#like. will's entire deal is trying to find control of herself again and help people and Find Identity

[uranium-bender]

The idea of azula and yue travelling constantly and surviving on the land is many things but mainly funny.

Both of these 2 are princesses, young girls who have spent their entire life in luxury and wealth, and now they have to survive living in the wilderness with no money or servants or experience. The only thing they’ve got is yue’s spiritness azula’s bending. They would complain and whine as much as they want but It’s not like anything would change because of that’s since they’re not around anyone to follow their wishes and commands, and then again azula is too prideful to act too much like a child and yue put herself in this situation so she can’t complain that much.

We already know azula is strategic and tactical so she would try to plan and micromanage every aspect of their travels, but nature isn’t like that, there are always gonna be surprises and unplanned factors playing in, I think that would help azula deal with her obsession of perfection and control.

Being with yue, a spirit, especially an important one like the moon spirit, helps. Animals and plants are gentler with her since spirits are more in tuned with nature. They tend to find good spots for camping and more than once animals help yue and subsequently azula find food and so. If their sailing or on water, it would be even easier, since the moon controls the tides.

They still have to assign chores: yue hunts, especially for sea food. Azula uses her fire to cook. Yue can identify the non poisonous plants and read the stars, and azula plans their trips in the most efficient way so the least time and energy is wasted as possible.

They still have to cross civilisation, towns and villages, for supplies and shelter during harsh weather and so. Yue handles most of the the socialising and people handling because, number one, she’s not as socially inept during non-conflict as azula, and number two, there’s a risk of them recognising azula, the fugitive fire nation princess. They’d need an alias and coverup story, so most of the time they just say they’re wives and they’re travelling together, since they’re too different to be relatives and saying their just friends undermine the value of their companionship (neither of them faced her feeling for the other and so both are in constant denial).

They probably participate in peasant activities as to not draw too much attention. So maybe they’ll go dancing during parties, and play games during festivals, basically just having fun. If they interacted with the other villagers for more than necessary it would either be comedic as they lie about their true selves as much as they can, or fuel a jealousy dynamic between them if either one was, or had a woman be, too friendly. I imagine they’re both very possessive and territorial of each other.

They can’t stay too long though, not longer than a week, they always leave at the end.

I can’t imagine their travels as completely peaceful. Even if fire nation soldiers aren’t looking for her to put her back in prison/asylum, azula has a lot of enemies in all the nations due to her status and also her actions. What if they come across a group targeting azula specifically, so now there’s another stake in their mission (which is literally just her staying alive). Cue to azula and yue training together. Azula teaching yue what she knows to the point yue’s waterbending look and behave more like firebending, and azula begin to do the same and take waterbending inspiration in her firebending. I’m thinking of ways they can combine their respective combat styles and be more efficient in battle, like yue covering a lot of opponents in water so azula can electrify them all at once. A lot of combination like that. They’d be an epic fighting duo.

But still the majority of their travels are filled with peaceful and domestic days. Yue cuddling azula for warmth in their joined tent, them stargazing and cloudgazing while they lay atop the grass. Telling each other their deepest secrets and wishes and childhood stories under the cover of the night while no one else hears them but each other and the sky. They grow impossibly closer to each other. Yue would panic and sweat and heave breath and have her body shake and tremor all over in terror if azula is away for more than usual, and of course, vice versa. They’re so in love, and they don’t even know it yet.

[foreverautumn89]

""The California storyline was a waste of time and Jonathan is useless"" Pt 2

So according to them: Jonathan was useless and did nothing but get stoned this whole season.

Right from the start this is stupid. Like I said on the last post, Jonathan didn't get stoned once he was left in charge, Argyle did, but Jonathan did not. Jonathan got high first two episodes at most, but once he was in charge of the kids-no he didn't.

Now about the Jonathan being useless part and doing nothing to help anybody or help save the world ext: All Jonathan did this ENTIRE season was take care of the kids in more ways than one.

So lets go over all of that:

-Get this one out of the way first: Jonathan is still being big brother to El and Will since the beginning and taking care of the kids and having Argyle drive them to school. And I mention this cause everyone is talking like Jonathan isn't taking care of the kids anymore when he is so...

-When El felt like a monster for smacking Angela with a roller skate, Argyle and Jonathan immediately tried to cheer her up and assure her that Angela would be fine and it was no big deal. And they didn't make her feel like a monster for it. They were understanding.

-Jonathan kept this from Joyce to protect El. He told her without telling her. It actually reminds me of the scene from 'A Christmas Story' when Ralphie got in the fight and he thinks hes dead like his dad is going to let him have it when he gets home and finds out, but the mom controlls the narrative so Ralphie doesnt get in trouble. She tells the dad but she makes it appear like it was not as it was. They told Joyce and Uncle Murray about the skate attack but they're like no big deal gonna be fine and didn't specifically mention it was El that did it. Jonathan protected El right there and told Joyce without telling her to protect El.

-The moment El was taken, Jonathan was on it running around trying to do anything and everything to save his little sister.

-Goverment comes in shooting at everything all willy nilly, Jonathan is being a human sheild once again making sure both Will and Mike are safe.

-Jonathan is the one who planned their escape and found them a ride and brought Argyle into it so they could go rescue El.

-Jonathan spends the entire season going through all this stuff to rescue his little sister El.

-Jonathan is there for Will and tells him he'll love him no matter what scene

-Jonathan going along with Mike's plan and believing in him going along with it so they could rescue El [going to suzie's] even though that would take longer and be a lot more stress on all of them and in the meantime, they could die since the goverment was hunting them now too. But he believed in mike and trusted him.

-People say El has her powers and didn't need saving but she did need help. Jonathan hit the horn to distract the morons attacking her. El was down on the ground, drained, and they were ready to fire at her and she would have died if it wasn't for Jonathan. It helped El and gave her time to get up find the adrenaline she needed and then take them down.

-Also here is the big one:

El has her powers and she may MAY have been able to save herself physically like others claim but its unlikely, but even if she had, thats not what her big issue was. See the whole season was El needing saved in a different way.

she believed she was a monster that didn't belong and the only person who truly loved her was dead. But big brother jonathan wasn't going to let her believe that. Right then, what El needed wasn't someone to rescue her psychically but emotionally. She needed a family to show they loved her no matter what with or without her powers. That they would save her and be there for her whenever she needed them. She needed people who were going to show her she wasn't a monster she wasn't a burden she wasn't unloved. She needed someone to show that they loved her and would do anything for her and Jonathan and the others did. That moment that El looks away from 'papa' to look at her brothers and Mike showed it. I don't remember what they were saying to each other, but I do remember El looking between papa and Jonathan and them and choosing them over him because Papa just wanted to use her for her powers, but Jonathan loved her no matter what.

[[And since thats another lie the fans tell I'll address that too-No Jonathan didn't only want to save El to use her for her powers thats obvious if you watched the show because the woman who talked to them about where El went told them it would take weeks/months for El to even get powers back. Meaning that Jonathan knew El didn't have her powers back and wouldn't for a long time. And Meanwhile, Jonathan was like fck that we're going to go save my little sister RIGHT NOW especially since I know shes with her old abusers: Hawkins Lab. Jonathan didn't know Papa was back fine, but they knew she was back with the bad guys Hawkins Lab who started this all and meanwhile another division of the goverment was out to get her. Jonathan knew El didn't have her powers and wouldnt have them back for a while so this narrative of 'Jonathan was only getting her back to use her for her powers' is total bs. He was doing it because he wanted to save her from Hawkins Lab or rather the new version of it.

-Another thing about when they came to save her: Even if El had gotten out and used her powers and saved herself as ppl claim she could have done without Jonathan anyway, she still wouldn't have gotten back to hawkins in time, been able to save max without him he came to rescue her, he got where she needed to go. Without Jonathan, El would have just walked from the Hawkins base, been caught again afterwards or at best would have made it somewhere else but she wouldn't have been able to help any of the others. -Jonathan is the one who got the surfer boy pizza guy to lend them the place so El could go in and save Max and did everything to set it up for El.

-And before that he was trying to convince the ppl on the phone to let them get to Hawkins so they could be there for Max showing much he cared for Max too because thats his little sisters best friend.

No Jonathan doesn't do everything on his own, BUT NONE OF THE CHARACTERS DO NOT EVEN EL! So why are his contributions to help/save/rescue ppl constantly overlooked and don't count while everyone esles do. It just doesn't make sense to me. So I don't understand how he is ''useless and just ''does nothing but smokes weed''.

[lavendori]

mob psycho + ‘changed for good’

in this final arc of mob psycho, we are about to see the culmination of each character’s development upon meeting mob and getting to know him over the series. and actually, for all of season 3, everyone is getting their moment + closure, starting with dimple, then tome, then teru, and now suzuki fam + ritsu this week. each character gets a fitting conclusion that all ties back to how emotional connections in community, specifically with shigeo, change you for the better.

ONE said mp100 began with the idea of “what would happen if a powerful esper was going through the woes of adolescence?” and BOY i have never seen anyone explore that theme as uniquely and hilariously as ONE has done. let’s take a look at the characters and where they were at in the beginning of the series.

like most good stories, we get to know mob out of order, with his past trauma with ritsu introduced slightly later in the early stages of the manga. instead we meet mob when he’s already working for reigen, at an age where puberty and psychosocial development starts to challenge shigeo and really shake his steely determination to keep a tight lid on ???%. here, we are immediately introduced to reigen, who’s obviously a fraud, dimple, who wants to be a god, & tsubomi, who seems to be the symbol of mob’s unattainable distant dream. this is the beginning of mob starting to lose control after a few years of trying to contain the storm inside him (yes, he and ritsu are TOTALLY like elsa and anna, but way more interesting).

for the first half of the series, as we mob continues to meet new people in this phase of his life, it becomes clear that everyone he encounters has an Opinion on how he should use his powers (except body improvement club lol, and tsubomi). some, like reigen and dimple (and to some milder extent, mezato and tome). reigen’s is obvious from the start: he’s been using mob to help him get more customers. dimple wants to use shigeo’s powers to become a god. tome wants to find aliens. mezato wants to make mob the god. teru, mogami, shou, & suzuki the older & co all had strong Opinions on how powers as strong as mob’s should be used, too.

ritsu, as his lil bro, is a bit of a special case. he’s certainly always had Opinions on how those powers should be used, and he envied mob for it, developing an inferiority complex along the way. this is multiplied tenfold by the tension that stemmed from the traumatic event they shared. mob started withdrawing and trying to contain himself so he’ll never hurt ritsu again (elsa without locking herself up & speaking with no one lol) and ritsu Felt that. ritsu is an intuitive boy, he knows mob holds everything inside out of care and it’s hard to deal with because he can never be there for mob or interact with him like normal brothers who might occasionally have little fights. he definitely has a bit of a growth arc in s1, and today’s episode shows more of how that development has been actualized (more on that later.)

in this entire final season, we see the culmination of where their development has led them now that they’ve all been impacted by mob. we see everyone recognize mob’s power for what it really is.

1) dimple gets his deepest ambition fulfilled and seizes his god moment but once he starts to grow more powerful, he realizes how important shigeo has become to him & that all along, he just wanted friends. he also recognizes mob’s powers more fully than before and acknowledges that it’s SO much to hold, and that being a god with that much is actually pretty costly!

(spoiler alert but this is also what shou and his dad realize too!)

2) tome was serious about starting telepathy club to find supernatural beings but she also feared disappointment & felt bad for dragging others along. she convinced mob to stick around the telepathy club (sorta), dragged him out a couple times to find other espers, but given how her friends sometimes still don’t take her seriously, she had some underlying fears about wasting everyone’s time. in the end, for her, she got to have her exploration day and learned through that adventure that it was about the friends she made along the way— right before her wish to meet aliens actually came true.

3) teru started out as an arrogant prick whose confidence was built on his powers & he never really saw harm in using them to subdue others because he also enjoyed the social power/control it came with. mob exposed the insecurities beneath all that and pinpointed teru’s overcompensation due to his fear of being weaker than others. through that first battle, mob taught him that he’s no more special than anyone else, and to accept himself without powers. that was a huge growth arc of course, but during the middle of the series, he still saw himself as inferior and wanted to reach mob’s level and be worthy of calling him a rival. teru recognized his weakness in comparison to mob, but therefore it seemed like he kinda idolized mob for that sheer power (that “you’re amazing” line even when brainwashed :’) lol.) the reason he said “i win this time” after facing ???% & getting his ass kicked is bc he won philosophically. last time, mob’s moral ground of not hurting others & not relying on psychic powers for self-worth won by a landslide. for teru, acknowledging his commoner-ness was humiliating defeat. this time though, with the same hilarious conditions of fighting mob until he’s naked & bald, teru’s determination to not harm others stayed strong, even making sure to put barriers around the citizens. (funnily enough, he also adds the line that “it’s okay if people laugh at you” LMAO. rip teru always getting humiliated.) he thus truly recognizes mob’s commoner-ness too, in parallel with mob’s sheer power, & ends the series content that he can call mob his rival.

4) RITSU and his inferiority complex. as mentioned before, ritsu always struggled with living under the shadow of his extremely powerful brother. he never felt like he could compete or even BE THERE to understand mob and his burdens. secretly, despite everything he said in his lil rebellious arc, he’s always wanted to be strong enough to shoulder the weight of that overwhelming power with mob. now that he’s gotten powers and has been using/practicing them, his big culmination of his arc gets realized when he is able to face, without fear, the ???% side of mob that has been repressed this whole time: “I was seeking psychic powers for the sake of this moment.” this moment being that he is now unafraid to compete with mob and listen to him, which means he finally has the capacity to use his power to help shoulder his brother’s emotions.

5) REIGEN. now this one deserves its own post. even if mob has a lot of important people in his life as a character, as far as mob psycho 100 AS A SERIES goes, reigen is definitely the deuteragonist and the second most important development of this entire manga, so there is A LOT to say about his arc, as the whole story basically is about reigen’s and mob’s influence on each other. but. for now i will keep it brief.

why is reigen always the last line of defense for mob? after everyone got brainwashed, mob didn’t fully go Dark until reigen also got affected. at the end of fighting ritsu, ???% says that NOTHING can stop him, followed by a shot of reigen pulling up. when we think back to the beginning of mp100, the whole story of mob’s growth into adolescence starts with him being used by reigen. as much as reigen cares about his success + money, he finds himself deeply impacted by mob and his pure earnestness to be a good person. all along, reigen’s hated his real self, knowing he’s got a terrible character (and ironically, as reflected in his own fears, is kind of cockroach-like).

when he finally sees everything mob’s been holding inside, how all that destruction is basically caused by HIS OWN LIES, it’s a huge wake up call that his treatment of mob has real consequences, and he needs to take responsibility for it. over the course of the series, we’ve seen him grow into caring for mob and putting his own selfish desires aside to spare mob from any further harm. but this lie, the first one he started their mentorship with, is the most dangerous one he needs to make right.

so he goes after mob, despite not having any powers. he lets himself get buffeted and pushed around by ???% (and ironically, since he doesn’t have psychic powers, ???% can’t absorb them from him lol).

and finally, FINALLY. HE TELLS MOB THE FULL TRUTH.

and the most beautiful thing after seeing how much reigen despises himself, is that he finally comes clean to mob and becomes utterly vulnerable at his wake.

THIS IS THE REAL ME.

and at long last he tells mob that regardless of all of that, he has the freedom to accept himself. he doesn’t need reigen at all anymore.

and although ???% came out due to his overwhelming desire to confess to tsubomi in the wake of shigeo going unconscious, the ultimate thing that he wanted was to be accepted - not by tsubomi, but by mob himself. reigen assumes responsibility and forcibly removes it from mob’s shoulders, allowing mob and ???% to be able to merge peacefully together.

[notbadforafailedvessel]

Batcina AU - Part I

Not many knew Alcina had another transformation.

Just like her draconic form is the signal of losing control of her mutation, her bat form indicates her most healthy state, feeding herself correctly to keep the reins over the cadou.

However, it's not a form Alcina is fond of turning into because as a bat she's more fragile and vulnerable, making her feel mortal.

Also because it made her feel humiliated. How was it possible that a woman of her height, capable to provoke fear and intimidation ended up turning into a tiny creature that could be considered adorable?

One night, Alcina decides to go out on her own after listening some gossip about hunters, once again, planning to attack the castle, wanting to deal with it once and for all instead of waiting for them.

She spots the group right away, the gang not even bothering to go unnoticed with the torchs in their hands.

Alcina wonders, boringly, licking her claws clean, if humans were becoming more stupìd. She had killed the group so easily. Why even trying an attack when it seemed they didn't even bother to come up with a plan to at least make it thrilling?

The last thing she expected was finding herself surrounded by a bunch of people in the next second.

The village didn't count with such quantity so it was clear that people from other places had joined for the assault.

She fights without hesitation, but sometimes her height ends up being a disadvantage despite her strength.

Alcina had never faced so many people at the same time, much less people who actually counted with a plan for the confrontation, and even though she would have prefered to deal with this on her own, she was aware it wasn't going to be possible.

Despite it wouldn't be enough to kill her, the large amount of weapons coated with holy water and silver bullets striking her skin over and over again were enough to make an impact and weaken her.

She decides what's best is let Mother Miranda know what they are facing, that this time it's wasn't just an heretic group from the village as they were used to but a whole mob.

Alcina turns into a bat, small and nimble, confusing the people around her by her sudden disappearence to fly away.

But there was a hunter with hawk sight that noticed the creature that wasn't common to see in those lands, who is capable to hit the target, piercing Alcina's wing with his arrow before she managed to disappear entirely from his sight.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

You live on the village but somewhat isolated, after experience the nastiness of people, you preferred it that way.

You are getting ready for bed when you listen a crash outside, startling you.

After waiting a few seconds, making sure there wasn't further commotion and waiting for your heartrate to slow down, you decide to investigate.

Holding a lantern, you step outside your cabin, not finding anything out of the ordinary at first sight but then you notice the fallen buckets in the front of your garden shed, knowing that's not how you left them.

You squat in time to see a bat shaking its head, shaking off the dizziness of the hit, using its wings in an attempt to get up just to tumble to the right side, which makes you notice the tear of the wing membrane.

"Oh, you poor thing," you whisper, placing the lantern on the ground, your eyebrows furrowing with concern. Without thinking, you reach out to take the animal in your hands, not surprised when it hisses at you, finally realizing of your presence, but you do stop before achieving your goal. "I know, I know. I just want to help you, I promise." You keep one hand close to the animal so it realizes you are not a threat.

The bat freezes, its golden eyes locking with yours instead of inspecting your offered hand, looking at you in what it could be considered, a scrutinizing way.

You are befuddled by it, used to animals getting desperate in their attempt to escape and seek refuge to lick their wounds. Instead it felt like you are being inspected.

Alcina would prefer to escape and leave the mortification she is feeling behind. But after the unexpected attack she received, it wasn't possible for her to turn into her human form, she was too weak to even try it.

She looked at the person in front of her, knowing she would have to depend of them for a while because she was aware that she wouldn't be capable to make the rest of the flight. For a reason she had fallen during it. Unable to fly or move easily, it wasn't going to be possible to take care of herself on her own.

It wasn't something Alcina liked but needed, reason why she still hissed at them once she finally moved, crawling carefully over the offered hand. She hoped they were smart enough to get the message.

You smile when the bat settles down on your palm, noticing its body fits perfectly on it, its healthy wing folded against it while the other one is spread to the side not to aggravate it further.

You scratch softly the bat's head with your index finger, in a reassuring gesture, to then take the lantern with your free hand and stand up, making your way back to the cabin.

Alcina huffs at the petting. "It seems they aren't smart enough. Or at least they are smart enough to remove their finger before I had the chance to bite it." She sighs dramatically, already abhorring what would come in the next weeks.

Part II, Part III, Part IV

I would like to make a special shoutout to @ctitan98 because watching them share their AUs inspired me to finally share mine instead of keeping them in my mind and most likely never coming to life in any way, lol. Thank you so much for blessing us with your Alcina content!

[belethlegwen]

MASTERLIST POST

[HEADER CREDIT TO: @chamomile-g-tea <3]

My name is Belle, I'm a Giantess-leaning G/t fan who writes G/t fiction and enjoys art, writings and getting to chat with people about G/t and other nerdy things. Most of my writing gets posted to AO3, but there will be scattered shorts and writings posted here among the usual mess of my personal blogging and reblogging.

LINK TO MY KO-FI: HERE

If you like what I do and want to toss some support my way, it's extremely appreciated!

WRITING:

The Stranding:

My largest work to date, it is active and currently still being updated.

Almost two years after a man named Henry suffers a shipwreck and is rescued by a woman named Melanie, the two left on a journey to try and return him home, only to suffer a shipwreck of their own. The good news? They made it; Henry is home and is among his own people again. The bad news? To him, and everyone else in his homeland, Melanie is over fifty feet tall.

An out-of-time, out-of-place situation, Melanie has to navigate being integrated into a small military force for a nation that seems to be in a tense, fracturing peace with it's nearest neighbour, and also just navigate a world that has never had to deal with anyone or anything like her before.

[I personally recommend reading until at least Chapter 12 - Nightmares before starting on The Rescue]

The Rescue:

The prequel-piece to The Stranding, and also currently still active and being updated.

Melanie travels to the beach after a storm, as she often does to find driftwood and debris that can be used for crafts to keep herself busy in her lonely life, and sees a ship in distress just off of the shore. Unable to believe what's happening, she is able to rescue a sailor from the nearly-doomed vessel and take him under her care.

She helps him adjust to life in her land, which is vastly different-- almost like a different time entirely-- from his own. The biggest obstacle in doing so, however, is that the man isn't even eight inches tall.

[I personally recommend reading The Stranding up until Chapter 12 - Nightmares before beginning this work, but I am also not your real Dad and can not control you.]

The Faerie Spell:

[Can also be found here on Tumblr with the help of this Chapter Directory]

A first-person-perspective written work following Daphne as she attempts to navigate a strange and upsetting curse where a Faerie has stolen parts of her essence so that the Fae can, whenever the mood seemingly strikes them, steal Daphne's height and attain a more human-like appearance to hide that they are a Faerie. While the spell is active, however, Daphne because 5.5 inches tall (give or take a few millimeters).

Can she, or her friends, really navigate this new part of her life and all the difficulties it brings? Or is this spell about to change everything to do with her life?

The Scars We Leave Behind: [written by @adjacentperception and myself]

What's left of a hero when everything is taken from him? What's left of a villain with no identity?

What's left of a man who has no choice but to save the symbol of a system he's fighting against?

Within a city constantly besieged by a super-power fueled war between Good vs Evil, a hero is captured by a powerful villain and their secret organization and forced to play part in a twisting and enigmatic plan; to tear down the systems in place that keep the League of Heroes in an ultimate seat of power to rival the government itself. But… is the system as good as it projects itself to be? Are the villains and their henchmen really as evil as the media says? Is it truly as simple as tearing it down, or does that simply open up space for a new, worse system to enter?

Is the harm we do when we believe we're helping mitigated merely by our wishes to be better? To create something more? To fix what we believe is broken?

Do we hold blame for creating the evil we think we're fighting against, regardless of our intentions?

This work features descriptions of violence, abuse, neglect, and uses adult language, as well as mentions of nudity and sexual topics.

ADDITIONAL LINKS:

ABOUT RECURSIVE FICS: Here

SHORTS AND BONUS SCENE Masterlist

FANART AND COMMISSIONS MasterPost

THE STRANDING CHARACTER DESCRIPTION/REFERENCE POST

Dividers by: @firefly-graphics

[kingprinceleo]

Please tell us more about Shadow and Rouge , Shadow and Knuckles, or the trio itself pls I’m begging 🧎🧎🧎🧎

!!! Ok uhh

They're fun I love them I need to do more stuff with them 😰

Knuckles and rouge have known each other for years before shadow appeared, knuckles used to offer his own blood to rouge so she wouldn't get into trouble with GUN for stealing or attacking people. Once rouge finds Sol it becomes way less common, since rouge can easily access food through their markets, but she still teases him about biting him bc she finds it funny.

Knuckles is a farm boy out in the Wild Zones! (Angel Island is one main island with 7 smaller ones branching off, 3 of them belonging to GUN, and the other 4 being untouched, the Wild Zones)

He's got a pickup truck 😎, growing food for himself and to supply his (pizza) food truck with fresh ingredients. In his free time he likes to treasure hunt around Angel Island, trying to piece together echidna tribe artifacts and other remnants of an older society before their modern time. Rouge likes to tag along sometimes and "help", stealing his shit >:/

She knows the echidna stuff is very personal to him tho, so she'll leave those pieces alone, everything else? She tries to snatch for either herself or to sell off to her black market dealers. They have a knack for knowing all the gemstone hotspots on the islands, they've been around for a long time, so rouge keeps contact with them regularly.

Things get shaken up pretty fast when they find shadow tho, a bloodied ball curled up in knuckles field, running on pure adrenaline and prey animal fear. Knuckles is the one primarily trying to deal with him while rouge just watches fjfjfnfn. Shadows pretty fucked up with some teeth growing over each other, claws out of control, and knuckles has to tussle with...All of that as he tries not to get his face ripped off

Shadow eventually gets taken care of and the next few days are knuckles just trying to understand what's going on, but shadow won't speak a word. Rouge decided to go digging for anything about him, and finds out that GUN is looking for him. And since rouge is already off the grid and doesn't exist to them, they decide it would be best for shadow to go stay with rouge rather than knuckles (neither rouge or shadow are a fan of this)

Rouge brushes him off a lot at first ! Doesn't care if he runs off on his own, not her problem. But eventually he starts growing on her, especially when he proves to be incredibly useful when she's stealing from GUN. That's how she starts bonding with him fjfjfnfn and it's something they regularly do for years, even while rouge is working within GUN as a supervisor for the chaotix.

At one point she finds shadows inhibitors and uncovers more about it through old documents and scans, and she lightens up on him a bit. Once he has his inhibitors back he slowly starts working up to talking again, and the blackouts he used to have stop entirely. Then rouge realizes he's the Biggest Bitch in the West <3 now being able to sling insults at each other like a full time job

But mostly things carry on pretty smoothly! Shadow used to have an extremely violent reaction to vampires even being mentioned, so rouge has never told him that she's one herself. And it's been so long that shadow just thinks all of her bat and vampire themed decor is just normal fnfjfnfjjrj.

Present day shadows out and about during the night, sleeping during the day bc he's got paranoia about being vulnerable. He n rouge still regularly loot from GUN for chaos drives and other valuables and shadow helps with the black market things on the occasion. Rouge has Tried to dissuade shadows obsession with wearing silver but he never listens </3. rouge would consider shadow a friend, but he views it more like a teammate situation, he's not a friend guy

And with knuckles! He would frequently come by to check on shadows wellbeing, maybe wrestle with him a bit for the enrichment and getting shadows energy out. Eventually knuckles offers shadow a job to work with him on the food truck and on the farm, which shadow accepts since he's really got nothing better to do on this island and needs money eventually and that's their main thing, being coworkers. Knuckles at one point gets shadow a sick ass hover motorcycle since shadow can't buy anything big under his own name. And shadows an incredible worker, his perfectionism being both a gift and a flaw.

All 3 of them hanging out present day would likely be rouge dragging shadow to knuckles house after a heist where they can just unwind and watch something together

Or knuckles and shadow sparring in the field, which rouge insists she's above getting her hands dirty for fun, until they bait her into the fight by starting an argument

And probably other little things I need to think about more !!

But uhh one last thing I think, rouge and knuckles are both fiercely protective of shadow, it won't pop up often, but if something is wrong theyll both always be the first to be there

Like when shadow n Hoax make their blood deal, rouge won't actively intervene unless something bad happens, she's trusts shadow can handle himself. But she would bludgeon Hoaxs head in if she found out he did something horrible to shadow

Knuckles . Didn't wait for an answer. Fjfjfnfn literally the first time he sees Hoax after learning about the blood deal it is On Sight, which is how knuckles is the first to learn who Hoax is!!!! He punches him so fucking hard he turns back into Sonic 🤭

uh !!!!! Oops that is a little long, they are just so silly to me, hope u got what u were looking for !!! Dnhfjfnfjf

[inkblackorchid]

Orchid's 5Ds stuff Masterpost

Figured it was time to collect all my stuff nicely in one place again, and really all my stuff, this time. Fanfiction, character analyses, other meta posts, and theories, all gathered in one spot, for my own and everyone else's convenience.

Fanfiction:

All my fanfic, as it can be found on ao3 via the links provided here. Heavy focus on the female characters in the show.

The Aki series - Brimstone in my Garden, Roses set on Fire (in suggested reading order; also known as my attempt to give Aki a full character arc while trying not to upend canon entirely. Faithshipping ahoy.)

To Bloom or To Wilt (rated M, 64k words, 6/6 chapters, complete) Summary: After the defeat of the dark signers, all the souls that were taken by the Earthbound Immortals have been returned. Among them is that of a man who is driven by nothing but anger and selfishness, eager to use and manipulate those around him at every turn. A man who has caused Aki Izayoi, in particular, tremendous amounts of grief and nearly moulded her into a weapon for his personal use. And a man who has, unfortunately, proven to be very good at avoiding law enforcement ever since his return to the land of the living. Or: Divine comes back to life for a second and final time, trying to scrape together what remains of the Arcadia Movement, take revenge on Yusei Fudo and make Aki's just barely peaceful life a nightmare in the process.

Chase the Sunlight (rated T, 26k words, 2/2 chapters, complete) Summary: In the aftermath of her final, harrowing encounter with Divine, Aki feels unbalanced and afraid that she might become a danger to others again. Yusei notices, and as usual, tries to help--albeit in his own way.

You have a Mirror, but do You see Yourself (rated T, 40k words, 3/3 chapters, complete) Summary: Several months after seeing Divine for the last time, Aki reflects on how she's spent that time trying to fully learn to control her powers--without him. Her judgement ends up not being in her favour, and now, with the start of the WRGP just a few days away, she worries something will go terribly wrong. As she ruminates on what to do, she encounters not one, but two unexpected, but familiar people who give her a lot to think about while she tries to prepare for the match against Team Unicorn.

Snapping Jaws and Piercing Horns (rated T, 49k words, 4/4 chapters, complete) Summary: It's time for the WRGP and against her own expectations, Aki finds herself in the team lineup for the very first match, set to go up against the rather enigmatic duellists of Team Unicorn. To her dismay, performing well during the duel itself is far from the only thing she has to worry about, though, with her powers feeling too volatile for comfort and doubts in her duelling skills surfacing due to a recent loss. How is she supposed to keep a clear head in this international tournament when self-doubt seems to weigh on her like a ton of bricks? More importantly yet, how is she supposed to help her team win?

Be Careful what you Wish for (rated T, 71k words, 4/4 chapters, complete) Summary: Leading up to the match against Team Catastrophe where she's supposed to be taking part, Aki has an accident that changes things. Changes them in a way she could have never assumed--and realises she's woefully unequipped to deal with. When a fateful encounter with an old acquaintance additionally shakes things up, she comes to the conclusion that perhaps, she's not quite as done dealing with her past as she thought she was.

The tainted Soil of the Fields of Arcadia (rated T, 174k words, 10/10 chapters, complete) Summary: Following an eye-opening confrontation with Misty Tredwell, Aki decides she might have to face up to her past if she ever wants to be free of it. After approaching Mikage with a curious request, she ends up with the last remains of the Arcadia Movement--and starts digging.

Next work: Currently in the process of being written!

The Carly collection - I swallowed the Dice, I make my own Luck now (currently in its infancy, more planned, but: also known as me trying to let Carly retain more relevancy in the story instead of relegating her to Jack's harem. Occupies the same, adjusted canon as the Aki series.)

The Architect of one's own Fortune (rated T, 89k words, 8/8 chapters, complete) Summary: After the bombastic defeat of the dark signers, Carly is left with a suspicious hole in her memory and the feeling that something isn't quite right. As disturbing memories resurface, she must grapple with a lot more than just an increasingly unsatisfying job and the fact that Jack is ghosting her. Overwhelmed by guilt, confusion, exhaustion from work and frustration due to her lacking social life, she's left asking herself who she really is, and, even more so, what she actually wants in life.

Next Work: To be written once I reach a certain point in the Aki series. (Sorry for the wait!)

5Ds meta posts:

All my extensive yelling about the show, both on an emotional and an analytical level. Sorted by topics. Careful, not a single one of these has a reasonable length.

Character-focussed posts:

Aki

An unhinged (slightly analytical) rant about Fortune Cup and Dark Signers Aki because I love her to death

A closer look at the amount of setup done for Aki from the pre-WRGP onward that was sadly never paid off

Why Aki losing her powers in canon bothers me beyond reasons of "her powers were badass tho"

Yusei

A rant about why Yusei's hangups regarding the Zero Reverse make me want to punch a wall (and why this means they're excellent character writing)

Crow

The Crow dissertation (also known as a deep dive into Crow's character writing and what happened to it), part one: the Dark Signers arc, or: why you should never let your characters hide in a fridge

The Crow dissertation, part two: the pre-WRGP arc and the Pearson Backstory, or: how NOT to introduce an extra signer dragon

The Crow dissertation, part three: the WRGP arc, or: what do you mean, the Team Catastrophe duel has good character writing??

The Crow dissertation, part four: the Ark Cradle arc, or: if you want two characters to have a meaningful argument, maybe you should let them interact before that.

Carly

A look at why the sudden, drastic change in Carly's character writing undermined not just herself, but someone else, too

Plotline-focussed posts:

The Meklord wordlbuilding and its many holes that give me headaches

I'll try to keep this masterpost updated as more fanfics/theories/meta posts come along! If you ever wanna hear me talk about something specific, feel free to ask, the ask box is open!

[emmafallsinlove]

I used to think that the point where something got broken between Rory and Jess was when Rory never wrote to him and Jess decided to move on- like that was the point when they started to hold back, started to distrust each other... And I still think it WAS in a lot of ways, especially for Jess, but I'm starting to think that for Rory it was missing her mom's graduation. Because that was the point where she started feeling like her feelings for Jess were something she couldn't control. And that was TERRIFYING! And now people were getting hurt! Her MOM was getting hurt! And Rory had that whole meltdown desperately trying to deny why she would do something like this. But then, as soon as Jess showed up again, she lost control of herself AGAIN. Like, IMMEDIATELY. And I think that really, really scared Rory and she started seeing Jess as someone she needed to keep at a distance (even when she also wanted that distance erased).

So, now I'm wondering... would the trajectory of their relationship have been any different if Rory hadn't gotten on the wrong bus that day? If she'd made it to the graduation on time, with the Go-Go's record Jess helped her to find (being a reason for her mother's happiness instead of a reason for her pain)? If her obsession with Jess hadn't been a thing that hurt her mom, would she have had more positive feelings about it? Jess seemed ready to go "all-in" when he first came back (he MOVED BACK! For HER! What a huge thing that is?!), but grew bitter over the summer. But what if Rory had been "all-in" too? Would their relationship have gone better if both of them felt like they could trust that the other REALLY CARED?

i put this ask kind of on "hold" for a lot of reasons, and the most important one is because i think you are 100% right, but i think it's started even before - when rory got hurt and jess left to nyc without saying goodbye to her, i think something of her just broke there, and no one believed her it isn't jess's fault, and that she is responsible to what happened exactly as he is. she wanted him to keep driving, she is the reason they even got into this car accident in the first place (because if she wouldn't have said 'turn right', jess would've drive back to luke's, they would've studied a bit more & maybe meet tomorrow morning at luke's before she goes to school). instead, her arm got broken and he left without saying goodbye, and on the day her mother graduation's, she went to see jess, got stuck on a bus in nyc and missed her mom's graduation completely and now she has to suffer the consequences of all of it. because the moment jess is back, she is kissing him behind dean's back! and a few days (or weeks, you can't really tell time between episodes lol) she cried to her mom that she loves dean, that she will always gonna love dean, she literally punished herself and felt to awful because she hurt her mom and other people too! and see how quickly rory stop kissing jess (she kissed him first!), demand him not to say anything (he kept that promise!!! he didn't say ANYTHING!) and welcomed him home. like???? we have so many things we need to discuss here but kissing jess was what made her go to washington because she couldn't deal with spending an entire summer around him (and being with dean....) and she couldn't tell her mom that because as we saw in lorelai's reaction in 3.01 (and rightfully so) she took dean's side. people are keep getting hurt for her love for jess, and maybe she feels like she needs to keep her distance from him, until they are together and now it's okay because now she is the one who gets her heart broken and not everyone else around her. and it's completely heartbreaking but like.... this is so so important because in s4 she is very much heartbroken by jess while everyone seemed to have moved on from being hurt by him - her mom isn't worrying about them being together, and in the yale vs harvard game she is admits to emily she is hoping he'd gone forever and rory wouldn't hear from him again, then he showed up again in rory's life twice and she is getting hurt by him again what leads her in a way to have sex with dean and then she doesn't hears for him for over a year but in this point it doesn't matter because she is dating logan! and she loves logan! and jess is nowhere to be found, to hurt her again! or make other's people get hurt by her because her love for him!

and i think, if rory wouldn't have said 'turn right', or even if she would've and still got her arm broken and then made it back in time to her mother graduation, i do believe things could've went very different! like maybe rory wouldn't even going to washingtion for the entire summer, maybe she & jess could've sorted things out and she would've breaking up with dean and start dating jess way earlier and then her love for jess wasn't that scary terrifying thing that makes people around her getting hurt, it would've been that thing that heals her & the people around her because think of the endless opportunities lorelai and jess could've had getting alone over the summer! and jess and lane's friendship! all this little things would've change the way the town sees jess but more importantly the way rory sees her relationship with jess!!

[narwhalandchill]

dhil story leaks/bailu theory situation ramble again, incoherent prolly. do Not take this as an established theory that i fully stand behind bc that 100% clueless in my bio is there for a reason !!!

ok honestly im ngl ive confused myself now after looking at the daniel story leaks again and sleeping on it. bailu theory status is pending its literally schrödingers rn im so torn. does the timeline enable for it or not???? it Would explain some things but hhhhhh i cant make sense of it yet.

at first i was like yeah p sure its not happening bc of the dragon heart fuckery and how baiheng wasnt there for the entire course of events only arriving once shit was going down but. what if. df used the heart partially for resurrecting yx??? and then as baiheng sacrificed herself i do find it curious that they specify only drops of blood and hair remaining of her post-vaporization. which are. classic sources of DNA .

and we know dan feng went berserk with his dragon form so its plausible he temporarily regained the vidyadharas ancient but currently long lost ability to just go fuck all gene splicing manipulate biology and living tissue. that ability + baiheng DNA remains + the dragon heart is just hmm.

another thing i realized that i didnt yesterday is that bailu being recognized as the next imbibitor lunae even if her powers are lacking implies she Has the dragon heart (bc its like. not just A vidyadhara heart its clearly its own thing and a huge deal with a critical role in the continued high elder reincarnation line and longs legacy being passed down). so like its clear dan feng had to pass the dragon heart down to her reincarnation line at some point but as the vidyadhara couldnt get him to budge on the hearts status in the shackling prison i doubt it was anytime after the sedition. the IL position has been passed down its just that it wasnt done properly.

so like im thinking there might actually be two separate resurrections happening consecutively?

first yingxing who is possibly either dead or dying as dan feng initially arrives already but the initial attempt at resurrection goes horribly wrong and an emanator (?) of abundance appears + the arbor activates and leads to things like the toxic mist explosion described by the vidyadhara eggs that kills a lot of vidyadhara and eggs instantly. potential resurgence/triggered plague of people being infected by mara on the luofu? yx potentially becomes marastruck then despite being short-lived? (also if the emanator is literally shuhu then... yeah adds up w blades talent name)

and if yx now marastruck is on a clock for how long he lasts before permanently losing his self i can see that being when df uses the dragon heart to stop the mara from proceeding further through bruteforcing permanence to overpower yaoshis abundance as the core fueling his immortality - which is the basic principle behind the draught of draconic surge and how vidyadhara bone marrow is already confirmed to interact with mara. & this would prolly be when df loses control of his form? both fighting the emanator and trying to desperately help yx in time

n like the thing the storys a bit unclear on is just at what point yx had already acquired that perfected immortality of abundance + permanence. but like he must have by the time baiheng arrives on the starskiff and sacrifices herself right? bc whatever baiheng brought w her (some say lan, some say a stellaron) clearly vaporized everything in the vicinity and was enough to strike down the emanator and/or at least halt the crisis with the arbor and everything. and regular mara struck dont come back from that whereas blades still kicking

so with the like mara/arbor/emanator of yaoshi portion of the seditions initial lead up done i feel like baihengs arrival is when the Actual sedition (in terms of an armed rebellion) begins? with the vidyadhara confused but many who survived the initial stage still choosing to stand with dan feng and fight against the arriving cloud knights and all the abominations of abundance

so would this be when the 2nd resurrection and baiheng possibly becoming that furry-draconic mutant abomination happens?? and also how the position/power of the IL ends up passed down although not properly to then-mutated-baiheng and eventually-bailu by df using the either damaged or outright incomplete dragon heart (if he put most of it in yingxing) in the process.

so like in this scenario the 'sin' that yingxing and dan feng share might also be the decision to go fuck it we ball mess with life and death and biology even further (as if the mass casualties so far werent enough) and resurrect their fallen comrade as the new high elder line except it comes out wrong and horrible and jingliu has to put that beast down.

this would also explain part of where the somber tone in blades voiceline about dan heng comes from - if he still understands that the motivation behind that 2nd resurrection was at least to make amends in some desperate way when all they had available was baihengs DNA, a damaged dragon heart with dan fengs hidden DLC cas9 crispr vidyadhara powers still accessible to him. like theres nowhere near the pained sympathy and shared guilt that the tone in the dh line conveys when he talks about jingliu or jing yuan in comparison. it has to be more complicated than "he made me immortal. NOT a fan 0/5"

anyway dunno if its just me but this just makes the beloved thing even more confusing. on one hand "turning the beloved into a monstrosity" really lines up with how the xianzhou views the mara-struck and blade views himself as like. a bass boosted mara-struck on steroids who literally cannot die unlike normal mara victims. and "the one who buried the beloved is you" doesnt kinda sound right for baiheng when all she left behind was just enough genetic material for dan fengs terrible horrible awful no-good cooking class - not a lot to bury. also burying the beloved fits blades melodramatic inner dialogue style and tone with how he considers yingxing already dead and strictly uses 3rd person towards his past self. but also its hard to argue that what happened to baiheng IF the transmutation resurrection theory is real doesnt also warrant a match for "monstrosity". like bailus cool now but that first mutation sure wasnt. she got changed species with no say on the matter

the ambiguity is strong enough that a part of me wonders if its on purpose for censorship reasons tbh. (not an expert on this and by no means want to imply any proper familiarity with the subject. so like if this is wildly unrealistic or inaccurate its fully on me, lmk and ill delete) setting up a scenario where all the homoerotic subtext is clearly intentional and solidified around yingxing and dan feng but this specifically explicit romantic word used Could be twisted to apply to baiheng too for plausible deniability. this assuming they dont actually end up pulling a secret het love triangle reveal in the end at us hhhh im still kinda paranoid - ill be sad but also honestly assume their hands were forced if that rly is the case :/

also at this point it should be expected (thanks hoyo) but EN tl has inaccuracies and if sth i say here doesnt add up with what EN text suggests its prolly bc ive taken into account some of the commentary on the accuracy on reddit. too lazy to list all specifics but ask if sth pops out at u

anyway im so drained this is all killing me . What happened. yingxing. dan feng. what did you Do.

[kvothe-kingkiller]

Edit: No longer looking for Alpha Readers but I’m keeping this up for posterity and info

I’m looking for alpha readers for an ongoing fantasy project which I am currently releasing chapter by chapter. I’ll also make a post when I finish it in case you are the type to prefer to read it in one go. 

You do not need to have editing skills or experience. I am only looking for basic commentary.

Blurb: In an unsteady time of peace following a generations-long war, Mila, an 18 year old farmer, finds herself unexpectedly thrust into the world of nobility upon discovering she can wield a power thought only to be possessed by the upper class. Struggling to find her feet in this new environment and shunned by those around her, she juggles learning about her abilities, her identity, and the truth of the war behind the propaganda. When her equally ostracized mentor gets a tip about a plot to assassinate one of the country’s leaders, it’s down the dysfunctional teacher with a shady past and his apprentice who can barely control her powers to prevent the country from falling back into conflict.

(This is adult fantasy, not YA)

tags/highlights/themes: non-european-based fantasy world, adult fantasy, many queer characters and relationships (including aces), discovering sexuality, struggles with mental health and addiction, physical disabilities, dealing with trauma and taking responsibility, race relations, eat the rich, government propaganda, political intrigue, war is for money, war hurts the most vulnerable, etc

more info under the cut but if you’re interested or have questions, please DM me

(scroll down for info about setting, plot, and characters. content warnings and ‘rating’ under plot)

General Info:

Like I said, no experience needed. All I want to hear about is what you like/dislike, what is clear/unclear and any theories you have (for foreshadowing). You can be as detailed as you want or you can leave a single sentence comment for each chapter, anything helps. 

This is a first draft to be clear. I want alpha readers so I can make large changes to plot before rewriting everything for the second draft. On one hand it’s still fairly rough, on the other hand you don’t need to know anything to help. I just need opinions on plot and pacing and characters and foreshadowing etc etc. Again I am still writing it, I usually do ish a chapter a month sometimes faster sometimes slower. The chapters are usually ~10k, and I already have 27 out. (it is long)

This is going to be done through google classroom (yes, google classroom) because I need it to be inaccessible to anyone not invited and because I want people to be able to comment without being influenced by others and google classroom was literally the only thing I could find to do that for free. This does mean that whatever name you have on google will be seen by me and possibly others, just as an fyi. Also I have to add you to the ‘class’ but I can send you the prologue first if you want to try-before-you-buy (tho be aware the prologue is a bit more action packed than the start of the plot)

misc. pros for doing this: it already has art! because I do be an artist as well and I only ever draw my characters because motivation be finicky. Also, if you get through the entire thing I’ll do a commission for you (for free). plus I’m always looking for art ideas so if you say ‘it would be funny/cool if x did y’ then chances are I will actually draw it lol. also, free book ig?

Setting: 

Magic: Low fantasy with scarce/rare magic. The magic is called forging and is basically element magic but I wanted to explain all the hand movements people do with those so I incorporated more rules and ‘science’ to make it more rigid. there are ten basic ‘facets’ (air fire water stone earth wood iron copper blood bone) and people can be born knowing any number, or special different ones, but it gets exponentially rarer with more facets. the magic is genetic and mostly confined to the upper class and has become a way of oppressing the lower class. this actually gets addressed rather than mentioned then ignored (cough, korra, cough)

Culture: The culture of the main country, Odrad, is based on african, middle eastern, and mediterranean cultures, with a bit of southern asian. However most of that is simply due to the setting being dry and hot, and so developing dark skin and loose clothing and making most things out of stone and plaster due to the scarcity of wood. Religion is polytheistic based around an all mother type goddess and the god of the sun with the biggest festival being the start of the wet season. Other important countries include Acrait, the biggest on the continent, which is more south asian based, and Sheiro, which is steppe-type culture. Odrad is an ex-monarchy ruled by a council that has morphed into capitalism and feudalism’s horrid little baby with ‘nobles’ controlling everything. 

Queer Culture: First of all I use the word queer a Lot lol so if you aren’t into that, might not be for you. There is oppression since I am one of the queers who prefers an overcoming story than a setting with no oppression, but it is similar to current western culture in the sense that it’s not Horrible (so no like legal death sentences for gay sex etc), not As bad as it used to be, is worse in rural areas, and is rapidly changing in the cities. for the most part people hide their queerness but there is underground culture. Most of the characters are queer so there’s a lot of rep including ace and nb

Plot:

So far, it is Long. I am 200k words in at chapter 27 and probably only halfway through and this is only the first book. A lot of the first bit is just Mila’s struggles at the school where she’s learning forging. It is taking a turn into much more political intrigue than I planned but I’m leaning into it. so just know that its long and not just constant action, there is a lot of downtime since I enjoy my character interactions and developments and fluff etc. 

It is very R rated. Mostly due to dark subject matter, blood/gore etc, and lots of swearing (I come from a family where they’re just used as emphasis words really lol, so that’s somewhat leaked in...and it’s a first draft so I can’t be bothered to spend that much time removing them). There is a Lot of discussion around sex but no actual sex scenes. It has many things which could be triggering so just lmk if you want me to warn you about anything specific. It is dark and has dark themes, however, it is not a grimdark vibe, the vibes are actually fairly light all things considered. The characters have a lot of bantz and mess around and have fun, so it’s much less constantly serious than most ‘dark’ adult fantasy. I wanted to make them more relatable as people rather than just ‘whatever badass magic user’ (they’re actually mostly fairly pathetic pft)

General CW list: violence, gore, emotional abuse, abusive relationships, child abuse, sexual harassment, bullying, homophobia, transphobia, racism, ableism, frank depictions of mental illness, alcohol/drug use, addictions, intrusive thoughts, self harm, suicide ideation/attempts, war, war crimes, torture, mind control

CW list of things mentioned and discussed or that happen but not shown directly ‘on screen’: rape, pedophilia, forced pregnancy

Characters:

I’ll just give a very brief (and not great) description of the main three

Mila: (pron. ‘mee-luh’) the MC, disaster lesbian but more in a cringe fail way than a messy bitch way. tiny (4′10) but v powerful, just can’t quite use it yet. country kid way behind on the times. needs a break so badly

Ardev: imagine if you gave a wet rat the power to take over the world but he couldn’t be bothered. gay/ace and has so many things deeply wrong with him. short king

Endel: the only competent one. bi. BDE. femme. a slut. perfect at everything. his biggest flaw is that he likes Ardev. also has things deeply wrong with him.

thx for reading and again, DM if you’re interested or have questions <3

[gaysonlyocean]

ok ok I have a few for ogtbh

how is evelin handling everything? I care her so much how is she doing-

chaos on the car #1, the theft, I really REALLY wanna know more about Thatcher and Dave's reaction and how shit goes down after

and uhhhhh what was Adam's first kill like-

(you don't need to answer all of them i just wanted to gives some variety teehee 🥰)

oh yippee mel questions!! EDIT FROM HALFWAY ANSWERING THIS IS GOING UNDER A CUT SOBS UH WARNING FOR DESCRIPTION OF MURDER

evelin would answer being asked if how things are going with "well its going ':]" she stressed out of her mind as it is

shes trying her best to keep things under control and not freak out but nothing seems to be going right and she was already dealing with m.a.d. as it is so shes been having a lot of quiet cries to herself when shes pretty sure no ones looking

evie was also venting to jonah about things at first, but then the ear thing happened and she felt bad putting it on him when hes also stressed so she stopped and has just been internalising it

the bottlecap pendant and the conversation she has with thatcher to get it help alot though!!

god i fucking love the first chaos in the car on their end cause they have a significiantly less chaos in their car but its still so chaotic, we get two for the price of one in that bit

they literally said NOTHING to eachother the entire ride up to that moment other than a "get in" "thanks" when thatcher picked dave up cause this happens literally like. a hour after the divorce phonecall so neither are happy about this

AND THEN SUDDENLY DAVE JUST GOES "is that my car??" AND LOW AND BEHOLD IT IS AND SARAH IS DRIVING IT so dave just winds down the window and you KNOW thatchers car doesnt have electric winders so he has to turn that fucking gear thing and now hes half out the fucking window going "sarah? is that y-" AND SHE FUCKING YELLS OUT A CUSS AND HITS THE GAS SPEEDING OFF

SO NOW THE TWO OF THEM ARE JUST SITTING THERE CONFUSED BEFORE THATCHER STARTS DRIVING AFTER THEM AND THE ENTIRE TIME THEY CAN HEAR EVERYONE SCREAMING IN THE OTHER CAR

AND THEYRE NOT MUCH BETTER CAUSE DAVE KEEPS GOING "WHY DID SARAH STEAL MY CAR???" TO WHICH THATCHER GOES "IDFK THE ONLY INTERACTIONS WITH HER IVE HAD WERE HER SENDING ME DEATH THREATS WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME???"

theres also a lot of unhelpful comments from both of "where did she learn to drive holy shit" cause of sarahs fucking gta approach to it rn

how things go down after is they finally catch up cause unlike sarah thatcher is trying to not accidentally drift and shit and daves car is just abandoned

they go out into the area to try to find them when suddenly both of their phones start going off and then stop ringing the second they go to answer

dave thinks this is weird but thatcher thinks this is Alarming and starts looking extra hard and eventually find bps + evelin trying to sneak away and they just have. so many questions

but before they can ask any dave goes "dammit im gonna be late to the church" which makes adam panic and go "you absolutely cannot go there" and then he just. refuses to elaborate and now his friend are also vaguely going "yeah dont go to church"

obviously this is Weird so they go "right car theft forgiven your all coming with us what the fuck is going on" and they are refusing to give answers while staying at daves house for the next few days

dave doesnt mind and is happy to have people over so hes just trying to play host and having fun while also trying to contact o'brien who strangely is ignoring him

thatcher starts coming over again for the first time in years cause he also wants to know what the fuck is up with these kids and uh

he gets his answer :)

ANYWAY MOVING ON this ones gonna be a doozy ill tell you that >:)

adam killed someone for the first time when he was 15, and what he really remembers of it is the aftermath of six basically going "finally, you became one of us so young yet took so long to do this i thought youd disappoint me again and not do it, im so proud of you" cause yknow the desperation for parental affection weve all been there

it was someone in yonder county, he doesnt remember the details exactly of how the house looked from the outside, but he does remember the interior like the back of his hand

single bedroom bungalow with a really tiny bathroom, no tub, the fridge hummed incredibly loudly and they always turned the stove off at the wall for some reason, they didnt really have room for a living room but they had a nice recliner in the tiny space anyway, and a stack of books beside it, there was a lil storage space inbetween the bathroom and bedroom in which the owner kept a vacuum and cleaning chemicals

adam had let himself into the house a few days prior and had gone unnoticed, keeping himself to the little storage space, moving lil things around the house to make them doubt things

he then cornered them in the kitchen, just like hed been taught to do, and he doesnt remember he had the knife first or if they had it out but he knows he pushed it through their neck until it came out the other end

and then, despite the praise he got for it, after it was done he found himself feeling weird about it, it wasnt quite sadness and it wasnt quite guilt but it was bad whatever it was

[littleperilstories]

Whumptober 2022: #3 :: A Hair's Breadth from Death

Gun to Temple | “Say goodbye.” | Impaled

Whumpees: Freddie Howell, Fen Bailey-Song

Whumper: Kain Brockhurst

@whumptober-archive / @whumptober

CW: general peril, female/lady AND male whumpees, gun use (warning shot, explicit threats), gore (hand impaled), restraints (handcuffs, duct tape), gag (duct tape), physical violence (hitting/punching, kicking), kidnapping/abduction, death threats

Fen & Freddie

Next instalment: Day 5

I want your sister. And you're going to help me find her. And if you don't cooperate, Miss Bailey-Song, I'm going to blow your pathetic little boyfriend's brains out.

None of this was real. It couldn't be, Freddie rationalized. Things like this did not happen in real life. Things like this only happened in the movies.

Armed goons did not come speeding into alleyways with guns drawn and pointed at two friends walking back to their overpriced rental house after a late night study sesh at the twenty-four hour Starbucks.

Menacing black cars did not block the only escape path at the mouth of the alley.

Strangers did not just start throwing punches, hard ones, blows meant to hurt—maim—leave scars.

People he loved and trusted—whom he thought he knew—did not glide into a fighting stance and start kicking ass, dealing blows right back to their attackers.

Freddie was seeing double, the figures in front of him blurry and unfocused. He could taste blood in his mouth. It was an unfamiliar sensation; he’d never been punched before. The blood was metallic and rancid, on his tongue, and his mind skipped from one confused, irrational thought to another.

What was happening?

Who were these people?

What did they want?

He needed to help Fen.

Where did she learn to fight like that?

She looked so beautiful.

This thought spun in dizzy circles around his head. It, and more than one variation of it, was never far from the forefront of his mind—but it was particularly useless right now. While he was busy spitting blood onto the asphalt and trying to form even one coherent idea, she was going head-to-head with these bastards, limbs flying in graceful arcs. He hadn't even known Fen Bailey-Song, his best friend, could throw a real punch, let alone take on an entire gang.

"Freddie!" Her voice broke through his stupor. "Freddie, run!”

Me, he thought dizzily. She's talking to me. She was telling him to run. While she fought them off. By herself.

He staggered to his feet, the world spinning around him, a cruel and out-of-control merry-go-round.

Her voice broke the air. "No!”

Something—a fist? a foot? he couldn't tell anymore—slammed into his gut, and then a set of arms yanked him upright, one muscled limb snaking around his neck.

I can't breathe.

Freddie gasped for air, a panic like he'd never known tearing through every atom of his body.

"Stop," he rasped—at least, he thought he did. Outside, in the realm of breath, of air, of oxygen, Fen was screaming the same word.

"Stop! Stop it! You're killing him!"

"You want me to stop?” A cool, disturbingly unperturbed voice asked, right next to Freddie's ear.

"Yes!”

"You don't want me to kill him?"

The arm around his neck relaxed, and Freddie sucked air into his lungs, each breath a humiliating wheeze screamed into the night.

“Run, Fen,” he choked out. “Please.”

"Let him go," she snarled, ignoring his pleading. Freddie could focus on her again. She was still tense, surrounded by their attackers, but unhurt. 

Something cold pressed against Freddie's temple. "I will. But before I do that, we are going to have a conversation."

Fen released a guttural roar at the sight of the gun pressed to Freddie's head. She seemed about to charge, a look of wild, unbridled wrath upon her face, when the man holding him said, "And if you don't cooperate, Miss Bailey-Song, I'm going to blow your pathetic little boyfriend's brains out."

Fen, beautiful and sweet and gentle Fen, froze. Not his girlfriend, no. But the most important person in Freddie’s life? Yes.

"Hands up," the man said softly. Fen obeyed, her eyes not leaving Freddie's.

"Pat her down."

As two men lurched forward, Freddie came to his senses. "Don't you fucking touch her!" He struggled against the man's grip, even as the chokehold grew tighter again.

"Shut the fuck up," the man growled, and a loud click sounded in his ears.

"Don't!" Fen's hands shot higher into the air. "Freddie, it’s—it’s okay, you don’t need to worry, I promise it’s okay.” She nodded as if that somehow made the words more true. "You'll be okay."

Some small part of him appreciated the lie, even though it was categorically the least true thing had ever been told.

"Do you know who I am?” the man asked calmly as his cronies finished searching Fen’s body for hidden weapons. Her purse, the first thing she’d discarded when the fight began, was on the ground, its contents strewn across the alley floor.

"Kain Brockhurst." She spit out his name as if she'd been sucking snake venom from a wound. "What the fuck do you want?"

"Why, that's easy, dear." The muzzle of the pistol pressed harder into Frieddie's temple. "I want your sister. And you're going to help me find her."

"In your fucking dreams." Fen's eyes flashed like lightning. "Even if I knew where she was, I wouldn't tell you.”

Brockhurst tsked. "What a shame. Here I thought you shared some of your sister's…heroic qualities. Perhaps you'd secretly enjoy seeing this fucker’s brains splattered on the pavement?"

Fen was shaking.

"There's a convenient dumpster just there," Brockhurst said, pulling away the gun just for a moment to gesture with it. "I wouldn't even have to travel far to dump his body."

I am going to die.

Freddie couldn't breathe again, but this time it was his own lungs turning against him.

Fen flew forward, and Freddie closed his eyes, waiting for the bang.

Instead, though, a cry ripped through the air. His eyes flew open again.

It took two men to hold her, and she was fighting fiercely, but they had her overpowered. Her face was contorted with rage.

"If you fucking hurt him, Kain, I'll—"

The force of his body slamming into the ground knocked the very air from Freddie's lungs. He screamed as Brockhurst's foot slammed into his chest.

"Oops," Brockhurst said. "That might have broken a rib. Or several."

Fen was crying. Crying because of me.

But she was strong, stronger than he’d ever realized. She could escape their grip. She could get away.

"Run," he tried to gasp again, "get out of here.”

A gunshot split the air.

"A warning shot," Brockhurst said. Somehow, Freddie was still alive, though he was gasping for breath.

He knew he wouldn't be able to stand.

"Don't hurt him!" Fen’s voice was shrill as Brockhurt coolly inspected the pistol.

"Beg."

Fen stopped thrashing. "What the fuck did you just say?"

Tears blurred Freddie's vision as he watched Brockhurst lean in, bringing his face mere centimetres from Fen's. "I said. Beg. Me. Beg for his life."

"Don't." Freddie's voice was a rasp, a scrape of rusty metal. "Fen, don't—“

"Please." Fen turned her tearful face up towards Brockhurst’s. "Please. I'm begging you. Don't hurt him. Don't kill him. He has nothing to do with this. He barely even knows Bridget. He doesn't know where she is—please, I swear. He doesn't. Neither of us do.”

Freddie heaved in a breath, wet and ragged, and tried to haul himself onto his hands.

One of Brockhurst's henchmen kicked him down again.

"You see, that's the funny thing," Brockhurst said. "I don't need you to know where she is."

Fen's eyes snapped with fury again. "Then why—”

"I just need to give her an incentive to come to me."

Fen flailed against the arms still gripping her. "She won't. She'll never—"

"Oh, she will." Brockherst backed up a few steps, stopped, and then he raised his arm again. The goon over Freddie yanked him upright.

The round void of the muzzle pointed directly between his eyes.

"You will do as I say, Fen Bailey-Song," Brockhurst said quietly, "or I will pull this trigger, and you can say goodbye to your friend forever."

"Fen, don't—"

But she was motionless, save for a slow, tearful nod.

"Fen, don’t—"

The remaining henchman hurled a punch into his stomach, and Freddie doubled over, groaning. A hand grabbed onto his hair and pulled him back up. Brockhurst's aim had not shifted.

"Hands behind your back."

Freddie choked on a sob as she did, and the sickening click of handcuffs rang through the alley.

"Feet together." Fen shifted. One of the men wrapped duct tape around her ankles.

Freddie was screaming. Was he? He couldn't tell This was a nightmare, it just had to be—

"Don't. Fucking. Move." Tears were streaming down Fen's face as the tape was pressed over her lips, wrapped around her head in an inescapable gag.

"Stop it.” Freddie was sobbing. "Stop, leave her alone, stop—”

"What a sweet, obedient little girl." Brockhurst was smirking as he lowered. the gun. "Did Bridget ever tell you my specialty?"

Trembling, gaze burning with fury, Fen shook her head.

"Superior strength,” said Brockhurst smugly. "Incredible accuracy.

A kick to the back of the knees had Freddie kneeling. A backhanded blow sent him sprawling.

Fen was screaming through the tape, eyes round and terrified.

And then a boot was pressing into Freddie’s arm, pinioning him to the ground.

"I’ve decided I won't shoot you in the head today," Brockhurst said. "I have a better use for you. You'll give precious Bridget a message for us, won't you?"

"I don't—" Freddie rasped.

He realized what he was looking at too late.

A piece of paper, stuck through with a gleaming silver knife.

A knife that punctured, no, that shattered through his trapped hand, digging into the very concrete ground beneath him.

The last thing Freddie saw before the world turned to darkness was the love of his life thrashing against the men who were dragging her away, tears staining her cheeks, as she tried to scream his name.

[cranes-best-experiment]

Terror's Trance: Part 4 (A Burdened Birth)

(Jonathan Crane Origin) (Jonathan Crane x Reader)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After a seemingly never-ending pregnancy, of high emotions and annoyance with life. Karen found herself in a situation that she never would have expected. She was currently back in her childhood home and in labour, almost ready to give birth. During a visit to a local market she had unfortunately spotted her grandmother. Her reaction had been extreme but a one that had been instilled since she had been young, fear overtook her and she blacked out and almost immediately fell to the ground. She hadn’t been with Gerald, and Mary would have loved to have left her there, she promised to never help or see the child. However, she knew God was watching and her life was to serve him and to help her would be to serve God in the correct way. 

Marion was furious and they had argued about it, Mary mentioned that she again harboured no feelings of want or care and this was just a service to the higher power. It was the 16th of September, exactly 2 months before he was due, birth was already something Karen had dreaded without the added anxiety of having a premature baby and being unhappy with the child. She had wondered throughout her pregnancy whether she would still retain the hatred towards the child, when in front of her, as much as being pregnant and having the child inside of her. She knew that it would be much different when they were face to face. Perhaps a motherly love would be born as she looked at the child, and it would win her over with a charming look that Gerald first gave her, and the hatred would dissipate. 

No matter the slightly positive thoughts that were trying to help her stress,  the tension didn’t dissolve, as in her eyes, she would soon be dealing with and caring for the thing that caused her the most strife.  And it just felt useless to look forward to anything with it. 

The pregnancy was lengthy and strenuous, at least the child had spared her one thing, and that was morning sickness. It was rare that any sickness hit her and when it did, it wasn’t very strong. That was one thing she could be thankful for, but she wasn’t sure if it were just the fact that she wasn’t eating much. She was sure if it could, it would give her the most severe morning sickness, to make every aspect of her life as miserable as possible. But what was not expressed through morning sickness was expressed through the appearance of many spots. Making her feel extremely insecure, Gerald had joked saying that if it were a girl perhaps it was stealing her beauty. This was something that she didn’t find as humorous as was intended. It enraged her even further, being fortunate enough to have never experienced acne ever. 

She was sat in her childhood room, under the judging eyes of her mother and grandmother. Her husband was notified but wasn’t allowed in the house, he sat outside in his car nervously anticipating the birth of his son. He viewed it as a way to support his wife from the sidelines. She had been in labour for 13 hours now but her mother and grandmother had refused to allow her to the hospital, for an unknown reason. As much as they hated her and the child, they had to be in control of every aspect of the people around them. 

She felt like she wasn’t getting any closer to giving birth, all she wished for was it to be over. Desperate for the agony to end. She had never experienced pain as extreme as this and it was expressed through the throat shredding screams that Gerald was sure he could hear from outside. She cursed the child for being so difficult. “Scream daughter… scream in agony!” Marion spat at her writhing daughter, “And pray I’ve kept your God I’ve kept your little folly from entirely ruining the Keeny family name.” Karen wanted to react, but the pain was too strong to even be bothered, she was deafened.  Mary sat at her feet helping her deliver it. 

An hour or so had passed, and the pained tears had dried, the arduous journey had stopped and a new Crane had been born into the world. His great grandmother grabbed his silent body from her thighs and shook him slightly before a dull noise came from the poor child. Mary looked down at her great-grandchild with disgust in her eyes, “Hmph! The ‘Family name Marion, is nearly as anaemic as this emancipated newborn,” She held it to her daughter, “such a spindly little spider.” Marion shook her head. “Wonder it’s still breathing, considering the Drug-polluted source.” Karen had passed out for a small amount of time, her body couldn’t handle the pain. “And the child’s future?” Marion started to walk away. “Bury it, mother. Back in there in your atrium. I never want to speak of it again. Quick before she’s back with us.”

The child lay silent in her arms, not flailing. Just staring around at the world, Mary had heard things about Gerald and refused to follow through with that. Karen woke up rather quickly, and the last thing that was discussed before Mary again banished her was that Karen was to name her child ‘Jonathan’. Karen didn’t understand why, but didn’t argue she hadn’t really considered names, and didn’t hate it so she obliged. But what she didn’t know was that, that was the name that Mary had desperately wanted to name the little boy she couldn’t have. 

As soon as she left, Gerald insisted they go to the hospital to get them both checked out. The nurses spent most of their time on Jonathan, due to the lack of movement and noise, but also the fact he was 2 months premature. He was of course underweight, but he was a long baby which was what had made a struggle for Karen. He was silent and calm, majorly different to how regular Newborns were. When the child first opened his eyes at his parents, there was a mixed pool of hypnotising cerulean and ice, he had received the pigment from both parents. But the colouring was layered in such a way, that changed colour and were amazingly beautiful - unlike anyone has seen. 

They, of course, still checked Karen over, to make sure there was no excessive bleeding. But they were enchanted with the little boy, he was incredibly well behaved and beautiful. They were in awe of him, asking for honours to do things like give him a feed. They made remarks such as ‘he will be a heartbreaker, when he is older’. As Karen had refused to breastfeed him, she would also refuse to hold him. The nurses didn’t judge for this, they knew it could be difficult for a new mother to have a child and quite frequently postPartum depression had a factor in the behaviour and was more common than most people had thought. 

Gerald finally got to hold his boy, he was fascinated by the child. He never really knew if he wanted a child, he wasn’t big into children but his child was different. He wanted to see how he would grow up. He could see so much of himself in the child’s features - the height in particular. 

Karen felt an empty sadness as she lay on her side, she knew it wasn’t how she was supposed to feel after having her child. You were supposed to be so proud and joyous, but those feelings of hatred didn’t subside. She thought perhaps a look at the child would solve it, but it made it worse. Maybe he really did ‘steal’ her beauty, she pondered. The conversations she overheard of her ‘breath-taking child’ vexed her so much, she felt she couldn’t control it. 

Those innocent eyes and hopeful smile had taken everything from her, her life for 18 years, her family, her freedom. And everything she tried to get those back, failed all because of him. He had doomed her. She wondered again if she were depressed, perhaps it was just postpartum depression, from all the extreme negative opinions she held of the child through her pregnancy, and she was just feeling bad. Surely, it would pass, and she’d too be enchanted with her son and maybe it would work out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[ziracona]

Ok so, i see we are viewing the issue of Tranquility from very different points of view. You are seeing as a rights issue only, while i'm not. As a health professional Cassandra's and Solas' attitude is the ethically right one to deal with a treatment who isn't undertood beyond it's capacity to bring harm to the patient (in this case also others, because of the out-of-control magic).

If Cassandra was truly lying about her intentions to spread knowledge of the Cure once it was understood (something that realistically would take longer than the 2 years until Tresspasser) we will only know for certain in Dreadwolf. But i will say that it doesn't make's sense for her characterization to do so. Cassandra's main defining trait is searching and revealing the truth, it's core of every piece of her arc and interactions with other characters.

I don’t really care if it’s in character for her? Characterization in dAI was all over the place anyway. Trying to argue a point by what makes sense is a losing battle with the writing quality in that game, and it’s not what I’m talking about anyway.

From a health perspective, she’s in the wrong. People have a right to know they have options besides dying, and hiding information and conducting tiny studies alone even just intellectually is neither efficient or medically sound, especially considering Cassandra has no personal expertise in tranquility. That’s stupid. It’s also not a exactly health issue. Any more than a lobotomy is. They mind control rip out part of a brain. That’s not cancer bro. Also, it isn’t ‘understood beyond its potential to cause the patient harm.’ That’s ONE HUNDRED % a HYPOTHESIS. It’s not ‘understood’ at all, although the small imperical data that exists would suggest the opposite. Seekers are fine, and that’s the closest we have for comparison. Again, the idea mages cured of tranquility would become a danger to others and themselves is entirely a hypothesis, to begin with. You can’t say withholding life saving treatment for thousands of people based off a bigot’s bigoted belief influenced hypothesis is ‘ethically correct.’

When temporarily cured in DA2, Karl is fairly scared, but calm and rational mostly, certainly not angry or dangerous. Cassandra, an under qualified person not remotely of the minority being affected even, is making herself judge, jury, and executioner, then choosing a hypothesis to work from that’s oppressive to begin with, because of her history of religious indoctrination. I don’t like hate Cass, but she is a complicated character, as people are, and she’s a flawed religious bigot in a lot of areas, and hasn’t fixed many issues with herself. And that’s fucked. Especially considering she is /part of the structure of authority/ that has done this in the first place. It’s like being an assistant for doctors who did lobotomies and finding out ‘Oh wow. We did this to women who just were emotional or foreign, or people other people needed silenced, and it actually totally doesn’t help and is super fucked up. And uh. Actually we can undo this procedure holy shit we could save everyone we hurt’ and then going ‘mmmm but I worry personally that all these people we lobotomized in institutions might lash out if cured, so I, part of the oppressive system that did this to them in the first place, not a medical doctor though just some rando, decide on my own it’s my choice to withhold treatment until I’m 100% sure it can be cured with no side effects because that’s responsible : ) and I’m also not consulting any of their families or people who have undergone procedures or medical doctors I’m just doing this shit hehe bc I’m the Moral Center of the Universe.’

It’s not ok. Or right, or good. Also, you can’t take ethics out of medicine. The Hypcratic oath is taken for a reason. Doctors need to consider ethics in the complex issues they deal with, because guess what? Ethics come up literally constantly in medicine babe. Constantly. And when doctors decide to be cold and clinical and super personally biased, which they do way too often, we get rampant malpractice, and we get eugenics. I’m not viewing it as a rights issue only, but you’re not viewing it as one at all. Which, if you’re actually a health professional, gross. But sadly not surprising. You literally cannot divorce medicine from ethics though you have constantly got to be considering how your actions and inactions impact the people in your care. That’s the goddamn point of healing.

I’m right, and I don’t really have any reason to want to argue with you. I was making a meme for fun, and get nothing out of discussing this with someone I’ve never seen before. You’re the one going out of your way to debate a stranger over a joke that made you uncomfortable, I’m assuming because you like Cass, and can also tell there’s some truth in what I say, because people laugh and move on, not lash out, when they see stuff, unless they feel threatened by it. Just block or ignore me like a normal person and go about your life if arguing is what you want, because I’m way too tired to want to spend my time and energy debating people I don’t even know, stuff I already know I’m right about and literally am sure they won’t change their mind about either. Why would I want to argue with a brick wall?? And for that matter, why would you? Is either of us the arbiter of Dragon Age Truth? No. We’re two strangers with different moral codes and intellectual interests and knowledge and yeah one of us is right and that’s me, but I’m not asking for a debate and you won’t get anything out of debating me any more than I will debating you, so please leave me alone. I didn’t ask for this. It’s just a meme. You can let it go.

[alyssalikestoreadbooks]

Borrow My Heart - Kasie West

"When a girl overhears a guy getting verbally destroyed by his friend for being catfished, she jumps in to save the day—and pretends to be his online crush. A young adult romance from the critically acclaimed author of Places We've Never Been.

Wren is used to being called a control freak. She doesn’t care; sticking to the list of rules she created for herself helps her navigate life. But when a cute guy named Asher walks through the door of her neighborhood coffee shop, the rulebook goes out the window.

Asher is cute, charming . . . and being catfished by his online crush. So Wren makes an uncharacteristically impulsive decision—she pretends to be the girl he's waiting for to save him from embarrassment. Suddenly she’s fake-dating a boy she knows nothing about. And it’s . . . amazing.

It's not long before Asher has her breaking even more of her own rules. But will he forgive her when he finds out she's not who she says she is? Wren's not so sure. . . . After all, rules exist for a reason."

Read Date - August 2024

Length - 320 Pages

Genre - Romance, Contemporary, Young Adult

Rating - 6/10

Stars - ★★★☆☆

Notes - I've said this in the past, but i think its SO CUTE when books have little quirks or unique features. This book features "rules" at the start of each chapter! i love it. I love how nerdy Asher and Wren are, and the way they converse with each other is just so sweet. The fake identity thing is REALLY interesting and i can't wait to see how that plays out. It's interesting to see how Wren has to deal with Karen's at the animal shelter, and the dynamics of different people is so cool. The concept of Wren reverse-catfishing Asher is genuinely very cool to me and i think it's very interesting the way that it's all played out. Asher slowly falls in love with her, and Wren breaks all her rules. On top of this all, she's lying to him, and hiding the truth. The reveal that Wren creates these rules to protect herself from her mother is heartbreaking, and it makes sense psychologically. The drama between Wren and her mom is such a smart way to draw a divide between the sisters, and Wren wants to make up for it by going on a trip with her sister to her moms. Involving social media in the efforts to get Bean adopted was such a smart and cute thing. I love all the different events, and how people come out of their comfort zone to make it all happen. The reveal that Asher knew the entire time is breath releasing like oh my god yesssss i love this trope. Wren's mom ditching them again is a good way for the author to get Wren's sister to realize that she's a deadbeat parent, without having to manufacture too much drama to create it. Dale and Asher posting the videos about the catfish to go viral literally has anxiety spiked in my chest, like I can't believe he would do that. I don't think this is redeemable imo because Wren is such a shy and reserved person who doesn't like to be on social media and this just betrays her trust despite what she may say. It's a great wrench thrown into a dynamic where she started out the bad guy, and Dale is trying to paint her slightly that way (unintentionally) by doing so. I had to skip some parts because its a hard cringe read when Wren finds out that he's used her to go viral. Bean getting adopted before Wren could say goodbye was so heartbreaking and it literally makes me want to CRYYYY THAT WAS HER BABBYYYYY!!!! Her eventually getting to see him again is so sweet, and im just so glad that no dogs die in this book. it's so amazing. Asher making his brother delete the video and the two of them getting shamed by their mom for posting it was satisfying. It made it alright that Wren and Asher got back together in the end. This is the first time i would've been okay if Wren got together with Chad.... just saying! In general, this was a nice book that i'd recommend to other YA readers but outside of that niche, I'm not sure if others would like it as much. It was an alright book for me.

[dramatiique]

JD likes to be in control mentally and emotionally at all times. He stubbornly fights against emotions that are considered negative (anger, sadness, fear, guilt) and keeps them all locked inside. He never wants to show any weakness because he knows that will only lead him down a path he can’t face. Whenever something happens that could result in a blow-up (e.g. Kurt and Ram trying to fight him), he will usually respond in a calm, logical manner with perhaps even some cockiness. He is very skilled at putting on an apathetic façade, which is one of the reasons people tend to keep their distance.

However, some emotions end up slipping through the cracks and he has to reel them back in. These slip-ups are rare, but each time they give a glimpse into his wrecked mental state. An example of how warped his mindset can get is when Veronica leaves him. He twists her sensible reasoning into something that it isn’t. He truly believes she only broke up with him because the other students got into her head and messed with it. In his mind, if he gets rid of the school — while also viewing the “mass suicide” as being for the greater good — the hold they have over Veronica will be lifted and she’ll want to be with him again.

During the “Meant to be Yours” segment, he is still in control, but not in the same rational way that he is when dealing with other situations. He is quiet and demented, his anger just below the surface. The kind of anger that is so much more intense and frightening than if he were to shout and scream at the top of his lungs. In this state, nobody knows when he’s going to go off the rails, which makes him that much more unpredictable. He also still maintains a sort of cockiness, but it’s faked and without the usual charm. However, as he recalls her leaving him, he loses that grip on his own control and screams out, his voice breaking and his true feelings show. Throughout the entire scene, he’s desperately trying to reel it all back in, but he just doesn’t have the same power over his own emotions anymore.

Upon seeing Veronica hanging in her closet, he thinks she really is dead and the shock that overcomes him is too much. Not only has he lost the only girl he has ever loved, but his life becomes completely meaningless at that moment. With all his emotions trying to battle it out inside and without knowing how to handle it all, he focuses on his plan to destroy the school. A plan that started out as his attempt to win her back changes to one of pure, hatred-fueled revenge against everyone who drove her to suicide. Again, he has no idea that she only faked it because she was afraid of him getting to her.

By the time Veronica finds him in the boiler room and he realizes she isn’t dead, he has shut himself off. He feels betrayed by her faking her suicide and focuses solely on his plan. However, after being shot and seeing Veronica hobble off to the football field to sacrifice herself, some clarity returns. He decides at that moment that she is a truly good person and that he can’t allow her to die over this.

When he takes the bomb from her and says he’ll trade his life for hers, he finally breaks. All of his walls come crashing down and he cries while clutching the bomb to his chest. He’s still clinging on to the love they shared by saying that he hopes she’ll miss him and how he wished she’d kiss him. He realizes that he’s damaged beyond repair and that only she can make things better through her own means. As the bomb is ticking down, he feels certain that sacrificing himself is the only way, but that doesn’t stop him from feeling sad that it has to end like that. With the last seconds passing, he feels an intense fear grip him and then it explodes. In his last moments, Jason showed his true self; a sad, scared, and lonely boy who desperately required help that was never given to him.