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btsandvmin · 3 years

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Ask: Reply - 2021.04.16

Time to answer some more of your questions. I have a lot this time, and still a lot left I’ll have to save to another post. You are all very good at being curious and asking interesting questions. There are also some asks that are replies to old asks, and then I’ll include the link to the referenced post.

This time the topics will be:

Ask 1 - About KTH1 and expectations Ask 2 - KTH1 spoiler with “Oh lady” Ask 3 - Vminies getting superiority complex Ask 4 - Not dismissing the bond between Vmin and the other boys Ask 5 - Other people’s words can influence your thoughts Ask 6 - Vmin not sharing rooms in Bon Voyage Malta Ask 7 - Has being a Vmin shipper always been so overwhelming with all the content? Ask 8 - “Just a friend” interview Ask 9 - The garnet necklace Ask 10 - Vmin in CMs Ask 11 - Taehyung uncomfortable about shipping/tae*kook? Ask 12 - What did Jimin write on his shirt in Run ep. 53? Ask 13 - Gina Maeng ask follow up Ask 14 - Vmin’s love is beautiful (and so much nice praise omg)

Today’s post is a long one... Enjoy!

Ask 1 - About KTH1 and expectations

Ok, so I did write a shit post about this... (I mean… This is literally all Vmin’s songs so far ), but I still think your questions are worth a proper answer.

Honestly I think speculating about KTH1 is kind of hard, and as seen in the shit post I am quite torn with my expectations... In general I am the type who doesn’t like to expect too much in fear of being disappointed. I rather be pleasantly surprised. That being said Vmin does have a track record of getting involved in each other’s songs. I mean a lot is just speculation of course, but we do have confirmed cases as well, enough to not be too surprised if they would keep it up and do something for Tae’s solo album as well. (Tae saying his mixtape would be named Jimin back in 2016 still haunts me.)

On the other hand, they have already given us a lot of collabs. Adding more would feel more like a statement, at least if it would be only Jimin out of the members on that album. The thing is that if Vmin would have something “real” or at least if they are a bit careful with how they come across... I am not sure they would do something too “obvious”. But where such a line would be drawn is impossible to know. I mean clearly they managed to write and sing Friends and it worked fine, even if they did get more attention as a ship.

We also know Tae has been quite loud about Jimin in ways that single him out, so maybe they would really dare push the boundaries as far as actually including Jimin in the album somehow. It’s also very possible there could be other members, and honestly we probably shouldn’t hyper focus too much on it and that it has to mean something no matter if anyone is on it or not.

I think one of the rappers being on it is probably more likely out of the members, but it seems Tae has shown an interest in collabs with people outside of BTS, so that’s kind of what I am expecting the most. No matter who in the group is on it I am sure fans will make a big deal out of it, and maybe Tae would rather have his own thing for his first album. I really don’t know how his thoughts would go.

But again, looking at how Tae and Jimin has talked about working together, and have had moments like Tae promising Jimin a song or Tae saying they will work together again... It’s definitely not impossible to get another Vmin song. I do feel it’s more likely for any connections to be vague and not instantly noticeable though (at least not anything romantic looking because we know what happened to the Christmas song). Especially considering how they have only recently revealed things like 4 clock’s inspiration more openly and had Friends followed by Sweet Night. My main stance for any possible real ship is still that they have reason to be careful, and yet another Vmin collab, on Taehyung’s first personal album would probably raise some eyebrows considering everything else we already have. But it could also be me over analyzing them, and maybe they just really like and want to work together. Tae for sure has after all been vocal about this preference and want to work with Jimin.

So yeah, on one hand they have a track record that is hard to ignore... But on the other I wonder if they might want to add another “point” for ARMY to look at them and their songs. I also don’t want to assume that if there are songs on there that sound romantic that they automatically will be about Jimin. There will have to be legit possible connections for me to acknowledge them.

It’s tricky. I guess we will have to wait and see. I am kind of scared both that there won’t be anything or that there will be SOMETHING. Thank you for the ask, and I hope I shed some light on my thoughts on this subject. Either way I am very excited and looking forward to an album full of Taehyung’s own songs and the stories he wants to tell.

Ask 2 - KTH1 spoiler with “Oh lady”

I am not sure it is “lady”, since it’s a bit unclear in general. He also has a part that just seems to go “do be do” and I don’t know if the lyrics are even finished or if he worked with someone else etc. We basically lack a lot of information. But even so using lady/her/she etc. in a song doesn’t have to mean it is about a specific person or that the person is a she or that it is Taehyung’s own feelings (I know he said he usually sings about things he have felt, but just saying it doesn’t always have to be).

Of course I don’t want to downplay it and say it doesn’t mean anything, but considering their fanbase is majority women, they live in a homophobic country and he has even been denied to sing a romantic song with a man before, it’s not impossible to add that to make it more “relatable” or less “gay”. God, that sounds terrible. I don’t want to start discussions where we don’t take their words for what they are, so I hope you might understand my point of view. That being said of course it could just as easily be to or about a specific woman in his life that we don’t know about. Or as you say, he isn’t actually in love but is simply writing love songs that could be inspired by non-romantic relationships or movies etc. as was the case for his inspiration for Winter Bear.

Tae also used “she” in Winter Bear, and that seems a bit forgotten. Or people try to say it has to be about his grandmother... Which we obviously don’t know, it’s just the woman people jump to since he used “she” and many people don’t like the idea of him dating a woman or writing about a woman we don’t know. Either way I think we need to remember that anything is possible and we don’t know them personally and how they think or why they choose to do what they do.

I think we need to remember that there is always going to be the possibility that ships aren’t real, that the romantic songs aren’t about Jimin and that either one of them could be in a relationship with someone else (all genders included).

Ask 3 - Vminies getting superiority complex

Hello! I want to address something that has been bothering me for a while now. I have been seeing some vminnies have a superiority complex just bcoz they ship vmin. Its very rampant among new vminnies and twt vminnies. I get that we all feel validated and happy when out OTP claim to be soulmates and bff. I feel that way too. But people have to remember that vmin are real people and their relationship is dynamic. Like they did grow from bff who used to tease e/o and fight alot to soulmates who are gentle and caring. Who is to say that one day they wont drift apart (i hope not and dont think thats gonna happen but for argument sake) so there is no reason to feel superior or look down on other shippers.

If people think vminnies are superior bcoz they are not toxic they probably know they are lying. Lbr i have seen my share of toxic vminnies though may be a lesser number but they are there and its not the ship but its that particular person who is at fault. While i agree that some ship theories cultivate hate and toxicity there may be people among those ships who are just as sane and good as we claim to be. I just wanted to address this bcoz seeing some vminnies on twt saying locals thinking vmin were tgt after coway add is a validation kind of triggered me. I m sure there would have been similar responses to any other ship bcoz they all have been tgt for a decade and are very comfortable with e/o. I just wanted to talk to someone about this and i know you have discussed similar topics in the past. So yeah this was very long.

First of all, on request I won’t show your name, but thank you for sending me this and letting me know who you are. It’s always nice to know who is behind the question. But that being said I don’t mind people asking on anon, I totally get it being a lot easier to ask or question things when you don’t have to reveal yourself. Either way I am just glad to get interesting and important topics and I do think the things you bring up are worth talking about.

As you say, there is this thing when people start to feel and act superior for various reasons, and I too have seen some Vminies do this. Getting a lot of moments is sure nice. But honestly, just imagine if another ship came and mocked Vmin or gloated every time they got more moments. It has surely happened too, and I am sure it doesn’t feel very nice when on the negative end. Just be a decent human, ship moments will always vary and it’s great to be happy about getting moments, but there is no need to compare or look down on other ships. I say it again, shipping is not a competition, just enjoy your own ship and let others enjoy theirs.

As for feelings superior based on group behavior I think we really need to stop looking at groups and start looking at individuals, both when it comes to groups we are part of and groups we consider “bad”. I have said it many times, but individuals of other groups we don’t agree with won’t all be bad, or all stupid or young etc. We might want to tell ourselves they are worse, but it really doesn’t change much.

Being “less bad” it not a merit and it shouldn’t be a competition. We all have our own selves to answer to and we should judge other people based on their actions and not based on what group they might belong to.

I think size and the toxicity of a narrative can lead to more people in certain groups behaving in toxic ways... But I think any person could happen to fall into these behaviors if not careful and aware. Often the change is gradual too, or you feel attacked by the other “rival group” and thus feel it’s justified to attack back, and so it escalates.

Vminies are at the moment as a group smaller, and thus have less “bad apples”. We likely also have a narrative for Vmin that doesn’t require as toxic mindsets, for example extreme jealousy or Vmin being forced to hide. But there for sure are still toxic Vminies, and there are also a lot of non-toxic shippers in all groups. Usually the louder ones are also the worst ones while the chill and nice will remain in their own lane and ship more peacefully. But being part of a smaller group doesn’t make you superior, your actions is what is important.

As for small moments getting noticed or other types of “validation” for your ship, of course it’s going to feel nice. However, what people see and think of any relationship in BTS is still just an outsider view and literally has no meaning for their actual relationship beyond it being a cute moment. That’s why size and popularity also doesn’t matter as any kind of “proof”. Interpretation will always just be interpretation, good or bad, if you like it or not.

Sadly I think we will get more and more toxic behavior from more ships as the fandom grows and as some things get more normalized within those ships’ communities. It’s about certain behaviors growing into a community culture... The more toxicity that is allowed the more others will follow. That’s why bringing up the problems is important, but trying to do so without shunning people so that they don’t go and create their own space where everyone else is the enemy. After all, being open and welcoming and understanding is much more likely to make someone listen and even change their mind than by attacking them.

I answer for my own actions. So does every person. I don’t want to be judged for everything every Vminie or ARMY or Multi K-pop fan etc. has done. Generalization is a huge problem in general, not just in fandoms or ship wars. I do try to be a positive influence, to not judge too harshly and to remember that being hostile won’t help any situation. But that’s about it. I am glad you brought up this topic, because talking about it is important, but sadly I don’t think there is a lot that can be done about it. Just try to be nice and open minded.

Thank you for the ask, I hope you all understood what I wanted to say.

Ask 4 - Not dismissing the bond between Vmin and the other boys

Thank you. I really see no need for it. It’s clear as day that they all love each other, and even if one pair would happen to be romantic instead of platonic that won’t change. We don’t have to compare and we definitely don’t have to downplay the moments they share with each other. All shippers should at the very least accept the the things they do and say as mostly genuine. I trust BTS and what they show us, it’s that easy.

I know some also get influenced by toxic fans, but we really need to remember that no narratives by fans matter when it comes to reality and what bonds BTS share with each other. They are all great people and seem to have such love and respect for each other I frankly don’t understand how you can be a fan if you think any of it is played up to the point some claim.

Likely no ship in BTS is real, but if any is, to me I am sure the ones involved would be happy and supported by the rest of the members. That’s why it doesn’t really matter what ship would be real or not real as long as they are happy. We shouldn’t let our own views and sometimes want or hopes affect the way be judge their reality. This applies for things outside shipping as well.

Thank you for your kind words. :)

Ask 5 - Other people’s words can influence your thoughts

Indeed. The brain is a powerful thing. This is very obvious if you are a multi-shipper or a general fan, but BTS truly has a lot of questionable moments between all kinds of pairs. Focus is a interesting thing. If you like something you will notice it more, and you will also remember it more while you forget other moments. Likewise if something is “negative” like a rival ship you are likely to notice them more as well. This happens even if you just watch the general content and get your own bias. Imagine then how it might influence you when others keep repeating either your happy interpretations or things you worry about? You’ll get it stuck in your head and remember it more than other things.

Like isn’t it funny how we might gush about Vmin sharing beds, or worry about ji/kook or tae/kook cuddling while hope/kook literally sleep wrapped around each other in both Bon Voyage 3 and 4? Sometimes it’s all about perspective.

By now we need to realize that fan perspective will influence us a lot. And in particular if a lot of people say it or if it is presented in a way that makes it sound logical and intelligent. Words have power.

I still think using “Vmin is dead” or spreading worry often in itself leads to people thinking it and it being somehow accepted as fact. In similar fashion getting to hear about certain ships or certain narratives will make us notice things in relation to that. My own words and posts too will have influence on some people that read them. That’s why I try to be so careful, and why I try to avoid using strong words or claims that might cement themselves in someone’s mind. (I’ll actually talk more about the power of language in my big analysis as well)

Thank you for your input, it’s definitely an interesting thing to consider and another aspect of why shipping mentality is so complicated.

Ask 6 - Vmin not sharing rooms in Bon Voyage Malta

Hi and yes, I have answered this before HERE, but it’s ok. I know it’s not easy finding old topics amongst my collection posts.

Collection of asks - BTSandVMIN Collection of asks 2 - BTSandVMIN Collection of asks 3 - BTSandVMIN

In short I think Vmin wanted to share rooms but that Taehyung got fooled when Jimin stopped him from checking the upper room. Because it seemed like Jimin stopped him from walking into that room by saying he couldn’t peak Tae probably assumed it wasn’t Jimin’s room and that when Jimin said it was his room he was joking (his face was definitely something). So yeah, I think he just got fooled by Jimin’s statement about not being allowed to look inside the room before picking. There are other interesting things about this whole moment, but the one thing we should take away from it is how it is one out of now many examples that seem to show that Vmin have a preference to share rooms/beds. Thank you for the ask. :)

Ask 7 - Has being a Vmin shipper always been so overwhelming with all the content?

I wouldn’t say it’s something recent. I say it often, but we really do get very intense periods from time to time with many of the ships. For example in February 2017 with ISAC, fan signs and everything else we got a lot of Vmin too. I remember being overwhelmed myself, and that was coming out of BST era Vmin. We got many moments every day and that’s just one specific period I can remember.

Over the years sometimes we do get these very intense days or weeks with a lot of moments at once. Usually I get asks like “do you think something is up with Vmin lately” or “wow I can’t believe how much Vmin we have gotten lately” but really, it’s hard to tell, because it really does happen from time to time. I also still say we always get Vmin moments regularly as long as we get BTS content, but sometimes a bit more and sometimes less. I am sure there will be more times when we also get “Vmin is dead“ and worried people because we get less moments than they expect. It just happens, up and down and around it goes.

As for what ships are big I will definitely say Ji/kook and Tae/kook are the biggest, but that all BTS ships are big by now. Meaning as soon as we do get moments it will be seen online. Especially if you follow people who talk about it of course. I also think what platform you are on can result in some ships being seen more than others. For example I know ji/kook is by far the biggest BTS ship here on Tumblr while Youtube seems to have more tae/kookers.

Thank you for the ask. Let’s hope Vmin keeps overwhelming us. (But let’s not start to worry if they don’t) ;)

Ask 8 - “Just a friend” interview

Ah yes, I have a bit of a soft spot for this interview myself. I am not sure, but I think it might be from 2017 (since Tae wrote a birthday letter to Jimin in 2016), or at least that’s when I found it and saved it down. I haven’t actually tracked the original source. You can find the translation in the link shared HERE, credits to @95z.

Seeing this close after the chaos of Let’s BTS and other letter confessions it really does seem very cringe for them to express sincere thoughts in these more formal ways. I can’t blame them.

I do think this interview is yet another example of how much Vmin has tried to adapt to each other, learn and be more open with expressing how they feel. They literally inspire and learn from each other in how to express themselves. Isn’t it completely endearing?

I also love how they get each other to feel strong emotions and how they are there for each other when in need. On a slightly more analytical note I also can’t help but note the “just a friend” vs “soulmate” descriptions and how they seem to have a hard time putting it into proper words. We already know this of course, but yeah... They really don’t have an easy time describing their relationship.

Thank you so much for sharing this moment. I was going to talk about it in my big analysis anyways, but honestly I can’t save everything for it, and you mentioned it so who am I to keep it to myself.

Ask 9 - The garnet necklace

Oh yeah, I know that JK wore it once and that the talk was that a fan gave it to all of maknae line. Not much was ever confirmed from what I know, but regardless it doesn’t change why I think it’s a Vmin/soulmate necklace and why I see it as special.

Here is the thing, when I use “Vmin thing” it really doesn’t have to be exclusive. To me it’s the context around it and how they have used it and even reacted to it that makes the garnet necklace something special for Vmin. In the case of the soulmate necklace Vmin wore it a lot. Almost constantly during a big part of 2017 and even a bit into 2018. They also wore it at the same time a lot. I find this very cute, and we all know “couple items” is something all fans enjoy even if it would just be a platonic relationship behind it. But if both of them wearing it was all there was, as a lot of Vmin sharing clothes (or BTS in general sharing clothes) I wouldn’t really think too much about it beyond it being cute. It could still be just a cute thing that Vmin did, but I personally see it as something beyond the normal clothes/jewelry sharing.

(At the very least you can remember Vmin did this while people thought their relationship was dead, which doesn’t make much sense to do if you hate or dislike someone.)

The things I find more noteworthy about this necklace is the fact that the fandom picked up on it and because they wore it so much and so often at the same time it was dubbed the “soulmate necklace”. Possibly knowing this Tae also brought specific attention to the necklace at two times, as if wanting to show it off. Interestingly enough, in one of these times Jimin seemed to ignore Taehyung who was bringing attention to it on purpose. For me it came across as another thing Taehyung wanted to show off and that Jimin was a bit more careful about.

Of course I could have read it wrong, maybe Jimin just misunderstood. But even so, Tae did bring attention to it in specific relation to Jimin. You can watch the clip HERE. (BTS Tell Us What They Love About Each Other & An Update On Tony & Nate From America Hustle Life)

The other time was in Run ep. 39, right after Vmin talked about being in school together and showing off their school uniforms. If Tae is the one to try and highlight something, I feel it likely has some meaning to him at least.

Either way the necklace is basically a symbol of Vmin’s relationship and the fact that they liked it so much and wore it together during a long period I think they liked wearing it not only because they both happened to like the design but because they both had it. If JK also had one and didn’t use it of course it could include him, but I will still say it remains significant for Vmin’s bond with each other.

As for buying a necklace together they haven’t talked about this one in particular, but Tae did mention he bought his tiger necklace with Jimin in NY, so maybe you are mixing the two things up?

Ask 10 - Vmin in CMs

Thank you for loving my blog and for the ask! :) I am not sure if you perhaps meant in a lot of BTS own photoshoots/units as well, but I’ll focus on CMs in this post since that was your direct example. I might go a bit beyond here, but I saw it as a good chance to revisit some Vmin ad moments.

I wouldn’t personally say we have gotten “way more” but I do think because of their Friends unit they got to do some more interviews together and some CM stuff too. I also think we have gotten more BTS commercials in general now, likely because it’s an income alternative to touring during the pandemic. So that obviously means more CMs, and more chances for them to be paired up. They also have gotten paired with others of course (like in the Bodyfriend CM or Baskin Robbins), but most commonly they aren’t divided in smaller groups at all.

We also have gotten Vmin paired up before, both in photoshoots and in CMs. Of course we saw some great ones in 2016 with Puma and NUGU, but I don’t think we got that much more in 2016 and before than in 2017-2019. I think what we can see is BTS having more endorsements after Covid.

Like honestly, the Puma adds are iconic. Of course the original one, but also the revisits from 2018. Puma definitely seemed to like to pair Vmin in particular. (There are so many good examples from Puma that I’m not including)

We also got a snippet in the Hyundai one, also from 2018.

Another snippet from the Coconut Chicken ad from 2017.

I mean, I don’t know if I should count the snippets at all, like from BTS x VT cosmetics in 2019, but I feel sometimes just being seen in the same frame seems to get attention as being paired up so. (I decided to not include being together when it’s at least a third member in the frame)

And guys... Have you ever watched BTS and the milk song?

What did we get so far more recently? In 2020 we had the Hyundai interview.

And the hyundai #PositiveEnergyChallenge

Fila provided a nice one, also from 2020.

Samsung gave us a snippet recently.

Coway was basically couple goals and like the best one in my own opinion (besides Puma because it is going to take a lot to beat Puma).

But other than that? I don’t think we have seen it that much, have we? I am not complaining or anything, like I am happy with what we got, but I don’t know if it’s that much. I might forget some obvious ones, but these were the ones I had top of mind. Feel free to add ads if you can think of more recent ones that I left out.

So I think we have gotten more BTS ads in general, also more where they are not all of them or single focus, and that we have seen maybe Vmin getting paired a little more after Friends. But to me there is such a small difference I can’t really say if it is anything particular to Vmin or just BTS doing more CMs.

I mean, I don’t have a sheet of who has been paired with who and how many times over the years. But either way I don’t think we should look too deeply into things like CMs or even photoshoots units. Thanks for the ask though, I hope you enjoyed this mini collection. :)

Ask 11 - Taehyung uncomfortable about shipping/tae*kook?

So this is a thought sent in after THIS ASK though it really brings up a new subject, which is that of Tae possibly being uncomfortable with shipping. As for Tae saying that to a tae/kooker in particular I think we have to remember it could very easily just have been in the moment and we can’t know why he decided to reply to that person in particular.

The Vmin post was not invasive and it wasn’t romantic. I mean, I do think Tae keeps showing again and again that if there is any person in BTS that is special to him it’s Jimin. But the difference in the posts also likely matters, but we can’t know how much. We don’t know if Tae would feel annoyed if a Vminie wrote the same thing as the tae/kooker did, and we don’t know if it was just in that moment that he got fed up with the shipping discourse in general, or if it was because it was tae/kook.

Honestly any shipper, regardless if a ship would eventually prove to be real or not, should not go and invade spaces where the boys get exposed to it. We don’t know if Taehyung would have reacted in a similar way if it happened to be another ship.

Personally I don’t think tae/kook drifted apart as a result of shipping, because honestly they still kept being pretty intimate physically and engaged in fanservice on stage etc. If they truly were uncomfortable with the idea I just don’t think they would “feed it” much at all. I think as they said in ITS they just, kind of changed and it became harder to talk. I’ve talked more about tae/kook and my views on their bond in THIS POST and a little in THIS POST as well as about BTS possible stance on shipping HERE.

I also think all of BTS has a pretty good distance from hate and fandom speculations in general. I think that because they know about shipping and partly also feed into it they probably expect crazy people to some degree as well, even if they probably don’t like it. Hetero shippers as well, or solo stans etc. have very toxic behaviors at times, but I think BTS can recognize that it is kind of “bound to happen” with their popularity, no matter what they do about it. Not saying they would like it, and they could definitely feel awkward or annoyed because of it, but it doesn’t seem to bother them too much as I think they can detach themselves from it pretty well.

I also think “fan opinions” in form of rival shipping wouldn’t really harm a hidden couple as it first would likely be a sort of “shield” and second because they have their relationships and are likely comfortable with them on their own terms. What fans think is probably secondary.

It is possible that they could get annoyed or frustrated at times, but again, if they truly felt bothered by it they probably wouldn’t do a lot of the things they do. Because I am sure they are aware to some degree that fans scrutinize their every move and ship moments. Both Tae and Jimin are some of the most physical out of the members, and also some of the members that seem to like to initiate fanservice moments... So I doubt they would have much problem and can feel secure enough in their relationship no matter what fans think.

Ask 12 - What did Jimin write on his shirt in Run ep. 53?

Hi, I guess you got curious after I talked about this episode recently in my post Ask: Reply - 2021.03.30 (Ask 8 - Going down the rabbit hole, micromoments and shipping vs believing).

I don’t know hangul, but I do know what “Jimin” looks like. On Jimin’s shirt from behind the scenes of Run ep. 53 you can see he’s written his own name “지민” Jimin followed by what looks to be “ 님 “ which is nim. So basically the text on the container in the picture says Sir Jimin.

Jimin seemed very keen on writing his name on both his own shirt and on Tae’s and even tried on JK’s. He failed of course, but he sure did try.

Thank you for the ask, and isn’t Tae cute?

Ask 13 - Gina Maeng ask follow up

Glad you liked my reply. :) (From Ask: Reply - 2021.03.30 Ask 4 - Idols dating members of the same group). Yeah I get what you mean, talking about it openly I suppose isn’t so normal. But since it seems to be more and more fans who assume it happens to some degree maybe it’s not so strange if it starts getting more talked about as well. I’ll take it as a good sign, even if the information is nothing new in itself, being more open is going to make it easier for fans to realize it’s possible for their idols to be LGBT+ or have hidden relationships.

As for K-Population it doesn’t seem to be too well known, but it’s one of few actual examples to be found. So yeah, interesting that we know it has happened, and also that it shows what risks it could mean to get involved with a group member. I think the risk of a falling out is something a lot of shippers tend to forget. Anyways, thank you for your reply. ^_^

Ask 14 - Vmin’s love is beautiful (and so much nice praise omg)

Oh my... I am not sure I have ever been called sweetheart by anyone ever before. Thank you! You are making me blush with all the praise. 💜💜💜

But really, we can all just watch Vmin in awe and be happy they have each other and feel such immense love for each other, no matter what that love is. It’s kind of amazing. Like even if they are platonic their relationship is so wholesome and they put so much love and effort into it that it’s truly inspirational. I love when we get bombed with moments like this with a very intense period of great Vmin interactions. As you, me too never fail to feel all soft watching them together.

95z is love and what a love they share. Truly wonderful. 💜

You take care too, and really, thank you so much for this lovely message. it means a lot and is very heartwarming.

And with that sweet ask I’ll end the post. There was a lot of very different questions and I feel I could have written more about many of them, but alas I need to remember I can’t write full essays on everything or I would never get anything posted. Thank you all for reading and I hope you found my thoughts and speculations interesting. ^-^

#vmin #vmin analysis #btsandvmin #ask: reply #vmin collection #vmin ad #vmin cm #vmin commercial #vmin gif #vmin photo #bts shipping #btsandvmin answer #my post #Ask: Reply - 2021.04.16 #vmin soulmate necklace

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monkey-network · 4 years

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Crash Bandicoot the Series Episodes

52 Episodes; To stop N Tropy and Cortex’s Plan Z that puts reality in jeopardy, Crash and Coco must travel between dimensions to gather crystals necessary. Along the way, the duo meets familiar faces and it’s a guess of whether they’re friend or foe. Then again for Crash, an enemy’s just a friend you haven’t made yet.

Method of the Marsupials: Spelunking down an ancient temple, Coco slowly feels inferior compared to Crash’s spontaneity always lucking out. Then again, Crash has never been one without his sister.

The Titanfields and Mucoltants: A chase after a baby mutant leads to a universe where two different clans have been feuding for generations and it’s up to the Bandicoots to finally put an end to it, or make the fighting feel different.

Crash Cultivation: Our siblings split up momentarily and Crash’s adventure involves helping a farmer confront a curse that prevents anything from growing on his land.

In My Element: Coco’s adventure is a puzzle room, literally a room full of puzzles she has to solve to get out. She’s having a blast, but comes to realize that the joy could be endless.

Breakfasticoot: Taking a break from gathering the crystals, Crash decides to go into the morning wilderness to get his sister breakfast in bed. Needless to say, it isn’t easy for our unbreakable hero.

Tense Theory: In order to get the next crystal, Coco needs to show that she can relax like her brother.

Tales as Old as Tiny: The Bandicoots encounter Tiny Tiger, depressed and very lacking in muscle. Crash wants to help, leading to the two entering the wildcat’s mind.

Minuscule Madness (Part 1): The Bandicoots reach a dimension that has everyone in it out to kill them. The problem is that the “everyone” are too small to be noticeable by the duo.

Minuscule Madness (Part 2): Crash’s body has been invaded by the small people and Coco must figure out how to save her bro before he dies or the small people die first due to Crash’s surprisingly volatile insides.

Jake and the Crashman: Crash is split from Coco and is thrust into a noir story involving wumpa fruit, cars, and a hidden conspiracy.

War the Game: Crash and Coco face off against a supercomputer possessing a crystal where losing will mean the end of that world, the heart and mind of our Bandicoot siblings truly at unity this episode.

Coco Kaijuu: The next dimension our siblings enter have them transformed into giant monsters and while Coco wants to be peaceful towards the civilians, Crash is having fun with his new form which unleashes a force trying to stop them.

Rip Roo Ca-Choo: Ripper Roo is alone after his original defeat from Crash, rejected by Cortex and with no direction. He then sees Crash again and becomes determined to exact his revenge.

Crash the Bachelor: A hopeless romantic Skunk finds love when Crash is the one being that isn’t driven away by his putrid stench. And while Crash enjoys being friends, our bandicoot doesn’t care about getting closer.

Tawna Comes to Tango: Dimension hopping Pirate Tawna shows up to help our Bandicoots win the crystal at a casino but her love of risk soon gets in the way.

Bookbrain: Our new trio visit the library where a crystal’s hidden and the former two decide to get Crash into more advanced reading. Crash loves it at first, but when the three discover the comic book section, it’s a challenge to keep that and Crash separate.

Animal House: Crash, Coco, and Tawna have to strengthen their teamwork to face a chicken, a monkey, and a shiny jellyfish in order to get the crystal.

Ghostdusters: Tawna doesn’t believe in ghosts, but a trek through a haunted house suddenly has her scared sneezing. The three try to make their way in and out, but finding the crystal will mean cleaning things up.

Crashket Ball: A game so complicated for Tawna and Coco leads to Crash helping them understand things his way.

Why Love Him: Tawna is separated from her friends into another dimension and stumbles across a dejected Crash that’s been through what she went through long ago in her dimension. She tries to cheer him up, and comes to realize what she saw in him originally.

The Messiness of Music: Our trio have to confront N Gin in a music contest in three days but instruments aren’t their forte, Crash and Tawna can’t and won’t sing, and Coco is overwhelmed in making the best song. However, music doesn’t have to be flawless to feel good.

Crashcading Fury: Crash wakes up angry and on destructive rampage for the next crystal. A scared Coco and Tawna do what they can, desperately trying to get their more cool, easy-going buddy back.

Lunchtime: Crash, Coco, and Tawna have the chance to relax and get sandwiches and the Komodo brothers are sent out to kill them.

Ahoy Baby: A young group of aliens claim Tawna as their mom and she joyously comes to teach them how to live her way.

The House of N (Part 1): Knowing the trio’s progress, Cortex comes up with the idea of bringing multiple versions of himself to come up with ideas in stopping them.

The House of N (Part 2): A battle of the one true Neo Cortex ensues, leading to our main scientist at odds with himself of where everything went wrong.

Aku Uka Alone: Uka Uka and Aku Aku mentally link and argue over the faith they have in their hero/villains.

Dream Reaper: In this silent but musical episode, N Tropy sends a villain capable of killing people while they’re dreaming to the trio, only for our villain to underestimate all three’s imaginative capabilities.

Pace and Test: Crash is challenged to a simultaneous physical and academic exam for a crystal which is where his sister and bestie put their all into making him the best of both worlds.

Ferally Feud: Crash and Tawna get into an argument, leading Coco to try moderating and sees why she loves them both.

It Takes a Bandicoot to Save a Village: Former chief Papu Papu asks Crash to help rebuild his village after Cortex’s meddling might force them to leave the island.

Crate Minds Think Alike: Cortex manages to weaken the trio to the point where they can’t bash crates anymore, leading to them pushing each other to get stronger in the real way.

Dial D for Dingo: Meeting up with an old chum at his “established” restaurant, the Bandicoots take a stand when health inspectors have come to shut down the place by ANY means.

Two Times Tropy: While Cortex is out, N Tropy and his female alternate are working on repairs but are ignorantly making things worse with their constant ego stroking.

Crash The Banditoon: The trio reach a blank dimension where things feel different, more animated and that’s saying something. Crash isn’t complaining though.

Juicy Juiced: A special wumpa Crash finds gives the trio enhanced ability but at the cost of sleeping for days. So they keep eating it in order to come up with an antidote to null the effects at the risk of an eternal sleep.

Lab Rat Revolution: The trio arrive at a place populated by a majority of Brio’s rejects and helps them get revenge.

Wayback Brio: An encounter with N. Brio has him and Coco stuck in a cavern. While Crash and Tawna figure out a way to their freedom, the two inside are forced to rewalk their former relationship.

The Skinner (Halloween Special): Crash is possessed by an evil spirit that’s known for desiring the skin of its victim, unbeknownst to Tawna and Coco though, an unstable spirit can’t control an unstable body.

You’re a Bad Man, Dr. Cortex: Cortex arrives in a dimension where he’s the leader of the world, only this version is a good guy. Naturally he replaces the other Cortex and tries to spin the world into his image, but is conflicted that he’ll destroy a utopia he technically made himself.

Nurse Bandicoot: Coco catches a high fever after a trip through the arctic dimension, and the others do what they can for her. Crash surprisingly takes things slow while Tawna is frantic in making things better.

Do Mursupials Dream of Magic Sheep?: Crash suddenly gets nightmares and it affects him while awake. One night, a figure appears in his dream and the two adventure to found out how to resolves these bitter feelings.

Cocomotion: A trip to the future has Coco visit a successful version of herself. As such, it’s the age old case between future versus family.

Crunched Kindness (1/2 Hour Christmas Special): Infiltrating Cortex’s castle, the trio frees a disheveled Crunch Bandicoot and helps him see the beauty of the world.

High School Bandicoot: The Trio are stuck in a video game dating sim where Crash has to win in one go or get deleted forever.

Fishing for Crystals: A fish eats a crystal, a bigger fish eats the little and so on, forcing our heroes to fish differently in the effort to get it back.

Continue?: Crash finds himself alone in a dreary world where it turns out he's dead. He meets a little possum girl and her big bodyguard as they help him uncover a way back to life.

The Trials of Crash Bandicoot: Crash is framed for multiple interdimensional crimes in space court, all of which are Cortex’s doings, and while Coco and Tawna play defense, everyone he’s encounter over the series comes to either his aid or prosecution, and Cortex has something up his sleeve, Crash himself is seemingly out cold during everything.

The Dimmer of Hope: After the events of the previous episode, Cortex has all the crystals and the trio’s banished to the end of the universe. All feels lost, so all that’s left to do is reminisce of the adventures the three got to have.

The Dimensional Dance (Part 1): Cortex and the N Tropys have everything set for multiversal domination but argue over how they want to do things. Meanwhile the trio get back to reality and figure out a way to destroy the crystals.

The Dimensional Dance (Part 2): Crash has absorbed all of the power of the reality machine to make a universe in his own image. Tawna, Coco, the N Tropys, and Cortex are aware and find out that this won’t be stable for much longer and have to save Crash to reverse the effects.

The Never Ending Story (Series Finale): Crash is alone again, not dead, this time in a plane outside all existence and, given the chance to speak for the first time, reflects on his life and everything he got to have to a being he’s familiar with.

#crash bandicoot #coco bandicoot #tawna bandicoot #crunch bandicoot #neo cortex #n. brio #crash bandicoot 4 #crash 4 #video games #cartoons #long post #fake episodes #fanfiction #dumb

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consumedkings-archive · 4 years

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☕️🍂🥀🌗 + ell & soli xx

♡ hi stella ily thanks for coming in and wrecking my inbox per usual : ‘ )

under the cut for ancient names/witching hour spoilers (sort of), domestic violence mentions, etc and so on

oc questions!

☕️ give us one (or more if you feel like it) of your OCs deep dark secrets! why do they keep it hidden? spill the tea!

it might be a cop-out to say that i don’t think isolde has any deep dark secrets? the woman owns pretty much everything about herself that exists, and if you don’t like it, don’t be around her (lol). i guess something that might constitute as a secret is that she actually went on a date with her younger sister’s now-fiance, prior to avery and him becoming engaged, sometime post-joseph and pre-joseph (you know, post engagement failure and pre-reconnection). she thought it would make it weird to mention it to avery, so she didn’t, but that’s the reason isolde set them up on a date together--because she thought they’d get along great! other than that the most shameful thing about her is probably that she likes joseph’s stupid yellow aviators.

@baeogorath likes to POSIT that PERHAPS there is some unresolved sexual tension between isolde and jacob and i will leave that to the aether ♡

🍂 what are their opinions on the different seasons? which one do they hate and which one do they love and why?

every season is inferior to summer. john’s theory is that isolde is actually a cold-blooded reptile and so she needs the warm weather, because every other season is on soli’s shit list. winter and fall are jam-packed with family-heavy holidays (yuck) and spring can’t decide what temperature it wants to be. the real reason is that she grew up in turkey, on the coast, so she’s a sun-and-sand kind of woman.

🥀 has your OC ever been hurt by someone they love? ever been betrayed? abused? attacked?

boy you know for a woman as smart as isolde, she sure has really, really bad taste in men. she was married to one man before joseph, someone named alec, that she had been with for many years, went against her gut feeling that marrying him was going to be bad. naturally he ends up being a total trash heap. the toxicity of their relationship finally cultivated into an argument that turned physical when alec accused her of cheating on him, and ended when isolde smashed a vase in his face. needless to say, the cops were called, divorce proceeded, and she would have taken all of his money if not for the fact that the police found alec in worse condition than she was when they showed up to respond to the domestic violence call.

aside from that, joseph’s greatest miscalculation/grievance towards soli is that he thought he was exempt from the “no marriage” rule, and said “i want you to marry me”, and tried to put a ring on her finger. this results in the Great Dumping, which was essentially isolde going “are you STUPID” and then kicking him out. later down the road they re-negotiate (among other things) and that’s all well and good.

🌗 early mornings or late nights? what do they spend their time doing during these hours?

both. sleep is for the weak. isolde’s body probably needs a solid 3-4 hours of sleep to be operating at maximum capacity, and she spends most of that time working--if she’s allowed, anyway. down the line joseph manages to get her to relinquish some of that workaholic nature, but to be honest it’s so fundamentally a part of who soli is that it’s near impossible to really get her to slow down.

☕️ give us one (or more if you feel like it) of your OCs deep dark secrets! why do they keep it hidden? spill the tea!

hmmmmmmmmmmmm. i guess it’s not MUCH of a secret anymore, but elliot is a hopeless romantic at heart. like, hallmark christmas movie, grand gesture of love, steamy-sappy romance paperbacks that you buy for $12 at the grocery store next to elaborate boxes of chocolate. you know the ones. absolute, complete garbage, but perfect for filling your down time. she doesn’t like to let anyone know, because then she probably wouldn’t be so scary anymore, but you know.

also that one excruciating date she went on with staci pratt when she first came back to hope county will die with her, thanks

🍂 what are their opinions on the different seasons? which one do they hate and which one do they love and why?

because elliot’s body is constantly under fight-or-flight pretense, her extremeties are always cold. she hates winter, hates the snow, hates the cold, but loves taking hot baths; not to be mistaken, she still continues to take them throughout the year, it’s just that winter is the premium hot bath experience. i would say that her favorite season is probably spring, because it’s like the first rays of hope after the dark, bleak winter; everything coming to life, the earth is waking back up, the world is full of baby animals. you get the gist!

🥀 has your OC ever been hurt by someone they love? ever been betrayed? abused? attacked?

STELLA YOU KNOW THE ANSWER TO THIS KJHASDK. let’s forego any mentions of mason, shall we, and just marinate on the fact that john seed has the audacity to, once, try to drown her, drug her, get her to confess under said drugging, be a big enough idiot to handcuff them together and then lose the key, systematically lies to her until LITERALLY THE VERY END, and then HUNTS HER DOWN FIVE STATES APART and then SAYS: “i love you”. anyway he’s an idiot and elliot’s too good for him what’s new

also s/o to daddy ambrose honeysett for leaving her in a mall at 8 years old so he could dip for good : ‘ )

🌗 early mornings or late nights? what do they spend their time doing during these hours?

early mornings, when there’s still a bit of light. the dark fucks with elliot’s head too much for her to be comfy with super late nights, and while she doesn’t necessarily get enough sleep as is, she likes to get up when the light’s still grey and take boomer on a run or a walk to get some fresh air and shake off any nightmares.

#ask games #ch: isolde khan #ch: elliot honeysett #love that my girls are so messy #love that for them #: ' )#faithchel

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tumlbrtumlbr · 3 years

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Woman as alien: Angela Carter's Heroes and Villains.

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"Woman as an alien, the non-patriarchal alien in a patriarchal society, the patriarchal alien in a non-patriarchal society, the non-patriarchal alien experiencing the stress of positioning as a patriarchal subject - all are strategies used by feminist science fiction writers to deconstruct patriarchal ideology and its practice." (1) This quote taken from an essay by Anne Cranny-Francis is for me a very suitable starting point for a discussion of Angela Carter's Heroes and Villains (1969). Written from within the counter-culture of the 1960s, this novel is Carter's excursion into the disaster story convention, a literary sub-genre which was very popular during the period of the Cold War. (2)

Heroes and Villains is a very interesting and unsettling early book, and yet, surprisingly, one that has received "far less critical attention than one might expect." (3) Apart from a few interesting essays, (4) the existing studies of the book (primarily sub-chapters of monographs devoted to Carter) focus almost exclusively on the way the novel reverses gender stereotypes and undermines cultural codings of female sexuality as passive and masochistic. My point is different: I would like to show how, by having a female protagonist (and focalizer) who revolts against cultural stereotypes, Carter revitalizes the disaster story convention that in the late sixties seemed an exhausted and repetitive sub-genre of pulp fiction.

In order to do this I am going to briefly present the British disaster story tradition, place Carter within its context, and then discuss Heroes and Villains as an atypical disaster story that, thanks to a woman-alien who disrupts mythical frameworks that people are confined by, points to new ways of constructing narratives. I will show how the female protagonist of the novel matures and gradually learns that her post-holocaust society is based on a set of false binary oppositions it has inherited from pre-holocaust Western patriarchal society, and that her world is slowly giving way to entropy. I will then prove that Heroes and Villains indulges in descriptions of chaos and decay in order to show the deterioration of once potent symbols and thus of the mythical order which they represent. Only then, once the old order disappears, can the female mythmaker create a totally new civilization, one that does not repeat old and static social paradigms, but is dynamic and mutable. Similarly, Heroes and Villains shows that, in order not to degenerate into pulp disaster, the story should refrain from recreating already known historical epochs (for example, a new post-holocaust Middle Ages), opting instead to create radically new societies ruled by women-aliens.

Though it is rather difficult to state exactly what disaster stories are, a fair working definition of the genre seems to be the one given in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction: "stories of vast biospheric change which drastically affect human life." (5) According to John Clute and Peter Nicholls, the British disaster story was born at the end of the nineteenth century when the first anti-civilization sentiments were being felt, and people began to mistrust the idea of the white man's Empire standing for reason, progress and science. In 1884 Richard Jefferies, a Victorian naturalist and journalist, published After London, a novel describing the ruins of the greatest city on Earth; in a post-cataclysmic future our civilization inevitably succumbs to nature, savagery and non-reason. In the following years such writers as H.G. Wells, Conan Doyle and Alun Llewellyn published numerous fantastic ac counts of natural- or human-provoked disasters, the retrogression of humankind, new ice ages, barbarian raids, the destruction of Europe, etc. (6)

Though dating from the nineteenth century the genre did not flourish until the 1950s and early 1960s during the Cold War, when young British writers revived the old tradition by incorporating a new influence: that of American pulp magazines. American stories of the time were very pessimistic, as the recent war left many with a feeling of despair and fear of the nuclear bomb, political systems based on unlimited power and culture's imminent doom. In England there was a strong native tradition of gloomy fiction concerning authoritarian societies (George Orwell, Evelyn Waugh and Anthony Burgess), and thus the young authors of disaster stories belonging to the so-called "New Wave" of British speculative fiction (J.G. Ballard, Michael Moorcock, Brian Aldiss and others) had examples to follow. (7) Their older colleagues Walter Miller (in the United States) and John Wyndham (in Britain) were writing their post-holocaust bestsellers at that very time.

Heroes and Villains seems to belong to the same tradition as the disaster story classics: Walter Miller's A Canticle for Leibovitz or John Wyndham's The Chrysalides. (8) Miller and Wyndham describe the beginnings of a new civilization; their prose demonstrates how the deadly heritage of our times (pollution, mutations, decline and chaos) serve as the basis for another better world. In A Canticle monks of a second Middle Ages try to gather and preserve the records of our knowledge by rewriting all kinds of texts (just like the caste of Professors). Though they no longer understand what they copy, still there is hope that one day civilization will be regained. Wyndham's post-catastrophic society, in turn, is obsessed with the idea of purity and the norm. His characters want to recreate civilization in such a way as to make it immune to self-destruction. In its fear of deviations and mutants (bringing to mind the Out People) Wyndham's society is cruel and fanatical, but his novel is, just like Miller's story, full of hope for the future. Human folly and cruelty evoke terror and pity in order to improve the reader's mind. Carter's procedure in composing Heroes and Villains is to allude to Wyndham and Miller's tradition. Both Heroes and Villains and her other post-holocaust novel The Passion of the New Eve show to what extant literature today is repeating already known tales. Yet disaster fiction, a very commercial genre, enables Carter to reuse the stock motifs and to create her own often times shocking pieces. Her disaster novels may therefore be read as modern Menippea: a mixture of heterogeneous literary material. According to Mikhail Bakhtin, Menippea was the genre which broke the demands of realism and probability: it conflated the past, present and future, states of hallucination, dream worlds, insanity, eccentric behaviour and speech and transformation. (9)

Heroes and Villains juxtaposes overt allusions to nuclear fallout and mutations caused by the self-annihilation of technological society with counter-cultural poetics: subversion of the social order, new hippie-like aesthetics, alternate lifestyles, and concentration on entropy, decay and death. Carter is no longer interested in the bomb--she does not warn against the impending holocaust; but instead describes in detail the gradual dissolution of social, sexual and cultural groupings which follows the inevitable disaster and which makes room for a new female-governed future. Thus, she deconstructs the markedly masculine tradition of after-the-end-of-the-world fantasies which deal with the creation of a new order, strong leaders and outbursts of violence (as is the case in the above-mentioned novels by Miller and Wyndham). In stock disaster stories women are either commodities or breeders who are fought for and whose reproductive abilities are to amend r the drastic decrease of population.

In Heroes and Villains the Cold War motif of a post-holocaust civilization allows Carter to create an exuberant world of ruin, lush vegetation and barbarism. Three groups of people live among the crumbling ruins of a pre-nuclear explosion past: the Professors, who live in concrete fortified villages and cultivate old science and ideology; the Barbarians, who attack them and lead nomadic lives in the forests; and the Out People, radiation mutants cast out by all communities.

The Professors are the guardians of this order, and they try to uphold standards and attend to appearances such as dress and accent. Marianne, the novel's focalizer, is the daughter of a professor of history brought up to live in an ordered patriarchal society and to study old books in trying to preserve knowledge. The futility of the Professors' work - abstract research done in white concrete towers, editing what nobody would ever read - demonstrates the arbitrariness of post-apocalyptic social roles. The caste of Professors, in wanting to be different than the irrational Barbarians, must devise artificial attributes of its individuality.

Unable to cope with an existence devoted to cultivation of the past and attracted by the colourful and seemingly romantic Barbarians, Marianne helps one of them--an attractive young Barbarian leader named Jewel. He is very beautiful and he wears an exuberant savage costume, making him look like a Hollywood film star who plays in a wilderness film. For Marianne he embodies her desire and fantasies --on one occasion she even calls him the "furious invention of my virgin nights." (10) Moreover, his name might be considered an allusion to the beautiful savage girl whom Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim made the queen of his little kingdom. (11) Marianne's name might well be read as an allusion to Jane Austen's too-romantic heroine of Sense and Sensibility. (12) This canonical echo is contrasted with the association with pulp fiction: Marianne, a professor's daughter lost in the wilderness, evokes the character of Jane in the Tarzan stories. (13) It is by such literary allusions that Carter constructs her self-conscious pastiche, thus demonstrating the whole range of possibilities offered to a female character by romance and, at the same time, she points out the exhaustion of these conventions. John Barth in his Literature of Exhaustion postulates that "exhausted" literature might be saved by coming back to well-known classics and by echoing their extracts in new shocking contexts. (14) In this way Carter mingles her generically heterogeneous "prior texts".

Wounded in an attack, Jewel escapes from the village and is followed by Marianne. He then takes her to his tribe and, despite her protests, proclaims her his hostage. Marianne is a total stranger among the Barbarians; they find her repulsive and unbearably alien; like a creature from outer space in a B-grade science fiction movie she provokes fear and hostility. An educated and self-assured woman in a tribe "caught in the moment of transition from the needs of sheer survival to a myth-ruled society," (15) she is thus a woman-alien. Interestingly, as early as the 1960s Carter used a science fiction stock character to talk about women in a society that is undergoing changes: in the 1990s Donna Haraway, in her famous "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century", in a similar way makes use of the science fiction concept of a cyborg. (16) Haraway follows Carter's footsteps, and indeed makes her point even stronger, as her "cyborg" comes from the social outside and is alien to traditional gender structures. As Joan Gordon and Veronica Hollinger explain:

Haraway develops her "Manifesto" around the cyborg--product of both science fiction and the military-industrial complex--as an imaginative figure generated outside the framework of the Judeo-Christian history of fall and redemption, a history that unfolds between the twin absolutes of Edenic origin and apocalyptic Last Judgment. Like Derrida, Haraway warns that (nuclear) apocalypse might, in fact, be the all-too-possible outcome of our desire for the resolution of historical time. Haraway too is wary of cultural discourses that privilege resolution, completion, and totality. (17)

Marianne is alien to the tribe as she refuses to adopt traditional female roles. Thus, Carter uses science fiction literary conventions to talk about gender as performance much in the same manner Judith Butler will some twenty years later. (18) Elisabeth Mahoney in her above-mentioned study of Heroes and Villains reads the novel in the context of Butler's thesis, that "fantasy is the terrain to be privileged in any contestation of conventional configurations of identity, gender and the representation of desire." (19) This is a very good starting point and an interesting comparison but, as Elaine Jordan notices, "Carter did this sort of thing before Butler, so her work could just as well be used to explicate Butler." (20) The same is true for Haraway, Gordon, Hollinger and a number of other feminist critics often referred to nowadays in order to validate Carter's argument. But Carter turning to science fiction for her metaphors predates them.

The tribe (whose descriptions bring to mind a 1960s hippie commune) is apparently governed by Jewel and his brothers, but Marianne soon realizes that the real source of power is Donally, an escapee professor of sociology, Jewel's tutor, and the self-proclaimed shaman of the tribe. For Donally the tribe is a social laboratory where he tries to perform an experiment: to wit, to introduce a new mythology designed to be the founding stone of new type of post-holocaust society. (21)

It seemed to me that the collapse of civilisation in the form that intellectuals such as ourselves understood it might be as good a time as any for crafting a new religion' he said modestly. 'Religion is a device for instituting the sense of a privileged group; many are called but few are chosen and, coaxed from incoherence, we shall leave the indecent condition of barbarism and aspire towards that of the honest savage. (22)

When Marianne meets Donally she immediately recognizes his professorial descent: "his voice was perfectly cultured, thin, high and soft ... He had a thin, mean and cultured face. Marianne had grown up among such voices and faces." (23) Seeing in his study books which she remembered from her childhood (Teilhard de Chardin, Levi-Strauss, Weber, Durkheim) Marianne discovers Donally's attempts to rule the Barbarians according to the outdated formulas written down by pre-apocalyptic sociologists.

Disappointed by the tribe, Marianne runs away only to be recaptured by Jewel, who rapes her, brings her back, and then ceremoniously marries her according to a ritual devised by Donally. With the tribe again on the move, Donally quarrels with Jewel and has to leave. Marianne gradually learns how to manipulate Jewel, her quasi-royal power grows, especially once she becomes pregnant and is to be the mother of Jewel's heir. When Donally sends a message that he has been caught by the Professors, Jewel goes to rescue him and both are killed. In the novel's finale Marianne decides to become the new female leader of a new society.

This brief summary reveals that, in parallel with the action-adventure narrative, the novel also depicts Marianne's gradual psychological change. She learns how to articulate her own fantasies and to objectify the man she desires: Jewel. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that when her romantic illusions disappear she discovers her own deeper motivating desire in her relationship with Jewel: it is her newly awakened sexuality that counts, not the male himself. Though a tribal leader and a future patriarch, Jewel is in fact a passive object both Marianne and Donally struggle to possess. Linden Peach writes:

In the relationship between Marianne and Jewel, Carter also rewrites a further traditional story, that of a demon-lover, of whom Jewel has many characteristics--he is powerful, mysterious, supernatural; and he can be cruel, vindictive and hostile. However, in her description of him, Carter challenges the male-female binarism which ascribes so-called masculine qualities to men and feminine characteristics to women. In discovering the nature of her own desire, Marianne finds that male-female attributes exist within each individual. The demon-lover is also reconfigured as part of her own eroticisation of the male other. (24)

New ways of looking at herself and others set Marianne free and empower her. Towards the end of the book she feels ready to construct a new narrative for herself and make the world around believe in it. A woman-alien dissolves the tribe's patriarchal structure and commences a new phase in its history. The old order based on binary oppositions (hero/villain, passive/active, natural/civilized) and a number of taboos that originated in pre-holocaust times are abandoned. Carter does not do what a standard disaster story author does: she does not establish a rigid binarism between the Professors and the Barbarians, i.e., the civilized and the savage. The post-holocaust narrative is for her a space where she "explores the blurring of conventional boundaries and binarisms and the way in which such artificial boundaries are maintained." (25) She re-uses existing narrative patterns of disaster fiction in order to break the "Wyndhamesque" formula and instead create a new and radical vision of the end of the world.

Moreover, these post-holocaust times are shown to be not a new version of the old order, but an unknown epoch typified not by stability but by creative chaos. Step by step, Marianne realizes that the entire distinction Professors\Barbarians is as false and naive as the children's role-playing game called "Soldiers and Villains". As a female child growing up in a Professors' village she always had to play the part of the Barbarian, the villain, the other, while the boy she played with, the son of a professor of mathematics, always wanted to be a male civilized hero who shoots her dead. As a small girl she was brave enough to refuse to play such a game; now as a young woman she realizes that in the real world the basis of the division between the Professors and the Barbarians is a set of myths and superstitions. (26)

The stay in the Barbarians' camp proves to Marianne that there is no other difference but old wives' tales: to her surprise (and in opposition to what she was told in the Professors' village) the Barbarians do not represent instinct, folklore and savagery alone. They do have a lot of superstitions; they do sport ridiculous tattoos, hairdos and costumes and they do believe in folk cures--but at the same time they are very far from unreflective "nature". When Marianne first sees Jewel he seems the embodiment of the wilderness: a man fighting to survive among hostile wildlife. But he immediately destroys this impression by quoting to her a relevant bit of poetry: Tennyson's poem about Darwinism. (27) Jewel is very well-educated by Donally and likes to boast of his knowledge of philosophical theories and the Latin names of beasts, which seems as irrelevant in the dirty Barbarians' camps as the Professors' lore in their concrete towers.

The Professors and the Barbarians need each other to define themselves. Both tribes work hard to impress the opponent (the Barbarians wear tattoos and facepaint, the Professors organize armies of specially-equipped soldiers to defend their villages). They also blame each other for the hardships of post-holocaust life. Marianne's father, in explaining to her the reasons of the war between the tribes, asks at one point: "if the Barbarians are destroyed who will we then be able to blame for the bad things?" (28) Aidan Day remarks:

The Professors, failing to recognise their own repressions, have sought to hound that which is not gentle and ordered outside themselves. They have committed the crime of finding external scapegoats for realities within their own hearts and minds that they find problematical. (29)

In a world where the Barbarians discuss philosophy and shamans comment on being shamans, even the seemingly biological distinction human\inhuman is not stable and fails to structure reality. While roaming the jungle Marianne encounters mutants whose bodies and minds transgress the human norm. What is worth noting is the origin of the Out People motif: mutants and deviations often populate the worlds of post-apocalyptic stories, the above-mentioned example of Wyndham's The Chrysalides being the best known; but the way they are described is usually quite different. By transgressing the norm Wyndham's mutants reinforce the notion of being human, of possessing some mysterious human factor along with all the rights and duties, while Carter's Out People are just strange, speechless bodies:

Amongst the Out People, the human form has acquired fantastic shapes. One man has furled ears like pale and delicate Arum Lilies. Another was scaled all over, with webbed hands and feet. Few had the conventional complement of limbs and features. (30)

Their appearance shows that overwhelming entropy is not external scenery the human race has to live in, but that it touches and alters the very essence of humanness: what humans are and what humans create is falling apart. Carter is re-writing an iconic disaster story motif (that of humans genetically altered by radiation), but she gives it a new ideological meaning. In classic male post-holocaust narratives mutants are disfigured humans who suffer for the sins of the fathers: civilization should start anew, albeit preserving its essential features (humanism, liberalism, traditional family values and consequently, patriarchy). Carter's Marianne, in watching the Out People, does not believe in re-establishing the old social order with its norms and values. Heroes and Villains is not about the rebirth of humankind, but about apocalypse itself.

In this chaotic world--where there are no more essential differences between phenomena, and the randomness of things does not allow for any conventional divisions--race, species, gender and even time cease to exist objectively. David Punter comments:

The conflict ... is a multivalent parody: of class relations, of relations between the sexes, of the battle between rational control and desire.... There are, obviously, no heroes and no villains; only a set of silly games which men play. (31)

Each entity possesses its own characteristic features; but on their basis no classification can be made as, gradually, all the points of reference are destroyed. Such a process is particularly striking as far as temporality is concerned--in the world of the novel there is no objective measure of time; everybody lives in the temporal dimension of his biological rhythm without calendars or chronometers. In Heroes and Villains the flow of time is stopped forever, as shown by the beautiful though useless chronometers that for Marianne are merely souvenirs from the past, elements of pure decoration. The book starts with a description of her father's favourite heirloom:

[A] clock which he wound every morning and kept in the family dining room upon a sideboard full of heirlooms.... She concluded the clock must be immortal but this did not impress her ... she watched dispassionately as the hands of the clock went round but she never felt the time was passing, for time was frozen around her in this secluded place. (32)

Time itself has become an heirloom, a peculiar reminder of bygone days. For Marianne the ticking of the clock has no relation to the rhythm of life. Its ticking proved to be the sound of her childhood and her father's old age. She left it behind without regret as it had never served for her any purpose. The next chronometers she saw (dead watches worn by the Barbarian women for decoration) were signs of an even greater degree of timelessness as nobody remembered their initial function. The last clock in the book, a gigantic and dead apparatus, welcomes Marianne in the ruins of the old city: (33)

Prominent among the minarets, spires and helmets of wrought iron which protruded from the waters was an enormous clock whose hands stood still at the hour of ten, though it was, of course, no longer possible to tell whether this signified ten in the morning or ten at night. (34)

The gigantic size of this clock and its absolute deadness create the image of the total arbitrariness of any measure of time. Exhaustion and entropy know no time but the vague "now" which for a fraction of a second can at best turn into "a totally durationless present, a moment of time sharply dividing past from future and utterly distinct from both." (35) The post-holocaust landscape of ruined cities near the seaside adorned with dead clocks brings to mind a visual intertext: Salvador Dali's The Persistence of Memory. (36) In this surreal painting, influenced by psychoanalysis, gigantic dead clocks are melting down, showing that clock time is no longer valid. Dali and Carter (who adored the Surrealists and often wrote about them in both her fiction and non-fiction) are both trying to recreate inner landscapes: their critique of the contemporary world takes forms of fantastic neverlands.

Carter's great admiration for the Surrealist movement results from the fact that, as she holds, theirs was the art of celebration and recreation. Their techniques haphazard and idiosyncratic, the Surrealists attempted to create combinations of words and images which by analogy and inspiration were supposed to evoke amazement; such art was based on a strong belief in humankind's ability to recreate itself. The world shown in their works is "deja vue", as in a nightmare we recognize separate elements which we have already seen as they date back to diverse moments of the past. It is a world deprived of time experienced in the mind. In surrealist art: "It is this world, there is no other but a world transformed by imagination and desire. You could say it is a dream made flesh." (37) In Heroes and Villains Carter attempts to use a similar technique to depict the post-apocalyptic world in which past, present and future intermingle.

For Carter's characters the future offers no escape: they are doomed to inhabit the ruins and repeat social scenarios from the past. Living in such a world has the haunting quality of a nightmare: the self-conscious characters feel oppressed by the same surroundings, similar activities and repeated words. What is the worst is the fact that there is no escape in space either, as there cannot be anywhere to go: "There's nowhere to go, dear,' said the Doctor. 'If there was I would have found it". (38)

Madness, drunkenness and paranoia seem to be the only ways out of the grotesque post-apocalyptic wilderness where everything is falling apart; indeed, the wild world Marianne enters (and finally renews) is entropy-ridden. The story's characters can hide only inside their troubled egos, as the outside reality is nothing but an everlasting nightmare. A stifling atmosphere of exhaustion and oppression is created by numerous images of overgrown vegetation, desolate ruins, half-destroyed houses full of fungi and rotting furniture, detailed descriptions of dirt and disease all in the atmosphere of sexual fantasy and paranoid visions. These images are too vivid and drastic to be mere scenery; it is the power of death and the different faces of decay that constitute Carter's style.

Carter treats bits and pieces of old discourses (the above-mentioned allusions to Conrad and Austen, as well as to Edgar Rice Burroughs and John Wyndham) in the way the Barbarians use old garments and broken down pieces of machinery found in the ruins: apparently to adorn but, at the same time, to take delight in dissolution, destruction and death. Metatextually, Heroes and Villains depicts the de-composition of traditional modes of writing; Carter follows the example of such New Wave authors as Pamela Zoline (39) for whom the key narrative term is entropy. In the short story "The heat death of the universe" Zoline defines the entropy of a system as "a measure of its degree of disorder." (40) The "system" is post-capitalist affluent society, and in order to capture the experience of living within the contemporary mediascape she both depicts the chaos of her character's life and introduces chaos to her narrative.

Zoline's "The Heat Death of the Universe" ends with the scene when the protagonist methodically smashes all pieces of equipment in her kitchen, thereby creating an irreversible mess of destruction; all forms give way to chaos. Carter's novel has a totally different post-apocalyptic setting, yet chaos and entropy are equally important. The narration of Heroes and Villains describes decay almost with pleasure and most certainly with great precision. The text changes into a study in decomposition, the anatomy of both our civilization and the disaster story genre: they both are killed in order to be examined. "For I am every dead thing"; (41) this quotation from John Donne would best summarize the world of the novel, which does not allow for any hope. The only emotion left is curiosity: Marianne the focalizer takes some pleasure in scientific observations of decay.

Among the ruins and scattered heirlooms of the past a prominent place is given to old symbols, which at the moment of the world's death, change in significance. Deprived of their contextual power the symbols die, creating ephemeral constellations and gaining for a moment a certain new meaning. The anatomy of signification becomes a favourite pastime of Donally and, later, Marianne; but the way the two of them interpret signs differs. Donally seeks to maintain patriarchal mythical frameworks: the sharp unequal antagonism between male and female; civilized and uncivilized; reasonable and wild. Marianne tries to dismantle these oppositions: for her signs are reduced to aesthetics and the old signifying system dies. The moment she starts to observe signs for their own sake marks her growing understanding of the world around: she lives surrounded by the debris of a bygone civilization which one may study--but only for scientific purposes. New myths are yet to be created. The last conversation between her and Jewel best shows the difference between them. Jewel is still naive enough to believe in symbols, while Marianne analyzes them:

But when he was near enough for her to see the blurred colours of his face, she also saw he was making the gesture against the Evil Eye. Suddenly she recognised it. "They used to call that the sign of the Cross,' she said. 'It must be handed down among the Old Believers." "Did you call me back just to give me this piece of useless information?" (42)

The anatomy of symbolic meanings and their changes is best seen in the example of clothes. Both the dress and decoration worn by the Barbarians come either from the ruins (and thus from the past) or are stolen from the Professors' villages. Worn in new and shocking combinations, old garments gain new meanings. A similar process was described in one of Carter's fashion essays from the Nothing Sacred collection. The essay entitled "Notes for a Theory of the Sixties Style" analyzes the nature of apparel. According to Carter clothes are the best example of the decadent fashion of the sixties, as in those years they "become arbitrary and bizarre ... reveal a kind of logic of whizzing entropy. Mutability is having a field day." (43)

The term mutability is the key notion for this essay, one written two years before the publication of Heroes and Villains. In this text Carter defines style as the presentation of the self as a three-dimensional object. Wearing eclectic fragments of different vestments "robbed of their symbolic content" (44) is a way of creating a new whole whose items are not in any imposed harmony. The theory formulated in the essay seems to be the key to understanding the symbolic meaning of clothes in Heroes and Villains, where mutability is not a matter of individual choice, but the condition of the whole dying civilization.

In broader terms, symbols have meaning only in reference to the mythical structures behind them--and clothes are a perfect example of this process. In a patriarchal society, where the law of inheritance makes men value female chastity and pre-nuptial virginity, the wedding ritual has a deep mythical sense and the white wedding dress becomes a potent symbol. Donally makes Marianne wear an old deteriorating white robe during her marriage ceremony in a vain attempt to reestablish patriarchy in the tribe. For Marianne the dress is just an ugly relic of bygone epochs. Lost in the exhausted reality of dead symbols she feels she has to create their own future: first to escape the old symbolic order and then to devise a new mythology herself.

Thus, paradoxically, the novel combines the symbols of entropy and mutability; it shows the world in the moment of its disintegration, and yet the disintegrating elements are constantly being re-used to create changeable structures. In one moment we read a "Wyndhamesque" end-of-the-world-fantasy, in another Carter deconstructs this tradition. Roz Kaveney writes:

The formalist aspects of Carter's work--the extent to which she combined stock motifs and made of them a collage that was entirely her own--was bound to appeal; sections of the SF readership discovered in the course of the 1970s and 1980s that they had been talking postmodernism all their lives and not noticing it, and Carter was part of that moment. (45)

Kaveney reads Heroes and Villains in the context of the science fiction readership in the late 20th century, and discovers how Carter makes use of SF conventions. Eva Karpinski in her essay "Signifying Passion: Angela Carter's Heroes and Villains as a Dystopian Romance" refers in her reading of the book to the utopian tradition:

The dystopian romance proves to be a suitable vehicle for Carter's didactic allegory of the relationship between the sexes, an allegory, one might add, that uses the utopian ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau in order to re-write the myth of the Fall as it structures Western representations of the social and sexual difference. (46)

Other critics, for example Elaine Jordan (47) use the label "speculative fiction," (48) and Carter herself in the famous interview given to John Haffenden calls her fiction "magic mannerism." (49) Thus, one can think of diverse generic formulas to describe the novel, although none of the labels is final, as the narrative itself is unstable and mutable.

The novel also celebrates new feminist myths in order to playfully laugh at them on the next page. Having got rid of Donally and having won her mental struggle with Jewel, Marianne decides on a scenario that suits her best. She has found her identity and now wants to take control over the tribe and to become a post-apocalyptic leader, which she declares by paraphrasing the Bible: "I will be the tiger-lady and I will rule them with a rod of iron." (50) In this sentence she alludes to Donally's attempt to tattoo one of the tribe's children into a tiger-girl, something which ended tragically, as the baby died in the process. But the idea of the artificial creation of a "natural" tiger-human had some appeal to the Barbarians and thus Jewel wanted to get the tiger tattoo himself.

When Jewel learned that at his age it was impossible, he planned to tattoo his and Marianne's baby. And now it is Marianne who is going to symbolically possess the tiger's strength and beauty: not by getting a tattoo, but by ruling "with a rod of iron" over the tribe. Her "rod" is probably going to be her knowledge and education, the love of reason her father taught her, combined with her ability to reconcile binary oppositions and blend nature with nurture, reason with instinct, the Barbarians and the Professors. Only a woman-alien can do this by creating a third, reconciliatory way between the two patriarchal societies. Marianne is aware that she is not yet living in the post-apocalyptic order, but still within the Apocalypse itself, that is, amidst the bits and pieces of the old world which is falling apart. Thus her declaration "I will rule them with a rod of iron" echoes Saint John's Revelation:

and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness. (51)

Marianne misquotes St John for a purpose: she aims to give old patriarchal texts a new meaning for new times. At the end of the book Marianne is, physically speaking, "ready to deliver", as her baby is to be born very soon. But here the similarities with St John end: who can be identified with the devouring dragon? Perhaps patriarchal attempts to remodel the child so that it serves a purpose? After all, Donally and Jewel wanted him tattooed and ruling the tribe according to the old pattern of power. Moreover, Marianne (in contrast to Donally and Jewel) is not so sure the baby is going to be "a man child", and so she plans the future regardless of its sex. Finally, her flight into the wilderness is in fact an act of usurping political power herself: it is she who is going to become a tiger-lady and to rule the new "wilderness", the world outside the villages of the Professors and the camps of the Barbarians.

"People kept wild beasts such as lions and tigers in cages and looked at them for information. Who would have thought they would take to our climate so kindly, when the fire came and let them out?" (52) which is how Marianne's father once explained to her why the exotic beasts roam the countryside devouring smaller creatures. After the apocalypse carnivorous cats once again become the king of beasts; they are the only ones that gained power instead of losing it. Predators could survive and rule. As this is true of tigers, perhaps it can also be true of people?

Tigers and lions are very prominent in the novel; we very soon learn that Jewel is attracted to wild cats, which is perhaps the effect of his own weakness. One of his most vivid memories is the scene when, as a teenager, he met a lion face to face and survived only because the beast ignored him. This story (which he told to Marianne) anticipates the end of the novel: when Jewel gives up and goes to seek his death he encounters another lion and again fails to attract its attention. Marianne sees the animal and cannot but admire its fearsome beauty:

She had never seen a lion before. It looked exactly like pictures of itself; though darkness washed its colours off, she saw its mane and tasseled tail which flicked about as it moved out of the edge of shadow on to the dune. (53)

Marianne is not disappointed; the lion looks "like pictures of itself": the thing and its representation for once go together. The mythical meaning of wild cats is going to survive the end of civilization and shall remain a handy metaphor. Marianne decides to rule over the tribe as its tiger-lady not in an act of imitating a queen of the wilderness fairytale motif, but in an attempt to start a new epoch with its new myths. (54) As Margaret Atwood puts it in her essay on Carter's stories "Running with the Tigers", as the tiger will never lie down with the lamb, it is the lamb the powerless female--which should learn the tigers' ways. (55) By the same token, Marianne wants to create a new definition for a power system in which the oppositions male/female, intellect/desire or civilized/wild are of no importance. (56)

When Marianne gets to the Barbarian camp for the first time she finds herself imprisoned by the patriarchal myth of a new Creation. Both Donally and Jewel want her to act out a new Eve role in order to secure a re-enactment of history which would result in a repetition of the old social and political order. Jewel advises her at the time of her trouble in adapting to the tribe to pretend to be Eve at the end of the world. The original patriarchal myth of Eden is re-enforced by a tattoo Jewel has on his back whereby Eve offers Adam an apple, and by a number of metaphors and allusions. This myth is thus very prominent in the novel and suggests the strength of patriarchal ideology--parallel to the strength of the tribe's male leaders (and also of the Professors' village: both societies are exclusively male-governed). The rival mythical intertext--the Revelation of Saint John--appears not until the end of Heroes and Villains and marks the beginning of a genuinely new epoch when Marianne, a woman-alien, takes power.

A woman-alien sets out to create a genuinely new social order and the question is whether she is going to recreate the hegemonic power-relations of patriarchal order in both the Professors' villages and the Barbarians' camps. In science fiction narratives aliens often perceive human civilization in a new way, one that enables us to see "normal" social order in a defamiliarized manner; Marianne is a stranger to her own world, she is not interested in the reversal of binaries, but in their liquidation. Carter does not celebrate her political victory as a birth of a genuinely feminist paradise: the very concept of "tiger-lady" cannot be taken too seriously. Marianne the Queen is demythologized from the very start of a reign which is going to prefer mutability to stiff order.

Marianne the tiger-lady has a long road to power behind her. Heroes and Villains tells a story of her maturation in a world full of bits and pieces of old symbols and power structures. Marianne learns to see that these binding discourses are giving way to entropy, and that in her world of total chaos new myths have to be created --and that a new, post-patriarchal epoch is yet to be commenced. Moreover, a similar procedure might well be applied to the old literary genre Heroes and Villains pertains to: the British disaster story. By having an atypical protagonist, a female-alien strong enough to destroy patriarchal social structure, Carter manages to revive the exhausted convention and to create a genuinely new story.

(1.) Anne Cranny-Francis, "Feminist Futures: A Generic Study," in Alien Zone. Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema, ed. Annette Kuhn (London and New York: Verso, 2003), 219-228, p. 223.

(2.) To call Carter a "feminist science fiction writer" would perhaps be an exaggeration (though the most influential science fiction lexicon, The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction edited by Clute and Nicholls, does have an entry "Angela Carter"). Nonetheless, in some of her novels she purposefully uses fantastic literary conventions.

(3.) Elisabeth Mahoney, "'But Elsewhere?' The future of fantasy in Heroes and Villains," in The Infernal Desires of Angela Carter, ed. Joseph Bristow and Trev Lynn Broughton (London and New York: Longman, 1997), 73-87, p. 73.

(4.) One has to mention Eva C. Karpinski, "Signifying Passion: Angela Carter's Heroes and Villains as a Dystopian Romance," Utopian Studies 11.2 (2000) 137-51; and Roz Kaveney, "New New World Dreams: Angela Carter and Science Fiction," in Flesh and the Mirror. Essays on the Art of Angela Carter, ed. Lorna Sage (London: Virago, 1994), 171-88.

(5.) John Clute and Peter Nicholls, ed., The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (London: Orbit, 1999), p. 338.

(6.) Clute and Nicholls, pp. 337-339.

(7.) For details concerning the New Wave of British speculative fiction, see Judith Merril, England Swings SF, Stories of Speculative Fiction (New York: Ace Books, 1968). The most important disaster novels written by the New Wave writers are J.G. Ballard, The Drowned World (Harmondsworth and Ringwood: Penguin Books, 1974) and J.G. Ballard The Wind from Nowhere (Harmondsworth and Ringwood: Penguin Books, 1974).

(8.) Walter Miller, A Canticle for Leibovitz (Philadelphia, Lippincott and London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1960) and John Wyndham, The Chrysalides (London: Joseph, 1955).

(9.) Mikhail Bakhtin, Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics, tr. by R.W. Rotsel (Ann Arbor: Ardis, 1973), p. 96.

(10.) Angela Carter, Heroes and Villains (London: Virago, 1992), p. 137.

(11.) Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).

(12.) Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility (Harmondsworth, New York, Ringwood and Auckland: Penguin Classics, 2007).

(13.) Tarzan's adventures were originally created by Edgar Rice Burroughs and published in the years 1914-1950.

(14.) John Barth, The Literature of Exhaustion and the Literature of Replenishment (Northridge: Lord John Press, 1982).

(15.) Karpinski, p. 138.

(16.) Donna Haraway, "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century," in Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature (New York: Routledge, 1991), 149-181.

(17.) Veronica Hollinger and Joan Gordon, ed., Edging into the Future. Science Fiction and Contemporary Cultural Transformation (Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002), p. 162.

(18.) Butler talks about gender in terms of ritual practices, a role one adopts thus excluding other modes of behaviour. What is excluded forms the "constitutive outside" the zone of the suppressed from which gender roles can be challenged, much in the same way Marianne challenges social norms in the tribe. Judith Butler, Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of 'Sex' (London: Routledge, 1993), p. 23.

(19.) Mahoney, p. 75.

(20.) Elanie Jordan, "Afterword," in The Infernal Desires of Angela Carter, ed. Joseph Bristow and Trev Lynn Broughton (London and New York: Longman, 1997), 216-219, p. 219.

(21.) Carter's numerous shamans, for example the character from Nights at the Circus, are usually totally different. They are given a role similar to that of a writer: they believe in the magic they perform, therefore what they do has the mystical quality of a true primary text. In their context the comments and analysis by Donally seem artificial and exhausted.

(22.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 63.

(23.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 49.

(24.) Linden Peach, Angela Carter (Oxford: Macmillan, 1998), p. 96.

(25.) Peach, p. 87.

(26.) For example, according to these beliefs, the Barbarians sew up cats in the bellies of the Professors' women, while the Professors in turn bake Barbarians alive "like hedgehogs".

(27.) Alfred Lord Tennyson, "In Memoriam A. H. H.," in Selected Poems (London: Penguin, 1992), Canto 56.

(28.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 11.

(29.) Aidan Day, Angela Carter: The Rational Glass (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998), p. 45.

(30.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 110.

(31.) David Punter, The Literature of Terror--A History of Gothic Fiction from 1795 to the Present Day vol. II The Modern Gothic (London: Longman, 1996), p. 140.

(32.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 1.

(33.) The city is probably London and the clock Big Ben; the tribe is traveling south to spend the winter at the seaside and finally reach the gigantic ruin. Descriptions of London after various cataclysms are very common in disaster stories; examples are: Jefferies' After London, J.G. Ballard's The Drowned World and The Wind from Nowhere and Wyndham's The Day of the Triffid. Once again Carter rewrites a canonical disaster fiction motif in a new way.

(34.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 138.

(35.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 148.

(36.) Painting by Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, 1931.

(37.) Angela Carter, "The Alchemy of the Word," in Expletives Deleted: Selected Writings (London: Chatto and Windus, 1992), p. 70.

(38.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 95.

(39.) Pamela Zoline, "The heat death of the universe," in England Swings SF, Stories of Speculative Fiction, ed. Judith Merril (New York: Ace Books, 1968), 313-328.

(40.) Zoline, p. 316.

(41.) John Donne, "A nocturnall upon S. Lucies day, Being the shortest day," in The Complete English Poems of John Donne, ed. C. A. Patrides (London and Melbourne: Dent, 1985), p. 90.

(42.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 148.

(43.) Angela Carter, "Notes for a Theory of the Sixties Style," in Nothing Sacred (London: Virago, 1988), 85-89, p. 86.

(44.) Carter, "Notes for a Theory of the Sixties Style," p. 86.

(45.) Kaveney, 175.

(46.) Karpinsky, 137.

(47.) Elaine Jordan, "Enthrallment: Angela Carter's Speculative Fictions," in Plotting Change: Contemporary Women's Fiction, ed. Linda Anderson (London: Edward Arnold, 1990), 19-40.

(48.) "A kind of sociological SF which concentrates on social change without necessarily any great emphasis on science or technology" (Clute and Nicholls, p. 1144).

(49.) John Haffenden, "Angela Carter," in Novelists in Interview, (London: Methuen, 1985), p. 80.

(50.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 150. This is uttered in a conversation when Marianne describes her plans for the future of the tribe: " 'they'll do every single thing I say.' 'What, will you be Queen?' 'I'll be the tiger-lady and rule them with a rod of iron.'"

(51.) St. John's Revelation 12:4-6 in The Holy Bible: Old and New Testament in the King James Version (Hazelwood: World Aflame Press, 1973).

(52.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 9.

(53.) Carter, Heroes and Villains, p. 140.

(54.) Sarah Gamble suggests that the moment Marianne becomes a tiger-lady symbolically "implies that Marianne has now broken free of the stereotyped roles--daughter, victim, wife and whore--in which she has been complicit from the text's beginning." Sarah Gamble, Angela Carter: Writing from the Front Line (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997), p. 79.

(55.) Margaret Atwood, "Running with the Tigers," in Flesh and the Mirror, ed. Lorna Sage (London: Virago, 1994), 117-136, p. 358.

(56.) A. Day elaborates upon Marianne's future reign: "But while, as tiger-lady, she is going to draw on primordial Barbarian energy, Marianne, it must be noted, does not give up her purchase on reason. It is this emphasis on maintaining reason that separates her from the Donally-inspired Barbarian cult of the irrational. At the same time as Marianne stops being a stranger to her own id during her sojourn amongst the Barbarians, reason emerges as a cardinal feature of her discovery of herself.... In Marianne's case reason may order, like an iron rod, the inchoate energies of the id, while the energies of the id--the energies of the tiger-lady--may enrich reason. This synthetic model is identified as specifically feminine, in contrast with the masculine insistence on self-definition through opposition to an other" (Day, pp. 51-53). COPYRIGHT 2010 Eotvos Lorand Tudomanyegyetem, Department of English Studies

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notfromanotherworld · 4 years

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If Hollywood cast actresses of appropriate ages, the intense sexualization of female teenage girl media would become more apparent. In the ‘90s, before Internet pornography, when a female character was supposed to be 14/15, the actress hired to play her would be that age. Melissa Joan Hart was 14 when she started playing 14-year-old Clarissa Darling, Mayim Bialik was 15/16 when Blossom first aired, and when Saved By The Bell first came on, back in the 8th-grade years with Miss Bliss, Lark Voorhies was 14 when she played a 14-year-old Lisa Turtle. These shows featured long term relationships and didn’t shy away from talking about sex, but in a way that was realistic. The teenagers weren’t necessarily having sex, but they were experiencing the hormones, questioning if they were ready for different things much like actual teenagers. In Blossom, for instance, there are two memorable episodes that deal with sex. In one, she is trying to decide if she’s ready to take things to second base with her long-term boyfriend. She examines the situation from every possible angle, telling the viewer that sex is a responsibility, and shouldn’t be taken lightly, and her final decision is never revealed. It stays private, which is a pretty good lesson as well. In the other, she goes on a date with an attractive guy who hits her when she doesn’t get into the backseat of his car with him. She goes to the police, and the episode takeaways are 1, don’t do anything you’re not ready for, and 2, nobody has the right to try to force you into anything or to put their hands on you. Most of the episodes, however, don’t even touch on sex, because there is a lot more to a person, and to growing up, than sex.

In a post-Internet porn world, however, things are very different. In shows for “teenagers” (which, let’s be honest, are generally consumed by primarily female audiences) sex is everywhere. In this world, where sex sells and sexiness is absolutely required, grown women get cast to play high schoolers, thus giving young female audiences impossible body standards to live up to, as well as making the sexual nature of the shows seem less creepy. In Pretty Little Liars, for instance, it doesn’t immediately seem weird that 16-year-old Aria is having an affair with her at least 23-year-old teacher, because Lucy Hale, the actress, is 21 in the first episodes of the show. The actor portraying her teacher is only 24 in the first episodes, so there’s not actually much of an age gap between them. The affair seems sexy and clandestine and romantic, rather than like child sexual exploitation. When considering an actual 16-year-old though? Yuck. The other Liars follow this trend as well: 16-year-old Spencer is played by 25-year-old Troian, so her affair with a grown med student doesn’t seem unnatural; and the other three most frequently seen 16-year-old girls are played by actresses who are 21, 22, and 23, respectively. The only one who is age appropriate is the girl you don’t see much of until later seasons, when she was actually the age they were portraying. Her character has romantic involvements with grown men in flashbacks, and the feeling of those flashbacks, when you see an actual 15-year-old girl interacting with a grown man, is significantly more unsettling than the older actresses with the same man. On top of that, despite the same grown male characters having repeated affairs with young teenaged girls, they aren’t painted as predatory, and part of the reason they are able to get away with that is that the actual age of the actresses makes people forget how old the characters are actually supposed to be. This compounds even further because, like in most shows, 16 lasts longer than a year, so these actresses are aging as they remain portraying 16-year-old girls in all sorts of sexual escapades. It is not the epicenter of the show, but it is frequent, casual, and generally with grown men. Pretty Little Liars isn’t the only show with this problem: most shows about 16-year-old girls (they all seem to start around junior year, and slowly go from there) feature actresses who are, seemingly at the youngest, 19, and more often than not in their early twenties. There is a HUGE difference between a 16-year-old girl and a 20-year-old woman, and it’s even more disconcerting when the show requires them to be 16 for 2,3, or 4 years. That means that most representation of teenage girls on television shows for teenage girls are portrayed by grown women because a young twenty-something is much easier to sexualize than a 14-year-old girl. Thanks to our pornified culture, it’s suddenly not OK for girls to play characters their own age, because they don’t have the bodies of grown women, and if anyone ever has doubts that this is why older actresses are cast in these shows, they only have to take a look at the family type sitcoms that are marketed more at parents: the teenaged daughters in those are played by age-appropriate actresses much more often, because those shows aren’t about selling sex to teenagers. It’s created a weird situation where people think high schoolers look like adults in their young twenties, which is confusing and damaging for everyone. Even the high schoolers who see their classmates every day and would theoretically understand that real young teenagers don’t look how they do on TV spend massive amounts of time trying to sexualize themselves and their peers as a result of pornified media.

In the real world, most of us are much more than our sexual identities, and young to late teenage years is when a lot of us figure out what those things are. We should know who we are before we give it away to someone else, otherwise, how can we really understand what we’re giving away? With the onslaught of graphic sexual content and unfettered internet access most teens enjoy today, oversexed teenagers are a real issue. We shouldn’t hide from talking about sex and teenage years, but neither should we cultivate a world where we normalize the sexualization of teenage girl media, and by extension, the teenage years. Yet, with the normalization of hardcore pornography, that’s what we have: teenagers that are oversexualized by themselves, by their peers, and by the world. When sex is portrayed as akin to English homework in media, kids are less hesitant to have sex, but that doesn’t mean they are really ready for it. Instead, we have entire generations of kids having sex who don’t, and can’t, understand the difference between sex and intimacy until it’s too late.

- “Porn and the Sexualization of Teenage Girl Media” by Sam Groll

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rockislandadultreads · 4 years

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2020 Romance Hits: books you need to read

Written in the Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur

After a disastrous blind date, Darcy Lowell is desperate to stop her well-meaning brother from playing matchmaker ever again. Love—and the inevitable heartbreak—is the last thing she wants. So she fibs and says her latest set up was a success. Darcy doesn’t expect her lie to bite her in the ass. Elle Jones, one of the astrologers behind the popular Twitter account, Oh My Stars, dreams of finding her soul mate. But she knows it is most assuredly not Darcy... a no-nonsense stick-in-the-mud, who is way too analytical, punctual, and skeptical for someone as free-spirited as Elle. When Darcy’s brother—and Elle's new business partner—expresses how happy he is that they hit it off, Elle is baffled. Was Darcy on the same date? Because... awkward. When Darcy begs Elle to play along, she agrees to pretend they’re dating to save face. But with a few conditions: Darcy must help Elle navigate her own overbearing family over the holidays and their arrangement expires on New Year’s Eve. The last thing they expect is to develop real feelings during a fake relationship. But maybe opposites can attract when true love is written in the stars?

The Truth About Dukes by Grace Burrowes

A new duke and a woman with a secret in her past get a second chance at love in this delightful and charming Regency romance from the New York Times bestselling author of the Windham series. Robert Rothmere is hiding a past no duke should have endured, but he's not hiding it well enough. Sooner or later, his enemies will learn that he spent years locked away at a private asylum. To get their hands on his wealth, they'll try to send him right back to his worst nightmares. If Robert is to foil their schemes, he needs to marry a perfectly proper, blessedly boring, deadly dull duchess, immediately—and he knows exactly which quietly delightful lady he'd love to entrust with that role. Lady Constance Wentworth has cultivated a reputation for utter forgettability. She never speaks out of turn (in public), never has a daring thought (that she admits aloud), and never comes close to courting scandal... as far as anybody knows. Her path crossed Robert's years ago, though, and she's never forgotten the extraordinary lengths he traveled to keep her safe when she hadn't a friend in the world. She longs to be his demure duchess...but little does he know that to marry her would be utter madness.

A Lady's Guide to Mischief and Mayhem by Manda Collins

An intrepid female reporter matches wits with a serious, sexy detective in award-winning author Manda Collins' fun and flirty historical rom-com! England, 1865 : As one of England's most notorious newspaper columnists, Lady Katherine Bascomb believes knowledge is power. And she's determined to inform and educate the ladies of London on the nefarious-and deadly-criminals who are preying on the fairer sex. When her reporting leads to the arrest of a notorious killer, however, Katherine flees to a country house party to escape her newfound notoriety-only to witness a murder on her very first night. And when the lead detective accuses Katherine of inflaming-rather than informing-the public with her column, she vows to prove him wrong. Detective Inspector Andrew Eversham's refusal to compromise his investigations nearly cost him his own career, and he blames Katherine. To avoid bad publicity, his superiors are pressuring him to solve cases quickly rather than correctly. When he discovers she's the key witness in a new crime, he's determined to prevent the beautiful widow from once again wreaking havoc on his case. Yet as Katherine proves surprisingly insightful and Andrew impresses Katherine with his lethal competency, both are forced to admit the fire between them is more flirtatious than furious. But to explore the passion between them, they'll need to catch a killer.

The Boy Toy by Nicola Marsh

A woman ready to give up on love discovers that age is truly just a number in this heartwarming and steamy new romantic comedy by USA Today bestselling author Nicola Marsh. For almost a decade, successful 37-year-old Samira Broderick has used her bustling LA practice as an excuse to avoid a trip home to Australia. She still resents her meddling Indian mother for arranging her marriage to a man who didn't stick around when the going got tough, but now with a new job Down Under, she's finally ready to reconnect with her. And while she's there, a hot international fling might be just what she needs to get out of her recent funk. Aussie stuntman, Rory Radcliffe, has been hiding his stutter for years by avoiding speaking roles. When a job he can't refuse comes up as a reality show host, he knows he'll need some help for the audition: a dialect coach. But he finds himself at a loss for words when he discovers it's the same sexy woman with whom he just had a mind-blowing one-night stand... Samira can think of many reasons why Rory is completely wrong for her: he's ten years her junior, for one, and he's not Indian--something Samira's mother would never approve of. Even if things were to get serious, there's no reason to tell her mother...is there?

#romance #romance recs #book recs #reading recommendations #recommended reading #library #tbr #booklr #booklist #reading list #to read #lgbtq #contemporary romance #historical romance

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staciijaejohnson · 4 years

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[MY TRUE STORY] Between my mother and my grandmother there were 7 marriages. Between the two women ... my mother and my grandmother that was love to my little self - between 2 generations divorce, violence, infidelity, pain and suffering. At 56 years old, my mother on her death bed in hospice fighting cancer, going through her 5th divorce shared with me these words, she said “more than anything she wanted to show my sister and I that love works”. She apologized that she was not able to do that. See she had not seen love work with her mom and men and that affected how she loved. She started off wanting to do something better for me and my sister, but just couldn’t figure it out on her own. She kept trying though. until her death at 56. I committed myself to my own personal development in the area of love and cultivating healthy romantic relationships at that moment because I knew my mom did her BEST with what she had. She had never been taught how to be in relationship with a man, how to cultivate real connection, her role in loving herself and truly understanding her needs and wants AND she really didn’t even understand how to love a black man. She didn’t understand their needs and how to give them what they needed. That was almost 15 years ago. I will be 59 in January. I did the work on myself. I committed the time and getting the help I needed. Now for the last 7 years, my moms desire to show me that love works... what she intended for me .... lives in the work I have committed my whole life to as a dating love and relationship expert coach and match maker .... and that is showing singles that love works by giving them the tools and help in their personal development to see that it can. As we move through racial injustice WE HAVE TO REMEMBER THAT BLACK LOVE IS APART OF THE MOVEMENT. It’s how ALL of US beautiful black people got here. To ALL my single brothers in sisters ... I GOT YOU! I am committed to protecting black love! Happy Sunday y’all. #blackloveisapartofthemovement #blacklovematters #staciijae #justdategirl #lovecoach #datingcoach #relationshipexpert #matchmaker #blacklivesmatter #BLM✊🏾✊🏽✊🏿 https://www.instagram.com/p/CBIysmgJ8l1/?igshid=1str0lahohum8

#blackloveisapartofthemovement #blacklovematters #staciijae #justdategirl #lovecoach #datingcoach #relationshipexpert #matchmaker #blacklivesmatter #blm✊🏾✊🏽✊🏿

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traincat · 5 years

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I've been ranting to my friends about Johnny being abused and raped recently and one of them said: Lyja has damaged and put an element of distrust into every relationship he may ever have. which is really fucking me up and I wanted to share in part bc I don't wanna be sad alone and also bc I think that's an interesting side effect of Lyja's time in his life that doesn't get talked about enough

Thank you for sharing this because the thing is I do think there is a very definite divide in how Johnny acts particularly in regards to relationships before and after his marriage to “Alicia.” I doubt this was entirely intentional on the parts of the writers who handled the book after, but I’ve said before that I think after a certain amount of time and with enough stories behind them characters tend to take on a life of their own, and even if the writers are hesitant to address it there’s no way an event like his relationship with Lyja couldn’t have deeply effected Johnny.

Simply put: I don’t think “playboy Johnny” exists before Lyja. I don’t buy into “playboy Johnny” much as a general phenomenon, because if you actually look at the canon there’s just not much to actually back it up, but he certainly has at periods played into this public (both in and out universe) perception of himself. What I mean is, pre-Lyja, there is absolutely no proof Johnny had ever engaged in casual sex. (There’s actually no proof he wasn’t a virgin when Lyja began working her way into his life while masquerading as Alicia; this panel from Fantastic Four #275 is the first time Johnny having sex is addressed:

That shirt is Johnny’s – you see him wearing it the issue leading up to this one. To be clear, there’s nothing in the issue that supports this being Johnny’s first time, either – it’s just that he doesn’t have any sex scenes prior. Either way, this is not the reaction of someone who had a good time.)

Pre-the Alilyja incident, Johnny had a grand total of three relationships: Dorrie Evans in high school, Crystal Amaquelin, Frankie Raye. He had a few dates with a girl named Lorrie Melton who called things off with him because he was more serious than she wanted to be, and shared a whole one kiss with a girl named Valeria from the Fifth Dimension (no relationship to his future niece). He also briefly pursued a girl named Julie Angel, who blatantly wasn’t interested in him. When Julie’s friend Sharon came onto him during this period, he reacted with discomfort:

(Fantastic Four #259)

So, playboy Johnny Storm, a womanizer who sleeps around – he doesn’t exist in canon at this point. (If anything, Johnny repeatedly reacts negatively to being kissed suddenly and without his permission leading up to and during the marriage.) Then you have the marriage, which happens fairly quickly – Johnny and Alicia’s relationship is “cemented” in FF #275, they get married in FF #300. I want to note that Johnny’s pretty young when he gets married, especially by modern standards – you have to do the Spider-Man math with this one, since Johnny’s age at this point in canon isn’t stated, but he and Peter both get married at roughly the same time. We know that they’re roughly the same age, Johnny being 16 when he got his powers and Peter being 15 and these things happening fairly closely together. Peter comments very shortly after he’s married that he’s been out of high school for five years, which would make both him and Johnny roughly 23 when they respectively tied the knot. Alicia is labeled during Byrne’s run as three years older than Johnny, but it should be noted that Byrne has a habit of making women younger and putting them in relationships with much older men – which would track if it’s his opinion Alicia first met Ben when she was 19. (It’s my personal belief that she should be older than that, but that’s neither here nor there.) We have no idea how old Lyja is in comparison to Johnny. So he’s young, and the relationship escalates very quickly, which, looking at it with the retcon in place, makes sense, because Lyja is on a mission to infiltrate the Fantastic Four. So it’s quick. The marriage, the Skrull reveal, and the ensuing melodrama lasts… a while after that.

Then the big reset button that was Heroes Reborn got hit after Fantastic Four #416 and Johnny and family were shunted off to a pocket universe for a little bit, sans Lyja. Fantastic Four v2 is the first look we get at a more playboy-ish Johnny Storm in line with, say, the Chris Evans version of the character – older when the accident hits instead of being a fresh-faced teen, a bit irresponsible, comes off a little bit like he might be a dog. But this reboot canon can’t really keep it up: it reunites Johnny and Crystal temporarily, and then everyone gets snatched out of their alternate reality bubble and planted back in their regular timeline anyway.

So let’s look at Johnny’s relationships after his marriage:

1) Alysande “Caledonia” Stuart: A young woman Johnny found and rescued in another dimension who lived with the Fantastic Four for a while. I’m including this even though it isn’t strictly a romantic relationship – Johnny appears to have feelings for Alsyande, but it’s unclear if they’re reciprocated or if she just feels a deep debt of loyalty to him for rescuing her. Either way, I really like how this relationship is handled; they’re both very respectful of each other in a way that’s missing from a lot of Johnny’s actual romantic relationships. They definitely didn’t have sex.

2) Namorita Prentiss: The first actual romantic relationship Johnny has post-Lyja. This one’s another weird one; Johnny and Namorita first get together after teasing the paparazzi and commiserating about being famous. They then proceed to spend next to no time together. Seriously, like, to the point where the books remarks on it:

(Fantastic Four v3 #55)

Johnny and Namorita do do things like attend celebrity functions together, so I label this as Johnny’s first “publicity” relationship – less about being in love, and more about him and the other party looking really good together for the public eye. (This is also something he never did before his marriage.) Anyway, they break up off panel, although Johnny did apparently ask Nita to move in with him at one point, which she refused.

Kourtney: A second and much more prominent “publicity” relationship. Kourtney is a supermodel who we’re first introduced to when she breaks up with Johnny when the Fantastic Four go broke and he falls out of public favor. They do get back together for the duration of Marvel Knights 4, and then they apparently break up again. Nothing to write home about in this relationship – she and Johnny don’t really appear to actually like each other all that much, especially on her end.

We enter a relationship deadzone for Johnny as we hit Waid’s run. He starts it off apparently shaking off a bad celebrity breakup, and while he goes a bit moony-eyed over a few pretty girls at the beginning, basically nothing happens. He at one point meets up with a girl from the internet who claims to be a fan of his and things seem like they might get romantic… except his body language really is screaming the opposite:

Fantastic Four #514 – I’m not saying how much of this was intentional or even what the intent was, but if there’s something a comic book artist should be good at conveying, it’s body language. Here Cole’s is aggressive – leaning in, touching his face – and Johnny’s is closed off – hands in his pockets, leaning away from her. It’s just interesting if we’re supposed to believe he’s hot for this girl.

Anyway, Cole turns out to be the Wizard’s daughter, catfishing Johnny to find a solution for her unwanted superpowers. So. That lasts two issues and nothing happens between them.

Psionics: And now we enter Millar’s run. Millar’s run is probably the biggest contributor to Playboy Johnny – not only does he have an ill-advised sexual affair with a superpowered bank robber named Psionics, he also gets walked in on – apparently – about to have a threesome with two girls cosplaying as Storm and the Scarlet Witch. I’ve had a problem with the cosplay scene for a while now, because it just doesn’t fit with Johnny’s 616 personality. Something about it has always felt very off. And while I could just go “well it’s Mark Millar,” it occurred to me on a recent reread what’s wrong with it: it feels staged. Johnny’s in the middle of filming a reality show; the camera crew is who walks in on him. If he was trying to cultivate this playboy image, well, one way to do it is to make sure you’re walked in on in a compromising situation. He and the girls are all still fully clothed, and he actually ditches the scene as soon as they’re discovered – to congratulate Ben on his engagement, but still – while the girls frankly seem more interested in each other. It’s a weird scene still, but there’s nothing in it either way to say he was or wasn’t setting it up to make it look like he was the kind of womanizing carefree celebrity party boy who has threesomes with hot cosplay girls while not actually doing that.

As for Psionics, the hot bank robber he sleeps with? Well, turns out her family from the future kidnaps him and uses him as a giant power battery in a machine that has a good chance of killing him. No bad feelings or anything, though.

Again with the awkward body language. He certainly just stands there while she kisses him. This is the exact opposite of smoldering passion. Also, next time he sees her she tries to kidnap his niece, kills his longtime family friend Alyssa Moy in front of him, and then gets murdered right before his eyes. So. That all happened.

He has one apparent would’ve-been one night stand in Hickman’s run after this, except she turns into a bunch of bug monsters and activates the Negative Zone portal. He also has a highly implied brief sexual relationship with Daken Akihiro at this point, who… uses that connection to make Johnny feel horribly guilty over Daken’s apparent death and then so Daken can steal a weapon from the Fantastic Four. There’s a weird pattern here.

Darla Deering: The last and most recent of Johnny’s publicity relationships – Johnny starts seeing Darla, a major pop star, sometime after his experiences in the Negative Zone. This is another “they’re in a relationship but they don’t spend any time together” fling, too – at the end of the relationship, when Darla’s gotten together with Scott Lang, Johnny actually admits that he liked dating Darla because of Darla’s celebrity lifestyle more than he liked her.

Here we hit Robinson’s run. Johnny does a lot of partying after he’s lost his powers, and while it’s not explicit, there’s something of an implication during this point that he is sleeping around. However, his most serious relationships in this run are with his family, Wyatt Wingfoot, and Peter Parker, and he has no consistent romantic partner.

Which brings us to his last serious relationship: Medusa. This one’s a weird one, too, and it’s one where I’m not hesitant to blame the writer’s lack of research at all when Medusa and Johnny were genuinely very close during her stint on the Fantastic Four team. It’s clearly a placeholder relationship – we know Black Bolt/Medusa were going to get back together. If anything, I think here Johnny’s holding onto a piece of his then-missing family the only way he knows how.

So, a couple of relationships post-marriage, but by in large, with the exception of Namorita where we see hardly any of their actual relationship on page and perhaps Medusa, nothing serious. Certainly nothing like his impassioned “head over heels” falls for Crystal and Frankie Raye. So there’s very definitely a change in Johnny after Lyja and in how he behaves in romantic relationships – the implication that he does have casual sex, the uptick in relationships that are clearly for the public eye, a lack of a previously held deep devotion to his partner. I think you could make a really good case for all this coming about as a result of lingering and unaddressed trauma from Lyja.

There’s also, and this isn’t explicitly romantic, the appearance of this little quizzing game:

(Fantastic Four: Secret Invasion) This actually is Lyja in her only appearance since FF #416, disguised as Sue and trying to convince Johnny that Ben is a Skrull for… well for nothing good, obviously, but the book never actually gets into why she’s attempting to separate Ben from Johnny, except that separating him from his family is exactly what she tried to do before she was discovered to a be a Skrull during their “marriage.” But it’s telling that when Johnny feels like something isn’t right, he immediately starts quizzing “Sue” about things she should know. Definitely seems like the kind of game someone who unwittingly married and was abused by a shapeshifter would invent to make sure that the people in his life are really who they’re supposed to be.

So I definitely think there’s a lot of lingering trauma there that, if a really good writer dug into it, could inform a lot about both the romantic relationships he had after that point and his romantic future, especially if it was paired with a story where he explores his romantic feelings for men. It’d be interesting to see it doubled up with doubts after his relationship with Daken in that regard, since Daken also used him to gain access to the Fantastic Four. I’d love to see it all really gotten into and actually, for the first time, addressed, especially if it was in the context of a romantic relationship with Wyatt Wingfoot, who was present during the early days of Lyja’s seduction of Johnny and is also who Johnny ran to after he discovered the truth about the monster Lyja told him was their child. A lot of history to get into there.

#johnny storm #marvel comics #long post/#traincat talks comics #*replies #Anonymous

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ultimavolatusrpg · 5 years

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ACCEPTED // SIERRA FLETCHER

34 years old, 78th Hunger Games, FC: Tessa Thompson

Intelligent, caring, observant, deceptive, skeptical

tw: execution, death

THE ARENA

The 78th Hunger Games was a memorable Arena, if not only for the setting. A large stone, gray castle loomed over a valley and was carved into a mountainside. The grounds of the castle were crawling with snarling wolves and under the moonlight they turned into even more terrifying monsters. Inside, the corridors were long, echoing and full of ghosts.

Several chambers held bedrooms, others chamber-pots, and one held a grand library. A great hall, a kitchen, and a dungeon were also present in the layout of the castle. This Arena had constant dangers and did not let the tributes rest for very long. Armour became animated at random moments and ghosts could turn hostile at any moment. Paintings that adorned every hall, could reach out from their frames and hold a tribute against the wall until they broke free.

Each day of the six-day Arena was painted with blood. The bloodbath was not as spectacular as years previous, leaving only 5 tributes dead and 19 children still alive in the halls of the castle. Only one tribute found the passageways that were hidden in the walls of the castle and she used them to her advantage, setting traps and killing her opponents to move to the finale. The finale wasn’t particularly grand as the last two tributes were moved to the great hall. In a confusing, second long confrontation, Sierra Fletcher was named Victor, her use of the secret passageways earning her a place among the sneakiest and smartest Victors of the last fifty years.

BIOGRAPHY

Sierra Fletcher was born to two dairy farmers in District Ten. She grew up in a small farmhouse where she got up at the crack of dawn to help take care of the cows that they were tasked to look after. Most families that lived around her were full of children to help do the daily chores. Siblings numbering from 5-7 was common around the fields where the Fletchers lived. However, her family only had her. It wasn’t from lack of trying. Both her father and her mother were distraught they couldn’t give their only daughter a sibling and to take some of the stress off of themselves and Sierra.

But, Sierra was okay with it. She worked hard, but never was able to go to school. She found quiet moments around the farm, where she would watch the world go by and figure out things on her own. Her constant curiosity and bright mind were her companions on the farm. Sierra’s mind expanded over the years as she learned how the plants grew and how the machines on the farm worked and how to saddle a horse just from observing.

The Fletchers loved Sierra and whenever they could they gifted her an old textbook or novel that another kid didn’t need anymore. So, she grew up loved and surrounded by books and knowledge and cows. It wasn’t a bad childhood, some would say it was good.

But, when she was 12, her father died. It was an accident, a misidentification by the Peacekeepers during the Quarter Quell. Her mom was compensated only a little bit when the Peacekeeper in question realized his mistake. It was only his generosity that helped them; the Capitol didn’t really care. Sierra and her mom struggled to make ends meet, but with the help of their neighbours, they were able to find a groove and hire some more help on the farm.

For the next three years, Sierra grew and learned and worked. It wasn’t quite as happy as before, but she found her best friend in her mom and cultivated a love for books that could not be matched. She watched people over the top of her current novel and dived deep into the worlds that she could find.

But, of course nothing could last for Sierra Fletcher and she was reaped in the 78th Hunger Games at the ripe old age of 15. She was one of the youngest tributes in her year, only the girl from 9 being younger. Sierra was like a fish out of water in this grand, new place and ended up staying mostly to herself, only opening up for her district partner, Trace.

The pair from District Ten were not noteworthy as they exited the Bloodbath with their lives and a knife between the two of them. They continued to run through the halls of the stone castle, trying to find somewhere to hide or somewhere with food or water. Together they survived the first day, but Sierra lost Trace when they had wandered into a courtyard during twilight. A bipedal wolf had attacked them, Trace losing his life in front of Sierra. She had escaped with deep claw marks in her left shin.

Distraught she wandered around the castle, scared and alone. Sierra wasn’t thinking clearly, only wanting to find a place to curl up and wait for whatever was going to come and get her. She folded into the corner of a bedroom, watching for something to come for her if her exhaustion and thirst didn’t get her first.

She watched and watched, tracing the bricks on the wall with her eyes when her mind grew bored waiting. It was as she noticed the details of the wall, that she found that the bricks looked slightly different. Pulling herself out of her ball, Sierra tested the wall and found that it opened to her touch. Rejuvenated with this possibility, Sierra moved into the passages behind the walls and began to explore.

Over the next few days she stole, set up traps, and strayed as far away from the mutts and dangers that the Arena was throwing at the remaining tributes. During her stint in the walls, she managed to kill four different tributes, crying herself to sleep after each kill she committed. As the tributes dwindled, the Capitol was sick of her shenanigans, only keeping her around for the entertainment value. They tried to flush her out with a fire shot through the wall passages, but Sierra had learned the passages over the past few days and she evaded their attempts to kill her until the last possible minute. It was only when the fire and a poisonous gas cloud that was also let loose in the castle walls collided, did she exit the wall into the Great Hall, an explosion following her.

Sierra stumbled into the other tribute that had been led to their final battleground. She collapsed on the tribute from District 4 and in a panic, stabbed her knife from the Bloodbath into the boy’s neck. Sierra had won, but at what cost?

The months following her victory, Sierra buried her nose in any book she could find. She did not want to face the world that lay outside the windows of her new abode in the Village, wanting to plunge her thoughts into the worlds that each of these books contained. She was not only grieving the people that she had killed in the Arena, but she was grieving her mother too. She had passed during her time in the Games, laid waste in Sierra’s childhood home while they stole every valuable thing in there - not that there was much.

It had nearly destroyed her being fifteen and utterly alone, but her mother had been a strong one and the words that she had told Sierra before she went into her Games echoed in her mind, ‘keep moving forward.’

So, Sierra began to heal and return to a place where she could be utterly herself. The hurt was still there, lingering, but it was never deep enough to incapacitate her when she was awake. When she was asleep though, just like any other Victor, the past came up and made her look back.

The years swam by and Sierra had blossomed into an intelligent, caring young woman. She had managed to date a little bit and find pockets of happiness. She even had started writing a novel, a new world she could pretend was real, rather than live in the one she was in. Whenever she stepped out of the Village, a mask fell onto her face and anything that she heard she didn’t believe. It was hard for her to find hope anymore. She just held on to the moments of happiness, knowing that they were fleeting. She grew close with Cambric of District 8 and formed some real bonds with some of the other people in the Village.

It was only when she was 28, did her life change drastically again. While in the Capitol she had met a young man who was charming and handsome and funny. He had swept her right off of her feet and Sierra thought she might have found someone worth living in the real world for. They began to date earnestly, but secretly, and Sierra found herself pregnant with her and Hawke’s child.

Her and Hawke were ecstatic, but he decided to let her in on a secret that he had been keeping for a long time: Hawke was a rebel. It was doubly dangerous for a Capitol citizen to be caught up in the Rebellion, but there he was, trying to help the Districts. Sierra found it hard to believe, but seeing how passionately he spoke about wanting to give the Districts equality with the Capitol, she gave into reason and the truth in front of her. Hawke was worried that Sierra and their new child would be in danger and Sierra dismissed it, wanting to join him in his crusade - together or not at all.

Together, they made some headway within the Capitol underbelly and Sierra kept it on the downlow with the Victors unsure of any of their feelings towards the people who housed them, watered them, and kept them safe.

When she was 8 months along, Sierra got the news: Hawke had been caught sending supplies to rebels in District Eleven. He was to be executed the next day publically in the Capitol. She felt distraught, like no one in the world was going to be able to stay in her life. She watched from the crowd as he was executed. One last wink from the stage as the punishment was brought down on him. Sierra didn’t look away, wanting to be with him until the end.

Fast forward five years and Sierra had been freed from the constant observation of the Capitol. They did not know that Hawke and her were romantically intertwined - not many had. The people in the Village save a handful she was close with only knew she had a baby with a Capitolite. But the Capitol did know that they had been friends and spoke with one another. The proximity to Hawke had made her popular with Peacekeepers and frequent questionings. She put on her mask when she went to these meetings, making sure to use her smarts and charm to her advantage. And no one was the wiser that Hawke had meant so much more to her.

Her daughter June was five now and was quite honestly the thing that was most dear to her. She was a mischievous little one, but charming to boot. Sierra knew that her daughter’s traits were closer to Hawke’s than hers. But, that was what was wonderful about June, not only was she her own person, but she was her father’s daughter. Sierra still preferred to spend her time weaving and living in new worlds than causing trouble in her old one. However, that was slowly changing as the news of more rebel activity reached her ears. Maybe she could continue Hawke’s legacy. But she had much more riding on the line this time.

PENNED BY: CASSIE

#accepted #character bio #sierra

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is6621 · 5 years

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Online Dating is Killing Romance. - Hattie Swank

Here’s the deal. The dating world is never going to be the same. No more organically meeting a guy at a bar, no more being set up with your Mom’s friends’ cousin, and no more traditional dating. This in thanks to the overwhelming popularity of dating apps in the recent years. I remember my first encounter with online dating: my 10th grade geometry teacher met, dated, got engaged, and married to a man she met on ChristianMingle.Com all within the year she was my teacher. She had shame in telling us they met online, especially because they met on a site like Christian Mingle. Sure we giggled behind her back because it was a foreign concept to our 13-year-old selves, but looking back it wasn’t that weird.

The explosion of dating apps means there’s one for everyone. Between a site for Jewish people, a site for Farmers Only, a site for over 50s, even vegans, every type of demographic is covered in terms of availability of specialty dating apps. No matter the category you put yourself into there’s a dating app for that. This being said, with so much choice around which dating app to choose, it is hard not to wonder if these platforms have gone too far.

Bumble, the first of the dating apps to give control to women, recently opened up a café called Bumble Brew. Located in SoHo, NYC, this meet-up place was carefully curated to set up the perfect date, meeting, or girls night. Each decision that went into building the Bumble Brew was meant to cultivate the best possible scenario for people intending to use the space. Tables in the space are only meant for two to encourage dates, both romantic and platonic. Couches and lounge areas exist throughout for the groups that wish to participate. The menu is carefully curated to feature date-friendly food – meaning no messy hot wings or full fish heads. The wine list only features a slim 15 choices, easy to pronounce and understand what they are. Only a few bottles are available in case your date is not going too hot. Although this seems like a great way to encourage dating beyond behind a screen, it almost seems like it is set up too perfectly.

Facebook Dating is the most recent online dating platform to come into existence. When you sign up for Facebook Dating, it will automatically create your dating profile from your own Facebook profile. Once your profile is created, Facebook will start to send you matches based on your interests, location, age, and so on. The good thing about the privacy of Facebook dating is that it will never send you matches that you are friends with on Facebook – unless you want that. This is definitely a smart solution to the overwhelming process of selecting an online dating platform. Facebook is making it easier to have all of your accounts under one roof, but it raises the question of if Facebook should just stick to what their good at. Is the company spreading itself too thin by now trying to get their users to date? I think so.

Will dating ever not be online? Nope. Not with Tinder around. A few years ago, people would bashfully admit that they have the Tinder app on their phone hidden among their Bank of America and Dunkin’ apps. But now, it has turned into a game. College kids now sit around and swipe left or right for fun, even without the intention of finding something they could seriously date. Bad Tinder pickup lines are becoming memes and crazy profiles are being sent around to friend group chats for humor. Although you would think this is decreasing the popularity, it is actually driving people to download Tinder! Online dating is becoming a falsified way to search for potential hookups, and even though this was not the intention of them, these companies are running with it because it is making them money.

This new era of computerized dating is killing romance as we know it. Dating should be a natural progression of two people deciding they like each other enough to spend a little time together here or there, not two people swiping left or right on each other. Dating apps are allowing people to choose based on looks alone with little consideration of personality or literally any other winning characteristic one may have. It is sad, but this is the world we live in now. But if I have any advice to people looking for that special someone, don’t go on a date with someone just because their profile says they’re 6’2, chances are that’s a lie.

Sources: https://adage.com/article/digital/dating-app-bumble-opening-wine-bar/2175331

https://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/how-to-use-facebook-dating-to-find-the-love-of-your-life-or-at-least-a-date/

https://www.wired.com/story/facebook-dating-in-the-us/

https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2019/09/8458247/what-is-tinder-swipe-night-october-2019

https://www.businessinsider.com/dating-apps-how-to-choose-2018-3 https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/12/tinder-changed-dating/578698/

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hozukitofu · 6 years

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oh no we’re stuck

People are painfully aware of...whatever the things that their stupid genius king Hashirama is doing with the quasi-rival warlord Uchiha Madara. It’s not exactly a secret - it’s the most well-known piece of information when one steps foot onto the Senju court - and the courtesans had long ceased their incessant chatter in regards of the exact degree of canoodling the king is committing in open knowledge of everyone else in the standing court.

It’s not as if it’s a capital offence. He is the king. What are the people going to do to him? Nothing. They can’t. He makes the law - he is the law - and there are no laws that say he can’t...do whatever it is that he does with Madara.

It’s not as if there’s anything immoral between them. They’re chess partners, brothers in arms, fellows from the same and different sides of a war. It’s honourable, this type of companionship, which only becomes more honourable as the degree of devotion increases.

On a completely political viewpoint, it is encouraged that he continues this affiliation with the perpetually warmongering Uchiha clan head, to put a stop on the ongoing civil conflict that had been waging for centuries and centuries now. People are tired of being subjected to the daily sieges. The Uchiha clan aren’t all bad, but if they would just stop and take all the deep breaths in to use the available two brain cells that must be circulated somehow through all the members of that stabby clan, and think. Think long and hard about Peace is economically and politically and emotionally and all the other good virtuous things ending with -ly beneficial to the clan, so how about we consider that?

This had been a standing generational problem that induced the subsequent generational balding problem in many of the king’s counsel. All the people want the war to stop. Nobody truly hate the Uchiha for any valid reason except for the prime minister Sir Grumpy Grandfather Tobirama Senju, and even his hate is specifically targeted at Madara alone. His hate really boils down to some petty grudge from long ago or something or another. It’s not valid to everyone else. The Uchiha are nice human people who just happen to be very good at killing other human people. So are the Senju, but so far there had been only severe maiming that was the result of some moron attempting and failing to grope Touka and that had ended in absolute disaster. For the exiled man, anyways. Touka just carried on as usual.

Given all of the details, the people are fairly supportive of the king’s odd but endearing courting of the warlord general, which isn’t amounting to fruitlessness. No more random outbursts and declaration of war from the man who all is certain, had married the vice of Warfare himself, Uchiha Madara. He had started using his words - his words - and participated in inter-village negotiations. People celebrated with a lot of alcohol. They threw flower bouquets out into the street. They lit incense in thanks to the king. The fellow subjects and the king’s court fully support the inevitable union of the Senju and Uchiha clan heads.

If only Tobirama, the sole lawmaker of this village, would listen to their pleas, and allow the union date wedding to go through.

But Tobirama had been unmovable. Completely unconvinced. Cannot be reasoned with.

“Sensei,” one of his disciples, Koharu, tried once. “It’ll bring in a lot of benefits for the village.”

“I understand your concern, but my answer will remain no.”

“I think you’re just holding onto wrongful reasons to hate someone who hasn’t committed any wrong against you.”

“And I am only doing what is the best for the nation.”

“Your brother is a grown adult man, a monarch of a village. Surely he can be trusted to make his own decision,” she rolls her eyes, and leaves him be.

Oh sure, leave Hashirama to make important decisions that can impact the future of an entire village. This is the same man who wanted to erect a statue to celebrate every inch Madara’s hair gains after each solar cycle and the same man who almost fell on his sword because he tripped on wooden tiles. He cannot be trusted to even walk around unsupervised. It’s a goddamn miracle that he can run a nation and cultivate blood red roses outside of all his time wooing Madara.

Even the rose garden happens by sheer mistake on Hashirama’s end and everybody else in his extended family had to pitch in the effort of maintenance. Madara even had to tend to it, in which Hashirama is blissfully unaware of, because completing deeds for your beloved out of the altruism in your heart and liver and then not communicating that you were the culprit of those deeds being done, is apparently the trend for wooing nowadays. It’s apparently romantic, swoon-worthy, the most adorably beloved sight to craft elaborate letters over - who knows.

These lovers and their stunts. Tobirama is going bald and joining the ranks of Father’s old counselling minister in the Generational Balding Club.

And no, he doesn’t hate Madara outside of all the war crimes he committed and the body count he long exceeded in the royal archives. No, his hate is much much more realistic than being petty that this warmongering moron killed my great uncle twice removed when I was fourteen when everyone and their grandmother was in the middle of a civil war.

Tobirama’s reason for hating Madara, to the surprise of the loyal citizens, was simultaneously understandable and also ridiculous. If Tobirama even tolerated whatever cahooting business that his brother and his wild-haired demon warlord lover craft out between them, it would give rise to Hashirama’s further slacking of work. He already does the bare minimum as the king, the monarch of this entire village comprising of a lot of people already, dependent on his protection and guidance. Approving of the wedding will just give rise to Hashirama completely relinquishing his position and then Tobirama would have to take up the throne because any other option is just as bad as Hashirama, or possibly even worse. He specifically denied his participation in the ongoing game of ‘No I don’t want the crown’, because he just wants to write literary articles and nag at the brats who swarm around him to leave his side and raise them properly. He has no interest in becoming king -

“You Grace, honourable Senju -” someone from Waves flags him down from his litany of curses targeted at both Hashirama and Madara. “The proposal of free trade between our borders -”

“Will not go through the land of fire if the details of transaction are beneficial only to your nation,” he rolls his eyes. “Try harder.”

This is exactly why he wanted none of the kingly duties, honour and glory be damned. Hashirama should be doing his job, not sneaking off to plant more flowers to gift his lover and shirking his duties.

Speaking of squandering idiot kings, where is that stupid brother of his? Is he in the palace? Once Tobirama gets to him he will put so many godforsaken tangles in that stupid long mess of hair that Madara parades around in and shove Hashirama to choke in the brambles.

There is another meeting after this. Where is he?

“Aniki!”

There is a boom and a crash, and Hashirama stumbles out of his library, an event practically unheard of. Tobirama is fairly certain this one isn’t aware of what a book is, let alone to linger in places that are inherently places of habitation for books and learning.

“Aniki,” he says, in the same way someone would pronounce You worthless pile of human flesh I am going to throw you into the city’s canal.

"What did I do wrong?" Hashirama has the audacity to ask.

Tobirama feels all the blood inside of him reaching the boiling point inside a noodle soup pot.

"There was a meeting," he grits, "that you missed. Where were you?"

Hashirama blinks big guileless eyes, wide and completely convincing to anyone who hasn't put up with his bullshit for years and years and years and counting. He even chimes in, "Ototo, what meeting?"

"I'm sure you can fool anyone you wanted, including your Madara, but that ruse won't work on me, to stop that blinking, fix up your hair, and come to the east wing. The agricultural minister wants to have a talk about the farmlands up north," he stalks away.

He hears Hashirama haphazardly checking his kingly robes and heaves a sigh of relief, and really, the role of the annoying and cute younger brother is placed on Itama’s shoulder to bear, so he shouldn’t have any strings, ties or obligation to carry out his role, except -

Except that he had to sit through five meetings now because the king was absent and he’s feeling especially stabby, so he’s substituting the stabbing with being a complete little asshole.

“Aniki,” he half turns, “remember to get a different robe. Parading around in a cut sleeve won’t look too good on your reputation.”

And because this is Hashirama, someone who by all means shouldn’t have been able to grow up past the age of 4 because he’s such a dumbass down to his hair and he has no brain cell, this stupid brother of his full of nasty surprises, kicked life in the face with a roundhouse round and screamed I lived, sucker!

- it is this little rebellious streak in him that compels Hashirama to pompously declare -

“Oh this? I’m wearing it to court. See you at dinner, ototo.”

Tobirama is going to commit treason.

“I have a mind map of why aniki marrying Madara-san would benefit more than it inconveniences,” Itama ambushes him, as he does, on the scheduled Thursday where he would inevitably make his way across his troublesome cute youngest brother and suffer the full brunt of his wily persuasion.

“No,” he says.

“It even has a plan of implemented rules and prohibitions so that the Uchiha clan can settle in with our society and dump fairer workload onto aniki’s head,” and Itama is their brother, alright, he has that Senju tenacity.

“No,” he says again, but weaker.

Itama grins, bright and shark-like, with all of his teeth gleaming and sharp and white. He’s considering it, it’s not terrible, it’s not life-ending, Itama is a ruthless strategist and can sweet talk Izuna into keeping Madara in line. It’s not a completely fruitless proposal -

Except -

Wait. Hang on.

Tobirama breaks away from Itama’s presentation of Worst Case Scenario.

Oh dear gods no.

What if he gives in to the annoying bargaining that Kawarama and Itama and Touka and Kagami and Hashirama rained down onto his head - then Madara becomes King’s Regent, the true king to Hashirama’s slacking king figure.

Tobirama distinctly has a recollection of Madara delivering a speech to his clan to stop the war, at sixteen years of age. That ended rather against his favour, with a lot of fires raging across fields, Izuna and Itama bonding over how stupid Madara was. This idiot cannot be trusted to make negotiations that will sustain a village. They’ll die because of these two lovesick fools, within two weeks.

“That’s stretching too far, nii-san,” Itama points out, and leans down to open his arms to embrace two menaces that Tobirama himself permitted to frolic around in the palace. He should’ve just banned them indefinitely and exile all children to the country of rice. Life would be more bearable that way.

“Hey sensei,” Torifu waves, shyly hiding behind Homura.

“Are you bursting more veins over the emperor?” Homura asks without any preamble, which is a lot of character development, seeing how he could barely make eye contact when Tobirama and he first ran into each other. Literally.

“I am not,” he righteously denies.

Homura and Torifu share a look that might as well scream Okay so he is, but what’s new?

“We all know about the cut sleeve robe, yes, children of my brother,” Itama bends down to their kiddy ear level. “I daresay that the official union will not be long from now.”

“Don’t we have to wait for approval?” Homura points at Tobirama, dead between his eyes.

“Mitokado I am disowning you as a disciple -”

“Nah,” Itama, the one who should back him up, shrugs. “It’s coming. I can see it.”

“Please stop overreacting, sensei, it won’t be good for your blood pressure,” Torifu recommends.

“I am not overreacting,” he insists, like a liar. “I’m being realistic.”

Three pairs of eyes, the same exact look of uh huh, whatever keeps you awake at night, great minister-san echo back at him like a doomed nightmare destined to play inside his head for the next four moon cycles. He glares, hoping it is as withering as he intends, and Itama takes his brats away, waving a jaunty goodbye.

Tobirama is not overreacting.

He is not overreacting.

He repeats this as a mantra, as he treks across the pouring rain to duck under the sheltered corridor to wind back to the south wing, back through the linen supply closet, to change his soaked clothes.

There are the pitter patter of tiny brat footsteps under the pouring rain and he suppresses the absolute urge to scream.

“Sensei,” Kagami greets him under a wide umbrella, Hiruzen and Danzo huddling under its coverage.

His answering grunt is at best interpreted as a curse word.

“You just don’t want to share your brother anymore than you already are,” Kagami then has the audacity, the lungs, to call him out -

“Hear hear,” Hiruzen chimes in, because he wants to taste the sweet sweet reverie of death’s cold fingers deep in his eye socket.

“You two,” he growls, “two hundred strokes of -”

“Oh wow would you look at that, isn’t that Izuna-san? I have to go!” Kagami waves and absconds from under the umbrella, taking Danzo along with him. Hiruzen remains, clutching the umbrella tightly with his spindly spiderweb fingers.

“Sensei, I don’t think there is much to pore over or regret for anyways, as we speak. Nothing has to change, sensei. Or if it has to, it is for the best.”

He slants an eye over at the brat. “You’re a hundred years too young to be telling me vaguely moral terms on how my life should be conducted.”

“You should be a brother before a politician to your brother, the king. I’m sure he hasn’t passed down any bill legalising whatever he wants because he is waiting for your approval. Shouldn’t happiness and peace be more important than coveted and pointlessly arbitrary protection?”

Tobirama is not listening to a twelve-year-old lecturing him on how to carry out his personal duties as a person and as a lawmaking authority of this debilitating village.

“Plus,” Izuna’s voice chimes in. “Worst case scenario, we just accept that there will be an injustice incurred against his majesty in him being barred from ever uniting with his one and true love, despite multiple evidences of them consummating their devotion to each other long long ago. It would be such a shame, a public blemish upon the otherwise mostly decent Senju dynasty -”

“It’s not a dynasty yet. Aniki doesn’t have any children,” he immediately points out, missing all the points of that entire speech.

“That you know of,” Hiruzen helpfully provides.

“I’m fairly sure that is a situation applicable to many others but not the king himself. If it was possible, or permissible by nature itself, his highness would have my brother’s child. But alas, it is not so. So we don’t have to worry about dynasty by filial lineage yet. The issue at hand is that there are all the necessary preparations done to accommodate a union when it happens. The question is,” Izuna points a crooked finger dead between Tobirama’s eyes. “Are you playing nice?”

(He finds out later that Itama had orchestrated that entire thing and he isn’t too sure if that is admirable or just plain scary.

Scary. It’s definitely scary.)

“Aniki. Uchiha-san.”

“Madara is fine.”

“I’m not fine with it,” a pause, a painful pause. “I’m not fine with any of this, but my duty to you is first and foremost as your family, and I care and worry for you to the points of extremism, in which I disagree with all of this. But I am also a man of intellect and you don’t need intellect to see the sheer crime in intervening to prohibiting this union, therefore I will withdraw most complaints about the union and peace treaties between our two clans, and whatever next you choose to do, well, that is your business as a person and as king.”

“Tobirama!”

“Get off me, stupid brother! Oi, you, get him off! I don’t want to be tackled and die from a head injury!”

“Kagami, are you recording all of this?”

“Yes, King Regent uncle sir.”

“Good boy. You can set the falcons onto Izuna today.”

for @fallofield - hey creator can you disown me please and thank you i did This

#naruto #naruto shippuden #naruto founders #hashirama #madara #the collective uchiha clan #tobirama #itama #tobirama's brats (children)#imagine a shitpost but in an essay form #that's what this mess is #touka #izuna

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dorianbrightmusic · 6 years

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Some Megami Ibunroku Persona headcanons about the characters

Uesugi Hidehiko (”Brown”)

Hidehiko, were he to work hard, would likely be at the very top of his class. His intelligence is on par with Nanjo’s, as he enjoys memorising trivia for the purpose of amusing others (e.g. he can conjugate verbs in Latin because he looked into the ‘Romanes eunt domus/romani ite domum’ sketch after seeing it). Trivia turned into facts turned into goddamn syllabi. However, unlike Nanjo, he prioritises his (failing) social life, so he attempts to cultivate the image of a carefree slacker by intentionally stuffing things up. His study habits are incredible (he spends hours every night working), but he doesn’t bother applying them in exams.

For those who also ship Hidehiko and Nanjo, I’ve got a little bit more with this headcanon. The year after the game takes place, Hidehiko stopped failing tests intentionally, likely out of an attempt to impress Nanjo. (Nanjo: “You need help with your homework?” Hidehiko: “I’m the year below you, but sure.” *Proceeds to prove more helpful to Nanjo than vice versa.* Nanjo: ‘What the heck was that?”)

Hidehiko has a strange and lovely friendship with Reiji. Though initially terrified of the six-pack leader, they bonded over card tricks. (Reiji is stated to be good at them in-game, while I imagine Hidehiko using them for pranks and such.) As a result, Hidehiko has also become something of an academic anchor for Reiji.

Hidehiko’s ego was, for the longest time, in fact an inferiority-superiority complex. His character development not only ended his cowardice, but also gave him the ability to properly love himself rather than plead for others’ attention in an attempt to validate his worthwhile.

Hidehiko’s hair is partially dyed. For a long time, he experimented with different colours (including blue), but he decided that brownish-red plus the natural black was a good combination and has stuck with it since.

Kido Reiji

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

After Kandori’s death, Reiji inherited a share of his money. Reiji’s hatred toward Kandori was almost completely one-sided, while Kandori was fond of his little brother/brother(er). Reiji had absolutely no idea what to do with several thousand dollars, but were it not for them, he probably would have completely broken down out of inability to support the growing family by the time of Persona 2.

Around this time, Reiji, with Hidehiko’s assistance, started to actually study, as he realised some degree of financial literacy wasn’t going to kill him. Nor was history. Or geography. Or Japanese. Or maths.

Before the game started, Reiji broke Naoya’s nose. (Because, Naoya, do you really think flirting with an antisocial man with hair-trigger fists is a good idea?) Naoya still hasn’t forgiven him. (The nose is still the only thing deemed unattractive on Naoya’s face by the St. Hermelin alumni. To be fair, it looks like an off-centre shingle between the eyes.)

Kirishima Eriko (”Elly”)

Eriko, like Masao, love the creative pursuits. She paints and plays piano in her spare time. She and Masao disagree on multiple points, however. Eriko likes still, ambient art. Masao likes politically-relevant (and politically incorrect) graffiti. Eriko is absentminded enough to forget that politics is a thing.

Eriko, like Tamaki, attends the St. Hermelin fencing club. She often discusses Ideo Hazama with her, and she’s very interested in exactly what happened at Kurokaza Gakuen.

Ayase Yuka

She never stops speaking in kogalgo. Reiji is probably going to do something horrible to her nose if she keeps it up. She and Hidehiko briefly dated (it ended with both of them just forgetting to do romantic things and realising they were acting like friends anyway), so he’s the only one who understands her. Eriko regards kogal speech like another language and wants to learn it from Yuka.

Yuka, like Eikichi, dyes her hair every day. The amount of bleach and product used is unthinkable.

Mayuzumi Yukino (Yukki)

Because of her old stint as a yankii, new transfer students and such often don’t trust her immediately. She aimed to bring Reiji out of his delinquency and into something more civilised. Thus, she befriended him. She still rides a motorcycle to school. Without a license.

In Persona 2 IS, she wanted to assist Eikichi with acting civil. (It worked somewhat.) As a result, once she left the party, her legacy lived on in Eikichi mentoring Jun as Yukino had mentored him.

My attempts at posting regularly as of late have been fairly nonexistent, but commencing February 22, I’m going to try and get something up here every Friday. It’s mostly going to just be stuff such as the random head canons above, but who knows what might happen. School and music are going to disrupt this, of course, but regularity’s now a semi-priority.

#megami iburoku persona #shin megami tensei #uesugi hidehiko #kirishima eriko #nanjo kei #mayuzumi yukino #kido reiji #takahisa kandori #ayase yuka #toudou naoya #mishina eikichi #kurosu jun #the sceptical fedora #Persona

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bakashidan · 5 years

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TaS - The Sims 4 Farr Dynasty (1#1)

I’ve played TS4 for so long and have done lots of challenge (though without ever sharing about my experiences), but I have never had done the legacy challenge. Seeing that I currently have nothing to do in my game aside from the 30-days Build It challenge, obviously I decided to have a little fun with one of the biggest, oldest challenge around 🙌

Instead of creating a new sim from scratch, I picked out a randomly generated townie. This allowed me to have a completely random sim whose traits and aspiration are alien to me - since I have a tendency to make my sims look and have certain traits - while also introducing me to the freak show that is Maxis’s choice of... well, je ne sais quoi.

The game did a good job on utilizing all my cc, that’s for sure.

So here is the founder of the soon-to-be Farr Dynasty: Robin Farr.

Driven out of home by her parents, Robin Farr promises to create a far (pun not intended) greater legacy to prove her worth. She moves out to a small island near Windenburg, settling down on an empty land, with what little changes she’s saved up from her job as a leaf cutter. That’s right, folks. Our miss Farr is a gardener. Now that’s something I’ve never truly played with, despite having the seasons expansion.

Following the basic rules of the challenge, the succession laws I follow are gender equality, traditional, merit, and brood. I considered the exemplar law, but then again it would be far more interesting to see which child tries to lick ass the most :D plus I rarely interact with children in my game plays, so the hates children trait really sits well with me. What doesn’t sit well instead is the scoring sheet, since I will most likely forget to tally all my dos and don’ts to even know my score at all due to college works. I also set down the quality to laptop mode due to having to work on another 3D rendering program, so my graphic in game looks quite crap.

Traits: Romantic, Geek, and Hates children. Hmmm.

After setting my money to §1800, I had to send her off to work because the damn phone is starting to explode with the boss’s calls. She brought home §175, a meager sum which I doubt would even be useful at all to help me build a house - SOOO I set her out to visit the neighbors, the Bro household and the Bjergsens. Robin had free meals over at the Bros’ and introduced herself to Bjorg Bjergsen and his smallest daughter, whom she had the misfortune of having to entertain. That little interaction gave her a 6 hours tense moodlet, lol.

That being said, right after the little imp scampered away to play in a leaf pile, Bjorg made a move on Robin and DUH, of course she retaliated back. They were watching a romantic movie together, sitting by each other’s side with flirtatious jokes flung around, generally having a really suggestive time a homeless person and a rich father of two shouldn’t be having. Then Clara Bjergsen came in, and Bjorg got embarrassed just in time before his wife caught on them. Robin left the house with a plate of warm turkey dinner and a dirty little secret I might had planned to cultivate.

She left the house to go back and sleep at the Bros’, I might add. That earned her a negative relationship with Joaquin, but also a significant boost to her romantic relationship with Sergio for no other reason than all the flirting the two kept doing because they were under the influence of the steamy ginseng juice Joaquin brewed. So much for trying to get her out of the house, Le Chien.

The romance went steady even with all the sneaking around Bjorg led Robin to do - he asked her to dinner right after he fought with Clara, took her to the humor and hijinks festival, and had a date to the park - and at the end of the day, Sergio’s romance meter was higher than Bjorg’s. Fuck it, I thought. Persuading good ole Bjorg to get a divorce is way harder than marrying Sergio. On their third dinner date Robin asked Sergio out, and he immediately followed up with a proposal. It might be because they were celebrating his birthday or whatever, dunno, but she said yes - and they eloped on impulse Θ_Θ)> The news didn’t sit well with Bjorg, who asked Robin out to another outing right after her sudden wedding.

He hated it. The old man argued with Robin and threw her drinks until suddenly, Clara Bjergsen came inside the bar, looking shocked to see her husband so violent. It prompted him to stop fighting with Robin, but the deed is done and the love is gone. Whatever fling they had had gone down the drain, even as Robin tried to smoothly recover and apologize (jackass had the nerves to shove her in response!). So I moved her out of the bar, heading to the art gallery, a place where she usually unwinds... with Jade Dragon. Seriously though, this game needs a heavy PG rating - and not just because there are super R-rated mods in the community :>

After three plates of chicken nuggets and unwinding with the bubble blower, I couldn’t force the poor girl to walk home when she’s already jackshit hammered.

So she slept in the art gallery and was late to her work - oh, joy! - and I automatically switched to Sergio. He was chatting up Joaquin in front of a Japanese restaurant I put in Newcrest and Joaquin didn’t exactly look thrilled about it; so maybe he was asking Joaquin to be a godfather or something? Is this a sign from SimGod that some ~spicy~ woohoo is on the way that night?

Anyhow, because the lad had a day off, I fulfilled all the requirements for his promotion and bought some basic furniture to fill a 6x8 room. I crammed a (used) double futon, a baby basket, a toddler bed, a high chair, a fridge, a toilet, a bath tub, and a workstation as efficient as I could and bought some more decoration mod that resembled hastily given wedding gifts (clothes rack, shoe rack, and an ‘adults only’ neon sign that I put up for no other reason than looking cool during nighttime). Must’ve been heaven for Sergio, seeing as he was a materialistic sim. Building the whole room costed me an arm and a leg, and when Robin came back home the two of them had a quick, free meal to save on their food expenses.

Later that night, Joaquin invited Robin to dinner and Sergio tagged along. True to their action earlier, the bros started talking again about SimGod-knows-what and the conversation took a pretty strange turns when bubbles of sun, diaper, baseball gloves, and an anti-Sergio one poured out of Joaquin’s mouth lol. Is he rejecting Sergio’s offer? Is he dissing his bro? Is he really not bad-mouthing Robin, the one whom he had bad relations with?

Sims are... fickle????????

“Yo, what the fuck, bro.” -Sergio 2k19

On the side notes, while these three were having a serious conversation, the Landgraab couples came and copulated in front of the entry way. I never would’ve seen it coming, not even when the blue notification box popped up and notified the whole world about their intimate times. I luuurve WickedWhims, but sometimes it’s just too much hassle - both the setting and the random sex pair ups. Teen Alexander Goth came by and excitedly took a picture of the event (shame that NPCs can’t exactly take a picture, though).

Even more later on that night, after they went back to Joaquin’s place from dinner, a certain someone couldn’t keep their hands inside their pockets and flirted a lot. And by a lot, I mean a whole damn lot. Sergio finally won over Robin’s reluctance and they tried for baby inside his old closet while Joaquin took over Sergio’s old bed and slept on it. It took a single try for Robin to carry a kid from the suave tech guru, whereas with Bjorg none of the hot dilly dally even produced in anything but the cum slut spermatozoa fluid hussy moodlet. Good thing she broke up with Bjorg, right?

No.

God, I don’t even want to relish the next part ever again. Possibly one the worst drama I’ve witnessed in sim history, even with the knowledge that all kinds of activity that happens is probably mutually agreed upon. But hey, the worst is yet to come... I think. And the next part of our first generation is going to be a grim and heavy, but I won’t forget to add all the cute parts that popped up here and there. Rewriting my experience so far has made me realize just how dramatic a sims gameplay can be 🤔🤣

Special thanks to all the amazing creators whose mods I use during my gameplay, and to ChilliP0uch for talking me into joining this challenge ♥

#the sims 4 #ts4 #ts4 legacy challenge #the sims 4 legacy #Farr Dynasty #Farr Dynasty Legacy Challenge #ts4 cc #sims 4 story #First generation legacy #sims 4 gardener #sims 4 cc in picture

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mst3kproject · 6 years

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815: Agent for HARM

I fear I am among the minority who really don’t find the host segments in this episode funny. They’re kind of tedious and frustrating, really – though I do smile at Crow being a character witness – and when the time came to re-watch the episode in preparation for this review, I actually skipped them and got straight to the movie. It’s pretty drab, too.

Dr. Jan Stefanik defects from… somewhere or other, and moves to California to do… some kind of research. When his assistant Henry suddenly dissolves into a mess of green goo, spy organization HARM decides Stefanik needs a full investigation and sends Agent Adam Chance, a guy who dresses like Mr. Rogers and still manages to sleep with every woman he meets. Stefanik explains to Chance that his country has new and terrible tool of destruction: an alien Spore that reproduces by feeding on human flesh. That’s right, they’ve weaponized the space mummy fungus from Being from Another Planet! The movies are coming together into a single, mud-clear, incoherent whole, again!

Y’know, Secret Agent Super Dragon and Danger!! Death Ray weren’t very good, but they could legitimately claim to globe-trotting adventures. Super Dragon took us to Amsterdam, and Death Ray at least mentioned Rome and Barcelona. In Agent for HARM we see one beach and a motel in Mexico. The whole movie seems to be in pastels, which aren’t really urgent colours, and something about the pacing is off. No matter what the movie tries to tell us, it just never feels like we’re in any sort of a hurry.

It’s not without legitimate entertainment value. The music’s not bad – it isn’t totally forgettable, but also not as obnoxiously memorable as the theme from Danger!! Death Ray. The Spore itself is a scary idea and the makeup that represents it is actually pretty good. I especially like the impression you get that there’s a dark, hollow cavity underneath the foaming fungus, as if the victim’s face is about to collapse. The improbably complete eyeball in Dr. Stefanik’s sample is entertainingly gross, and I like the glimpse of his lab animals that hint at what his work actually entails.

I’m sure the thing everybody remembers best about Agent for HARM, though, is Dr. Stefanik’s niece Ava. She’s cute and blonde and spends most of the movie running around in tiny little bikinis, and she works for the bad guys because of course she fucking does. This plot point is so obvious to anybody who’s ever seen a movie in their lives that I’m not sure why the writers bothered establishing it. The beautiful woman in a spy movie is always working for the bad guys.

I really would have liked to see way more of the relationship between Stefanik and Ava. Actually seeing them interact at any length might have helped to dispense with the creepy vibe we get from their age gap, her habit of wandering around in nothing but a tiny swimsuit, and Stefanik’s wistful commentary on how close they’ve become. It’s easy to see why Mike and the bots made some jokes about incest. Some character development here might also have suggested why Stefanik trusts her, when he surely must have suspected her of spying when she first showed up. The interactions we see make her look so damn suspicious that if she’d turned out to be genuine, Dr. Stefanik’s actual niece who really does want to help him, it would have been a shocking twist!

What would not have been a shocking twist would be if she turned out to be a robot. Barbara Bouchet wears so much makeup she looks like she’s made of plastic (or maybe that’s just her face – she looked exactly the same as Moneypenny in Casino Royale and Maria in Black Belly of the Tarantula… man, I’ve seen a lot of terrible movies) and for some reason her hair looks fake. She moves kind of robotically, too, and the first time I watched the movie I was thinking about the comparison well before Chance declares ‘she’s a machine’. He may have been more right than he knew.

What’s somewhat mysterious is when, exactly, Chance figured out Ava was a spy. His drunken boss asks him, but doesn’t receive a straight answer, and when you watch the movie a second time you can’t help but try to figure it out. Was it when she blatantly tried to distract him by inviting him to go swimming with her, and he said you’re not fooling anyone, Angel? But if so, why does he later save her when the guy who looks like Prince threatens her, if he already knew it was a ruse? Is it so she wouldn’t know that he knew? Was it when he realized the gun she’d given him wasn’t loaded?

I actually lean towards the latter incident as the moment of revelation, because it’s the one he references when he has her arrested. That also explains why he doesn’t give his boss a straight answer – he’s ashamed it took him that long.

The love story in this movie isn’t between Chance and Ava – or Chance and Karate Girl, or Chance and Beehive Secretary – anyway. It’s the bromance between Chance and Dr. Stefanik.

The two of them start off deeply suspicious of each other. Chance has been sent to keep an eye on Stefanik and he’s quite worried that the scientist may be some kind of spy himself. Chance threatens him with both death and deportation. Stefanik, meanwhile, is a man whose main flaw is that he trusts too easily, and he has learned the hard lesson that people who deal in the fate of nations do not make good friends. He fears the Americans may try to use Spore as a weapon just as his own people did. The one person he trusts is Ava, and only because she’s family – and boy, did that backfire on him – and even she is not allowed full access to his work on an antidote.

By the end of the movie, Chance and Stefanik come to trust each other totally, and are good friends to such a degree that their separation, reunion, and the reveal of Stefanik’s death plays out like a romantic tragedy. The captured Stefanik stares at the horizon, waiting for Chance to come for him. When they reunite, Chance wants to touch Stefanik despite knowing that the stuff in the bags, with which Stefanik is now covered, is deadly. When told Stefanik is dead, Chance denies it over and over until the proof is staring him in the face. If one or other of them were a woman, nobody would question that any of this is meant to be romantic, and they’re certainly closer in age than either of these gray-haired men is to twenty-two-year-old Ava.

This is two episodes in a row where I’ve talked about the homosexual undertones. Do I just have my tumblr goggles on, or are the movies actually that gay?

A certain number of things about this film become a little clearer when you know that it, like Stranded in Space, was intended as a pilot for a TV series. That’s why there’s not much for locations – they had to keep the budget down so as not to scare the investors. That’s why they bring up the cancelled date with the Beehive Secretary – perhaps she was supposed to be a regular love interest. It explains why not just the villains but the good guy of this particular story – Stefanik – must be dead at the end, because the main character can’t form long-lasting attachments that might carry into future episodes when the actors are guest stars who might not be able to come back. Maybe that’s also why Stefanik’s antidote to the fungus also didn’t work, because they were going to use Spore itself as an ongoing plot point.

Spore is an interesting and scary choice of weapon, probably the most interesting thing in the movie, and it’s possibly a metaphor for how communism was perceived in the 50’s and 60’s – as a disease that consumed societies from the inside. We saw an example of this in It Conquered the World, when Beulah implanted mind control devices in its victims, infecting them with its poisonous view of progress. The people in Stranded in Space thought Stryker was the one with the thought disease, here to infect their planet. Now here in Agent for HARM, we have Spore, which enters the human body and turns it into something unthinking and alien, just as Beulah did. Also like Beulah’s victims, who had to be killed because they could not be cured, once it has started there is no way to stop it.

Ava the ‘machine’ and the compassionless bad guy Malko also fit into this way of thinking. Their politics have transformed them into things as unthinking and alien as the fungus. When Chance writes the words Jan Stefanik, Human Being on the toe tag, he is emphasizing that Stefanik had succumbed to a disease of the body but not to this disease of the mind. Yet Chance’s boss reminds him, and Chance agrees, that they, too, are machines – Chance has, after all, coldly murdered several of Malko’s henchmen. In order to fight these unfeeling enemies, he has had to cultivate a lack of feeling in himself. Perhaps he emphasizes Stefanik’s humanity partly because he doesn’t feel quite human anymore.

Agent for HARM is okay, but it’s not great. There’s some interesting ideas in it, under-used, and a number of those glamorous secret agent tropes, over-used. It certainly doesn’t come near toppling Danger!! Death Ray as MST3K’s best secret agent movie – it’s just too forgettable.

#mst3k #reviews #agent for harm #tw: incest #the movies are all coming together #60s

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kpopfanfictrash · 7 years

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Five Dates

Author: @kpopfanfictrash , as part of the Bound series with @underthejoon

Creative Content Contributor: @m00nk1ld FOR THIS PERFECT, BEAUTIFUL MOODBOARD.

Rating: 18 + (explicit sex, dirty talk)

Word Count: 17,578

Summary: “Ten dates,” he nods, smile tugging at his lips. “Ten dates, to decide if you want this – want me – or want me to go. Ten dates to get to know me. Ten dates,” he says, oddly soft, “to fall in love with me.”

Which then becomes five. (Arranged Marriage!AU)

Looking up from your desk, you note your office seems empty.

The thought is, in itself, a silly one. Usually you simply brush it aside but for some reason, the notion keeps on presenting itself to you today. You were chatting in Sarah’s office earlier, visiting the cubicle she has on the fifth floor and couldn’t help but notice all the things stuck up on her walls; scribbled drawings made by her children, faded letters from co-workers. Tiny objects, small things to remember – there were things though, which is entirely different from your space.

Your office is bare. When you moved into this new building, it was your assistant Kyle, who bought everything. He peppered your walls as requested, laid them out precisely according to your instructions and guidelines. You wanted modern concepts, abstract ideas – murals which required thinking, when co-workers sat down in your office. It is not your personal taste, you note, looking around with dismay. You’re a bigger fan of the impressionists, in love with the romantics. Entirely opposite of your office – but then, everything about your life is carefully cultivated for work.

Sitting in your fancy, high-backed chair, you stare at the cityscape and wonder what will come next. You wonder – not for the first time this week, nor even today – what in the hell you’re doing. An arranged marriage is a good idea, at least it is on paper. Most of the men and women in your family have one, with your own parents being the shining paradigm and example.

“We didn’t love one another – not at first,” your mother loves to say, sliding her arm around the waist of your father. “No, definitely not love. It was during our first crisis though, when he came through for me. He supported and cared, and over time became my very best friend.”

You remember all the times that she’s said this, staring at the papers sprawled on top of your desk. Your mother and father are currently celebrating thirty-one years of happily wedded bliss. Your older sister just got engaged to her own prince charming, which leaves you the odd woman out – the odd, high-powered, executive woman. The woman who usually ends up intimidating men that she meets. A woman who, honestly, can’t seem to find another way of getting married.

Staring down at your desk, you shuffle the papers. Or, resumes, as you like to call them. Emailed by your parents, printed out by Kyle; all of them embossed on high-quality paper, detailing the hopes each one has for their lives and their wives. Each paper holds a man your parents have recommended. Whichever one is the most qualified, you’ve decided to marry. Just the thought makes you grimace. Qualified and recommended. You should like an interviewer, not a woman selecting her future husband.

Leaning back in your seat, you close your eyes. Lacing your fingertips tight across your stomach, the sound of a knock at the door is near-startling. “Come in,” you call out, not bothering to open your eyes. Likely, it is just Kyle, a man who has seen you in worse times than this.

The door opens and shuts, closing with a thud. When no one speaks, you frown. Kyle always is the one to greet you first. For him just to stand there is unusual, making you crack open an eye.

The person is not Kyle.

You realize this quickly, jerking upright for your feet to awkwardly fall to the floor. The man standing before you is unfamiliar – you should be scared by this fact; or at the very least, alarmed. “Hello,” you nod, shutting your laptop. “Nice to meet you.”

The man looks at the door, then to you. “Hello.”

Without moving, you survey his body. The man is good looking. Tall, broad-shouldered with a youthful complexion – though, perhaps this has more to do with his expression than age. The man appears perplexed, staring at you wide-eyed, like a deer caught in headlights. You aren’t quite sure if he’s shocked or surprised.

Some would say there is not a difference, but you know these people are foolish. Surprise, is when you step into a room and discover a party. Shock, is when you step into a room and find there’s a snake.

Your lips curve upwards. “I wasn’t aware I had another meeting today,” you say, pushing yourself to stand.

“I wasn’t aware we would be meeting in your office,” the man shrugs, walking forward. “But then, nothing about this is usual – is it?”

Your brows shoot up. It has been a while, since someone dared to address to you like that. A long time, since someone even implied you were in the wrong, or that anything you care to do is odd. Truthfully, it feels kind of nice. You hate ass-kissing.

“Well.” Sitting back down, you stare at the man standing before you. “That depends – what are you here to discuss?”

“Jungkook,” he supplies, taking a seat and slowly crossing his legs. “I’m here to discuss our engagement.”

It’s unfortunate that you’ve just had a sip of your coffee, since half of the drink comes right back up through your nose. “I’m so sorry,” you cough, waving aside his concern. “Our what, now?”

“Our engagement,” Jungkook reaffirms, smiling. “Did you see the resume my assistant scanned over?”

At this, you nearly laugh. Hearing Jungkook describe it as a resume is all too familiar. Now, you do look at him and see that he does look familiar. Leafing through the twenty or so papers laid out on your desk – you find him. Jeon Jungkook, his name written in bold black and white. His profile is arranged like a resume, and briefly, you wonder if he repurposed one for the other. His ‘about me’ blurb explains how he created a sports fantasy game in college. The game then went viral, became a worldwide phenomenon and led Jungkook to sell it, reaping in millions of dollars in profit. He’s currently retired, though he occasionally hires himself out for consultation on a variety of gaming projects.

Watching you read, Jungkook drapes one arm snugly across the back of his chair. “Did you find what you’re looking for?” he asks, struggling to suppress a smile.

You nod, continuing to read – and then freeze, spotting tiny, red letters at the bottom of the page. “Carlisle?” you repeat, leaning closer. “You’re from Carlisle?”

Jungkook nods. “I take that to mean you don’t remember me.”

As you squint, though, as you look – a picture begins to form in your mind. “I,” you pause, tilting your head. “Kookie?”

Jungkook’s expression falters. “Great. Yes, let’s bring that back.”

Noticeably brightening, you sit up in your chair. “It is! Kookie, the kid who followed me around on the playground. Wow,” you laugh, clapping your hands. “I haven’t seen you since – what? You were ten years old?”

“Eleven,” Jungkook corrects, somewhat stiff.

“Right,” you exhale, shaking your head. “Which means I was what, fifteen?”

“Fourteen.” Jungkook meets your gaze. “Anything else you want to discuss about childhood?”

His directness is startling, especially given the fact that all you remember is what you just said. Kookie, the scrawny kid who hung helplessly on each word you said. You remember him hiding behind slides and swings, watching until you inevitably called him out on it – although, you also remember being oddly protective of the kid. He was just so angelic, with those big doe-eyes and teeth. You recall in the end, you ending up fighting off most of his bullies. Protecting him was a pastime, your Kookie – it makes your stomach drop, to realize he’s not so little anymore.

“I think,” you muse, laying your palms flat on the table. “I have just one question. Which is – why?” When Jungkook hesitates, you frown. “You’re good looking, successful, clearly able to hold a normal conversation. Why do you want to have an arranged marriage – and why to me?”

Jungkook considers this for a moment, never looking away. You try and hold his gaze, try to remain steady, but it’s been months. Months, of your parents sending you candidates. Months, of meeting each man and ushering them, one by one out the door. At the start, you were hopeful. At the start, you scheduled each meeting as a date. You had dinner with one, grabbed coffee with another, went out for drinks with a third. Over time, you found yourself becoming disappointed and gradually, the meetings became shorter and less personal.

It didn’t matter what you asked them, not really. The only question of importance to you was why. For most, it was all about the money. You, yourself are fairly successful. Your family is rather well-off, as well. Being part of your life is enticing, especially for the good-looking opportunists of the world. The trophy husbands, as you call them.

Then, there were some whose motives were more sinister. Ones just as smart, just as conniving as you – these men wanted to take your money, rather than simply use it. There were the men you steered clear of. With each potential candidate you declined, each faltering week that passed – you found yourself less and less hopeful. All you want is a partner, someone like what your parents have. Someone to rely on, to depend on; a man who’s an equal, not a chore. Without meaning to, your meetings turned from dates to appointments. Eventually, they become fifteen minute intervals on your calendar; a revolving door of men who walked into your life – and back out again.

Perhaps, this is why Jungkook is intriguing. He is clearly intelligent and he has money of his own. If Jungkook is not here for fame or fortune, why at all?

Jungkook places his hands on your desk. “You know me as the boy who followed you around on the playground,” he allows, lifting a brow. “I know you as the girl I once said would be my wife.”

When he says this, you freeze. Staring back at him, you find the words stuck in your mouth. “You – what?”

Jungkook nods. “When I was eleven, I was very sure I wanted to marry you.”

It’s somewhat of a struggle to remain calm. So, Jungkook is a stalker. A very cute, well-mannered stalker. “Uh,” you cough, unsure what to do. “You’re here to fulfill a childhood dream, then?”

“Ah.” Jungkook looks up, eyes gleaming. “You misunderstand.”

“I don’t think so,” you respond, equally sharp.

He adjusts a cuff. “Look, I don’t know you – not anymore. I’m not eleven, I’m not overly romantic about falling in love. It’s just,” Jungkook hesitates, looking out at the city. “I don’t know what I want,” he admits. “I’ve been in shitty relationships ever since I was a teenager. Relationships where they changed me, where I changed them. I found myself chasing love after love, all of whom inevitably crashed and burned.”

“Tragic,” you quip, attempting to stifle a yawn. “Not to mention, dramatic.”

Jungkook’s lip quirks. “I can be. I’m over-passionate, I throw my whole self into things – this is how I became successful at such a young age. Honestly, I never saw myself entering an arranged marriage. This has always been something my parents wanted, but not me. Lately, though,” he sighs, rubbing his forehead. “I’ve realized I don’t know what I want. And,” he admits, quieter, “I’d like some stability – for once in my life.”

You stare at him. It is odd; Jungkook’s reasons are far from your own – not even close. You do believe him though, which is more than can be said of the others. At least he comes across as direct.

Slowly, you uncross your arms. “I don’t like it, when people idolize me,” you warn him. “I don’t care about you having a crush on me before, or about us having known each other once. If anything,” you admit with a shrug, “that turns me off.”

“Off?” Jungkook asks, followed by a grin. “Does that mean you were turned on, at some point?”

This is so startling, you blush – actually blush, which is alarming. “I – no,” you stammer, but Jungkook already looks pleased.

“Interesting,” he states, his tone thoughtful.

You stare back, unaccustomed to this feeling. This intense nervousness, a vague excitement coupled with – well, frankly, annoyance. Jungkook annoys you, with his overconfident stance. The way he stares at you is bothersome, as though he is seeing right through you. Even if he is, even if he can, it’s only common decency to pretend.

Rather than respond to him with this, you lean back in your chair. “I’ll be honest,” you return, since he seems to respond to that kind of thing. “This is usually when I tell people to leave.”

An odd look crosses Jungkook’s features – as though he has pictured this moment many times over, and not once did he think you would say no. This makes you smile.

“What was it,” he asks, dimple appearing in his forehead. “Should I not have told you about my crush on you? Listen, I just can’t… lie, like that. I wouldn’t want our marriage to start off on the wrong foot.”

“Our marriage?” With a groan, you lower your head to your hands. “You really need to stop that.”

“What?” Jungkook asks, a perfect angel. “Speaking in affirmatives?” When you look up, his grin widens, all confidence returned. “I should stop citing the inevitable?”

“You don’t even know me,” you protest, though you can’t help but laugh. It is just all so ridiculous. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I’d like to, though.”

This statement gives you pause and for the very first time, you consider him seriously.

Jungkook looks back at you, also solemn. “You said,” he pauses. “This is the time when you usually tell people to leave. I can’t help but notice you haven’t asked me.”

“No,” you muse, blinking. “I haven’t.”

Jungkook exhales. “Ten dates,” he announces.

Your eyebrows shoot up. “Excuse me?”

“Ten dates,” he nods, a smile tugging at his lips. “Ten dates to decide if you want this – want me – or you want me to go. Ten dates to get to know me. Ten dates,” he repeats, oddly soft, “to fall in love with me.”

“I,” you stop, unsure what to think. What Jungkook is proposing is a gigantic leap of faith. “You keep saying for me to decide. What about you?” you respond, curious. “Isn’t this just as big a decision for you?”

“Ah, yes,” Jungkook nods. “True. Fine, ten dates for both of us. The ring of that isn’t as nice, though. Also – I know myself,” he admits, smile lazy. “I only need five dates to decide.”

“Five?” You can’t keep from smiling – everything about this guy is just so intense, so blazingly earnest. “That’s all?”

He grins, uncrossing his legs. “Intimidated by that?”

Your eyes narrow. “Not at all, it’s just – you’re right. Come to think of it, five is a much better number. Less pain, less time to decide we don’t like one another.”

Jungkook shrugs, as though unconcerned. “Fine with me,” he agrees, standing up from your chair. “So,” he announces, holding out his hand. “Do we have an agreement?”

With a nod, you push yourself to stand as well. “Five dates,” you agree. “Five dates, to revisit the idea of marriage.”

Your heart hammers in your chest, the noise overly loud. This is not unusual, you tell yourself; people make these kinds of decisions every day. You, yourself have made tougher decisions before. This, though – you can’t help but feel a line has been drawn. A thrill travels your spine; excitement, coupled with furious, all-encompassing fear.

This fear is somewhat lessened, when Jungkook takes your hand. “Agreed,” he smiles, his gaze lingering on yours. “I’ll get your number from your assistant; I won’t take up any more of your time.”

You stare when he leaves, your entire body jittery and on edge. You find yourself unsure what happened, unsure why you’re so excited.

Jungkook pauses at the door to glance over his shoulder. “I’ve never done something like this before,” he confesses, gaze bright. “And, in answer to your earlier question – I’m honestly not sure why I agreed to do this. It’s wholly out of character for me. But then,” he hesitates, offering a shrug. “I’m not scared.”

He then leaves, shutting the door with him.

Jungkook: You ready to fall in love with me? [2:46 PM]

Y/N: Stop that. Or I’ll become suddenly ill and I don’t want that to happen – I bought a really pretty dress for tonight. [3:13 PM]

Jungkook: A dress, hm? Tell me about this dress. [3:25 PM]

Y/N: No. Bad, Jungkook. [3:46 PM]

Jungkook: … or good Jungkook? [4:01 PM]

Y/N: Anyways. Where are we going to dinner? [4:15 PM]

Jungkook: A restaurant. You do love specifics, don’t you? [4:28 PM]

Y/N: I got where I am today by being a major control freak [4:37 PM]

Jungkook: Hm. This will be interesting. [4:45 PM]

Y/N: Oh? And why’s that. [4:48 PM]

Jungkook: Same. [4:50 pm]

Jungkook: See you at dinner, babe ;) [4:50 PM]

Sitting back at your desk, you realize you’re smiling – a response which you hastily, almost guiltily, wipe from your face. Glancing at your office, you shrink back in your chair. This is odd. Normally, you would not be so interested so soon. Joking with Jungkook is easy, though, laughing with him is easy; your conversation is never forced, rarely awkward. Perhaps this is just the advantage of the situation: there is no added pressure to like one another. If you don’t want to continue seeing each other after five dates – you won’t. You’ll each go your separate ways and never speak to each other again. Your parents will continue to send you resumes and you will continue to search for your husband.

The thought makes your stomach drop and, when you consider the opposite, your fingers freeze on the keys. The other choice is you could marry Jungkook. This could be it; you could be at the end of the road. Yes, you’ll be his wife. Yes, you’ll get married. The thought makes you oddly light-headed with fear.

On the desk, your phone starts to buzz and you ignore it. For some reason, you have only ever given thought to the search. Mostly, you consider the act of finding someone to marry and, somewhat selfishly, you never really considered how you’ll fit into someone’s life.

Lowering your head to the keyboard, you wonder how your parents went through with this. It is such a crippling decision, deciding to spend your life with a stranger. Objectively, you know that your husband won’t always be a stranger. Over time, he will become your best friend. He will be your partner, the one you know better than anyone. It’s just that – right now, he’s a stranger. Which means the future is so hard to envision.

You know that you’re good at conceptualizing, but not like this. Not when you have no experience, no expertise to draw upon and not when the numbers and figures make no sense. Not with matters of the heart – this is something you’ve always been poor at.

Your phone buzzes angrily again and this time, you look. Jungkook has sent you the address of the restaurant, along with a time – 8:00 PM. Your gaze snaps up to look at the clock. It’s nearly 5:00 now, which makes you groan out loud. Typically, you wouldn’t leave your office before 7:00 PM. It’s just habit – your day is usually full of meetings until five, sometimes until six. You need the extra hours at the end of the day get work done. You need them to answer unread emails and ponder the future of the company.

Gritting your teeth, you hastily unplug your laptop. If you want to look presentable, you need to leave now. In order to shower, do your hair and wipe off the day’s worth of stress and makeup – it’s already going to be a tight squeeze.

Kyle’s brows arch, when you hurry through the door. “You’re going home,” he gasps, mock-clapping. “Amazing! I’m so proud of you, Y/N.”

Shaking your head, you tug on your pea coat over your clothes. “I do leave eventually, Kyle. Just, you know – when I’m done working for the day.”

“Which is never,” he supplies with a grin. “Glad to hear Jungkook is taking you someplace nice though,” he sighs. In the reflection of his window, you can see Kyle has the restaurant’s menu pulled up on his screen.

“Kyle,” you groan, near laughing – then pause. “Wait – since when are you on a first name basis with Jungkook?”

“Since he sent me recommendations for my fantasy football league,” Kyle mumbles, scrolling through a website. “Ah, you have to try the caviar tart. Reviews say it’s exquisite.”

Wrinkling your nose, you open your phone. If you’re being entirely truthful, you hate caviar, but if that’s what Jungkook wants to eat, you owe it to him to be open. “Anyways,” you exhale, turning away towards the elevators. “You should go home soon, Kyle. The boss has officially left the building.”

Kyle waves you away, not even bothering to respond and you ride the elevator alone to the lobby. That’s something no one tells you about being the boss. It can be lonely. It can be alienating, being the ultimate figure of authority. You exist in a professional capacity as a decision maker, which means you exist, in essence, to be feared. Maybe this is a part of why you agreed to an arranged marriage in the first place. You like to have things outlined, you like your life to be compartmentalized. Since you didn’t see a way to make things work the natural way – here you are.

The next few hours are both the slowest and the fastest of your life. A blur of makeup, steam and various tricks to better your appearance. You slide your body into a skin-tight dress, zip it all the way up and survey yourself in the mirror. You look good, or at least – you think you do. There comes a point when, after so many failed attempts at dating, it can be hard to know what’s right and wrong about yourself.

If the problem were entirely one-sided, your disastrous second date ratio wouldn’t exist. No, it would be arrogant to assume the problem is not you, at least not entirely. Not everyone is compatible, not every two people fall in love – but still, it seems odd for you to crash and burn so often.

This, though, you push aside. This, you shove deep into a corner with the rest of your insecurity. Tonight is not about that. Tonight is about getting to know Jungkook. Who is – already here, you realize walking into the restaurant.

He currently stands at the bar, staring down at his phone. The screen lights up his features, making him appear older than he is. His hands are stuffed into his pockets, wrinkling his suit – this is something an older male wouldn’t do. Or, perhaps Jungkook does know and just doesn’t care. As you close the distance between you, he looks up and blinks, nearly dropping his phone.

“Wow,” he breathes, gaze trailing your body. “You look absolutely breathtaking.”

You’ve received many compliments in your lifetime, heard many kind words. It is all just part of the game; part of the give and take, before the inevitable take. This, though – you’re certain no one has ever complimented you like this before. Jungkook speaks with such sincerity, with no hint of agenda in his eyes.

“Hi,” you return, offering a smile. “You look nice, as well.”

This, frankly, is an understatement. Jungkook looks devastating in a fitted, navy suit. His dark hair falls into his gaze, jawline cut and defined. You glance quickly over his body, not wanting to linger when he smiles.

“Just nice?” Jungkook teases.

“Very nice,” you allow, meeting his gaze.

With a shrug, Jungkook holds out his arm. “I’ll take that. Let’s go.”

Jungkook seems known here, you realize, walking towards the host. You don’t know if this is because he comes here often, or because of his name. This can often be difficult to separate, in places like this. Restaurant owners Google their patrons – sometimes to avoid offense or insult, but sometimes it is to sell them out to the paparazzi outside. The odds are fifty-fifty, really.

Jungkook follows you when led to the table, his hand warm and low on your back. Upon reaching your seat, he pulls out your chair and waits until you sit before following suit. Your waiter arrives just as fast, drink orders are taken and the water is set before you. From over the top of the bread basket, sipping quickly on your water – things fall silent.

Not the good kind of silence. This is not quiet introspection, nor taut awareness. No, this is the awful, brutal lack of things to say. Clearing your throat, you stare at your water glass. It is cut from the highest caliber of crystal and, if you’re being entirely honest, you hate it. You hate this place, with its dim lighting, stuffy atmosphere and overwhelming sense of anxiety and panic.

You would much rather be at home, or in a bright, dive-y restaurant. Anywhere but here and across the table, Jungkook sighs.

You look up, startled by the sound. Eyes widening, you seem him loosen his tie. “What you are you doing,” you hiss, leaning in. “People will see.”

With an arch of his brow, Jungkook looks to where your waiter has disappeared. “Let them. You know,” he muses, lowering his voice. “We haven’t actually ordered yet, Y/N.”

Glancing down at your menu, you shrug. “I – okay. I can be ready to order, if you want to call the waiter back.”

Chuckling, he grabs the top of your menu. “No, that’s not what I meant. What I meant,” Jungkook states, placing your menu off to the side. “Is that we haven’t actually ordered. We can leave, if you want.”

For a moment, you just stare at him. “Go?” you ask, thoroughly bewildered. “Where would we go, though? And why?”

The corner of Jungkook’s mouth lifts. “Correct me if I’m wrong,” he says quietly, “but you don’t seem all that comfortable here.”

This is surprising. “I actually dine in places like this a lot.”

“Exactly,” Jungkook nods. “Which is why, I think we should get pizza.”

“Pizza,” you repeat, stunned.

He nods. “What, you’ve never had it? Ah, Y/N,” he groans, pushing his hands through his hair. “It’s so good. Like, there’s cheese – any kind! And toppings – all you can eat! Plus the crust is bread, and –”

Interrupting him, you smack Jungkook on the arm. “I know what pizza is, you ass,” you quip, as he grins.

“Oh, good.” Pushing his chair backwards, Jungkook makes a big show of standing. “Then, let’s go. I’ll tell the host on the way out. I really hate places like this. I only made the reservation because your assistant suggested it.”

Automatically, you stand as well. “But,” you hesitate, gaze darting to the other tables, still eating. You know that technically, Jungkook is correct. Technically, you are doing nothing wrong if you left. You haven’t ordered yet, barely glanced at the menu.

If you’re unhappy here, you should go.

This thought is oddly liberating, and you find yourself wondering why you continually force yourself to stay in miserable situations. When you look up from the table, you see Jungkook’s hand outstretched before you. “Alright,” you announce, slipping your fingers into his. “Let’s go.”

“Excellent! Oh,” Jungkook grimaces, glancing over his shoulder. “Shit, I forgot I ordered the wine. Sir,” he waves an arm, overly obnoxious. “GOOD SIR!”

Covering your mouth, you attempt to control your laughter. “Jungkook,” you hiss, giggling, but this only makes him wave harder.

“SIR – I ah, thank you,” he smiles, when the waiter walks over. “Could we take this bottle of wine to go?”

The waiter blinks, looking between the two of you. “Could you have this wine – to go?”

Nodding, Jungkook settles his lips in a frown. “My date is feeling poorly and we must leave – but I did want to drink the bottle later.”

Somehow, he manages to keep a straight face while talking. Jungkook is careful not to look at you – since you are decidedly not as composed as he is – and eventually, the waiter just nods. “Alright,” he agrees. “We’ll wrap that up for you right away, sir.”

Jungkook nods, pulling you closer. He taps his foot while the wine is wrapped and you continue to stifle your laugh with your hand. Turning the noise into a cough when the bag is returned, you wince apologetically at the waiter.

“Thank you,” Jungkook nods, patting you on the back. “As you can see, she’s deathly ill. Of a cough, it appears. My card is on file at the front,” he informs the man, nodding. “Have a delightful evening!”

Yanking you along, Jungkook wraps your hand in his to tug you quick out the door. The second you’re outside, cool air whipping your face, you whirl around to face him. “What was that?” you gasp, hair blown all around. You push it aside, wanting to see him; wanting to see his shy smile, the way Jungkook shuffles from foot to foot.

“You seemed unhappy,” he explains, then shrugs. “Life is too short.”

This response makes you arch a brow. It is so close to what you thought in there, it’s uncanny. When you leave, though, you find yourself wishing you’d brought a warmer coat. You dressed to exit a taxi and enter a restaurant, not saunter through the late night of the city.

Noticing your shiver, Jungkook moves even closer. He wraps an arm around your shoulder, watching for rejection as he does. It’s as though he waits for you to push him away – but you do not. Instead, your breath catches at the touch of his warmth. Your gaze flicks to his, wondering what Jungkook is thinking and find him already looking at you.

“You mentioned pizza?” you venture, and he nods.

“Around the corner.” Jungkook keeps his arm tight while walking. Pulling you closer, he manages to keep you warm. “I used to go to this place back in college. They have amazing pizza, plus it’s super low-key. It, uh, there’s a bowling alley in the back.”

At this, you smile. “Bowling?”

Jungkook nods, serious. “Yet another thing I’m really, really good at.”

“You want to bowl,” you repeat. “Despite the fact that you are wearing a suit, and I’m in a dress.”

Jungkook shrugs. “Admittedly, you might be at a disadvantage.”

“You think?”

He laughs, eyes crinkling at the corners. “Alright, fine. I’ll give you a handicap. What’ll it be? Do you want me to bowl left-handed? With an arm tied behind my back?”

“Granny-style,” you deadpan, forcing Jungkook to stop walking.

Having continued your way down the sidewalk, you stop to glance over your shoulder. “Jungkook?” you call, laughing at his expression.

“Come on,” he groans, quickly catching up to your stride. “Challenge me. Make me be impressive. Tie me up, I don’t mind. Just don’t,” he begs, pulling a face, “take away my pride.”

A hiccup escapes you, pushing open the door; the unfortunate consequence of laughing too hard. “I think I’ve found your weakness,” you grin, exhaling with happiness at the warm sight of the room.

“Well.” Jungkook allows the door to fall shut behind you. “I guess you’ll never know until we play, hm?”

Only Jungkook, would walk out of a restaurant he didn’t like.

Only Jungkook, would ask for two plastic cups, order a pepperoni and spinach pizza – complain the entire time about how exceedingly poor your taste in toppings are – and then proceed to kick your ass not once, not twice, but three times in one night. He pours wine whenever anyone scores a point and you both become slightly tipsy in the process.

Jungkook walks you home, that night. Halfway there, he slips his hand into yours. It is alarming, just how comfortable it feels. It makes you disappear quickly into the lobby of your building, uncertain why just the touch of his skin is intoxicating. Flipping on the lights of your bedroom, your body feels strange – as though you’ve drunk seven sodas, with no satisfactory explanation as to why you’re feeling this sugar high.

It was the best first date you have ever been on. Possibly the best date you have ever been on. A fact which is scary, considering this wasn’t technically a date.

Not really.

Jungkook texts you the next day, and then the following. He sends you little things, ideas which make him think of you. On Tuesday, you receive a link to homemade spinach pizza – along with another lament, about your poor taste in toppings. On Wednesday, he sends a wine tasting bar and asks if you want to try it sometime. On Friday, he asks you what you want to do for your second date.

You have to admit, his openness throws you. The guys you used to date didn’t normally ask where you wanted to go; a fact which strikes you as sad. It takes some time to respond but when you do, Jungkook responds to your idea so fast, you laugh out loud.

Y/N: Can we go to a baseball game? [11:10 AM]

Jungkook: really?? [11:12 AM]

Y/N: Yes? Is that bad? [11:15 AM]

Jungkook: No, no. It’s just – can I marry you now? [11:16 AM]

Y/N: Oh, shut up [11:17 AM]

Jungkook: Okay, but yes. Done. Just bought tickets. [11:25 AM]

Y/N: It’s the playoffs, isn’t it? : / I don’t want you to spend a lot of money on me. [11:27 AM]

Jungkook: Oh, you’re right. Dammit, Y/N! I hate it when really hot girls force me to watch my idols play baseball with them in the playoffs. You’re the worst. [11:29 AM]

Y/N: hahaha okay, point taken. I’m excited [11:31 AM]

Jungkook: Same :) [11:33 AM]

The following afternoon, Jungkook practically beams with excitement when you meet him in your lobby.

“I’ve never been in the bleachers,” he confesses, while you walk toward the trains. “I’ve only ever sat in a box seat, owned by my father’s company. Never on my own,” he grins, his hand wrapping around yours.

You don’t object to the hand-holding. It feels nice, as does his excitement, which makes you excited by default. This is only your second date, your second time in public and all you can think about is the terrible start to the last one. You want to avoid that at all costs, which is why you suggested a baseball game in the first place. You want Jungkook to feel comfortable today, you want him to have fun.

Walking into the stadium, Jungkook’s hand tightens in yours. You like it, how easy being with him is. You like the way he keeps glancing sideways, continually checking to see if you’re also having fun. When you catch him doing this for the third time, you laugh and shove at his shoulder. “Stop that,” you grin and Jungkook grins.

“I can’t help it!” he protests. As you walk past the shop, he points. “Y/N,” he gasps, grabbing twin jerseys from a rack. “I’m buying two, and you’re putting one on. No negotiations.”

With a frown, you glance at your standard, black-on-black combination. It was oddly warm out today, which resulted in you not needing a coat. “What’s wrong with my jeans and sweatshirt?” you ask.

Jungkook smiles. “Absolutely nothing. Put this on, though,” he demands, thrusting out one of the jerseys. “I’m going to pay.”

Grumbling under your breath, you obey. At first, you feel silly, tugging the fabric over your head in a bathroom stall. It makes you feel dumb but when you step outside and see yourself in the mirror, it makes your eyes widen. The jersey is… cute. Turning around, you examine the back. You feel like some girl in a movie montage; a bad one, where the main girl and guy are about to fall deeply in love.

The look is just so couple-y. Which, oddly enough, you find nice because none of your prior boyfriends wanted to do that stuff with you. Smile overtaking your face, you stroll out of the bathroom. Jungkook stands just outside, leaning one shoulder to the wall and chewing on his lower lip – when you exit, he looks up.

Freezing in place, Jungkook stares. “Is it weird,” he ventures, trying hard not to smile, “if I say you look hotter than you did on our first date?”

Blushing at this, you punch him hard in the arm. “You ass. That dress cost a fortune!”

With a shrug, Jungkook removes the baseball cap from his head. He sticks this onto your head, adjusting the brim. “And that is priceless,” he murmurs, the words soft. “Now, this outfit is worth more.”

His face is so close to yours. So close, you can count each individual eyelash. Jungkook’s gaze scans yours, smile light when he pulls reluctantly away.

“Thanks,” you manage to gasp, more than a little thrown.

He takes your hand in his. “Welcome.”

The seats Jungkook bought for you are awful. Absolutely horrible – they’re so high up, you can barely see the players and a pole exists, partially blocking your view. Jungkook is mildly horrified, until you start to laugh. “I don’t even watch baseball,” you say cheerfully, picking over legs to get to your seats. “I wouldn’t even understand what I’m seeing.”

Jungkook stares for a second, disbelief written over his features. “Then why,” he demands, following you into the row, “did you even ask me to go to a baseball game?”

With a shrug, you reach seats 14 and 15. ‘I don’t know,” you admit, turning sideways to face him. Jungkook watches you sit, awkwardly lowering himself into the tiny chair. “I’ve never been to a baseball game before, and I’ve always wanted to go. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.”

Jungkook nods, looking out at the field. “I see. Alright,” he laughs, looking back. “See that guy? He’s the pitcher. He –”

The next thirty minutes are spent with Jungkook describing the game. He painstakingly details every rule and, despite remembering none of it, you’re thoroughly entertained throughout. Jungkook is funny. His humor is dry, expression bright and he often gestures so enthusiastically that he nearly knocks over your drink and you tear up with your laughter. It becomes difficult for you to look away – and this is when you realize.

This feels solid. He feels solid. Whatever this is between you – you have the oddest sensation, it just might be real. As the lights in the stadium brighten, as the sun sinks towards the horizon, Jungkook begins to tell you more about himself. He talks, speaking mostly to entertain – but within his stories are kernels, nuggets of information to grab onto. His father worked when he was younger, he traveled throughout much of his childhood, resulting in Jungkook barely knowing his father’s face growing up.

“I was closest to my mom. Still am,” Jungkook admits. His hand continues holding your own, thumb lightly stroking your palm. “Especially once Dad died. A plane crash,” he answers the question you didn’t dare ask. “On a business trip and this hat,” he explains, looking at the brim you currently wear, “is one of the only things he left me before dying. That’s why I said it’s priceless.”

His gaze moves to your face, then the hat and you squeeze his hand tighter.

“My parents started out as an arranged marriage,” you respond, looking out at the field. All around, people are drinking, celebrating the player who just reached second base – but your only thoughts are of Jungkook. “That’s why I agreed to one in the first place, I think. It worked out so well for them. I saw each of them choose the other one, over and over – and that’s what I want. Choice,” you flush, embarrassed to say it out loud. “I want someone to choose me. I want to choose someone. If they happen to have my parents’ approval,” you laugh, ducking your head against your chest. “Less reasons to argue at Christmas, huh?”

Jungkook’s answering smile is wry. “Yeah. My Mom and Dad were married on their own, but it was traditional on my Dad’s side to have an arranged. It made things tense,” he confesses. “Not with us, but with the rest of them. I used to wonder… Ah,” he breaks off, cheeks reddening. “I shouldn’t say that.”

“Say what?” you ask, curious.

He turns sideways to face you. “I used to wonder why anyone would want that. To me, an arranged marriage meant force. The opposite of choice and choice,” he sighs, “is the one thing I’ve continuously fought for. It is funny,” he admits, lip quirking, “to hear you say that to you, an arranged marriage is freedom – because to me, it has always been the opposite.”

Your body tenses at his honestly. Perhaps it was arrogant of you, but from the way Jungkook entered your life – you assumed that he wanted this. You assumed that he wanted this more than you did. It is embarrassing, to have assumed Jungkook was already decided. This is just as much a decision for him, as it is for you.

Jungkook swallows. “This,” he hesitates, gazing at your hands. The tip of his thumb traces over your skin. “It doesn’t feel forced. I don’t feel trapped. In fact,” he looks up, gaze dark. “This is the freest I’ve felt in a while. I don’t know why.”

You just stare. You can’t think of words, not now that Jungkook has confessed his feelings for you. There exists this ember, this flicker of hope deep inside. Words might collapse your tentative flame, and you desperately need the warmth to be real. You like him this way, his hand holding yours and you don’t want to break the moment by speaking.

“Anyways.” Jungkook looks down at his shoes, swallowing hard. “Want a beer?”

You nod, settling back in your seat. “A beer would be nice,” you admit, grateful for the distraction.

Jungkook leaves and when he returns, he carries two of the most gigantic cups you’ve ever seen. “There was a sale,” he informs, struggling to keep a straight face, placing one in your hands.

You shiver, since the drink is cold – and Jungkook barely hesitates before placing his arm around you. This time you don’t pause, leaning into his side. This time, you press your entire body to his and this time, it is not just a spark that lights you. It is an inferno engulfing your body, swallowing you whole and wherever his hands brush your skin – you’re aflame.

Drinking your beer, the game continues and your inhibitions start to loosen. By the top of the sixth inning, you actually start to understand what’s going on. When you yell out a foul before anyone else does, Jungkook cracks up and starts clapping. “That’s my girl!” he yells, slightly tipsy himself. “I taught her that!”

No one is really paying attention, but he wraps his arms tighter around you. Pressing you close to his chest, he explains, “You need to get warm.”

“I’m not cold,” you point out, still grinning.

“Oh.” Jungkook pauses, then says, “Then please, help me get warm.”

With a laugh, you turn to place your chin on his chest – Jungkook’s expression softens, just looking at you. Slowly, he pushes the brim of his hat back. Your heart races, meeting his gaze. The stadium spins, and you’re not entirely sure if it’s from him or the beer. When he lowers his face, eyelashes brushing your skin and –

Someone dumps their drink down your back.

“AH!” you gasp out, jumping away. Whirling, you lock gazes with a laughing, red-faced man.

“Fuck off,” he snorts, turning to face his friends.

Jungkook tenses, seeing the interaction occur. Gaze hardening, his jaw tight as he stares. “Hey,” he interrupts, voice low. “What in the hell did you just say to her?”

“Jungkook,” you mutter, tugging his hand. “Just let it go.”

The asshole ignores you both, continuing to talk and when you fold Jungkook’s hand in yours – he glances sideways. Whatever he sees in your expression, makes him exhale. “Alright,” Jungkook mutters, letting it go. “Fine.” His gaze turns concerned, at the sight of your beer-soaked shirt. “Maybe we should go though, you look froz –”

“Look, that guy is whipped by his bitch. Must be some cunt.”

Your lips tighten, anger flaring to the surface. “Jungk –” you start, but it’s too late.

“Oh, fuck no,” Jungkook fumes, turning around.

There is barely time for you to react. One second, Jungkook is holding your hand and the next, he’s snapping the douchbag’s head back. He throws a clean, well-delivered punch – straight to the bridge of his nose and the guy yelps, falling backwards. His friends grab him on the way down, yelling at you to get out, before the dude comes to.

Jungkook seems surprised, but agrees. “Let’s go, babe! Let’s blow this popsicle stand!” he yelps, grabbing your hand in his.

He takes off, practically running down the steps of the stadium. You’re right behind him, one hand held tight in his, the other one holding onto his hat. Your hair flies out behind you, barely able to breathe from your laughter. Normally, you wouldn’t condone this sort of violence. Especially not violence done, ‘in the lady’s honor,’ but this, though – you can’t stop grinning. That guy was just such an ass and he looked so surprised when Jungkook clocked him back there.

Bursting free from the stadium, you collapse against the red, brick wall of the building. Jungkook bends over, struggling to catch his breath. “Sorry,” he gasps, squinting upwards. The night is quieter out here, as he pushes himself upwards to stand. “I shouldn’t have done that. God, it’s been so long since I fought anyone. I just –”

He stops, when you lift yourself on tip-toe to press your lips to his cheek.

The kiss is just that, nothing more. Your lips, soft on his skin before you withdraw to stare up at him. Jungkook’s cheek is smooth, warm and smelling of the coconut sunscreen you gave him earlier. His gaze is dark, though, hardening the longer he stares.

You do want to kiss him. You wish to entangle your hands in his hair, shove him to the wall and kiss him, but – you realize you’re drunk. You two are drunk, in public and are currently on the run from the law.

“Take me home?” you say instead, and Jungkook freezes.

He seems to realize everything you just did, based on his expression. “Yes,” he agrees, blinking and nodding. “Absolutely,” he sighs, grabbing your hand in his.

The next morning, you wake up regretful for several confusing, conflicting reasons. You regret pushing Jungkook away. You regret drinking as much as you did. You regret stopping the kiss – though, this thought is interrupted by your phone buzzing on your nightstand.

Jungkook. It appears there was nothing to regret, at all.

The two of you text non-stop that week. You find out the others’ likes, dislikes, fears, desires. As a matter of fact, you two are so busy talking, learning, seeing that you nearly forget everything you might not want to see. You forget about things you might not like, or know, or understand and it’s your friend Anna, who brings this sobering fact to light.

Anna: How goes the whole arranged marriage thing? [6:47 PM]

Anna: Find The One? [6:48 PM]

Rolling your eyes, you grab for your phone. Your work day is almost at an end, you were just wrapping up a final email.

Y/N: It’s great, if you must know. I’ve been seeing this guy… [6:51 PM]

Anna: Oh?? Who? TELL ME [6:52 PM]

Y/N: Omg, you’re so needy lol [6:53 PM]

Y/N: Jeon Jungkook. Do you know him? [6:54 PM]

Anna: hm no [6:54 PM]

Anna: WAIT [6:55 PM]

Anna: IS HE??? [6:55 PM]

Sitting up straight, you arch a brow at your phone. Anna types, backspaces, then types again.

Y/N: Is he what??? [6:57 PM]

Anna: www.google/news/washingtonpost/youngmogu… [6:59 PM]

Hesitantly, you click on the link. You don’t know what you’re about to see, which makes you cautious. Your eyes widen, reading the headline.

YOUNG MOGUL, JEON JUNGKOOK, SPLITS FROM FAMOUS INSTAGRAM GIRLFRIEND, LILY MAYA

Scanning the body of the article, your heart plummets. The man is Jungkook, all right. You see his perfect, handsome profile plastered across several, large photos. You see his strong, stupid hands all over a girl’s waist. There are his perfect lips, sucking the face of a very pretty model. No, more than pretty, she’s gorgeous – it makes you slightly sick to your stomach, staring at her beautiful face.

Of course, Jungkook has dated others before you. Of course, he has had prior relationships – he mentioned as much, the very first day you met. Nothing he has done since indicates he still has feelings for anyone. Still, the title of the article does give you pause – so does the date, which was printed less than a year ago.

Jungkook said it himself, that is is unusual he has agreed to an arranged marriage. It makes you wonder if there exists more than what he’s said. If maybe you’re his rebound, a final attempt to get over Lily. Squeezing your eyes shut, you try to block out the image. Now that it exists though, you can’t seem to stop.

It makes you suddenly shaky, horribly rotten. Lily would never feel like this about someone else and, thinking this, you groan. Lowering your face to your hands, you slowly shake your head. Already, you are comparing yourself to her. Already, you are summarizing the differences and finding yourself wanting. Lily is gorgeous, you are just pretty. Lily is thin; you’ve been known to eat an entire family-sized bag of Sun Chips in one sitting. Lily is perfect, poised, put together – and everything that you show to the public is carefully cultivated.

After several minutes of wallowing, you take a deep breath. Forcing yourself to get a grip, you rather determinedly respond to the currently unanswered text in your phone.

Y/N: Your turn. Where and when, is our next date? [7:34 PM]

Jungkook texts back within minutes.

Jungkook: Actually, I do have an idea in mind. [7:35 PM]

Jungkook: Y/N [4:27 AM]

Jungkook: Y/N, wake up [4:29 AM]

Jungkook: Are you awake? [4:31 AM]

Jungkook: GET UP, THIS IS DATE NUMBER THREE [4:32 AM]

You wake on Saturday morning not to your alarm – which is set for nine – but by the incessant buzzing of your cell phone. Text after text, followed by a sharp ringing which nearly makes you throw your phone to the wall.

“Hullo,” you groan, fumbling to get the device to your ear. “Who’s this.”

“Rise and shine, sleepyhead!”

“I,” you pause, cracking open one eye long enough to squint at your clock. “What the fuck, Jeon. It’s 4:30 AM.”

“Yes,” he hums, as though he is currently talking to a very small child. “I know it’s early, silly. But it’s my turn to pick the date, and this is what I want to do.”

“Die?”

“Very funny. No, I’m not dying until February 30th, 2098.”

“…I hate you.”

“Nope, you don’t. Now, get that cute butt of yours downstairs.”

Hanging up, you sincerely consider going back to sleep – but can’t help but wonder what Jungkook wants. After several moments of debate, you groan, throwing back your covers and rolling out of bed. “Fuck me,” you groan, shuffling into the bathroom. “I hate everything.”

You barely bother getting ready; it’s only the irritating memory of Lily Maya which convinces you to put in any sort of effort. A quick wash of your face, a small brush of makeup before you twist your hair high in a knot on your head. You tug on a crewneck and jeans, throw on a pea coat to jog out the door. It slams shut behind you and you fervently hope it woke people up.

You’re grumpy the entire way to the lobby. Grumpy, pushing open the door to the parking lot – but when you see Jungkook, you find it suddenly hard to stay mad. He’s wearing a ski cap, black coat and looks absolutely amazing. It’s unfair, that guys do so little and look so good. His face breaks out in a smile when he sees you – which forces your stomach to flip somersaults.

“Hey,” he grins, when you come to a stop right before him.

You glare back. “This had better be good, Jeon.”

“O-oh,” he chuckles, grasping your hand. “My last name – that’s how I knowyou’re mad. Come on,” he tugs, pulling you close behind. “We don’t want to miss it.”

“Miss what,” you grumble, trailing in his footsteps.

Jungkook just shakes his head, miming a zipping action of his lips.

His car is – black. You’re honestly not sure of the make or model; you’re far too tired to care. The seats are soft, though and you turn dutifully to face him, curling up on the passenger’s side. “Jungkook?” you mumble, until he looks your way.

“Yes, pumpkin?”

You make a face. “Please, no.”

“Peanut?” he grins.

“Gag me.”

“Maybe another time. Angel?”

“No way.”

“Princess?”

You remain quiet, picking at your nails and Jungkook grins triumphantly. “I knew it,” he smirks, leaning his head to the seat. “I knew you would like being spoiled. You always did, even as a kid.”

“Did not,” you gasp, outraged. “You little brat, take that back!”

Jungkook merely chuckles, merging onto the highway. “Maybe I was a brat, but so were you. The perfect princess,” he teases, “never giving me the time of day.”

“You’ve been holding this in for a while, haven’t you?”

He grins. “Maybe I have. So, what?”

“I was fourteen,” you groan, drawing both your legs onto the seat of his car. “You were eleven. Maybe the difference isn’t much now, but in child years – I would’ve been a predator.”

Jungkook snorts. “A sexy predator.”

“Oh my fucking god, Jeon!”

“Kidding, kidding,” Jungkook laughs, wincing when you punch him. “Careful princess, I bruise.”

You roll your eyes, glancing out the window. You’re finally coherent enough to see where you’re going. Outside of the car, the city sprawls by. You’re already past the skyline, heading straight into the country. “Where are we going?” you ask, sitting up straighter.

Jungkook doesn’t respond, just grips the wheel tighter, “It’s a secret.” When you glare, he gestures loosely towards the back of the car. “There’s coffee,” he says and when you make a pathetic, little noise, he starts to laugh.

“Why didn’t you say so,” you gasp, reaching happily over the console.

Jungkook stares, shaking his head in disbelief. “This entire time,” he groans, almost to himself. “I could have fixed your deplorable anger with coffee. Noted.”

You nod sleepily, stirring creamer and sugar into the cup. “That’s all it takes, really.”

Jungkook chuckles, lapsing into silence while he continues to drive. His music plays in the background, soft and soothing – almost enough to make you fall back asleep. In fact, you’re just starting to drift off when his hand touches your leg.

“Y/N,” he whispers, even though you’re the only two in the car. “Wake up.”

When you open your eyes, you might be the only two people in the world. He’s parked on top of a hill, one you don’t know the name of. There’s forest and hills spread in either direction, only a few sleepy town lights below. On the edge of the horizon, the sky is just turning light, a dull shade of grey instead of black, with tendrils of blue shot through the edge.

You look over, surprised to find him looking back. “The sunrise?” you ask. “You brought me to look at the sunrise?”

Uncertainty enters Jungkook’s gaze. “Yes.”

You look past, out at the horizon. “I’ve never watched the sunrise before.”

“Then let me show you,” Jungkook says, and opens his door.

You follow, unbuckling your seatbelt and taking your coffee with. The grass is crunchy, wet with frost and brushing the tips of your boots. Jungkook hops onto the hood, lying quickly down on his back. He props himself up on the windshield and gestures you to join. “Come on, princess.”

Grimacing, you follow. Clamoring onto the hood with decidedly less grace than he did, you watch your breath fog in the morning air. By now, it’s not a question of if you’ll touch him, but when. Jungkook’s arm wraps tightly around your waist, this time – he pulls you snug against his side.

“Sorry it’s so cold,” he breathes, and you shake your head.

“Not so much, anymore.”

He smiles, saying nothing. Staring at the horizon, you watch the sky subtly streak gold. It is strange, watching time pass. Looking at the sky, watching the sun slip above the horizon – you stare first at this, then at him. Jungkook’s profile is light, burnt against the darkness of the sky and it’s honestly hard to look away now that you’re here.

“The funny thing about evolution,” you clear your throat, and Jungkook looks over.

“Were we talking about evolution?”

You shake your head – then nod. “Yes and no,” you hesitate.

He chuckles, looks up. “Go on.”

“The funny thing is,” you exhale, staring at the peach-lined sky. “So many people say, ‘you can’t see it.’”

Jungkook doesn’t move from his place on the hood. “The concept can be difficult to grasp, yes.”

“You can’t see it, so it’s not real,” you whisper, eyes darting to his. “A silly thought, and based on a wrong assumption.”

“That you can’t see evolution?”

You nod, stomach lifting. “Exactly. Sometimes,” you raise a hand, tracing the shape of the sun. “Time itself is visible. The Galapagos are always linked to Darwinism, always talked of in the same breath as evolution – but so few people know why.”

Jungkook smiles, still not looking your way. “Why, then?” he asks, words soft on his lips.

“The islands were isolated,” you explain. “They were so removed from society, it ensured their evolution was seen. There was a year the weather lent itself to a certain kind of seed. Birds with beaks able to crack that type of seed survived. The next year, a different kind of seed flourished. A bird with a different evolutionary advantage emerged – and a different kind of bird survived. This went on, but in such short increments of time you physically saw the birds change, saw them adapt to their environment.

Jungkook leans back further, splaying himself on the hood. “This sunrise is the birds,” he finishes, nearly inaudible. “Mostly, you look at the sun and see it fixed. The light static, the motion immobile. It changes, sure – but you never notice. Sunrise,” he breathes, watching the curve of the light. “The change is visible.”

“Exactly.”

You lie down beside him, a mere heartbeat away.

“Y/N?”

Looking sideways, your heart contains a queer sort of ache. “Yes?”

He stares at you, stretching out a finger. Jungkook brushes your jaw, trails over nothing and something in his expression changes – almost wistful, in the golden hour. “Nothing,” he whispers, then looks up at the sky.

You shiver, and follow suit.

The next week is odd.

Not for the usual reasons – a change in weather, in workload or location. No, it’s a change in yourself. Your very world has shifted. Inch by inch, text by text, you find your thoughts no longer occurring in the singular. It is no longer do I want to do this, but do we. That realization is terrifying.

It might be silly to text Jungkook less because of this, but you do. It is only that you’ve always valued your independence. Well, that isn’t entirely true. You valued your independence, since college. Largely this was due to one relationship, a singular man who stripped you bare and removed everything you thought you were.

Your goals disappeared, to become goals which fit his. You tried to fit in with his ambition, his friends, his work, his morals and, though you did not realize it at the time, it was toxic. It wasn’t even clear to you what was happening, not until after the break-up left you devastated. Hindsight is 20/20, after all.

Even after all that, you continued to seek him out. For the eight months following you two were fuck buddies, for the eight months following you two slept together, as he tried his best to ‘find himself.’ You were essentially still boyfriend and girlfriend – just now, your ex was free to sleep around. There was no commitment on his end, no dedication, no compromise or promise. He took all he wanted from you, and you received nothing in return.

It took longer than you care to admit, to catch on. To see him for what he truly was, to recognize the toxicity he brought. Perhaps it’s why you’ve been single ever since. Perhaps this is why you tend to see sex as a necessity. A physical need, one to pursue and discard like other vices. There are only moments, small moments, where you miss the feeling of love.

These moments aren’t often. It has only been since Jungkook, that you’ve begun to feel like you’re missing out on something. Not that you miss that asshole ex of yours – what you miss is something deeper, something more. You didn’t think you’d find this with Jungkook, though – a thought which terrifies you.

For some reason, you thought an arranged marriage would solve everything. You thought that by choosing someone to marry, it would be less painful than falling in love. Of course, you should have known better; you should have seen the love shining clear in your mother’s eyes. The devotion, in your father’s. Having someone in your life by any means is painful, just as much as pleasurable.

Swallowing with difficulty, you stare down at your desk. You stare at your hands, splayed on the wood and attempt to forget the feel of his hand in yours. It’s become common these past three dates, to hold hands with him. Holding hands used to seem childish, but now it is something to anchor you. Just his touch, his hands wrapped around yours, makes you feel more solid.

Maybe this is what you’ve been missing all this time – a connection. Sex fulfills physical need, and there’s no shortage of guys looking to fuck in this world. Friends are social interaction. It’s the intersection, though. The moment of someone understanding the whole you, inside and out. A connection which is singularly unique to love.

Exhaling deeply, you spread your fingers further. You didn’t think it would be like this. An arranged marriage was supposed to be something to control. A way of looking at love, at life in the same way you look at work. With logic, and the mutual benefit of both parties in mind. Marriage is a joining of assets, decision-making and liability. On paper, it is. Perhaps not in life.

Jungkook does not exist on paper.

His is alive, brilliant and wonderfully complex. You never know what he’ll do next, never know what he’ll say and you like that. You find yourself thinking of things to explain, to share and to show him. Not because he is something on paper, but because he is him. Because he is Jungkook. Because you might possibly – tentatively, futuristically – be able to love him.

The thought is wholly unsettling, entirely unprecedented and oddly exciting.

Lifting your phone, you send him a text.

Y/N: I have an idea for our fourth date. [8:13 PM]

Jungkook: Oh? What did you have in mind, princess? [8:20 PM]

Y/N: Ugh. Meet me at Clark and Gregor. 3:30 PM, Saturday. Dress warm :) [8:25 PM]

Five minutes before you told Jungkook to arrive, you’re sitting on the park bench, staring at your breath while it fogs into the air. Last night brought about sudden cold snap, which is something you’d been counting on. Today will be more fun if it’s cold. You have only been waiting a minute before Jungkook skids into view, harried and out of breath.

“Hi,” he gasps, readjusting his hat. “I’m so sorry – my train was late, but I’m here!”

With a laugh, you stand up. “I’m early, you’re not late.”

Chest deflating, Jungkookg catches his breath. “Oh. In that case,” he shrugs, turning to leave – until you grab his arm.

“Come on,” you grin, tugging his coat. “Let’s go.”

“Go where?” Jungkook whines, though he follows you obediently. “You could be leading me off a cliff, for all I know.”

“Yes, because there are so many cliffs sprinkled throughout the city.”

“You never know,” Jungkook grunts, grinning when you move even closer. “Y/N,” he chides, just noticing. “You’re not wearing any gloves.”

His mittened hands wrap around yours, keeping you warm when you look down. “Oh,’” you flush, digging through your pocket with your other hand. “I have them! Just forgot to put them on.”

Jungkook lets go long enough to remedy the mistake – then grabs your hand again and, smiling, you fall into step beside him as you walk. His hip occasionally bumps into yours, body warm in the space you don’t occupy. You let it happen, allow your thoughts to wander where they shouldn’t. It is becoming possible to picture it, to think of marriage. The idea of his hand holding yours, imagining nights just like this one – it is possible to picture the concept of forever. This is terrifying.

But maybe you want that.

Glancing at his face, you almost lose yourself in his features. He’s beautiful, truly he is. The panes of his features, the curve of his cheekbone, the steep drop to his nose. Jungkook once mentioned he thought his nose was too big – this was on your first date, if you recall. You were bowling, his strong hands on your waist while he showed you how to throw the ball with a curve. He mentioned his father also had a large nose, that the trait was inherited from him – and that Jungkook hated it, while growing up.

You wanted to contradict him then, to tell him no – Jungkook’s nose was perfect, just like the rest of him. Each feature of his is thoroughly and uniquely Jungkook. This means he is attractive, yes, but it’s more than just that. Beauty fades, and so will his. This isn’t about how pretty he is, nor about how attracted you are to him.

This is about finding him beautiful, inside and out. Both his flaws and his merits. This is about wanting him even when you’re upset, when you’re sick, when you’re strange and angry and savage. Staring at his profile, the crazy notion enters your brain that maybe you want that with him.

Jungkook glances your way. “Really?” he asks, arching a brow. “What are we doing? Why did I need to dress warm – are you going to lock me out in the cold, because I’m a wimp, I –”

Rolling your eyes, you point ahead. Jungkook’s gaze follows, fixating on the silver length of ice and his eyes widen. “Cool,” he grins. “I’ve ice skated since I was young. I’ll help you, Y/N, when you inevitably fall.”

Groaning out loud, you move to push past. “We’ll see about that, Jeon. Come on.”

It turns out to be a giant blow to your ego, when Jungkook ends up being right. You are horrible at ice skating. You can roller blade and for some reason, you thought the two would interchange. Wrong. The two are similar, but one doesn’t seem to help the other. The ice is slippery, you stop in a different way and the wobbly metal is much thinner than wheels beneath your feet.

Jungkook skates before you now, zig-zagging backwards. “C’mon, Y/N,” he teases, holding your hands. “You can go faster. There’s an elderly gentleman about to pass us. I – oh, wait. He just did,” Jungkook beams, waving an arm. “Hello, sir! Have a good evening!”

You swat him and stumble, nearly taking him down with you. Jungkook grunts, grabbing tight to your waist and holding you steady. He starts to laugh like that, chest shaking against yours.

“Jungkook,” you gasp, also laughing.

Since your realization, it has been harder and harder to act like you don’t care. That’s how you usually are in relationships, because typically you’re the invincible one, the inexhaustible one. It is difficult, to pretend that you’re solid. To pretend like you’re steady, strong and tough. What you really want to say – what you’ll never admit to wanting, at least not now – is to tell Jungkook how you really feel. He should know that he makes you feel weaker, makes you feel vulnerable.

It has been a long time, since anyone made you feel that way. With a smile, Jungkook pulls himself back to make scissor motions with his feet. He practically dances over the ice, eyes mischievous and you nearly trip in an attempt to keep up.

“Jungkook,” you laugh, stumbling again. “Stop! Kookie!”

Jungkook looks so offended at this, you start to laugh. “After all this time,” he mutters, pulling you closer. Sometime during the past hour, the sun has sunk low on the horizon. It is colder out now, making your gloves entirely necessary. Jungkook’s scarf flutters against your cheek when he whispers, “You still don’t see me as a man, do you?”

“I,” you hesitate, staring deep into his eyes. “I think of you as a man.”

The only reason you hesitate, is because of the truth. Your feelings for him are much different now – you not only see him as a man, you see him as your man. Jungkook doesn’t know this though, and so his brow puckers.

“Oh?” he asks, unsatisfied. Moving nearer, Jungkook’s lips brush your ear. “Fine. If I’m such a child, beat me to the edge. Ready?” He pulls back, and you stare at him in alarm. “Set,” Jungkook warns.

“Kookie,” you stammer – and it turns out, this is the wrong thing to say.

“Go!” Jungkook yells, letting go. He skates hard, in the opposite direction.

Yelping, your legs skid out from under you, until – both arms fly out to steady your speed. The entire world slows, and suddenly you’re skating. Well, kind of. You’re going so slow, the grandpa has lapped you again – but hey, at least you’re still moving. A laugh escapes your chest, pushing out with one foot. Wobbling violently, you catch yourself and continue – then look up for Jungkook, and find him on the edge of the rink.

Jungkook stands awkwardly, easily identifiable in his long, black peacoat. His arms rest on the railing, his expression inscrutable. From here, he looks tenseand you wonder why until you recognize his compansion. Lily, Lily Maya. You freeze where you are – no pun intended – at the sight of his ex-girlfriend, Instagram model extraordinaire, at the rink.

She looks adorable, in a sky-blue cap and mittens. Never mind the fact that the coat is much too thin for tonight’s weather – she looks wonderful. The tip of her nose is red, her lips are chapped but Jungkook, true to his nature, doesn’t seem to notice. He chats evenly, tugging his cap even lower before facing away.

It’s hard to see his expression from here, which makes your stomach twist with discomfort. As you take a step forward, intending to leave – you remember belatedly, the fact you can’t skate. This is a fleeting thought, since it happens simultaneously with your feet slipping out from under you. You fall, flailing wildly in the moment before your knees hit the ground. The fall is nothing graceful, just the cold smack of skin against ice – you suck in a gasp, sliding several feet to a stop.

Chest heaving, your palms wet from the water, you slowly manage to push yourself up on the side. Rather than move, you sit down on the ice – lower lip trembling, when you realize the blood. The scrape on your knee is shallow, but it already trickles a thin, steady line down your leg. Swearing softly, you bite down on your lip – this is just so like you, so predictably ugly.

Jungkook is probably still talking to Lily, which means you need to reach the edge of the ice by yourself. Placing one hand awkwardly to the ground, you attempt to stand. You only manage halfway, before strong arms wrap themselves around you.

“Y/N,” Jungkook gasps, yanking you upright. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” he pleads. Shaking his head, he turns red in the face. “I shouldn’t have left you alone. I should have –”

“Thank you,” you interrupt, chest suddenly buoyant.

Jungkook shuts up, shocked into silence. Instead, he stares and couples whiz past around you – colorful swirls against the ice. You feel happier where you are though, with Jungkook’s hands on your waist and blood on your jeans.

“Hold on to me,” Jungkook instructs. His words are confusing until he turns, sliding your hands around his midsection to tow you back across the rink.

At the exit Jungkook helps you off, grabbing your elbow until you step down on the ground. “At last,” you sigh, collapsing on the closest bench. “Sweet, non-slippery freedom.”

Jungkook’s lips quirk as he kneels. At first he is smiling – and then he catches sight of your leg. “Y/N,” he groans, both hands sliding to your calf. “You cut through your jeans and are bleeding,” he tuts, sitting back on his heels. “Do you think anyone here has a band-aid?” Jungkook mumbles, squinting out at the park.

It seems like a bad sitcom, when his ex-girlfriend steps out of the bathroom. Seeing her face, your expression drops – as Jungkook’s visibly brightens, waving an arm. “Lily!” he calls out, loud as ever. “Lily! Could you come here for a sec?”

Lily turns at the sound of his voice, freezing when she sees who he’s with. Her entire face pinches, wildly uncomfortable but she finally walks over. When Lily reaches you, she shoves both hands into her pockets and smiles weakly.

“Hey. What’s up?”

“Do you still carry band-aids in your purse?” Jungkook inquires.

This entire time, he has been crouched on the ground but now, he stands. When he does this, you see that he and Lily are closer in height than the two of you are. Her eyes are level with his nose, the perfect height for kissing.

Lily glances at you, then at Jungkook. “I do,” she agrees, opening her bag. “Do you need one?”

“I,” Jungkook pauses, seeming to realize how weird this all is. “Yeah,” he coughs, rubbing the back of his neck. “My girlfriend skinned her knee. My fault, really,” he manages to smile. “I got kind of competitive.”

Lily arches a perfectly-made brow. “You don’t say.” She smiles, some inside joke between the two which makes jealousy claw at the walls of your stomach.

It’s unbearable, to sit here like this. Unbearable, to watch the two of them laugh, to have Lily so close to him – to have her as your hero; the savior of Jungkook’s bumbling, awkward date. You wonder if he is now regretting things. Wonder if he’s unsure why he left Lily in the first place – or worse, why she left him. Now your head is spinning uncomfortably, wondering why they even broke up at all.

Maybe you’re just his rebound. Maybe Jungkook was hurt and he wanted something, anything that was different from her. Rather uncomfortably, you remember why you don’t let yourself date the first place. All those reasons you had for wanting an arranged marriage – and here you sit, dealing with each and every one of them.

Lily hands Jungkook a band-aid, closing her purse when Jungkook nods his appreciation. “Thank you,” he extends, smiling again. “Good luck with the new shoot.”

Lily nods, glancing curiously in your direction. “Thanks. Have fun on your… date,” she allows, as though she has trouble believing the words.

Flushing, you fumble under the weight of her gaze.

“We will,” Jungkook smiles, reaching out for your hand.

You stare at this for a moment; at Jungkook’s red, woolen mitten. You aren’t sure why, but the sight makes your throat tight and lips parched. As your hand slides into his, grasping onto solidarity – the corners of your eyes start to burn against the cold. Lily just shrugs, turning away but it’s the first time anyone has ever made you feel large, when you told yourself you were small. Jungkook did it so easily, he fixed things in one, simple gesture – and when he bends back to the ground, pulling out the band-aid, you lean forward to face him.

“Why did you break up,” you ask, inches away.

Jungkook blinks, surprised by your proximity. His right knee is wet, from kneeling down in the snow but he doesn’t complain. “I – you know we dated,” he asks, more breath than question. Then, he frowns. “Does it matter?”

“It does to me,” you say quietly, tracing over his face.

Jungkook hesitates. “She broke my heart,” he admits, tugging off one mitten. He quietly, slowly undoes the band-aid. “I thought I was in love with her, thought the excitement of being together meant we were in love.”

“Excitement?” you ask.

Softly, Jungkook blows on your cut. You wince at the sting, but then he withdraws to look at you. “She liked drama,” he explains, placing the bandage on over the wound. Soothing the sides, Jungkook makes sure the fit is tight. “She liked the feeling of falling, of pushing people away – all so they could come back to her and tell her they needed her. It was tiring.”

“Oh,” you allow, the word small. “I see.”

Jungkook doesn’t move, even though your knee is already bandaged. “Eventually, I stopped playing her games. I stopped chasing her when she ran, stopped hurting myself for her pleasure. I took her off the pedestal I had her on, and she grew bored. We broke up,” he continues, “when I walked in on her fucking my former best friend. She wanted a reaction.”

“Oh,” you repeat, heart squeezed tight. “I’m sorry.”

He nods, acknowledgment. “The funny part was,” Jungkook exhales, looking down at the snow. “I wasn’t devastated by it. Sure, I was angry; sure, I was sickened and sad and hurt. But at the bottom – I was relieved,” he admits, cracking. “I think I knew we didn’t belong together. You don’t hurt the people you love,” he says quietly. “Not like that.”

“I get it.”

Jungkook looks up. “You do?”

“Well, I don’t get that,” you admit, backtracking and Jungkook cracks a smile. “I’ve never been through that. I understand that kind of relationship, though. Relationships where you’re expected to lower yourself, in order to make the other one feel strong. I,” you swallow. “Love isn’t like that. It can’t be.”

“I hope it’s not,” Jungkook says to you softly.

You’re still touching. His fingers still rest upon your knee, warm against your skin – and somehow, you shiver. The air is cold, the night dark, but none of that matters. It is just Jungkook – his eyes, his smile, that fringe of his hair – it’s Jungkook, who makes you want to move closer. His hand rises from your leg to your waist, hesitating only briefly before his hands cup your face. Jungkook stares at you, a silent question – before he lowers his head to yours.

Your lips part, when you kiss.

His mouth is gentle, as though asking a question. As though waiting for affirmation, before his hand slides into your hair. “Y/N,” Jungkook groans, kissing you harder. You tilt your head up, his tongue dragging across your lower lip to request entrance.

You grant him this, just as greedy in your motions. Meeting the heat of his mouth with your own, your hands find his arms while his body presses between you. When Jungkook stops, forcing himself still – you open your eyes, and exhale. He’s already looking at you, staring and the world is tilting, breaking, breathing. You feel like the scenery has shifted, or been swallowed – because nothing, nothing could ever be the same.

“What I feel,” Jungkook ventures, hoarse. “Is like nothing I’ve ever felt before.”

You stare at him, nodding because you cannot be trusted with words. If you speak, if you even think about speaking, it might break the spell. You might say something stupid. You might ask him to kiss you again, might ask him to stay overnight. You might forget the fifth date entirely, and ask him to marry you right now – which is crazy.

After a long moment of silence, Jungkook stands. “Let me bring you home,” he asks quietly, and you nod in agreement.

Taking your hand, he leads you to the rental booth. Jungkook doesn’t speak still, but no longer is it uncomfortable silence. This is the good kind; his hand in yours, his body next to yours – there’s no need for words, in silence like this.

When you reach your apartment, Jungkook kisses you again. You’re pressed rough to the wall, tongues exploring while his hands slide firm to your waist. Your legs are shaking by the time he pulls back; it terrifies you, the sheer intensity of your feelings. When you open your mouth to explain all this, he looks down at the ground.

“I’ll see you later,” Jungkook responds, as though convincing himself. He steels his back quickly, nodding to himself before turning – as he walks away, you notice his rather stiff walking.

When you understand the meaning of this, your eyes widen – warmth pooling quickly between your thighs at the sight. You aren’t sure why he left. Perhaps it was for the exact same reason you didn’t ask him to stay. Five dates, you promised. Five dates, for you both to decide and somehow, inviting Jungkook in seems like a declaration. You imagine sex wouldn’t just be sex – no, it would be giving yourself entirely. Just the thought makes you clench your thighs tighter. The idea of Jungkook in your bed, lips parted and holding onto your hips while he –

Your motions are hurried, rushing inside. You fidget the entire staircase up, taking several attempts to shove your key into the door. Once you’re inside, throwing your coat onto the chair, you collapse down on your bed. Staring up at the ceiling, tight with frustration,you arch your hips quickly into the palm of your hand. It doesn’t take long to get yourself off; the hard and fast motion of your hand leaves you aching for more. You want to feel him between your thighs; want him pressed against your chest; want to know his hands, his lips, his body on yours.

Afterwards, you feel unsatisfied. Needy, to the point where you almost text, almost call – but manage to stop yourself in time.

Five dates, you promised.

The next week passes slowly. Partly due to work and partly because of Jungkook. He doesn’t text much, which makes you worry. You replay the events of Saturday over and over again in your mind. Dissecting every word, every look, all the possible implications – but his sudden dry spell makes no sense, not in that context.

Y/N: On the train this morning, someone licked my neck. MY NECK, JUNGKOOK. It was horrifying – what’s stronger than soap, to wash myself with? [9:06 AM]

Jungkook: bleach [9:16 AM]

Jungkook: Don’t wash yourself with bleach. [9:18 AM]

Y/N: Lol noted. How was your morning? Didn’t you have a big presentation? [10:02 AM]

Jungkook: Sorry, was in a meeting. Yep, it went well! [11:31 AM]

Y/N: That’s good : ) [11:45 am]

Y/N: What are you thinking you want to do this weekend? [11:47 AM]

Y/N: Hey, good morning! [10:02 AM]

Jungkook: Morning : ) [10:31 AM]

Y/N: So, about that fifth date. [10:42 AM]

Jungkook: How is your leg healing? Did it bleed more, after Saturday? [11:03 AM]

Y/N: No, it stopped later that night. Everything is good! [11:22 AM]

Y/N: It’s your turn to pick the place though Jeon, don’t make me choose for you lol [11:23 AM]

Jungkook: Ha. Fine, what about the Christmas tree lighting on Saturday? [11:45 AM]

Y/N: You’re on. [12:00 PM]

Jungkook: It’s a date. [12:14 PM]

Jungkook: Hey, Y/N. I am so, so sorry – I have to cancel Saturday. The guy I sold my company to needs to discuss something, I’m flying out to Seattle tomorrow night and staying the weekend. Rain check? [6:12 PM]

Y/N: I – uh. Okay. For when? [6:17 PM]

Jungkook: For when I get back? [6:21 PM]

Y/N: Which is…? [6:25 PM]

Jungkook: Next Thursday. What about next weekend, Friday night? We can go see the already lit Christmas tree. [6:32 PM]

Y/N: Haha okay, sure [6:41 PM]

Y/N: How’s the trip going? [2:08 PM]

Y/N: Jungkook? [9:46 AM]

Jungkook: Sorry! Awful service here. Listen, I need to go to a work dinner Saturday night now. This new client, Taehyung, wants help developing their product. Can we reschedule? [11:11 AM]

Y/N: Seriously? [12:02 PM]

Y/N: Fine. Reschedule for when? [12:04 PM]

Jungkook: Saturday [12:10 PM]

Y/N: Okay [12:12 it

Y/N: Hey, what time are we meeting tonight? [3:56 PM]

Jungkook: Oh, fuck. The guy from last night really wants to meet again to discuss specs. I’m sorry, Y/N – can we reschedule once more?? [4:12 PM]

Y/N: Fine. [4:13 PM]

Staring down at your phone, you’re silently fuming. It sits, silent and useless while you glance at your clock. It’s past 4:00 PM. Past 4:00 PM, and you’re uncertain if Jungkook would have remembered to cancel, had you not thought to ask. You reread the words, cold and blank as a small shred of doubt enters your stomach.

After that fourth date, you were certain. You were so certain of Jungkook, so excited at the prospect of being with him. You thought Jungkook felt the same, from the way that he kissed you – those things that he said – you truly thought that meant something.

He wouldn’t reschedule though, if he liked you. He wouldn’t avoid you, wouldn’t push back your dates. Maybe the kiss left something to be desired. That’s the only logical conclusion, because the kiss was the most important moment of the fourth date. The thought is devastating, but there it is. You keep replaying the moment, replaying the night. You watch it over and over in your mind and wonder if you should have done more. Perhaps you should have explained how you were feeling, but you were trying to give him his space. Jungkook wanted five dates to decide, so five dates you gave.

It’s around 10:00 PM that you stand in your kitchen, downing a second glass of wine and continuing to stare at the phone in your hand.

Jungkook never texted back and as you stare at the screen – your entire body churns with emotion. He said five. Five dates and like hell, is Jungkook going to give you four. Your thoughts are splintered with anger as jerkily, you tip the rest of your drink back.

This emotion only grows, building into a storm as you stand, slamming your glass to the counter. Turning around, you shove random items into a bag – barely considering what you’re doing, before you leave your apartment. It’s late out, the night sky is dark overhead as the snow whirls past while you rush to the train.

Lowering yourself down in a seat, you have a sudden moment of realization. You are currently upset, angry and slightly drunk on wine. Perhaps this isn’t the best decision, and you consider just calling. But then you remember the story Jungkook retold, the one about his ex who fucked his best friend.

Cold, hard fear enters the pit of your stomach. You should have seen this earlier, should have read between the lines. Jungkook has met someone. He’s dating someone else, or rekindled things with Lily and he doesn’t know how to explain. He probably wants to let you down easy, and so is trying to push you away.

Though tears prick the backs of your eyes, you grit your teeth because you can’t wipe them away. Your hands are shoved deep in your pockets, having forgotten to grab gloves before exiting your apartment. Jungkook would have scolded you for this, but you don’t care what Jungkook thinks anymore

Jungkook’s apartment building is tall, built of glass and steel. It’s much different from your brick condo, and you stand outside for a full minute before venturing through the doors.

“I’m here to see Jeon Jungkook,” you announce, stepping up to the desk.

The man nods, looking down at his computer. “Apartment number?”

You pause, hastily scrolling through your phone for the resume. The one sent to you by your parents – there, at the top, reads number 3708. You repeat this back to the doorman, who nods and buzzes you up. “Go on,” he instructs.

The elevator ride to the top is long. Long, nerve-wracking and – slightly sobering, while your wine buzz wears off. You stare at the doors, wondering if this is still a good idea. You debate for a moment about riding back down, but then – ding – the doors are already open. Heart pounding, you step out in the hall.

His apartment is close – a black number 3708 on the door and you stare, managing to gather your strength and to knock. The sound is shaky, barely audible, so you knock again – this time louder as you wince, because maybe that time was too loud. You’re about to knock for a third time, when the door flies open.

“Hey, I – Y/N?” Jungkook freezes, wallet in his hand.

Your mouth drops open. He’s dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt – and glancing beyond, your anger only grows. “What the hell?” you gape, spotting a half-drained glass of whiskey and cable TV. “Did you even have a dinner?”

Jungkook makes a noise, not a very coherent one. His face is pale, when you push your way past. As the door falls shut, you struggle to regain control before turning around. “So?” you demand, crossing your arms. “Why did you lie to me?”

Jungkook continues to stare, as though unable to place two and two together.

“Well?” you ask, lifting your brows. “Say something!”

Jungkook shakes his head, coming to life. “I didn’t lie,” he remedies, half-pushing his hand through his hair. “I did go to dinner, things just ended quickly.”

“Fine,” you allow, taking a breath. The silence is deafening, and you’re unsure what to say next – but then you decide fuck it, there’s already no recovery. “Why didn’t you call me,” you whisper, “after your dinner?”

Jungkook’s expression changes. “I – did you want me to call?” he asks, slightly dubious. “That sounds… it sounds like a booty call, to me.”

Quickly, your cheeks flush. “Well, no. I don’t want you to do that,” you respond – although maybe you do. “You cancelled on me,” you blurt, hating how needy you sound. “Three times in a row – how am I supposed to just brush that aside?”

Jungkook winces. “Three times that I had explanations for. Look, I’m sorry Y/N – things just came up.”

“Right,” you scoff, heel tapping rapidly against the floor. “So, what – you just kiss me, drop me at my apartment and dodge me, until I get the hint? Am I not pretty enough?” As you ask this, your heart hammers against your ribcage. “Am I not funny enough, successful enough? Did Lily remind you what you once had; did it make you want her back?”

Jungkook’s eyes widen with surprise. Lifting both hands, he takes a step closer. “No,” he affirms, shaking his head. “Absolutely not. You – you think I don’t like you?” Jungkook seems confused by the question.

“What else should I think,” you whisper, pushing the words out. “When you’ve barely talked to me, since our last date?”

Jungkook closes his eyes. “Ah. That. Do you want to know,” he starts, then stops. “Do you want to know, why I haven’t seen you since that night?”

This is a difficult question to hypothesize, since he just shot down every answer you had.

“It’s because I want you,” Jungkook explains, voice scraped raw with emotion. He opens his eyes. “It is because I want you so badly, its torture to be around you and know you don’t want me. It’s torture to kiss you, to hold you like that, and have you say nothing. I know, I know,” he groans, noticing your expression. “I know you wouldn’t kiss me if you didn’t want to. It’s just that I don’t think you want me in the same way that I do,” Jungkook responds, gaze earnest.

You stare at him for a moment, allow this to sink in. “What… in what way do you want me?”

“Every way,” Jungkook whispers. “I want you in every way possible, each way imaginable. I want to change with you, grow with you, until I no longer can. I want absolutely everything,” he insists, moving closer. “I want to be next to you always, and it’s absolutely killing me that you don’t feel the same.”

“But,” you inhale, shaken by his outburst. “If that’s true – hear me out, Jeon! – if that’s true, then why the hell dodge me like that?”

Jungkook bites down on his lip. “Okay, I’ll admit – it wasn’t a very good plan.”

“What wasn’t a very good plan?” you hiss, exasperated.

“I kept canceling,” Jungkook winces, “because I didn’t want our fifth date to happen.”

Falling silent, you struggle to comprehend. “I – what? Why?”

“Because I didn’t want this to end,” he explains.

You’re silent for only moment – before you explode. “Are you crazy?” you yell, striding towards him over his floor. “You didn’t want this to end, so you pushed me away?”

“I know.” Jungkook bobs his head, swallowing weakly. “Look, I know. It was stupid – I realize this but,” he stares at you, pained by the words, “I couldn’t help myself. When I kissed you, when I walked you home – you said nothing! I thought you were waiting to turn me down. I thought you would tell me no, which is why I didn’t press to come in. I wanted to make the perfect fifth date to convince you,” he exhales. “I just hadn’t thought of a plan yet. I wanted to prove that I’m more than the boy you once knew – I wanted to prove that I’m worthy of being wanted by someone like you.”

“Jungkook,” you hesitate. You find you are not sure what to say, your hands falling limp to your sides. “I already know who you are.”

“No,” he exhales, reaching out for your hands. “I know you hold my hand, when you want. I know you kissed me back – but it can’t be the same,” he insists. “I don’t know if I ever said this to you before.” Jungkook hesitates, before barreling on, “but I hate the idea of fate. I hate destiny, hate all of it.”

“Oh?”

Jungkook nods. “My sister used to cut out my horoscope and I’d throw it in the trash. I said I’d make my own destiny, because I couldn’t stomach the idea of someone else being in charge.”

A smile tugs at your lips – his words are just so familiar. “No?”

Jungkook sighs. “I hate destiny, but I don’t know how else to explain you.”

This is not what you expected. When he moves, hands sliding over your arms – a flutter enters your stomach. Not just a flutter; a storm, a tempest, a wildfire racing through your veins. You rather like the feeling.

Jungkook exhales, hands moving into your hair. Your chests nearly touch while he examines the stands in his grip. “I feel like you’re meant to be here,” he murmurs. “In the beginning, you were the one who taught me to stand up for myself. Now, you’re the one pulling me back together. I have to say that frankly, I don’t know what I bring to this relationship. I don’t what I bring to you, but I’ll try. I’ll be funny, if that’s what you want. I’ll be supportive, if that’s what you need. I’ll leave you the fuck alone, if you prefer that. Just,” he exhales, thumb brushing over your cheek. “Let me try.”

For a long moment, you cannot find the words. For a long moment, his words make no sense. They mix with your emotions, mirror your fear and tenacity and – it is hard to breathe.

“Do you know why I was silent?” you finally ask, staring up at him. When Jungkook shakes his head, you continue. “It’s because I was scared.” Lower lip trembling, Jungkook brushes yours with his finger. “I was scared because of how whole – how complete, you make me feel. When I’m with you, I feel like myself – which makes no sense, because I should feel most like myself when I’m alone. But no, you bring out these parts in me I didn’t even know existed. You bring out sides which shouldn’t be there in the first place, and yet here they are. I don’t believe in miracles, Jeon Jungkook,” you say softly. “But I believe in you.”

He inhales, soft. “Do you expect me to just – accept that?”

“Yes,” you smile, looking back at him. “You have to, I said so.”

Jungkook’s lips part. “So,” he muses, wrapping the strand tighter around his finger. “Do you need that fifth date still – or?”

“Or,” you tease, lifting up on your toes.

On second thought, your height really is better for kissing.

He nudges your lips apart with his own. Drawing you into him, his large hands secure your face to his. “Or,” Jungkook exhales, forehead bending to yours. “Will you marry me?”

“Yes,” you agree, no longer a hesitation.

“Ah,” Jungkook groans, reaching down for your thighs. His hands dig into your ass to deposit you on top of the counter. He moves quickly, pushing your coat from your shoulders and tossing it to the floor. “I don’t think a word has ever made me that happy,” Jungkook moans, burying his face in your neck.

You gasp when he sucks, forming a mark you are sure will bruise. “Jungkook,” you gasp, scolding – but forget your own words, when he looks up. His gaze is dark, hair falling into his eyes as he leans both hands to the counter.

“Yes?” he asks, brow arched.

“Forget it,” your hands slide to his waist. “Please, just kiss me.”

Jungkook doesn’t need to be asked twice. His mouth descends, hot and bruising while your bodies twist roughly together. Your legs wrap around him, tight as his arms move from your torso into your hair. He kisses you hungrily, pulling your body closer; needing more, needing now, needing all of you at once.

His hands slide forward to undo the buttons on your blouse. This is shoved aside, dropped to the ground along with your bra. When you are sitting there, naked from the waist up, Jungkook stares. He exhales, hips grinding into your core when he bends to taste. His tongue flicks casually, leisurely over your breast. As he draws the nipple into his mouth, he teases you slowly while you groan his name.

“I want,” Jungkook murmurs, kissing up your neck, “to lay you out on my bed and have my way with you. Spread your legs, princess,” he whispers, nodding in approval when you obey. “Good. I’ve thought about this so often, these past weeks. I was so fucking hard after you kissed me,” he groans, hand sliding down the front of your jeans, “I jerked myself off twice at home. Imagining my hand was your pussy, your mouth,” he murmurs, biting down on your lip.

You groan, bucking your hips forward. “Jungkook,” you whine, struggling to press closer.

He nods, not wasting time as he lifts you from the counter. He walks the two of you backwards, continuing to kiss while he shoves open the door with his foot. Jungkook walks you into his bedroom, decorated in cool tones of navy and grey. He moves fast, dropping you down on his bed to take a step closer. Tugging the shirt from his body, you slide out of your jeans while he watches. These you drop on the floor, wearing only your panties when you lean back on his bed. Jungkook’s fingers slide to the waistband of his sweatpants, and you push yourself upwards.

“Hang on,” you grin, stilling his hands. “I want to do that.”

Jungkook stops, chest rising and falling while you reach for his sweats. Wrapping your fingers around his cock you find him already hard, hissing through teeth as you touch him. The sensitive tip is pressed tight to the material – you exhale, running a thumb over his member.

Lowering yourself to your knees, you yank his pants down until his dick springs up. The crude slapping noise makes you wet, panties damp while you press your thighs tighter. “Tell me what you like,” you instruct, licking a slow strip up his cock. “Tell me what gets you off, and maybe I’ll do it.”

Jungkook’s eyes widen when you place his tip in your mouth. When you start to suck, pulling him closer – he groans.

“Ah, fuck,” he stutters, while you play with your tongue. “I like fucking from behind, with you bent over a table. I like seeing you helpless, spread out for me and – ah, god – I like to hear your moans, half-buried in the wood.”

“Mm,” you muse, sliding off him with a pop. “What else?”

You move a hand down your body. Pushing one finger beneath your panties, you trace over your clit because just teasing him is unbearable; you need something to help – only his words are turning you on. The soft grunts and groans from Jungkooks lips are torturous, as is the slow sound of his cock leaving your mouth.

Jungkook’s eyes start to shut, eyelids fluttering. “I like to fuck, hard. So hard your face is buried in the mattress, your ass is red from spanking – and I like to cum all over the marks,” he breathes, and when you look up – his jaw is clenched. He’s having difficulty holding himself together, so you deep-throat him.

Jungkook makes a strangled noise before continuing, “I like when you moan my name. When you’re so turned on, so needy for my cock that you can’t do anything else.”

At this, you slide off. “Get on the bed,” you demand, watching him smirk. “I want you to fuck me – you can come where you want.”

At this, Jungkook’s smile disappears. He jerks himself slowly, spreading your saliva while he walks to the bed. He yanks open the drawer to his end table, giving you an excellent view of his ass bending to grab for a condom. While he rolls this onto himself, you sit down on his bed. Scooting back until you rest against his pillows, you spread your legs and wait for him to join. “Jungkook,” you whine, watching him move. “Please.”

He inhales, pressing one knee to the mattress. “How wet are you?” he breathes, moving closer. Jungkook’s gaze is dark, uncontrolled. “Show me.”

You obey, sliding a hand down your body. Spreading your legs, you let him see how you are dripping. Jungkook groans, moving closer and his hand joins yours, thumb circling your clit while his index finger slips inside. You moan, arching into his hand. Feeling already tight, already full and needing more than just his fingers to be satisfied.

“Jungkook,” you whimper, pressing your face into the crook of his neck.

Jungkook withdraws to grab for your hips. He spreads you wider, aligning his cock before he gives you all of himself. Jungkook enters you slowly, inch by inch and when he fills you entirely, you forget everything else. Jungkook is large, hot and each inch of him is pleasurable. When he is fully inside, unable to take any more – you shift your body up. Rocking into him, forcing him deeper – and Jungkook’s hands tighten on your ass.

“Let me know if it’s too much,” he murmurs, pulling away. When he thrusts back inside, the motion is bruising and you whimper. He spreads you further, wrapping your legs around his waist to set a rough, brutal pace. Jungkook watches your chest bounce underneath him, groaning out loud at the sight, “Fuck,” he moans, watching his cock enter your body. The sounds of him fucking you are wet and sinful, over and over while you come together.

Reaching down, he rubs your clit as he fucks – and immediately, your insides tighten around him. It’s almost too much; the angle he has, the pleasure thrumming through you. Jungkook bends, your chests brushing together to whisper, “I want to come inside you.” His teeth catch hold of your earlobe, “I want you to feel me filling you. Want you to know how fucking crazy you make me, how out of my mind I am for you. Do you like being marked,” he murmurs, sucking your neck.

You nod, arching upwards, losing all ability to speak when he fucks you harder.

“Good,” Jungkook affirms, thrusting deeper. “I want you to be mine – I’m already yours. You already fucking own me, and I want to return the favor. Not where anyone can see, of course. Just so I know you’re walking around with my teeth on your body, your pussy still sore from the night before, god,” Jungkook grunts, and you almost come right then and there.

“Jungkook,” you breathe, struggling to hang on. You fight off your orgasm, every limb in your body trembling. “I’m going to come, fuck, I need to come.”

“Hang in there,” he groans, speeding up. Jungkook chases his own release, fucking hard and fast until he groans, pulling back to meet your gaze. “Almost there – I – ah, fuck. Come for me, baby.”

You can’t hold it in any longer. Giving up, you clutch onto him tight. Pulling his body close, forcing his cock deeper while you fall apart. Your entire body is shaking, trembling as Jungkook comes undone as well. True to his word, he fills you up – and when both your breathing slows, hips settled against each other, you seek out his gaze.

Jungkook’s eyes are lidded, expression blissful. He bends to brush his lips with yours, before withdrawing. Pulling the condom off and to the side, he ties this in a knot before tossing in the garbage. Flopping back down, Jungkook pulls you in close. “I know, I know,” he murmurs, kissing your shoulder blade. “You need to clean up – I know. I just want to hold you like this, for a second.”

Thoroughly amendable to that, you snuggle into his arms. Jungkook smiles, soft and sleepy against the pillow. “When did you decide?” he murmurs, legs tangling to push your shin with the pads of his toes.

You giggle, feeling his cock soft against your stomach. The touch is intimate, gentle in a way you don’t think you’ve felt before. “I don’t know if it was a moment, or a series,” you admit honestly. “The moment I realized, was when we were watching the sunrise.”

“Visible change,” Jungkook whispers, and you nod.

“I want to change with you,” you confess, as he smiles.

“Me too,” he whispers, pulling you closer. “Me too.”

[Bound Series Master List]

Five Dates!Jungkook + babysitting for Obligated!Namjoon

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