you grit out.

Between your legs, Steve makes a displeased sound. “That’s what the ex told you, huh?” He doesn't wait for you to answer, one of his thumbs sliding down, down, until it starts rubbing down at your taint, pushing right up against the edge of your pussy. You gasp and he shushes you. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong, here,” he murmurs, his breath a hot whoosh against you.

You whimper at the realization of how close he is to you now. “Please,” you whisper, “Dr. Kemp—”

“Steve,” he corrects gently, still thumbing circles of pressure into the thin skin at the edge of your hole, almost teasing, almost threatening with how close it is and how with only a little bit more pressure, a different angle, he could slide it right in. “I told you to call me Steve.” His other hand splays out over your mons, the thumb dipping down to swipe up and down over the hood of your clit. It’s a slick, gliding, barely-there touch. He’s hardly applying any pressure but that’s how you like it. You’re so sensitive there, and you can’t hold in the pitiful little moan that leaves your lips. Steve hums in approval. “Yeah,” he says, voice low and quiet. “You’ve got a prominent clitoral hood.”

You toss your head on the table, a whine building in your throat at his bold, clinical language. It doesn’t match his tone of voice or the way he’s touching you. This is so wrong. But you can’t stop it. You like it. He intimidates you horribly, and you like that, too.

He’s still stroking you there as he says, “What was that word you used, hm? ‘Meat’?”

You cringe.

“Well it is,” Steve says lowly. “Very meaty.” He traces your folds again, this time holding your labia delicately between his fingertips and rubbing the sensitive flesh. You just about die.

“St-steve, please,”

“And these lips,” he says, ignoring your pleas. “These gorgeous …juicy fucking folds.” he says, nearly growling the words. “Makes a man wanna lick, and suck…”

You go rigid at the first touch of his tongue. “Ohmygod,” you whisper, hips jolting up against his mouth without your permission. You’re about to apologize, but before you can, Dr. Kemp is loosing the filthiest, most appreciative groan, the tail end of the sound becoming muffled as he mashes his whole mouth against your pussy. “Holy—” Shit, you finish in your mind, unable to force words past your throat anymore. Steve mouths at you like he can’t wait, like he’s desperate, and you feel it as his tongue swipes broadly over your entire cunt. Your fingers spasm, digging painfully into the edges of the exam table as your whole body tenses up. “Oh, god,” you moan, hips jerking against his mouth.

He makes a muffled sound of pleasure and sucks everything he can into his mouth; your clit, your lips. He sucks, hard and sloppy, releasing it all with a loud, wet sound. “Fuck, honey,” he pants. “Never wanted to suck on a pussy so bad.” His hand returns to your mound, his thumb taking up the same swiping motion over your clit, only now you’re drenched and swollen, throbbing with sensitivity.

“Shit,” you whine, pressing up against his hand without realizing it at first.

He holds you down easily and flicks his thumb a little rougher, a little faster. “Yeah? He breathes, kissing at the edge of your sex, near your thigh in a move that is surprisingly sweet. “That feel good for you, Sweetheart?” You make an unplanned noise of assent, and he hums darkly. He’s pleased. “Good girl,” he says again, and flicks his thumb. “Such a big fat clit, and these pretty pink lips. Mmhm, so fucking plump. I could play with it all day, looove it.”

You toss your head, unable to take the words he’s saying. And he’s growling it all at you like it’s a good thing, like your pussy’s the best thing he’s ever seen. You can’t doubt for a second that he means it, but you’re just so overwhelmed by what he’s saying…

You make an embarrassingly high pitched sound when he presses a finger into you. “Oh!”

“Shsh,” he warns you, smoothing his other hand up the apex of your thigh, up under the fabric of your dress, over your belly. “Shh, honey. Don’t want the nurse to walk in, do you?”

You gasp, suddenly afraid of that possibility. He feels you get still and silent and soothes you with a heavy lick over your lips, the finger that’s inside of you curling. “You’re okay,” he promises, kissing your clit, sucking it and letting it pop from his mouth. You sob. “Shh. You’re okay.” He moves his finger shallowly, stroking you from the inside. It feels nice, and you exhale shakily, trying to calm yourself down.

“Steve,” you breathe. “You shouldn’t. We… I shouldn’t….”

All of a sudden he rises from the stool, standing to his full height and moving to the side of the table as he keeps his hand on you, in you. He stares down at you, his expression rapt but tender. It’s so much worse with him looking at you like this. It’s almost harder than when he had his face mashed against you and half your sex inside his mouth. It’s even more serious like this, you think as you blink up at him with parted lips. It’s more personal. He looks you right in the eyes, unfaltering, as he slips in another finger. You keen, and your hips press up into it, seeking. His lips curl, pleased. He moves his hand in such a firm, practiced way. He’s not pulling out very much at all. Not thrusting so much as he is rocking, grinding.

Inside, something starts to feel tight and desperate. You watch him watching you, watching it happen. He’s smiling, smug, he knows what he’s making you feel. “You’re soaking my hand, honey,” he murmurs, and you feel your cheeks flood hot with shame. “Uh uh,” he corrects you, stern. “No, it’s beautiful.”

He changes it, starts rocking deeper, curling against your walls and jabbing harder at that spot. It’s not an orgasm you feel so much as an urgency, and you squeak as the pressure builds. “S-something,” you try to say, try to tell him that something’s going to happen. But his eyes gleam in pleasure, like he already knows. Above your clit, the thumb of his hand starts rubbing in downward strokes: down down down. Holy fuck does it feel good. Your eyes slam shut as you feel it building, building and tightening. Oh—

“I want you to promise me,” Kemp says, and you’re shocked at how close his voice is. You open your eyes. He’s bent over, his face mere inches from yours as his hand keeps working. “Before I make you cum, I want you to promise me,” he growls. “Promise me that you’ll never let anybody cut on this fucking perfect pussy.”

You gasp, his words jabbing at the core of you almost as much as his fingers inside do, “Ahh-oh!”

“Promise me, Angel,” he says, rocking his hand harder, faster, harder. “Promise me now.”

“I… I…ha-oh! I pra–hom–mi–ssss!” Your eyes slam shut and your hips jerk against him as it happens. You cum, you cum hard. You hear him curse and know that he’s moving back down between your legs to look at your clenching cunt. He never stops jerking his hand into you, drawing the pleasure out. You’re loud. You squeal and shriek and jerk wildly through the whole thing, unable to control your body. It’s never felt this; this urgent, this out of control. You buck against his hand, feeling the wetness soaking everything beneath you, until finally it comes to an end.

He pulls out of you and uses both hands to spread your lips apart, staring. You whine and squirm, and then you really feel the extent of the wetness down there, and you blanch. “I—Oh no.” You try to sit up, try to pull away from him and get his hands off you, panicking. “I… I peed.” You struggle, mortified, pulling your feet from the stirrups and swinging them to the side of the table, trying to close yourself to him, trying to get off the table and—

“Heyheyhey, no. Hang on baby, calm down.” Steve stops you, his hands at your waist, keeping you seated on the table. He crowds you, holding you in place. “You didn’t honey, you didn’t. You’re okay.” He laughs. He’s laughing. You can’t believe it as you watch him. You begin to scowl, ready to be hurt and mad, but he hushes you with a kiss to your mouth.

You gasp and go silent, somehow more taken aback by this than anything he’s done yet. His mouth is so sure and confident over yours, his lips pillow soft but commanding. He pulls back from the kiss and looks at you. “You squirted, honey,” he explains, amusement still clear in his eyes, only now you’re calm enough that you can see the affection there, too. The satisfaction, the desire. He’s not making fun of you.

“What?” You look down to the end of the table, where you’d been splayed open for him. The paper covering and the vinyl padding of the table are soaked with a clear liquid. You look down to your lap, which is barely covered by the material of your bunched up sundress now. Between your thighs, it feels wet too. “I… I did?” you nearly whisper, astounded.

He laughs affectionately and leans in to kiss your forehead. “Yeah, Angel, you did. It was amazing.”

You flush and tuck your head down, feeling tingly from his obvious approval. The things he’d said about your body… “You really meant it?” you ask. “All the—”

“Yes,” he says firmly. He tips your chin up, forcing you to look at him. “Hey,” he says gently. “Remember what you promised me.”

You squirm uncomfortably. Maybe he finds you attractive, but you can’t help but to worry about other guys, about the future partners you’ll have. Steve might like it, but he’s just one man. The fact remains that down between your legs, you still look like most of the before halves of the before and after pictures. “I’m sorry,” you whisper, apologetic to dismiss his opinion of you. “But I just… I want my next boyfriend to think I’m pretty, there,” you say reluctantly, glancing up at him.

He has a fierce gleam in his eyes as he boldly tells you, “He already does,” and then surges down to kiss you again.

It’s been a long day. With both his own patients and a bunch of Hickory’s to see to as well, Steve is pretty tired by the time 5:00 rolls around and the office staff is closing up. He changes out of his scrubs and lab coat, back into his gym shorts and sneakers that he’ll jog home in. That’s how Cassie finds him. “Brendan, check it out!” She holds up her phone for him to see the picture of a wet, vaguely purple-colored newborn. “Boy,” she tells him. “Five pounds, whatever ounces. Small but healthy. She says they’re naming him Grady Harrison.”

Steve grins. “Awww.” What a horrible name.

Cassie puts her phone away and tilts her head at him. “A bunch of us are going for drinks. You want to come?”

Steve shakes his head. “I’m beat. Gonna head home soon.”

“Mm. You know your nickname is Boring Brendan,” she teases, grabbing up her purse and heading for the exit.

“It is not,” he laughs, waving her out the door. “I’m just gonna finish up with a few notes. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She waves goodbye and the office door falls shut, locking behind her because he’s the last one there and the office manager already left. Steve walks behind the partition of the nurse’s station and sits down, booting up one of the computers. He clicks the mouse over a few folders, typing in his password when it prompts him for entry into the patient data files. There’s one in particular whom he wants to learn everything he can about.

He finds the folder marked with her name:

Moreau, Ann J.

The corner of his mouth ticks up and he clicks to open the file. “Ann,” he murmurs the name, remembering the taste of her cunt against his tongue, filling his mouth, his senses. Mmm. She’d been delicious, exquisite. Not taking his eyes away from the computer screen, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the tiny scrap of lace she'd left behind in her hurry to escape him. He holds the panties under his nose, inhaling. Fuck, he thinks, remembering her delicate body in that delicate cotton dress, how she'd cried out and creamed herself for him. So sweet.

He wants to learn more about her, fully plans on tracking her down and taking her on a date. On many dates, if he can.

Because he’s never been the type to be satisfied by just one taste.

Masterlist

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[haee-elia]

spence-tober: day 14 - middle school teacher

pairing: middle school teacher!spencer reid x fem!reader

summary: in which you greet your new colleague who happens to be the same age as you

word count: 1634

warnings: fluff, awkward, its a meet cute

spence-tober masterlist

As you turn down the colorfully, painted hallway of the middle school classrooms, you spot an unfamiliar sight. 

Usually so early in the morning, you were one of the few to be in the school and to your knowledge, you were the only middle school teacher who came so early to prep for the school day.

Carrying your tote bag and your large to-go coffee cup and dressed for the school day, your interest peaks as you spot a man sprawled out on the floor on his hands and knees, collecting a large amount of papers that had obviously escaped from his hands.

You rush down the hall, your flat shoes clicking on the tile of the hallway, and then set your stuff on the ground, bending down to help the man.

Even though his face is angled to the floor, the man looks to be about your age. His face is slightly flushed, you guess by embarrassment, but it’s a rather handsome face you can tell. He’s dressed in a nice button up with a cardigan over it and some nice slacks with some white vans on his feet. His brown hair is messy, but short enough that it doesn’t roam about around his face.

“Are you okay?” You ask, him, trying to search his face to see if he had slipped and fallen.

He looks up at you and gives you a small, shy, smile, “Yeah, I just tripped.” The tips of his ears turn a bit red. 

“I didn’t fall.” He corrects, “But I did send all of these papers flying.” He chuckles, nervously, “Thank you, for the help,” He says, gesturing to the collection of papers you have gathered from around the hallway for him.

You shrug it off and offer him a kind smile of your own, “It’s no problem. Are you new to the school?” You inquire.

You, yourself, have been working as a middle school teacher at this school for about six years now, having started right after you graduated with your degree. You had interned as a student teacher in your last year of college to gain experience and then accepted the offer by your mentor to take her place when she retired. 

The man nods and gratefully takes the papers from your hand, adding it to the pile in his own, “Uh, yeah, I am. I’m Spencer, by the way.” He introduces. He offers his free hand not holding the stack of papers for you to shake.

You give him your name and shake his hand with yours.

“What are you teaching, Spencer?” You ask, wanting to get to know your new co-worker more.

“English for 7th and Math for 6th.” He responds, his nervousness starting to dissipate. “How about you?”

“Science for 7th and 6th.” You answer, “I’ve never been very good at grammar or inferences.” You admit to him.

“Well, you must be pretty good at math to teach a variety of sciences.” Spencer assures you.

You giggle and shake your head, “As long as I’ve got a calculator, I’m fine.”

Spencer chuckles back at you, “A calculator never hurts to have.”

You glance at the stack of papers in his arms, “So those are your first day activities?” You ask him, pointing down at the pile held by his hands.

The top paper is one of those get to know me print out sheets that could be found all over the internet. If you’re not mistaken, you used that exact print out during your first official year of teaching.

Spencer nods and neatly tucks in the paper edges of the stack to be more uniform, “Oh, yeah. Um, just some get to know me’s. I have some math puzzle sheets and a few of my favorite short stories too.”

“That’s really nice of you to share your favorites.” You compliment with a warm smile, “Don’t worry, the middle schoolers aren’t too ruthless.” You joke. 

He returns with a smile equally as warm as your own, “That’s good to know. I don’t want to get eaten alive on my first day.” He quips.

“Oh, I wouldn’t let them.” You assure him, playfully bantering back and forth now.

Neither of you go to leave and still stay, standing stagnant in the hallway together alone. “Do you, um, usually come to school this early?” Spencer asks, trying to make some small talk.

You nod, “Yeah, I usually like to get the work day started. Leaves me less to do at the end of the day and all that.”

He grins at you, “That’s really smart.” He holds up the stack of papers in his hands, “I wanted to get everything printed and ready for today.” There’s a hint of nervousness in his expressions.

He adjusts the stack once again and seems to struggle a little bit when he has to readjust the glasses up further on his nose. “Can I help you with that?” You ask, pointing to the papers.

Spencer looks like he’s about to refuse your offer when the papers slide once again. You chuckle and go ahead and take about half the stack in your free hand, having grabbed your own possessions off the floor but easily juggling them.

He profusely thanks you for the help, but you brush it off. 

“Don’t worry about it. It’ll get easier to carry stacks of papers when there’s a crowd of students in the hallway and you only have time to make one trip to and back. Trust me.” You inform him, trying to calm some of his nerves, “Everything will get a lot easier. Teaching’s the easy part, wrangling middle schoolers who are in the midst of drama is much harder.”

“Thanks,” Spencer says again, “First day jitters are getting to me and all that.” He chuckles, nervously.

“Well, my classroom is the one with my name on the door.” You say, pointing down the hallway a little further back, “Let me know if I can help you. I swear, I had first day jitters my entire first year of student teaching.”

He nods, “Hopefully I can get into the routine of things. I, uh, was teaching at a community college for some time, but realized I wanted to teach a little younger. This is my first time with middle schoolers.” Spencer walks with you until you reach a door. It’s like yours, just a little bit more plain and instead has his name on it, Mr. Spencer Reid. 

He holds the door open for you and gestures you to go first, “Here, if you could just put it on my desk.” He directs.

You do as he says and find a space on the crowded desk for the papers. He follows behind you and piles on the rest of the papers in his hand.

While he straightens things out, you decide to look around the classroom. You were familiar with it, of course, you knew the older teacher who retired last year and often came into the classroom for supplies or otherwise. All of the decorations from the prior teacher were gone and it was still quite bare bones, but you could see the little things Spencer has started to add. 

The large shelves were filled with many books of different variety and sorted by genre. You could spot The Hunger Games Trilogy, the Illiad, Geronimo Stilton, and Magic Tree House, to name a few. The walls were pretty bare, but there were some brand new dinosaur themed garlands decorating the tops of the cabinets and bulletin boards. Judging by the plastic bags resting on the floor near the teacher’s desk, Spencer wasn’t quite done with decorating yet.

Spencer turns back to you when he’s finished straightening out his desk. He watches your eyes take in the room around you, “It’s not done yet, I, uh, didn’t realize how much stuff I need to fill a classroom.” He chuckles, rubbing the back of his head with his hand. 

“It looks really good so far.” You compliment, looking back at Spencer with a smile.

“Sorry, bye the way.” Spencer blurts out next, like he had been sitting on saying it for a while. 

You furrow your eyebrows, “What?”

“I’m sorry,” Spencer repeats, a bit bashful this time. “For keeping you. You came early to get things done and I’ve kept occupied. You haven’t even bene able to put your stuff down.” He gestures with his hands towards the tote on your shoulder and the travel coffee cup in your hand.

Before you can respond, a school bell sounds off and Spencer visibly panics. You know the panic all too well and hold up your hand to stop him in his tracks, “That’s the teacher bell. No students yet. They test the bell on the first day to let all the teachers know its 30 minutes until students will show up.”

“Oh,” Spence relaxes and his tense shoulders melt with your explanation.

“I should get going though and sort out my classroom.” You say, looking at the watch on your wrist, “And don’t worry about keeping me today, any time you need help, just come find me. The first year teaching middle school can be stressful.” You tell him, honestly, “I’m here early every day and I leave about an hour after school ends.”

You collect yourself and move towards the door, turning around one last time, “Have a good first day.” You say, wishing him the best.

“You too!” He says, catching you right before you left down the hallway.

It would be years before you would tell Spencer that when you left his classroom starting down the hallway towards your own, that the other teachers were giving you very knowing looks. 

When you did finally tell him, it would be on your honeymoon.

a/n: i am not very happy with how this turned out but at least its done? at this point (sorta halfway through writing the month) all these prompts and blurbs are running together...

[drdemonprince]

This was several days ago but it was still bugging me (autistic) so I have to be a little pedantic about your tags on the pop neuroscience post: https://www.tumblr.com/drdemonprince/742517045406613504?source=share

The post is 100%. Pop neurosci is complete bullshit. All this "dopamine"/other neurotransmitter stuff people talk about especially.

With your tags though, please don't conflate the entire field of neuroscience with fMRI. For sure, 90% or more of fMRI is total bunk, I am with you. But there are many methodologies besides fMRI. And decades of neuroscience research that is real science. Including actual experimental methods that can establish causality, unlike fMRI. Much of that is done in lab animals. (Don't want to get into animal research ethics here but there is plenty of humane, non-horrifying animal research in neuroscience, although most of it does end with the animal being humanely euthanized. Of course some people hold the position that we should never raise, keep, or euthanize animals for research purposes, which is a valid position that I don't happen to agree with.)

Almost all of what the field of neuroscience actually knows about neurotransmitters is from animal research. So when you say we have no experimental data on that - not true, we totally do, just not much of it in humans.

We even do have a way to look at real time neurotransmitter release in living human brains, by injecting people with e.g. a radioactive dopamine-receptor-binding chemical and then do PET imaging to visualize the movement of the radioactivity in their brain while they do tasks/view stimuli. As their own dopamine floods an area, the radioligand is displaced (it's designed to be a weaker binder to the receptor than natural dopamine) and you can infer dopamine release in that area. It's indirect, correlational, and does involve some fancy math (but not as bad as fMRI). But it is a method that has produced meaningful findings. Nora Volkow is one of the scientists who used that methodology to study cocaine addiction among other things. Her research combined with neuroscience using lab animals contributes to the modern understanding of dopamine's role in drug craving and drug-seeking behavior, and how dopamine has nothing to do with the pleasure or high from the drug.

There are other valuable findings from human research that are not fMRI. Including stuff done on people getting brain surgery (kinda "poke this and see what happens", but it does establish causality); TMS which experimentally disrupts certain areas; studies of people with brain damage; and histological and anatomical studies of human brains donated to science postmortem, where you can look neuron by neuron which you can't do with fMRI or other imaging or EEG. And, fMRI/imaging has produced a LITTLE bit of worthwhile stuff. Just...not much, I agree.

I think coming from social psychology you may have been mainly exposed to "social neuroscience" which is generally fMRI about social psychology stuff. And often being done by social psychologists with not enough neuroscience background, not that fMRI is done rigorously by those people either, but it doesn't help. But that is not all of neuroscience! I used to do neuroscience and taught it to college students for 10 years. It is so much more than hogwash fMRI, I promise!

Thanks for the message. If you'll bear with me being mildly pedantic back (Autism), since we were discussing the topic of anti-psychiatry, I think there being no real studies of neurotransmitter activity in humans as it relates to any kind of psychiatric drug/treatment in field is tantamount to there being no useful ecologically valid knowledge on it. Lab animal research just does not generalize well enough to ground anything that psychiatry is doing or prescribing or that is being reported in the popular press.

And I would certainly chalk up "poke and see what happens" style brain surgery as being under the "exploratory, not science" banner that I already mentioned. To say that we can establish causality with that kind of methodology is just not true. It's also just not generalizable. There is so much we don't know about variation in brain organization.

You are absolutely right that my main area of direct involvement was working in a social cognitive neuroscience lab with an FMRI and an EEG, doing absolute fuckall nonsense, but that's not all that I have familiarity with or training in. Your notes are well taken, and I sincerely thank you for them and I'm sure a lot of people will find them interesting, but I think we're still very much in the dark ages in understanding this stuff, and that stance of mine does incorporate those methodologies.

[flameshadowconjuring]

I am in the middle of my Assassination Classroom reread and rewatch and I am really enjoying it. It might just be that it resonates with me more now than 8 years ago when I originally read and watched it (ironic, given that I was much closer in age to the characters then than now), but it is even more fun than I remember it being. Most anime don't make me perpetually grin while watching them. Korosensei must be rubbing off on me.

The series does what the Japanese do best exceptionally well, which is to mix things that seem incompatible and make it work. Korosensei is the most kind and devoted teacher there is. He is also going to blow up the earth in one year if no-one kills him before then. He is the best teacher ever, can move at Mach 20 and is just generally a badass superbeing, but he is also deeply pathetic. He can destroy the world, but lives paycheck to paycheck. He encourages his students every step of the way in their mission to assassinate him, but does everything he can to survive their attempts. His students love him and depend on him, but also they are doing all they can to assassinate him. The most skilled assassin in the class, Nagisa, is a meek, kind boy who looks like a girl. All of this contrast is the source of most of the comedy of the show, and it works really well.

The thing I find most compelling in my reread/rewatch is how the task of assassinating their teacher unites the class. While the (almost) thirty students don't all get equal screen time/relevance, they all get moments to shine, and all of their successes come from everyone pitching in with their own unique set of skills. So many shonen manga talk about the power of friendship, but Assassination Classroom actually delivers on it. It has this strong message that everyone has talents to be nurtured and can become badass assassins someone awesome if you give them the chance.

The characters, particularly Korosensei, are very likeable and fun to watch. The anime's soundtrack is really good. It suits the series perfectly. The anime is generally a great adaptation. The mangaka actually worked closely together with the studio (at least for season 2, presumably also season 1). The cuts that the anime made were largely scenes from the manga that weren't essential. Exposition scenes whose information content can be inferred from more active scenes and stuff like that. I liked those scenes in the manga, but they were definitely the right scenes to cut so that the anime can conclude within only 47 episodes. The anime is really good. Just try not to look at students in the backgrounds of shots. They are often CG.

Perhaps most notably, Assassination classroom has achieved what most manga fail to do, which is to be neither too long nor too short, and to end in a way that wraps up the main plot in a satisfying, emotionally moving way. You will cry by the end of the story. I don't make the rules. The ridiculous initial premise of 'hey, your new teacher is a superbeing that just blew up the moon, he will do the same thing next year with the earth. It is your task to assassinate him before then.' is actually explained satisfactorily by the end.

That being said, I do have a few criticisms. I don't really like Bitch-sensei. A lot of scenes featuring her feel more like a reminder of 'hey, she still exists'. There are some great scenes with her, but not many, since she really only has one gimmick.

The first big plot twist of the show, which, to describe it in a non-spoilery way, is the big twist surrounding the actress, came out of nowhere. Maybe I am just dumb and missed all the clues (the author did point out that he planted some extremely subtle visual clues), but there were a bunch of scenes where the author could have easily planted some clues that would be subtle enough, but that a reasonably attentive reader would be reminded of during the reveal. The twist right after that one is really good though, so honestly its fine.

I will frame my final criticism as a warning. You might be tempted to let your guard down. To get emotionally attached to any budding romantic subplots that the story is suggesting or outright devoting entire scenes to. Don't. Down that path lies only disappointment and ambiguous open endings.

So, yeah. To close this with something positive, I guess I'll say who my favourite character is. Except I am going to cheat. I love Korosensei and Nagisa, but they are the two characters who get the most screen time. My favourite non-main character is Rinka Hayami. She is the sniper girl who is a steady shot no matter what, and she is just really cool. I ship her with the sniper guy who can shoot from super long distances. They are just a really cool, calm, get-the-job-done-without-a-hint-of-complaint duo. Mild spoilers, but they were responsible for what you could argue was Korosensei's closest brush with death.

Who would have ever thought that a show about middle school students learning the art of assassination to kill their teacher could be so wholesome and touching?

[paragonrobits]

so i think one of the more frustrating things to see in online discourse, especially lately, is the idea of mutually exclusive One True Interpretations, especially in terms of applicability for seeing yourself reflected in a fantastical situation that can be read in many different ways, but various online communities get hostile at any reading OF that applicability towards anything but their own reading

lets take a prominent example in the 2000s live action X-Men movies; its not hard to see that many different people can see themselves reflected in the main characters of the setting; born different from those in power, constantly facing rejection and oppression because of those differences, living in constant fear of being hunted down or otherwise living in constant risk of violent reprisals from others

Now, its pretty obvious to see all kinds of different metaphors, and some of the obvious ones were of course the racial discrimination ideas and antisemitic violence that has always been a key part of X-Men at the very least since the Claremont run (possibly earlier, but it was his run that really codified this aspect), but I remember the online discourse at the time that took the view that this was explicitly and exclusively only a metaphor for gay and lesbian rights and fear of oppression; as much a fear then as it is now, with transgender rights taking much of the brunt of the right wing's hostility now, but its pretty clear where the metaphor feels obvious.

Now, imagine being a young autistic kid around that era; your life is super unstable, you've had a miserable time at school because between being bullied for completely incomprehensible reasons by other students and sometimes being treated with superficially friendliness that feels incredibly patronizing over time (and is, somehow, worse than just being insulted). The general treatment towards autistic people ranges from a neurological difference being declared as worse than cancer because at least people with cancer don't have to live their whole lives like that, to saying that autistic children NEED to be cured and be Good Normal People. That not being Normal meant being... sub-human, or that's how you read it. Everyone else thinks it would be better if you were dead than just being who you were.

The idea of these differences, whether in terms of sexual orientation or you processing things differently from the allistics, is something you definitely hear a lot about. For you, you hear so much about how a lot of people think you were born wrong, and it would be better for you to die or for your brain to completely rewired and the person you are functionally cease to exist so long as you're Normal now. That kind of thing hits you different than it might for others.

So when you watch the third X-Men movie and see angry and scared mutant characters crying "We don't need a cure!" ... well, it strikes a chord with you. Something that resonates with you.

It resonates with other people, in a different way. So, its genuinely upsetting whne people online latch on to this but for different reasons than what you did and declare that not only is this a clear metaphor for themselves, it definitely DOESN'T apply to you.

There's no reason both can't be true. Resonating is better than textual allegory in most circumstances for this reason, and its hard not to feel at the very least pushed out when people whom should be at most engaging in conversation about how that scene struck them in a different way while you compare notes about the simliarities and differences, instead there's a whole bunch of hostility at the idea that it was not explicitly and solely meant to refer to just one thing.

Nowadays I don't think you see as much of that kind of thing, but it still does happen now and then, and in a broader sense for metaphors and applicability in general; the idea of a canonical inference, and if someone has a different read on it, or it resonated them in a different way then it did for others, well then! They're doing it WRONG, and they need to understand that it can only mean This or That... and so on, and so forth.

Ultimately i think this is a pretty damaging way to look at things, and very reductive; it feels like trying to shove experiences into little boxes, and anything that doesn't fit into that box is doing Experiences incorrectly.

IDK. I wish that particular trend just caved off; I'd rather not see the old argument of 'This character/moment/series is for US, not anyone else' for things that can resonate in many different ways, and I'd rather see more of people comparing notes or getting insight into other people's thoughts.

I'd like to argue that this whole tendency is also probably reflective of some of the more troubling developments in the blogospheres over time, but it might not be, it DOES make any kind of discussion more than a little frustrating.

[hey-haven]

Ranking all the TWST books from Worst to Best Part 5

Number 2: Book 1

Don’t know how much of a hot take this one will be, but Book 1 was a very strong start to the game. The simplicity of it really falls in its favor as it’s meant to serve as an introduction to the formula that we’d get used to even as it grows and expands as the story progresses. Compared to the stakes of the later chapters, this one really feels like nothing in comparison as you’re literally just baking a tart with the Heartslabyul gang, but that’s honestly a good thing.

The story itself takes a back burner as it focuses more on the characters. You get to know every member of the dorm and really take the time to figure out what they’re about as well as how they interact with one another. Considering that Deuce and Ace are essentially the deuteragonists of the game, I’m glad that we take the time to get to know them a bit more throughout the chapter all while it doesn’t stray from Riddle’s arc. Even when they’re not present, their actions still push the story along and we can infer just who Riddle is with with how they’ve been running their dorm and with how Trey and Cater talk about them. It’s impressive how much we really get to know Riddle when there are only around 20 chapters overall and they’re not present in all of them.

You know someone’s character writing is damn good when I can go from completely despising Riddle only for them to easily become my second favorite character of all time (no one can take Idia’s throne though tbh). Despite the scale of the conflict being much less severe than in later books, Riddle’s actions are still very extreme. As Ace said, magic is near essential for a mage. He said that removing their magic is no different from removing someone’s limb. It is an extrnsion of themselves used in day to day life, so to have Riddle be locking student’s magic up left and right is actually kind of messed up. Especially knowing how small a lot of the offenses were. It made me kind of angry to watch someone control these people like the tyrant they were described to be. It was easy to hate Riddle and to root for Ace and Deuce because the writing does a fantastic job paining the Housewarden as an asshole. We yet to see the full story, only getting nuggets of whatever good Riddle displays from what Trey says. After all, he must be loyal for a reason.

And then we see Riddle’s backstory. It’s the first one we see, and it’s still the one that impacts me the most. Child abuse is a narrative that we see a lot, but the specific execution with the abuse Riddle faced is one that really pulled at my heart. Maybe it’s because I relate to some extent. To not be abused physically but still faced the impact of being raised by a parent who did not provide love. Trust me when I say that it can break a person. The lack of control Riddle has in their home life easily explains their more neurotic need to have control in school. The voice acting, the story, they way Riddle begs for their mom to just let them have one slice of cake. I cried, I really did. Their story is what I consider a mastery of making a sympathetic and redeemable antagonist.

The pain Riddle faced, and really continues to face as they do still live with their mom at the end of the day, never excuses their actions in game (unlike some of the later antagonists) but it does explain them. I’m sure my own personal life is a big part of why I was more willing to forgive Riddle nearly right away, but another part was also their desire to put in the effort to be better. It’s an attitude that carries over to the second book and really every other time we see Riddle including special events. It’s a process, but we still continue to see them get better especially knowing they are surrounded by people that actually cares about them.

Book 1 is fantastic. It’s one of the only 2 books I have cried over because ouch parental issues ouchie. The heavy focus on the characters rather than some grand story made it easy for me to fall in love with them. The shorter chapters forced Yana to actually focus on the main plot and not get distracted by side quests (I’m looking at you Book 5). Riddle is actually such a wonderful character, being able to see them at their worst and their best. It’s just really fucking good. I look back on Book 1 fondly cause I remembered being excited finishing it and seeing what the others had to offer hoping they would be as good as the first.

And then I was smacked by the disappointment that was Book 2 but oh fucking well.

Part 4

[donnerpartyofone]

Recently somebody posted a link to kind of antique-seeming book about some foolproof method of learning calculus that clarified it even for students whose minds are really resistant to grasping it. My curiosity was piqued but the example screenshots the person added were basically just language-related, like how to reconceptualize the meanings of different symbols so they're more colloquial. That was disappointing to me, I have no problem with language. Actually I think I'm pretty great at it. It's numbers, any description of quantities and their relationships and operations shorts me out; it's so extreme I think it's possibly pathological, like even really elementary operations become intolerably abstract to me and I have to use a calculator because I don't trust myself and even then I don't feel confident that I told the calculator the right thing or that I'm even reading it right. I do understand that math is itself a language, so I feel like I shouldn't have such a big problem, but I guess I have some disability in apprehending what it is describing. I don't know if the linguistics of math are directly analogous to verbal systems. Like I can read a sentence with a word in it that I've never seen before, and of course I can probably infer its meaning contextually, but it also has a texture and a weight that does something for me whether or not I get the whole intended picture. You can say something with really bad grammar and I can still extract your exact meaning from it if there's enough information. Or you can say something that follows the rules perfectly but in a way that's sort of obscure or difficult--maybe you're trying to describe something unusual and you're not sure of the best way to say it--and we can come to a "you know what I mean" type of agreement. You can express one simple thing fifty different ways depending on whether you're focused on efficiency or rhythm or poetry or musicality or whatever. Does math feel like that? Do people have a whole rainbow of options to describe one quantity and do they have strong aesthetic preferences for certain styles? Is it possible to say "but you know what I mean" in math? Probably all of this is on the table. Recently I passed a rack of cheap books on the street and there was one by Marilyn Frankenstein on how to teach math in a way that works for young students whose minds are not generally wired for math. I really, really wish I had picked it up because I can't even figure out what the title was. It may have related to the article linked below. Let me know if you know what I mean.

[lediz-watches]

Podcast: Weird Medieval Guys

Another podcast, because it's consumed my brain over the last week.

Weird Medieval Guys started as a Twitter account (go off, Musk), but is now also a bi-weekly podcast starring Olivia (the Twitter creator) and Aran (the historian she bribed with a platform to rant about Constantinople). Every couple of weeks, they gather together on Olivia's living room floor to academically gossip about medieval life, loves, and nonsense.

Because people have always been nonsensical, and that's amazing.

I found it through another podcast that I will one day do a post about (I need to... come to terms with why I love it) called We Can Be Weirdos, in which Olivia came on and caught my attention with her passion for the legal debates people got into about heraldry, and her willingness to admit that medieval people were just as petty and ridiculous as we are now.

Because that's the thing, and which I think this podcast shows so well: people have always just been people.

The world we exist in has evolved. Technology has marched on, our ways of interacting with each other have changed, and we have different values, different things we consider important, but we're still the same, really. We think of the past as this noble and dirty and incorruptible space, but people were making sex jokes and lame puns for a hundred thousand years. We aren't special just because we can blast our lame humour to seven billion people at a time.

But anyway.

Each episode of the podcast takes the form of a loose essay, Aran lecturing Olivia (or occasionally vice versa) on some topic about the medieval period, and don't get me wrong - they are lectures. There are stupid jokes, Aran loves to play different characters, Olivia giggles constantly, and the point of each one is that medieval people were Just Like Us, but Aran is an academic talking about research. Yes, his area of expertise is a later period, but the skills remain.

And to be clear, I am a recovering cultural studies student who until recently has been out of academic life and away from other academics for over a decade. But I suspect this is not a podcast you can walk into without some academic-adjacent background. They discuss articles and a lot of their humour is based in inference and the kind of irony you see in people who debate reality for a living.

But they are also redditors, and Twitter natives, and talk about their subjects as 'based'. Aran loves to call people King and Queen. They bring their subject matter to the now.

The most recent podcast was about medieval Welsh bards, and they read out a rap (flyte) battle between two of them (Olivia's bard totally won, I don't care what you say), and finished on the DIRTIEST poem I have ever heard (seriously, ugh), and it taught me a lot about Wales' history, which I've never really known much about, so thank you for that. But it was great to hear all this poetry and these poets and put them in a context where you can strip back the language and see them for the frustrated, young, often horny, very human people they were. Also I loved the owl poem and must search it out because I grew up next to koala tress and boy, I feel you.

The episode before that was about medieval animals, and while it was fun to hear about hedgehogs and the bestiary, it also contained a beautiful insight into why we use animals as narrative devices. The only downside is that I'm still on the edges of the Hellverse fandom and started analysing furry culture and honestly, no one needs that in their life...

But my FAVOURITE episode so far is part two of their Constantinople episode, where they described the Ottoman leader Mehmed as so... painfully human. Even as his soldiers ransacked a once-glorious city and he chased a mad dream, he was just so lost and passionate and terrible and... Aran described him so beautifully, I was just swept up in the story.

So yes. Although there are a few hiccups along the way (please please please go back and fix the episodes with the overlapping voice tracks it hurt my ears so bad), if you have even a passing interest in history or culture or what makes humans human, check out this podcast.

Because we're just people. We've always just been people. And that's amazing.

[luckydoeslanguage]

Immersion Review | スーパカブ（Super Cub）

So! its finally time for me to write down my log of this show. Immersion is a unique experience for everyone cause depending on your tastes in media you may end up watching wildly different things.

if what i say here makes you a little interested in checking out the show, you can watch it here!

A lot of whats recommended to beginners in JP are Slice of life shows because they're usually slow paced, and have easy to digest dialogue (for the most part) which makes them either laid back, easy going dips into immersion, or unbelievably boring snooze fests. Super Cub is definitely a show that falls on that fine line. I think for me, slice of life really depends on the show. for example, I literally fell asleep once while watching Non Non biyori, but were not here to talk about that, haha.

As for Super cub, well, lets get into the review! (more under the cut! this post may be long, i will try and keep it from meandering.)

The show follows Koguma. A highschool student who lives in a semi rural town in the japanese countryside with no friends, no hobbies, no parents, and little money. She lives a pretty boring day to day life until one day, on a whim from her way home from school, she drops by a small motor shop and acquires a Honda Super Cub for dirt cheap from the store owner. From there, her life slowly, but surely, begins to become a little brighter from the new experiences she has while travelling around on her new moped. (not the most compelling synopsis, i know.)

At its core, Super Cub is a show about how changes, big or small can breathe new life into your own. There's a scene in episode 1 where, upon sitting on the moped for the first time and taking hold of the handles, Koguma's world literally gets a little brighter from the experience. up until now the show has had a pretty muted colour pallete. But for a single moment, the drab colours melt away and become bright and vibrant!

As a Japanese learner, the first episode is as accessible as a TV anime get aside form kids shows. Things get a little more complicated as it goes on, there's a fair amount of words related to mopeds, motorcycles and related things that honestly I just glossed over for the most part. Koguma is a quiet (honestly kind of depressed) girl who speaks pretty slowly, and its easy to understand her. Aside from the obvious focal of the show, the dialogue uses a lot of common words you'll come across quite frequently, so it was good practice for me to listen to. There also isn't a lot to miss out on if you don't understand everything. a lot and be inferred form the current visuals on screen, which makes it easier to pick up on new words.　（the show also makes me really want to get a moped, lol.)

I also really enjoyed the sound design of the show. the sound effects for the moped like the engine starting and the clunks the metal make or the textures of cloth are fantastic. i also think the pacing is pretty good. its laid back, but it has this adolescent warmth of discovering a new passion for the first time. the 3D models i will admit are a bit ugly, but they dont show up frequently enough to be bothersome.

The overall tone of the show has a melancholic feel that slowly drifts away as it progresses. Its like and iced coffee. sweet, but a tinge of bitter that keeps it from being all boring. I'm glad the cast is so small cause moe slice of slice shows can easy feel a little samey, despite having larger and more vibrant casts.

My Verdict - ★★★★★

Super Cub is a great show for language learners who want to try out a slice of slice that feels more down to earth. It has an energy of discovering new passions, and the small and large impacts it makes on your life.

the dialogue is easy to follow, and aside from the focal point of the show the word usage is quite easy to digest and get a feel of. while laid back, it has a great atmosphere that feels careful, but caring at the same time.

I hope what I've said today has gotten you to consider giving the show a try! if youve made it this far, thank you for reading my post and i hope to see you all again! またね！

[mlobsters]

supernatural s12e16 ladies drink free (w. meredith glynn)

s12e16 / hannibal s2e9 shiizakana

okay so it's kind of generic dead boy and girl in snow but the fur on her jacket and the positions and the grunty growling presumably werewolf just made me think hey it's a way less gory version of the hannibal scene

MICK My report to the home office ran long. We've had our hands full since... (Dean and Mick look down at a blood stain on the floor) Well, best not to dwell on that. DEAN Wow. That is some world-class repression. You are British. MICK We prefer to call it a stiff upper lip.

you're one to talk there, dean

SAM Wait a second. You killed them all? Even the ones that weren't hurting anyone? MICK Sorry? SAM I mean, werewolves aren't like most monsters. Some can control it. I mean, we – we have a buddy got bit. Nothing but beef hearts ever since. MICK And you trust him? Well, killing is a fundamental need for werewolves. And monsters don't just stop being monsters. DEAN Well, Garth did.

was wondering when this would come up

poor sammy. but dean's too excited for free and fancy shit. thanks for throwing us a bone, meredith

so old mick here lied about the girl being bitten, actual crisis of conscience or setup for having to kill her later to prove his point or...

(yay it's claire/kathryn keeper of my favorite hair on the show)

CLAIRE So, your foreign exchange student is totally lame. DEAN Yeah. He's Sam's best friend. (Sam sighs deeply) They're like nerd soul mates.

you jealous, dean-o

why is the moon literally being erased by cg, forgot to make the cloud?

secret third option, return to the hospital to kill her quietly before she's even turned. but he's sorry! oh how convenient she turned right as he was about to kill her so he had to fend off her attack

CLAIRE Sam, no offense, but who do you think the kids are gonna wanna talk to? Me, or some old skeezer?

skeezer lol

DEAN Yeah? I used to think the same thing. Well, here's a little tip. Things aren't just black and white out here.

took a minute but he came around

should have seen her getting bitten coming but i 100% didn't

SAM Mick, you killed a kid. We're not angry. We're done!

he gonna stick to that?

there's something about the way she said "unless i break out" that really worked. and the music was appropriate and far enough behind the dialogue it wasn't obtrusive

MICK The subject died in agony. Sorry. CLAIRE Yeah. Maybe second time's a charm. DEAN Hey, no, no. You don't get a vote in this. CLAIRE It's my life. I get all the votes. DEAN Sam, you wanna back me up here? SAM It's her life.

of all people, sam's gonna back her up on this topic 24/7

dean really in full-on protective dad mode this episode. i must have learned this little werewolf lore tidbit in fic and didn't realize because i honestly thought we already knew this sire business, or made some inference from the vampires 🥴

kathryn newton is so good as claire

they remembered to put the moon in a spot that vaguely looked like it was obscured by clouds, good job team

very special episode where mick learns things aren't black and white, after all

CLAIRE Right. Eat me, Teen Wolf.

lol tell him, claire!

BARTENDER It's not like I want to do this. My pack, we were happy. We didn't hurt anyone. And then hunters with weapons that I've never seen before, they show up and... take out 20 of us, just like that.

ha ha so bmol is to blame for it all because they went after the veggie wolves, i snorted. hammering us over the head with their point again

and the very special episode where claire learns again she's loved by her family and not in fact better off alone

always laugh this show makes blood draws happen in any old place, just slam a needle in, bing bang boom done

wish they'd leave her hair what i assume is her natural texture (wavy), whenever it's overly Done like this it doesn't really vibe with what she's usually got going on. was gonna bitch if dean didn't get a hug goodbye from her :p

really glad they didn't kill her off. feel like if this was in the early seasons, she would have died for the manpain of it all

[castieelsblog]

omg okay so:

One of the accounts I follow on twt, and someone on here made a theory about Crowley and I just wanna...add my own interpretation. Okay so the theory went that "piece of my world" might have spoilers involved with the full song, which you don't think about sounding like Crowley, right? Wrong. Well sorta at least. I noticed it recently but the way the first part of pomw is written kinda sounds like how we've heard some people's UM be written/said. Getting into the actual theory however, they had theorized that Crowley is doing rare faerie magic called "realm dominance" which is how the dormitories are made. Now at first I was kinda like "mmm???" But the more it's thought of, the more it makes sense. I'm not sure about on here, but my friend and I were always just-pissed when Crowley handed his responsibilities over to students during overblots. However, what would STYX want with Crowley, because the ONLY way they'd ever be involved with him is if he overblotted or if he has information about overblots for them. The thing IS though, we can infer that if you overblot once, you can overblot again. But why would Crowley overblot? Even though he's a fae, he's still susceptible to overusing his magic, and we know NOTHING about Crowley's past so for all we know, he could have fought in the war against humans after Lilia was exiled from the capital and thus the fae army. The tutorial had us fight what looks like Grim (I think the whole Fandom agrees on that, right?) And you notice how the background just looks-god awful? What if Crowley had created a new dimension of where NRC wasn't burnt and broken? What if he had made us have the visions before someone overblots so we know what we're getting ourselves into? What if Crowley brought us there for a reason, not just to be a beast tamer? What if we are the key to undoing what has already been done so that way they know how to destroy grim JUST ENOUGH to where he has his humanity back? The first few verses of "piece of my world" roughly translates to "will you look beyond the door? I'm waiting for you let's go to wonderland." (According to one posted lyric video ofc, it's just a rough translation do please do correct me) which I think means that Crowley already knew we were there. He's not looking for a way to get us home because there's something we bring to the school which makes killing overblots and phantoms easier. If you think about it, the manga protags all are almost the opposite of the dorm wardens: yu? Tall and sure of himself, he's a kind leader that makes sure you know when your wrong but actively helps you work on what you need helped with. Yuuka? She's strong and independent, active and an all around great leader as well-I'm not caught up with the Savanaclaw manga so PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong. Finally yuuta, he's another kind person who is what Azul used to be and look like. So we already mirror the housewardens in that department, which goes back to the first part of the song being a spell.

I feel like this went off the rails-way too many times, but to make a long story short: Crowley knew that we would be able to help in some way so he brought us into twisted wonderland via magic and the first lines of the opening song are the spell he used to get us there.

[metro-mtp]

Hi, DK! For the “What hyper specific things can you infer about me from my art” challenge, I already know a bit about you since we’re mutuals, but if I didn’t, I would probably guess:

You like retro Pokemon stuff, old Disney cartoons, and cartoons in the 90s and early 2000s.

Minish Cap is your favorite Zelda game, but Four Swords is a close second. 2D toon Link is your god.

You prefer DS over 3DS because it can play GBA games.

You really like hot chocolate with those giant marshmallows.

In the 2010s, you had a phase where you wore dramatically big glasses and were very proud of being nerdy.

You used to say XD a lot and still prefer emoticons to emojis.

You love when dignified characters act like chaos gremlins (we all do lol)

You love reading but are really busy and don’t have much time for it atm.

Hugs, Dem 💕

Pretty much. I like a lot of retro things in general, and I'm particularly into the overall vibe of animated shows/films from the 90s-00s. Lot of newer stuff is good too

Not sure if I ever explicitly mentioned that one, but yes! There's a certain charm to the 2D games that I love. It's probably childhood nostalgia tbh

My 3DS (modded) is the only one I have at the moment, but it actually *can* play GBA titles natively! (They just have to be digitized due to the lack of a cartridge slot)

I was a horribly awkward middle/high schooler during most of the 2010s and kept my interests to myself (except my dad/friends), so I'm now having my openly nerdy phase in my mid-20s. No more cringe, I'd rather have fun :)

Who doesn't love a scrunkly scrimblus?

Being a full-time student for the last several years and transitioning to a (hopefully!) long-term career in my chosen field has, unfortunately, taken a lot of my energy to read for fun. It was one of my main hobbies aside from gaming and drawing, but I do more of the latter two these days. I mostly like books about history, animals, Spanish language/culture, and graphic novels of all kinds

[the-path-of-zen]

The Secret of Zen: Zen is really about intuition

From the book The Secret of Zen, Chapter 1

Zen is really about intuition

First let me say that I will tell you many times in this book that Zen is about, specifically, spiritual intuition. Please don’t confuse it with sitting in meditation. All traditions of Buddhism practice seated meditation. It is quite common in all Buddhist countries to sit on the floor in a Buddhist temple. Intuition and seated meditation are not exactly the same. Having said that, the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma was an early teacher of Zen in China which for him was the Sanskrit word “dhyana” which in Pali is “jhana”. Bodhidharma belonged to the Lanka School (楞伽宗) named after the Lankavatara Sutra. He said that dhyana means seeing the Buddha-nature within yourself. This special seeing is more, accurately, intuition. But how is this Buddha-nature seen? Certainly not with the eyes or by sitting ramrod straight on a pillow trying to achieve a state of quietude (jing 靜). Nor is it a special kind of somatic feeling. Admittedly, this nature is not easy to behold. It can only be realized through intuition. The Buddha intuited this nature which is why he was called “Buddha” as did Zen masters after him like Bodhidharma, for example, and others who followed in his footsteps.

To repeat myself, the only way that you can come to know your Buddha-nature is by intuition. The kind of knowledge that you derive from your senses and intellect is limited. Let’s call it sensory knowledge. Intuitional knowledge is not the same—not even close. You could even call it mystical knowing. For the average person they have an inherent capacity to know their real nature, which is transcendent, by intuition. But most could not care less about using this inherent capacity that lies unused within them. They are too busy being caught up in worldly illusions, entrapped by their samsaric consciousness of birth and death. What is more, such people find it hard to believe that they have this ability already within them.

It is important to keep in mind that the English word “intuition” comes from the Latin word, intueri which means to look at, gaze, pay attention to, consider, contemplate. According to Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, intuition is described as “the act or process of coming to direct knowledge or certainty without reasoning or inferring; immediate cognizance or conviction without rational thought.” This is nothing less that direct knowledge—a super knowledge. Intuition, you could say, leaps over reasoning and inferring. Almost instantly you see what the Buddha saw when you become enlightened.

Historically, the Buddha’s practice of dhyana came from an older Indian tradition of contemplation by the same name. Overall, this practice can be thought of as a process of introspection whereby one abandons all forms of mentation leading to direct intuition of the absolute.

The four dhyanas of the Buddha-to-be described in the early discourses of the Buddha were deepening levels of inner-awareness which had nothing to do with the physical act of sitting which seems to be the practice today. These levels of dhyana were still constructed and impermanent according to the Buddha but necessary. Think of dhyana as something like leading an ox to a watering hole. Then the ox, on his own, has to bend down to drink the cool thirst quenching water. Likewise, you the student, are led by the Buddha’s teachings so that you turn inwards, getting closer and closer to the goal. It is up to you to intuit Zen’s secret, directly converging with it. This intuition, you could say, is a return to the one which supersedes all things; which has always been present, except that it is concealed by your constant mental activity.

Those who lack the basic intuitive capacity for Zen tend to be over analytical. They can’t see the big picture much less the forest for the trees or intuit the sound of one hand (a beginner’s koan). They like to breakdown something into its various parts as if the whole is just the sum of parts. You see these kinds of people in Zen who go into an analysis of Joshu’s No (無). But this word only hides Zen’s secret! It acts like a barrier.

Remember how important intuition is. A part of you is always trying to inhibit your intuition as if to say no to it. This same part might even insist that you use gradual, step-by- step reasoning as if this is the only way you can arrive at truth. Sorry, but in Zen you have to go by way of intuition. This is the only means you have to uncover the secret of Zen. But don’t confuse intuition with instinct or a sudden judgment, either, it’s not found here. The unique operation of intuition begins from the inside of you as you work on trying to uncover and learn Zen’s secret. It ends when you find Zen’s secret within you: an indescribable transcendent presence. This is true mystical knowledge. It is way beyond the intellect.

---

This is a sample chapter from the book The Secret of Zen. Read the full chapter and book on your kindle or get a printed book here.

[eliazine]

Diving into trying to understand the level of Kinn's agency and Korn manipulation.

Third part of my reaction to @dancinbutterfly meta. (done for now ^^)

"The nuance, in this case is that Korn went at Kinn in a very specific way that in my opinion was different than the way it was largely applied to the greater staff. The word I am looking for here is finesse. Korn applied the BITE model with a maestro’s finesse."

As OP clearly demonstrates the major family definitly applies the BITE model to control its staff but I'm not so sure it does apply to Korn's own sons ? and if so how ? I need to ponder on this more.

Edit : on my nth re-read of the original meta, I finally shamefully noted that the emphasis made on the BITE checklist were on the criterias applied to Kinn and not to the staff as I understood it until then. And it is very clear and informative on the staff front but for Kinn, I'm less sure. OP would love to see more of your thoughts on the matter ! (a note to say that these posts are not there to contradict or correct you but just to help me formalize my understanding so I can make up my mind about it all)

So did Korn manipulate Kinn ? (well yes that is kind of his MO but I mean it in a self-serving/sacrificing Kinn to his own cause way)

Korn must also have been groomed by his father in becoming a successfull mafioso, one able to survive, thrive and even relish victory in this cut-throat environment, but I wouldn't define him as trapped by his upbringing (even if he may have his fair share of trauma based on what Gun infered about their "papa" ?).

Taking for granted that they have no moral dilemma regarding the Mafia, for him how would manipulatingly grooming differs from genuiningly teaching his child the skills he deems necessary to succeed in his foreseen carreer ?

Be it for his machiavelic needs or not, it seems telling that he is loved, trusted and seemingly not feared by his sons, most clearly by Kinn and Tankhun. They look to him for guidance, are open to him about their thoughts and feelings and he does seems to adapt his strategy to accommodate them. As an exemple, Kinn reveals his love for Porsche knowing it went against his father (anti)romantic advices but without looking even the least bit worried that it wouldn't be accepted

Do people feels that safe toward a cult leader manipulating them ? Don't they have a feeling even if they love him that they are not allowed to go astray ? I don't know, it may be the sign of a really skilled manipulator.

The only trouble seems that Korn has squeletons in the closet that wouldn't be a problem (well for their particular kind of moral compas) if Kinn was in love with anyone else. And I can see how he would want to avoid the problem by burying them and writing his own version of history.

On the other hand, I can see :

- the attitude of Kim hints at something more for now without explaining why. Kim is noisy but at the same time he doesn't seems to fear Korn (see, their conversation when Kim comes to sneak around but doesn't hesitate to question him openly about Big and Porsche ep5).

- There is also this major/minor dynamic that Kinn has been taught to be necessary because competition makes us stronger (what about now then ? was the lesson considered learned ?)

- The soldier child aspect that the boys were all trained to be killers (could it have been seen as necessary after Tankhun kidnapping ?)

- The singing competition interference (a blow for Kinn ego but well that's what money is for and seeing the way they interract it doesn't seems to be part of a greater list of stabs ? Kinn self confidence seems well established and indeed it needs to be for him to be a good heir)

So, am I missing something ? am I minimizing patterns of abuse ? Would love to be proven wrong and learn from it.

It makes me wonder about real cult heirs, are they really trapped themselves ? What would be the difference between a genuine cult leader and a trapped one not realising he is ? Does it matters ? why so or why not ?

In a more mundane way, I chose my career as a student based on my interest and validated my choice knowingly as an adult because I do like it. It is a path that aligns with what my family hoped for me. Not out of interest for themselves but because that was the way they thought would bring me happiness (understand : a job that is at least safe, stable and reasonnably paid). Was I manipulated in perceiving happiness this way ?

I guess the difference would be in wether or not my family would have respected my choice had it been different (allowing for some back and forth at first as they learn, adapt to the different way of seeing things that my choice may entails and reassure themselves that I will be fine. luckily for me, they did in other area of my life which makes me confident they would have).

So going back to Korn, I'm not sure I would call him manipulative toward his son and not accept at face value that he just tried to pass on the lessons he himself applied in his life (the rusty knife metaphor may have been genuinely given ?).

So the question would be, how would he react to Kinn leaving the mafia behind ? Would he try to break him into staying or would he stay emotionnaly calm, accept that Kinn's life isn't going that way, making him the wrong person for the role and find himself a willing and so more suitable heir (he may have to look for someone out of the biological family but considering the orientation of all his sons and nephews, letting go of the idea of blood dynasty seems to have been accepted some times ago)