#protectors are fallible and will not always do the protecting ..

[bredforloyalty]

when i first watched coraline i didn't notice this or like it must have stayed subconscious but her mother (the real one, at the beginning) is so much like mine

[ragingstillness]

Recently caught up on the Black Butler anime and manga and it just reminded me of how much I love the series. Also made me realize that the last time I caught up was so long ago that I’ve never written any meta for it and I have things to say:

Obviously the selling point of the series and what fascinates me the most is the relationship between Sebastian and Ciel (note: NOT a romantic relationship! Relationship as in a connection between two people). They have one of my favorite kind of relationships which is one that doesn’t really fit in any typical relationship boxes. It’s too nebulous, too flexible for it. Are they father and son? No not really. Are they siblings? Definitely not although they do occasionally fight that way. Hero and sidekick? Nope. Cousins? No. Teacher and student? No, they switch those roles around too much. The closest I can get is Bodyguard and Client but even that doesn’t fit. The only right word is partners but partners in what is not clear.

There’s multiple motivations on Sebastian’s side. He’s clearly intrigued by Ciel and by humanity in general, albeit not enough to feel anything about killing them. He’s hungry, eager to eat Ciel’s soul. He’s invested in Ciel and his goals because of this. But he’s also protective of Ciel and Ciel’s mission. Somewhere along the line that change occurred and imo we see that change confirmed during the Campania arc.

Ciel returns this new understanding when he orders Sebastian to rest after fighting zombies all night and comments on having never seen Sebastian injured before. The barrier of untouchable immortality between them has come down a bit. They have always schemed together but in the arcs that follow they seem to be working more together than working alongside each other.

Above all else, my hc is that Sebastian is bored, or was bored, with the life of a demon who quickly devoured souls. And Ciel, Ciel is interesting. He doesn’t act like the humans Sebastian has eaten before and he’s entirely unafraid of him, confidently striding into his own doom. That’s a new experience for him. It’s worth enough, adds some undefined richness to Ciel’s soul, that makes it worth the wait.

Ciel’s motivations for beginning the relationship are incredibly transparent. He was in danger and he cried out for help. He was weak and needed a strong ally. He was afraid and needed a protector. Over time that grew into having duties as the Queen’s Watchdog and needing an impossible secret weapon to wield.

Ciel’s motivation to continue the relationship and the way he reacts to Sebastian is more complex. He likes being the king, likes feeling invincible, and Sebastian’s presence gives him that. But at several points during the series he is forced to stand on his own. He faces down Madam Red alone, he destroys the circus’ “Father” alone, he utilizes social engineering to ingratiate himself to the other students alone, and he has to keep both himself and Lizzie safe alone on the Campania.

Of course Sebastian joins him eventually in every one of these situations but slowly Ciel realizes that he can’t rely on Sebastian to save him 100% of the time and begins to develop skills of his own. Of course this comes to a head on the Campania when he sees Sebastian get seriously injured for the first time and has to come to terms with his invincibility being fallible. At that point he’s faced with a choice, to give in to fear and lash out at Sebastian for not being perfect or to accept the limitations and resign himself to being scared yet charge forward bravely. He stops seeing Sebastian as untouchable and while he certainly doesn’t forget that Sebastian isn’t human, he begins to treat him more as a person who is working with him towards the same goal. He even reciprocates the protectiveness a tad, in asking Sebastian to rest and also in his taunts to Ronald that “his butler could never be so weak as to lose to him” (paraphrasing).

The manga bears this pattern out, with the two of them sticking closer together than before when they go into the forest, seeking treatment together, not spending time alone, sticking close for the idol arc and partnering up for the current arc. Some of that closeness is fear, but it’s also an acknowledgement that they work better together than independently. There’s less of Ciel as a damsel in distress and more fighting together, tricking people together, discussing mysteries together.

And even still, the relationship is impossible to pin down. Partners in crime implies a similar skill level and a similar age (generalizing) which is certainly not the case here. Sebastian can do pretty much anything Ciel can, except for the things that only Ciel can do, such as leveraging his peerage and making connections based on human emotions, which Sebastian doesn’t have and doesn’t understand. The differences in age, in socialization, in levels of empathy, in species, in opinion, they are too tangled to come up with a single label and I love it.

I could gush about all the other reasons I love this series but it’s late and I have work in the morning so I’ll cut it here for now. Anyway, would love to hear people’s thoughts.

[stargazer-sims]

Journal Entry #23 (part one)

previous // next // story index

__________

Yuri

Complacency is dangerous.

I’m sorry to say, this week I’ve learned that lesson the hard way. More than sorry, in fact. I bitterly regret that yet again I failed to see something which should have been obvious, because I was so wrapped up in the illusion of my perfect little life. That’s my weakness. I know it now, and I know I have to change, not just for myself but for Victor too.

The problem is, I think I’m scared of the real world. The one I’ve been believing in is so much better. In that one, there’s always someone to take care of me, shower me with affection, protect me and shelter me from everything that’s bad. But in the real world, there’s pain, stress and complex interpersonal relationships, and there are no heroes who'll swoop in to save the day and create a happy ending.

Even the strongest people are fallible. Even the ones who love us most can still hurt us. Even the ones we feel safest with can’t shield us from everything. Unfortunately for me, I’ve often forgotten those truths, or chosen to overlook them because they were too hard to face.

All I’ve ever wanted is to be happy and safe. Until I met Victor, I didn’t know what happiness or safety felt like, and once I understood how good it was not to be sad and afraid all the time, I never wanted to experience anything that challenged or scared me ever again. I was sure I’d found a willing protector in Victor, and I’d selfishly placed almost all the burden of responsibility for my happiness and safety on him, and took on very little for myself. Worse, I don’t think I’ve ever taken nearly enough responsibility for his happiness, much less my own.

That position is unsustainable, and I wish I would’ve figured it out sooner.

If I could rewind time and go back to last Wednesday morning, I would, and I’d make different choices. The first thing I would do would be to insist that Victor call in sick from work. We might’ve avoided a lot of trouble if he’d stayed home. I might not have learned anything in that case, but at least no one would’ve gotten hurt.

Victor hadn’t been feeling well when he woke up on Wednesday. I may actually have realized he was getting sick before he did, because he was coughing through the night and it woke me up. As I was trying to get back to sleep, I noticed his breathing sounded different than normal. Most people might not even pay attention to that, but I’m ill so often myself that I think I’ve developed some sort of hyper-vigilance for signs of illness in others.

In all honesty, I’d actually expected him to stay home on Wednesday and was surprised when he chose not to. He did stay home on Thursday and Friday though, and as much as I dislike not being close to him, we mostly avoided each other in the hope that it’d lessen my chances of catching his cold. Maybe that’s something I’d want us to do differently if given a second chance as well.

On Saturday morning, I answered my phone to a woman who introduced herself as Tomiko Izumi, Victor’s boss. The fitness center is open seven days a week, but Victor only works from Tuesday to Friday, so I was a caught little off guard by the call. I don’t know why, but for some reason I’d assumed he and his supervisor would work the same shift.

“I tried calling Victor’s phone, but he isn’t answering,” Tomiko said. “This number was listed as his emergency contact.”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m Yuri, his spouse.”

I'll confess, I like saying that. It requires less explanation than ‘soulmate’ and seems to carry more power. We’ll always be soulmates, but in certain circumstances, following the path of least resistance is what’s called for.

“Well, I guess you’re best placed to know when he intends to come back to work,” Tomiko said. “That’s what I’m calling about.”

“I’ll have to get him to call you,” I told her. “I’m not sure when he’ll be ready either. Hopefully by Tuesday, though.”

Tomiko and I chatted for a couple of minutes, and she gave me some instructions to pass along to Victor.

“I hope he gets well soon,” she said. “Everyone at the centre misses him.”

“I’ll let him know,” I said, and then we exchanged goodbyes, and hung up.

After getting off the phone with Tomiko, I went to Victor’s room to check on him. I hadn’t been in his room more than twice since Wednesday evening. It felt a little strange to simply walk in, even though that’s what we both typically do when we enter each other's room. As I crossed the threshold, I wondered if I should have knocked.

The first thing I noticed was that he had his normal colour back, not pale like he’d been on Wednesday, and not flushed with fever like he’d been overnight on Thursday.

His eyes were closed, but I could tell he wasn’t asleep. I knelt beside the bed and touched his arm. "Hey,” I said. “It’s almost ten o'clock.”

It took him a second to acknowledge me, but finally he said, “Okay.”

“You’re looking much better,” I observed. “How are you feeling?”

He made a sound that was like the vocal equivalent of a shrug. “I don’t know.”

“Do you feel like getting up?”

“No,” he said.

“Do you want some tea, or something to eat?”

“No.”

“Your boss called,” I told him.

“Uh-huh.”

“She wants to know if you’re still sick. She says if you’re not going to be back by the time your shift starts on Tuesday, you’ll need a doctor’s note.”

“Okay.”

“So, do you want me to take you to the doctor, or do you think you’ll be better after the weekend?”

“I’m not going to the stupid doctor,” he said testily. “I probably won’t be better, but if my boss wants me at work on Tuesday, I’ll be there.”

“If you’re not better, she’s not expecting you back,” I assured him. I reached out to caress his cheek. “It’s okay. I can take you to the clinic. It’ll be—”

He nudged my hand away from his face. “Yuri, I said I’m not going to the doctor,” he snapped. “How many times do I have to say it?”

His tone was like a slap. Victor had never spoken to me like that before, and the shock and hurt I felt seemed almost physical. I was willing to accept a little irritability, considering that he wasn’t feeling well, but I was not at all prepared for such an irrationally angry reaction over my simple suggestion of going to the medical clinic for a quick examination and a doctor’s note.

“I… I’m sorry. I heard you the first time,” I said, my voice small and shaking. “But I’m worried. If you’re really that sick, I think you should see a doctor.”

“Can you just leave me alone, please? Stop harassing me about it.”

“I’m not trying to harass you,” I said. “I only want to be sure you’re all right. You’ve barely been out of your room for the past three days, and you haven’t been eating, have you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does. If anyone should know that, it’s you.”

“Yeah, I know, but maybe I don’t care.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said. “Can you please just do as I asked, and leave me alone?”

“Fine,” I said, trying to force down my own sudden spark of anger. “You can have the whole house to yourself. I have to do the grocery shopping and go to the post office anyway. Then, I might see if Takahiro and Seiji want to do something. I can be gone all day if that’d suit you.”

I got up and started to turn away, but Victor caught me by the wrist. “Yuri, wait.”

“Let go of me,” I said.

Instead of releasing me, he tightened his fingers around my arm. “You can't go out. Stay here.”

I tugged against his grip. “Victor, let go!“

“You can’t go out by yourself,” he said. “Please.”

“Make up your mind!” I exclaimed. With a backward lurch, I succeeded in freeing my wrist. Unluckily, inertia continued to propel me, and with nothing holding me in place any more I stumbled and landed on my backside on the floor.

After that, It was like time stopped. The look on Victor’s face was one of absolute horror, as if something from his nightmares had become real. As for me, I gave up trying to maintain any semblance of emotional control.

“Yuri, I…” Victor began, but didn’t seem capable of getting beyond that.

“What do you want?” I shouted at him. “Do you want me to leave you alone, or do you want me to stay here? Tell me, or I’m making my own decision, and it’s not going to be to stay in this house with you!”

Victor stared at me, and not unpredictably I saw tears starting to leak from the edges of his eyes. I shouldn’t have been surprised. He cries over everything.

He climbed off the bed and started to move toward me. “Yuri, I’m sorry. I… I didn’t mean… Are you hurt? Can you get up?”

“You’re supposed to protect me,” I said. “You promised.”

“I know,” he said, his voice already strained and diminished by his tears. “That’s what I was trying to do.”

“What?”

“I want you to be safe,” he said. “But… I don’t know how to protect you. Not this time.”

“This time? What are you talking about?”

He moved closer, “Come here,” he said, holding his hands out. “Let me see if you’re okay.”

Let me see if you’re okay.

Something about that phrase made my chest constrict in instant fear. My mind flashed back to a moment over five years ago, when someone else had hurt me and had said those same words, exactly like that.

One of Ren’s favourite things to do was to trap me in the corner of a room or against a wall, a door or the refrigerator; any place he could hold me with only one arm and prevent me from moving. He’d use the other hand for… exploring.

This one time in particular, Ren had pinned me on the wall in his bedroom. He’d held me there with one hand pressed into my collarbone, while he tried to unbutton my shirt with the other. When I’d struggled a bit too hard, he let go of my shirt and used both hands to push me into the position he wanted. He shoved forcefully enough that the back of my head struck the wall. I cried out and he let go of me, and I slipped right through his grasp and ended up sitting on the floor.

I’m sure he hadn’t planned to injure me, and I think for a fraction of a second he’d been scared. He’d knelt down in front of me, and in the soft voice he usually reserved for apologies, he'd implored, "I didn't mean to hurt you, Yuri. Let me see if you’re okay."

"Don’t touch me,” I said to Victor, just as I’d said to Ren on that day five years ago.

Victor stretched his hand out toward me, not touching, but looking like he wanted to. He said, “Yuri, I didn’t mean to—“

"Don’t touch me!” This time, I yelled it so loudly my voice cracked.

Victor’s face went white, and he snatched his hand back, clutching it to his chest. ‘Dismayed’ would not have been a strong enough word to describe his expression. I saw in his face the precise moment that something inside him shattered. He inched away from me, as if now he was the one who was afraid.

Of course, I’m remembering all this in hindsight. I was experiencing it then, but I wasn’t processing it. I’m sure I was operating on pure reflex in that moment.

As soon as I judged the distance between us to be enough, I scrambled to my feet and dashed out of the room. I didn’t stop until I was shut securely behind the door of my own bedroom.

Across the hall, only slightly muffled by the closed doors, I could hear Victor sobbing; huge, noisy, anguished sobs that would normally tear at my heart and have me rushing to comfort him. But this time, I told myself I didn’t care. I was angry and scared, and it was his fault. He could console himself.

I didn’t cry. I lay on my bed and stared up at the ceiling, my mind racing frantically to interpret what had just taken place.

Calm down, Yuri, said the rational part of my brain. You have to calm down. You need to think logically and then decide what to do.

My instinct was to run as far and as fast as I could, but the rational part quietly questioned whether that was necessary. It said running would be an overreaction. I felt as if my instinct was shrieking at my rational mind to shut up, that running would be the only way I’d be safe, but eventually the thinking part won over the feeling part.

For a long time I lay still, breathing deeply in the way Victor had taught me. Fifteen-second breathing, he calls it. Breathe in slowly through the nose for a count of five, hold for three, and exhale through the mouth while silently counting to seven. The technique is meant to help manage pain, but I’ve found that it helps me settle just as effectively when I’m feeling anxious or frightened.

After several repetitions, the haze of fear and anger in my brain cleared. I still wasn’t completely calm, but at least I was once again capable of thinking logically.

I raised my arm to inspect my wrist and found myself gazing at my beautiful snowflake bracelet. It was undamaged, and when I carefully slid it higher on my arm, I saw there wasn’t even a mark on my skin beneath it. I took a moment to mentally assess the rest of my body. Other than a growing ache in my stomach, nothing hurt. I was fine.

I lowered my hands and covered my face, feeling completely foolish.

Victor wasn’t trying to hurt me, hadn’t harmed me in the least, in fact. The truth was, I’d been utterly terrified by the prospect of being restrained and I panicked. That, and I was upset and confused by Victor’s inexplicably hostile behaviour and had somehow read my own meaning into it.

I thought I’d managed to purge my mind of all the fear, pain and anger I’d lived with when Ren and I were together. I’d convinced myself that Victor’s gentleness and unconditional love for me had healed me somehow, and that my wounds had disappeared. Of course, that was a convenient lie. I'd let myself be lulled into a belief that couldn’t possibly have made sense if I’d had the will to think about it.

My scars weren’t gone. I’d only been ignoring them. In a world where I was sheltered and spoiled and adored by my loving, gentle protector, setting aside thoughts of my past trauma became easier, and instead of getting the help I probably should’ve gotten, I chose to tell myself everything was all right.

But everything is not all right.

Up to this point, I’ve been fortunate. I’ve never had any reason to fear Victor and nothing he’s done has ever triggered a memory like the one I had just relived. Victor and I frequently disagree and we do raise our voices sometimes, but he's never acted aggressively toward me in any way.

I wanted to believe he wasn’t capable of it, but now I realize he’s as susceptible to emotional outbursts as anyone else. He isn’t immune to mistakes. He’s human just like me. Stupidly allowing myself to accept the fantasy I’d created about my perfect hero led me to a place where I not only felt hurt and betrayed when the slightest thing went wrong, but also to where my complete overreaction to that imaginary betrayal had likely done very real harm to Victor.

With that revelation, the last of my anger dissipated. In its place, I was flooded with shame. How could I have been so selfish and careless?

I’d accused him of not keeping his promise to protect me, but what had I done to protect him? What had I done to even acknowledge he needed protecting? I’d realized on Wednesday that something other than a cold was troubling him, but I hadn’t pursued it. I hadn’t tried particularly hard to find out what the problem was or offered to help him fix it, and the situation had evidently grown to a breaking point.

I’ll admit, I didn’t know what to do next. I didn’t think Victor would want to talk so soon after what had happened between us, but I wanted to say I was sorry, at least. And I wanted to be near him, even if that meant I had to sit in a corner of the room while he gave me the cold shoulder.

Slowly, I dragged myself off my bed and made my way across the hall. I knocked lightly on his door.

“Victor?” I called out. “Can I come in?”

He didn’t respond, which I suppose I should’ve expected. What I didn’t expect was to discover the door was locked when I attempted to slide it open.

I tried again. “Victor?”

Several seconds passed, and then came his quiet reply. “Stay away from me.” It sounded as if he was right next to the door.

“Can you open the door, please? I want to see you.”

“You didn’t want to see me before. Why would you want to see me now?”

Because I love you. Because I was wrong. Because I’m sorry.

Those are the things I should have said. What I actually said was, “Please, don’t be like that.”

“Like what?" he demanded. "Like somebody who’s upset because he always tries his hardest and still isn’t enough?" "

"You're more than enough," I said. "You're everything."

"Whatever," was the dismissive reply. "I don’t want to see you right now, and I don’t feel like doing whatever you expect me to do to make you feel better. Just for once, let's not make it all about you, 'cause I have feelings too, you know."

“Victor—“

"I’m not opening the door, Yuri. Go away.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, but it was evidently too late in the conversation for that, because my words were met with nothing but silence.

I slid down the wall and curled up on the floor, asking myself desperately how everything had spun so far out of control.

[edutainer2022]

Oh my, Scott's mind is indeed a minefield! So many excellent insights to navigate - and lots of traps his brain readily sets up for him.

He couldn’t help worry that sitting there and telling his younger brother of some of the horrors had made things more ‘worse’ than they needed to be, however. And then hearing John’s calm but clearly emotional description of witnessing his elder brother relive that time while feverish and incoherent…

That's really such a good thing they did group therapy with John. Scott needed a candid glimpse into how his turmoil affects those who love him. But of course, it's Scott, so his conclusions are maybe sideways - it's his fault, he shouldn't burden or scare them, he should be strong.

Scott hissed quietly to himself. It went against everything he stood for. He was supposed to have been the strong one, he was supposed to have shielded them from all of that. Too late now. His clear cut role as the protector had shifted irrevocably. He knew John, Virgil too, would now always feel more of a drive to look after him because they’d seen him at his worst, his weakest. He hated it. He hated it so much he wanted to burn the last three months from history and restore their innocent belief in their big brother’s invincibility again.

That's the point I really wanted to cuff him up his head! Because THAT'S THE POINT of healing - to share the burden and accept help. His role as protector is not set in stone - a protector needs protection too. Maybe Patricia needs to reach deeper than Bereznik for the root of Scott's almost obsessive need to protect, to shield his brothers, to control what hurts them - Mom. The loss that left him one on one with the world being chaotic and cruel - not receiving substantial protection from that elsewhere, he stepped up for his brothers. Then Dad - same thing. Response to trauma of captivity is maybe a symptom, not the whole problem. There's also a lot tied up to the self-image reflected in his brothers - if they think he's invincible, maybe he is. But if they see him weak and fallible - maybe he's not earning his keep. If he's not doing his job as protector - what is he even good for?

But it was what he didn’t see but had dreaded for a decade if the truth ever escaped in this way - the disappointment, the pity. They were missing, miraculously, gloriously absent from his brother’s reaction. What he saw instead was respect and admiration and acceptance and it had blown his mind. The idea that he could so utterly fail to be what he was supposed to be and John would still look at him that way was… well. He guessed he’d be processing that one for a while yet.

You do that, Scotty! The brother loves you unconditionally and, actually, too wants to control what hurts you - that is, nothing ever again. The brother looks at you and doesn't want an infallible bronze statue, he sees a human of extraordinary strength and courage - someone who came out of unimaginable pain still so full of love. If John even didn't think him a hero before, he certainly would now.

He’d seen it so vividly he’d sometimes woken believing he’d somehow been the perpetrator, having to race to the bathroom as his stomach let him know it was as disgusted with him as his mind was.

This is such an evocative glimpse into how persistent and creative Scott's mind is in weaving guilt. Real or perceived, or misplaced, or irrational, his brain just wouldn't LET GO of such a juicy way to hate and blame himself.

He knew now his mistake had been to show weakness. His reaction had clearly tipped them off that this… THIS was a way to torture him where more conventional methods had been less than effective.

Goodness, this is so cruel! Vicious! Of course they spotted an "in" - the tiniest emotional investment - and blew it up into a full on horror. The translator to make sure he got the details... That's truly next level mind games and torture. What if they looked up his family ties - father and brothers. What stopped them from saying they had Dad tortured or killed in the next cell over? Or Virgie kidnapped from university by their "agents"? And of course now he's also blaming himself for believing the spun lies. Under torture. Scott's brain indeed cuts him no slack whatsoever.

He blinked back tears as the relief washed over him yet again. If they’d only known it was much easier to make him cry with relief than with pain.

Scotty, you big ole sap! But who's to say they didn't know?

But the real, selfish reason was he needed to see her with his physical eyes again. To reinforce his belief she was real, that he wasn’t imagining it. So he could more easily picture her alive and happy. Hopefully then his subconscious would catch up and maybe sleep would be less… complicated. Was it ok to want to do something just because it would make him happier? People often said it was… he’d just never been convinced.

Sure, Scotty, you're not allowed to want anything for your own sake ever. You're selfish and needy. You don't deserve to see or talk to people because they make YOU feel better. You can only do, have, give or be things that are useful to others or are demanded/expected by others of you. You shouldn't impose your company on anyone and you should, preferably, just quietly martyr yourself for humanity's salvation not to bother anyone. That's exactly how it should be. *end pained sarcasm* Oh dear... There's SO MUCH to unlearn there. And SO MUCH self-worth to build up from scratch (it's in negative numbers now). I can't imagine where he should even start... Bless Virgil for suggesting a hack to be kinder on Scott's psyche, but it's like a warzone there. His mind is his own worst enemy. Doctor Patricia has A LOT of work cut out for her. It's good Scott sought counsel to check if his company would also be good for, not damaging to Estera. But hey... chatting with an acquaintance, even a friend, and offering facetime shouldn't be the military campaign of logistics and self-doubt, and second guessing. It's okay.

He had spectacularly failed to follow Patricia’s previous advice about not letting himself feel responsible for the woman. He already felt as though the fact Estera was alive was an invisible thread holding him together, keeping him steady, keeping him here. That… might not be ideal.

No, it's not ideal. Which is, yay, self-awareness! But it's also external validation and measuring worth by an external factor. It's a duct tape and a Hail Mary, holding him together right now. And, sadly, it can't last for long. She could have died in the warzone later that same day for reasons, absolutely unrelated to his actions (because warzone). She may be hit by a bus now (literally) - something tells me Scott is gonna readily make it his fundamental fault and failure, unironically. If only her phone is run over by that bus - Scott would probably find a way to believe he was too intrusive, imposing, and she didn't want to ever speak to him again. I'm making an educated guess here.

Estera - Ch 20 - Thread

Things are ticking along nicely aren’t they? Could so easily leave it there… but… nah, life isn’t that easy chaps.

It’s been a while since we last saw the rambling chaos that is (in my imagining at least) the inside of Scott’s head. So we shall have a little catch up with that. And a smidge of Estera’s too, just to keep it even.

Recrudescence (to which this is a sequel) and earlier chapters are here.

✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

The interior designer had done everything possible to make it not feel like a clinical setting but you only needed to come a couple of times before the high-end-hotel-lobby look developed an association with the reasons behind the reason you were there.

Scott sat in the waiting room and tried to lose himself in the wallpaper. John had managed to spend 7 minutes tracing a continuous line through the swirls from one side of the room to the other but frankly Scott didn’t have that sort of patience.

He sighed and looked up at the ceiling, casting his mind back to the time they had come to see Patricia together. It had been good. Awful. Genuinely awful. He shivered. But objectively a good thing. As she often said “It usually needs to get worse before it gets better”. He couldn’t help worry that sitting there and telling his younger brother of some of the horrors had made things more ‘worse’ than they needed to be, however. And then hearing John’s calm but clearly emotional description of witnessing his elder brother relive that time while feverish and incoherent…

Scott hissed quietly to himself. It went against everything he stood for. He was supposed to have been the strong one, he was supposed to have shielded them from all of that.

Too late now. His clear cut role as the protector had shifted irrevocably. He knew John, Virgil too, would now always feel more of a drive to look after him because they’d seen him at his worst, his weakest. He hated it. He hated it so much he wanted to burn the last three months from history and restore their innocent belief in their big brother’s invincibility again.

But.

The revelation had been what he saw in John’s eyes that afternoon.

The horror, he’d expected.

The simmering anger, yes.

But it was what he didn’t see but had dreaded for a decade if the truth ever escaped in this way - the disappointment, the pity. They were missing, miraculously, gloriously absent from his brother’s reaction. What he saw instead was respect and admiration and acceptance and it had blown his mind. The idea that he could so utterly fail to be what he was supposed to be and John would still look at him that way was… well. He guessed he’d be processing that one for a while yet.

Scott hadn’t told him everything though. Not the very darkest part. He’d said only what was necessary to explain what his little brother had been forced to endure with him. He hadn’t mentioned Her: His first great failure.

Then she’d exploded back into his life and it turned out that she wasn’t.

He hadn’t.

They… hadn’t.

Ten years of nightmares as his subconscious picked through what they’d told him and treated him to the lowlights. What she’d endured because of his arrogance in thinking he could make a difference. How much more painful and humiliating her death was thanks to him. He’d seen it so vividly he’d sometimes woken believing he’d somehow been the perpetrator, having to race to the bathroom as his stomach let him know it was as disgusted with him as his mind was.

He knew now his mistake had been to show weakness. His reaction had clearly tipped them off that this… THIS was a way to torture him where more conventional methods had been less than effective. He should have spotted the story became more embellished each time. Should have realised what they were doing. They’d even brought an interpreter to his cell, just to make absolutely sure he understood every last detail. The man had looked so sick, so disgusted by the words he was forced to say. He wondered what happened to the guy… if it ever kept him up at night too.

If only Scott could let him know it wasn’t true. They hadn’t… he hadn’t.

She wasn’t.

Because it meant everything. He blinked back tears as the relief washed over him yet again. If they’d only known it was much easier to make him cry with relief than with pain.

Nothing was immediate though, not even Thunderbird One and especially not the process of persuading his unconscious mind that things had changed. Probably 75% of the times an image of her came to mind it was… not a good one. As Virgil had suggested, every time it happened he tried to imagine her face as she’d sat across the table and teased him about the action figure. The little grin and flash of mischief in her eyes. But that memory was weak and fleeting compared to how reinforced the decade old ones were.

Which was why he was here to see Patricia.

Because he wanted to see Estera again.

Yes, of course it was partly to check she was ok… he was still worried about her. She still seemed very alone, although she had at least opened up a little in her messages he was concerned that might be her only outlet beyond the weekly half hour session with the state-provided counsellor. Oh, and the dog. Seemed like she talked to the dog a lot.

But the real, selfish reason was he needed to see her with his physical eyes again. To reinforce his belief she was real, that he wasn’t imagining it. So he could more easily picture her alive and happy. Hopefully then his subconscious would catch up and maybe sleep would be less… complicated. Was it ok to want to do something just because it would make him happier? People often said it was… he’d just never been convinced.

If she hadn’t been keen, he’d forget it. He wasn’t THAT selfish. But she seemed keen last time he mentioned it. She’d even seemed pretty pleased to hear from him when he’d accidentally called her in the middle of the night, once she’d gotten over the very Virgil-esque half-awake grumpiness. Scott had nearly called again several times since but couldn’t quite think of a good enough excuse and so had ended up channelling his desperation to know she was alright into another silly joke or a jibe about the British weather or asking after the kids in her class.

He had spectacularly failed to follow Patricia’s previous advice about not letting himself feel responsible for the woman. He already felt as though the fact Estera was alive was an invisible thread holding him together, keeping him steady, keeping him here. That… might not be ideal.

It was certainly going to be a different Patricia conversation to the usual. For once, he knew exactly what he wanted. The question he needed to get straight was: was it a good idea?

✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

The sky was a brilliant blue.

So very close to the shade she loved most of all, toned down perhaps a little by the faintest wisps of cloud lingering in the stratosphere. As she let the surgery door swing shut behind her and paused at the top of the ramp, the wind dropped to the merest breath as if the world was pausing, waiting for her next move.

“Look, see? The UK can manage sunny weather after all.”

Ah, she was doing it again. Chatting away in her head to the imaginary blue-eyed friend she’d carried with her so long he felt closer than family. Not that he ever spoke back… she wasn’t that far gone.

It was still a bit of a shock every time she realised she could actually communicate with the real life version now - she took a quick photo of the sky and a seagull swooped into shot just in time. Nice. She sent it over and watched for a few moments to see whether it would show as received. It didn’t. She pushed back the tendril of panic that edged up her spine. He was just busy. And he’d said Dawn would let her know if anything happened and she hadn’t heard anything so logically everything was fine. Everything was fine.

The gull wheeled, seemingly aimlessly, far above and she watched it for a while before shaking herself and striding purposefully towards the footpath for the main road and the bus stop. She’d booked herself a treat for after the appointment today and didn’t want to miss the bus that would get her there in good time.

That had been the 6th session of the 12 she would get, and so in theory she should be half way there to sorting herself out. It was always hard to know immediately afterwards, as she generally came out feeling as though she’d been run over by something large and extremely weighty… perhaps Virgil Tracy’s big green behemoth… but things were improving. The dreams were still an issue, but she wasn’t losing focus on the present nearly so often during daylight hours and that was definitely something to be thankful for.

The guilt, ‘survivor’s guilt’ as the counsellor called it though Estera hated the phrase because, as she’d pointed out on at least two occasions, she had done far worse than just survive, was perhaps the heaviest thing. She understood and mostly agreed on an intellectual level that it was irrational and, particularly as the supposed victim of her actions didn’t appear to blame her, it was something she should let go of. She knew it in her head. But the knowledge hadn’t made it as far as her heart and she accepted it likely never would. Perhaps she was just supposed to carry the burden… as a way of redressing the balance somehow.

She jumped backwards as a seagull dived to snatch a discarded piece of pastry from a few feet in front of her. She wondered if it was the same one she’d photographed and proceeded to distract herself from more unhelpful trains of thought by trying to work out whether it had been pasty or pie it had scored. A small piece of filling remained behind on the pavement - probably apple? Or potato. Bez would have happily eaten it either way of course.

The bus tracking display on the shelter clicked over to “due”. She straightened up and pulled out her phone in readiness to pay but it vibrated suddenly, slipping from her hands and skidding into the road. She saw the message notification pop up just as the bus swung around the corner.

✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

[thecataclysmic6]

hey! So uh, I think I might be a system, but can't find any good information anywhere, and was wondering if you could help! I was wondering what it felt like to be a system, and what the roles are and what they do, and if you can be a system without having trauma(actuly still debating that, parents might have been verbally abusive)

Sorryuf this is insensitive or something, I just dint know where else to go.

Hi there! I'm glad you felt comfortable enough to reach out to us for information! Sorry for the late post, we've been dealing with personal issues and wanted to be able to give you a (hopefully) decent answer. At the bottom of the post I've included a few terms to help your research in the future!

As always I'm not a doctor, I'm a patient. I'm not here to diagnose you and I am fallible so there may be somethings I get wrong from time to time. This is gonna be a long post so buckle up!

So what is a system? When a child is young around the age of 6-10 give or take, a child's personality develops in sections. Overtime, in a healthy child these parts will come together to form one whole person. However if a traumatic incident happens while the personality is still forming, barriers may be created between the parts and may prevent them from becoming one whole person, but rather separate personalities developing on their own. After the original separation, the brain may feel inclined to do so again with future traumas even after the age of 10. As for whether or not this can happen without trauma, is something that I'll cover below.

What does being a system from there feel like? Once these personalities are separate, they often take on their own identities. Between me and my alters, we all have different likes, wants, and feelings. We may have differening opinions and sometimes don't get along. For us, its less of having friends in our head who do things for us but rather a group project that noone seems to know what the assignment is. I personally am a part of an OSDD-1B system, so my experiences may differ slightly from systems where amnesia between alters is higher. Some systems go a long time before even knowing there are other parts.

So, what are system roles? System roles help describe to others or even to a main alter in charge how each member functions in the system. These roles are not strict by any means and you should never force an individual alter into complying with a role. Think of them as descriptors rather than forced jobs that alters MUST do.

Here's a few roles as we understand them. Hosts and co-hosts often are the alters who take care of most day to day life and tend to be some of the most frequent fronters. Protectors are alters who's main goal is to protect the rest of the system from danger or trauma. Caretakers are alters who's main goal is to take care of the rest of the body/system. Persecutors are alters who's actions often intentionally harm the body or system. Littles are just alters who are stuck at a childlike state or age. These are only a few common ones and not every system will have all of the above.

As for whether or not someone can be a system without trauma? This is where things get tricky. CDDs such as DID and OSDD are covert disorders stemming from trauma. These disorders are formed intentionally to keep trauma hidden to keep the rest of the system safe. Now. I would like to say something very serious. Do NOT go looking for trauma. Especially not without the help of a guided professional such as a trauma therapist or psychologist. It takes a very strong mindset and if you are not ready to face anything of that degree then you will need a strong support system to fall back into. So do not go looking for trauma to justify being a system.

Here's some terms that I think might help you to do some research into! Again try your best to look outside of blog spaces and use multiple sources to cross check if available.

As for whether or not a nonCDD system can exist without trauma? It's theoretically possible. It's still under alot of research and discrepancy if I'm being honest. And likely our experiences as systems would be very different. Personally I can't speak too well on this front as I myself am formed from trauma. I implore you to do research into this topic outside of tumblr and syscourse spaces as there is misinformation everywhere here. But that's all I will say on this topic.

DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder)

OSDD (Otherwise Specified Dissociative Disorder, type 1a and 1b specifically)

CDD (complex dissociative disorders)

ANPs (Apparently Normal Parts)

EPs (Emotional Parts)

Alters or Parts

System Roles

Protectors

Persecutors

Caretaker/caregivers

Littles

Introjects

Fictives and Factives

Nonhuman Alters

Dissociation

Dissociative Amnesia

If someone else believes I missed anything or wants to add, I encourage it! (Please no syscourse funny business though)

And of course anon, I hope this post helped a bit and I wish you luck on your journey about discovering things about systems and maybe something about yourself.

[theggning]

Do you think Danse will ever accept that the Brotherhood was toxic? On the one hand, he doesn't have a lot of respect for Elder Lyon. On the other hand, joining the Minutemen is the most logical ending for him (he's even tagged as one post BB), so he effectively ends up as part of "Lyon's" group again. I'm wondering if he'll change his mind, or always feel that he has to settle for something inferior.

Great question. And honestly, I’m not sure he’ll ever dismiss the Brotherhood as a whole as toxic.

People gripe about Danse not turning against the BoS even after he’s kicked out, which while disappointing in some ways, is A. a gameplay limitation, sorry, that’s how video games work and B. expecting a man who has believed heart and soul in something to the exclusion of his own well-being for well over 10 years to instantly and immediately drop it. It’s not reasonable to expect that of anyone.

Danse is barely beginning to believe that he even deserves to live, but I think after some time he will be able to accept two difficult truths: that the BoS’ intolerant human-centric views are wrong, close-minded, and blind to nuance, and that the BoS did him outrageously dirty. He is nowhere close to this at the end of his canon arc, but I believe his dialogue indicates that he will eventually reach this point. He needs to be removed from total immersion in the BoS’ culture to allow him to see the ways that its negative aspects have poisoned him and changed him for the worse. (One reason I absolutely hate the “alternate”/”original” end of Blind Betrayal that allowed you or Danse to become Elder.)

But I don’t know that Danse is ever going to dismiss the BoS as an entirely toxic organization. To Danse, the BoS provided him food, shelter, protection, and a purpose for his life. It helped him reach his full potential as a skilled and competent soldier, not just a struggling junk merchant. It is the only family he has ever known. Part of him is always going to see it that way, and believe that his life has been made better by his time in the BoS. Even if he acknowledges that Maxson was rash, or that he was personally treated unfairly, or that the organization is flawed and fallible, part of him will always believe in many of the BoS goals and ideals.

But I do think that those ideals are things he can also find with the Minutemen-- and indeed, reasons that he appreciates the Minutemen as a cause, if not as the organization currently stands. He believes in service beyond your own personal gain, in helping those who need it because it’s right, in using one’s strength to protect the weak. In that way, I don’t think that a MM!Danse would consider the MM “inferior” to the BoS. Technologically disadvantaged, yes. Less organized, certainly. But while Danse likes those aspects of the BoS, they aren’t who he is at heart. He’s a protector, a giver, a do-gooder, a soldier. With the MM, he can find all the things that the BoS gave him, even if they are in a different form.

Both the BoS and the MM have their problems and really bad aspects, but I wouldn’t personally call either an entirely toxic organization. The fallibility of ideals and organizations is a major theme in Fallout, and both factions have a lot of interesting things to say about it.

(And though Danse talks bad about Lyons, which is the current “party line” as far as the BoS is concerned, many of their current practices and Maxson’s policies are lifted directly from Lyons.)

[tawakkull]

Love and Mercy in Islam: Love of God.Part2

How significant the above couplet is; not only does it remind us of our position, it also stresses reality. If a human being is a mysterious mirror of the concealed Beauty, which is, without a doubt, the case, then a person must turn to Him with the eyes of his or her heart, lying in wait to witness the manifestations, and expecting breezes that will take him or her to residences of deeper love. Also, in order to please Him, and thus, to become one favored by Him, a person must make use of each and every means available on the road leading to His intimacy. Like a key in the lock of the Hidden Treasure, his or her heart must keep turning all the time. As such, if love is Solomon and the heart is the throne of Solomon, it goes without saying that the sultan will ascend the throne, sooner or later.

Once Solomon ascends the throne, or in other words, when love meets the heart, people always think of Him, speak to Him in the inner world and taste His blessings, openly and explicitly, in the water they drink, in the food they taste and in the air they breathe. Moreover, they feel the warmth of His intimacy in all actions. The relationship of the tides of closeness and love deepens and their hearts begin to burn as if on fire. At times, they are destroyed by the fire of love, yet, never do any of them complain and thus, never do any of them tire others with their sighs. In contrast, such people consider these to be a gift bestowed by Him. They burn like a furnace without smoke or flames. Like chastity, they preserve their joy and love for God, never revealing any secrets to more tactless people.

This road is open to everybody. Nonetheless, it is essential that the traveler be sincere and determined.

If believers find out that all of beauty, perfection, greatness, excellence, magnificence belong to God, then they turn to God with all the willingness, love, and affection that have been brought about by these means and they love God with a love that is fit for His Sublime Being. This love, if not passion, is for Him and it is the source of human love and desire in a unified manner. After all, in a heart that is confined to uniformity and that relies on Islamic principles, one can never observe any deviation, let alone any disorder of love. Believers love God because He is God, and their love for God is not connected to any earthly or unearthly considerations. They filter and test the gushing springs of love and the waterfalls of their desire for God with the Holy Qur'an and the principles of the most exalted spirit.Such people also use these as a barrier in the path that they follow with human fallibility. Even at times when they are completely consumed with the fire of love, they act righteously and justly. Never does presumption interfere in their love for God. Instead, regarding Him as the Real Owner and Protector of everything, Who is known with His Divine Names and Attributes, they love God wholeheartedly with a clean, sacred and reverent love.

Believers love God more than anything, prior to and in the aftermath of everything as the Real Beloved, the Real Desired, and the Real Worshiped.

They desire God and through every possible action they cry out that they are the servants of God. For the sake of this devotion, they love in the first place Prophet Muhammad, the Pride of Humanity, who was the loyal attendant, the true interpreter of God’s Essence, Names and Attributes, the end of the succession of prophets and the essence of messengership, peace and blessings be upon him. Following him, they love all the other prophets and people of sainthood who were the true vicegerents, the purest mirrors, and devout servants of Almighty God, who were in charge of representing divine purposes and supervising the building, design, and order of the world. Next they love youth, for it is conferred by God as an advance credit upon humankind so that they can better understand and evaluate this finite world. After that, they love this world, for it is an arable field of the other realms and also a manifestation of His Beautiful Names. Then they love their parents, for, being heroes of affection and mercy, they undertake the responsibility of looking after their children. Finally they love children, for they sincerely protect their parents and have an intimate closeness to them, as well. All these can be regarded as signs of cordial affection toward God and of love for the sake of God.

Unbelievers love people as if they were loving God, while believers love them because of God; these two are totally different.

This sort of Godoriented love, which is experienced through faith and prayers, is unique to ideal believers. While the corporeal love based on waywardness and the evil-commanding self are the manifestations of sin and disobedience hidden in the nature of man, love of God and utterances of the lovers of God are like a sacred potion angels wish to drink. If this love grows to such an extent that the lovers forsake everything—material or spiritual—for the sake of the Beloved, leaving nothing for themselves, then there is merely the consideration of the Beloved in the heart. The heart girds itself with this consideration, beating accordingly, whereas eyes verbalize this love with tears. The heart reproaches the eye for releasing a secret, and the bosom for cooling down. Crying and bleeding inside, he tries not to let others discover his agony, and says:

You claim to be in love, then grieve not over the calamity of love,

Do not let others into your suffering from love. (Anonymous)

Actually, love is a sultan, the heart is the throne, and the groans of hope and longing uttered on the prayer rugs in the remotest corners are the voice of that sultan

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: Volume 6 “So That’s How It Is”

This is a re-posting from Nov. 17th, 2018 in an effort to get all my recaps fully on tumblr. Thanks! 

Real talk: that episode was 100% not what I wanted to see and honestly not what I thought we’d be getting after the tone of “The Lost Fable.” Yet here we are.

We start off with the gang having just finished Jinn’s vision, which surprised me a little bit. RT tends to delay gratification—Want to know how people will react to this plot point? If that person survived? Gotta wait a while longer!—so I was expecting to begin with the villains, if not push this confrontation an entire episode. Yet we kick things off with a voice over from Yang, highlighting the exact part of the story we knew she’d hyper-focus on:

Yang: “Salem can’t be killed. You all heard her too right?”

And we’re immediately back to where we were emotionally in episode two—which frankly drives me a little nuts. The entire purpose of getting glimpses of the team throughout the vision was to see their reactions to the events: Qrow lifting a hand towards Ozma, Ruby looking ill at Salem trying to kill herself, Blake and Weiss heartbroken over Salem’s grief, Yang horrified at what the gods were doing to them. On the one hand I agree that it’s incredibly realistic to have them lashing out like this. Put a bunch of teenagers through that much trauma, chuck a now fallible mentor at their feet, and they’ve got themselves a scapegoat they can’t resist. On the other hand, Team RWBY + co. has been portrayed as staggeringly better than this in the past, so it rings as at least a little false to me that they’d go this far. Not that they wouldn’t be angry, but that out of the six of them—including Oscar now—there’s not a glimmer of empathy alongside the anger. I understand entirely that we ended on the worst note possible (more manipulation by Jinn), but that doesn’t erase the fact that this is a) a large group of b) incredibly compassionate people who c) just spent 99% of that vision witnessing traumatizing events that weren’t Ozpin’s fault and feeling for him then. Bypassing one moment of sympathy for him or even hesitation at cutting him further feels less like realistic teenage fury and more like the writers deciding to ignore a large chunk of their characterization for the sake of drama.

Because what they witnessed aside, this is still Ozpin. He’s still the headmaster/friend they adored, still the man who taught them in Haven, still the huntsmen they fought beside in one of their worst battles to date. And here he is now after having his entire past ripped from him, back on his knees and crying. That’s an image that the protectors in them shouldn’t be able to brush aside so easily, especially when each of them has been through a piece of Ozpin's existence. Weiss knows what it’s like to have people more powerful than you pulling the strings. Yang understands anger that drives you to choices you’ll later regret. Blake has already fought against unimaginable odds (see: Oobleck’s lecture about how she wants to change the world but has no idea how to do it yet. That’s Ozpin). Ruby is familiar with being the eternal outsider—“I don’t want to be the bee’s knees! I just want to be a normal girl, with normal knees”—and Qrow, as he’ll mention in a moment, knows what it’s like to have nothing and no one. Ozpin was there for him then, but he won’t do the same for Ozpin now.

Let them have their anger, but let them act like themselves too.

Yang: “There was so much you hadn’t told us! How could you think that was okay?”

Yang in particular has a lot of displaced rage. She has since she was a kid and now Ozpin has become a very easy target to direct all that towards. Still, it doesn’t change how mind-numbingly frustrating it is to see these kids twisting every piece of information that comes their way. How could he think that was okay? Ozpin already gave you his answer. He said straight out that he doesn’t want to reveal all his secrets because the last two times he did that (Raven and Lionheart) he was betrayed and, presumably, that’s happened numerous times before. Yang insists that he can tell them his secrets. They’ll stand by him! But oh look, they wrenched the secrets from Ozpin forcibly and now they're not standing by him.

The girls are liars and hypocrites in this moment. Like I get it, they're also traumatized teenagers, but that doesn't change the fact that they're pulling the same shit Ozpin is currently getting all the flack for.  

I’ve mentioned before that there are a hundred reasons why Jinn’s answer to that question is complete BS. Even ignoring our audience-knowledge of how jinns tend to operate, we have the in-canon fact that she can’t answer anything about the future. Her answer regarding Salem's defeat is null and void in light of not knowing how the situation might change—how can she possibly say that Ozpin or another will never win? But even ignoring that too we have the additional fact that defeating Salem never was and never will be the true goal. Uniting humanity is. Keeping people safe from the grimm is. These are things everyone agreed to long before they even knew who Salem was. What? Did Team RWBY think they were going to wipe out the grimm in their lifetime? That they’d drive creatures to extinction that, as far as they know, have existed since the dawn of time? No. They were just planning to make the world a better place for as long as they could. They’d already agreed to a fight against an “impossible” to beat enemy. Fundamentally nothing has changed.

Yet Ozpin understands that suddenly learning that a Big Bad is immortal knocks a huge dent in everyone’s hope. He knows—largely from experience—that laying out the situation with no context or nuance (as Jinn did) will make people give up. And we already see it happening, not just in their reaction towards Ozpin, but in casual lines like Blake’s, “I just want to get this stupid relic to Atlas.” No doubt one of Ozpin’s greatest fears is that learning the truth will alienate people from fighting at all. It did for Raven. It did for Lionheart. And now it’s doing the same for the girls, with them acting like they just want to get the powerful relic out of their hands and then leave Ozpin to fight this war by himself. Though I don’t actually think the girls will give up (that would be a very different kind of story), that line is not reassuring right now and just re-emphasizes that Ozpin was right to be wary.

We also see it in Qrow’s exchange with Ozpin:

Qrow: “No one wanted me. I was cursed. I gave my life to you because you gave me a place in this world. I thought I was finally doing some good.”

Ozpin: “But you are—”

Qrow: “Meeting you was the worst luck of my life.”

No one is letting Ozpin finish. Yang demands to know why he kept his secrets and then cuts him off before he gets out more than an “I—”. They let him admit that he doesn’t have a plan, but no space to explain any context surrounding that statement. Here Ozpin tries to tell Qrow that he is doing good, he does have a place in this world, the existence of Salem does not suddenly negate everything else they’ve accomplished… but Qrow doesn’t let him get that far. At this point they’re not interested in listening to anything Ozpin has to say. This isn’t a conversation anymore, it’s an emotional witch hunt.

So is it any surprise that Ozpin eventually nopes out of there? Qrow has just punched him and, far more damaging, delivered that gut-wrenching line about how he’s the worst thing that ever happened to him. Again, context always matters. Two friends fighting and saying cruel things to one another? Not great, but survivable. Ozpin and Qrow aren’t just two friends though. Qrow is currently Ozpin’s only friend.

Let’s recap: His children are dead, his first host is dead, the original version of humanity that he knew? All dead. Who Ozma once was is gone, the gods he knew abandoned him, and the one remaining tie he has to his past is his genocidal ex-wife who’s hell-bent on killing him. Every host Ozpin has had since then has passed away or merged with him in some horrific amalgamation. His friends at Beacon are either out of reach or don’t know about his reincarnation trick and think he’s dead too. Raven sided with Salem over him. Lionheart, a friend for decades, sided with Salem over him. The children he’s traveling with are out for his blood, including the child he’s forced to share a body with. The one person he had left was Qrow… and Qrow just gave the biggest “fuck you” possible. Keep in mind the abuse coding from last episode and fill in the blanks of a couple thousand years. Then Ozpin told Salem the truth and was murdered along with his children. Now the truth comes out and he’s chucked into a tree and screamed at. Ozpin has been conditioned to expect nothing but violence when he bares himself emotionally… and people keep proving him right. He’s currently the lowest he's been in decades and there’s no one here to help pick him back up.

“Maybe you’re right," he says. Maybe I am the worst thing that’s ever happened to you all… so I’ll leave. As much as I’m able to, anyway.

The real kicker though? That’s just met with more anger. “That bastard!” Yang yells. “Tell him we’re not done yet!” Ozpin quite literally can’t do anything right in their eyes. Keep secrets to protect people? You’re evil. Spill secrets? You’re evil. Stick around to defend yourself? How dare you. Leave because you’re obviously not wanted? How dare you.

And you know what I just realized? At least one of the reasons why this arc feels so extreme to me? Because our characters are currently acting exactly like a large portion of the fanbase. For years RWBY viewers have demonized Ozpin and complained every time he came on screen, waiting for the day when the show would finally prove that he’s irredeemable trash. Except when that day came we actually learned that he’s a flawed, mortal man who was manipulated by a bunch of dick gods. Instead of acknowledging that hey, maybe we were wrong about his character, a huge portion of the fanbase has spent the last week grasping at straws in order to continue hating him. Ozpin has been sacrificing child soldiers to his war for millennia. (False). Ozpin has done nothing but lie to the cast since day one. (False). Ozpin raped Salem during his first reincarnation and was super abusive towards her. (False??)

Now we have this kind of mangled “justification” made canonical. Fans and characters alike are currently determined to make Ozpin their antagonist—no matter what.  

So Ozpin basically has a panic attack while still trying to give them what they supposedly want: a world where he’s not around to mess things up. Yet the girls’ hypocrisy is revealed once more. They despise every decision Ozpin makes… but still want him calling all the shots.

Weiss: “He just left us?”

Blake: “What are we going to do now?”

Newsflash, you can’t have it both ways. Lucky for them (since no one is willing to take on the responsibility that Ozpin has been shouldering) Maria steps up and announces that they need to put off this conversation until they’ve found someplace safe. Because grimm. Which is what they should have done in the first place and would have if Yang hadn’t thrown a temper tantrum. She starts yelling at Maria too—“Lady, I don’t know who you think you are”—which just further demonstrates how Yang is willing to take her anger out on anyone and anything that crosses her path. It’s not healthy. It’s certainly not fair to those around her and I really hope someone addresses this soon.

Maria: “I’m still coming to terms with the fact that this is Humanity’s second time around!”

You tell ‘em! Poor Maria was thrown into the deep end of the pool with no life preserver and she’s the only one managing to keep a level head. God bless this woman.

(Please don’t be evil, oh please don’t be evil.)

Maria: “If we don’t move we die and I’ll be damned if I’ve lived this long just to die out in the cold!”

And how long is that exactly? Long enough to have lived through the Great War? Inquiring minds want to know…

Ruby agrees though—beginning to segue back into her role as compassionate leader—and at her word everyone packs up the rest of their stuff and heads on out of that awful spot. Salt and burn the earth, girls. Leave it behind.

Except just when I think the emotional punches are through we get this horrible moment between Oscar and Qrow. Oscar tells Ruby, in an intimate moment of confidence, that he’s afraid he’s just going to be another life of Ozpin’s. Ruby immediately showed compassion again once Oscar switched back (reaching for him when he winced from the punch) and here she’s her old self again, reassuring him that no, he’ll always be his own person. That's the Ruby we love.

Then Qrow breezes by and denies it. “Don’t lie to him,” he says. “We’re better than that.”

Wow.

That was not okay. By any stretch of the imagination. Goddammit, Qrow, you’re the adult here and honestly I don’t give a damn how much you’re hurting right now, that doesn’t give you the right to take your anger out on an innocent kid. Oscar didn’t ask for this and the idea that he exists only to be Ozpin’s host is just blatantly untrue. You’re being cruel to him for cruelty’s sake which, I’d like to point out, we’ve yet to see Ozpin do. Despite all the trauma he’s suffered, he’s never taken his grief out on the children around him like that. He’s also never claimed to be above lying as Qrow just did. With the point being only that this group is making a LOT of mistakes right now while refusing to allow Ozpin his own.

With that lovely piece of advice we turn to the villains… which frankly felt like some much needed breathing room after “The Lost Fable” and these last five minutes. The fact that the villains’ plot-line is taking place in the past means that nothing revealed to them is news to the audience. Cinder’s alive? We knew that. Ozpin reincarnated? Obviously knew that too. The focus is instead on how they react to this information… and it turns out the answer is “Pretty damn violently.”

Before that though we see Hazel, Emerald, and Mercury arriving back at Salem’s palace (the same one that she and Oz once lived in together). I’ve already come across jokes about how Hazel is now the dad of the group, and while obviously this is just meant as a silly acknowledgement of some really flimsy compassion we see from him, Emerald does look to Hazel when she gets off the ship, clearly seeking reassurance after Cinder’s (presumed) death.

Tyrian is waiting to greet them and he’s his usual, creepy self—minus half a tail. Really though, he seems to have recovered quickly from Salem’s wrath last volume. He taunts Emerald about Cinder and when she threatens him he just cuts himself on her blade. Not gonna lie, I love Tyrian more and more as the series goes on. He’s the wild card of the group and as such remains endlessly entertaining.

Mercury is supportive of Emerald, helping her calm down a bit in the face of Tyrian’s taunts, and really all of this is a nice contrast to what we’re getting with Team RWBY: the villains are supporting one another while our heroes tear each other down. Remember all those references to how Salem’s victory will be in dividing humanity? Yeeeaah.

She’s obviously displeased with the report. Hazel tries to take responsibility for the defeat and, uh, this happens:

Look familiar? I’m getting very worried about what that intro shot of Qrow and the grimm arms is going to mean.

So Hazel is tortured for a while until Emerald admits that it was Cinder’s fault they lost. It’s all some really horrible mind games on Salem’s part: ask for an answer and torture the guy who provides you with one, get Emerald to call out the one person she cares for, casually drop that this person still lives, intimidate Watts for questioning her. Tyrian is the wild card, yes, but we know now that his ramblings about his “Queen” aren’t so random after all. Salem is still playing the part of the God we saw in Jinn’s flashback and her followers treat her accordingly. They do as she says out of fear. It’s what Salem lays out in the trailer: they can have their own desires, but only if they don’t interfere with her own.

Hazel drops the bomb that, oh yeah, your ex also reincarnated already, which puts an interesting twist on Salem’s anger. Meaning, I wonder if she’ll be more forgiving of their failure now that she knows they were unexpectedly facing Ozpin in Haven. Regardless, she’s not happy about the news.

At all.

We leave her letting one hell of a draft in and return to the gang. Yang bitches about how the path hasn’t led anywhere and Maria asks if she really doesn’t have anything “better to do than harass a defenseless old lady?”

More real talk: does Yang have experiences that explain her current attitude? Hell yes. Does all this make for compelling characterization? Absolutely. But right now I don’t like her. Having a reason to be angry doesn’t excuse the harm you do when you direct that anger towards those who don’t deserve it. From her pointing her weapon at Qrow to harassing Maria, I don’t think Yang is acting like a very good person right now and I haven't enjoyed her time on screen. An understandable development? Again, yes, but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s acting like a brat and encouraging everyone else to do the same.

Of course, as soon as she challenges Maria the path leads them to a farmhouse. Not that Yang is ready to apologize for her attitude (another big difference between Ozpin’s mistakes and others’: he’s constantly apologizing for his). Weiss notes that the place looks deserted, but at least it’s better than staying out in the cold.

…Is it though? That farmhouse looks creepy as hell and I don’t trust it. To say nothing of the fact that we’ve got that sewer place from the intro right next door.

And that’s where we end up, the gang walking into this abandoned, potentially grimm-infested farm while they’re all pissed at each other and the gate squeaks ominously closed behind them. Oh yeah. I’m feeling real good about the next episode.

(Not.)

Other Details of Note

I’m intrigued by the fact that Jinn seems to have dissipated immediately after finishing her story, both because personality-wise she seems like the kind to stick around and gloat, and also because they’ve still got one question left. We saw Awful Facial Hair Oz ask his questions back-to-back, so unless Jinn streamlined things for convenience’s sake there doesn’t seem to be a wait period between each question… I don’t know. Narratively it makes sense (wanna clear Jinn out so there’s no distraction from the Ozpin bashing), but in-world the rules governing these relics seem a little murky.

So Salem knows Cinder is alive. I wonder if that’s connected to the grimm arm she gave her. If Salem has ties to Cinder that she hasn’t bothered to explain yet. Hmm. Wonder if she can control Cinder’s arm like she does the other grimm…

Salem also mentions the Sword of Destruction and intended to go after it before she heard that Ozpin had already reincarnated. Will that be the next relic on the list then?

With the exception of Ruby fighting the sewer grimm and everyone facing off against someone off screen, we’ve hit on most of the imagery from the trailer and intro already. I’ll be interested to see what the rest of the volume holds since it looks like that vast majority of that material is being kept carefully under-wraps.

Still looking forward to reconciliation. Still putting a lot of stock in that one image from the intro lol

[hufflly-puffs]

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Chapter 21: Hermione’s secret

“And yet – is it good for him to be given so much special treatment? Personally I try to treat him like any other student.” – There is some truth to it, as Snape treats all his students horribly, except for the Slytherins.

“Harry stared up into the grave face and felt as though the ground beneath him was falling sharply away. He had grown used to the idea that Dumbledore could solve anything. He had expected Dumbledore to pull some amazing solution out of the air. But no … their last hope was gone.” – Dumbledore is, within Harry’s perspective, but also largely seen by the wizarding community, an almost God-like figure. And this is not just based on his powers, but the immense trust that Dumbledore will always make the right choices, and will always have a solution, even if everything seems hopeless. This marks the first time where he apparently doesn’t know what to do next, where he seems fallible. In the Harry Potter series the children are forced to grow up at a very young age, because of how their school system works, but also because in the later books a war is going on, forcing them all to make choices no child should have to make. And among all Dumbledore is build up as the big protector and saviour. Hogwarts is build up as the safest place on earth, but this safety is due to Dumbledore. With him gone Hogwarts becomes a place of terror as well. And with Dumbledore’s death also starts Harry understanding that Dumbledore was human after all, that he made mistakes, and that because of who is he is, those mistakes have very serious consequences. Their relationship has never been healthy – Harry puts a blind trust in Dumbledore and Dumbledore did manipulate Harry, knowing he was needed for a greater goal.

I love how Dumbledore was super vague, instead of just telling Harry and Hermione to save Buckbeak, so that Sirius could escape on him. Thank God Harry had one of his smarter moments and figured it out.

I love that in a book that is so much about the past we learn that it is impossible to change the past. Everything Harry and Hermione do has already happened. Because it isn’t just about the past – it is about letting go of the past. Snape has never learned to let go, the same way Sirius still lives in the past. He tries to rewrite the past, tries to make things right again, but fails. Harry learns more about his past, especially his father, how he is a part of Harry, and how this shapes his identity.

“It was time for the rescuer to appear – but no one was coming to help this time – And then it hit him – he understood. He hadn’t seen his father – he had seen himself” – This is such a powerful moment, when Harry realized that it had been himself all along who saved him. And this is an ongoing theme – Harry has people around him who try to save him and protect him, but ultimately he saves himself. And it is another step in him coming of age – to realize that there is not always someone around to save him (not Dumbledore, not his father), that the person he has to rely on is himself. It is a lesson we all have to learn, an important lesson, though most of us learn it much later in life. Accept help whenever it is offered to you, but at the same time trust yourself, and more importantly save yourself.

[wisdomrays]

LOVE AND MERCY IN ISLAM : Love of God.Part2

How significant the above couplet is; not only does it remind us of our position, it also stresses reality. If a human being is a mysterious mirror of the concealed Beauty, which is, without a doubt, the case, then a person must turn to Him with the eyes of his or her heart, lying in wait to witness the manifestations, and expecting breezes that will take him or her to residences of deeper love. Also, in order to please Him, and thus, to become one favored by Him, a person must make use of each and every means available on the road leading to His intimacy. Like a key in the lock of the Hidden Treasure, his or her heart must keep turning all the time. As such, if love is Solomon and the heart is the throne of Solomon, it goes without saying that the sultan will ascend the throne, sooner or later.

Once Solomon ascends the throne, or in other words, when love meets the heart, people always think of Him, speak to Him in the inner world and taste His blessings, openly and explicitly, in the water they drink, in the food they taste and in the air they breathe. Moreover, they feel the warmth of His intimacy in all actions. The relationship of the tides of closeness and love deepens and their hearts begin to burn as if on fire. At times, they are destroyed by the fire of love, yet, never do any of them complain and thus, never do any of them tire others with their sighs. In contrast, such people consider these to be a gift bestowed by Him. They burn like a furnace without smoke or flames. Like chastity, they preserve their joy and love for God, never revealing any secrets to more tactless people.

This road is open to everybody. Nonetheless, it is essential that the traveler be sincere and determined. 

If believers find out that all of beauty, perfection, greatness, excellence, magnificence belong to God, then they turn to God with all the willingness, love, and affection that have been brought about by these means and they love God with a love that is fit for His Sublime Being. This love, if not passion, is for Him and it is the source of human love and desire in a unified manner. After all, in a heart that is confined to uniformity and that relies on Islamic principles, one can never observe any deviation, let alone any disorder of love. Believers love God because He is God, and their love for God is not connected to any earthly or unearthly considerations. They filter and test the gushing springs of love and the waterfalls of their desire for God with the Holy Qur'an and the principles of the most exalted spirit.Such people also use these as a barrier in the path that they follow with human fallibility. Even at times when they are completely consumed with the fire of love, they act righteously and justly. Never does presumption interfere in their love for God. Instead, regarding Him as the Real Owner and Protector of everything, Who is known with His Divine Names and Attributes, they love God wholeheartedly with a clean, sacred and reverent love.

Believers love God more than anything, prior to and in the aftermath of everything as the Real Beloved, the Real Desired, and the Real Worshiped. 

They desire God and through every possible action they cry out that they are the servants of God. For the sake of this devotion, they love in the first place Prophet Muhammad, the Pride of Humanity, who was the loyal attendant, the true interpreter of God's Essence, Names and Attributes, the end of the succession of prophets and the essence of messengership, peace and blessings be upon him. Following him, they love all the other prophets and people of sainthood who were the true vicegerents, the purest mirrors, and devout servants of Almighty God, who were in charge of representing divine purposes and supervising the building, design, and order of the world. Next they love youth, for it is conferred by God as an advance credit upon humankind so that they can better understand and evaluate this finite world. After that, they love this world, for it is an arable field of the other realms and also a manifestation of His Beautiful Names. Then they love their parents, for, being heroes of affection and mercy, they undertake the responsibility of looking after their children. Finally they love children, for they sincerely protect their parents and have an intimate closeness to them, as well. All these can be regarded as signs of cordial affection toward God and of love for the sake of God.

Unbelievers love people as if they were loving God, while believers love them because of God; these two are totally different. 

This sort of Godoriented love, which is experienced through faith and prayers, is unique to ideal believers. While the corporeal love based on waywardness and the evil-commanding self are the manifestations of sin and disobedience hidden in the nature of man, love of God and utterances of the lovers of God are like a sacred potion angels wish to drink. If this love grows to such an extent that the lovers forsake everything—material or spiritual—for the sake of the Beloved, leaving nothing for themselves, then there is merely the consideration of the Beloved in the heart. The heart girds itself with this consideration, beating accordingly, whereas eyes verbalize this love with tears. The heart reproaches the eye for releasing a secret, and the bosom for cooling down. Crying and bleeding inside, he tries not to let others discover his agony, and says:

You claim to be in love, then grieve not over the calamity of love, Do not let others into your suffering from love. (Anonymous)

Actually, love is a sultan, the heart is the throne, and the groans of hope and longing uttered on the prayer rugs in the remotest corners are the voice of that sultan.

[mariannewhughes]

Here’s Why We Think Galaxy Folds Are Failing

Who could have guessed that Samsung’s Galaxy Fold would be such a fragile PR nightmare? The iFixit folks who take apart and investigate mobile devices for a living, that’s who.

We’ve watched as Galaxy Fold review units broke for The Verge, CNBC, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal, and YouTube reviewer Marques Brownlee, each in interesting ways. And while it’s a new device, maybe even an all-new category, there’s still some aspects of the Fold’s brutal first act that we recognize.

I spoke with iFixit’s Lead Teardown Engineer Sam Lionheart about the Fold and the broken units we’d seen glimpses of thus far. I also talked with Dieter Bohn of The Verge about his experiences with his broken review unit. We talked about some potential problems with Samsung’s nearly $2,000 potential trendsetter. What follows are guesses at how the Fold is failing―informed guesses, based on more than a decade of examining the guts of similar devices, but guesses nonetheless.

First Off: OLED Screens Are Really Fragile

Samsung is the world’s leading maker of OLED displays, both by experience and market share. It makes the OLED displays for the iPhone X series, its own Galaxy phones, and about 89 percent of the world’s AMOLED displays as of 2017. OLED displays have many advantages over more typical LCD displays: they work without backlights, they’re more power efficient, they can create brilliant colors. Most importantly, they’re the only kind of display that you can use in this kind of folding, hinged phablet.

But OLED screens are also far more delicate than LCDs, and prone to complete screen failure rather than localized damage. Any small crack in the encapsulation layer around the OLED layer can fatally damage the organic materials inside the display. As industry-watching site OLED-info notes, “OLEDS are very sensitive to oxygen and moisture and so the encapsulation layer is critical.” You get a sense of their brittleness from seeing repair techs and enthusiasts talk about OLED fixes on Reddit.

The edges of OLED displays, in particular, are something Lionheart and other iFixit techs find challenging to disassemble or repair without damage. “We’ve definitely damaged those displays more when tearing them down, especially when curved,” Lionheart said. “It’s really easy to separate the OLED from the glass, and once that happens, that’s usually it for the screen.” Curved displays are particularly tough to fix, as shown in our Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge teardown.

OLED displays are like tiny, extremely thin cleanrooms you carry around, and any intrusion or stress on them is likely to kill their delicately balanced work. You might be able to see where we’re going with this.

OLED Plus Particles Equals Death

Knowing how OLEDs react to prying, moisture, oxygen, or nearly anything, it’s plain to see—from reviewers’ photos alone—that the Fold is literally inviting trouble into its fragile innards.

In pictures posted in The Verge’s hands-on impressions (before their Fold review unit broke), you can clearly see gaps at the top and bottom of the hinge when the full screen is open. A close-up of the hinge on its side, with accumulated pocket detritus, makes it even clearer. And the back of the Fold, even with the hinge closed or partially open, doesn’t look airtight.

“These are some of the biggest ingress points I’ve seen on a modern phone,” Lionheart said. “Unless there’s some kind of magic membrane in there, dust will absolutely get in the back.” It’s important to note, too, that Samsung has offered no IP rating for the Fold.

Bohn finds it baffling the way his Fold unit broke. Especially because the first time he saw a “bump” under the Fold screen was late one night. After consulting with Samsung, he closed the phone and put it aside until the morning. The next day, examining the phone, Bohn saw two bumps under the screen.

“It seems odd to me that it appeared where it did,” Bohn said. “It’s hard to believe that I would not have noticed a piece of debris inching its way up from the bottom.” To us, this suggests the debris, both pieces, may have gotten in from the back hinge. Backing this up is German reviewer Lorenz Keller, who tweeted at Bohn that his Fold also developed a bump, at a point that was the mirror opposite of Bohn’s defects. Keller’s bump eventually went away, which may be the result of the hinge being open enough to allow debris back out.

Photos make it clear that while the screen is supported on its left and right panels, there’s flex room between the panels, as there must be for the device to bend with such a tight radius. That means a thinly-encased OLED screen bends inward and potentially presses against objects that got inside. The inside of the device shows three hinges along the spine. If dirt can get into the spine of the Fold, it could also accumulate around those hinges, bringing them in contact with the fallible OLED layer, and that might explain the similarity between the bumps on Bohn and Keller’s review devices.

Why make a device with a fragile OLED layer, so little tolerance between screen and spine, and so many ways for dirt and moisture, to get in? Hubris? Testing with robots instead of real humans, with pockets and fingers and different ways of opening and closing things? These are questions that may go unanswered, even if we learn the cause of the defects.

Why Pre-Installed Screen Protectors Went So Wrong

Three of the review units that broke were due to the removal of a protective polymer layer that Samsung never intended for people to remove, as captured by Marques Brownlee.

PSA: There’s a layer that appears to be a screen protector on the Galaxy Fold’s display. It’s NOT a screen protector. Do NOT remove it.

I got this far peeling it off before the display spazzed and blacked out. Started over with a replacement. pic.twitter.com/ZhEG2Bqulr

— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) April 17, 2019

Samsung states that the layer is not for human hands to remove, nor will it support additional sreensavers. That tells you something about the display underneath. Pre-installed protective layers are not new; Samsung’s S10 series sports them. But because the flexible display is so fragile, people removing the protective layer—conditioned by years of removing the shipping plastic on their brand-new phones—are pressing their fingers and fingernails against the underlying surface, as well as applying uneven pressure across it. RIP OLED.

Robot Folding Versus Human Folding

What’s the difference between robots built by Samsung, Lewis from UnboxTherapy, and Dieter Bohn from The Verge? They all close the Fold with different gestures. Samsung’s robots, which the company states folded test devices 200,000 times, are pressing with perfectly even pressure across the phone’s outer plates, and opening with a similar even-force grace. In most situations, Dieter and Lewis press somewhere inside the display, on the display, to push the hinge out of its stay-open state and close the phone, then opening the phone up like a book, with their thumbs. Dieter tends to press near the bottom center of the Fold’s left panel, while Lewis, in opening and closing the Fold 1,000 times, hits a few different points in the middle and bottom. Yet another reviewer, Soldier Knows Best, closes the phone with a press in the upper-left of the inside display.

While no media review devices have yet failed due to folding issues, it’s worth noting that if any debris is inside the Fold’s hinge, or underneath the screen protector, pressing on the screen to close it could damage or aggravate the OLED enough to cause failures or problems. Neither reviewers nor yourself are likely to press very hard to close it, but uneven force, applied over thousands of instances, can lead to problems makers don’t always test for, Lionheart said. Samsung’s robots are running inside a cleanroom, while humans are using these devices in real-world conditions: lunch tables, outdoors, and in a hurry on the subway.

A Few More Potential Problems

From what we can tell, the Fold doesn’t seem to have a pre-scored line down the middle of the display to guide the screen when it folds. This is likely a benefit to the aesthetics of the device, so the screen resembles one big display instead of two distinct panels. But without a scored line, the pressure from folding is applied in many different places, instead of down one uniform line.

Lionheart, who majored in graphic communication at college and spent considerable time around printing presses and label applicators, wonders if the crease in the Fold “can wiggle a bit, if you push on one side or another.” That kind of uneven pressure could cause kinks or puckers on the display, which might be an alternate explanation for the damage seen in the Verge review phone.

Both Bohn and Lionheart said that the Fold’s display would seem to need some kind of “play” or “float” to keep the screen from pressing against the edges of the display when opening or closing. “Like a carpet threshold, maybe,” Bohn said. Carpeting can stand to be pushed around a bit inside a container, but, as noted, OLED displays are not made to be bunched up or pressed upon by anything other than fingers.

We look forward to having more pictures and insights from the Fold as soon as we can take one apart. It’s a device with a lot of stories to tell.

Photos courtesy of The Verge.

[stargazer-sims]

Journal Entry #24 (part one)

Yuri

Complacency is dangerous.

I'm sorry to say, this week I've learned that lesson the hard way. More than sorry, in fact. I bitterly regret that, yet again, I failed to see something that should have been obvious because I was so wrapped up in the illusion of my perfect little life. That's my weakness. I know it now, and I know I have to change, not just for myself but for Victor, too.

The problem is, I think I'm scared of the real world. The one I've been believing in is so much better. In that one, there's always someone to take care of me, shower me with affection, protect me and shelter me from everything that's bad. But, in the real world, there’s pain and stress and complex interpersonal relationships, and no heroes who swoop in to save the day and create a happy ending. Even the strongest people are fallible. Even the ones who love us most can still hurt us. Even the ones we feel safest with can't protect us from everything.Unfortunately for me, I’ve often forgotten those truths, or chosen to overlook them because they were too hard to face.

All I’ve ever wanted is to be happy and safe. Until I met Victor, I didn’t know what happiness or safety felt like, and once I understood how good it was not to be sad and afraid all the time, I never wanted to experience anything that challenged or scared me ever again. I was sure I’d found a willing protector in Victor, and I’d selfishly placed all the burden of responsibility for my happiness and safety on him, and took very little on myself. Worse, I don’t think I’ve ever taken nearly enough responsibility for his happiness, much less my own.

That position is unsustainable, and I wish I would’ve figured it out sooner.

If I could rewind time and go back to last Wednesday morning, I would, and I’d make different choices. The first thing I would do on the second pass would be to insist that Victor call in sick from work. We might’ve avoided a lot of trouble if he’d stayed home. I might not have learned anything in that case, but at least no one would’ve gotten hurt.

Victor hadn't been feeling well when he woke up on Wednesday morning. I may actually have realized he was getting sick before he did, because he was coughing through the night and it woke me up. As I was trying to get back to sleep, I noticed his breathing sounded different than normal, too. Most people might not even pay attention to that, but I'm ill so often myself that I think I've developed some sort of hyper-vigilance for signs of illness in others.

Anyway, I'd actually expected him to stay home from work on Wednesday. To my surprise, he didn't. He did stay home on Thursday and Friday, though, and as much as I dislike not being close to him, we mostly avoided each other in the hope that it’d lessen my chances of catching his cold. Maybe that’s something I’d want us to do differently if given a second chance as well.

On Saturday morning, I answered my phone to a woman who introduced herself as Tomiko and said she's Victor's boss. The fitness center is open seven days a week, but Victor only works from Tuesday to Friday, so I was a caught little off guard by the call. I don't know why, but for some reason, I'd assumed he and his supervisor would work the same shift.

"I tried calling Victor's phone, but he isn't answering," Tomiko said. "This number was listed as his emergency contact."

"Yes," I said. "I'm Yuri, his spouse."

I confess, I liked saying that. It required less explanation than ‘soulmate’ and seemed to carry more power, too. We’ll always be soulmates, but in certain circumstances, following the path of least resistance is what’s called for.

"Well, I guess you're best placed to know when he intends to come back to work," Tomiko said. "That's what I'm calling about."

"I'll have to get him to call you," I told her. "Honestly, I'm not sure when he'll be ready either. Hopefully by Tuesday, though.”

Tomiko and I chatted for a couple of minutes, and she gave me some instructions to pass along to Victor.

“I hope he gets well soon,” she said. “Everyone at the center misses him.”

“I’ll let him know,” I said. We exchanged goodbyes, and hung up.

After getting off the phone with Tomiko, I went to Victor's room to check on him. I hadn’t been in his room more than twice since Wednesday evening. It felt a little weird, simply walking in, even though that’s what we both typically do with each other’s rooms. As I crossed the threshold, I wondered if I should have knocked.

The first thing I noticed was that he had his normal colour back, not pale like he’d been on Wednesday, and not flushed with fever like he’d been overnight on Thursday.

His eyes were closed, but I could tell he wasn’t asleep. I knelt beside the bed, and touched his arm. "Hey," I said. "It's almost ten o'clock."

It took him a second to acknowledge me, but finally he said, "Okay."

"You're looking much better," I said. "How are you feeling?"

He made a sound that was like the vocal equivalent of a shrug. "I don't know."

"Do you feel like getting up?"

“No,” he said.

“Do you want some tea, or something to eat?”

“No.”

"Your boss called," I told him.

"Uh-huh."

"She wants to know if you're still sick. She says if you're not going to be back by the time your shift starts on Tuesday, you'll need a doctor's note."

"Okay."

"So, do you want me to take you to the doctor, or do you think you'll be better after the weekend?"

"I'm not going to the stupid doctor," he said testily. "I probably won't be better, but if my boss wants me at work on Tuesday, I'll be there."

"If you're not better, she's not expecting you back," I said. I reached out to caress his cheek. "It’s okay. I can take you to the clinic. It'll be—"

He nudged my hand away from his face. "Yuri, I said I'm not going to the doctor," he snapped. "How many times do I have to say it?"

His tone was like a slap. Victor had never spoken to me like that before, and the shock and hurt I felt seemed almost physical. I was willing to accept a little irritability, considering that he wasn't feeling well, but I was not at all prepared for such an irrationally angry reaction over my simple suggestion of going to the medical clinic for a quick examination and a doctor's note.

"I... I'm sorry. I heard you the first time," I said, my voice small and shaking. "But, I'm worried. If you're really that sick, I think you should see a doctor."

"Can you just leave me alone, please? Stop harassing me about it, okay?"

"I'm not trying to harass you," I said. "I only want to be sure you're all right. You've barely been out of your room for the past three days, and you haven't been eating, have you?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does. If anyone should know that, it's you."

"Yeah, I know, but maybe I don't care."

"Why?" I asked.

"I don't want to talk about it," he said. “Can you please just do as I asked, and leave me alone?”

“Fine,” I said, trying to force down my own sudden spark of anger. “You can have the whole house to yourself. I have to do the grocery shopping and go to the post office anyway. Then, I might see if Taka and Seiji want to do something. I can be gone all day, if that’d suit you.”

I got up and started to turn away, but Victor caught me by the wrist. “Yuri, wait.”

“Let go of me,” I said.

“You can’t go out.” Instead of letting me go, he tightened his fingers around my arm. “Stay here.”

I tugged against his grip. “Victor, let go!"

“You can’t go out by yourself,” he said. “Please.”

“Make up your mind!” I exclaimed. With a backward lurch, I succeeded in freeing my wrist. Unluckily, inertia continued to propel me, and with nothing holding me in place any more, I stumbled and landed on my backside on the floor.

For a second, it was as if time stopped. The look on Victor’s face was one of absolute horror, as if something from his nightmares had become real. As for me, I gave up trying to maintain any semblance of emotional control.

“Yuri, I…” Victor began, but didn’t seem capable of getting beyond that.

“What do you want?” I shouted at him. “Do you want me to leave you alone, or do you want me to stay here? Tell me, or I’m making my own decision, and it’s not going to be to stay in this house with you!”

Victor stared at me, and not unpredictably, I saw tears starting to leak from the edges of his eyes. I shouldn’t have been surprised. He cries over everything.

He climbed off the bed and started to move toward me. “Yuri, I’m sorry. I… I didn’t mean… Are you hurt? Can you get up?”

“You’re supposed to protect me,” I said. “You promised.”

“I know,” he said, his voice already strained and diminished by his tears. “That’s what I was trying to do.”

“What?”

“I want you to be safe,” he said. “But… I don’t know how to protect you. Not this time.”

“This time? What are you talking about?”

He moved closer, “Come here,” he said, holding his hands out. “Let me see if you’re okay.”

Let me see if you’re okay.

Something about that phrase made my chest constrict in instant fear.

My mind flashed back to a moment over five years ago, when someone else had hurt me and had said those same words, exactly like that.

One of Ren's favourite things to do was to trap me in the corner of a room, or against a wall, a door, or the refrigerator; any place he could hold me with only one arm and prevent me from moving. He'd use the other hand for... exploring.

This one time, Ren had pinned me on the wall in his bedroom. He'd held me there with one hand pressed into my collarbone, while he tried to unbutton my shirt with the other. When I'd struggled a bit too hard, he let go of my shirt and used both hands to push me into the position he wanted. He shoved forcefully enough that the back of my head struck the wall. I'd cried out, and he let go of me, and I'd slipped right through his grasp and ended up sitting on the floor.

I'm sure he hadn't meant to hurt me like that, and I think, for a fraction of a second, he'd been scared. He'd knelt down in front of me. Let me see if you're okay.

"Don't touch me," I said, just as I'd said to Ren on that day five years ago.

Victor stretched his hand out toward me, not touching, but looking like he wanted to. He said, "Yuri, I didn't mean to—“

"Don't touch me!" This time, I yelled it so loudly my voice cracked.

Victor's face went white, and he snatched his hand back, clutching it to his chest. 'Dismayed' would not have been a strong enough word to describe his expression. I saw in his face the precise moment that something inside him shattered. He inched away from me, as if now he was the one who was afraid.

Of course, I'm remembering all this in hindsight. I was experiencing it then, but I wasn't processing it. I'm sure I was operating on pure reflex in that moment.

As soon as I judged the distance between us to be enough, I scrambled to my feet and dashed out of the room. I didn't stop until I was shut securely behind the door of my own bedroom.

Across the hall, only slightly muffled by the closed doors, I could hear Victor sobbing; huge, noisy, anguished sobs that would normally tear at my heart and have me rushing to comfort him. But, this time, I told myself I didn't care. I was angry and scared, and it was his fault. He could console himself.

I didn't cry. I lay on my bed and stared up at the ceiling, my mind racing frantically to interpret what had just taken place.

Calm down, Yuri, said the rational part of my brain. You have to calm down. You need to think logically and then decide what to do.

My instinct was to run, as far and as fast as I could, but the rational part quietly questioned whether that was necessary. It said running would be an overreaction. I felt as if my instinct was shrieking at my rational mind to shut up, that running would be the only way I'd be safe, but eventually the thinking part won over the feeling part.

For a long time, I lay still, breathing deeply in the way Victor had taught me. Fifteen-second breathing, he calls it. Breathe in slowly through the nose for a count of five, hold for three, and exhale through the mouth while silently counting to seven. The technique is meant to help manage pain, but I've found that it helps me settle just as effectively when I'm feeling anxious or frightened

After several repetitions, the haze of fear and anger in my brain had cleared. I still wasn’t completely calm, but at least I was once again capable of thinking straight.

I raised my arm to inspect my wrist, and found myself gazing at my beautiful snowflake bracelet. It was undamaged, and when I carefully slid it higher on my arm, I saw there wasn't even a mark on my skin beneath it. There were no marks on my wrist at all. I took a moment to mentally assess the rest of my body. Other than a growing ache in my stomach, nothing hurt. I was fine.

I lowered my hands and covered my face, feeling completely foolish.

Victor wasn't trying to hurt me, hadn't harmed me in the least, in fact. The truth was, I'd been utterly terrified by the prospect of being restrained, and I panicked. That, and I was upset and confused by Victor’s inexplicably hostile behaviour and had somehow read my own meaning into it.

I thought I’d managed to purge my mind of all the fear, pain and anger I’d lived with when Ren and I were together. I’d convinced myself that Victor’s gentleness and unconditional love for me had healed me somehow, and that my wounds had disappeared. Of course, that was a convenient lie. I let myself be lulled into a belief that, logically, couldn't possibly have made sense if I'd had the will to think about it.

My scars weren’t gone. I’d only been ignoring them. In a world where I was sheltered and spoiled and adored by my loving, gentle protector, setting aside thoughts of my past trauma became easier, and instead of getting the help I probably should’ve gotten, I chose to tell myself everything was all right.

But, everything was not all right.

Up to this point, I’ve been fortunate. I’ve never had any reason to fear Victor, and nothing he’s done has ever triggered a memory like the one I’d just relived. Victor and I frequently disagree, but he’s never raised his voice to me or acted aggressively in any way.

I wanted to believe he wasn’t capable of it, but now I realize, he’s as susceptible to emotional outbursts as anyone else. He isn't immune to mistakes; he’s human just like me. Stupidly allowing myself to accept the fantasy I'd created about my perfect hero led me to a point where I not only felt hurt and betrayed when the slightest thing went wrong, but where my complete overreaction to that imaginary betrayal had likely done very real harm to Victor.

With that revelation, the last of my anger dissipated. In its place, I was flooded with shame. How could I have been so selfish and careless?

I'd accused him of not keeping his promise to protect me, but what had I done to protect him? What had I even done to acknowledge he needed protecting? I'd realized on Wednesday that something other than a cold was troubling him, but I hadn't pursued it. I hadn't tried particularly hard to find out what the problem was or offered to help him fix it, and the situation had evidently grown to a breaking point.

I’ll admit, I didn’t know what to do next. I didn't think Victor would want to talk so soon after what had happened between us, but still, I at least wanted to say I was sorry. And I wanted to be near him, even if that meant I had to sit in a corner of the room while he gave me the cold shoulder.

Slowly, I dragged myself off my bed and made my way across the hall. I knocked lightly on his door.

“Victor?” I called out. “Can I come in?”

He didn't respond, which I guess I should’ve expected. What I didn’t expect was to discover the door was locked when I attempted to open it.

I tried again. "Victor?"

Several seconds passed, and then came his quiet reply. "Stay away from me." It sounded as if he was right next to the door.

"Can you open the door, please? I want to see you."

“You didn’t want to see me before. Why would you want to see me now?”

Because I love you. Because I was wrong. Because I'm sorry.

Those are the things I should have said. What I actually said was, "Please, don't be like that."

"Like what? Like somebody who's upset because he always tries his hardest and still isn't enough? I don't want to see you right now, okay? I don't feel like doing whatever you expect me to do to make you feel better. I'm tired of trying."

"Victor—“

"I’m not opening the door. Go away."

"I'm sorry," I said, but it was evidently too late in the conversation for that, because my words were met with nothing but silence.

I slid down the wall and curled up on the floor, asking myself desperately how everything had spun so far out of control.

[russellthornton]

White Knight Syndrome: Get Off Your Horse and Save Yourself First

Everyone assumes the knight saves the day. But, what if he is just playing the white knight syndrome and getting as much out of it as the damsel?

What does every good fairytale have? A white knight, of course. The white knight is the man who shows up at the end to save the day, makes the hurt go away, and whisks the damsel in distress away from the horrible situation she finds herself in. It is no wonder every girl grows up dreaming that somewhere out there is her version of the white knight. But what happens when a guy plays the white knight syndrome?

As time goes on, what women realize is that there is no such thing as a white knight. Some guys protect you more than others, but they are all human and fallible. Sometimes, when you need them most, they can be found in a bar trying to drink you away….

Happily ever after?

There are some guys who grew up with the same ideation of what a relationship entails and consider themselves to be the white knight put on earth to save a woman from the darkness she finds herself in.

Although the end of the fairytale story concludes with the damsel and white knight riding off together, that is never the end of the story. The “happily ever after” isn’t the ride away, it is what happens after you ride away. And, that ending, well, is never in a Disney film, is it? [Read: 15 subtle things that completely change after marriage]

11 things driving your white knight syndrome

If you are a guy who thinks it your duty, no wait, your obligation, to save a woman from either the bad situation she finds herself in, or, possibly even, from herself, it might be time to look at what you get out of it.

There is often a presumption on the part of the white knight that their actions are purely altruistic, but that isn’t necessarily true. For the white knight, if he wasn’t gaining something in the mix, why would he continue to put himself in harm’s way?

Love is a pretty powerful tool. It isn’t always the only thing that drives a white knight to come to the rescue, even at his own, or the damsel’s, demise.

Before you think you are sacrificing yourself and doing someone else a favor, figure out what is driving you to be the knight in shining armor, selflessness or selfishness?

#1 You want her loyalty forever. The white knight knows that if he slays the dragon and saves the princess, she will be forever grateful and “owes” him her life forever.

You might have the white knight syndrome if you try to gain unconditional love through your acts of valor instead of through true love. Saving her is awesome. Doing it so she will be indebted to you forever, isn’t so awesome. [Read: 15 ways true love sets itself apart]

#2 You need to have the upper hand. A white knight knows that once he shows his dominance, the damsel forever sees him as her protector. But, sometimes he wants more. Sometimes the white knight is looking for more power over her.

If you save her from something horrible, then you show her how “powerful” you can be, and put her in a submissive position.

#3 You want to be seen as “the good guy.” Sometimes the white knight sacrifices it all, not for the love of the damsel, but to show the townspeople how amazing he is. It isn’t about the love he feels for the woman he saves. It is more about the recognition and adoration he gets from everyone around him.

Being the guy who sweeps in and saves someone elevates you to a pretty big stature in a community, whether you do it intentionally or not. Adoration is pretty powerful. [Read: The 20 qualities in a guy that makes him a really good man]

#4 You are just as dependent on her as she is on you. There are times when the white knight saves the damsel because, without her, he would be lost forever. Fairytale romances rely on two characters, not just the damsel but the knight too.

There are times when men try to save unsalvageable women because they need them just as much as the damsel is needed. Co-dependent relationships aren’t about saving anyone; they are about dragging both down.

If you see she needs saving, and you just hang on because you can’t be without her, then you aren’t a knight. You are a co-conspirator of her bad behaviors. If you aid her in ways that you think help but are really only fostering her and keeping her stuck *i.e., cleaning up her mess*, that isn’t saving, that is helping to drown.

#5 You enjoy the sympathy. Some people live off the sympathy of others because it negates them from any responsibility. If you stick by a woman in a bad situation who continually puts herself there, then you aren’t there to save her, you are there to cry “poor me.”

If you tried to bring her out of it and aren’t able, but just run around trying to elicit sympathy by telling everyone how much you care and tried, consider the possibility that it doesn’t really have anything to do with her at all. It might be all about you needing attention and people to feel sorry for you. [Read: 16 signs you may have an attention whore in you]

#6 You are all about self-sabotaging. Self-sabotaging is a way we make choices knowing we fail and then saying, “See I knew it was going to fail.” If you have the white knight syndrome and this isn’t your first rodeo or chance at saving someone, then you might want to think about whether you enjoy sabotaging yourself for some reason.

We sabotage our own happiness for many reasons. What is it that you gain by setting yourself up in a situation where failure is the only result available?

#7 You couldn’t save someone in your past, so this is your second chance. Sometimes we grow up in families where we watch people we love destroy themselves, and we aren’t able to save them. That sets many adults on a path to right the wrongs of their childhood.

If you had an alcoholic mother or a drug addicted father, you might be trying to save someone to undo the past and the lack of control you had before. But you can’t ever save someone who doesn’t’ want to be saved. Not when you are a child and not when you are an adult. Saving someone isn’t your duty, it is their job. [Read: The nice guy syndrome – 16 real reasons why girls find you boring]

#8 You grew up watching a co-dependent relationship. If you grew up with parents who had a similar relationship where one always saved the other, then that is probably all you know.

Sometimes we are addicted to drama and co-dependent relationships because it is all that we know. So we seek out destructive relationships because we can’t handle normal and stable ones. If you grew up in a dysfunctional family *which almost everyone did*, try to change your future by leaving the damsel to work her own way out and save yourself for once. [Read: 17 relationship red flags most people ignore]

#9 You are a narcissist who thinks it is your duty to make things “right.” Sometimes a man has the white knight syndrome because he believes it his duty to morally protect and guide everyone because he is perfect.

If you save her just because you think you are the only one in the world who can, you’re that perfect, then maybe consider she doesn’t want to be saved. It isn’t your duty.

#10 You want her to be dependent on you. If you are the one who saved her, then she owes you her life forever. And, you are the only one capable of not only saving her, but keeping her safe. If you think if you save her once, she will forever be dependent on you, you’d better think about whether that is the type of relationship you want with someone.

Do you want her to love you because she loves you, or do you want her to love you because she must out of fear of being lost again? If you truly love someone, then you should want them to choose you because they want to, not because they fear the consequences of not staying. [Read: 20 glaring signs you have a control freak in you]

#11 You can’t save yourself so why not save someone else? There are many people so messed up inside that they focus on those outside themselves. Figuring they can’t save who they are or get themselves together, they might as well cure someone else.

Instead of always looking for someone to save to take the onus off of trying to change you, you might just want to take some time to figure your own shit out and let her figure her’s out. Once you have both gotten yourself together, it makes for a much better relationship.

[Read: How to woo a woman right: 17 secrets to sweep her off her feet]

Before you storm the castle, yet again, take the time to think about why you are always in the same white knight syndrome, what you get out of it, and, if it might be time to step back and instead save yourself.

The post White Knight Syndrome: Get Off Your Horse and Save Yourself First is the original content of LovePanky - Your Guide to Better Love and Relationships.