#scathing satire

[aoifereal]

My favourite ongoing halimede bit is whenever anyone's like. "Wow ms halimede, you're spitting facts :)" she always replies "I never spit >:(" it's so fucking stupid but it cracks me up every time I'm not expecting it it's so out of tone with the rest of her tweets. I'm really enjoying also people being mad at the halimede rp account for being a liberal like that isn't, like, her entire point.

[power-chords]

You have no idea how insane this makes me lmao and it’s tip of the iceberg stuff!!! BUDDY

[grendelsmilf]

your comments on reading convos w friends reminded me of a great review (Normal Novels in ThePoint) i read abt that book and normal ppl which talked a lot about the way "normality" crops up in rooney's novels and her "brand" and i thought maybe you'd be interested. (contains spoilers for the ending of convos w friends tho iirc)

i don't agree with everything said in this piece, but it is very incisive and an interesting read. thank you for sharing!

[chungledown-bimothy]

I cannot overstate how much I love Tom Lehrer's story. It sounds so fake but is entirely real.

He's a goddamn genius- he started studying mathematics at Harvard when he was 15 and graduated magna cum laude. He worked at Los Alamos for a few years before being drafted and working for the NSA, where he claims to have invented jello shots to get around alcohol bans.

He then went back to Harvard for a couple years before starting to teach political science at MIT.

Through all of that, he was writing and performing both some of the funniest shit you'll ever hear (Poisoning Pigeons in the Park, Masochism Tango) and absolutely scathing political satire (Who's Next, Wernher von Braun, Send the Marines). Until the mid/late 60s counterculture gained momentum. He didn't like their aesthetic, so he stopped making music.

Shortly after, he moved to California and started teaching math and musical theater history at UC Santa Cruz for the next 30 years.

I don't know if non-Californians understand just how goddamn funny that is. It's where stoners and math (and now computer science) kids who couldn't get into Berkeley go. Leaving Harvard/MIT for UCSC is peak academic phoning it in. And by all accounts he had a blast.

Plus the whole putting all of his music in the public domain thing. That fucked.

[arcticdementor]

Happy Monday, if you could call it that. But you can't. Like most Americans, you're probably still trying to digest what has happened over these past four days. Profound national trauma is like that. Once you face something unimaginably horrible, nothing is ever the same. Nothing will ever be the same. Like prison, it changes a man.  

This is not an easy time for any of us. We get it. We're literally –  literally – still shaking as we think about how close this country came to losing our democracy last Thursday. Last Thursday was June 16th, a day forever branded in our memory, a day that has joined the pantheon of tragic turning points in human history. Where were you on 6/16? You'll never forget and neither will we. At the time, we were preparing a show on Tony Fauci and his push for a new Corona shot for kids. It seemed important then. It seems so trivial now.

As we were speaking on the air at that very moment, a team of seven saboteurs had entered the Capitol grounds and then proceeded, as saboteurs do, to breach the Capitol itself. Inside those hallowed grounds, within the very womb of democracy, these wreckers began their hunt for sitting members of Congress. That happened, ladies and gentlemen, and if it sounds shocking to you, it gets more harrowing from there.

This was not some spontaneous outbreak of insurrection. No, this was a meticulously planned coup from afar. The group in the Capitol was under the direct control of an extremist called Stephen Colbert, who as a White man, is, by definition a White extremist.

…

While inside, the insurrectionists tried to gain access to a restricted area, but they were thwarted by brave law enforcement who arrived, risking their very lives to remove the insurrectionists from the premises. But it wasn't enough because hours later, an aide to Congressman Auchincloss secretly permitted the insurrectionists to reenter the Capitol complex. And then around 8:30 p.m., they cause some kind of disturbance. The details are murky as of tonight, but according to one report, they were banging on windows inside the Capitol, trashing the place, committing violence against our democracy. And for that, apparently, we are hearing tonight, they were put in jail, but within hours they were out again.  

Now, the man who controlled this attempted to coup, Stephen Colbert, knew exactly what he was doing. He knew the stakes. He knew the crimes he was committing and we know that because just last year, this White extremist, Stephen Colbert, explained that grown men who unlawfully enter the Capitol to harass sitting members of Congress are not pranksters. They're not protesters. They're domestic terrorists.  

STEPHEN COLBERT: Lord have mercy. There are some dark subjects that we talk about on the show occasionally, but I've rarely been as upset as I am tonight. This is the most shocking, most tragic, least surprising thing I've ever seen and his followers did what he told them to do. Behave in a way, that's ...what's the word? Deplorable. One of these domestic terrorists even broke into Speaker Pelosi's office and put his feet up on her desk. They now live in an alternate universe that is now collapsing in on itself. It's like a black hole of Whiteness, and this was never some sort of peaceful protest. This was Charlottesville come home to roost.  

…

We're scarred by what we saw. We're all Kasie Hunt tonight. It'll be a long time before we can revisit the Capitol building, before we can forget where we were when democracy shook on its very foundations. It's going to take therapy. It's going to take a lot of support from our fellow survivors before we can recapture the carefree innocence that Stephen Colbert stole from us, before we can feel safe again. We're not alone in our despair tonight. 

[necronatural]

Context on Project Moon discourse

I did some digging and watched some internet slapfights between Korean users, and collected as much context as humanly possible, trying to avoid hearsay where I can:

Misogynistic dudes start complaining about how sexless and non-waifu-female-heavy the game is, feeling the skimpy Sinclair outfit with the thotty little collar VS the fully covered Ishmael outfit is pointed feminist jeering (a law Hawkeye Initiative). Korean anti-feminists are really sensitive to pointed feminist jeering. More on that in a bit

Upon learning the identity artist is male, they trawl the rest of the staff to prove their stupid-ass theory.

They latch onto the lead CG artist, who has tweeted about feminism before.

Project Moon receives countless threats and people marching on their office IRL demanding to speak to the CEO.

The resulting hate campaign leads to Project Moon firing the lead artist for violation of contract; it was specifically requested by the company that all users delete political statements and controversial topics before joining, and the tweets the incels are using seem to prove that the worst case scenario for not adhering to the request has come to pass.

The thing is, she did delete the tweets.

This user has screencapped incels scrambling to justify their belief the game is for man-haters, including a statement that he had dug up deleted tweets. These are old records.

These are the retweets, all made before joining the company (but again, the policy was that the tweets like this should be scrubbed). Most of them are just being catty. The most extreme statements are a scathing satire even a child could understand, and some general feminist sentiments which are not incendiary in any way. It seems they were screencapped to cement a pattern of passionate feelings on feminism.

In Korea, feminism is considered a wedge issue, which means basic activism becomes extremely politically charged. Think of it like how trans issues are being treated in America at the moment, or how "Critical Race Theory" was a wedge issue like 2 years ago. Nevertheless, the most hateful statements in these tweets are not "feminist", but rather annoyance at misogyny, and pretty obviously jokes.

The tweet that the incels are latching onto here states "if being a feminist makes me Megalia, I am Megalia. If being against patriarchy makes me anti-social, I am anti-social". Megalia was a scumbag leftist radfem group originating from Korea's 4chan (anonymous messageboards). It was bad enough that banning gay slurs created a splinter group. Megalia was well-known for mirroring misogynistic behaviours back onto men. They were reviled. An actress lost her job for wearing a T-shirt this group sold, even though the funds were going to supporting women seeking legal actions. Association with Megalia was reputation poison.

Notice I refer to them in the past tense, because Megalia shut down in 2017. The tweet was in 2018. You could not get any more obvious that the statement being made was "you can insult me by calling me Megalia, but I still believe in feminism". There is no association with this incendiary group.

Incels "supported" their argument with an image of Yi Sang holding a vial in basically one of the only 2 ways you can hold a vial, calling it a reference to 🤏, an emoji used as the Megalia logo interpreted to mean "men have small penises". This insane interpretation is being used to cement the whole company as misandrist.

Therefore: Project Moon fired their lead artist even though she didn't violate her contract because insane incels did a "how dare you say we piss on the poor" bad faith misinterpretation of deleted tweets in order to justify their belief that Project Moon is a man-hating company, and as a man-hating company deserves to be annihilated, leading to threats to staff.

The artist for Leviathan later stated that Project Moon pushed the comic forward with no buffer, and when the schedule became unbearable, they just cancelled it. They were told there was an issue with production (supported by the fact the company dropped the translation in favour of focusing on the game), but this news has made the artist pessimistic about the company's treatment of their art team. (Update: deleted, with a statement they feel they felt attached to their debut work, and struggle with feeling like they ran away.)

Here's the artist Vellmori's twitter if you would like to support them through this period.

[whatbigotspost]

The legendary Boots Riley has taken Amazon money to make one of the most vehemently anti capitalist pieces of media I’ve seen in a minute.

Y’all need to watch I’m a Virgo. This lil summary here does it no Justice. It’s so much more…and above all, a scathing and effective takedown of our deeply fucked up economic system.

Don’t believe me? How about these people?

I binged the series earlier this week and really enjoyed it. One of the best parts of it is how it’s not just dealing in anti capitalist symbolism or passing implications. It’s overt OVERT. There are entire very hand-holdy explainer segments that even the most 101 level person can’t deny. There’s one character in particular, who explains in undeniable detail such issues as how capitalism REQUIRES there to be homeless/unemployed/exploited people who suffer for the profits of the mega wealthy. Or the power of collective action.

It’s not only a very interesting and unique show telling a compelling story, it’s offering like an associates degree in anti capitalist radicalization in 7, 30-some minute episodes.

[theotherpacman]

look I think death note is a really poignant satire of the japanese justice system.

(im not japanese but i am american so. im not saying the japanese justice system is worse than my country's or anything)

japan has one of the lowest homicide rates in the world, and one of the reasons for that is because homicides aren't fucking reported as homicides. they're reported as heart attacks or suicides, because the japanese police just want to say that they have a low murder rate and a high solve rate for murder cases: on a personal level they want good numbers so they can get promoted, but on a societal level they want the police to remain the good guys in the eyes of the public. and that's light. "heart attacks" and "suicides" and "accidents" all actually murders, covered up to uphold the societal ideal of the law as the ultimate good.

in japan, 99% of people charged with crimes are convicted. innocent people falsely accused are put under enormous pressure to confess, at which point they often crack under the pressure and accept conviction. and that's L. he put a lot into the theory that light was the culprit even when he had nothing to go on and indeed evidence to the contrary, because he had no other suspects. and remember when he fucking had misa tortured ????? bound standing up with her eyes covered even when it couldn't have been clearer that they weren't going to get a confession out of her and it had been weeks? and he kept it up pretty much solely because he was too proud to admit that he had been wrong, or at least that this wasn't working.

in that way, light is the corrupt police force, and L is the corrupt judicial system. together they make the system of justice, but do either of them actually believe in that? they say they do, but light's "justice" is deference to the law, or rather, the status quo that the law represents; L's "justice" is having someone in prison, someone to blame, and the same perpetuation of the status quo. ideally they'd be able to keep each other in check - the police to arrest a corrupt judge, the court to convict a corrupt officer - but they're really exactly the same. light killed lind l. tailor, but L is the one who sent him to die.

it isn't 1:1 allegorical but it doesn't have to be. it's a thought-provoking and scathing criticism of what the japanese government calls justice. I think it's solid social commentary

[punk-in-docs]

hello, how are you? I hope you're having a good day. I was the anon who sent the ask about joe quinn's characters, happy that you took a liking for prince paul and tom. Erm, I do have a request for prince paul, like we start with enemies to lover trope, reader thinks that prince paul hated her coz prince paul always contradicts her but sweet and polite to other women then after a while another noble took interest on her, planning to court and propose to her for marriage. prince paul gets to know this info and he's livid then he confronted and confessed to the reader about his love, how he wanted them to be together then it turned smutty? I will leave this up to you how you want this story to turn out. thanks for reading my ask yesterday, love lots.

🥀 Pick Your Poison 🥀 Prince Paul x Reader || Part I || 9.2k words

Summary: You have Mother Russia melted deep into the marrow of your bones, and you’re not afraid to grit your teeth and have a scrappy fight. Draw out a little of that pumping hot slavic blood you’re so proud of.

“Charmed.” You smile at him with your perfectly rouged lips. You sneer him like a viper. Like you’re another one of the delicious black widows formed from these courtly, poison-skated walls.

He stalks off and Minister Panin bows to you all. Scurries along after him like a puppy. Catherine isn’t displeased or discouraged by her sons frosty behaviour. She was expecting it.

You watch him stride away. Sip your champagne and drag your eyes over his back. 

He must store such tension in those reedy shoulders. Keeps it stored under that ridiculous wig maybe.

All of Russia is owed to him by birth and he’s kept a hairs breadth from clutching it.

Warnings: Very much smut, a little dub-con-ish, hate sex, piv, fingering, oral, enemies to lovers.

Author Notes: Nonny, I sincerely hope you enjoy this, turned out a lot darker/meaner than I had intended. Maybe even a little satirical. Catherine is a bitch, and paul is a moody lost puppy. Reader is caught between. Enjoy-

Some people are an elixir; others are a venom. Choose wisely my child-

 ~

“Weak chin. I always thought.” Sniffs Catherine next to you. In that haughty dismissive way she does. Eyes stone cold. Wrists held crossed in front of her so serenely, as she scathes at the painting.

You’re stood with her. Unkindly surveying the huge velvety swirled oils of her husbands portrait, that glowers with glory off the buttery yellow walls of the Grand palace.

All stained in gold, pomp, and circumstance. Scrolls and frescoes and chalky painted scenes etched on the pretty walls.

Walls that have housed such debauchery, broken glass, and bloodshed. Court full of vipers. A nest of writing spitting rattlesnakes. Ladies of her Queens court whose tongues wag and lash sharp, like cat-o-nine tails.

“Unattractive fucker isn’t he? Do you remember?” Countess Praskovya digs a sharp elbow into her majesty. She’s the only one who could dare so such a thing.

“He really was.” Cackles Catherine. Smile a mouth full of razors.

She means it literally and you laugh as you sip your lovely little glass of champagne. Maybe it was in poor taste to find it funny.

Crystal cut glass with flowers and pretty patterns on the rim that digs into your rouged lips.

“Is it much of a likeness?” You ask curiously before you sip, and peer over your glass. There’s no two ways about it. The man in the oils was fucking ugly.

“Sadly. Yes.” Catherine smirks. “Can’t say I can remember much about the man I did find pleasing.” She offers.

“Not even his cock?” The Countess goads with a chuckle.

“A shrivelled little pink shrew.” Empress answers. They laugh.

Bite your lip. Taste the champagne sting. You guard your tongue. Something people here, simply don’t do.

The Empresses’ shimmering Italian Greyhound’s are zipping around your skirts chasing each other, yipping, as you stand there alongside her and the Countess.

You’ve found some friendly crux in their embraces. They leave cloying lipstick kisses on your rouged cheeks. Tell you what colour silk dress to wear. What wine to drink. Who to flirt with. How sweet and young you are- like sugared violets. They dote on you.

Catherine brought you here, heavily curried favour to pave your way. She wanted something to stop Paul from his whining. Not someone, something.

A prized little sacrificial lamb with a silk ribbon around your neck, shoved into the wolves pit. That was you.

You’d travelled all the way from Rostov three days ago. She knew your Father. He was a Count.

You weren’t stupid. You saw her impish curl of grin as she asked after things. Particularly that of your Father. How is the stubborn old boar.

You impolitely knew that meant he had won favour by fucking her a while back. When Peter was still alive.

You were from a good noble family. Rich enough. An estate to your name. You played chess. You studied military strategy and languages. You hunt, shoot and ride, like the men do, if not better than. There’s pure Russian stoicism kicking in your blood. You were punchy, savage smart.

You are so exactly like me when I was your age.

She told you that last night over dinner. Tucking a finger under your chin and nudging your head up. Cooing at you maternally like you were her own child. Candlelight travels like smooth satin across your skin. You were a pretty little thing. A pretty insect encased in amber. She bopped her fingertip to the end of your nose.

Buckets and buckets of champagne and a whole table stuffed with cold slimy seafood had sat before you for feasting on. You ate little, and drank lots and danced until your toes were throbbing sore.

Quite enjoyed the way soldiers eyes wandered over you like you were fresh juicy meat. Ready to be devoured. Many glistening pairs of new male eyes, rolling over your drunken steps, in the gold candlelight.

You went to bed alone though. Too drunk to do anything else but sleep. Woke up to be bathed and powdered, laced into another rich dress. You didn’t forget why, and for whom, you were really here.

You rose early to let Catherine show you around, herself. You’ve learnt things about her very quickly. Grasping them close like loose threads.

She simply doesn’t have the time for anyone or anything that isn’t as cutthroat as she is. She’s harder than the clutch of sharp diamonds always choking around her neck. Colder than them too.

She does have these little moments where she peels away icy skin to let you see there is some beating warmth within. Some love. She saves none for people, or men, or her son. It’s all for her country. The one she plucked right out her husbands undeserving hands.

Paul and her get along about as well as a naked flame introduced to a barrel of gunpowder. Powder versus fuse: There’s sparks and a mean amount of friction between them.

In a nutshell, he wants power, and she will give absolutely none of hers away.

She clutched it tight in fistfuls and doesn’t relent. She eats men. So some say. Eats them alive and doesn’t even spit out the bones.

Footsteps slap into the room behind you. Harsh on the shiny tiles like whip cracks. Two pairs of booted feet.

“Mother.” A petulant voice cuts through your girly interjections of his fathers portrait.

You look over your shoulder and there he stands. The future heir to all Russia. Your goal.

“Paul, my darling son.” Catherine turns and sways towards him with a puckish grin. Full of cold plotting and intent. Her peacock blue skirts scraping the floor.

She holds out her hand as a gesture for him to step closer. The man beside him stays put. Minister Panin.

“Come meet my beautiful friend.” She croons.

He steps to her gently. Hands fiddling with a gold ring on his finger. Twiddling it round round round.

His cheeks are all pink rouged, his white wig all coiled and curled. He wore a emerald coat and a red royal sash around his chest. His lips are full, boyish and succulent pink like he’s been biting them all nervous.

She links an arm through his and lopes him across to you. He goes stiff when you smile at him. Frown deepens. Lines on his pretty face age him.

She introduced him to you. You flick your lashes downward and curtsey to him. All politesse. You bow your head.

Oh. She’s very good. You heard the Countess congratulate you in a murmur that was almost to herself. It nearly sounds like she’s flirting with you.

Can I keep her? The Countess jokes. Eyeing you voraciously from the corners of her coppery eyes like she’s a hungry tiger. She’s omnivorous. She’ll have anyone. Swallow them down, crunch them up like her Empress does.

Your dress is very low cut. The sugary colour of tea roses. Red ribbon tied around your neck with a fine jewelled broach. You know it hangs between your breasts.

You also know he’s seeing that. And the way they’re clasped up high in your corset.

You think he’s much more handsome than his father. Cherubim beauty. He has this natural magnetism. All doe deer wet eyes and flicking brown lashes that burn with umber at the long tips.

Those roe deer baby eyes glare so fierce and unsure- especially when aimed at his Mother. Like he doesn’t know quite what to make of her. Unpleasant and mercurial woman that she is.

He does have Catherine’s eyes, you’ll dare say that.

Something about the way she can look like a clever hawk, about to slice up a rabbit to bloody strips in her talons. Top of her food chain. Ruthless and all mirror sharp edges designed to cut.

His eyes are softer, but the same viciousness lurks. That greatness to rule living and twisted in their same shared blood.

It’s the Russian way, you think. That immovable, stout, hardiness. It’s the way you’re all bred. Maybe it’s because of the bitter stodgy landscape that sustains you. Or the vodka.

Probably the vodka.

“She’s here to visit me a while. You should get to know one another. I knew her Father. Count Voronsky. You remember…“ She instructs.

“I’m sure you do.” He aims with meaning. Aims to wound. Tongue like a sabre. That must run in the family too.

He looks at you like you’re a bottle of nightshade stood tall in front of him. You may have been stunning. Wrapped in girly pink silk like a daring naughty present to tempt a man. But he won’t be moved.

Even if your perfume does smell like peaches and you look reminiscent of heaven itself. And he’s heard whispers in court that Voronsky’s are rumoured to be the best lovers of all.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. Your royal highness.” You keep your tone soft and light. And all flirt. Stick your eyes in his walnut gaze and are contented to leave them there. Bold.

You curl your rouged smile and try your best to look beguiling. It has the opposite effect to the one you intended.

He rips his arm out of his mothers.

“I don’t need a toy. In case you hadn’t noticed I am not a child anymore. I don’t need you to pick whom I surround myself with.”

He scowls. And then he turns. His displeasure spilled over onto you. He looked haughty. Ready to wound.

“I bid you good day, Miss Voronsky. Go back to Rostov. I have no use of you or your kind here.”

He steps in so close and says it to you, spits at you. You can feel the warmth of his breath. The wet fierceness of those doe eyes, why, he looks like your greatest challenge. And you don’t shrink from challenges when accosted.

You should be scared but you’re just not.

He doesn’t scare you. He’s a whelp in a princes costume. His mother, now there is a terrifying woman. Of her you are most certainly scared.

This man is just stuck up the wrong way. And he seems to want to take it out on you. He’s got the world, this empire, grazing at his fingertips and it simply isn’t enough. He’s clinging to the shadow of her skirts. And she casts shade wherever she stands.

His cheeks flush the longer he stands and looks at you. Stepped toe to toe.

You step up. Even closer. Eyes diamond hard. Fuck, you’re daring.

You’ve got one hell of a firecracker spirit. Let him challenge and insult you. Let him see how far he gets-

You have Mother Russia melted deep into the marrow of your bones, and you’re not afraid to grit your teeth and have a scrappy fight. Draw out a little of that pumping hot slavic blood you’re so proud of.

“Charmed.” You smile at him with your perfectly rouged lips. You sneer at him like a viper. Like you’re another one of the delicious black widows formed from these courtly, poison-skated walls.

He stalks off and Minister Panin bows to you all. Scurries along after him like a puppy.

Catherine isn’t displeased or discouraged by her sons frosty behaviour. She was expecting it.

You watch him stride away. Sip your champagne and drag your eyes over his back. He must store such tension in those reedy shoulders. Keeps it stored under that ridiculous wig maybe.

All of Russia is owed to him by birth and he’s kept a hairs breadth from clutching it.

Is it any wonder he’s a spoilt brat.

“That boy doesn’t half have a poker up his ass.” The Countess barks in a laugh.

“Just like his father.” Catherine agrees drily.

They sway away to take a walk in the gardens, and pick at good looking men like starlings.

“Come, petal.” Catherine coos at you

Like a good little lamb, you follow along in tow. Whippets on your heels. You’ll be requiring more champagne.

~

Paul gives you a wide berth. You don’t offer him the same.

Whenever you turn your eyes to him. Or glide past with the Countess talking about gossip, or last nights vivid lover. You’re met with a scowl, or straight shot of ignorance.

His mother seats you right next to him at the Opera. You fan yourself and pray to god it makes your perfume curl across to him. Judging by the way he clenched his fists, knuckles cracking, whenever you so much as moved. You’d say your plan worked.

He kept shifting in his seat. Moving his coat to hide the growing bulge in his lap. You’d smirked like a devil. He left wordlessly.

You wandered close where he was playing chess in the library the other day, with a Lord you hadn’t yet met. Obolensky, you think.

Just to needle the boy, you swayed up and smiled all prettily at the Lord. A lecherous old perv you’d been warned. He’s already groped your ass during a dance. You keep light and snappy on your feet and you’ve learned to lock your doors at night.

Utilising your best coquettish gaze. This Lord now undressed you with his eyes. Left them in your cleavage rather than making eye contact.

“My lords.” You’d purred.

You angled your body just so to lean over the table. Made sure they were both looking. Your breasts practically shoved in their faces. You plucked up the Lords chess piece, and moved it to play check mate against Paul.

“Enjoy your day gentlemen.” You preen. All wily lashes and tease.

He’d looked at you like thunder as you pouted a sickly smile. Grabbed a book. And sashayed away to your rooms. Laughing at him.

“Voracious little Voronsky slut.” The Lord leered as you left.

“Get her on her back. Teach her some manners. Show her the mighty wrath of Russia, Tsarevich.” He gestures to Paul’s crotch by grabbing his own. Cackling away.

“She’ll be panting like a cowed bitch in heat for more. Mark my words.” He sips his red wine all haughty.

That flashed scandalous, indecent images in Paul’s head, to his shame, not for the first time-

His fingers knotted throughout your curled hair. Your elbows folded up on those fine pillows in his bed. You’d be all silky limbs and peachy soft skin. Head thrown back. You wouldn’t need rouge here.

Your screams sailing out that pretty pink mouth taking the shape of his name, as he slams his hips into the soft of your plump round ass. Fucks you open on his cock, like he isn’t a crowned prince.

Like he’s some small-folk peasant. Hands clawing in your skin as he looks down at you with all the power he’ll ever need.

He wouldn’t let you cum until you choked out his name. Eyes rolling back. He’ll fist a hand around your lovely arched throat. Make you cry out ‘Your Majesty’ in your bliss. He wants pleasured tears splashing from you as compensation, when he screws your brains out.

He swallows. That image causes his mind torment enough. Imagining shutting up your insolent mouth.

He’s dug his heels into his bed, and fucked raw the slick mess of his fist, to that deliciously debauched image of you and him entwined. Mingling somewhere between pleasure, passion, and sheer hatred.

Sweat glimmering in the pool of his collarbones, cause he’d not been able to get past the way you sneered at him earlier that very eve.

He can’t help it. You have a nasty habit of curling your fingers in, and plucking at this vital string inside him. Something that’s twanging all relentless and mean.

“I don’t require counsel in these matters.” Paul shunted out harshly to the Lord.

“I detest that girl.” He held out. Eyes flicking to the shape of your back. The nape of your neck. That shade of your hair he knows by heart.

“Beg your pardon, but that’s not what it looks like.” The Lord surmised.

Paul glared.

He’s surrounded by people he hates. His whole life it’s been that way. What’s one more?

What if there’s something about the way your electric stunning eyes spark this roiling fissure of red hot heat inside him. Splashes up his stomach and leaves him aching. Fists clenched. Cock throbbing in his infernal tight breeches. Too much blood caught up in the trap of his ribs.

He hates the way you move. Hates the way your perfume smelt so inviting every time you drew near. He just wanted to grab your hair and shove his face in your neck. Keep you to himself like a caged creature. Bar your windows and keep you contained. All for him.

The way you lick your lips and dance and flirt with other men. You drink too much champagne, always, and your too loud laugh gives him goosebumps. You’re too much. You’re foul. Intoxicating. You’re never enough.

You had tried to approach him last night, after dinner. Thaw the ice. You held your skirts up primly and started in his direction. He wasn’t having any of it.

He scooped up his wine glass and left the room abruptly. Slamming doors after him and you knew better than to try and follow. His doors were heavily guarded.

You were getting nowhere fast and it was evident that he didn’t wish to engage. You didn’t want to think about what it meant for the rest of your indeterminable stay here.

The wrath of his mother was what you dreaded the most if he remained unhappy.

The other day you were coming up the steps in the gardens. Beautiful day out. Powder blue gossamer skies with clouds like spooled white cotton. The air dances with the fine scent of his mothers pet rose bushes. Trimmed groves of trees to wander down for privacy.

It’s impossible not to notice you.

Your silk dress is golden yellow like sunflowers. His eyes followed you like you were the sun.

A big thick strip of white silk ribbon was tied in a ridiculous bow around your neck. He wanted to fist it and hear your breath catch. Watch you break out into a perverted smile as he choked you with your own pretty silky things.

The dainty tie of your shoe had come undone. The laces slithering open.

You turned to the man you were walking arm in arm with. Orlov’s fucking son.

You pointed it out all pithily. Like you were some brainless slip of a girl. Who couldn’t possibly bend over to tie her shoes. Get your dainty lace gloves all dirty.

When you saw him watching you complain to your handsome suitor. Your lips gathered up into a cruel smile. A crowding storm coming in. Put on a show.

Cherry red mouth as sharp as a knife box.

You scrunch your skirts all the way up in one hand. Lifting them to show him the entire sculpted shape of your leg. Your white stockings tied with striking yellow ribbons ending at the knee. You flash him the supple length of your silky round thigh.

His eyes want to scan up and up. More. He knows a blush is scrawling up his already rouged round cheeks.

You’re not watching your suitor bend at the knee in the mud to fix your shoe. You’re keeping your eyes pinned on him. You tilt your head across at him. Daring.

Like what you see? Your excellency?

All he can think about are your fucking legs. And what’s between them.

How much he wants to wrap his hands around your ankles and pin them to his shoulders. He wants to rut you so deep it will feel like he’s fucking your throat.

He will be rough. No doubt about that. He will take out every single warped aggression he carries, on you. In you.

He will leave your ass smacked sore. Spit into your sweet cunt and shove his fingers inside. Spit in your mouth and make you swallow. Make him thank you when he spills his fine royal seed in your womb.

Doesn’t care if his touch rolls into dark bruises or hurts like Hellfire slaps on your skin. He would cruelly mark you as his and not stop til he is satisfied. However long that may take-

He will clench your throat in his hand. Make those dumb lust-drunk eyes of yours that he hates, stay on him through the whole thing.

You are worming your way under his skin. Wearing him thin so you can peer in and laugh at what’s inside. You are a parasitic, peach scented thought that preys on his brain and he can’t set you aside. You are a new brand of torture.

He decided in some hateful way to get his own back.

One night after a card game in the parlour. You’re stood in the corner. Giggling with some oaf of a Count. Hand on his arm and he’s whispering to you about something that makes you blush.

Tilting his square jaw into your neck to whisper scandalous sordid things in your ear. Yanking you closer by slipping his hand along your curvy waist. You preen like an exotic songbird for him. Blushing like roses.

You tip your head back like you’re succumbing to pleasure and that’s the final straw.

Paul takes clever opportunity to nudge a passing footman right in the back. Who in turn trips and spills the entire tray over you both. Glasses of port all down the front of your pretty butterfly blue dress.

Glasses smash to shards. Silver tray clatters. The whole room grinds to silence and flickering candles burst their shapes all up the walls. Orange and then daggering black. Eyes blaze from every corner.

You look across the ballroom, shaking with anger and pushing sopping wine soaked hair out your eyes. It dripped down your face like sticky rivulets of black cherry blood.

The front of your dress is blooming to vivid wine red. Like some macabre wash of sunset or a messy death. Crushed glass littered at your pretty silk heeled feet. Sparkling like blood soaked diamonds.

Cut across the crowds. You see him. Doe eyes. Brattiness. Smug.

It’s the first time you see him smile. It’s sharp white teeth flashing at you. He had eyes all venom dark and piercing.

Just like his mother.

  ~

The hunt was afoot. You crash through the spiky pine trees in your steady footed silk boots. Listening out for the rustle and crack of your fellow man around you. Stalking for the deer. Your rifle in hand.

Russian mud is thick and unrelenting squelching almost black under your toes. You love it. The stench of it. The summer is a warm one but a biting autumn will soon be on its way to snatch up the heat. The frigid bitch of winter after that.

You stalk quietly through the blue trees that climb so high they must scrape the tip of heaven. Pricking into the sky with their tops. Disturbing God.

Where you’ve batted away the tree branches, rain clings to your coat shoulders. Draped on your hat and wetting the ends of your hair. Mud is brushed across your cheek.

You leave the frippery of court behind you in the trees as you walk. Far away beyond sight. You’d veered off the path. Away from the hoard of finely dressed lords and ladies sat astride their mounts long ago.

These woods are wild and barren. You lose yourself in the dark majesty of them.

Footsteps crash after yours. They try and cling to silence but they cannot.

You’re scanning the trees for your prize. You will have it. You’re ignoring the fact you may have a pursuer hot on your heels. You don’t need a man to do this.

You hear a crack. A stomping shift of a hoof. You gasp softly.

You crouch and peer around in the clearing. Spy the brown Hyde of a deer stopping to nuzzle the plants and chew the undergrowth. Ears twitching. Cleverly hidden amongst the dead wood of a fallen tree.

You temper your breathing. You don’t dare even move your feet by one inch.

“You’ve strayed too far, Voronsky.” Comes your least favourite voice. Needles and pins. Whiff of petulance and snobbery.

Paul.

You aim your gun. Back arched. Head high. Finger on the trigger. Ready to pull and take your kill shot.

“What are you doing? Do you even know how to handle a gun, you foolish girl.” He digs. His mouth slithers heat over the top of your ear. It makes you shiver.

“Or are you going to go over there and tear it’s throat out with your long teeth?” He mocks.

“Do be quiet.” You hiss at him. You don’t dare turn your head. Your eyes locked on your prey, pumping pulse ringing in your ears, like the feral scratchy lioness that you are.

Fierce leather gloved hands yank in your sides and slam you around. Tight to your ribs. Twists you to face him. His grip hurts.

He’s put nothing but yards between you and now suddenly he’s all over you. Talk about sugar and vinegar.

Your body skips with flame where his hands are on you and you can’t figure out why.

“Don’t speak to me that way.” He seethes. His teeth grit at you when he finished snapping words.

“Stop telling me what to do.” You crowd closer and stare him square in the eye. Unafraid.

 He’s taller but you crane your neck and let your eyes slip into dripping venom.

“I am the future ruler of Russia. Girl. I can tell anyone in this fucking court what to do and they will jump to do it.” He boasts.

You snatch your gun back.

“I’m not in your court. I’m in your mothers. You’re not the Emperor. Not yet.” You sneer. Fully nasty. You gnash your teeth.

As if he needed reminding. It’s hammered into him on a daily basis.

You hear the deer scampering through the trees far away. Clopping away to freedom unscathed. Your hisses and shouts could rightfully wake the dead after all.

“I don’t want you here!” He fairly yells. Snobbery in his tone.

You get right up in his face to yell back. Storm up to him with a gun clenched in your hands. Damn this little prig.

“You’ve made that perfectly clear, your highness.” You spit.

“Why did you come then. To torment me like she does?” He shouts at you. Pointing an accusing finger at where you’d left his mother, and her party of harpies and perverts, through the trees.

“It wasn’t precisely my choice.” You argue. “It was hers and my fathers greed for money. So perhaps you could stop glowering at me and spitting fury and understand, my lord, that I am indeed just as trapped here as you.”

You prod a finger into his chest. Stab into him with it.

He swallows. Snickering crack of bones where he clenched his teeth again. He did that a lot around you. Like he was trying to bite down on words that had yet to be birthed past his teeth.

“You don’t seem to have difficulties finding your fun.” He mocks. Essentially calling you a whore.

Orlov’s son. Lord Obolensky. Your sniggering Baron Ivanov from the gardens.

“You clearly do.” You point out. It’s a low dig but it was stone hard truth.

You’ve heard the rows he’s had with his mother. The smashed vases. Throwing trays of food scattering off the polished tables in sudden bursts of rage, that she screeched at him, until the doorways rattled, that he was acting just like his cunt of a father.

He pushes the gun out of your hands. It falls in the mud. He has you crowded up against the nearest tree. You don’t know if you let him back you there out of fear- or out of something else entirely.

He’s dropped what he was holding too. Clatter of wood to the floor, guns abandoned with foolish care. Crossed in the dirt. Forgotten. Your bodies crash against the tree.

His hips flush into yours. Chest squashed to your own. His hands are pressed to your sides. Compressing the whalebone and silk of your corset. He’s crushing. It feels good.

“I loathe you. Voronsky.” He snarls every single syllable.

Sparks glittering in his dark eyes. Hatred blended with pure lust. It sparkles like precious gold gems lost to shadow in those doe depths.

“I can’t fucking stand you, either. Highness.” You growl.

You stand here pressed against him, feeling his sword and buttons on his coat dig into you. And that wasn’t the only hard thing jutting into you.

Your noxious little Prince feels big. Well hung. Even through his breeches. That’s a sizeable bulge to be contending with.

You look at him and he’s panting. As are you. Eyes flicked to your mouth. Yours to his. Scanning up his face. That wasn’t rouge sat painted on his cheeks.

“For once in your life. Shut your mouth.” He commands.

You chew on a scathing retort. But it quickly dies when he smothers your lips with his in a kiss. Hot and hungry.

A fiercely firm kiss.

You hate him for how he’s got you pulling him in closer. Hand on his coat shoulder. Fisting it in. Dragging his sultry mouth to yours.

The kiss is animalistic. As you thought he’d be. Full of fiery hate and pent up rage. Slightly tainted with the need for love and sex.

Like you should both be rutting and grunting in the mud. Snarling like beasts. Your cunt slapping wetly with his hard stabbing thrusts.

“My mother knows how to pick a decent whore for me. I’ll give her that.” He insults.

Before he bites the skin under your jaw to make you yelp. You claw the back of his neck. Digging in your nails.

You’ll scratch and bite back. You’re no meek girl.

You roll your hips against his hardening cock. A slow grind. It’s all push and shove and neither of you back down.

“I haven’t lifted my skirts for a single one of those fuckers.” You curse. Heaving for breath. Words stumble sharp as arrows out your mouth.

You lips are spit shiny wet from him. He wants to suck on it. Devour it. Bite it. Eyes blown all dark.

“Why should I believe you.” He snarls against your swallowing kiss.

“Touch me and you’ll find out.” You tease.

He’s spoilt and you’re stubborn. You’re knotted and tangled here like a ball of veins. Russian born serpents with dripping fangs exposed. And mark your words, there will be blood-

He grunts and his hand scoops under your pretty skirts to find your thigh. You moan when he hitched your knee up. You yelp with sudden surprise and it’s good. No space spared.

Cold leather hands sliding up your thigh. Hiking it over his hip. He pressed into you harder. Didn’t care if it hurt.

You moan louder, head thudding for the scratchy tree bark, when his hand leaves your ribs and dives down for the hot secret of your wet cunt.

Spitting a glob of white onto his hand first of all. Then he’s shoving three broad fingers in your pussy. Knuckle deep. Heel of his palm grazing your clit.

Wet soft leather and you’re writhing with it.

You didn’t think he’d be brazen enough for this- You’re harsh and unyielding. Never a creature to roll over and surrender normally. But here? You were awfully glad you were proved wrong.

The way you squelch for him as he fucks you open with his hand, makes his knees knock into yours. Poor baby bird.

You grip the back of his hair - that ugly wig hooked above your fingers - you snatch his mouth back to yours. Let him groan into the warm cup of your mouth. You flick your tongue along his teeth and take his very breath.

He is dying to know how warm and tangy sweet you are. Spread you open at the thighs and lick at the rich juices that spilled. Like peaches, ironically enough.

He wants to take your spilling breasts in his hot mouth too. Lap at them with lashing tongue like a greedy child. Those globes pushed in your corset have been taunting him for days and days.

His vicious and his movements are quick and curling. His mouth slanted to yours as he makes hungry impatient little groans.

You bite his lip, don’t care if he bleeds, and drag him deeper. Tugging him in like a seeking tar pit. Your eyes flick back with the way he curls his fingers against a spot inside that warps and burns-

More more more, Paul.

“They told me about you Voronsky’s. All natural born sluts, so they say.” He pulls his mouth off yours and sucks your neck again.

Right.

Your hand slithers down between your bodies. There’s little room but you get to where you want to be. The poor boy is leaking all over the inside of his very tight breeches.

You palm the wet spot at his tip. Cup him. Drag your hand right up - up and up - the length of him.

“I’m not the only one enjoying this. That must make you a slut also, your highness.” You say slyly.

Your mouth skates up the side of his neck. You purr into his ear like a wild cat and bite at the lobe. He presses his body all the way into you. A desperate keening noise trapped in his throat as he allows himself some friction.

You wrap an arm around him and you both clash into each other.

You’d been doing that since your arrival for heavens sake- but this is some sort of healthy catharsis. Burn the hate to crumbled cinders and let passions curl to take its place.

Damn this biological - all rugged animal - response you had to him. Made you mindless. Melted your head to inconsequence. It was body to body. This pressing need to crave another so deeply.

And by the cursed fucking bowels of some portion of hell, you were so fated to collide with him. Clash like angry stars, and rain and bloom burning pieces, down from space.

You tell him harder and he gives it. Meets every degree of your wants and your cunt is spilling crudely down his fingers. Wetting his wrist. Every piece of you shrieking his name.

You draw blood - an offence punishable by torture. But you just can’t help it. When you cum on his hand, you bite his lip and bring back the taste of coppery pennies.

You’re clutching onto him like a lost thing. Hands bunched in his coat shoulders. His free hand slipped around your back and settled in the slope there. You both slow your wild rutting. He smells the perfume and powdery tones of honeyed soap off your neck. The sweat beaded to your hairline smears on his lips. Passion.

He screws his eyes shut. Just for a second. You were heaven.

He dares take a look at you. Admiring the way this lust craze seems to have tamed you. All hazed hooded eyes and lips raw like red meat from his unpractised mouth. Rouge smeared to your chins from messy teeth clacking kisses.

He’s got a feeling this is the first time you’ve been struck dumb. There won’t be a second.

He untangled himself from you. Shuffling his coat over his swollen hard on. You smile and go to paw at his trouser fastenings but he steps out of your hands reach. He’ll have to deny you.

When you glance up from hungrily eyeing up his cock. There’s this unreadable expression on his face. It’s sadness.

I cannot keep things I like around me. It always ends badly.

He doesn’t say any of this to you. Of course he can’t.

He sinks his dark whiskey eyes to yours for a second. Frightened roe deer with blood on his lip.

Then he’s turning heel and crashing through the crush of green-black undergrowth. Away. Gone to the trees. Swallowed by forest. Leaves you all alone.

Your prey slips your snare yet again.

You gather yourself and pet your mussed hair back into place. You don’t even stop to gather your weapons. You slink back to the party, dazed. Your sticky thighs are trembling still.

Catherine almost seems impressed. She huffs an amused sound at you. “Bend you over a fallen tree did he? That’s my boy.” She winks.

You say nothing.

 ~

His Mother summons him to her breakfast table two days afterwards. Rings the bell and in comes her minion. Like a servant, or a trained lolloping puppy

They’re expecting a Swedish Prince and his delegation in two days time. She wants an alliance for trade. Hungers for it. He can see it in her eyes.

Tells Paul to share nicely and not throw his toys out the pram. Let the other children have and do whatever they want at court. Like he could stop them.

They’ll bring in only the finest painted whores if they want them. Vodka. Only the best, from Samara. Roast boar and lobster. Silly girls who need husbands and their diamonds and dowries. Stuff the space with amusement and hold riotous lavish parties.

She’s half talking to him, half writing her letters. Sat there, unrouged and tough looking even in her simple silk dressing gown. Eyes and cheekbones all angles, and her face bare. No decoration or jewels here in her private chambers.

It’s like seeing a proud golden lion go about without its mane. It appears wrong.

Then she says something that makes his heart crawl up the inside of his mouth.

“I need to keep the Swede sweet. We cannot afford to lose their trade corridors. I may let him have Voronsky.”

What?

He knows he must’ve said it out loud because she stops and peers up at him. She detested repeating herself and being questioned.

“Voronsky.” She says again.

“I do like the girl. She does amuse me, such a fucking tongue on her. Whip smart too. She is of the finest noble stock Russia can boast, but I cannot have anyone dwindling idle in my court.” She says it like the imposition lands on her.

You are a little possession. Brought here to entertain. To be fucked or married.

A china doll to be passed around and made to pose. Have your hair petted and arranged. Something tells him you’d hate that.

“If you don’t want her Paul. Then I will give her away.”

He can’t bring up the words. But they rattle in his mind. He wishes they had the temerity to climb out his mouth.

But I do want her.

~

The Swede arrives the next day. Young, stupidly handsome with a bladed nose and a fine chiseled jaw. Dark obsidian hair and piercing blue eyes. Taller than Paul. Just as ineffectual and skinny. Threaded with the uncertain confidence of an ingenue. A prize child thrust into the role of royalty. Paul recognises it as the same traits he has.

He’s all homegrown Nordic handsome too, which doesn’t help. White white dazzling straight smile. How he brightens to attention when he sees the flock of pretty Russian girls ready to meet him. Pounce on him.

Paul stands back and watched you get introduced. You wore that plum coloured dress that he so adored on you. You wore a dark red choker. Velvet. Looked like a slash of blood like someone had dared slice your throat to ribbons.

The countess painted deep waxy rouge on your lips. Told you to wear the dress low for your beloved. Wear the Parisian perfume.

Smile like a tart. Secure him my dear, he’s virile as a horny dog, and rich as anything.

You don’t smile too much. You fold your hands. Almost look, meek. Only Paul knows how much of a lie that is. Your meekness is the trap.

Step carefully. He thinks. She bites.

You curtsey. You state a crass joke that has the Prince belly laughing out loud.

He flatters you. That was a mistake. You eat men’s flattery of you for breakfast. Still picking it out your teeth, in fact.

You split a veiled grin. It’s just this side of mocking.

“Being pretty only counts for so much, Highness. I’d rather be considered ungovernable. Maybe even detestable. It’s so much more interesting.”

“Catherine is rubbing off on you.” He insists.

The Empress laughs loudly, because she likes it when people think her impossible.

They’re right. Because she is.

He thinks you’re brilliant. Savage Russian girl more brutal than the vodka you love. It may actually run in your veins. That liquid smooth bite. Your smile is gouging.

Swede is finding you’re made up of silver savage sword edges. He could cut himself on them if he isn’t careful.

You’re being pushed from pillar to post. Shoved, pummelled, manoeuvred and you bear it all - somehow - angelically. Though you still occasionally flash your teeth, glare, and spit poison when needed.

Told where to go and what to be. Who shall you be tonight? Let the Countess and Paul’s mother pick out your character for you like they would clothes. The touchy flirt. The vivid dancer who steps and twirls til she drops. The drunk girl with mischievous stars in her eyes.

He thought you were freed of this crushing place, but apparently, it’s just as swallowing for you, as it is for him.

In the end, this palace and this life will consume you all. You’ll die for it. One way or another.

It makes Paul itch when you’re left with the Swede. Thrown together left, right and centre. Cobbled as one like two puzzle pieces.

You shoot and hunt together. You ride out to see the forest and share a picnic like those silly couples in fanciful novels.

It lasts for nine hellish days.

For those treacly slow days that pass he cannot get you alone. He sees your skirts whipping away in the corners of the gilded door cases when he comes near.

He catches the back of your head. The bleached ghost of your perfume in the empty room he’s just walked into. Milky corner of your eyes at Dinner. The turn and twist of your neck as you look away.

You try not to look at him. But it’s like trying to avoid the sky. Or the ground. He’s wherever you tread.

He snuck out of his duties to watch out the window. The pair of you take a simple walk in the gardens past the spitting spray of the fountains. Emerald lawn crushed under your neat steps.

He twiddles the gold ring on his finger as he watches as you seat yourself on a stone bench. Leaves curling to dead brown in the once green canopy above you. Papery and rattling on the wind.

Autumn and it’s chill picks up fast here. You’re wearing fur on your collar and coat cuffs. Ruby red wool garbing you. A stupid hat with a ridiculous plumage of a milky ostrich feather that won’t keep you warm in the sneaky cut of the wind. Like everything else about Russia. It slices like knives.

He can’t watch but he can’t tear his eyes away. The swede takes to one knee on the grass. He can’t. He can’t.

Paul stomps away from the window and locks himself on his room. He shouts to the maid for wine. Vodka. Anything that’s strong. Anything that will numb-

This is it. You’ll be whisked away to Sweden to be a nubile bride. Off to have scores and scores of blue eyed babies. The thought of that cunt between your legs and rutting into you makes him retch. You deserved better.

You’d be taken away from him. Away from vipers and the barking hyena laughs of his acerbic Mother.

He can’t bear it.

He stumbles downstairs for dinner. Drunk and he’s no shame in it. He lives on the edge of the room nursing a glass and chasing his food around the plate. Some boned little bird with its wings ripped off. Eating none of it. His stomach squirmed.

The swede appears and you don’t. He does find that odd.

Weren’t newly engaged couples supposed to put on a show with it. Swan with joy. Prance down and flounce around to be pecked at with congratulations from everyone.

His mother finally seems to spare a second for him. She snips at him. “You’ve got a face like a smacked arse.”

Paul isn’t in the mood to dip his tongue into sour words to retaliate. He tips a bottle back to his lips. More wine flows. Less feelings come.

He sits there slumped, and watched everyone dance and swirl around. Dragging silk and clap of heeled feet on shining parquet. All ineffectual blurs to his drunk eyes. The candles squirm like orange worms in his vision. He hates this cruel world. He really does.

She tired of him and strode off to eviscerate someone else. Dig someone else’s guts out like she usually does.

Then he noticed something. Swede is dancing with someone else. Someone that isn’t you.

He hears gaggles of gossip. Some of it slips at his ears as couples pass him.

She wouldn’t have him. One scoffs.

Fucking proud Voronsky bitch.

Jilted him. This afternoon, apparently. Sent him packing. He’s gonna have to screw the Vassiliev girl instead.

Paul feels his heart glow hot and slippery like coals. You jilted a Prince.

He watches the Countess scurry across to mother. Whispers through that pursed rouge mouth into her ear. When she pulls back, Catherine’s eyes dim to dull obsidian. She curls a snide smile. Tips her head.

“Shame.” She bites out.

Paul doesn’t stay to see the rest. He finds his clumsy feet. Finds the door. And the next, and the next. Coppery hawk eyes watch him stumble his leave.

He has to find you.

He checks everywhere in the cursed palace. Turned it inside out to seek sight of you. It’s pretty hopeless until he decided to venture into the moonlit gardens.

The tree tops skimmed with sickly silver. The grass beaded in dew drops that wink like jewels.

He does manage to find you.

It’s savage cold out here. You feel at home. He can see the silver drift of his breath as he runs. Shoes slipping skating. He’s not wearing enough layers or his courtly white wig but he can’t give a fuck now.

He finds you. Delicately curled in on yourself. Sat on the steps to one of the many gazebos dotted around the gardens. He hears your sobs first of all. The choke and drag of your lungs. The slosh and clink of Möet against glass.

Half full bottle of champagne in your hand. Another empty one littered at your feet. You were swigging from the neck. Tears ribbon their etchings of salt down your cheeks.

You’re wearing a deep blue dress. Navy in the cold blue wash of night. No torches or light reaches out here. Just the ghostly fingers of the moon.

You wear a black ribbon tied around your neck. A silver broach with a rose suspended bloody in the oval black glass. Your lips are red raw and rouge is painted around the bottles neck. You’ve been slurping and crying out here on your own.

You turn back to him like a startled creature when you hear the wet crush of his footsteps on the lawn.

“Are you not cold?” He asks softly. Had he a jacket, he’d take it off right now to drape it over your shoulders.

“Fucking frozen.” You gleefully admit.

Swigging back more golden champagne. Your whole body is swimming fizzing gold with it. You’re very drunk.

He steps closer. Dares to crouch in front of you. You watch him. Only your eyes move. They glitter bitterly with the moon.

“Ask me nice. I might share.” You bite.

He tenderly takes the bottle off you and drinks some of it. It’s cold and your hands are trembling. He edged down next to you. Your skin is ice.

“You’re not coming inside?” He checks. “It’s warmer.” He says.

He almost sounds, soft. He reaches over and curls a knuckle to skim at the round of your shoulder.

“Your mother terrifies me.” Is your answer.

That may be the first thing you actually agree on.

“Me too.” He admits. Sounding small.

“Not going to Sweden, then?” He just wants to check.

“Not.” You confirm.

You sway into him. Nudge your head on his shoulder. Peaches washed over him. Bright and fat sweet. He feels calm and ridiculously happy.

You sit up all sudden and shoot him daggers.

“I’m offended you think I’d marry a fucking pickled herring stinking swede.” You growl lowly. Raising your fangs at him.

“There she is.” He peers across at you. And there’s that rare smile. He cups your face and he’s pulling you close.

“It is cold out here.” You accept. His other hand slips for your skirts.

“Think we should do something about that Voronsky?” He asks crudely. Yet somehow he sounds all puppy eyed innocent with it.

You split your thighs and he pushes up your skirts. Nestles between them. You gasp when he settled between them. Hikes them up and grins at you.

“Only if it pleases, your majesty.” You simper.

Only you could make obedience sound like insolence.

He draws up your skirts so he could see your soft thighs. Your slick pussy is right there for him to take. As he wishes. So he does.

You weren’t expecting him to shove his shoulders under swathing blue silk and wriggle his tongue inside you. But you’re not complaining.

You lay flat on your back and your thighs frame his face as he laps you up. He pushes the silk up so he could watch you intensely as he ate you out. Suckling your clit. Spitting boldly into you and chasing it around with the swirling tip of his tongue. You want to ask how he got so good at this.

Brown eyes searching all over for the way you move and jerk. Curse his name every blazing profanity under the sun. You fist his short curls you groan for him. Hair feathering through your fingers. Hips smacking his face. Even against this, you fight him for power.

Fuck. Paul. Yes. Fuck-fuckfuck

“You and your foul mouth.” He hums. His nose pressed right up against the mound of your cunt as he eats you sloppily. Relentlessly.

“Been wanting to taste you since the other day. You came all over my favourite pair of gloves.” He bitched.

It’s so absurd. That you chuckle.

But not for long cause, oh, this boy prince was determined to wrench this orgasm from you. Whether you wanted to give it or not.

You curl your fingers tight and your hips roll to that boyish face. He seems to delight in tasting deeper. Keeps licking. He’s not doing this for his means to an end. He’s doing this to learn you- to savour the taste.

He’s so rough and getting rougher. Slurping you up cause yes you just are that wet. It sounds obscene.

You cum and you sob. Muscles clenching down in his tongue and fluttering for him. Your yelp shatters off every leaf and trunk in the gardens and bounces back all distorted like broken glass.

Paul’s smile and chin is all wet when he clambers over your thighs to come kiss you. Your taste painted in his lips. You drag him in. Greedy for it.

Your pretty prince. You feast and peck at his lips again and again. Again. Smothering him with your mouth.

“You better give me your cock this time. Tsarevich.” You smirk at him. Bite your lip. Panting for more.

“You’re getting it right now.” He explains. Impatient.

As he sits back on his heels and shuffles his hands over his trouser fastenings. Flapping back and ripping them open. Finding his cock in hand and tossing his head back to moan as he strokes himself.

You curl your leg around his ass and tug him in. One hand slips up your thigh and sneaks under your stockings. The other guides himself down so he can slip into you.

He drives to the hilt. You wrap him up in your legs pressed to his sides cause sweet blessed fuck, he’s bigger than you thought he would be.

“Fuck.” Stabs out his mouth as he punched into you with short hard thrusts that knocks into the very cup of your womb. You grit your teeth through the sting. He was your first after all. He’s splitting you in two.

You tip your head to the cold stone and let him take you. Ecstasy frozen on your expression. Like every rut will stab into your heart and you’ll die out here under the stars, wrapped in him.

He leans in close and loses himself in your molten warmth. The shooting pips of pleasure taking you both from head to toe. Your walls suck him deliciously tight. You scrape your mouth against his and you taste like rose rouge, tangy Möet and salt.

His sharp hips barrel into you. Snapping relentlessly as he fucks you into unforgiving stone. Clasping your knees around him. No space is left. You smirk against his mouth and let him rut you like a beast.

His thumb sneaks for your clit and he watches your face pull down into sheer bliss. Your cunt is crushing him so tight he can’t breathe.

You roll your hips for him all silky, desperate for that gut punch, and he can’t hold back. Pleasure rolling up and mounting in his spine. Ready to tip.

You cum. He does too. His cock spits a blooming warmth inside you.

You lay there, limp. All swallowed in each other with a sultry kiss slanted on lips. Messy clothes all twisted and undone. Shaking limbs and gasps that fade as you lie there. Cooling in basted sweat. High on pleasure.

He cups your face and stares down at the stars in your impossible, wonderful stubborn eyes. Lips raw from his kiss.

“Can we try that in your bed now.” You ask him as you scrape your clawed nails through his hair.

He huffs laughter You really were going to kill him. He’s sure of it.

Countess Bruce scurries inside from the gardens and back to her Empress’ side. An open curl of an arm awaiting her. Tucking her in.

“It worked.” The Countess loops her arm through Catherine’s. Smiles winningly. Steals a chocolate off the table and scoffs it down. Sucks her fingers clean. Sweet dried violets and Belgian chocolate. The best.

Catherine chuckles drily.

“Fucking men. You tell them they can’t have something. It suddenly becomes the first thing they want.” She chuckles cruelly as she slurps her wine.

“On the bright side, atleast now you’ll have a grandson. Or grandaughter.”

Catherine looks amused. “Let us pray for a girl.”

Paul was so easily managed. Now she had him contented, maybe he’ll stop being a pain in her ass.

Her neat little plan had been nicely wrapped up. Shiny satin ribbon bows. She had to wrestle the added hassle of planning a royal winter wedding.

Could be worse. Now she had to think how to dispose of someone else for the Swede. Her mind ticks over with new fresh possibilities. Maybe she could just have the fool killed-

An Empress’ work is never done.

 ~

Mayhaps you’d like a gander at the sequel? 🥀👀

Tagging some Prince Paul/JQ babes, cause you never know, sorry if not your thing: @creme-bruhlee @corodedcofin @emmywrites-blog @youaremyfamiliar @the-suburban-blues

[amarguerite]

Picked up a cheap Regency romance novel for the long weekend and the heroine’s sister called Bryon’s poems sickly and full of damsels in distress and knights in shining armor, which like… no? Byron is Romantic but his work is not full of romance unless you are talking of the medieval definition of romance. Then I would be like, “why yes! Childe Harold is indeed a fascinating examination of chivalric romance as a genre, as seen from the Regency era! It examines what makes a hero, and is full of marvel-filled adventure!”

But that’s not what’s meant— I think the author is using romance in a contemporary and pejorative sense, which just… doesn’t make sense at all. Byron is not the guy you go to for sentimental romance in this period, he’s the guy you go to for scathing satire, complicated meter, cunning rhyme schemes, and scandal. He was popular to the point where some people sneered at him but it wasn’t becuase he “wrote romance.” People sneered at him for his social affections and because he fucked his half-sister

[weirdmarioenemies]

Name: Chemitory

Debut: Kirby: Planet Robobot

Hello everyone! I hope you’ve remembered to take your medicine lately! And I hope you take it from a secure and clean container received from your pharmacy, and not from a funny robot who throws ambiguous pills at you! Because that would not be healthy. That’s a Science Fact!

Of all the robobots they put in Planet Robobot, Chemitory is my favorite! This design is so so pleasant, and as it idles, it waves its hands gently and happily. Perfectly pill-shaped, since it is all about pills, with floaty hands and an eyes-in-a-void face! That is such a common kind of face for Kirby characters, but it works so especially wonderfully here! Perhaps this is a Haltmann Works Company healthcare robot, here to allegedly help. Instead, it throws pills at what it considers a problem in hopes that it will go away. A scathing satire of modern psychiatry!

Of course, Chemitory has a big clear dome full of pills, and it is here to throw them at you! This dome, delightfully, swings back on the two hinges on either side of its head, allowing it to reach in! What is Chemitory’s prescription?

Chemitory has been officially diagnosed as Mad Scientist! If it doesn’t have its pills, it probably turns into a boring ol’ Regular Scientist. Doing dilutions in a lab. Wearing proper protective equipment. That’s not Chemitory’s style! Chemitory would rather endanger lives and not be approved by the FDA, like a GOOD mad scientist!

Kirby can swallow Chemitory, OR its pills, to obtain the Doctor ability! I am a little surprised the ESRB was fine with letting Kirby consume strange pills, and receive a benefit from doing so. Again, please don’t consume strange pills. But I’m glad Kirby does it, because Doctor is perhaps my favorite ability! It is so fun! Kirby can throw pills like Chemitory, as well as lots of other medical-themed stuff! It is also probably the silliest looking Copy Ability. That is so many accessories! Wonderful.

Something I think is so delightfully wacky about Chemitory, and Doctor as a whole, is that they may very well owe their entire existence to the Dr. Mario amiibo! Planet Robobot allows for amiibo to be scanned to give Kirby certain abilities, and it seems that its new abilities were designed with this in mind! ESP is obviously a Ness reference, almost obnoxiously so. Poison, while the most original of the three, can be reasonably linked to Splatoon, since it features goop that splatters onto surfaces, and damages enemies that touch it. Doctor, of course, is heavily based on Dr. Mario!

Do you think, if amiibo did not exist, or if Dr. Mario was not added to Smash 4, the Doctor ability, and by extension Chemitory, would have never even been conceptualized? It feels rather possible to me, so I am glad both of those things happened!

Chemitory is a sort of one-hit wonder, appearing only in one game. At the end of Planet Robobot, when the mechanization is reverted, maybe every Chemitory even ceased to exist! I have faith, however, that we will see Chemitory again, since Copy Abilities always make their return eventually! And hopefully, Doctor will make its comeback in Kirby Star Allies 2: Chemitory Is In This One And Is Playable!

[darkestprompts]

If the heroes found themselves in a library that wasn’t on fire what books would they be reading?

Plague Doctor: Predictably goes for medical textbooks and treatises of natural science, but also picks up manuals from other areas to expand her scientific repertoire. She favors mechanics, after all, what is the body but a complex machine?

Abomination: Avoids anything related to alchemy. Finds a few religious autobiographies and contemplative books, think Teresa D'Ávila's Inner Castle and Augustine's Confessions.

Occultist: Surprisingly doesn't go straight for the sections dealing with magic and occultism (most of the content is superstitious bunk anyway) but meanders through books of astronomy and philosophy. Checks for an assortment of really obscure books in different sections, claiming they will be very useful for... reasons.

Antiquarian: Will sweep the library for rare books. If nothing catches her eye, she will look through catalogues, reference books, geographical accounts and the odd atlas to plan future endeavors.

Highwayman: Searches for poems and discovers there are way more styles of poetry than he expected. Spends some time figuring out what he likes, then sticks to a single author for the most part.

Arbalest: Reads accounts of far off lands with equal measures of wonder and skepticism (she has been misled by them before). Likes making fun of illustrations of animals clearly unknown to the artist ("Hey, Tardif, this one's you after a bender!" "...").

Man-at-Arms: Looks for combat manuals and provides loud, extensive commentary about anything he disagrees with until Paracelsus threatens to poison his dinner if he doesn't shut his piehole.

Crusader: Makes distinctly masochistic choices. First seeks out military history and treatises, as if he could confirm his wartime decisions were normal and necessary, but ends up just giving himself a flashback. Then he finds a book that makes him feel nostalgic or homesick and obsesses over it for the rest of their stay.

Leper: Although he loves his poetry, he has to make concessions on book subject and pick anything with a large enough font for him to read. Or, if someone is so kind as to read to him, he will take that person's taste into account.

Vestal: I know you are expecting me to say "hard porn", but, while she takes a peek at that too, she pretends to consider some religious material, then sneaks around to check every entry on the Index of forbidden books. She was always curious what those were about. Her reactions vary greatly depending on the book.

Musketeer: Finds an illustrated volume about firearms and the development of gunpowder to study possible improvements and adaptations for her musket. Is surprised by the chapter about fireworks. May be tempted to check occult books to see if she can find the Thing she saw.

Jester: Picks up the Book of Bawdy Tales to make people uncomfortable, peruses a few dozen topics at random then settles for scathing political satire.

Hellion: Gets excited and overwhelmed by the amount and variety of books available. Gets help from her companions and ends up looking at a few anthologies of short fantastical tales. Sure, she would enjoy epics and chronicles too, but that's heavy reading and she needs to pick up her pace first.

Bounty Hunter: Beastiaries, goetias, any description of monsters or strange beings. While many are fantastical or inaccurate, he knows the tiniest detail can give you an edge. They can be beaten, he will find out how.

Houndmaster: Doesn't take any chances and goes straight for his favorite plays (they are overdue for a re-read!). Another one that doesn't like to stray far from his favorite authors and genres.

Flagellant: Claims he needs nothing but his Verses. Ends up distracted by the medical diagrams on Para's books.

Grave Robber: Pilfers a book of poisons, then takes her time with the novels. Pilfers her favorite and shares saucy secrets she happens to know about the author.

Shieldbreaker: The very opposite of Reynauld, looks for something light-hearted to ease her mind. Folk stories, happy tales, comedies, farces. If she looks for anything that reminds her of her homeland, it will be something with a positive association.

Runaway: Is intimidated by literature, even more so in a place like this, full of huge books about complex subjects. She wasn't the best reader at St Martha's and her adopted parents were humble folk. She'll do much better by getting a buddy to read together and help her get into it. Good choices are Boudica (also a beginner, enthusiastic and non-judgemental), William (friendly, the plays he favors are a good place to start since they are basically dialogue-only) or Baldwin (has a large repertoire but is more patient than Alhazred or Paracelsus, could use someone to read for him). Or they could all form a book club!

[fantasyfantasygames]

Several Donated Games

I recently had the good fortune to meet Lily Vers at ProseAndCon, a semi-yearly interactive fiction convention in the backwoods of Maine. I mentioned that I write reviews, the next thing I know she hands me a pile of books and offers to buy me a drink if I promise to never give them back. I think she just wanted them out of the house because she's moving. They're not that bad. Well, most of them.

These are short games (well, most of them), so here are some short reviews!

Edge: Blades in the Kill (Hurtful Press, 2021) Long-time followers of the blog will remember HellBlaster and whether I wasn't really sure whether the game was in on its own joke. E:BitK is absolutely in on the joke. The game's aesthetic is part emo, part Hannibal fanfic, part Black Adder. You are a group of serial killer assassins murdering for fun and profit, then getting stiffed on the profit part by your clueless employers who seem not to realize what's going to happen after they stiff a bunch of murderers. Cool stuff: Manages to boil down systems stolen from Blades in the Dark and Kill Edge to their very essence, accomplishing 90% of what they do in 20% of the combined space.

D.E.S.P.O.N.D.E.N.C.Y., A Friendship-Ending Role-Playing Experience (Delta Elf, 2020) Have you ever played Diplomacy? This is Diplomacy in RPG form. One-player RPG form, thankfully. You write the stories of a group of (initially) friends playing a diceless RPG that slowly escalates into a series of alliances and betrayals that eventually leave the entire group and hostile. It reminds me of an Amber game I ran once where people got a little too into the intrigue and backstabbing. Cool stuff: The prompts really get you into the heads of all the characters you make. All your decisions on their part have to come from part of the short backstories you write for them.

Unexamined Fantasy Racism (anonymous, 2018) Hoo boy this one sets you up right from the title and doesn't let up. The book is a 64-page clone of OD&D that provides an absolutely scathing commentary on exactly what the tin says. Anyone who goes on to play a standard D&D (or related) game after playing or reading this one is going to feel real uncomfortable, and for good reasons. I don't think the game is going to get much play, but it's designed more for reading. (See "queerweird" below for another "you might never actually play it" game.) Cool stuff: Never becomes its own target. It's easy to write something like UFR and fall into the "actually doing what you're trying to satirize" trap. UFR instead sets up extremely standard FRPG situations and then slams you right into the exact problem with them.

Hackerface 1999: Don't Roll A Hacker (Crack the Hacker, 2000) I'm not sure who the audience for Hackerface is. It's a parody of Cyberpunk 2020 with references to 1990s floppy game hacking, so you would normally be able to perfectly zero in on the target audience. The game does not treat that audience with any sort of love, affection, or respect, so you come away either not getting a lot of what it's trying to say or feeling uncomfortable. And not a productive UFR-type uncomfortable, just the kind of uncomfortable you get from bullies. Even the hacking rules aren't worth stealing. The book reads like it was written by the kind of person who stuffs nerds into lockers, and how in the hell does that person end up writing RPGs? Cool stuff: The art is pretty great, especially for an indie game in the year 2000. It's done in an extremely stylized approach, with plenty of black ink, chiaroscuro, and anatomy that looks like it belongs on an actual human.

This turned into a longer post than I thought, so I'm going to split it in half. Tune in next time.

[randomlynormalgirl]

my take on saltburn is that it is a class commentary but not in the way people are thinking.

It’s not an eat the rich story, it’s more of a ‘look how desperate the English middle class are’. 

Oliver puts on a facade of being worse off than he is, similar to how the British middle class try to appropriate working class culture and struggles whilst at the same time aspiring to an upper class lifestyle and actively putting down working class people.

The movie also doesn’t portray richness as evil but it does show it as odd and those who HAVE richness as alienating - having customs that can only be known if you were born into it and that is what separates the middle from the upper classes in England. 

Oliver is a satire of the middle class hunger and desire for infiltration and assimilation into the upper classes, not a scathing satire of working class desperation, nor is he a working class hero.

[bestworstcase]

have you heard of and/or do you have a take on the gun theory?

unfortunately.

ok. my introduction to the g.u.n. theory occurred when somebody tagged the the narnia post ‘rwby gun theory’ and i went “the hell is that” and promptly found out.

that was two years ago jesus christ

since then it has occupied the dragon’s hoard of spurious fandom bullshit i keep in my brain to provide enrichment for my flock of scathing little carrion bird thoughts. i haven’t talked about it here because i do actually make an effort to be civil.

so.

the g.u.n. theory is underpinned by a fundamental misunderstanding of symbolism and allusion. both misunderstandings arise from the same analytical error, which is the presupposition that the text is written in code. it is, so to speak, a cryptographic reading.

before getting into the weeds i will say this: as a writer, i find this cryptographic approach genuinely a little offensive in, like, an “if you even look at my writing i will beat you to death and then eat you alive” knee-jerk fuck you kind of way. and that’s because this:

a theory that there is a second, completely different interpretation of RWBY from the apparent and generally accepted one […] that RWBY contains many, many more allusions than the creators let on. [they] are intentionally hiding these allusions […] by layering them, so that something that alludes to one thing on the surface also alludes to something else on a level beneath that, resulting in the audience easily seeing the top-level allusion but missing the lower level allusion- or allusions- unless they are paying very very close attention. [ src. ]

is fucking insulting. it is anti-storytelling. the point of a story is to tell a story, not to obfuscate itself by encoding the secret ‘real’ story in the proverbial fucking blue curtains. storytelling is communicative. storytellers WANT you to understand the story, the telling, that is the whole entire fucking point. symbolism is not a secret code. it’s a flag. it’s a trail-marker. it’s a tool for guiding attention and helping the audience connect the dots.

sometimes it’s accidental because writers make subconscious connections or just repeat a motif a lot for aesthetic reasons. (<- my thing is birds. if you’ve ever read bitter snow and wondered why everything is birds it’s because i just think that birds) sometimes it’s on purpose and sometimes it is On Purpose. but it is never, ever there to tell a secret hidden story that is not the story the story appears to be. stories say what they mean and mean what they say.

yes even allegories, fables, satire, et cetera. subtext is not “”hidden meaning“” it’s just narrative information conveyed implicitly. theme is not “”hidden meaning“” it’s the abstract ideas realized through the narrative. these are things the audience is supposed to pick up on, even if they lack the analytical skill to identify and articulate precisely how or why and even if they don’t consciously recognize it. storytellers want you to get it.

ok? ok.

takes off the writer hat.

the g.u.n. theory—like all cryptographic readings—begs the question. it’s a “method of further appreciating, understanding and even predicting the events of [RWBY]” by examining the story “as a confluence of dozens of familiar fantasy and fictional narratives and influences” because the story is actually something “completely different” from what it appears to be. the g.u.n. theory purports to excavate the deeper real story from the obfuscating “surface” story, which is an obviously insane thing to do unless you first accept the premise that the actual text—the things the characters do and say on the screen—is not what the story is.

the g.u.n. theory requires that “what happens in star wars?” is more relevant to interpreting rwby than “what happens in rwby?”

that is ludicrous. it is facile. it’s nonsense.

it would be nonsense even if the g.u.n. theory limited itself to genuine allusions (like ‘the marvelous land of oz’), because while rwby is retelling marvelous land pretty fucking overtly, you do in fact have to read marvelous land in context with a) what happens in rwby and b) specifically how rwby leverages marvelous land to construct its own story, which means you also need to read it in context with the other core allusions (maiden-in-tower tales, the little prince, cinderella) and the way the rwby narrative fits the pieces together. if that sounds complicated yes, but also no, because rwby is really very straightforward about it.

but the g.u.n. theory is the brainchild of people who think the core allusions are [checks notes] lord of the rings, star wars, avatar: the last airbender, fullmetal alchemist, and sailor moon. that the atlas arc is based on the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe (on this see The Narnia Post). that salem’s primary character allusions are the wicked witch of the west, sauron, cinderella’s evil stepmother, emperor palpatine, two presumably villainous fullmetal alchemist characters, and inexplicably maleficent?—but notably NOT rapunzel / persinette / petrosinella despite her being, yanno, explicitly the girl in the tower.

looks into the camera like i’m on the office.

what is happening here—this becomes obvious the instant g.u.n. theorists construct an argument for an allusion—is a conflation of common tropes and archetypes with narratively meaningful allusion. thus, “winter is jadis because she enters in a fancy airship, wields a sword and a smaller sword that kind of looks like a wand, there’s a stone lion-head fountain in this one scene, she’s short-tempered, and she’s from the frozen polar kingdom that oppresses the animal people” which is, um, stupid.

i am like five fucking thousand words deep in comparative analysis of salem and job arguing that rwby is a jobian narrative and i will still asterisk the book of job to hell and back as probably not a deliberate allusion because the comparison relies so much on subtext and i am waiting (very! patiently!) for salem to start talking before i’ll commit to arguing for intention. there are people who are convinced winter is jadis because her main gauche vaguely resembles a wand and she’s from the polar kingdom and, like, presents as an archetypal Ice Lady.

i just—

snarls. see the narnia post.

the point is that the g.u.n. theory’s analytical framework is both explicitly countertextual (the text is not the story) and interested in aesthetics and archetypal similarity almost to the exclusion of everything else.

joseph campbell would be proud.

that interest in aesthetics, combined with the g.u.n. theory’s cryptographic approach to analysis, is why prognostication guided by the g.u.n. theory turned out wrong with stunning regularity, and also why there are g.u.n. theory posts out there that make nonsense claims like “x symbol and y symbol have the same meaning and are interchangeable because they resemble each other and are connected to the same character” (<- snarls in ‘the broken moon = the burning rose’).

i’m glad V8 put it in the ground because if i had seen g.u.n. theorists babbling nonsense about alice in wonderland during V9 i would have been unkind

[daincrediblegg]

all right. my final word on house of usher is this:

it was a fun little poe soaked romp. I had fun. is it my favorite flanagan? not by a long shot (forever remains midnight mass and hill house). But then again I came in expecting some satirical romp and I got it. got it good. had fun. saw the blorbos from my shows again. Bruce Greenwood did a half decent raven reading but the best iteration of it remains treehouse of horror (but it's impossible to outdo that tbh). good sendoff from netflix with a scathing condemnation of capitalism and I applaud him for it evermore.