#my brother showed me the new act 5 update stuff it's really cool

[possessable]

why's there no fanart of this guy he's been my favorite since rhythm doctor was a flash game

[nothing-more-than-hot-leaf-juice]

Ok modern zuko would be an expert at breakdancing and sokka would be the guy who just bi-panicks whenever he does

(whoops, my hand slipped and I accidentally wrote a modern au headcanon turned zukka karate au one-shot) 

Okay but consider this instead: Zuko doesn’t know how to dance for shit and has horrible rhythm, but he is a GOD at martial arts. He’s been doing some type of style since he was a kid and is a full black belt by the time he hits high school. Martial arts was always something he excelled at, but it was also something that made him feel more secure. It was something he could work on to help him protect himself from his home life, even if it wasn’t enough most times. He specifically excels in weapons forms (I’m thinking twin sais) and you DO NOT want to spar with him. Because he may be skinny and shorter, but he’s quick and can hit hard at just the right spots. 

When he was younger he was obsessed mainly because he felt that belt rankings and trophies from competitions were a way to prove himself to his dad, but when he moved in with Iroh (who encouraged him to keep it up and was so proud of how talented and passionate he was about it), he basically used it in place of talking about his feelings. He didn’t talk about his home life or the shit Ozai did, instead, he put all his energy into his black belt levels, learning new weapons forms, and eventually into teaching new students as a junior instructor. 

At school, he’s awkward and asocial and just doesn’t have the energy for people. Zuko has little patience for asshole classmates who ask intrusive questions about his scar or spread rumors about where he got it. He eats lunch in his English classroom and would be a complete shut-in if Iroh didn’t get him to work part-time at the Jasmine Dragon. But in the dojo, he’s focused and is able to direct his energy into improving his forms and teaching younger teens. 

One of his newer students transferred from a different dojo after moving from a different state. He’s actually a freshman at Zuko’s high school but it’s not as if Zuko really interacted that much with him. This kid, Aang, is as talented and dedicated as he is, but has a long way to go to learn all the new katas. Zuko’s been dubbed the ‘scary’ trainer at the dojo. He’s the serious one who will yell if someone is goofing off and everyone’s seen that he has no problem using full force in a demonstration (little kids love him and he’s super nice to them, but he teaches the 12-15 age range). Plus there’s that scar, which doesn’t make him the most initially welcoming person. But this new kid Aang just latches onto Zuko immediately. He says hi to Zuko in the halls at school and works on his katas outside of regular practice times. At first Zuko thinks this sickeningly positive kid is annoying as crap, but warms up to him. He likes that Aang cares about martial arts and isn’t nice as a show, he’s just genuinely nice. 

And maybe he sees Aang hanging around school with a sophomore girl and her brother who just might be in Zuko’s calc class and English class. 

And maybe Zuko thinks this guy is insanely attractive and somehow incredibly funny even though most of his humor consists of the worst puns imaginable. 

But obviously, Zuko hasn’t attempted to ever actually talk to this guy. The most that he could classify as ‘talking’ to the cute, funny guy on the robotics club is the one day in English class when he had to respond to someone’s dumbass comment about Macbeth with what ended up being a ten minute spoken essay about obvious motifs and symbolism. To which Mr. Puns and Ponytail was very obviously paying great attention to and even gave Zuko a smile and thumbs up for. 

Zuko knows it’s pointless to engage. After all, he’s a senior and he doesn’t have any friends anyway. There’s no point in making any this year. Crushing on this guy from the comfortable position of the other side of the room is totally good enough for him. Totally. This is fine. He’s fine.  

Besides, he’s got competitions and if he doesn’t secure the regional championships this year he’s never going to get the chance after he goes to college. And he’s got his kids to train. Aang in particular is gearing up for his first debut into this area’s tournament. 

The tournament’s in October and usually, Zuko focuses on his own matches and performances, but Aang really wanted him to watch his set. So on this day, he stands on the sides of Aang’s zone instead of obsessively going through his katas in a corner.He’s not going to be able to watch the whole set because it overlaps with his own weapons portion, but he stands on the side and gives Aang a reassuring look that, ‘don’t worry, you’ll do great, you’re a talented kid,’ when his student looks over to him nervously. 

And wouldn’t you know it? Aang brought some friends to come watch. And one of them is Mr. Zuko’s Big Gay Crush. 

“Oh, hey Zuko,” are the words that come out of this guy's mouth that give Zuko a near-stroke. And damn if this guy’s eyes aren’t blue and pretty and he usually wears his hair in a ponytail at school, but now he’s wearing it down and Zuko wishes he could take screenshots with his brain because holy moly. 

“Hey.” Is the best that Zuko can get out of his dumb mouth. “You’re Sokka.” 

“Aang invited us to come watch,” Sokka nudges his head to indicate the ‘us’ includes his younger sister, who Zuko doesn’t know the name of. “How do you guys not get heatstroke during these things? It’s like a million degrees in here.” 

“Oh the gi’s pretty cold, I mean, it’s got air and stuff.” 

Zuko decided right there that he would be completely fine with being struck by lightning. Of course, that’s what his stupid brain would come up with. Of course, that’d be the thing he’d say in front of one of the smartest guys in his class. 

They watch Aang perform his set for the judges. Zuko recognizes that Aang took his advice when he said that he wasn’t putting enough force into his hits. He’s never seen Aang be as, well, aggressive isn’t the right word, but he’s definitely putting more power into his form. Zuko wouldn’t admit it, though, but only part of his attention was for Aang at the moment. The other part was for Sokka, who was smiling bright and pumping his fists when Aang completed a row of kicks. 

The small part of Zuko’s brain that wasn’t being taken up by watching Aang or trying to act normal around his crush noticed the clock on the wall indicating that the weapons portion would be starting in five minutes.  

“I’ve got to go do a thing so I’ll just, um, go do that now.” 

“Are you competing too?” Sokka asked. 

To this question Zuko just holds up his sais and raises his eyebrow as if to say ‘it’s a tournament, what do you think?’ Because yeah, he knows Sokka’s super smart, he’s seen him churn out calc answers at the speed of light and noticed his name on the robotics club awards update on the school’s website, but he’d also seen Sokka eat 5 packs of fundip at once on a dare and unironically wear a ‘women want me, fish fear me’ t-shirt for most of junior year. Somehow he had managed to fall for the smartest dumbass on earth. 

“Oh yeah, right.” Sokka eyes the sais and then looks right at Zuko’s face, “Aang says you’re really good.” 

Zuko decides that thinking about Aang talking to Sokka about him was something he didn’t need distracting him during his set. That was something he could anxious about later. 

“Hopefully good enough for those five assholes,” Zuko replies, gesturing to the panel of judges in the weapons section of the gymnasium. To his shock, Sokka laughs. It’s a nice laugh, too. And Zuko really hoped he could blame the blush that was one-hundred-percent creeping up his face on the lack of AC. 

“You know, you’re pretty funny man,” Sokka tells him. Zuko has no clue how to take that compliment, but he really does need to go. 

“Right,” he grins nervously and shifts his left foot around to bounce away, “well I have to go do my thing.” 

“Good luck!” 

That’s where Zuko thinks the beginning and end of his interaction with Sokka would be. 

The weapons portion thankfully goes by age. And since Zuko’s one of the youngest competitions, he gets to go first for his sai katas. This is what literal years of training have prepared him for. At regionals last year, the second advanced kata got him placed high enough to qualify for states. This is what he’s good at. He tells himself that a thousand times before starting his set. 

There’s not a thought in his head as Zuko goes through the form. The sais glide through his fingertips with every jab, block, and hook. The imaginary opponent doesn’t stand a chance. He’s cool and competent and graceful. It’s therapeutic in a sense. There’s enough adrenaline to make Zuko feel like he’s worth something, but more importantly, he knows he’s nailing this. Whatever the judges say about it, he knows that he’s perfected this form after practicing it at least a thousand times over three years. 

The judges agree with him. He’s the first competitor of the weapons portion but there isn’t really a doubt in their minds about who’s going to place. 

Zuko zones back in to the gym after bowing to the panel. He walks off, feeling lighter and letting a satisfactory smile take over his face. 

He expects the hug from Uncle and the proud smile from Sensei Piandao, but what he doesn’t expect is to see Sokka, eyes wide as globes, staring at him from the other side of the mat. 

Because what Zuko doesn’t know is that the second he turned his wrists in his first form during his hooks, Sokka’s brain went into Full Bi Panic Mode. 

And Zuko thinks the one conversation where he couldn’t talk like a human and wanted to die for most of it would be the only time Sokka would decide to willingly talk to him. Zuko is dead wrong. Sokka, in fact, has decided that this, this is the guy his Disaster Bi Brain has decided to latch onto. Sokka’s brain and all his squishy feelings have apparently decided to attach to this aloof kid with the scar who reserved his voice for eloquent, impassioned speeches about dramas and was apparently an actual god with weapons. Sokka decides that Zuko could roundhouse kick him in the side and he’d thank him. And right now Zuko’s looking at him with a dumbfounded expression, prompting Sokka to remember how to function so he can go over to congratulate Zuko and maybe ask if his dojo provides a free trial. 

So yeah, that one conversation ends up decisively not being the end of anything. 

[moonlit-imagines]

Headcanons for being a Party Member

Stranger Kids x reader

warnings:

a/n: 💖💖 these ones were kind bad but i hope you like!

prompt: anonymous: “Hi! Can you make a headcannon for Stranger Things of just being in the party? Sorry if its too vague. Thank you so much for giving us so much free content!!”

you’ve known the boys for a long, long time

your mom was friends with joyce in high school, so you knew will your whole life

he introduced you to mike and soon lucas and dustin had joined the mix

let’s face it, you guys weren’t the most popular, but as long as you had each other it was fine

“at recess do you want to play castle?”

“yes! but we need to make up our characters”

will the wise was born that day, it just stuck

you guys were obsessed with star wars when it came out

“i’d totally be a jedi” -mike

“mike, you’d cry at the sight of any alien creature”

“not true!”

“i think lucas would be a kickass pilot, though”

“i’d get the princess, too” -lucas

dustin ended up playing lightsabers with you, though

you’ve accidentally knocked down tons of stuff in mike’s basement

“cut it out, you guys!”

“soooorryyyyy”

“you are not!”

AV club was just the 5 of you acting afool under adult supervision

mr. clark was still proud of your young minds, though

D&D campaigns, you were the rogue

you were also easily distracted during the game

“anyone want chips, im gonna get some chips”

“no! you can’t leave now!”

“watch me”

playing with mike’s toys while he’s not looking

battling them with lucas, dustin, and will

until mike started protesting

bike rides around town until sunset

SLEEPOVERS

“who the hell is snoring?”

“i think it’s dustin”

“PILLOW FIGHT!!!”

“kids, time to sleep!” -any parent

“let’s watch a scary movie”

“no! i mean—i’m tired” -mike

depending on which house you were staying in, you’d have a great time

will’s brother, jonathan, was always nice to you

nancy...not so much

“hi na—” *door slams* “oh...”

erica always intruded on your sleepovers at lucas’s

“i wanna play! can i play?”

“no, erica, go play somewhere else”

“you’re so mean, lucas”

“bye!”

dustin didn’t have any siblings, but he did have a cat who was pretty nice

“hi mews!”

the night will disappeared was a night you’ll never forget

you were so determined to find him, he had to be around somewhere

you ended up getting in deeper water than you’d originally thought when you met eleven, who apparently had superpowers

“mike!!! you’re mom is gonna kill you for bringing a random girl in the house”

“i know! shhhhh”

she was weird to say the least

and it was pretty scary sneaking around with her

“dude...she has the force”

“shut up!”

after a long week of fighting with your friends and encountering inter dimensional monsters and the government, you realized your life would never be the same

your mom was pretty protective over you for a while

the party had to come to your house instead for the next few months

“sorry guys, she’s just...really upset about the whole thing”

“it’s okay, y/n. we don’t mind”

being each other’s support system

especially when it came to will, he really worried you guys

“today is will’s doctor visit, hope it goes okay...”

spending HOURS in the arcade, struggling to beat other people’s high scores

“i’m gonna do it! i’m gonna get the top score!”

“in your dreams, y/n”

hAlLoWeEn

you knew you weren’t supposed to dress up at school but no one was paying attention to you when you told them

unfortunate.

there was a new girl who mike hated right off the bat

but lucas and dustin wouldn’t stop fighting over

“you two are the worst, you know that?”

trick or treating and dumping your candy later on to trade, the most effective way to get the best halloween

“nougat, disgusting. anybody want it? i’ll give it to you for free”

*dustin and you simultaneously* “ME!”

dustin’s “pet lizard” scaring the hell out of you

“dart makes me...uncomfortable”

max pulling you aside to ask why mike hates her

“uh...he’s a dick? i don’t know”

you and max ended up getting along pretty okay, though

she did complain about mike a LOT though

and when lucas filled her in on the demogorgon/upside-down/eleven situation, EVERYONE was pissed

you guys realized that the upside down stuff was not over and there was an epic teamup with all of you yaaaay

steve harrington adopted you it’s true

eleven came back

that was cool

you gave her a hug bc like duh??? you missed her

steve babysitting you guys and then getting beat up by max’s stepbrother, billy

“can i hit him? i wanna hit him”

“do it!”

doing dumbass shit in the tunnels that ended up working out anyways! yay!

“we’re all gonna die we’re all gonna die oh my god i’m too young to die”

“Y/N STOP”

in the end everything was (mostly) okay but like, that was scarring

summer rolled around and el and mike were dating, max and lucas were dating, and dusting came back from camp and claimed to be dating some girl from faaaar away

“liar”

“i’m not lying!”

steve sneaking you into movies

he also gave you (and only you) free ice cream but only bc he knew you wouldn’t tell anyone else

robin and you talking while you hid in the break room to eat your ice cream

“so...what do you do for fun”

“kill monsters”

“oh...okay”

kinda sick of the party’s shit for a while, so dustin and you were off scheming with the scoops employees

bad ideaaaa!! the russians!! you were almost killed!!

rescue mission for steve and robin

“they’re high as shit”

“nO YOu aRe”

“wonderful, we’re screwed”

losing them fhdhdhsh

“y/n?!”

“what? i’m not a babysitter!”

being chased by russians but also the rest of the party showing up and updating you but also adults finally making an appearance and you wanting to cry because like what the fuck is happening

being chased by the mind flayer

“GUYS IF WE DONT MAKE IT I WANT YOU ALL TO KNOW I LOVE YOU”

“Y/N. STOP SAYING THINGS THAT MAKE US THINK WE’RE GOING TO DIE”

eek that night sucked

you also almost fell down the hill that cerebro was placed on

and then uhhh hopper died so that was really bad and will ended up moving away with el and everyone was very sad

your mom cried when joyce left :(

you cried way too much

might i add going over to lucas’s to hang out with erica bc now you guys are friends lmaooo

“why are you here, y/n?”

“erica wanted me to come over”

“you two are impossible”

and to end this on a high note, the remaining party members in town were finally working through their differences as you all grew up and knew that it’d be impossible to separate for good

also pizza nights every week (sometimes accompanied by an older teen bc why not)

“if you guys eat all the damn pizza we’re gonna have a problem”

“we can’t help it! we’re growing!”

taglist: @locke-writes // @queenofthehairharrington // @praellee // @bonniesbabybunnie // @lotsoffandomrecs //

[cxhnow]

Growing Up With Chloe x Halle

The Bailey sisters on why they didn’t switch up overnight — the world just caught up to their speed.

On their 2018 debut album The Kids Are Alright and on Freeform’s Grown-ish, a 19- and 17-year-old Chloe and Halle Bailey sang “Watch out world, I’m grown now.” So you’ll have to forgive them for acting out a little on their new sophomore record — they warned us. While Ungodly Hour might sound like a pivot to the grown ‘n’ sexy side of R&B similar to plenty of their peers, trading TKAA’s colorful doodles for chrome angel wings and skin-tight latex, they’re really just living the same truths they preached up and down TKAA: Own your insecurities, work hard, don’t get distracted by drama. “When we created this album, we said, Okay, we want to show all the different sides and layers of us,” Chloe tells me, sitting side by side with her sister, over Zoom from their family home in Los Angeles. “We don’t just want to show this one side. A lot of people still think we’re teenagers.”

Now 22 and 20, the former child stars are ready to explore the topics they’ve been singing about since they were kids making covers on YouTube, the ones that landed them a record deal with music royalty before they were old enough to vote. The new album calls out former flings, seethes with jealousy, and apologizes when necessary. Lyrics like “It’s four o’clock / you sendin’ me too many pictures of your …” and “No drama, no baby mamas” immediately started dating rumors online, roping in their Grown-ish co-star Diggy Simmons. While most fans are having fun with it, those a little, um, outside of the Baileys’ age demographic are still struggling (try to get through this Breakfast Club questioning without cringing). In case you missed it: They no longer have to change Beyoncé lyrics from “You showed your ass” to “You showed your butt” — on “Do It,” they proudly sing “I’m a bad girl, shake a li’l ass.” Alongside all the perks of growing up, the album makes sure to normalize the struggles, too.

When the coronavirus pandemic sent Halle home to L.A. from The Little Mermaid rehearsals in London, their house (complete with mom, dad, and younger brother, Branson) became their album rollout headquarters. One of the few albums to not be pushed due to the coronavirus, Ungodly Hour was originally planned for June 5, but the deaths of George Floyd in Minnesota, Breonna Taylor in Kentucky, and far too many others across the country, created a moment that Chloe and Halle felt they couldn’t ignore. They pushed the album one week, to June 12, and continued to use their platform to share petitions, funds, and awareness, while also personally signing petitions and making donations. As both an escape and work, they’ve been focusing their energy on the album, diving into elaborate DIY remote performances and mashing up songs, but making sure to leave Sundays for rest. After a busy weekend tearing up the BET Awards and Global Citizen virtual stages, channeling Aaliyah in one performance and going full rock and roll in the other, they’ll be back on Instagram Live this Thursday for Ungodly Hour Tea Time, where they often chill out in Snuggies, try to remember what day of quarantine it is, and update their supporters on their lives.

How has it been, emotionally, to have to sing and dance while all of this turmoil is happening? Halle Bailey: Emotionally, what’s keeping us afloat is music and feeling better through the art. I think that’s why we love music so much because even though we create it and we sing it, we use it as our healer, too. Everything going on really makes you reflect. But we’re young black women, this hasn’t been anything new to us. Our community has known about this for a very long time, and it’s constantly upsetting. But what I’m appreciating about technology and social media is that our voices can’t be silenced anymore. And the things that they used to try to hide, they can’t any longer. We’re seeing these injustices happen over video, and [so is] the rest of the world who’s usually ignorant to the racism that’s been underlying in this community. They’re seeing it and they’re upset as well. So it’s good because change can only happen when we’re all working towards a common goal. I can’t wait to see what comes out of this.

I feel like every time we have one of these moments where everyone is just mourning so publicly in such a communal way, there’s also music that uplifts us. Talk me through deciding to postpone the album.

HB:  During the height of the George Floyd protests, emotionally, we just were not right to release a project. Our little brother and our father — when we see a video of George Floyd getting killed in the street, we think that could be them tomorrow. And we wanted to shine the light on what needs to be seen. That George Floyd video, Breonna Taylor, all of the other brothers and sisters that we have lost to police brutality — that is what needed to be at the forefront and what still needs to be at the forefront.

And when The Kids Are Alright came out that was right around March for Our Lives, the Women’s March was happening. How does this moment compare for you?

Chloe Bailey: Wow, now that I’m thinking about it, this time, it feels a bit more like change is really going to happen. Around The Kids Are Alright, we went to the March for Our Lives and we were around that incredible energy; it was really positive and uplifting because we were all banding together. But for some reason, this time right now … I feel like we have the entire world’s attention. Actual change is going to come out of what’s been happening. So, it feels the same but different, right?

HB: Yeah, I definitely think this one feels more massive. Feels like, Okay, maybe we’re getting somewhere this time. Maybe it won’t just go away a week after all of this is over, you know?

In the early stages of Ungodly Hour, did you go in wanting it to be something that showcased your maturity? Or did that come out as you were going with it?

HB: We absolutely knew that we wanted it to showcase our growth, the evolution of us into young women. Because I feel like The Kids Are Alright was very much us finding ourselves and that project took three years to make. So with that length, you can kind of go through and see like, Oh, wow, they must have been really shifting through and figuring out what’s wrong and what’s right. So, for this project, it was like, Yes, we are here. We are now grown women. I’m 20. My sister’s about to be 22 this week.

CB: Hey!

HB: So we took that and we were just like, Let’s show who we’ve become. And let’s show the side of us that people don’t see whether it’s the naughtier side of us or the insecure side of us, or the part that picks every single thing apart about ourselves out. We wanted to show all the layers of us as young women, once you kind of know who you are, but also you’re still learning.

You’ll never be a finished product.

CB: Never, constantly evolving. And that’s the goal.

There have always been glimpses at your boss-bitch attitudes, hints of it in your music and on Grown-ish. Do you ever get the sense that you’re waiting for the industry and fans to sort of open their eyes and catch up to where you’re at?

CB: I’m not gonna lie, there are some moments. And I remember when we were even creating this album we were putting a certain pressure on ourselves. Because we were thinking, What do we want the world to hear from us? What do we think the world wants us to sound like? What would make people become more receptive to us? I remember we were creating for, like, one to two months in that mind-set, and we were creating some of the worst music we ever have.

HB: Yeah, it was. It was trash.

CB: It was because we weren’t creating from our hearts. We weren’t being honest with ourselves, and as a musician, you gotta be vulnerable and share that true part of yourself or the music isn’t going to be very good. Once we threw that out the window and said, You know what, let’s create a good body of art, the album continued to write itself. But that main lesson for us was never change yourself; the world will catch up to you when it’s ready. I feel like they’re kinda ready now for this project. It’s older and more mature than The Kids Are Alright because we’re older and more mature than who we were when we created that.

In making a more vulnerable album, were you nervous about expanding your image in that way? Was there anything that you debated not including or things that didn’t make the cut?

HB: Wow, so, I will say that our parents kind of had a hard time … well, not a hard time, but just like opening their eyes to the fact that, Okay, these are the topics that we’ve decided to talk about. This is what’s happening. It was really fun for us to watch them. I completely understand how they feel because, you know, we’ve been just little babies to them and now we’re growing and they’re hearing [about] certain things that we’ve been through, or that we just wrote in the music. They have been like, “Oh, okay, so that’s that.”

Fans tweet collabs at you all the time, but what’s your actual approach to choosing who you work with? (Ungodly Hour features just two major collaborations: Swae Lee on “Catch Up” and the title track with Disclosure.)

CB: Definitely we have to be fans of them, number one. Even though we make music, we are such big music fans and music lovers. Two, we have to feel like the person can sonically fit the song. We don’t want to throw just anyone on a song just because they have a big name, which is really cool too. It’s really great to get big features. But it’s so funny because we have a big wish list of who we hear on which songs and some people bite, some people don’t. It’s always fun to see what the end result will be. And I know we’ll start putting out remixes and stuff soon, which will be fun.

HB: It’s very interesting because it’s hard during the creative process. You kind of have to open yourself up to somebody you do not know when you make music; it’s a part of your heart that you’re sharing. So, it’s a very intimate thing to do with a stranger. Which is why with my sister it’s really easy. But when it comes to us working with new people, we gravitate towards the ones who have very open spirits and souls, nice people.

Chloe, would you ever produce for other artists?

CB: Absolutely, 1,000 percent. That would be so much fun. I would be getting out of my comfort zone, because the only person who I can comfortably produce in front of is my sister and blast it loud over the speakers. Whenever we have other sessions with other producers and we’re collaborating, I’ll put my headphones in, I won’t blast it on the aux with theirs. I have my little computer on my lap because I like using weird sounds and samples and chopping them up in a weird way. Sometimes it’s trial and error, so I don’t want people to hear my mistakes.

HB: She’s amazing and she should just blast it everywhere she goes, okay?

CB: I would definitely love, love, love to do that.

Yes, we want to hear you everywhere! So, when shelter in place started, you guys very flawlessly transitioned to doing these home covers and incredible remote performances. What’s the process of coming up with these concepts, especially the more elaborate ones?

HB: Oh my gosh, it’s really just a bunch of play. When we’re coming up with concepts, our creative director Andrew Makadsi is really amazing at seeing our vision for the songs before we actually perform them live. It’s been really interesting and exciting to have new songs to play with. But as far as the covers, you know, those are easy. We can do those in our sleep; we just love singing other people’s songs.

How long does it take to pull together a remote performance like the Today show one for example?

CB: Our amazing creative director came up with that and it took him a day. He just kept sending us a bunch of references and photo ideas he thought of and we picked the backdrop we wanted. The song arrangement, because we always like to switch it up every time, takes —

HB: Like a day.

CB: It takes us like ten minutes to arrange the songs. But then we took some of the choreography [by Kendra Bracy and Ashanti Ledon] that we learned during the music video shoot, and we added new choreography ourselves for the Today show performance. We were like on the floor and stuff — we did that the night before we filmed it. That took us like 30 minutes because we wanted to make sure the moves weren’t awkward because we’re not choreographers, so we would prop up our iPhone and that would be our little dance-studio mirror.

You guys are really doing it by yourselves in quarantine. So, what’s the tennis court situation? Has that always been there?

HB: Yeah, it has actually, we just haven’t really used it. I mean, we’ve been where we live for about two years now. We never really thought to use it until quarantine happened ‘cause we always go somewhere else to shoot performances. That’s been a beautiful evolution — using what we have. We feel so blessed to just be able to do what we love and also do it somewhere nice.

The tennis court performances have been life-giving.

CB: It’s been so useful, from the at-home photo shoots we have to do and then the performances, like I’m so grateful. We don’t actually know how to play tennis, but there are basketball hoops on each side so our little brother Branson’s usually out there. So, when we do have to do these things, I feel bad because he’s always out there shooting hoops, but he’s like, “Okay, you can have it for two hours …” [x]

[segersgia]

Looking Back: Part 5 - Chaos - Chaos Space Marine Infantry and Terrain

I like to believe that this edition was a very exciting one for Chaos Players, since we saw a major influx of updates when it came to their range. We first saw some glimpses for things to come inside of the Blackstone Fortress game, and eventually, we were rewarded with Shadowspear and Chaos got a much needed update to their main infantry.

Chaos Space Marines:

Chaos Marines are Space Marines who have given their allegiance over to Chaos, either worshiping them all equally or dedicating themselves to one specific god. They either exist as seperate warbands that raid and pillage planets, or they are part of one of the original Traitor Legions. 

A Chaos marine can come from different backgrounds. Often, a marine is created through the gene-enhancement of vat-grown humans, slaves, or kidnapped children. The most powerful and experienced of them all have been fighting since before the Horus Heresy. They don’t call it the “Long War” for nothing.

The gear they wear and the weapons they wield are often relics that have been tainted by the Warp. This means that, just like the Death Guard, they carry stuff that looks worn out and “vintage”. 

Chaos Marines needed this update. The old ones really started to show their age, as they were too small and badly proportioned. Their updated models fixed those issues and the overall design change has worked really well. These are most definitely marines that have survived millennia of war and carnage.

I noticed that some have said that, like the Death Guard, the new Marines are cluttered and overdesigned. I disagree with this sentiment. The problem that Plague Marines have is that their design is completely cluttered with mutations. Every Plague Marine has atleast one tentacle or Plaguebearer face sticking out of his armour. If their armour was just way more worn down, it would’ve looked a lot better. 

Meanwhile, these models don’t have the same issue. Yes, they have plenty of detail, but most of it is brass plating or ornate designs. These details don’t really overstay their welcome, while with the Plague Marines, they most definitely do.

What I do find a slight downgrade is the design of their horns. The old Marines had a way more smooth and clean horn design that has now been changed into some sort of weird growth. I would’ve preferred they kept the slick design, similar to what they did with the Age of Sigmar Chaos Warriors.

Looks better, right?

8/10

Havocs:

Havocs are the Chaos equivalent of the Loyalist Devestator Marine and they are obsessed with their occupation. They have a love of big guns and destruction that could rival Ork Oddboys and they go into battle carrying a variety of weapons, both old and new, such as heavy Bolters, Lascannons and Autocannons. 

I love Havocs. Heavy-weapon teams are always some of my favourite units in an army. The design team chose to slightly alter their appearance. If you look closely, the Havocs have way thicker armour that really gives them girth and a better presence on the field. I also really like their helmets; the piping and the visor scope makes the really stand out better. The spikes on their boots are a nice touch, as they probably serve the purpose of keeping the Havoc in a steady and stable position.

Kind of dissapointed at the amount of poses. These come in a unit of five, and you quickly notice that they only have about two different poses, discounting the Aspiring Champion. 

Speaking of the Aspiring Champion, may I just say that he has one of the best looking heads in the entire range. He looks proper evil.

8/10

 Chaos Terminators:

The Traitor Legions took plenty of boxes filled with Terminator Armour with them. Those that wield Terminator Armour are held in high esteem by the rest of their warband. Most of them are Aspiring Champions or Veterans that have served for centuries. In fact, the only way for a Chaos Marine to get Terminator Armour is to kill its previous owner. Most Terminators take on a leadership role in a warband and will often show their authority through horrendous violence. 

I have a love-hate relationship with this unit for a few reasons. The new ones fix one aspect of the old Terminators, which was their proportions, yet didn’t really fix the other problem, which was their size. This iteration of Chaos Terminators are in my opinion way too small.

Secondly, they once again flunked on the design of their horns and tusks. Their previous iteration were better in my opinion. They were way longer and came in some very cool variants, including rhinoceros tusks. The new ones still have this in a way, but not in the same manner as their predecessors.

7/10

Greater Possessed:

Possessed are Chaos Marines that have allowed Daemons to possess their very bodies in an act of devotion to the Dark Gods. They then mutate into these malformed beings that are half Daemon, half human. 

Greater Possessed are the big brothers that normal Possessed look up to. Their bodies are taken over by way stronger and more dangerous Daemons, such as Daemon Heralds. They are a taste of what a full ascension to daemonhood could be for a warrior, and are revered as champions and saints. 

Oftentimes, the process of their creation isn’t possible without the interference of a Master of Possession. Greater Possessed would instantly be consumed by their host without the help of one of these sorcerers.

Why was this unit necessary? I would’ve preferred it if these were just a replacement for the regular Posessed, as that old kit is just very ugly. I hope this means that normal Posessed are receiving an update as well at some point. 

Designwise, I’m a little divided on them, One looks stunning while the other one looks kind of derpy. The mutations on them atleast fit way more than some of the stuff that Plague Marines have. 

6/10

Obliterators:

Obliterators are Chaos Marines who are infected with the Obliterator Virus, a daemonic malady that turns them into a living arsenal. 

Obliterators become fused to the armour and the weaponry they wield, becoming half human, half machine. They also gain the ability to absorb other weapons into themselves and make them appear on their body at will. This makes these hulking masses of flesh and metal almost unstoppable in battle.

They also can teleport, since they wear Terminator Armour. 

The Obliterator Virus is a transferable disease, that spreads in the same way as the flu. I do wonder if non-Space Marines can become infected, as that would be a very cool conept.

The “glow-up” of this unit is really visible and I really hope that Mutilators get the same treatment somewhere in the future. I really do wish that a new version of them gets released that would allow for more customization. I do miss the Spiderweb-looking growths that is depicted in the artwork for them. 

Someone did point out to me that their armour resembles that of the old Rogue Trader Terminators. If this is indeed the case, then I like them even more. 

8/10

Noctilith Crown:

Noctilith Crowns are giant shrines made from Blackstone; a substance that the Necrons use to repel psychic energy and the powers of the Warp. Both the Blackstone Fortresses and the Cadian Pylons are made from this stuff and not only the Mechanicus have been fighting in order to retrieve this valuable resource, but the Necrons and Chaos as well have been aggressively coveting the material. Abbadon learned that the properties of Blackstone could be reversed, so instead of repelling the Warp, it strengthend it. 

Noctilith Crowns are specifically constructed to enhance the power of Psykers and to thin the veil between real-space and the immaterium. They are still a very dangerous and volatile structure to use, as would be anything that screws with the laws of reality.

This is a terrain piece that I’m surprised at wasn’t made about 3 editions ago. It makes so much sense for Chaos to have a Chaos Star as a piece of terrain. It is also nice to see terrain that isn’t tied to the Imperium. 

There is nothing bad to say about this. I’m just baffled we never saw this release earlier.

10/10

——–

While I have my gripes, the new update that Chaos got is making me giddy for what may come next for them. They most definitely needed this update. What came before was so outdated.

Next up, Drukhari, and boy do I have some stuff to say about  the Dark Eldar.

previous posts: Primaris Mainline Infantry, Death Guard Infantry, Craftworld Aeldari, Primaris Vanguard Infantry

[seasaltmemories]

Persona 5 Royal Review/Analysis

So I didn’t have a ps4 when the original persona 5 came out, so royal was my first experience with the game, as a result, I will be talking about spoilers for both the original content and Royal bc a lot of the additions seem mixed in aside from just the third semester stuff

let’s get the summary

Prepare for an all-new RPG experience in Persona 5 Royal based in the universe of the award-winning series, Persona! Don the mask of Joker and join the Phantom Thieves of Hearts. Break free from the chains of modern society and stage grand heists to infiltrate the minds of the corrupt and make them change their ways! Persona 5 Royal is packed with new characters, confidants, story depth, new locations to explore, and a new grappling hook mechanic for stealthy access to new areas. 

So one of the things that I picked up really early on into my playthrough was that Persona 5 feels like a very adolescent piece of media, like yeah it is about highschoolers, but more than just its cast and setting, it seemed really fixated on capturing and adolescent mindset, there is this fresh awareness to the injustices of the world and a burning desire to fix it without much understanding of how to even began to tackle those problems, and the fact it stuck so hard to to that worldview made me a lot more forgiving of its flaws then I might have otherwise been, not that there isn’t stuff to critique about the way it tackles controversial issues, but at the same time i just had this mindset of, “well of course they aren’t going to get everything right, what can you expect from teens?”

Anyone who knows me knows I am a pretentious blow-hard, but I think P5 is a perfect example of just how important style is to anything.  So much of the pure glee and joy I got when I booted up the game came from the fun presentation and commitment to the phantom thief aesthetic, I have a lot of thoughts on gameplay that seem to be contradictory to the general consensus but to keep things brief, all the “sneaking’ around a palace, grappling from places, ambushing enemies, and performing all out attacks just all gave this sense of being cool and stylish that was great, even if the writing stronger, without those fun flourishes I don’t think I would have enjoyed my experience as much

I also think the more than any other game, persona 5 does a great job of making me thinking “just one more thing” you got a lot of confidants to fill and stats to raise to fill them so there is always something to do, at most during the story sections things sometimes dragged, but i was eager to finish them to get back to finishing my goals, for as long as the game was, this made it feel so much more manageable

Unpacking an entire 110 hour playthrough is kinda an overwhelming task, so instead I’m going to talk about my four favorite characters and hopefully that will cover some good amount of material

1) Goro Akechi- one of the first things I knew about this game was what a controversial character this bastard was and it turns out I fell on the side that loves him bc I think I have a thing for traitor characters, I have to say though for most of the game I wasn’t sure how I felt about him, I knew his true role going in, so it was hard to get attached to Detective Prince Akechi as most of his interactions with Joker felt like an act, however his Rank 8 confidant link, when he not only pulls out a gun on you and challenges you to an one on one fight but also freaking throws a glove to challenge you in a duel I was like “oh so you’re a little bitch boy then!” and never turned back

To me part of what makes him so compelling is just how stubbornly he is set on his path straight to Hell, a lot of ppl were moved by his tragic backstory but honestly it does little for me, I think it is important to consider, but you have to remember he approached Shido about his powers first and basically volunteered to be his personal assassin, still it is hard to ignore that sense of lost potential, in a way I can see how getting to pretend to be a part of a safe and welcoming team environment almost made things worst because he just kept feeling like, “why wasn’t I allowed to have this earlier” and just too tied to his current path of self-destruction to waver from it, like even the fact the Phantom Thieves and he had the same goals regarding Shido in the end, he couldn’t side with bc that would mean acknowledging all the murder he did was for nothing, so they just continued to be another target on his list, made all the more dangerous bc of the affection he held for them

That said I don’t think I would have liked him so much without Royal’s updates, I mentioned Rank 8 being a key moment for me but aside from that, the fight with him in Shido palace had so much going on, it kinda dulled the weight of any one of the numerous revelations, 3rd semester kinda brought in the perfect amount and balance of the different sides of Akechi, the minute he appeared I swear me and my brother cheered in joy, obvious spoilers for the rest of it

I had seen 3rd semester Akechi called “feral” and while he is still as horny for murder as ever, i don’t really think that fits, there is still a sense of restraint to his actions, yet he doesn’t mask his true intentions and feelings so much, what I like is that his rudeness and outbursts come off as very deliberate and planned, as if he enjoys exposing the contrast between his “pleasant” reputation and his true bitterness, and with the reveal that oops he is supposed to be dead, you still have that determined “don’t be a fucking pussy, just pull the trigger,” attitude, I really like the dynamic that forms between a Joker that just wants the best for him and an Akechi that just emphatically refuses to be saved in anyway, he is an easy character to woobify but I love how canon just at every turn doesn’t let you ever see his true vulnerability even if we all know it exists down there, also just something about hearing him curse is always so much fun and delightful

TLDR: I have a lot of feelings about this edgy bastard and may or may not already have a playlist for him

2) Makoto Niijima- another character I had an interesting relationship with, while from the start she seemed like my type, the overwhelming love for her kinda made my hipster side apprehensive, however predictably I was won over and I did romance her in the end (what can I saw my Joker is into brunettes)

Part of what makes her stick out so much to me, is how the game felt much less afraid to show her unlikable in comparison to other characters, i usually don’t complain or really notice this but more than any other game series I’ve played, there is definitely a lot of self-insert fantasy elements involved, ppl rip the newer FE games apart for that, but I never really saw it as the terrible as the cast had dozens of life changing interactions with other characters, the fact most of the interaction we see are through Joker’s eyes, and the fact that he is the catalyst to changing several adults’ lives made this element a lot more noticeable

But not only does Makoto take an antagonistic role at first, but they let her be so smug and annoying that I probably hated her with the same passion as the characters themselves, yet even when she comes over to or sides, her flaws are still pretty open, like when trying to help out Futuba, she definitely had that air of, “neurotypical trying too hard to make you normal” that was understandable but still annoying, and I appreciate it bc it made the contrast between her good points all the sharper

I kinda wanted to roll my eyes at first at her archetype as an honors student, bc yeah i was a nerdy student who didn’t know how to connect with my peers and just kinda subconsciously sucked up to adults bc I didn’t know what else to do, but in comparison to the teeming tragic backstories involved, you can see a stark difference in scale, yet Makoto is just carrying all this familiar teenage girl anger that reminds me a lot of Serena from Arc V, and getting to see her embrace it is very cathartic, I also really enjoyed her confidant which was surprising after seeing everyone tear into it so much, I feel like a lot of ppl’s confidant’s centered around other ppl and it didn’t just start off with the Eiko stuff, you see her Makoto want to change from the sheltered snobbish life she has kinda trapped herself in and rediscover her dream of being a police commissioner, I also found it fitting for her to also kinda figure that out through her own little investigation and to see that exploration of justice explored through her acting with a third party

The fact she is related to Sae also gives her interesting relationships we get to see from a different POV, and a greater investment in arcs outside her own, it just naturally gives her the feeling of being more well-rounded to have it spread out, and while her romance stuff did have the same sort of fantasy elements (that I greatly self-indulged in) overall I never felt like Joker was “saving” her in some way but growing and exploring along sides her

Overall, a great character and while i think best girl debates are dumb, I will not stand for hearing her described as worst girl

3) Ann Takamaki- honestly before I got this game I expected her to be the “main girl” with a lot of popularity and focus so seeing how little love she gets was heartbreaking for me, bc she is part of what made the early phantom thieves so enjoyable

I’ve heard the discussions about the issues around her sexualization and I think things on that access come out to be a wash, the developers kinda brush near some interesting ideas about the struggles women face with sex and attraction but don’t really know what to do with that, and so I think trying to trace and overall arch one way or another about her and her body issues is kinda a lesson in futility

in the end though what made her click for me is just how much fun her personality is, like I feel like in other stories her cheerfulness might come off as generic, but the fact that she is introduced so depressed and sullen makes her attitude shift come off as refreshing, like we know she can be serious, but the fact she isn’t being repeatedly sexually harassed by her teacher gives her like plenty of reason to goof off and enjoy herself

Again despite all the criticism I really enjoyed her confidants, the Mika stuff was honestly barely a blip in the thing and most of it alternated between her shooting the breeze and just having fun and still dealing with that lingering guilt and issues surrounding Shiho and just not having been able to save a close friend when she really needed her, I think the contrast is very much needed, especially to keep things from feeling like wallowing, which i felt was a problem with some other confidants

In the end though the main reason i didn’t romance her was bc as much as I liked her as a character, I didn’t want her to be with Joker specifically, i wanted to support her and see her finally confess her feelings to Shiho and the two of them go ride off into the sunset lol, still there’s a reason I reached rank 10 with her first

4) Takuto Maruki- lol so in this section I’m going to basically go into all my 3rd semester thoughts, again the first leg of his confidant was kinda dull, but I was prioritizing him bc of the deadline, once we got into his personal past that is where I got interested

On one hand part of the charm was just getting to see a more adult story, while there are other adult confidants I found the grad school and like academic stuff relatable, plus like the little moment with the steamed glasses was very funny, he’s just a down to earth guy and his kindness is genuine

However when he stepped up as the antagonist in the third semester, that’s when he got interesting, I found the conflict itself of a dream world to be kinda simple, aside from the fact obviously we need to oppose this for a plot to happen, Persona 5 is all about this humanist approach to personal growth and change, most of what I found fascinating about Maruki was the kinda self-martyring narcissism to his approach, like aside from treat the phantom thieves with kid gloves at time and just doing his best to avoid being a bad guy, there is this simmering resentment he masks and tries to replace with his desire to basically save the world, rather than deal with his own drama and baggage he tries to invest his energy into solving other problems

And you can see some of the parallels between him and the phantom thieves that points out some of hypocrisy of themselves, calculating the exact risks and harms of altering ppl through the Metaverse is hard to do due to a variety of factors, personally I don’t even have other Persona games to look to, but in general while it is for the greater good, the phantom thieves basically impose their will onto ppl who didn’t consent to that change, and in the end they decide to oppose Maruki purely based on their desires to not live in it, the game doesn’t do much with it, but I found the contrast more interesting than the Holy Grail one, plus his boss battle was more fun bc you actually got to use the main mechanic of the game, exploiting weaknesses and baton passing

But yeah all this comes to a head at the latter half of the boss fight where he just is so desperate and refuses to lose, it is like abundantly clear that this dream world is much more for himself than it is for anyone else, it is a desire to turn all his trauma into something more meaningful than just pain, and nothing shows that more clearly than the fact he fistfights a high schooler even after he has basically lost and tries to let himself die rather than face the consequences of his lost.  All in all I think he was the my favorite antagonist and palace holder

Some last thoughts I couldn’t fit elsewhere: Casino was my favorite palace, while weak story-wise, Okumura was far from my least favorite palace gameplay-wise and his boss fight as frustrating as it was might be my favorite for engaging with the player, if anything my least favorite palace was Futaba’s, my favorite showtimes are probably Morgana/Ann, Makoto/Ryuji, and Joker/Kasumi, Caroline and Justine are a delight and I really miss them, Tycoon is addicting and distracted me from being able to beat the game for a while

I got more hot takes I might elaborate on in length in the future, but in conclusion this is another rec where I can see and understand ppl being disappointed in some of the writing and its quality but at the same time i think there is still value ppl are too quick to dismiss and definitely multiple reasons to still enjoy it, I think this is going to stick with me for longer than I first thought it wound

[kellyannecontent]

Dear Jimmy, Your family asked me to speak at your service, and I am so honored and touched. I’m also really scared, and I say that because you of all people will understand this. I’d like to run away and call in four days from now from the beauty parlor. I want to do a good job, because I love you, and because you always did a good job. I think the deal is I’m supposed to speak about the actor/artist’s work part of your life. Others will have spoken beautifully and magnificently about the other beautiful and magnificent parts of you: father, brother, friend. I guess what I was told is I’m also supposed to speak for your castmates whom you loved, for your crew that you loved so much, for the people at HBO, and Journey. I hope I can speak for all of them today and for you. I asked around, and experts told me to start with a joke and a funny anecdote. “Ha ha ha.” But as you yourself so often said, I’m not feelin’ it. I’m too sad and full of despair. I’m writing to you partly because I would like to have had your advice. Because I remember how you did speeches. I saw you do a lot of them at awards shows and stuff, and invariably you would scratch two or three thoughts on a sheet of paper and put it in your pocket, and then not really refer to it. And consequently, a lot of your speeches didn’t make sense. I think that could happen in here, except in your case, it didn’t matter that it didn’t make sense, because the feeling was real. The feeling was real. The feeling was real. I can’t say that enough. I tried to write a traditional eulogy, but it came out like bad TV. So I’m writing you this letter, and now I’m reading that letter in front of you. But it is being done to and for an audience, so I’ll give the funny opening a try. I hope that it’s funny; it is to me and it is to you. And that is, one day toward the end of the show — maybe season 4 or season 5 — we were on the set shooting a scene with Stevie Van Zandt, and I think the set-up was that Tony had received news of the death of someone, and it was inconvenient for him. And it said, “Tony opens the refrigerator door, closes it and he starts to speak.” And the cameras rolled, and you opened the refrigerator door, and you slammed it really hard — you slammed it hard enough that it came open again. And so then you slammed it again, then it came open again. You kept slamming it and slamming it and slamming it and slamming it and went apeshit on that refrigerator. And the funny part for me is I remember Steven Van Zandt — because the cameras are going, we have to play this whole scene with a refrigerator door opening — I remember Steven Van Zandt standing there with his lip out, trying to figure out, “Well, what should I do? First, as Silvio, because he just ruined my refrigerator. And also as Steven the actor, because we’re now going to play a scene with the refrigerator door open; people don’t do that.” And I remember him going over there and trying to tinker with the door and fix it, and it didn’t work. And so we finally had to call cut, and we had to fix the refrigerator door, and it never really worked, because the gaffer tape showed on the refrigerator, and it was a problem all day long. And I remember you saying, “Ah, this role, this role, the places it takes me to, the things I have to do, it’s so dark.” And I remember telling you, “Did I tell you to destroy the refrigerator? Did it say anywhere in the script, ‘Tony destroys a refrigerator’? It says ‘Tony angrily shuts the refrigerator door.’ That’s what it says. You destroyed the fridge.” Another memory of you that comes to mind is from very early on — might have been the pilot, I don’t know. We were shooting in that really hot and humid summer New Jersey heat. And I looked over, and you were sitting in an aluminum beach chair, with your slacks rolled up to your knees, in black socks and black shoes, and a wet handkerchief on your head. And I remember looking over there and going, “Well, that’s really not a cool look.” But I was filled with love, and I knew then that I was in the right place. I said, “Wow, I haven’t seen that done since my father used to do it, and my Italian uncles use to do it, and my Italian grandfather used to do it.” And they were laborers in the same hot sun in New Jersey. They were stone masons, and your father worked with concrete. I don’t know what it is with Italians and cement. And I was so proud of our heritage — it made me so proud of our heritage to see you do that. When I said before that you were my brother, this has a lot to do with that: Italian-American, Italian worker, builder, that Jersey thing — whatever that means — the same social class. I really feel that, though I’m older than you, and always felt, that we are brothers. And it was really based on that day. I was filled with so much love for everything we were doing and about to embark on. I also feel you’re my brother in that we have different tastes, but there are things we both love, which was family, work, people in all their imperfection, food, alcohol, talking, rage, and a desire to bring the whole structure crashing down. We amused each other. The image of my uncles and father reminded me of something that happened between us one time. Because these guys were such men — your father and these men from Italy. And you were going through a crisis of faith about yourself and acting, a lot of things, were very upset. I went to meet you on the banks of the Hudson River, and you told me, you said, “You know what I want to be? I want to be a man. That’s all. I want to be a man.” Now, this is so odd, because you are such a man. You’re a man in many ways many males, including myself, wish they could be a man. The paradox about you as a man is that I always felt personally, that with you, I was seeing a young boy. A boy about Michael’s age right now. ‘Cause you were very boyish. And about the age when humankind, and life on the planet are really opening up and putting on a show, really revealing themselves in all their beautiful and horrible glory. And I saw you as a boy — as a sad boy, amazed and confused and loving and amazed by all that. And that was all in your eyes. And that was why, I think, you were a great actor: because of that boy who was inside. He was a child reacting. Of course you were intelligent, but it was a child reacting, and your reactions were often childish. And by that, I mean they were pre-school, they were pre-manners, they were pre-intellect. They were just simple emotions, straight and pure. And I think your talent is that you can take in the immensity of humankind and the universe, and shine it out to the rest of us like a huge bright light. And I believe that only a pure soul, like a child, can do that really well. And that was you. Now to talk about a third guy between us, there was you and me and this third guy. People always say, “Tony Soprano. Why did we love him so much when he was such a prick?” And my theory was, they saw the little boy. They felt and they loved the little boy, and they sensed his love and hurt. And you brought all of that to it. You were a good boy. Your work with the Wounded Warriors was just one example of this. And I’m going to say something because I know that you’d want me to say it in public: that no one should forget Tony Sirico’s efforts with you in this. He was there with you all the way, and in fact you said to me just recently, “It’s more Tony than me.” And I know you, and I know you would want me to turn the spotlight on him, or you wouldn’t be satisfied. So I’ve done that. So Tony Soprano never changed, people say. He got darker. I don’t know how they can misunderstand that. He tried and he tried and he tried. And you tried and you tried, more than most of us, and harder than most of us, and sometimes you tried too hard. That refrigerator is one example. Sometimes, your efforts were at cost to you and others, but you tried. And I’m thinking about the fact of how nice you were to strangers on the street, fans, photographers. You would be patient, loving and personal, and then finally you would just do too much, and then you would snap. And that’s of course what everybody read about, was the snapping. I was asked to talk about the work part, and so I’ll talk about the show we used to do and how we used to do it. You know, everybody knows that we always ended an episode with a song. That was kind of like me and the writers letting the real geniuses do the heavy lifting: Bruce, and Mick and Keith, and Howling Wolf and a bunch of them. So if this was an episode, it would end with a song. And the song, as far as I’m concerned, would be Joan Osborne’s “(What If God Was) One Of Us?” And the set-up for this — we never did this, and you never even heard this — is that Tony was somehow lost in the Meadowlands. He didn’t have his car, and his wallet, and his car keys. I forget how he got there — there was some kind of a scrape — but he had nothing in his pocket but some change. He didn’t have his guys with him, he didn’t have his gun. And so mob boss Tony Soprano had to be one of the working stiffs, getting in line for the bus. And the way we were going to film it, he was going to get on the bus, and the lyric that would’ve one over that would’ve been — and we don’t have Joan Osborne to sing it: If God had a face what would it look like? And would you want to see if seeing meant you had to believe? And yeah, yeah, God is great. Yeah, yeah, God is good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Tony would get on the bus, and he would sit there, and the bus would pull out in this big billow of diesel smoke. And then the key lyric would come on, and it was What if God was one of us? Just a slob like one of us? Just a stranger on the bus trying to make his way home. And that would’ve been playing over your face, Jimmy. But then — and this is where it gets kind of strange — now I would have to update, because of the events of the last week. And I would let the song play further, and the lyrics would be Just trying to make his way home Like a holy rollin’ stone Back up to Heaven all alone Nobody callin’ on the phone ‘Cept for the Pope, maybe, in Rome. Love, David

David Chase in an open letter eulogizing James Gandolfini 

[archivedatl]

AP web exclusive: All Time Low tour diary

Posted by Scott Heisel on 08-Dec-06 @ 04:43 PM

Last month, Baltimore pop-punkers All Time Low took to the road with Sugarcult for a series of shows on the West Coast. Here's some of what they saw, in words and pictures. Learn more at www.alltimelow.com.

#1------------------------------------------------------------ Ooohooo So last night we celebrated two awesome occasions...well 3 since matt's molars finally grew in...anyways yesterday was Haloween and our first night of our tour with Sugarcult. I must say, it is pretty strange touring with a band who I spent the better years of my middle school life watching on MTV. Regardless of where this band has been, it definetly didn't eff with their personalities. They were all super nice to us and each came up and introduced themselves. The show went pretty well but it wasn't a good judgement of our the whole tour is going to be because Sugarcult didn't even headline, the Eagles Of Death Metal did, and the tickets for $25 on Haloween night :) I'm sorry but I would never go to a show if those were the circumstances...I'd be out expanding my collection of holiday treats. Tonight the 'real' tour begins so we will see how it goes. We are playing Washington State University in Pullman Washington. We haven't done too many college shows, so this should be interesting...anyways before we got on the road a couple days ago we were couped up in Ben Harper's (formely of yellowcard, now in amber pacific) house/studio in long beach, CA working on our new CD :). We demoed some hot licks that were going to send over to our producer matt squire so that he can put in some input. I heard my blogs are going to be posted on the Alternative Press website for this tour, so if that's the case then...helll yeah! Well I just woke up from sleeping in the van so I am gonna walk out into the freezing streets of Pullman, WA crack my back and grab some Qudoba. Much Love, Jack --jbstar #2------------------------------------------------------------ Yoo dooodds, So I'm gonna update you guys on the passed couple shows...on Wednsday we played Washington State University. Those kids are freaking crazy! Everyone seemed to be having a good time and we made some awesome new friends. I cannot stress enough, how cool the Sugarcult guys are. Which is really cool because I have been listening to those guys since 6th grade! Anyways before we played, matt thought it would be a good idea to have a fork and knife fight backstage...yeah it turned pretty ugly and we should have some footage online soon enough. That night we partied at 'The Christmas House'. Lets just say that I'm pretty sure alex made out with a dog...I really miss Hit The Lights :( Anways...we played Seattle after the college show and it was offf the hoooook. Everyone in the room was dancing and it got pretty redic. As soon as we told them the alex/dog story they went nuts. We met up with the Pink Spiders that night. We were nervous about that because we've heard some stuff...but for real those guys are the shit. There all super nice and we have no complaints about them. We have yet to tour with a band who we don't get along with (fingers crossed). We also heard that we may be doing a few shows with Cobra Starship in Dec, if that happends that would be sick. I'll keep you guys updated. Someone made us a bucket of the craziest donuts ive ever seen at the portland show last night!! They were reallly good. Sorry for the lack of pics, I'll make sure my next post has more, its just hard to take good pics on a sidekick :). Talk to you guys soon!!Jacko #3------------------------------------------------------------ Yo Babaayyss, Last nights show was off the hook! I love playing at The Boardwalk in orangevale calii. The crowd was as wild as usual and a bunch of kids were singing along. A lot of the same kids who saw us there on the Amber Pacific tour came back. Its always cool to see so many familiar faces,,,cough cough hint hint nudge...you get the idea folks! The next couple shows should be interesting...reno and vegas. I wont be able to gamble but at least ill be able to look at a lot of lights. We all have family comming out, so that should be exciting. I havent seen my brother and sister in ages and i know their gonna be wasted so that means they will be even more friendly :) Also Meg n Dia join up in vegas which is sick, SO SIKED FOR THAT!!! We met them on warped and their super nice. anyways i think its time, i go to In and Out because after this tour im not going to be able to go back for a while :( im going to eat there everyday twice a day until we leave Arizona. Ive attached pics from our set on the Epitaph stage at this years Bamboozle Left and also some pics of our acoustic set the 2nd day! Thanks to everyone who watched us either/both days :) love you peace peace n a bottle o' hair grease, jack #4------------------------------------------------------------ Wow...vegas has to be one of the strangest places on this earth. First of all we showed up in Reno (shity city) only to find that only sugarcults crew was there and the show probably wasnt going on. We were welcomed by a hooker in a pink tanktop and no teeth asking if we had any shirts we could give her...Thankfully we have power windows and middle fingers. Thankfully zack was asleep or he might have took her up on some of her offers...he's getting desperate you know..just kidding! Anyways we decided to hang out with sugarcults crew for a little then start the drive to vegas early since it was 8 house. We got to go over the Hoover Damn which was sweet. It's seriously Vegas Vacation all over again! Anyways, we got to vegas around midnight and it was a fantastic site! My bro and sis were staying at the MGM so thats where i headed. Rian to the Excalibur, Alex and Matt to the Venecian and Zack to the Luxor. We all split up and hung out with our fam for the evening. My brother took me around vegas and boyyy was it interesting. I was approached by numerous drunk people. It was basically like an Ocean City, Maryland for older people. It's just a place for adults to drink, walk around drunk, act like teenagers and maybe gamble a bit here n' there. it was Akward to say the least. Anyways the next day was the show at the House Of Blues at Mandalay Bay...probably one of the nicest venues we have ever played. We introduced ourselves to the Meg n Dia folks and got to know our new tour mates as we shared a dressing room. We soon found they are awesome people and they share a love for getting wild! The show was pretty cool, and the crowd was big. It was weird though because the merch was not in the venue, it was in the cassino haha. Anyways Vegas was an experience we wont forget, and I cant wait till we go there again. I hope the next time we go, were 21...actually nevermind because that would be three years :)stay rad, Jack #5------------------------------------------------------------ Lame! Tonight was our last show on the Sugarcult Tour featuring The Pink Spiders and Meg n Dia :( Damone will be taking our place on this great lineup. I am jelous that they get to join up! Anyways we made some lifetime friends on this tour and it was a great experience for everyone. Every single show was amazing and the fans never let us down. Traveling to bumfuck arizona and hearing a couple hundred kids sing your song is the coolest feeling ever. Sugarcult was very warming towards us and their personalities suprised the shit out of me. they were such cool guys and even when zack was sick they made him soup and gave him Emergen-C. WHO DOES THAT !?!? Thats like something my mom does...so in a way Sugarcult are our parents. They actually reffered to us as their younger brothers on stage. At the last show of the tour in Little Rock, Arkansas us and Meg n Dia ran on stage during "Bouncing Off the Walls" and started bouncing around and took over Tim's Guitar n Mic, Marko's (my twin) guitar and Airens Bass. It was so fun to bro down with a band that ive been listening to since middle school haha. Alex also got to soundcheck with sugarcult at Texas AM College because tim was at the hospital taking care of his sickness (i think he had a nasty cold). It was so crazy to see alex soundcheck with a band who for the past few years have held a special spot on my ipod and in my cd player :) I attached a pic of him sound-checking for fun. At the end of the show we said our goodbyes and gave our hugs. This is'nt the end of these friendships though, only the beggining...now we head home to write a new cd. Catch us on the road in the northeast in december when we head out with Cobra Starship! Stay safe, Jack

[romaniassexdungeon]

Shattered Romanticism of a God - chapter 9

Pairings: SuFin, NedDen,

Vidar - Norway // Tolli - Iceland // Luca - Luxembourg // Adriaan - Netherlands // Gunner - Denmark

Sorry this is late. I'm a slow dumbass. I would like to try to keep this updated regularly, though, as it has a whole load of support and I feel bed when I can't update due to being a sleepy bitch. There's some dumb jokes in here, but no funny business. Hope you enjoy.

Read on AO3

Vidar would make a good manager.

He was cunning, ruthless and incredibly intelligent, and the music industry had no idea of the storm that was coming. He could and would calculate his way to success, using whoever he needed, and dumping them in the gutter when they’d outlived their use. He was a filthy, greedy man who would probably meet his end at the guillotine, but at least he’d be swimming in money and power until the end. He would drag the Screaming Pagans to the top, or burn everything trying.

At least, that was what Gunner said in his tipsy pre-drinks speech.

He slapped his cousin on the shoulder, laughing heartily as he pulled him into a one-armed hug. “We’ll be getting bookings every week now!”

“No pressure then,” muttered Tolli, standing next to Tino.

The Screaming Pagans, Tino, and Tolli were crowded in Berwald and Gunner’s main room, all a couple of glasses of wine into what promised to be a night of drinking. And dancing. And acting like idiots.

Eduard, for some reason, had turned down his own invitation. Something about not wanting to babysit drunk Tino, and having a date of his own. Unfortunately, he’d refused to say more on the subject. No matter how much Tino asked and pleaded and teased about his date actually being his hand.

For the first time ever, Eduard hadn’t risen to the bait, so Tino had to suspect he really did have a date. Well, good for Eduard! Internet explorer-chan body pillow or real woman, it was an improvement.

He wasn’t a big clubbing guy, anyway. But, neither was Berwald, now that he thought about it. Was he dreading it? Tino shuffled over to him and took his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. Berwald almost smiled back.

“Trinity is the best place in town,” Gunner insisted, lining them all up outside the club of his choice.

“That’s it, you’re officially old,” Tolli rolled his eyes, “to anyone born this century, it’s Club Galaxy. They’re the best, and they’re a student bar so drinks are cheaper. Also it’s my uni bar so I get things for extra cheap.”

“You go there too?” asked Luca, beaming like he'd found a new ally.

“Their music’s too loud,” Gunner whined, proving Tolli’s point. “You can’t talk to people! And their beer's bad.”

“Drink vodka, then,” said Vidar, “don’t be a pussy.”

“No thanks. I don’t like the taste.”

“Costs more to get blackout drunk.”

“What makes you think that’s what I want? Maybe I just want a couple beers and a relax?”

Vidar flicked him on the ear affectionately. “Because I know you.”

“I’m not gonna get stupid. This time. Maybe. You’re no fun.”

“Don’t bully him,” Gilbert whined, “just cause we’re old, doesn’t mean we can’t have fun.”

“I’ve felt old since 17,” Tino commented, only within earshot to Berwald. “Or at least, my back does.”

Berwald nodded in agreement.

“You’re all old and embarrassing,” muttered Tolli. "Why do I spend time with you?"

Vidar shrugged. "Can't make friends your own age?"

“I’m cool,” Gunner pouted, “I smoke and fuck!”

“I gave you one toke and you almost choked, cried, then asked to go to the hospital,” said Adriaan, raising his eyebrow.

“No comeback for the fucking thing, I see.” Gunner flicked his nose, “also you charged for every puff. You're literally the worst.”

“I refuse to believe you fuck,” said Vidar, “not having a proper job really leaves you swimming in cock, especially when you take them home and show them your Lego model collection.”

“Did I fucking ask? I have a real job, and some people still have a childish side. Surely your girlfriend isn’t completely boring, right? She gotta have a childish side.”

“Nope.”

“Really? Not even a little?”

“She likes gross, sexual jokes, like some 12 year old, but generally no.”

Gunner blinked. “Huh. Wasn’t expecting that. Does she collect stuff? Everyone collects stuff, right? You know, I really do think she's a robot.”

“Ornamental knives.”

“Bruh, that’s so hot. Does she ever… use them? On you?”

Vidar looked at him. “I’m not answering that.”

“Are we talking about kinks?” asked Tino excitedly.

Gilbert winced. “And other things not beneficial to my relationship with the lord.”

“I wanna talk about kinks too!” Luca clapped his hands excitedly.

“Like the person saying your name?” suggested Tolli, to Vidar’s horror.

“You’re way too young to-”

“I’m eighteen, shitlips, I’ll talk all I want.”

“I used to be into the name thing,” Gilbert commented, “I dunno, it seemed nice, like your own hypeman. Except then the last 8 people said my name was too dumb to shout out in a sexy way.”

Gunner raised an eyebrow. “And by 8 people, you mean…”

“Two. But it really, really hurt my feelings.”

Tino burst out laughing. “Oooh, my turn!”

“No!” Vidar covered his mouth, “we haven’t got all night.”

Tino wondered if it was his imagination, or if Berwald looked a little disappointed at that. Did he want to know what Tino was into? Tino wanted to know what he was into, even if it was just holding hands under the moonlight, he’d be happy to indulge.

Though if Berwald was into feet, Tino was telling him to fuck off right now. Some weirdo kept sending him emails asking for feet pics and it honestly unnerved the hell outta him. He hoped it was just Vidar playing a prank on him.

Email weirdo was offering 1100 krona, though. Seemed like easy money, if Tino was 20% poorer and had 5% less dignity.

Why did his mind go to these places?

And now he’d missed whatever it was Luca had said to make everyone else start protesting and kinkshaming in horror.

“I just like the mask! And the lead!” Luca was defending, “I don’t actually want to be a dog!”

“Haha! Furry!” Gunner pointed and laughed at him. Adriaan bristled.

“What’s wrong with that?”

Gunner looked at him. “You made your brother a furry, didn’t you?”

“Good taste runs in the family.”

“I have never seen a fursona’s colour scheme that could be described as ‘good taste’.”

Adriaan reeled like Gunner had just punched him in the face. Luca looked like he was about to faint.

“Gunner,” began Tino, “how would you know unless you’ve seen multiple fursonas? Are you involved in the community?”

“You’re banned from writing about us, Väinämöinen. Not if you’re gonna be exposing us like that.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being a furry,” said Tolli, “except to everyone who picked on me in high school apparently.”

“Because you wore your fursuit to school every day,” Vidar pointed out. “And you were fourteen and refused to wear deoderant.”

“So you’re the guy who gives us all a bad name?” asked Luca. “Tolli!”

“I was a different person then!”

“Am I the only person in the band who isn’t a furry?” asked Gilbert.

“M’not a furry,” Berwald mumbled.

“I’m not in the band,” added Tolli.

“Also I’ve rped with your brother on furaffinity,” said Adriaan, "Lud's fursona is a German shepherd into BDSM."

Gilbert started banging his head against the wall. “I really wish we were inside and I didn’t have to listen to you people.”

“The music isn’t as loud, though,” Tolli pointed out, “you could still hear us.”

“It’s loud enough for me to escape!”

“Okay, just be on your best behaviour,” said Gunner, “we’re advertising the Screaming Pagans too, remember.”

“That why you’re all wearing band t shirts?” asked Tino, wishing he’d worn his, too, even if he wasn't a band member. He liked fitting in, which was a little tricky, given how weird he was.

“Yeah, it was Vidar’s idea,” Gunner affectionately punched his cousin on the arm.

“Even though no one can read the band name because it looks like a pile of twigs?”

All five members of the Screaming Pagans, and new manager Vidar, looked down at their shirts in disappointment. Berwald looked so heartbroken Tino wished he’d said nothing.

“Hey, we’re in,” Luca pulled Tolli forward, striding past the bouncer with a sweet smile. After getting his hand stamped, Tino followed, holding Berwald’s arm when he started looking nervous. Maybe it was growing up with Eduard, but he tended to feel protective of introvert friends, even though he was something of an introvert himself. Dad instincts, or something.

He only had vague memories of Trinity, but the glowing purple lights did seem familiar. He’d thrown up in the bathroom here. Luca ran over to the bar to order shots, knocking them down with absolute glee, and Tino decided to join him. Berwald, like his cousin, tended to opt for beer, ordering one and sitting at a table in the corner. Tino and Vidar ended up joining him for an hour or so, getting progressively more drunk and watching their friends be stupid.

“Since when were those two together?” asked Tino, watching Gunner hump Adriaan like an overly excitable dog. Adriaan, for his part, actually seemed to be enjoying it, and kissed his cheek with more affection than Tino had ever seen him use, even with his family.

Berwald shrugged, staring at the two in what must pass for bewilderment with his face.

“You didn’t know?” asked Tino.

“Nah. S’plains a lot, though.”

“Like why Gunner’s always at his place?”

Berwald grunted.

“Do you think they’re good together?”

He shrugged. “Guess. Been best friends forever.”

“I don’t know how they put up with each other,” added Vidar, “but they do.”

“I think they’re sweet.” Tino watched Adriaan try to pick Gunner off the ground, then promptly give up and let him carry on trying to do the worm. It was more like a worm dipped in bleach, from what Tino could see, but at least it was less horrifying than what he’d been doing before.

When he finally looked away, Gunner had been doing the macarena to euphoria.

“Wanna dance?” he asked Berwald, who squirmed.

“Hey, you’re probably not as bad as me,” he reassured him, “come on. Just for a bit. One song, then we’ll sit back down.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Berwald nodded and let Tino lead him to the dance floor. He swayed awkwardly to the music, still holding Tino’s hands as he danced wildly out of tune, shaking his cheeks like a baby in a lion’s mouth. He cared little for those around him, and how many people were within range of his iron hips.

The terrible dancing did seem to amuse Berwald, but Tino could tell the blaring music was overwhelming him. He dropped it low, touched his face gently and took his hand, leading him outside for a moment. Out in the crisp, night air, Berwald looked a lot happier.

“Want to stay out here for a bit?” asked Tino, face softening. Berwald nodded, but he still looked uneasy.

“Want to stay out here forever?” he added gently, “or go home and drink instead?”

Berwald nodded again, significantly more enthusiastic. Tino rubbed his back until he was ready to make a move, giving Vidar a quick text to explain the situation. Then, he lead Berwald down the street.

“Want more beer?” he asked once they came across a corner shop. Tino picked a bottle of vodka for himself. A small one, so he wouldn’t get too stupid. And maybe seduce Berwald in a normal, acceptable manner. Maybe he’d think Tino was cute and smart and handsome and someone definitely worth dating. Except he wasn't cute! What was he saying?

Berwald nodded awkwardly, and Tino grabbed a six pack he’d seen him drink before. Not that he was paying attention to Berwald’s every preference and mood, despite the lack of facial cues to help with that.

Berwald insisted on paying, even though Tino’s drink was more expensive. He explained he and Gunner had gotten new jobs, just to tide them over and keep them housed until the band took off. Tino’s heart ached at the thought of them not being able to live their dreams yet; they had the talent, they just needed the chance.

Maybe Vidar really could get them there.

They had to be careful, as they stumbled through the streets - drinking and singing out of tune - that they didn’t run into any police officers who would take their alcohol. And maybe fine them if they were feeling particularly mean.

“Have you ever tho- thought about writing a song about corp- corp. Rich companies. And rich people.”

Berwald watched him try and get his sentence out in amusement. Tino, meanwhile, stepped onto a low wall to try and be eye-level with the man. He still wasn’t.

Berwald nodded. “Migh’ do. Call 'em out fer being evil.”

“Yeah, of course.” He stumbled, and Berwald steadied him, “just throwing out ideas. You see what sticks.”

He smiled. “Thanks.”

“What are you working on? Song-wise.” He wished Berwald would work on him. What did that even mean?

“Tryna find an angle,” he shrugged, “like, somethin’ unique.”

“Like the viking stuff?”

Berwald nodded. “Somethin’ else too. Lotta bands do the viking stuff.”

Tino nodded and thought for a while. “Right. Something to set you apart from other indie bands... Huh, you like Eurovision?”

“Course I do. M’Swedish.”

“What about metal covers of Eurovision songs? But, like, the weird ones. Who wouldn’t want a metal cover of dancing lasha tumbai?”

Berwald snorted. “Serious ‘nes too. Heroes m’tal version? Wanna do it.”

“Can I be the tiny LED boy who flies off with a balloon?” asked Tino.

“Mm! Please!”

“Although, as much as I love this idea, you know what’s better than metal covers of Eurovision?”

“Hm?”

“Actually sending metal songs to Eurovision.”

Berwald nodded. “Hung’ry’s got the right idea.”

“Hey! We did it first!”

He smirked. “They did it better.”

“You’ve literally covered Lordi! You ever covered AWS?”

“Dun member,” he mumbled childishly. Jokingly. Bastard.

“I was there. It was the first time I saw you perform?”

“Can’t recall.”

“It was night of the loving dead !”

“ Raise h’ll in heaven , actually.”

“How wasted was I? Also ha! You admitted it!”

Berwald gave a hum. He might’ve been a little too drunk. “M’ybe so. Hey, Tino?”

“Yeah?”

He came to a halt, then began singing in his beautiful, low voice. “ Sieben, Sieben, ai lyu lyu, Sieben, Sieben, ein, zwei, Sieben, Sieben, ai lyu lyu, ein, zwei, drei .”

Tino didn’t know whether to laugh or cry or shrivel up in cringe; Berwald's voice did not match the song at all, and his body had no idea how to react. He was completely in love. “Dude, marry me, but, like platonically,” he added quickly.

Berwald looked at him strangely, then took his hands and swung them from side to side. “Tanzen!”

“Ich liebe!” He gave a little jump.

Tino almost fell off his wall, and Berwald grabbed him by the waist. He spun him around, growling in his ear, “I want to see, lasha tumbai.”

“I want to see! Lasha tumbai!”

“Rock 'n roll angels bring thyn hard rock hallelujah, demons and angels all in one have arrived!”

Tino snuggled up to him, and his body felt a little colder after Berwald put him down.

“C’me on,” Berwald took his hand, “lets get back to- back to- um.”

“Your place?”

He nodded sheepishly.

“Has anyone ever told you how handsome you are?” asked Tino, tripping over the coat stand. Berwald steadied him gently, and Tino cuddled his arm in response, with no intention of letting go. “And you have nice arms. They’re… good-shaped. Shapey. Hard.” He traced his fingers over Berwald’s hand, over the veins and rough knuckles and all the little nicks in his fingertips. “Good hands... good, strong hands.”

Berwald, for his part, seemed to be trying his best not to laugh. That was fair; Tino’s entire life was a cringe compilation his cousins were slowly putting together.

“Do you make things?” asked Tino, “you should. You have creative...ing hands.”

“I whittle,” he mumbled.

”Of course! Good whittle hands! You can make things!”

“Helps with nerves,” he admitted.

“It’s sad you have troubles with nerve. Stupid nerves. You’re so amazing and beefy and smart and handsome and you can do anything.”

“Got nerf’d with anxiety.”

He smiled. “Like how I got nerfed by being a manlet?”

“Yer cute. Small ‘n cute.”

“Don’t make me come up there and fight you!” Tino hugged him instead. Or, more accurately, fell against him. Berwald wrapped his arms around him. “Can’t hurt you. Too nice. Stupid tree.” Berwald snorted and lead him to the sofa to sit down. He went to pour them both glasses of water, because he was that barrel of laughs who drank water on a night out, to stay hydrated.

“You’re good,” when Berwald sat down, Tino leaned against him, sipping the water. “So good. You’re the best. You’re so nice to me, and- and- I wish I could make it up to you, and tell you I like you.”

Berwald blinked at that. “Y’like me?”

“Yeah. I wish I could let you know. Like, by fellating you or something.”

“Telling me would be fine!” Okay, if Berwald was saying that, maybe Tino needed to work on communication. Except, right now, his head was swimming and he was talking out his arse.

“You deserve nice things,” he tried to explain, “and you’re so handsome.”

“Yer drunk.”

“You’re hot.”

“Yes, but y’need a lie down.”

Tino perked up at that. “In your bed?”

“Yes. Not like that. Jus’ sleeping.”

Tino nodded. “See? You’re so nice to me, even though I’m being gross and weird. Like, I just said I wanted to blow you and you’re looking after me.”

Berwald shrugged. “Like ya too.”

“Really? Even though I’m a mess?”

“Yeah. Cute. Fun.”

Tino nodded and rested his head on his chest. “Strong. Gentle.”

Berwald picked him up, bridal-style, and lead him to his bedroom. Tino looked around at Berwald’s sword collection before gently being laid down on the bed. He noticed a workbench in the corner with half-finished wood carvings set out in a line. The sheets were clean, bed made, and it didn't smell like it had been slept in.

“Your room is nice,” he commented, “sure- sure you don’t- want me-”

“Go to sleep,” Berwald began stroking his hair, “want me t’sing ya to sleep?”

Tino nodded. He’d pay hundreds to hear Berwald’s voice; how lucky he was to hear it here, in the calm of night.

“Rise, nations pride… Hold what's yours… Strike 'em were it hurts…”

“Think I might love you,” he mumbled. Berwald was too stunned to reply.

The next morning, Tino woke up with a raging hangover nowhere near as painful as the overwhelming shame as he began remembering just what he’d done and said and oh God he needed to get outta there .

So, whilst Berwald was still asleep - tangled up in his arms - he pulled himself out of bed as gently as possible, gathered up his clothes, and left, making as little noise as possible.

In the hallway, he ran into Gunner, also doing the walk of shame. Not that he had even heard of shame, judging by the smug grin he wore as he wiggled his eyebrows at Tino.

“Yo, did my cousin actually get some?”

“Fuck off Densen,” he ducked past him and out into sunshine that had no business being that bright.

[matrixaffiliate]

Salient

Chapter Update FFN and AO3

One more warning that this is NOT Cursed Child Compliant...

Chapter 5

They ate in silence for a few minutes before Ellie asked a question that Al was very accustomed to answering.

"What was it like growing up famous?"

Al chuckled, "Thankfully, I'm not famous. Dad and Mum are. But it was still weird. My first day at Hogwarts, a reporter wrote a gossip column saying that I'd come to her from the future claiming that Voldemort had tried to come back through an illegitimate daughter, and I had stopped her."

Ellie laughed, "That's crazy."

"Yeah, but for the most part everyone is focused on Mum and Dad, less on me and my brothers and sister."

"So we'd be safe in Diagon Alley?"

Al hesitated, "Probably not. When my brother Ted was a teen that same reporter followed him and his now-wife around at the World Cup to try and stir up controversy about Dad and his friends. The rest of us have since tried to lie low."

Ellie blinked, "I thought your dad saved your country, and probably the rest of the Wizarding world subsequently. Why on Earth would reporters want to drag him through the dirt?"

Al shrugged, "Mum always says it's because they're jealous. Grandpa Weasley says it's because small minds have to occupy themselves somehow. I don't know, but I do know I like being a nobody in the Muggle world."

"So there are no benefits to being the son of famous war heroes, and a famous Quidditch star?" Ellie chuckled.

"I guess the lifetime Harpies' tickets Mum gets," Al tried to think of anything else, "And seeing Dad on Chocolate Frog cards is pretty cool. But that's about it. Mostly, we get left alone, as long as we're good and boring."

"But in the Muggle world, you don't have to be good and boring?" Ellie smirked at him and Al rather liked the way his chest warmed at her teasing.

"I tend towards good and boring anyway."

"I disagree," Ellie leant closer across the table, "I find you anything but boring."

Al suddenly found it hard to swallow.

"Why are you really living in the Muggle world, Al?"

Al took a large gulp of his water before breathing deeply. He was so thoroughly gone for this woman. It was sort of pathetic but, Merlin, he didn't care.

"I, I'm trying to solve something," Al took another drink, willing himself to stop acting like a nervous little git.

"Solve something?" Ellie frowned, "Like a mystery?"

"No, more like a puzzle," Al hesitated. "Are you sure you want to hear about this? My brothers assure me this is boring and my sister once told me it was definitely not dating conversation."

Ellie laughed, "I wouldn't have asked if I wasn't willing to risk it. Tell me about your puzzle, maybe I can help."

Al had to temper his excitement. She was willing to listen to him, not geek out with him.

"So, I don't know how much you've tried to mix the Muggle world with the Wizarding world, but when you mix technology with magic the whole thing is a nightmare."

Ellie nodded, "Ruined a phone on accident that way."

"Right," Al nodded excitedly, "so as a teenager I'd buy old used phones and computers and try to make them work while doing magic around them. But as I neared the halfway mark of my NEWT year, I realized I still didn't know enough to figure it out. So I badgered Aunt Hermione into helping me get into Muggle university. I figured if magic wasn't teaching me the solution, then I'd need to get a Muggle degree before I'd have a chance at solving this."

Ellie looked at him expectantly and Al sighed, "Only, I'm starting to think maybe I was wrong. I'm nearly two years in and nothing I've learned so far is making a difference."

She frowned, "Al, you do realize most of the classes that might help you are going to be starting next year or the year after, right?"

Al blinked. He actually didn't know much outside of what Aunt Hermione had told him, and she'd handled putting his classes together for him. He just followed the spreadsheet she made.

"Er, so I should have moved those classes from next year to last year?"

Ellie laughed, "No, it's just like magic, you can't learn NEWTS until you've learned OWLS."

"So I'm supposed to spend the first two years learning the basics and then I get the good stuff the second two years?"

"That's sort of simplified, but pretty accurate all the same."

"How do you know so much?"

Ellie grinned, "My mum is a Muggle. She's actually from around here. The waitress that helped you when I was gone is my mum's sister. She and my uncle own the place and offered me the job when Mum told them I'd be coming to university here."

Al's excitement bubbled beneath the surface as Ellie revealed more about herself. He loved puzzles and seeing another facet of Ellie was thrilling.

"What took your mum to Canada?"

"Mum visited St. John's after she finished A-Levels. She and Dad had a summer romance while she was there." Ellie smiled, "Mum decided to stay."

"So why did you leave?" Al pressed his luck, seeing how much more of herself she was willing to show him.

"I wanted to see the world. I love St. John's, and I want to end up back there, but I wanted to see what else was out there. This was as far as I could get with what I have, but I feel like it's been good for me." Ellie sighed, "But I do miss home."

"Benefits of the Wizarding world," Al smiled, "home is a portkey away."

"Not when you live with your Muggle aunt and uncle." Ellie gave him a sad smile. "They don't know I'm a witch, or that Dad is a wizard, or that Dad's whole family is magical. Mum says it's best that way."

Al frowned. He didn't like the way Ellie's demeanor had changed, but he didn't have answers to her problem either, and that left him feeling helpless.

He didn't like that feeling, especially not in regards to Ellie.

"Hey," Ellie tapped his foot with her own and Al looked up to see her smiling again. "Tonight's my last night in that gallery. Want to go look at my art with me?"

Al smiled, "Definitely."

Al decided to take an Uber from the restaurant to the gallery. He wasn't sure he knew the area well enough to Aparate without running into trouble. Ellie didn't seem to mind, at least Al hoped her holding his hand the whole ride was a good indication that she didn't mind.

Ellie smiled brightly at the lady tending the gallery that evening before pulling Al back to the small corner that held her five canvases.

"You're incredibly talented," Al stepped closer to Ellie, tentatively interlacing his fingers with hers. He tried not to sigh in relief when she squeezed his hand.

"Thank you."

"Have you ever painted with magic?" Al asked, remembering his silly attempt to talk to the painting of the old woman.

Ellie sighed, "Yes, but it's different. Painting with magic takes a lot of the process away from you. You really can end up with the painting dictating to you. Not that it doesn't feel like that happens in Muggle painting too, but…"

She frowned, and Al watched as she worked out what she wanted to say. She was really pretty when she was thinking.

"You know how technology to wizards who have never interacted with Muggles comes off as weird or a trick? Well, I can paint things the Muggle way that can feel like magic but aren't."

"Your bear," Al nodded. "It was a black bear and a polar bear depending on where my eye focused."

"Exactly!" Ellie nodded excitedly. "I love that I can make magic happen without a wand. And I want to get better at it. I want to show that there's Wizarding magic, but that there's magic in the Muggle world too. Artists and inventors and people who innovate new and amazing things are magical, just in a different way from the people who use wands."

Al grinned down as Ellie gave her impassioned little speech. She was so right. He'd learned as much having spent the last two years living in the Muggle world. Craig, for example, was a wizard of computer coding. He really could make a computer do almost anything. And Al's goal to merge Muggle technology and magic was going to show their world how right Ellie was.

"You're amazing," he suddenly realized his feet had moved closer to her. She smiled up at him with dark eyes, her lips mere inches from his.

"I think you're pretty amazing too."

Al could feel his heart beating against his ribcage as he closed the remaining space between them.

"May I…"

Ellie cut him off, pressing up on her toes and bringing her lips to his.

She started to lower down but Al followed her, maintaining the kiss as she put her feet flat on the floor. The feeling of kissing her lips was thrilling and he wanted to savor the way she made his mind quiet so completely and focus solely on her.

Al once heard his dad describe the first time kissing his mum as stepping out of time. Al didn't understand what his dad meant until this moment, in this gallery, kissing this woman, this wonderfully impassioned, beautiful woman.

After several long moments, Ellie pulled back just slightly and squeezed his hand still intertwined with hers.

"I've wanted to do that for weeks," she gave a small chuckle as her cheeks flushed with pink.

"Me too," Al ran his free hand through his hair, not sure what to do next. They stood grinning at each other like fools in the silent gallery. And if he was being honest, Al would have been content to stand there with her forever.

It was the gallery attendant that ultimately brought them back to the real world.

"Ms. Battiste," she walked up from behind them, "were about to close. Were you going to take your paintings tonight or come back and get them in the morning?"

"I can take them tonight," Ellie let go of his hand as she turned. "Just let me go grab my box."

"Excellent," the woman nodded before heading back to her post.

Ellie extended her hand out to Al, "Shall we do a bit of magic?" She asked him in a flawless imitation of his own accent.

"Merlin, you're full of surprises aren't you?" Al laughed and took her proffered hand.

"Says the man who tonight told me he's Harry Potter's son." Ellie winked at him.

She pulled him out and down a little side street where she pulled out her wand.

"Keep watch, yeah?"

Al nodded as she summoned a large box. He felt the familiar flow of magic around them as Ellie's box materialized on the pavement. When it stopped, he bent down and picked it up for her.

"I can get it," Ellie quickly held out her arms.

"I'm sure you can but I'm going to ask if you want to get it?" Al grinned as Ellie's arms fell back to her sides.

"When you put it like that," Ellie chuckled.

Al helped Ellie pack up her paintings before thanking the attendant and stepping back into the side street to send her paintings home again.

"So," Al pulled Ellie into his side as they returned to the pavement. "I honestly thought I'd be lucky if you stayed through dinner tonight and have nothing else planned for our evening. Anything you'd like to do?"

Ellie shivered against him, "I'm actually working tomorrow because I missed Tuesday. So we should plan to see each other after my shift if you're not busy and then take me home so I'm not completely useless."

Al experienced the most bizarre combination of feeling both excited and disappointed at the same time. He didn't really want the night to end yet, but his heartbeat on overdrive thinking about seeing Ellie again outside of her work.

"How about I pick you up at 4? We can decide what we'd like to do then?"

Ellie grinned as her teeth chattered, "Sounds perfect."

"Here," Al threw his coat off and draped it over her shoulders. "Don't you have a warmer coat?"

"Of course I do," Ellie snuggled back into his side. "But I was concerned about making sure I looked pretty tonight and that doesn't usually include synthetic down coats with windbreaker covers."

Al laughed, "Ellie, I thought you were the most gorgeous woman I had ever seen when you were in your work uniform. If you'd looked like this when I first met you I probably would have been so tongue-tied I would have walked right back out the door in shame for even attempting to talk to you."

Ellie laughed and pulled him down another empty side street.

"Don't be silly, it's not like you aren't good looking."

Al liked how that felt, to be called attractive. It wasn't something he really thought of himself as, but Ellie thinking he was made him want to hold his head a little higher.

He wasn't sure what to say, so he kissed her instead.

While their first kiss had been soft and tentative, this one was more confident on both their parts. He pulled her into him, wrapping his arms around her waist. She linked her arms around his neck, pressing herself into him and causing his jacket to fall off her shoulders and pool around her waist where his arms held her close. He gently ran his tongue against her and smiled when she sighed into him, parting her lips to give him entrance. When her tongue reached out to his, Al had to exercise all his self-control not to Aparate them to his flat on the spot.

"Ellie," he whispered as he continued to kiss her.

Her reply was a soft moan which almost did him in.

"We should get you home because I'm losing the will power to keep this appropriate."

She smirked against him. Apparently, she was rather pleased with what she could do to him. Which, unfortunately, or perhaps, fortunately, ended up being even more arousing.

Ellie stepped back before he could decide.

She handed him back his jacket before taking his hand and turning. Al felt the familiar sensation of being pulled through space before his feet hit the pavement of another side street.

"Just this way," Ellie tugged on his hand and led him out to the main street.

"Wait," Al took a moment to get his bearings, "isn't your work just over there?"

Ellie laughed, "Yeah, my aunt and uncle didn't want to live very far from it."

It was only a few yards more before Ellie stopped in front of a door and pulled her key from her coat pocket.

"Thanks for not giving up on me." Ellie smiled up at him.

"Thanks for giving me another chance." Al closed the distance between them and pulled her close. "Tomorrow we'll do something warmer."

"Warmer is good," she snuggled closer to him.

"Anything with you is good," he rested his forehead against hers.

"So tomorrow?" She tilted her head up just slightly.

"I can't wait," and he kissed her.

[crystalelemental]

FE Fates Replay - Part 1

Introductory segment, starring the better cast!

I did keep to the plan and am running Female Corrin.  I gave her the light purple hair.  It looks surprisingly nice on her.  Everything else was kinda standard.  I thought about alternate hair styles, but honestly her default looks the best.  I will say that I think the grids they use are stupid, though.  They list girly as one of the qualities in expression types, but one of the options furthest on that slider just had her eyes closed all the time like Brock, so I’m not sure that’s...girly, exactly.  My boon/bane layout is Clever/Unlucky, which translates to big magic but no luck.  Luck should always be your bane, kids.  I do find it annoying that they replaced the obvious descriptions with these new terms.  It’s not hard to figure out what’s what, but I know the stats and their associations.  If you’re new to the series, you might have no idea what Robust is.  Is that HP or Defense?  If it weren’t for keeping them all in the same order, I wouldn’t know.  It’s a similar thing to changing up class names; it’s really kinda pointless and only serves to confuse.  My subclass was Samurai, because I like the idea of Vantage and Swordfaire, which I feel is harder to find on her through the castles than all the other really good options.  Also I already have cards with Renewal and Luna, and it’s not gonna be hard to find Aegis/Pavise, so these two seemed like more interesting options.  With character creation out of the way, let’s get started!

The prologue is mostly just the now-standard in medias res tutorial.  Only, they had you side with the Hoshidans, because they’re totally not trying to sway your judgment here.  There’s not much to comment on, but I will note this, because it’s interesting: every time the Hoshidans talk about Nohr, the words “scum” and “filth” seem to come up every time.  They seem completely incapable of referring to the Nohrians as anything else.  Also, it’s absolutely hysterical to me that Xander nearly one-shots Ryoma, and Ryoma needs to activate Astra just to make an attempt at keeping up with damage output.  I think we all know who the better brother is here.

Chapter 1 is another simple tutorial, this time with Xander.  Not gonna lie, it might be Heroes influence, but I like Xander.  He’s nice.  He’s tough on Corrin, but is invested in helping her improve as a warrior to escape the fortress and be able to go out like she’s wanted.  He’s a good brother.  Who I thought was older, but may not be.  Unclear.  The other siblings are okay.  Camilla hasn’t really done a lot, Elise is just adorable, and Leo also hasn’t done much but prove that he’s kind of a klutz who’s like “there’s more to being strong than just slapping hunks of iron together!”  We also get a brief introduction to Flora and Felicia, who are pretty fun.  Nothing substantial on them yet.

Chapter 2 is a bit more interesting.  You finally meet the dad, Garon, who is a transparent villain that’s really not interesting at all.  He gives Corrin a suspicious sword, and tells her to kill off their prisoners from Hoshido.  The map itself...honestly is still mostly tutorial, this time for weapon triangle matchups.  It even gives you free healing in the center of the stage.  It’s more about developing small tactics and seeing how the different weapon types match up now.  I still don’t care for tomes being lumped in with swords and having a universal weakness.  I greatly prefer magic being outside the weapon triangle, and having its own matchups.  Still pissy about that...  Anyway, Corrin refuses to kill defeated prisoners, and Garon orders Xander to take care of it, so he gets involved.  Leo’s quick thinking keeps everyone out of trouble, and lets the prisoners, Kaze and Rinkah, survive.  Honestly, I do kinda like Leo after this map.  I forgot how clever he can actually be at times.  The whole family being against their father’s orders to kill the defenseless is also nice, though it makes you wonder about Garon himself, you know?  I know he used to be a good king, and suddenly changed, but like...when did the change happen, anyway?  How long was the family raised by good king Garon, and how did they not notice the drastic and immediate shift?  Corrin’s pretty nice here too.  Callie made a good observation for the series as a whole: “For a lot of these stories about kingdoms, the focus is on who’s in power, but the Fire Emblem lords tend to be way more concerned about how to help their people, and it’s really nice.”  I would agree, and Corrin does keep this trait.  She’s very concerned about establishing peace again after the war, and wants citizens on both sides to be safe.  Corrin’s alright.

Chapter 3, the doofening.  Hans and Iago, the other transparent villain idiots, are introduced.  Xander makes mention of Hans being arrested a few years back, which I guess alludes a bit to time frame for Garon’s transformation.  Law and order was properly upheld until “a few years ago.”  Without a proper scale we can’t say how long that was, but Xander was old enough to be on the job upholding the peace, so I’d assume no more than like...4-5 years, maybe?  Basically, the Nohrian siblings should’ve been old enough to recognize the sudden and drastic change.  Anyway, after your defiance of the king last chapter, you’re given a new mission and told you won’t even need to really fight this time.  Your objective is to scope out an abandoned fort near the Nohr/Hoshido border.  Gunter, Jakob, and Hans will be going with.  Corrin arrives, finds that the fort is filled with Hoshidans, and makes the sensible decision of “whoops, it’s not abandoned, better report this and not engage in needless conflict.”  To which Hans, predictably, runs in and kills a guy, then run into the fray and gets himself killed in like two turns because he’s inept.  Now...hear me out.  This guy’s plan was to kill one soldier, then charge in.  During this, Corrin shouts that Hans is disobeying orders, and acting independently.  In a sensible situation, this should be an easily resolved problem.  Corrin and the others actually following her orders stand back, or accost Hans themselves, and parlay with the Hoshidans, who have no intention fighting.  Instead, you engage them needlessly because Hans ran in.  So...okay, I guess.

You clear out the map, and get an introduction to Saizo and Kagero.  They’re not exactly compelling, beyond Saizo being kinda sexist here?  He dismisses Corrin as just a girl who couldn’t possibly know how to fight, but as soon as Xander shows up is like “Ah, this must be their real commander.”  Fuck you too, buddy.  Camilla’s actually hilarious at this point.  She decimates Saizo’s allies, and Corrin is momentarily taken aback by her usually gentle sister’s ferocity.  Elise is just like “Oh right, you’ve never seen her on the battlefield.  She’s just like this.”  It’s kinda great.  Kagero notifies Saizo that Ryoma is on his way with support, and Xander finally, FINALLY makes the sensible call to just fucking leave.

Oh, but of course it’s not that easy.  Hans is still alive somehow, despite rushing into enemy territory, having no support from us, and getting immediately blasted as he ran toward a heavily fortified post.  He also, somehow, knocks Gunter into the bottomless pit.  Corrin is outraged and demands answers, doing some weird body morphing dragon stuff in the process.  Not gonna lie, I forgot she did this, and it does look pretty cool.  Hans tells her was only doing it under the king’s orders, then he runs off.  Your weird evil sword tries to throw you into the pit as well, somehow, but wait!  Lilith is here, and she’s apparently a baby dragon creature that saves you!  You’re brought to a pocket dimension that the dragons can access, and this is how My Castle is established.  I will bitch endlessly about My Castle soon, I promise.  But for now, we’re just as quickly sent back out to where we warped in, and are immediately knocked out by Rinkah.  Nice.

Overall I’d say there’s nothing too egregious yet.  Chapter 3 is the least sensible, but I’m willing to waive some of the decisions as just pushing the plot along.  The only real hang-up I have is about Garon, who I just feel like should’ve been found out a long time ago.  Like...immediately, perhaps.  The Nohrians presumably had years with their true father, being raised with the moral compass they all have, yet the guy changes overnight and no one really questions it?  It’s a bit far-fetched, even by this series’ standards.  But, I guess we have to get the board set up somehow, or maybe Xander keeping the peace around the kingdom was on his own initiative and not the king’s orders.  Who knows.  Anyway, part 2 will happen eventually.  I’m mostly getting to play when Callie’s bored of the game, so expect some slow progress, but our next update point will be after the Hoshidan tutorial chapters.  Stay tuned.

[sakuya123draws]

for the end of year meme: 1, 8, 10, 14, 20 !! Please and thank you!

OH MAH GOD IT’S LATE!!! (I am so sorry @nalufever I finally got around to answering asks and I’m starting with the most recent ones!! It’s appropriate as they are for the “End of the year” meme I reblogged!)

 Anyways, without further ado, let’s answer these lovely questions~! >w

1. First things first, did you have a good year?

A: Well, I guess that is the first thing to ask when jumping from one year to the other! ^_^ If I’m being honest the year started out really bad. Lots of family problems, stress from college and my horrible relationship was weighing me down and draining me of my energy. I never want to blame anything on anyone, but I was in a dysfunctional relationship with someone and I finally got out of it around April. It’s a long story, but I don’t feel like dwelling on that stuff. I’m stronger now! (I mean I “hope” so ^ ^;) I was happy that I got in the honours roll for my first year which gave me entry to showing my artwork to judges at the college I got to! It was an amazing experience and I made some cool friends along the way! It’s a small class, but we’re like a family. :D As for my actual family, I lost my grandma…She was an inspiration to me and even today I will always show my appreciation for my grandparents! Other than that, my family had gotten better and we can finally understand each other a bit more when it comes to communication which is always a plus!! :3 Even on here with Tumblr being who it is, I still have lots of friends that didn’t leave and I’m happy to see they are better from last year! In short, (cause you can see THIS is a paragraph xD) I think the year was wishy-washy! It was all over the place, but it made up for it at the end to be called “good”. ^v^

8. Which fashion trends did you hate?

(I thought of him when I thought of the word fashion xD Don’t kill me, I LOVE Max

A: Even though my mom is a lady who lives by fashion, I can’t say I know the styles of 2018! ;w; I looked up a source (well you know Vogue and all that jazz :/) to base my opinion on. I only think this would be easier if I could say what I “loved”, but it’s a hate one so gotta be mean xD lol. I mean I never “hate” anything, so I’m gonna give it a shot. 

One thing I don’t like about fashion trends if I’m being frank is that it’s usually clothes on the runway. Many styles I see based on Vogue’s source are styles I can’t see the everyday person wearing. Personally, I wouldn’t wear half of those designs outside. That’s just me. My sense of style is a hybrid of my mom’s fashion she wears/sells, 80′s-90′s fashions and cutesy outfits. (that I think I’d look bad in ;w;) I’m gonna give a small bullet point list. (I know I always say small xD)

 Arty Impressions - This was the first one on the article I read. From what I can gather it’s fashion with famous works printed on it. (Artworks, for example, Andy Warhol’s, screenprints) I mean I can see the connection, but for me wearing something with a reproduced art piece is hard for me to personally wear. LIke it has to be done like how T-shirts have a design in the middle or small embellishments on it to make me wear it. The example I saw is fun and creative, but for me, I couldn’t see myself liking/wearing those pieces. It depends. 5/10? I guess xD

Plastic/see-through material - This honestly has been a reoccurring style that I have seen. It’s become more prominent now according to last year’s trends. I can’t stand the “see-through” look. I don’t know what it is, but it’s just too awkward to wear outside. LIke people will defend that you can wear what you want, but for ME and ME Only, I can’t wear those kinds of stuff. I would feel very scared/concerned with how I look. (Even to myself) If you don’t know what I am referring to, I mean like that umbrella looking material. (I’ve added the source in the paragraph above for this question! ^_^)

Geometric/Flannel Print - I can never see myself liking the flannel scene. For pyjamas, no problem! To wear outside, I can’t bring myself to do that. You can see me in an old sweater, but flannel I don’t think any of my friends have seen me in that xD I just can’t say it’s aesthetically pleasing to me. I have a problem liking this style. Maybe I will when I get older, but as I’m young and creative I see myself wearing clothes for the young generation! :P (my mom says that anyways xD lol) The clothes that make you feel like partying, even though you don’t go outside like me xD lol 

As much as I love talking about fashion, I think I would bore everyone with my opinions. xD (You’re definitely not here for these are you? xD If so, thank you) 

10. What song sums up this year for you?

A: I don’t have a definite answer, but I went through a lot of things. Many times I wanted to be in a dream world…Like to escape everything. All the pain and depression. I still feel that way, but in 2018 it was WAY worse. This song I originally heard in Silent Hill: Downpour (A GAME I LOVE ;w;) was a song I thought of when I see this question. I think it’s a great song! sad, but I’d recommend it. The singer’s voice is lovely. It invokes so many emotions in me ;w; (I’ll give a youtube link) 

Ed Harcourt - From Every Sphere

14. Favorite new TV show?

(I HAD to make it this guy >w

WARNING: HUGE ANSWER BELOW!

A: Well, as you may know, I don’t watch many shows anymore. I mostly play video games, but for the sake of this amazing question, I’ll say what anime(s) I did enjoy last year! I don’t think I’ve ever loved an anime as much as I love Gintama. It’s really funny because I originally “disliked” Gintama. It was a naive thing for the young me to have said at the time. I judged the show so harshly after seeing anime (IMO) being shat on with the usual themes and scenes I ALWAYS see. I began to give up on anime as a whole. My story starts when I was pissed at my brother telling me, “Gintama is amazing Tash, trust me you’ll regret hating it.” I answered with my normal response of, “ sure Ja, you ALWAYS say that. How will this be any different?” Maybe I shouldn’t have said that…Well, it’s too late now for present-day me. My brother showed me all the “humorous” parts first. (I honestly felt like he tricked me, but the show really starts that way xD) Anyways, we eventually watched a few episodes and I told him I didn’t understand the humour. (it’s honestly hard to get into if you’re not open-minded or don’t understand the comedy Sorachi uses) Until he decided to hit me with his ace, “The Shinsengumi Crisis Arc”. All I can say is, a different side of me was born. I started to see what a show could truly offer if it was done right, the way I wanted to see it. It’s hard to explain, but without Gintama’s sad/inspirational/happy/stupid/clever story writing/arcs I don’t think I would have ever gotten through 2018. I haven’t finished the episodes as of its recent update, but I really learned a lot from the show. I want to give a HUGE shoutout to Sorachi for writing this masterpiece and I would 10000% recommend it to ANYONE! It’s a show that changed my views on people’s situations and lives. I think all the arcs are amazingly written and so far I don’t think I’ll ever get bored of it! It really got me in the feels. I can honestly say that if you can’t feel after seeing an arc in Gintama, you haven’t felt. It’s that amazing! (Then AGAIN, it’s an opinion not everyone will sadly share xD) Also, I am really enjoying Bleach! I’m sad at how it ended in terms of what things happened and I honestly hope Kubo will be ok. I loved his episodes and the earliest ones really touched my heart like Gintama. He’s also really great at making me cry every episode! :P

(GOD SORRY FOR THE ESSAY AND STUPID STORY LINES xD I’m sorry I can’t add a RM for this b/c then everything under can’t be seen like the other answers ;w;) 

20. Did you develop a new obsession?

Well…YES! Many obsessions!! The real question is which is the one that I obsess over the most? Well I’ll put some bullet points to hopefully make it smaller xD

First of all, I don’t want to say it but I’ve taken a “liking” (what an understatement lol) to Gin Ichimaru from Bleach~! >////

I think everyone knows, but I have an obsession with cute/pink/pretty stuff. (Can it be called that?) I just LOVE pastel colours or pinks/blues/purples. Those kinds of soft colours you see in Hello Kitty toys or Fairy Kei/Kawaii merch (if I’m correct xD) I just have a HUGE soft spot for childhood stuff! I literally still act like a kid xD lol I don’t think I’ll be growing up anytime soon haha xD lol I just love to collect them! :) 

Vaporwave I guess has become a new obsession and old art styles of the past! I just can’t stop being in awe at those marble statues! The curvature and bodies are so magnificent! >w

So many different art styles that are brought to this world! :D This is the truth! I absolutely love most styles I see on here and whenever I encounter them! >w

Other than that, I don’t think I have any other obsessions I know about :P Sorry, I’m super boring xD That’s the art student life lol (only me guys xD dw)

THANK YOU SO SO MUCH FOR MESSAGING ME AND SENDING THIS AMAZING ASK YOU AWESOME PERSON!!! @nalufever I am so happy to have gotten something from you and I hope you’ve had a great Christmas and Happy New Year, friend!! I hope you stay happy and healthy this year!! All the best to you! Thank so much once again for taking the time :)

If anyone else is interested, you can send me something as well~!

Take care from me and Happy New Years everyone!!!

Saku~!

[bluerosesburnblue]

Extremely late to the party, but I finally finished reference drawings of my Hogwarts Mystery MC, Seren Dwyn, and her hopefully not dead bro. Sorry if the colors are weird, I had to manually adjust them when I switched computers

Assorted Information under the cut

Seren Dwyn

Full Name: Seren Aisling Dwyn

Birthday: July 29, 1973 (yeah, it’s just my birthday. I got lazy)

Blood Status: Half-blood (and 3/16 Siren)

Nationality: Half-Irish, Half-Faroese (lives around the shore of Malin Head, outside of Ballyhillin in County Donegal)

Wand: Acacia wood, Unicorn Hair core, 12″

Boggart: Has two. The Voldemort boggart, which represents her fear that Jacob wasn’t the person she thought he was, and Jacob as he was before he left telling her that she was a disappointment that shouldn’t have been born. Only Professor McGonagall saw the latter the one time it appeared, the Voldemort one showing up more often in Year 3 as that was the fear at the forefront of her mind at the time

Favorite Classes: Care of Magical Creatures (!!!), Charms, and Herbology (aka her chill out class)

She and Jacob were pretty much raised as Muggles due to the fact that their father was a Squib and disowned from his pureblood family and their mother was a Muggleborn from a Durmstrang-covered nation and so grew to resent magic as she received little education on its workings

So, like, they went to Muggle school until Hogwarts and knew of most things magic and Wizarding World, especially with their limited interactions with their father’s mother, but they were mostly removed from Wizard culture

Jacob’s nickname for her is Rinn, because it potentially means the same thing as Seren and is phonetically similar to the last part of her name

Her first bit of magic was hiccuping up floating balls of water when she was less than a year old. That was when Jacob knew she was going to be talented at magic

Her favorite candy is peppermints

Was just barely a hatstall between Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. Like, six seconds over time. The hat was insistent that she go to Hufflepuff, but Jacob told her he wanted her to go to whichever house was best for her, not just his house. It took the hat a while to convince her that Hufflepuff was the right house for her

She’s loyal to a fault, but also has no personal ambition. Literally everything she does is for the sake of people she cares about. No dream job, no future plans, nothing. She also has a strong sense of justice/fairness, which comes out as both a strong desire to help others, even at the expense of herself (literally most sidequests) or knocking others down a peg when they start acting unfairly and hurting others (most interactions with Merula)

That said, she’s really creative and treats magic like a science. She experiments with it, and is extremely gifted in magical theory. Prefers to understand why a spell works as opposed to how, and once she does she casts it extremely well

Starts out at Hogwarts as extremely shy and skittish, which just gets worse the more people compare her to Jacob. Bucks up a bit during second year, starts getting more sarcastic in third year, and completely snaps after the Vault of Fear. She comes back in fourth year Much Angrier, with less of a filter, and a bit more Punk™ (but not much)

Literally snaps because she can’t stand how Dumbledore is treating the situation. Constantly reprimanding her and then unfairly awarding her? Not just gathering a team of Curse Breakers and sweeping the school over the summer when no one’s around like she suggested? Yeah, no, she lost all respect for him and may or may not get it back depending on where future story updates go

“Well damn, if everyone wants me to be Jacob 2 I may as well give them what they want” but she knows the rules so well she manages to break them in spirit without breaking the letter and weasels out of trouble most of the time because she never technically broke the rules and does so out of spite

That said, it’s still Seren, and she’s a genuinely nice person and a snarky dork, she’s just no longer taking unfair punishment lying down and lost all sense of self-preservation

Seren cares too much about other people, but hides it behind a facade of snark that occasionally comes across as a bit dismissive at times

Very stressed, acts chill, but breaks down when she knows people aren’t looking. It’s hard dedicating your childhood/teen years to finding your missing brother

Loves magical creatures. Loves them. Fire crab? Sooo cooool. Bowtruckle? Aw heck yeah little buddy you go! Murtlap? Oh, what a sweetheart. Sickleworth??? Mine now!!!

She’s loved Augureys ever since she was a kid. They’re her favorite magical creature

This love extends to normal animals but they don’t teach that at Hogwarts

Named the bowtruckle Jacob because she just wants her big bro back, dammit

She has a plush baby seal from when her family went to the aquarium when she was a toddler. Jacob used to do a voice and pretend the toy was alive to cheer her up as a kid. She still sleeps with it

Her owl, Arlo, is actually Jacob’s owl whose care she took over when he disappeared. The rest of her pets were found around Hogwarts, and she has her friends take them home over the summer because her parents would KILL her if she brought four animals home

While she’s good at Transfiguration, she kinda hates the class most of the time. Anything involving turning living creatures into inanimate objects or vice versa just skeeves her out so much and opens up WAY too many existential questions

That said, her favorite teachers are Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, and Professor Kettleburn

She likes Professor Sprout well enough, but she’s her Head of House and Seren has a crippling fear of disappointing others, so she’s constantly worried that Professor Sprout secretly hates her

She doesn’t share a lot of personal information with the gang. She would if asked (usually), but since Jacob was her only friend growing up and he knew this stuff already, she never really thinks to share

She will never tell anyone her middle name because she’ll die before any of her friends find out her initials are SAD

The gang kind of considers her Team Mom/Team Big Sister because of her proclivity for taking care of everyone’s emotional states. Ironically, she’s the youngest person in the group, though no one in it is aware (because she’s never shared her birthday and at this point refuses to because she doesn’t want anyone making a fuss over it, especially since it’s not like any of them will see her over the summer to celebrate it)

Seren gets kind of protective over her friend’s siblings. Percy doesn’t like her much due to her chronic disregard for rules, but she still looks out for him. Fred and George think she’s cool but can also be a killjoy sometimes. Ron and Ginny both adore her. And if Penny’s sister Beatrice ends up in Hufflepuff and Seren’s a Prefect? “Oh boy, Penny, I’m stealing your sister she’s mine now!”

The gang has a minor freak out when they find out that Seren “Frequently an Irish Stereotype” Dwyn is actually only half-Irish and hates potatoes

Madam Rakepick makes her really uncomfortable... because she sees too much of herself in her. Rakepick kinda represents a “who you could be if you were an arrogant asshole” and Seren, being very Hufflepuff, wants to be anything but arrogant

Rakepick really does like Seren, or at the very least thinks she has potential, and has ever since Seren’s response to dueling Ismelda was to immediately disarm her and go into a leg sweep. Rakepick’s gotta respect a kid willing to fist fight if it helps their cause

Seren has no desire to be a Curse Breaker and chafes a bit every time someone tells her she should be one. Breaking curses is just a necessary part of finding Jacob. She doesn’t particularly care for it

Her courses are geared towards Curse Breaking, but it’s more because she has ZERO plans for her future beyond locating Jacob and at least it’s something she’s good at

She stole Jacob’s old sweaters at the start of year 4. It’s not like he’s using them. Team sweater vest all the way

Had she gone to Ilvermorny, her house would unquestionably be Wampus. Girl gets things done, especially once she gets over her shyness, but the fighter potential and defiance was always there as evidenced by the way she kicked Merula’s ass for harassing Ben and Rowan in their first year

5′3″ and steadily getting angrier every year

A lot of people think she just blindly worships Jacob, but she really doesn’t. She’s aware that he was a pretty flawed person, she just doesn’t care. He was good to her and she loves him and that’s all that matters

Jacob Dwyn

Full Name: Jacob Caradoc Dwyn

Birthday: December 15, 1968

Blood Status: Half-blood (and 3/16 Siren)

Nationality: Half-Irish, Half-Faroese (lives around the shore of Malin Head, outside of Ballyhillin in County Donegal)

Wand: Maple wood, Dragon Heartstring core, 10″ (broken before expulsion)

Boggart: Seren’s nearly drowned body that he can’t resuscitate*

Favorite Classes: Flying, Charms, and Transfiguration

Five years older than Seren but only four years above her in school due to where their ages are in relation to the cutoff date. Would’ve been in the same year as the prefects

Seren’s nickname for him is Jay, or Jayjay if she’s trying to be annoying/cute. Jake just never caught on for him

His first real bit of magic was accidentally charming a room full of people while singing in a school pageant when he was four. He’s been afraid of singing in front of other people since, despite having a really good voice

His first reaction to being told that he was going to be an older brother was “Oh boy new friend!!!” The first time he met Seren he let her grasp his finger and told her he was gonna be the best big brother ever

He then started hating her for a few months because she just would not. Stop. Crying. And her room was right next to his so he heard it constantly

Warmed up to her when he realized that she was just scared of loud noises and would sing her to sleep after that (and she’s the only person who he’s comfortable singing around now)

*His boggart comes from a moment when Seren was three and he was supposed to be watching her but was so caught up in his own adventure he didn’t notice her get too close to the cliff edge and she fell into the ocean. He jumped in after her but she was completely submerged and her leg was stuck in some seaweed. She definitely would’ve died if a nearby Merrow hadn’t pulled her out. And he didn’t know CPR (he was eight) so he was lucky she coughed up the water herself. The event traumatized both of them. Seren was afraid of going into the water for years and Jacob got super protective of her and developed a fear of being unable to save her, which is what his boggart represents

Firmly believed that rules should never prevent you from doing the right thing, which would really inform most of his actions at Hogwarts

Has two main goals in life: become a cool detective and go on a world tour with his family (though once he’s estranged from his parents for good it becomes go on a world tour with Seren)

Loves liquorice and liquorice wands. Was known to eat whole bags of them at once

Was a true hatstall between Hufflepuff and Slytherin, but was ultimately placed in Hufflepuff because he would throw away everything in a heartbeat to benefit someone he loved, he valued loyalty above all else,  and preferred to do things on his own merit rather than cheating. He got a rush from genuinely overcoming challenges

That exhilaration when he overcomes challenges led to him really loving puzzles and mysteries of all kinds. In a way, Seren was half-right when she speculated that his reasons for looking for the Vaults was that he wanted to overcome a complex puzzle. It was why the search became addicting, but not why he started looking in the first place

He was notably impatient and had a habit of acting without thinking through consequences a lot. Honestly, Seren was a good part of his impulse control and he took a lot more risks at Hogwarts than he would have if she was there

His witty and cunning side tended to get him into trouble, too. Boy had a hell of a sarcastic streak and never could keep himself from snapping back at people who made snide remarks at him (looking at you, Snape)

Say what you will about his bad habits, but he was a very good brother to Seren. Their parents were always pretty distant so he became the emotional support that she needed. He’d let her sleep with him when she got scared during thunderstorms, would hold her whenever she got upset after being teased in school (and helped her with her homework as much as he could), and at one point climbed up onto their roof without a second thought when she got herself stuck up there by an accidental use of magic... and then he realized that he didn’t know how to get either of them down. He played games with her until their parents came home and got them down

The entire faculty was aware that he would gush about his sweet baby sister if given reason to. Most of them already knew who Seren was before she started at Hogwarts because of it (”Hey Professor Sprout, what plants would be good to mail to my sister? She loves flowers!”)

The only way I can reconcile a Hufflepuff!Jacob going on a search for the Vaults is that he thought something in them/someone looking for them was going to pose a threat to either the student body or Seren, so that’s what I’m going with until proven otherwise

Honestly there were a lot of reasons people thought that he was certifiably insane. Beyond raving about Vaults that most people didn’t believe existed he:

had a tendency to just Not Sleep when he was working on a project and was known to down bottles of Wideye Potion and then not sleep for days. He always looked tired in his later years

got really twitchy when he didn’t sleep, so he was always nervously fidgeting in his later years

was so impatient that he’d jump off of part of the Grand Stairwell to get around faster

once had a serious craving for fish (due to his Siren blood, which neither he nor Seren are aware of) and ran into the Great Hall in a panic, grabbed cod with his bare hands, and then ate it while jogging out of the room. This was one of Angelica Cole’s few interactions with him and one of the only times Bill Weasley ever really saw him in their 1 & 1/2 overlapping years (”Seren, your brother was weird.” “Yeah, I- ...yeah. That sounds like Jacob.”)

was kind of a mess just before he was expelled. His shirt was never on right, he was lucky he could even get his tie on, constantly forgot his robes, and he was using Reparo on his clothes nearly every day because they kept getting torn up with Vault related stuff

is farsighted, but refuses to get corrective glasses or fix the issue, leading to him squinting a lot when he reads and such. He just can’t freaking see

Also, it’s canon that he has godawful handwriting and can’t draw to save his life. Boy’s a living disaster sometimes

If he hadn’t gotten involved with the Vaults, he probably would’ve joined the Quidditch team as either a Beater or a Chaser, and likely would’ve also been the male prefect of his and Jane Court’s year

He and Jane absolutely hated each other, but the kind of hate that involves some belligerent romantic tension. The kind that would probably lead to an emotionally abusive relationship if they ever got involved when they were older, but mutual attraction was still there. It’s a good thing they never got to that point, but I could see Jane trying to sneak him a love potion in 6th or 7th year if he hadn’t gotten expelled

If you asked him about it, it’d take him a while to remember who Angelica Cole was. He’d need you to describe her. He was nice to her, but their interactions were limited and he was usually distracted by the time she started talking to him more

I actually have a hard time seeing him in a long-term romantic relationship with a British/Irish witch or wizard due to his reputation. I could see him with a foreign magic user, maybe an Ilvermorny alumni or something

I could very easily see his Ilvermorny house being Thunderbird had he attended school there because he’s always wanted to travel and always yearned for adventure. Not super relevant, just some interesting personality trivia

Also, he’s only an average 5′9″ at maximum height, but he’s taller than Seren and that’s enough for him

He got expelled about a week before his 15th birthday. The last time Seren saw him, he was hugging her while sobbing and just kept muttering “It’s gonna be okay. I love you. I’m so sorry,” over and over again. He was gone the next morning and Seren hasn’t been “okay” since

Both/Other

Both of them are trilingual at Hogwarts (English/Irish/Faroese) and may eventually learn Mermish in the future

Their mother taught them Faroese and their father thought it would be fun to do the same with the language of his country, even though he did not speak Irish himself

They make a lot of very similar expressions and have similar body language, which most Hogwarts professors picked up on fairly quickly (”Miss Dwyn, I know you’re lying. Jacob used to make that face when he was lying, too”)

Jacob’s patronus would be a Sea Lion* and Seren’s a Common Seal*

*I actually haven’t settled on whose is whose. Dunno if I want their patronuses to represent the caster or their sibling more

Seren is unable to cast a patronus unless Jacob is found alive. She cannot cast one before they find him and will never cast one if he is found dead or irreversibly evil/insane/corrupted

I was actually pretty against it at first, but I’ve gotten attached to the idea of both of them being Raven animagi, with Jacob being unregistered and Seren’s registration status up in the air right now

Both of them keep their eye color when they transform, which is much better for Jacob since Ravens tend to have similarly colored brown eyes

They also both have a chuckle that sounds like the clicking noise Ravens sometimes make

Being a Raven animagus makes Jacob’s tendency to transfigure things into black quills to hide them way more ironic

Assuming Jacob is found alive, in the future they end up starting a private investigation/private detective’s office where they take jobs that the Ministry has turned down. They get a bit of a reputation for not turning anyone away who needs help: human or not. Also espionage

If Jacob is found dead (and Seren does not also wind up dead) then Seren either takes odd jobs with no real purpose OR joins the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, Beast Division, depending on the circumstances of Jacob’s death and how well she’s able to cope with it

Goodfuture! Jacob and Seren both get very good at Legilimency and Occlumency, Legilimency due to its uses in their profession and Occlumency due to paranoia arising from the entire Vaults incident. They practice on each other

Jacob is slightly better at Occlumency than Seren, Seren is slightly better at Legilimency than Jacob

Reading each other’s minds as much as they have leads to them being even closer than they were before. They now know secrets the other will never speak, and they can predict each other’s thoughts fairly easily. It also helped them work through Vault-based trauma

At some point they get really good at communicating wordlessly through magic. It freaks people out

Their siren blood does effect them, but I feel like that’s grounds for its own post

[coffeeandcalligraphy]

Chapter titles! | June Writing Update

Hey People of Earth!

It’s JULY which means we’re due for a June writing update! I honestly didn’t do very much writing in June (was June even a month? did it happen??), so like with May, this update will be pretty short!

FOSTERED #6

I’m kind of at an eh with this book, honestly! This month consisted of stressing over a scene I couldn’t get quite right, until @sarahkelsiwrites gave me some awesome advice while I was mid *sarah help me*. She said “Just end it where you’ve written up to and come back to it later” which is so insanely simple, but helpful. Because I take long breaks between writing scenes sometimes, I tend to lose sight of a lot of details/initial excitement for scenes, which is basically what happened with this scene! So coming back to it later is actually a lot more helpful than trying to piece together words I meant to write weeks prior, if that makes sense. This was actually something I tried to actively avoid, but it seems to be working way better now!

Sarah is my #1 supporter and I dunno man this book wouldn’t have made it past literally the first chapter header if it weren’t for her lol, so bless her patient soul. 

Also, me when I’m writing:

sarahhhhhhhhhh

my kayak is sinkingggggg

sarahhhhHHHAahhh

I did do a thing I REALLY LOVE for this book this month and that’s chapter titles!

A few months ago, I wrote a chapter that I just *knew* needed a chapter title (Table Manners). After writing it, I tried naming the rest of the chapters in this book, and it wasn’t actually as fun as I thought it would be lol. I couldn’t come up with anything I liked, so I dropped the endeavor.

Welllll I came back to it a few days ago and well I have a whole list now:

honestly this book suck but deez titles doeeeeee

I’ve been writing this book for 9 months and this is like the only happiness it has brought me.

For those who can’t read my handwriting lol:

Breathing Room

Catherine

1997

Max

Double Jointed

Paper Negative

Earl Grey

Table Manners

Girl

Fort Tilden

Fluoxetine

Mother

The Garden

these!!!

!!!

I love them !!!!

they are my babies!!!

their content suck but I love them !!!! beautiful !!

Which chapter title is your favourite? I’m rather fond of how the list meshes as a whole because the atmos thooooo but I *love* Catherine, 1997, Girl, and Fluoxetine!

I thought it’d be cool to do a quick run down of why I chose these titles because there was a lot of thought??

PEOPLE YOU WILL NEED TO KNOW:

Reeve 

main character

stressed and tragic

Foster 

love interest ?? kind ? of ??? tofu boi???

?????

he’s hardly in any of these chapters so just imagine him making lentil soup instead??

Lonan 

problematic brother of MC

has picked a fight with Harrison for *no* reason, currently in his first month of being salty (TM)

Harrison 

feisty af but has a big heart

is tired of being walked on by Lonan

hurt af but using that salty energy to help people aw

Darren 

the only morally correct character

doesn’t realize what he’s gotten into

Emily

evasive, acts as a manic pixie dream girl figure throughout the novel, is unfortunately romanticized a lot even though she’s very much just a normal girl

1. Breathing Room

Ch. 1 is set in a very ‘claustrophobic’ time for every character

Gang is very divided after *various conflicts, but somehow manages to be suffocated by each other’s problems?

Both Harrison + Foster need some ‘breathing room’ from Reeve lol me too

how do you take a vacation from your first person narrator

2. Catherine

Reeve tries 2 be Darren’s new friend

Helps him set up his library

Title inspired by Catherine Earnshaw (Wuthering Heights)

Foreshadowing for where Reeve’s character ends up (particularly in her relationship w/ Darren)

Since they’re making a library, Wuthering Heights was *relevant*

3. 1997

“My mom met my dad on a Tuesday morning in 1997.”

that’s basically it

I dont know why this sentence just isn’t my parents met on a Tuesday morning etc etc but ok

lmaooo what is writing

4. Max

The name of Reeve’s father (who has died)

She heads out on a ‘de-stress’ vacay with Darren who is her new father figure ?? yonks

Lots of father references, mostly named Max because of Darren’s paternal-ness

5. Double Jointed

@sarahkelsiwrites gave me this idea lol

let’s just say our girl breaks someone’s fingers ??

and a relationship ??

ouch??

6. Paper Negative

Reeve is looking thru family photos

Lonan shows up and starts being a brat

he’s the negative haaha

7. Earl Grey

Reeve makes Lonan tea and some is subsequently spilled

8. Table Manners

Harrison fights w/ Lonan and Reeve has the audacity to tell him he needs to find some manners lol

9. Girl

Reeve glorifies Emily as being this eccentric but perfect person when in reality she’s just a girl

At the same time, degrades her as a ‘lolita’ figure

Lots of toxic femininity

Highkey not stolen from John Lennon

a giiiiiiiiirl

This excerpt kind of explains the whole unhealthy a) glorification of her and b) judgements Reeve makes (tis long and unedited as a heads up):

She’s perched on the armchair next to him. Her feet, unsocked and half-baked laze atop the teakwood desk. She’s at a beach, maybe. Lost her sandals in the tide, mind in the boardwalk. Her hair is shorter, cut to curl at her chin. Red, as always, like the carmine lacquer chipped off her toenails. Shoulders are thin, her waist edges toward gaunt. But I’m sure he doesn’t tell her that. She’s beautiful to him. Starving herself, or taking turns fondling the new Marlboros he sticks between his lips, she’s still beautiful. A puff from him, trade-off, pivoted elbow, kiss from her. Her ribs stick out beneath her tank top, but he loves her. Size zero, tape measure a noose. With all her flaws, he makes love to her through rings of smoke.   

Smoking kills you. I want to tell her. That smoke goes straight for your throat. You’ll be forty at twenty. What about your beauty regime? Butted out like he’ll do to your heart, to that cigarette you do unspeakable things to. Aren’t you afraid of being ugly?            

I won’t, though. She’s doing nothing wrong. Sat in shorts with her bra leering from under her tank-top, toes flexing, shoulders meager. Guilty, no, garish, yes. I’ve never noticed the gold she wears in her ears until now.            

Somehow, she’s managed to remain on his side. With her body like dust, and temperament like mercury, he sits at his desk with her, lets her look at the findings on his laptop screen. I should get them rings for their left hands, an extra diamond for her. A mantle and a spellbook, a white dress and a bouquet. A four-post bed complete with a chiffon canopy for when he canopies her. Rose petals, and champagne. Congratulations. I’m so happy for you. I’ll save the date. 

She is a girl, like me, but with his attention. A girl who hasn’t asked for the speculation I impale her with. A girl who doesn’t deserve it. I should be ashamed of myself. That’s what my mom would tell me if she heard the vile thoughts I choke Emily with. You should apologize and be friends with her, Reeve. That’s two weeks grounded, until you learn it’s not ladylike to ridicule her because you aren’t her. It’s not ladylike, Reeve, not ladylike. Where are your manners, young lady? 

who doesn't have manners now ???

10. Fort Tilden

A memory about a family reunion at this particular place

11. Fluoxetine

Reeve recounts her mother’s use of antidepressants

Lots of gaslighting in this chapter

12. Mother

The saddest of the titles, recounts a betrayal of a mother figure

Kind of very sad when reflected with the contents of the chapter

13. The Garden

Recounts an experience in a garden with a boy

The setting for the death of a relationship where things are kind of in constant growth? backwards growth?? decay ??

So yes! I rather love these, lol, they bring me very much happiness. 

Onto some book stats:

CURRENT WORD COUNT: 56 449

CURRENT PAGE COUNT: 97

STUFF I’VE BEEN LISTENING TO: Ohhh, I mentioned a few of these in my goals update post, but definitely additions to my shippy playlist: Some Kind of Love by The Killers, Happier (Acoustic) by Ed Sheeran, And I Love Her by The Beatles, Can’t Say No by Conor Maynard (my *personal* favourite)

MEDIA I’VE BEEN DIGGING: 

Sarah drew this GORGEOUS duo portrait of Ris and Reeve:

(yessss Harrison’s nose is so satisfyinggggg) 

I also made a header for Paper Negative w/ this family photo I found in the licensed for reuse w/ modification section on Google:

EXCERPT:

I edited this into the chapter of doom, and you know, I just re-read it and I’m not mad?? I think there are like *adjectives for dayzzzz*, but I think it’s almost where I want it??

His room is warm. Smells of old coffee and cigarette smoke. Emily isn’t here with him. But she’s left her things, yes, her books, and her spells, charms, and crystals. A circle of stones on her dresser, the clamshell rosary looped around the mirror. Set with candles, and beading, a dish of mildewed water. He’s dashed his cigarettes over her incense, and from the look he shoots me when he catches me looking, I figure he’s left them there without her permission. She occupies half of his room, her space bent in a diagonal path from half the door, to the right of the night table. Where she is, her space still breathes, ribbonned and decorated, pinned with dried flowers, and flutes of perfumes. Where he is, his space jitters.

It’s no surprise the left half of the room beams with just his energy. Lighters, and chewed pen caps, posters and pictures and drawings tacked to every breathable inch of the walls, even leaking onto the ceiling. The map, hanging next to his bed, ripped and sewn together again by bits of cellotape. Two opposites under one roof.

And what would I be, then, if I inhabited this room? Not a roommate, or partner, but possibly a lampshade, or chest of drawers. Unimportant enough to not notice every day. Only missed when unavailable. Perhaps I would be of no particular use, too, like Emily’s hanging terrarium, or Harrison’s tossed out marker drawings.

So that’s all for this update, y’all. Hoping July brings back a spark, lol. If not, you can bet I’ll be thoroughly looking for it in the meantime. ;) Thanks for reading!

--Rachel

[thechocobros]

“SEE LUNA SAFE TO ALTISSIA” - part 16

Pair: Nyx Ulric / Lunafreya Nox Fleuret

Words: 6722

Plot: Luna and Nyx didn’t fell in the Empire’s trap, Nyx didn’t had to use the ring and he survived. What would have happened if Nyx really had the chance to ‘see Luna safe to Altissia’, like he promised to Regis? Here the part 5: The quick showdown in Altissia separated the newly wed Lunafreya Nox Fleuret and Nyx Ulric. She must fullfill her duty as Oracle. He must survive and go back to protect her. New allies and new enemies will come in their way, so in the chaos that follows, what will the future bring to them all?

Personal Comment: This took me long because I’m making so many things for the lunyx week! I also started to write two new lunyx fics etc, so please, please FORGIVE ME! >.< I hope this chapter will make amends. I’m publishing it before the week, so you will have time to read it.

Speaking of the chaper … Action and angst. My jam. I had to rewrite some scenes after seeing Ignis’ episode trailer, where Ravus appears too xD I also wanted to show more Luna and Nyx in their roles (especially Luna. Damn, that last update really ruined her more and I needed to go back to a more KG version of her, where she actually does stuff without whining), so yeah, I hope I did it good? More action!Luna is yet to come anyway. Let me know.

The next chapter should be the final one. OMG.  

Luna must have fainted at some point for she woke up on the couch, exhausted and covered in sweat. She had experienced terrible nightmares as always, but this time waking up and realizing that Nyx wasn’t back yet felt even worse.

Out of the window, the sun was setting alread, or maybe it was the dawn of the day after, she couldn’t tell and this made her panic. If she wasn’t able to understand what time was it, how could she know if it was the case to be worried or not?

She asked the soldiers guarding her room but they didn’t see the Glaive return. He was away for more or less 15 hours. Luna thanked them and shut the door behind her. Once she was alone with her fears, she started to cry.

——–

The worst part was not knowing what happened to him.

Luna waited until midnight on a chair on the balcony, biting her nails to the quick. Her fingers bled when she bit too deep, and all she could do was weigh the possibilities of what could’ve happened. Maybe he was caught by the Imperials. Maybe Noctis thought he was a traitor under Kingsglaive fatigues. Maybe he was killed. Her mind screened and examined dozen of awful scenarios, where her husband got trapped, betrayed, tortured and even assassinated, and in each of them she felt like it was her fault.

The torment born by these nihilistic thoughts brought anything but peace and nobody was there to offer her comfort. In fact, after their last discussion, Ravus decided that it was too risky to stay in touch with her sister and was now probably too disposed with the Empire to actually care about his new brother-in-law. Luna wished to ask Aranea, but had no way to contact her.

And so, Luna realized that she was alone.

“You just have to go on with the plan and do what you gotta,” Nyx had whispered in her ear during their last night together after loving her thoroughly and passionately. “You have your duty. Coming back to you is mine.”

Awakening Leviathan. Kill her and also the other Gods. Defeat the Darkness together with Noctis. Nyx strongly believed that she was able to accomplish such an absurd and extremely dangerous mission, even without his help.

The amount of faith he placed in her was unbelievably huge, but he had always been right about her. Even in so little time, he was able to know her better than she ever knew herself. She believed that she had the power in winning this battle because of him, heard it until it resounded throughout her entire being. Luna wouldn’t let him down no matter what came to pass.

—–

When the dawn came, Luna knew her husband was lost, perhaps forever.

Her heart was shattered in thousand pieces, but none of that matter now. She had a duty to see through and couldn’t let her own irremediably compromised feelings tear her down before it. She was the Princess Oracle, no, she was the Queen Oracle like her mother before her and she carried the voice that only the Gods would adhere to.

She had to look at things in the right perspective, focus on her priorities. She tasted a piece of heaven thanks to Nyx, but now he was gone and she had to do what Eos expected her to, Nyx included. Wiping away her tears with closed fists and nerves taunt as tight ropes, Luna would not falter – not now, not ever.

——–

Nyx was engulfed in nothing but pain and darkness.

It was like someone was tearing his skin off, piece after piece slowly, starting with his arm. He wished to have his arm torn off once for all so he wouldn’t have to bear that constant agony, but the relief didn’t come until an immeasurable amount of time later.

Nyx couldn’t understand when or how, but he started to breathe again and was able to open his eyes.

Even before realizing where he was, his first thought went to Lunafreya. Where was she now? What did she thought when she didn’t see him coming back and what did she do afterwards? If he was still alive, he had to go back to her at any cost.

But wherever she was, it had to be better than his situation.

The place he was caged in was nothing but a dark dungeon with cold walls and only a small window on the ceiling. Hewas chained by the wrists behind the back. His shoulder still hurt like hell, but as he tried to stand on his feet from the supine position he was, he noticed that also his entirebody was sore. Nothing alike the miserable condition he was some time ago anyway.

“You shouldn’t exert yourself,” said someone in a matter-of-fact tone. “I so kindly pulled you from death’s cold embrace so you don’t meet such a tragic end. Need time to gather your bearings? By all means, you shall have it.”

Nyx boggled at the sound of that mellifluous and cruel voice, it was like a creepy music which sent shivers upon his spine. Even at cost of terrible pain, the Glaive turned to watch his interlocutor.

“You…!” He said, recognizing Chancellor Ardyn Izunia himself leaning on the wall and waiting for his awakening.

“Me? Judging by your tone, I assume you recognize me.” He whispered melodiously. “Excellent. I dislike frivolous formalities immensely. We can speak simply, you and I.”

Nyx gnashed his teeth, trying to stand up. He just didn’t have the strength to, barely managing to move a few inches that his restraints allowed. “You healed me?”

“You may be surprised of how many people I used to heal back in my time though I might be a tad rusty at it now. Feel the drawbacks, yes?”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t fancy conversing with corpses. To put it plainly, dead men tell no tales.”

Nyx was finally able to sit, his ribs protesting like they were broken in two and a wave of nausea struck him even if there was nothing inside his stomach to dispel the sensation. “I guess this is the Imperial way of getting someone’s attention?” He brought his chained wrists to his sides, gingerly brushing where the bullet went through. “Dunno if I even wanna know what happens when you guys get friendlier than this.”

Ardyn Izunia moved too, his unhurried gait held an air of pompous clairvoyance and the aloofness of a grand chessmaster.

“Magitek troops are neccessary pawns, but simply incompetent. They know no other way to stop a Glaive but to shoot first. They lack the foresight to consider much else.“

"So using Lunafreya’s notebook and pretending to be Prince Noctis to corner her was probably your idea, huh?”

“You recognized my style! I’m glad to hear that and well, you can’t say that wasn’t genius.” When Nyx raised an eyebrow at the word ‘genius’, the Chancellor added quickly, “Lower your suspicions now. I hold nothing but the deepest regard for men like you, Nyx Ulric. Men who are brave enough to stab the Frostbearer in the name of love. You remind me of myself when I was your age and maybe this is the reason why the Gods are not fond of you. But I do. In fact, the last person who dared to challenge the Astrals was myself so impatience drove me to meet you in person. To see that spark in someone’s eyes.”

“What do you really want?” asked Nyx, not liking his insinuations and starting to loose his coolness. The wound on his shoulder was gone, but the pain left him exhausted and wasn’t in the mood for his mind tricks.

“I want to help you.”

Nyx grimanced. “I don’t buy that one bit.”

“But what if I told you that as soon as I heard about the Glacian’s tragic end, I brought the Crystal to Altissia so your lovely princess could awaken the Infernian and the Draconian?”

Nyx narrowed his eyes and held his breath, studying the chanchellor’s expression to determine if anything expressed had a ring of truth to them. There must have been a catch somewhere, he knew it. Ardyn’s eyes were glowing with the cruelest light, it was like a purple and malicious spark, able to creep the hell out of Nyx. He couldn’t trust his words. “Isn’t what you wanted?” The chancellor continued, appealing to Nyx’s true desire, “To kill all the Six and free the innocent princess from their devices?”

“It is. But I also want to save my King and Eos from the grip of Darkness.”

“Ah, and that’s where, hero. However, I’m not apathetic to your distress, I’ll give you an inestimable opportunity. Consider it a sign of gratitude for killing the Glacian once and for all in my place. Without her divine intromission and the other Astrals’ help, the Chosen King will be in the palm of my hand.”

“What… are you talking about?”

“I can protect the Princess Oracle when she wakes the rest of the Six. I can lend her my power so she will quickly end them. Speaking of ‘her’, I mean your 'wife’.” Izunia stopped to admire with a corrupted smile Nyx’s surprised expression. “Yes, I know that too. What an admirable act of courage, to get marry in order to escape from the destiny the Gods chose for her. But now, don’t throw your bliss away. If you allow me to protect her, I can offer you an everlasting future by her side.”

Nyx instinctively shook his head. “What are you asking me in exchange?”

The chancellor gesticulated with his hand, trying to look casual. “Nothing. After your princess kills the Six, you can take her and flee. You can take her wherever you wish, no one shall ever oppose you ever again.”

Nyx smiled, but he was not amused at all. His mind caught the evil beyond the apparent endeavor of looking lenient. “You only want Lunafreya out of the way.”

Ardyn Izunia pretended to look offended, a mock gasp before chuckling, “Oh! You presumemy beautiful gift as something terrible!”

“Afraid of her, too, aren’t you? You’re right to. Just wait to see what she and Prince Noctis are gonna bring to your sorry ass.”

Ardyn Izunia wasn’t one to know Nyx’s insolence and to tolerate those of his ilk. His playful smile turned into the pure personification of evil as his face lit of a mischievous glow Nyx would be better to fear. “You may live to regret your words.”

“The only thing I would regret is to free my princess from the demons of her past only to force her again under a far more heavy remorse. She would never accept your offer and neither will I.”

Speaking such a reckless statement with a defiant grin painted on his lips earned Nyx a backhand slap to the face. The strength beyond it was so supernatural that the Glaive couldn’t help but fell back on the floor, blood spilling from his nose and lip. He didn’t emit a single whine though. He was not so easy to break.

“So be it. You chose to be the one to experiment regret: because of you, I will kill your beloved wife before Gods do.” That was the only sentence which was able to sweep away the smirk from Nyx’s sore face. No physical pain nor personal menace couldn’t be compared with the fear of seeing Luna being hurt because of him.

“You can’t win this battle, Ardyn Izunia. They won’t let you.”

But Ardyn didn’t bother to reply. He just took his hat off and bowed a little, leaving him there, chained and worried. It was his turn to smirk smugly, like he already won it all.

—————

Luna decided to step out from her safe hiding place to perform the rite of awakening the Hydraean. She sent a short message to First Secretary Claustra to inform her of that, and received a visit from her correspondent.

“Your groom?” she asked, taking a sit on the empty chair in the luxurious room of the Princess.

“Not here,” Lunafreya answered, glacial expression and posture elegantly composed. She was dressed in the beautiful white dress Nyx bought her in Lestallum, her make-up was on and her trident was ready to be used. She wear her mask perfectly, exactly like it has been all those years. If she didn’t hold on to such an appearance she wouldn’t be able to hide her heartbreak. Nobody was allowed to see the pain beyond.

“I met with Prince Noctis this morning,” Camelia stated, trying to look professional. Her eyes hid a evil glow though, but Luna knew she wouldn’t be cause of trouble, not until she and Altissian people would have been safe. “He told me he received a message from you and that you would have asked me to perform the ritual to awake the Hydraean.”

Luna boggled, her words slicing through her like a knife. If Noctis received her message, it meant that Nyx succeed in his mission. So whatever happened to him, happened after that. She stood in silence to mask her anxiety from Camelia.

“We’ve sealed a deal. You can have your ritual. But I want my people to be protected.”

Luna was relieved to hear that was her condition.

“It’s reasonable.”

“We decided to evacuate the city but we’re going to need time. Now you will have a speech where you reassure people of having the situation under control. By the voice of the Oracle, Altissia will listen and evacuate promptly. My only plea wouldn’t help.”

“I can do so.”

“And tomorrow you will call for the Goddess of the Sea, not before noon. This time should be enough for a correct evacuation. The Prince’s friends are gonna help.” There was a small pause where Luna took a deep breath and forced herself to keep a straight face up. She had to focus on the real goal.

“What is the Empire going to say about your intromission in this situation?”

“The Empire knows the Accordo government will do anything to protect its people, so if we organize the evacuation they won’t be in the position to say anything. Regarding me protecting you, this is a personal business they will never know of. Furthermore, it was only a temporary solution. In fact, from now on, you will be on your own. Accordo is not going to protect you when the speech will start, nor it will during the ritual on the altar. You, Prince Noctis and the Empire will be allowed to do whatever you want on our territory once people are safe, but we won’t mingle in your affairs.” A neutral position. An hazardous choice for an all-business politician like Camelia Claustra. Luna was sure that if it wasn’t for the old friendship between her and her mother she wouldn’t have gone that far either.

“I see.”

“You know what really allures the Empire. The power of your trident, along with the rest of the Lucian Ancestors Arminger. When they’ll see Prince Noctis wielding them, they will lose their mind and chaos will burst. If worse comes to worst, you can threaten to throw the trident into the sea. Then they’ll listen. In the meantime, it will be well guarded. Better than the Oracle herself.”

“Understood. I shall reclaim it at the altar.”

“Remember, you’ll be under imperial watch.”

“Right.”

“Think of it as a necessary evil in order to forge the covenant.”

Luna felt weird hearing her mention a covenant. Camelia wouldn’t have known that the princess had evoked the rage of the Gods upon herself because she refused to forge any more kind of covenant. The First Secretary couldn’t even imagine what Luna was actually trying to accomplish with Leviathan’s awakening.

“I am in your debt.” Luna said anyway, bowing a little. The more complacement with the situation, the better.

“Once it’s over, you may go as you please. But you do so without our protection.”

“So be it.”

Camelia let a sigh escape from her lips. For the first time since they met, she looked compassionate when she said: “You better get going. Your public is waiting for you.”

Luna shouldn’t have been surprised of the escalating pace of her life, yet as she watched Camelia leaving the room, a squeeze on her heart reminded her she was getting closer and closer to the end.

She wished Nyx was there beside her.

When a dozen of imperial soldiers rushed in the room, almost crushing the door open for the excessive zealousness and pointing with their guns at her like she was a criminal, Luna didn’t stop to stare into the distance. If she was able to bear her husband’s absence, not even an entire army would have hurt her anymore. She took an unnoticed deep breath and stood up proudly, fervor in her eyes. The soldier who tried to put her on the opposite side of the gun was pulled away with one only firm and cold wave of the hand. Too bad Luna couldn’t see the face he made under the helmet.

She walked ahead, having nothing but one goal: destroy the Gods and the Darkness and possibly find a way to get her husband back.

———–

The gunshot was healed, but now Nyx had to deal with the headache caused by Izunia’s punch. He had to turn around a bit, breathing heavily and hoping that the hemorrhage would have ceased. In the meantime, his brain couldn’t stop thinking and thinking. He had to do something but he was chained down and not even his magic would have been useful in that condition.

He cursed under-breath for falling right in the Chancellor’s trap, but then again he knew it wasn’t his fault. He only had to find a way to get out of there. Who knew if the chaos already started somehow up there.

“Hey!” He screamed, headed to nobody in particular. “Is someone there? Heyyy!” The echo of his own voice was the only thing answering back. He let his head falling back on a stack of hay. That dungeon was so dark and silent it was hard to catch the smallest noise. The frustration grew bigger, until his whole body started to scream like a desperate. “Heyyy, someone take me out of here!” he screamed again, angrier. Then he heard something. A delicate swish, nothing more, but it sounded like it responded to the Glaive’s screaming. Nyx lift his head and looked around. “Who’s there?” he asked, this time almost whispering.

A shadow came out from the darkness and he boggled.

“Sir Ulric?” The mysterious figure was hazel at the beginning but as it got closer, Nyx could only sigh in relief and most likely, in disbelief.

“You…? What are you doing here?”

Ignis Scientia, the Prince’s advisor himself, came under the only candle light they had and adjusted his glasses, surprised as much as the Glaive.

“I’m evacuating the area under Secretary Camelia’s orders and it happened I had to check if someone was left behind in this dungeon.”

“Great! Find a way to get me out of here.”

“I’ll reserve the questions about your imprisonment later.”

“Yeah, later is good.” Nyx grinned, licking the blood away from his lip. He tried to stand up because he wanted to be useful for Ignis in case, but the young advisor seemed to have already clear in mind a solution. After less than one minute, he came back with Nyx’s kukris and without saying a word he shoved it in the floor, looking expectedly to the Glaive, which quickly understood his plan. As a matter of fact, Nyx started to feel immediately the magic running through his veins, screaming to him to be used. Smirking with satisfaction, Nyx let it go. He warped out of the cage’s bars, grabbing the hilt of his weapon and holding on to it. He had left the chains back in the prison and now was free to move again.

“If they really wished to cage you, they should have hidden your kukris in a better place, not near the dungeon’s entrance, where i spotted them before.”

“Right. Our weapons are more important than arms to us, our whole magic is connected to them. And to the King, of course.” Nyx confirmed, knowing that a member of the Crownsguard like Ignis knew all this for sure. “Thanks for bringing my kukris back, someone must have taken them away from me when they knocked me out” Nyx said, expertly rotating the knifes and insert them back in his belt.

“What happened?”

“After my talk with the prince, Ardyn Izunia decided to chat and somehow I ended up here. Crazy, ain’t it? Anyway, what’s the situation up there?”

“Lady Lunafreya is about to wake the Hydraean. The rite will start in a matter of minutes.”

Nyx felt his heart ache, knowing that Izunia was headed towards the altar too, with the clear intention to hurt her. Lunafreya needed his guardian, now more than ever, and he was still too far from her. He had to be quicker than a bolt.

“Ignis Scientia, what about Kingsglaive and Crownsguard joining forces? Please, take me to Lunafreya.”

—–

As Luna stepped ahead towards the podium, she heard people’s voices slowly shut up, in great expectations. It surprised her how many people promptly came as soon as they heard she would have had a small speech. Like she needed more evidences, that was one another one showing that she really was an inspiration for all Eos.

As the silence fell, she knew she held them in the palm of her hand. Whatever she would say, they would have listen, so she took a deep breath.

“Dear friends,” Luna started, “I stand before you today with little hope the words I speak shall reach beyond these walls. For slowly but surely, the Light fades from our world. And as it does, the shadows shall loom ever longer until all succumbs to the darkness. Darkness that evokes terror, hatred and sorrow in the heart of men. The ashes of Lucis… A dream of peace, twisted into a nightmare of death and destruction, claiming innumerable lives and leaving myriad souls to suffer.”

The memories hit Luna’s mind with an unexpected ferocity. Sometimes she wanted to afford the luxury of thinking that she wasn’t traumatized by Insomnia’s destruction, but she was. She really was. Even if she had already Nyx next to her at that time, she couldn’t forget the horrible feeling in her guts when Glauca passed his sword through Regis’s spine the same way he did with her mother. Nor she could forget the sensation of having buildings almost falling upon her, the screams of the citizens panicking around, the fire illuminating their skin, the blood on her dress, the smell of the ashes and powder, the uncertainty of not being able to do what it was her duty to do.

After stopping for a second, Luna regained enough energy to continue: “Yet, I beg you, do not surrender to despair. Have faith, for even if our gods would abandon us, the real power to resist darkness is inside every one of us. Working together, we can build a new world, a new future where the sun always shines. Where the night will mean only dreams instead of nightmares, where the rays of the moon will illuminate the peace fell upon us all. Our world will be delivered from the perils of the dark. I stand before you here, in Altissia, to call upon Leviathan, Goddess of the Seas, spirit of the deep. But first I offer you my solemn vow: on my honor as Oracle, I will not rest until the darkness is banished from our world and the light is restored.”

And in that very moment, an emotional applause covered her words. She looked into the crowd and she spotted a single familiar face. She couldn’t be certain of his identity because so many years passed since last time they talked. Only when he nodded, Luna could sigh in relief.

Noctis.

Her childhood friend.

She smiled, nodding back to him, and turned away.

————-

Ignis was incredibly fast for a man moving in such an elegant suit. Nyx expected to have to slow down the pace, but thanks to the stars it wasn’t necessary. They both ran so fast it was even hard to catch them with the eyes. Their goal was the altar but arriving there was more difficult than they expected.

The city was completely empty so they didn’t have to worry too much about people left behind and if this was a good thing, it also meant Altissia wasn’t a safe place for them neither.

A dark grey sky was illuminating a ghost town, touched only by a cold wind and spurts of water coming from the sea. It wasn’t raining yet, but there was so much humidity that the effect on the clothes and skin was very similar. It was so creepy that Nyx hardly recognized the warm and romantic city who welcomed him and the Princess only a week before.

In the meantime, Ignis continued to run, unstoppable. It looked like he knew perfectly every narrow lane and every hidden path, which was probably true since he seemed like the kind of guy who studies maps at night to be prepared the day after. If it wasn’t for him, Nyx wouldn’t have reached the cathedral square so fast.

“This is where Lady Lunafreya had her speech,” the young Advisor explained quickly, not bothering to stop to catch his breath. The place where they arrived was huge and now empty. The ferocious and supernatural wind pulled papers and trash on the beautiful tiles of the square, turning the original beauty into a desolated open space. “She headed in that direction. The altar must be there.”

Nyx grabbed Ignis’ arm, forcing him to stop.“You shouldn’t come with me. It’s too dangerous. A mess bigger than you think is about to start and you must not die.”

“I can take care of myself.”

Nyx shook his head, that was not what he meant. “I don’t doubt it. It’s not you I am worried about. Go to the Prince, keep him safe. If you die before, you won’t be able to do it.”

“What about Lady Lunafreya?”

Nyx closed fists, his eyes grew darker as he whispered, determined. “You have the Prince, I have the Princess. It’s my job to keep her safe. I won’t allow anyone to do any harm to her, as much as you won’t allow anyone to hurt the Prince.”

“You’ll need help.”

At that words, Nyx smirked, but the smiled didn’t reach his blue eyes. “Yes, I know. But I’ll manage it somehow.”

Behind the glasses, Ignis’ pupils reveled his evident desire to go back to Noctis and stand by his side during the battle. He clearly wanted to be helpful and he knew the best way to do it was to go back to his friend.

“Don’t die,” he said, finally nodding. They were in the center of the square and the dark clouds announcing a supernatural event we’re surrounding them. It felt somehow like a goodbye.

Nyx was about to answer when a sudden earthquake shook the floor underneath their feet. They barely had the strength to stand straight before a frightening noise broke the sky in two. They quickly turned to watch the sea in the distance and they saw the huge profile of Leviathan breaking out of the ocean, screaming with a terrible voice, capable of making the bravest man to shiver.

“The Hydraean!” Ignis screamed, his voice bearable audible in the chaos.

“Lunafreya has begun the rite!”

Ignis and Nyx shared one more look and nodded. They would have proceed with the plan if another intimidating noise - this time much closer - wouldn’t have interrupted. It wasn’t good news.

An entire fleet of imperial airships was on their way towards the altar, and as they passed by, Nyx noticed one in particular staying behind. Nyx instinctively wielded his kukris, because he kinda knew who was inside it. As a matter of fact, that single airship veered towards them.

“Bet it’s the Chancellor!” Nyx screamed so Ignis would hear him. The advisor wielded his knifes too, ready to fight, but when a small army of MTs jumped down the airship, there was not much they could do if not starting to kill them all one by one.

Nyx and Ignis formed an unexpected compatible duo in battles. Nyx was more impulsive but this defect was balanced by Ignis’ impeccable strategies he kept yelling at him. As expected, Nyx was a better soldier. His magic was way more powerful thanks to the warp and the spells he learned to use in the Kingsglaive so together they needed only a couple of minutes to have the situation under control. As soon as they did, Nyx caught the Chancellor’s profile watching them from the airship.

“I knew it” he had the time to whisper before Ardyn Izunia jumped down on the square next to them.

“You escaped the dungeon. Why am i not surprised, I wonder” he spoke out loud, gesticulating at Nyx like he was an old friend he was glad to meet again. “And you’ve got company I see.” Ignis’ eyes narrowed in the attempt of lining up the pieces of the puzzle, he certainly had no idea of what was really happening. In spite of this, when he spotted the Glaive wielding the kukris against the Chancellor, he did the same, lips arching in a menacing grimace.

“Go to Lady Lunafreya” he ordered, like the strategist he was.

“You have to run away, too. Fighting him now would be out of our league.”

“I fear it is” Ignis admitted, but his elegant accent didn’t lose the composure.

Yet, Ardyn Izunia summoned a weapon in that very moment, a beautiful sword Ignis could swear he saw already somewhere. Was that really an ancestral weapon? Things were getting even more confusing at this point.

A dozen of other imperial soldiers appeared out of the fog in that very moment, charging against them with the ferocity of an entire army.

Nyx had less than two seconds to decide. He didn’t want to abandon an ally like Ignis there, because he knew that would have been the equivalent of a sentence to death. At the same time, he knew that staying there to fight wouldn’t have helped Ignis anyway. They both would have died and the sacrifice would have been heroic yet useless. But in spite of any logic, for Nyx it just wasn’t an option. He never abandoned a companion during all his military career and he certainly wouldn’t had now. Wasn’t he the hero of Kingsglaive after all?

“Hell no.” Nyx said, then, with a smug smile on the face.

The impact was violent. There was shooting, iron against iron, screams, smell of sweat and blood. Ardyn chose Nyx as his direct adversary, so the soldiers threw themselves on Ignis. They took him down after less than a minute, attacking him from the front and from the back. The Strategist was really good in using magic even if he was just a member of the Crownsguard and not a Glaive like Nyx, so he was able to free himself a couple of time, but he would have died pretty fast anyway if it wasn’t for a long sword coming to help him. Looking up to see who was there surprised Ignis a lot:

“Lord Ravus!”

“I will regret this, Scientia. But for now, let’s just join forces.”

In spite of the impression he wanted to give, Ravus proved himself a lot less careless than he would have ever like to admit. Understanding that there would have never been a more crucial battle, he was ready to play the “it’s now or never” game.

Ignis didn’t need to be asked twice. No matter how much he was covered in sweat and blood, he stood up again. He and Ravus joined together against the imperial soldiers, opening a way to reach Nyx and Ardyn.

In the meantime the Glaive - who was hardly warding off Ardyn’s knocks - noticed Ravus’ arrival and with a smooth somersault, he moved back, crouched down and then warped ahead, so he could reach the allies.In a second, Nyx, Ravus and Ignis were standing one next to the others, watching their backs to protect themselves from the Empire’s wrath. In a way, counting on the support of such skilled allies was a relief, but it couldn’t last, because they had to part as soon as possible. In fact, Ravus’ true intentions were reveled when he said: “Ulric, go to Lunafreya. I’ll stay with Scientia, so you can stop playing the war hero.”

Nyx smirked but nodded, silently thanking his brand new brother in law for the help.

Under the Chancellor’s eyes, Nyx avoided a soldier which was attacking him, and was forced to warp on the closest airship to avoid the hit. The platform were he land was empty and safe, a perfect spot to watch the situation from another angle. However, when the airship started to move, Nyx gasped, glad but also worried for not knowing the direction he was headed to.

“Don’t die, ok?” He screamed anyway towards Ignis and Ravus, which still were in the center of the square, surrounded by imperial soldiers. He didn’t leave lighthearted, on the contrary, he knew that both Ignis and Ravus were risking their life and that their possibilities of survival were very few.

He cursed under-breath as he noticed that Leviathan in the distance was throwing huge pieces of buildings up in the air. Some reached the area close to them, starting fires and destroying everything. He focused again on the two allies getting smaller and smaller from the safe place on the airship. He noticed that they started to fight already but in a very short time Ignis was immobilized on the floor by the imperial soldiers. The rain was wetting his glasses, the mud sullied his elegant suit. It was a pitiful view even from afar and Nyx hated it. In fact he felt the urge to warp back to help him but decided to trust Ravus.

The last thing he saw was Ardyn Izunia swaying towards the royal Advisor and saying something, before he turned to watch the Glaive go with the most malicious blink.

Nyx closed fists, knowing it still wasn’t over.

And in the distance, the yell of Leviathan broke the sky in two.

————

Everything was still. In front of the altar where she was standing, there was nothing but the sea, fogged by the upcoming cataclysm.

Lunafreya collected her energy to perform the Awakening for the last time. Even if the disease weakened her enormously, she still had in her what she needed and after all, that was her calling. She did it perfectly. As she felt a quake in her magic, also the earth underneath her trembled in a similar way and the ocean curled up in spirals, making space for the ferocity of the Goddess of the Sea. The huge creature, with the form of a snake or better a dragon, appeared abruptly from the depths of the waters, screaming her anger out and spilling intolerance. Even if Luna got immediately soaking wet, she didn’t flinch. She stood still, the trident in her hand, with a determined glow in her eyes.

“What fool mortal dares break the slumber of the Tide!?” The Hydraen’s voice was like the broken noise of a vibrant radio station, it was terrible, harsh, strident. Luna needed all her strenght to not step back.

“It is I, Lunafreya, blood of the Oracle! Goddess of the Seas, I beseech you: cease your vain attempts of using mankind for revenge. Bless us all with the freedom of choosing about our own destiny.” Her request was simple: she just wanted to be set free.

“This wretched pile of bones and flesh, ignorant of that which governs all, comes to requisition the might of a goddess?“

"I do.”

“Blasphemous ingrates, all men, quick to forget the ages their goddess stood watch!” With a single violent wave, Leviathan threw the princess against a wall. The poor soul almost fainted because of the pain and blinking her trembling hands, she used the trident to regain footing. Her voice was beautiful in the chaos:

“It is in receiving mercy that men offer praise, and in shedding grace that the gods solicit worship.”

But Leviathan wasn’t inclined to accept any praise, and temperment most foul to afford shedding grace. “Yet this profane speck speaks her «freedom» heresies before a goddess! Insufferable sacrilege! Such a thing is far beyond your control!”

Lunafreya stared at the wild creature in front of her, as the saddest sigh touched her lips: “Well, I had to try to ask nicely”. But now, all she could do was to proceed with the plan, even if that would have meant risking more than her own life. If she failed, the entire world would have paid for her act of rebellion. Yet it was for the world’s sake she had to try.

She raised her trident up to the sky, releasing all her white magic in a single burst. It was unexpected, not even the Goddess of the Sea could imagine to be hurt immediately after her awakening. Nor she could expect to be hit by the Oracle itself.

The brilliant ray of power emanated from Luna cut both her fins and slashed the scales near her throat, but didn’t kill her immediately. On the contrary, it provoked her rage even more. As a reaction, Leviathan moved her tale, hitting Luna with an impressive wall of water and she didn’t fall in the depths of the ocean only because she found a rock to hold on to. As the Oracle spat out salt water that assaulted her nose and mouth, she took a second to recover and then tried again to raise her trident in the air. Leviathan was badly injured which made her extremely exasperated. As the Goddess lost from her fins the same silver blood Shiva shed too, she moved again out of control, causing such an hysteria that Luna couldn’t hit her again with the trident’s magic.

The Oracle let the adrenaline take over her own mind, so she could jump from a debris to another debris. Her beautiful white dress tore apart, a irregular slit appeared on the soft material but the girl didn’t bother. She helped herself with her own bare hands, turning the long skirt into a messy mini. After that, she looked out for an ally in all that chaos, knowing someone must be there.

In fact, Noctis appeared in that very moment on a spike in the distance. Luna felt a light squeeze on her heart as she watched the future King of Kings standing there, ready to fight and keep to his duty. In spite of his huge role in the destiny of the world, he still was the childhood friend whose memory filled Luna’s mind for years. Who knew if he used the Ring already and if its power started to corrupt his bones, leading him inevitably to self destruction. The coming developments would have revealed it to her in the hard way.

Lunafreya understood immediately what she was supposed to do now that she noticed the young prince in the chaos: reach out for him and fill him with the Oracle’s magic so he would have the strength to take the battle to Leviathan head on.

Clasping her fingers around the trident’s cold metal, Luna rushed ahead, trying to get close.

The war cries of the Sea Goddess were deafening and because of them, Luna missed an imperial airship’s arrival, coming out of the blue toward her direction. She stopped, staring in surprise at the Chancellor Ardyn Izunia himself descendingto meet with her.

Luna couldn’t believe at her eyes when the man grinned with a wicked smirk that illuminated his entire face, concealing nothing to the Oracle. He had came for her and now she hadn’t nowhereelse to run.

[clothtap]

gta 5 review Normalgo.com

i like Fast delivery, great price, product exactly as described. Nice It Was Good Thanks Disc itself was mangled. Didn’t play. Sent it back. One of the best XBox games of all time Favorite Game, have put so many hours into it Purchased for.my son. No complaints “Amazing game. A bit violent and definitely not recommended for kids. Would be great to have a kids friendly spin off using the same platform.”

Like Awesome Amazing Good Owner gave me the Xbox 360 game instead! It doesn’t work on Xbox one Price was good Excelente el juego que desean los niños Purchased two of these so that me and the wife can team up and take over the world. It is built with so many missions and side missions. We often like to team up with our friends too. Just a really great story and game play. Great product!!! Just love this game. fun game, fast shipping Cost Works well I played and beat this on 360 back when it first came out in 2013. It was fun back then but now with updated graphics and optional first person view it’s a blast. I have been spending my precious little free time playing this. I caught it at $15. Great value. Came in fine with no scratches Love It The disk was fake Excelente juego, buen producto GTA has always been a good game to play. There’s always something new to do so it never gets boring. I wish parents would actually read the rating of this game and keep little kids off of it though. It gets annoying when you’re playing and some of these disrespectful kids get in the lobby trash talking. But overall great game. Comes with everything inside the case and the game is awesome! Even comes with a map! Bought this for PS3, PS4, now the digital version for Xbox One S, because it takes up the same space on the hard drive. Best online game, really not for kids at all. My main concern is the unhealthy rf emitted by the system. I don’t even have kids, but I take out the wireless card from inside my Xbox One S and use Ethernet and use my controller cable. I also use non LED technology projector, another risk to be avoided for children. Same thing with Red Dead 2, it is too violent for kids. All in all, although the singleplayer was awesome, definitely we all love the online. I made over 10 accounts and maxed them all out. Expect an uphill climb getting wealth at first and level up. I grind missions on hard, using playlists I make. A lot of griefers kill you for no reason, but it’s the same on Playstation, although much less lil kids on microphones here, which is quite the plus in my book. I would never buy the special edition because the things cannot be sold and have no trade in value while meanwhile it is nothing I would choose, although it may help you. Main thing to remember is kill death ratio has no value, people with large kd levels are just more likely to be kicked and less likely to be friended by a friendly, helpful CEO interested in making money. What is there really to say about GTA V that would be surprising to anyone. It is awesome. I originally purchased this for Xbox 360, got to 100% completion and then sold my disc. I got the bug to play it again here recently and purchased the game for Xbox One (wow, it really has come down in price) and the gameplay is definitely enhanced. The graphics are quite superior as would be expected to my experience in Xbox 360. I understand that this game has been out a long time; however, $15.00 is an absolute steal for this game. Even if you do every single little side mission you can still have fun just roaming around or hopping onto the online platform.

love the price, and quick delivery. Very good game It was what It said and also a little Extra. With the gta online money.

CD error I need my money back Fun game Had this for my 360 and purchased this when i got my Xbox One. The graphics are sharper and they’ve added so much. “Not much of a game as far as it’s single player campaign. Many flaws in the control layout that make it not very intuitive. Acting was good. Once the campaign is done there ain’t much worth doing. Graphics and gameplay are showing their age. Turns out this game is very much not open. Pretty much another dumb interactive movie type.” Awesome game. Has endless playing game options Happy got this for someone gift as already played game more 100 times, but buy someone just great. Ok It’s literally shows naked people like what!Please for the sake of the human generation don’t get it for someone under 20.It has swears and it is way to violent.And my nephew was a perfect little boy until he got this game.Like a day after he got it I come up to his room and I hear him say 3 swears in a row. Great game, tons of free DLC making the game fun and keeping it interesting. The campaign is awesome in that you make choices that affect the overall outcome, very theatrical campaign. Online play is amazing and has tons of things to do. Always fun. No matter how many times I end up buying it very good game. much fun. vroom vroom Grandson likes it. Bought for his birthday. Played the game to this day. Real fun. Love the updates Best game Nice I’ve never played this game before so when I saw it! I had to buy it! It’s a great game! Bought this my youngest nephew and what else I can say it’s Grand Theft Auto 5 one of best video game series today, that’s all you need to know. Its got alot of cussing Cool Awesome game! Arrived on time and by far my fav game This is fun game, not a fan of multiplayer A very solid game to have in the collection there is so much to do if you hundred percent this game you have too much time on your hands. I found multiplayer to be a little toxic but it’s not nice to group the whole community is mean and wanting to kill you. Very solid single player with an OK multiplayer bass . I bought this present as a gift for my younger brother. He loved the game for months but no longer plays it. 4 play this game in this house. Our favorite game Got this video game for my son it’s a little racy wish I had known beforehand Great game It’s Gta what more needs to be said. bad game I’ve bought this game multiple times and have enjoyed it every time! It was in a Good conditiol.Came nicely packed. Great ty For a second i thought it dnt work so i just restarted my xb1 s and it fixed the problem and the graphics are way better than the xb360 Bothing Hola muy buenos dias, escribo esta oportunidad para hacer reclamo de que los productos nunca me llegaron, nunca me enviaron un numero de traking, por favor para que me den razon del producto, sin mas que agregar me despido espero su pronta respuesta It came sealed and new I bought it just to run around the city blowing stuff up. Excellent game, a lot of content Good price Fun game. Lots of missions. Exactly what I needed. Excellent Price. Fast Delivery My son had to have this!! He loves it!! I laugh watching him play it!! “I can not play this game, it got sucking from the first time I run it Now I will return it back to the buyer” Good ! Was a gift but he likes it. I love this game, I just beat the main storyline for the 4th or 5th time and it is by far the best in the GTA series. The characters are excellent, the options for clothing, vehicles, etc is awesome, the story is addictive, definitely one of my favorite games. Great Uno de los más adictivos, puedes perder todo el tiempo del mundo buscando detalles en la ciudad, haciendo actividades o pequeñas misiones alternas y lo mejor su modo multijugador. Amazing game Came early and my nephews love it Daughter loves it my son not too thrilled with this new, he bought this based on prior issue he played always “hi unfortunately, the box of the cd has two locks, on of them was broken already when I opened it

now the box cannot be closed .

thanks,” Always been a fan of GTA. Son loves it. Brand new shipped in great time. Best game ever the original game came in the box and it was sealed

Cant stop playing. Amazing, disk Looked immaculate. It also came with the enterprise starter pack which usually makes the game cost an extra $30. Which is an amazing deal. Highly satisfied. I always wanted this game, I started playing it almost 3 years ago, when I was in 4th grade. One of my friend took that game to school and when I started playing it, I didn’t wanted to stop. Nicely packaged and it’s new. This might be the most prolific game on this system. Takes a lot of space to play be prepared. Newbies are punished so keep it moving until you are comfortable will combat and confrontation! Way more children play this than you would think it shouldn’t be but it is so. Monitor your children while playing this if you allow mature content in your house. Fun game. Awsome game Second time owning this game and for the record its not good for children nor young adults. It is fun but the language and actions just are not suitable for anyone under 17 i do enjoy this out of control game. Actually i just got done playing it its very hard to put the controller down Love it Hehe haha hooooo Great game, fast delivery This game is just one of a few in a queue list of games I’m looking forward to playing within the next year or two. I’ve heard alot of good things about it, and it was highly recommended by a few well known sources for gamers! I don’t play games but my son said its a great game. So I’m giving all games 5 stars. Bought this because I had it on 360 and liked it, so when I got a new Xbox I had to get it. BEST EVER great game Worth it Cheap and works like a $20 whore Best GTA Game! Epic game definite bye for any gamer Great gift! Came wrapped up and never used. No scratches or marks on inside or out. Would recommend 10/10 Fun to play, GTA is the best! Great One of the best selling games of all time. It has a fun typical GTA story mode. Regularly goes on sale for 10 or 15 bucks. Check it out if you haven’t Worked good Thank you GREAT GAME Case had a little bit of scuff marks, but other than that, the disk and everything else came in brand new condition. Perfect! My son guards this game with his life In a pretend world they sure pander to the already deranged. the “real” world of vulgarity and unnecessary racist stereotypes and language in a PRETNED WORLD which could be a LITTLE different than the real world. I do not get it. Why would you create a parallel fake city based on some west coast crap-hole when you could set a NEW standard? The N word is offensive and you cannot even PLAY the game in a house of people because THEY get offended. Buy headphones, sit in your room and continue to contribute to the everyday stereotype negative for A GAME that is suppose to give you enjoyment and pleasure and fun AWAY from the real world!! Thought the premise of a game was to make you forget your problems for a little while, like a movie or playing an instrument. LOSER GAME!! People do not even get the indoctrination or the pandering. More parents need to buy this for their 13 year olds!! DO NOT BUY THIS GAME! Epic game Just needed a replacement due to damage to previous disc BOUGHT TO PLAY ON MY NEW XBOX ONE – LOVE IT AGAIN EVEN LOOKS PRETTIER Love this game. Arrived new and clean, not damaged. Only thing that was unclarified was if it was a digital code or game disk. I was searching for a digital code, but I guess I ordered a game disk. I’m also super happy about the price. Oldie but a goodie I received that disc on 4/26/2019 after i open the box and insert into console then it cant show me the game the disc is empty nothing inside its just blank …. Our twin boys loved this game as an Easter gift Standard Disc. As described. What can I say? It’s GTA V! Worked great Good price and shipped fast seemed to be factory packaging Love it came in new My daughter was overjoyed to receive this surprise, and I was overjoyed at the price, and that it was delivered in two days!! Thank you, Amazon-you saved the day!!!!! 11/10 As described I bought this for one of my Grand Sons he really likes this game. Thank you very much! Great game It worked. It’s not the game for me though. Red Dead is where my heart is, always and forever. Great product Got this for my Xbox one. Since I had it on 360 and I still love the game! Love the game got it for 16 dollars and it was delivered in one day Give for a gift

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