#that the reason victim draws is that he had seen that he is able to literally bring things to life. that alan is able to do that.

[storgicdealer]

taking this out of tags RIGHT NOW

tags by @navy-leader

this. makes me go fucking insane. continuing

im still going fucking insane about my last tags

there's NO possible way of victim not seeing something that was streamed on alans channel and respectively streamed in the outernet. its canon that avm original was streamed there. even if it wasnt every episode of avam it is still there. victim lives there and knows what outernet has (and most likely knows about oranges and cg existence. not their powers but existence from at least an avm original episode)

and given that vic learned about chosen and that he was wanted. that victim KNEW about their existence and chased after them. that he had seen something that made him realize that chosen inherently had ties with alan??

one of my thoughts is that only specific stuff is accessible to outernet in canon. maybe not even the whole content of vids. (though the avm original was sixteen minutes and in "the king" it is seen that the video streamed is also sixteen minutes) which could explain how victim only knew a small bit of stuff and didnt just see the a bit of a whole thirty minute willingly and went "well thats all i gotta know about it".

its likely victim accessed chosen(and possibly dark) videos streamed and connected the dots by recognizing alan, similar methods of torturing chosen and the interface of alans pc.

(since its canon victims torture is on youtube and possibly chosens its kinda fucked if they accessed it as well. which perhaps made them even more vengeful)

thought. was showdown something that was streamed or something that was uploaded on youtube? at least the beginning of it?? and victim knew only bits of it???. it could be possible that victim knew about chosen&dark place of living and darks technology. from just bits of information and his company couldve investigated it? but ultimately didnt find chosen nor dark there. and therefore placed a damn bounty on chosen. and they mightve used leftover darks technology there for their own shit. victim knowing about darks tech and possibly small pieces of the showdown could also be explained that he didnt seem to mind the events taken before yellow coded the cursor into the outernet when going through chosens memory. but it does make me think whether victim knew that the cg went back to the pc and therefore didnt place wanted posters of them ??? did he know about darks death and therefore didnt place wanted posters of dark?? wouldnt he try any means to find how to get to alan? is it possible that only the cursor and tscs awakening parts of the showdown video were erased and vic, again, wanted to see more to it (i had a thought that he couldve known what is up with the showdown due to having surveillance technology but im doubting it because chosen and dark lived really secludedly from the city).

but in case the showdown was somewhat seen? by other sticks? and vic couldve known about darks and chosen terror shit from other sticks/a news outlet? oh my god i just realized something

so theres a comic about me wondering how did sticks treat chosens&dark terror in the internet and possibly outernet too. that dark blasted a whole fucking beam in the sky near the stickcity and it wasnt unable to be seen. could victim see that???? could he connect the dots that it was hollowheads power??

the rocket logo. dude. i JUST THOUGHT about it yesterday. and it made so much sense to me

my possible thought was. that victim did escape alanspc through the ip/pc sky. somewhat. in one way or another. and it was the reason why a rocket was picked as the corporations logo.

a rocket is something that is able to literally fly to the sky. to access the higher parts of the world. the ip/sky part of it that had a wormhole to alan in it. the person victim chased after.

and given that rocketcorp specializes on tech. another reason to it besides victims knowledge and ability to use it before and deciding to bring it into the outernet and devote a whole company to it. a rocket is literally something that is made of technology. and since they had to chose a logo that symbolizes tech

victim chose something that represented his goal.

fucking insane about it

i basically treat it as a base for my theories that victim established/reformed a corporation that used internet technologies he himself brought into the outernet (in one way or another). but his company is widely known as a regular tech company that produces all different kinds of it. including domestic stuff like tvs and surveillance cameras and also weapons. but due to technology and digital stuff literally forming the internet and outernet itself they also act as some force in the outernet that upkeeps and protects its citizens. since theyre the only ones with that kind of power

and all these projects that cover many areas of technology that are made by them are used to cover their shady underground shit like. the box and torture and victims true goal (which i believe he could be secret about even to his mercs and colleagues)

and that the point of victim bringing internet technology there. his whole plan of revenge.

it is done in order to protect his kind from something that he experienced. giving them a mean to defend themselves. ESPECIALLY after knowing cursors of users can be manifested in the outernet and damage sticks.

and he is the kind to be ruthless about it if it means creating safety. something he lacked.

(violence and oppression cant be solved with peaceful talks kind of mentality)

im fucking INSANE about this right NOW.

also. another thought

giving the possibility that victim "fell down" from the ip/sky. him providing the internet with basically "divine power" that regular kind of outernet sticks didnt have. him trying to protect outernet sticks from danger and death.

makes the interpretation of victim with angelic/halo symbolism in the fandom so much more sense. and so fucking amazing. oh my god i NEED to make something about this idea.

tom you opened a whole different dimension to my thinking and it fills in the holes ive thought about. im going to be so fucking insane and annoying about this.

pinning this. im

(go to tags here if you want to see my another idea of victim that is so fucking. mind changing to me)

[yougavemeyourheartyouknow]

Oh, you wanna play psycho killer? (Ghostface! Miguel O’Hara x Fem! Reader x Ghostface! Peter B Parker) Part 1

RAAAAA! Excited about this one! Based off this post. Inspired by this drawing from Andalusia_Lu on Tiktok. Not proofread. Tbh I’m kinda nervous about this one but…Enjoy! Also in this story MJ and Peter are just friends. This is probably the darkest think I’ve written.

(Y/N) - Your name.

NSFW!!, Cursing, use of alcohol, death, murder, yandere behavior, Reader has a bf who does die, violence, blood, said reader’s bf calls her derogatory remarks behind her back, religious imagery(I think???), stalking, male masturbation, invasion of privacy, reader being drugged, panty stealing, stalking, implied kidnapping, gore, cameras being placed in readers home without their knowledge, it’s a horror one shot so… you know what you’re walking into. Dead Dove Do not eat, MDNI!

Word count: 2.5k

Part 2

Masterlist

—

October 31st, Halloween night. Also know as the night that gives college students an excuse to get fucked up while in a shit quality costume that cost 50 bucks at spirit Halloween.

That little rule you are not exempt from, that’s how you found yourself in a random college frat party at NYU, a bottle of beer in one hand, and your boyfriend’s in the other as you drag him through the crowd so you both can dance. The alcohol in your system made your whole body relaxed and your cheeks glow with a dash of red over them, your eyes half-lidded and your smile wide as you looked up at Daniel while Promiscuous from Nelly Furtado blasted through the house. You looked like an angel straight from heaven, although that might be due to your customer, being dressed up as Juliet from the 1996 movie, while your boyfriend was clattered in armor as Romeo. The costumes being your idea after having rewatched the movie a few weeks ago.

You both had lost the rest of your group in the crowd, Jess and MJ had said they were going to the kitchen while Miguel and Peter had said they were going outside to get fresh air but you haven’t seen them since, you wouldn't have extremely worried, if it wasn’t for the reason sightings of the ghostface killer that had been popping up on the news though. Sure maybe going to a party wasn’t the best idea either but you figured you would have been fine since you were going in a group, I mean, what wouldn’t you be okay? It’s not like an actual serial killer goes after a group of young adults who are all drunk right? But now you’ve lost 4 out of 6 people in said group. But maybe in the small chance you do get targeted, you should be able to stand a chance since your Daniel was always in the gym with Miguel, so he was pretty jacked (not as jacked as Miguel though but you’ll never say that out loud).

One song turned to two then to three, just like the beers in Daniel’s hand, you had slowed down so you could at least be sober enough to order a Lyft for when the night was over. Eventually you were whisked away from your boyfriend by MJ and Jess, thankful that they were still at the party and nothing happened to them.

“Hey, have you guys seen Peter or Miguel?” You shouted over the music after a while, Jess just shrugged, before MJ answered.

“They texted me that they found Daniel and he’s like, fucked up apparently.”

—

“Please!”

Stab.

“I don’t want to die! Please stop!”

Stab.

“I’ll give anything! Just don’t kill me!”

The begs and pleads become more desperate and sloppy with every second, the words slurring more together from the alcohol and the crimson red liquid dribbling out of Daniel's mouth. The sight was almost enough to make the two men feel pity. Almost.

“Anything?” The shorter one asked with an agonizingly slow head tilt, his voice altered from the voice changer attached to the plastic mask, signaling for the other to stop plugging the knife into their victim’s stomach. Despite not liking being told what to do, he dropped Daniel on the floor with a snarl. Daniel quickly retracted into a small ball, shaking arms going to cover his bloody wound with a groan and whimper.

“We want (Y/N).” If it weren't for him being in excruciating pain and bleeding out, Daniel would have thought they were joking, but the tone in which the words were spoken made his blood that was spilling out from his stomach and mouth run cold.

“W-what?” He asked as he tried to keep his breathing from becoming shallow and his head from becoming too dizzy, but he was failing miserably.

“You heard us. We. Want. (Y/N).” The larger one spoke this time. How badly, he wanted to emphasize each word with another stab, the knife in his hands twitched a bit as he tightened his grip on the black handle. He was itching for an excuse, but he’ll refrain.

For now.

Maybe it was the way he responded to a stressful situation, or maybe it was the lack of blood finally affecting his brain, but Daniel had the nerve to laugh. Fucking laugh. The laugh was breathy, and in between coughs and groans, causing Miguel and Peter to look at their prey like he was the crazy one. Rage filled their bodies when Daniel finally composed himself enough to talk again.

“Y-you can’t be serious? …Right? You-you’re gonna kill-kill me over some bitch?”

How fucking dare he.

How dare he speak about you like you were some random skank, like you were a pile of dirt. You were a fucking goddess, Miguel and Peter knew that, because they worshipped you like one. They didn’t see what you saw in Daniel, he didn’t deserve you, no one did, except Miguel and Peter, they would treat you better than any other man that roamed this stupid planet, and especially far better then the sorry excuse of a boyfriend that they had on the ground like he was a wounded animal.

For someone who was about to die, he sure had a lot of nerve.

He didn’t love you like they did, he didn’t know your every move like they did. They were like your real life guardian angels, always following behind you to make sure no one would harm so much as a hair on your pretty little head, and how lucky were they, that you were juuust oblivious enough that you don’t notice them, just enough to brush of your rummaged trash as raccoons, just enough that you didn’t noticed when a pair or two of your dirty panties go missing, you had too many to keep track of all of them anyways. Never knowing that one of the two would sneak into your apartment while you were asleep to grab them from your hamper, no matter which boy had decided to embark on their mission, both of them had to fight against the struggle to not stay and watch you sleep, fighting the urge to release their painful hard members and stroke while watching you sleep. They’d be lying to themselves if they said they haven’t lost the battle at least once before, biting into their free hand to stop any moans from escaping and waking you up, while they fist fuck their cocks with the other, but can you blame them?

They just loved you so much and you loved them too, you just haven’t realized it yet. How could you when that pest of a boyfriend of yours was pumping your head full of false thoughts? He didn’t love you like Peter and Miguel did. Sure Daniel might seem like he loved you so much, going as far as to get you flowers and gifts from time to time, but Miguel and Peter’s gifts they would give you were so much better, because these gifts were all given to you with the same purpose. To help them watch over you, make sure you were safe, strategically planning to make sure to eventually fill your entire home with cameras right under your adorable nose. The teddy bear that sits on your bed and the light up mirror over your bathroom sink were first of course.

Peter couldn’t help himself, with all of his force, he kicked Daniel right in the balls, causing him to curl up more in pain. Miguel was going to do the same when his phone pinged in his pocket, he quickly took it out and checked it, your name filling his screen made his heart skip a beat.

“It’s (Y/N). She’s asking where we are, and wants us to meet her at her apartment after she drops off Jess and MJ in 15 minutes.” Miguel mumbled as he looked down at his phone, before looking up at Peter then down at their prey on the ground. “She probably thinks we’re still with him, what should we do with him?”

Peter’s eyes followed Miguel’s gaze down to the half- conscious Daniel, silent as if thinking about what to say, or more likely what to do with him.

“We could leave him here for dead?” Peter suggested, but Miguel shook his head at the thought, too risky, they couldn’t have the chance of him being found by someone and taken to the hospital, that could ruin everything.

“You both… ar-are fucking psychotic! Killing me over some-some bitch who doesn’t eve-even give good fucking… fucking head!” Daniel yelled between coughs, more blood falling from his blue-turning lips, he looked like he had seen a ghost due to how pale he was becoming from the blood lost, and now he’s gonna become one. Miguel’s phone buzzed again, this time you only sent a single question mark, looking down at his phone.

“I want you to know that if I wasn’t about to be late to see you, I would beat this guy bloody, for the way he talks about you.” Miguel said out loud as if you could actually hear him, as if you were actually here to hear how true those words were, but instead Miguel raised his knife with one hand and grabbed Daniel’s hair with the other. Enjoying the way the Dani’s eyes widened in fear, his weak arms flailed around as he tried to fight the larger man off of him, but it was no use. “Guess I’ll just have to cut straight to the point.” He said, the smirk evident threw his altered voice before putting his knife against Daniel’s throat and slashing it open. Watching whatever life that was left in him drain from his eyes.

Peter being the skilled photographer he was, took a selfie of the two with their slayed animal, now it’s time to go claim their trophy.

—

Something was off.

Like seriously off, ever since Peter and Miguel disappeared at the party neither of them had answered their phone, and as soon Dani disappeared neither had he. Maybe the party wasn’t the best idea in retrospect, you let out a sigh as you entered your apartment, and collapsed on your couch, wanting to try and calm your racing thoughts a bit before you changed out of your costume. Closing your eyes, and taking in a deep breath.

Your phone started to ring.

Usually, you didn’t answer calls from people who weren’t already in your contacts, so the “blocked number” would normally set off red flags, but maybe the alcohol was still making your brain foggy, because without thinking you answer the call and put your phone to your ear.

“Hello?”

No answer.

You left out a huff and tried again.

“Hellooo?”

When you didn’t get an answer again you rolled your eyes.

“I think you got the wrong numb-“

“Wanna play a game?”

“I’m-I’m sorry?”

“I said, wanna play a game?”

“Um no thanks. I'm hanging up now.”

“Hang up and you won’t get to see your special surprise though.” Oddly enough, you grew a bit curious.

“Wha..what do I have to do?” You asked.

“It’s simple, We’re gonna play a small game of hot and cold.” You had a feeling this wasn’t a good idea, maybe you shouldn’t answer the call. “Right now you’re cold.”

Without another word, you slowly got up, and made your way down the hall, your floorboard creaking underneath your heels.

“Warmer.”

Your heart begins to beat in your ears, you bring a shaky hand up to the doorknob of your bathroom, you go to open the door when the voice from the other end of the phone spoke again.

“Colder.”

You quickly bring your hand back down to your side and let your heavy footsteps make your way into your bedroom.

“Hotter.”

You swallowed the thick lump of saliva down your throat as you made your way to the left side room, your eyes dead set on your closet.

“Hotter.”

You closed the gap between you and the closet, and brought your hand to the handle, mentally preparing yourself for whatever hides before the wooden doors.

“You're on fucking fire baby.”

Your hand drew back the door, the sight made you let out a blood curdling scream, almost dropping your phone in the process. Your Daniel, dead, sitting on the closet floor, gutted out like a fish. The voice on the other end of the phone let out a sly chuckle before speaking once again.

“Sorry about your boyfriend, guess all those muscles didn’t help much.” He mocked before the call went dead, and you finally released your phone, it falling to the floor, as your body began to shake and your breathing became rapid.

You let out a sob and began to stumble away from the mangled corpse that you once called your boyfriend, only for your back to meet with a what felt like a wall of muscle, you quickly look up over your shoulder, being met with the infamous ghostface mask that has been plastered all over the news.

“What’s the matter (Y/N)? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” The altered voice taunted. No, no, no,no. This cannot be happening. You shook your head as another sob left your lips stumbling away from the masked killer and into the hallway, expecting him to follow after you, but instead he just watched you. If you were thinking straight. You’d probably realized that this was a trap, but you weren’t thinking straight, as you finally reached the front door, you went to unlock the door and leave your apartment, but before you even stepped foot out of the door a large hand came and grabbed you around your waist. You take in a deep breath and open your mouth to scream, but instead a white cloth came and covered your nose and mouth, the strong smell of chemicals quickly filling your lungs.

“Surprised (Y/N).” This voice was a bit deeper, then the one from your bedroom, your head became dizzy as you eyes fluttered, your vision was beginning to blacken, before you were fully go under, you saw the man holding you still was a lot larger than the other one, it clicked, there were two of them.

You black out.

—

“She out?” Peter asked Miguel as he slipped off his mask, Miguel following suit.

“Like a light.” Miguel smirks as he goes to pick you up bridal style, your body limply laying in his arms. The two couldn’t help but smile as they watched your sleeping form, so peaceful looking, like an Angel. Their angel. Their plan played out just as they wanted, you were theirs now, and theirs alone. No one could come in the way of you three anymore, all they had to do now was make sure you wouldn’t leave them. But how would you do that if you didn’t know where you were? You couldn’t. That’s why Miguel gently placed you in the backseat of Peter’s car, before getting into the passenger’s seat. They were going to make sure you were far, far away from your old life, so you could start your new one with your lovesick killers.

[showtoonzfan]

So I wanted to avoid talking about the Alastor Voodoo discourse, (I kinda already did on twitter) but after seeing this thread I couldn’t help but want to give my two cents on it. Putting aside the fact that Rae is a problematic bootlicker regarding Viv and was someone who took part in dismissing her victims/transphobia, I wanted to say that their idea of Alastor being white passing when he was alive COULD work. I spoke with someone who is more educated on this subject than I am, and it actually could be good representation and educate people on the challenges POC had to face due to their history of being slaves and segregated. I actually wouldn’t mind the idea that he came off as more white passing, had to force himself to speak in a different accent for the show business, and that’s the reason he was able to get a job as a radio host in the first place, since he’s mixed.

HOWEVER, it’s upsetting that this thread was created just to excuse and defend Viv’s shitty character designing and silence people who have an issue with it, especially people of color themselves. I’m mixed race as well so it’s ridiculous that Al looks the way he does for a black man, there is no reason for his demon design to not have his ethnic features, it’s as simple as that, stop telling people they shouldn’t be upset about it, the time period has nothing to do with him looking white.

Rae also seems to have a similar issue with the fanbase where they’re inserting her personal headcanons/interpretation of Alastor into the canon show. I have NO idea what they’re going on about in the second tweet because all we know about Alastor is that he has a “moral code” and possibly only goes after bad people, but we don’t know the in depth details yet or anything on how he was murdering while being a radio host, Rae’s just adding stuff that isn’t there to fit their headcanon/idea. They need to realize they’re not a writer of the show, Viv is and we haven’t seen her ideas for Alastor yet, so using a fan theory/interpretation of what you THINK he could be like just to dismiss people’s issues with him is ridiculous. This goes for the entire fanbase as well.

I don’t know why everyone is trying to excuse the fact that he doesn’t look black and defend his voodoo practices. It has nothing to do with the character, it’s the creator that’s the issue. She was the one who decided to make him mix creole, she’s the one who decided to make him practice voodoo and yet she refuses to commit to her decisions, refusing to educate herself on how to fucking draw black people and listen to POC voices on how bad using REAL voodoo symbols are. Now that I think about it, why does Alastor need to be involved in Voodoo at all. Why couldn’t he just be a serial killer radio host. Him practicing voodoo doesn’t add anything to his character, at least yet. With Dr. Facilier it kinda made sense because his voodoo is what turned Naveen into a frog, he made deals with demons to give him these powers and that’s exactly what got him killed in the end. Alastor meanwhile is a deal maker and I guess that’s what made him powerful??? It’s kinda hard to say with Viv’s shitty vague world building, but you could have easily made him a powerful overlord without that.

The point is, these issues with Alastor are on HER, not on the people complaining about it and if these people were fucking normal regarding criticism and feedback, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

[therainscene]

Much of the supernatural horror that Will has to contend with works extremely well as a metaphor for his issues -- the Upside Down is the closet, the monsters represent homophobia, his powers are as repressed as he is, yadda yadda -- and in my opinion, this makes him a relatively easy character to analyze. Being able to draw on the supernatural stuff just gives you a lot more material to work with.

Mike, though? A goddamn enigma. He’s often present when supernatural stuff is happening, but he doesn’t interact with it to anywhere near the degree that Will does, and it’s much harder to fold him into the allegory being told here without reducing him to “Will’s love interest”.

And that’s interesting, don’t you think?

That the “stereotypical” gay boy who attracts homophobes like moths to a flame has had his issues laid out in code since the beginning? Whereas the straight-passing one, who’s so deep in the closet he’s probably not even out to himself yet, is so hard to read that most of the GA assume his bizarre personality change in S3 was a symptom of bad writing?

Figuring yourself out as a queer is a challenge even today, and part of the reason it’s so challenging is because heteronormativity steamrolls right over our right to know that being queer is a valid option.

The closet isn’t a queer space -- it’s a queer-shaped void within a heteronormative space.

Stranger Things is full of examples of this:

Will isn’t shy about expressing his disgust at the thought of dating girls, but he’s dealing with a lot of childhood trauma so he’s just a late bloomer, right?

Will is jealous and upset about his new step-sister’s relationship with the boy he’s been attached to at the hip since he was five, but it must be because he’s in love with her or otherwise misses his platonic buddy, right?

El’s character arc is about freeing herself from toxic relationships with men, but her infatuation with the boy who puts her on a pedestal is the one exception to that, right?

Robin shows zero romantic interest in men before coming out, but she and Steve just vibe so well it’s reasonable to assume they’re love interests, right?

Vickie paused Fast Times at fifty-three minutes five seconds, but she has a boyfriend so she must be straight, right?

Over and over, the show presents us with an ambiguously queer situation and dares us to assume it’ll end heteronormatively.

If this were any other show I’d call it queerbaiting... but these situations just keep ending in a non-heteronormative way, all while symbolically dancing around Mike.

Granted, “non-heteronormative” doesn’t necessarily equal gay -- El’s arc is more about independence and forging healthy platonic relationships than about replacing men with women -- but she’s still on the path to breaking out of comphet, which is rather a queer act regardless of whether she's literally queer herself.

But I’m digressing.

We’ve seen how Will is visibly queer and struggles with the trauma of being abused for it, and how his closet is symbolized by the existence of a literal alternate dimension full of monsters.

But Mike is invisible, so his closet isn’t represented by a metaphor at all, but by something more meta than that -- it’s etched out in the negative space formed by the narrative itself. Only the audience can see it, and then only if we’re paying attention, tracing the edges of the story and feeling out the shape it results in.

These two different approaches in depicting the struggle of being closeted remind me of drowning.

In films, drowning is a noisy and dramatic affair, easy to identify.

But in real life, drowning doesn’t look like what we think it does -- it’s silent and resembles calm water play. All too often, drowning victims will quietly slip under and succumb helplessly to the depths...

...right under everyone’s noses.

[mhsdatgo]

I've recently seen a lot of discourse sprouting on the fact that in the original writing of the Dance of the Dragons, Rhaenyra is wed to Harwin and she still gets usurped, thus somehow "confirming" that the greens were nothing but misogynists after all, and that she was usurped on nothing but accounts of her gender.

While misogyny is one of the main reasons why Alicent and Otto pushed most lords to agree and pledge loyalty to the Greens, saying it was just because of that is not understanding the position Alicent was in, and what brought her to think that what she was doing was in fact necessary for the sake of her ambitions and children.

Alicent, both in book and show, was a victim and the perfect example of what women in a quasi-medieval setting are promised in exchange for all the pain and sacrifice they go through. In Fire and Blood, she is the daughter of the Hand of the King, the second most important man of the realm. She probably accepted to marry Viserys because she had been promised all the delight that would come with being a Queen, much more if she would've been able to give the King sons, which was what he lacked and what he was remarrying for. Anyone would be happy with that idea. Especially an 18 year old girl who, although described as smart for her age, was surely not a mastermind that wanted to rule the world, please, she just wanted to be happy despite the horrors of the world she was born into.

It's that when she does her duty and gives Viserys not one, not two, but THREE sons and he still doesn't do shit about the succession crisis that is actively waiting to happen then what is she supposed to feel? All her life has been a lie, she's stuck in a position she would've never chosen for herself if only she knew better. To top it all off, the princess that is actually named heir does whatever she pleases and trusts her father to clean up her mess, which somehow ALWAYS WORKS, and is proving herself to be a major risk to the lives of her children if she doesn't react as soon as she gets the chance.

She's had multiple reasons to believe Rhaenyra could and would have killed her brothers the moment they stood in her way, and they kept piling up one after the other, but of course dowright admitting she was doing it to preserve her own safety would draw little to no support, duh, lords don't care about anyone's children unless it's theirs, of course they had to argue it was because Rhaenyra was a woman and she had bastards. That was the only way someone might've been interested to join their cause, because to the eyes of other nobles it turned into a matter of keeping up a certain model of society that gave them various advantages.

And let's not act like the Lords on Rhaenyra's side were that much different either. The Velaryons were Team Black solely because of Baela and Rhaena's betrothal, and other houses simply did the math between the side that had 11 dragons and the side that had 4, and chose the one with more flying nuclear weapons. At that point the ulterior motive was choosing teams because you genuinely wholeheartedly supported Aegon or Rhaenyra, not because you had something to gain lol.

So yes, Rhaenyra is still getting usurped even if she marries Harwin Strong, because she's still a risk to Alicent's children and because siring bastards is probably the least bad thing she's done up until that point. Rhaenyra's genitals and her kids are not the only arguments the Greens can use against her, I promise.

[maple-the-awesome]

You Sacrifice Yourself for Them Part 2/3

Part 1 || Part 3

Pairings: Four, Hyrule, & Warrior x GN Reader

Requested by anonymous: HIIIII OMG I JUST WANRED TO SAY i lovelovrloveloveeeee the way you write so much!!!!!!! ur recent loz post had me kicking and squealing in my sear hehehe T_T could i request a scenario with the chain in a situation where the reader sacrifices themselves to protect the boys? im imagining things begging the enemy to take them instead, protecting them from a hit or even something funny like taking the blame for a mistake they made!!! id love to see some angst from you!!!!! THANK U AND HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!!💖💖💖💖

Zelda Masterlist 💙 Fandom Masterlist

A surprise attack - that's what had awaited the group. They had their guards only slightly down, still keeping an ear for danger, yet that didn't do much to protect them from the onslaught of monsters who soon surrounded everybody faster than anyone could draw their swords.

It wasn't a huge deal at first, at least for ten seasoned heroes. They've been in troubling situations before, both during their own journeys and when together, so they all know how this sort of thing works, in fact some were even having fun with it, making a competition out of how many enemies they could each take down. Then everything went south - fast, too.

That troublesome lizard the Chain has been tracking for weeks - or has it been months now? - appeared without a sound onto the battlefield, going successfully unnoticed amongst the chaos as he creeped through the shadows waiting for an opportunity to strike. Everyone had gotten pretty spread out from each other, pushed apart by their enemies not that they took the time to notice nor worry. This meant the lizard could've realistically chosen anyone as his victim, it was dumb luck that his eyes landed upon Four who was finally beginning to break a sweat as he tried to one-up a Moblin.

Maybe a second passed between that Moblin disappearing into purple smoke and a blur entering his vision. All Four knew for certain was that he just barely blocked the lizard's sword which had been swung his way with such force that it knocked him off his feet. He's been knocked down before, though, and planned to fight without hesitation until -

"- GET AWAY FROM HIM!" It was you. Four didn't even realize you were so close and before he could object, you were engaged in your own little battle with that lizard, successfully drawing its attention away from your downed friend, however your efforts were not without cost. 

You got hurt. Bad, too (although Four would say any injury is horrid if felt upon your skin). You were thrown to the ground just like he had, the difference being you weren't as fortunate as to block the lizard's sword, rather taking a direct hit which sent you crumbling to your knees. Any other day, Four would've been amazed by your determination when you still tried to stand your ground with a wobble, but it was no time to be in awe of your skill. He doesn't doubt that if it wasn't for Warrior and Twilight taking on the lizard next, you wouldn't have won that battle you so desperately fought.

Now Four feels as if his breath is caught in his throat while he stands by, helplessly watching as Hyrule heals you. You're in better spirits than he thinks you should be, awake and alert, but winching in hissed breaths whenever moving too quickly. He can't help feeling responsible for this, cursing himself for not having seen that lizard earlier. If he had, he would've been able to hold his own ground better, giving you no reason as to rush in so suddenly. Of course, you have a different outlook on the situation:

"I hope you aren't kicking yourself too hard over there, Smithy," It's like you can read his mind - or perhaps you can just read his facial expression. You raise an eyebrow at him almost teasingly as if your tunic isn't stained in your own blood, "I was the one who decided to jump in, you didn't ask me to - and I'd do it again if it means you're safe, just so you know."

Four huffs from where he sits mere inches away from you. Simply happy to see you alive, he didn't have time to care about the fact that he’s been holding your hand nonstop since first getting you out of the fray which had been a good ten minutes ago, "Shouldn't I be the one saying that, not the other way around? What is this, the second time you've saved my butt?"

"I don't think you almost falling off a stool counts," You argue, but after a moment of thought, you give his hand a squeeze, your voice a bashful whisper, "...And who says we can't both say it, hmm? Both be willingly to protect each other with our lives?"

"Because then it would be contradictory - If I'm willing to die for you and you're willing to die for me, then we'd both die" 

"At least we'll still be together.”

Four frowns, but to your surprise, he proposes no argument. He instead nods eventually, squeezing your hand back as he looks off across camp in silent thought, “...I guess that’s logical. I’d just prefer we stay together in life, though.”

"You guys are sappy as hell."

"Shut up Legend."

You've had a well deserved afternoon of peace - at least the best you can probably wish for given the circumstances. You don't necessarily have a lot of scented soaps on hand or even access to a proper bath for that matter, and despite being near a town, you’ve been rationing your rupees since it’s slim pickings collecting them from only monster drops and those clay pots everyone fights over. Still, you did manage to sneak away from all the boys for some time alone, soaking in one of the nice little hot springs found around Death Mountain.

Still patting your hair with your now damp towel, you wander back into camp with dreams of a pleasant meal to finish your day with, after all this is Wild's universe, so you would think he'd know the area well enough to bless you all with something wonderful made from nearby resources. With this said, you're pretty surprised when your nose scrunches up in disgust upon a disastrous smell filling your nostrils. 

It doesn't take long to notice the source, having to push through a few bodies to discover what everyone is glaring at: a pot of bubbling soup of a color you hadn't realized could even exist...and a texture you wish you didn't know existed.

"What happened?" You whisper to Legend who's closest to you. He shrugs as if this sight isn't all that bad, although you're certain he's already thought of some excuse that can get him out of eating tonight.

"Hyrule messed with Wild's cooking again."

"How? Wild's been watching him like a hawk since the last time."

"He wasn't here. He came down to the shops to get some things and when we all walked back together, we found the food like this."

Oh yeah. You remember now. Having overlooked an ingredient for his soup, Wild decided to run down to Goron Town where the others had already gone for a quick supply run and to question locals about weird portals. Soon after he left, the Traveler promised to watch over camp while you went to check out the hot springs as you’ve been dying to do. During your excitement, it failed to cross your mind that he’d be left unattended with Wild’s half-finished food.

"What did you add?" Wild has a hand on his hip, the other holding a ladle that's pointed directly towards Hyrule's chest accusingly as the poor boy sinks into himself, trying to stumble out a response. 

This is far from the first time he’s messed with cooking despite everyone agreeing he should be banned from so much as touching a spoon, yet you can’t help feeling bad for the hero regardless of his bad habit in not keeping his curiosity under control. Hyrule did help you today. If it wasn’t for his kind offer to watch over camp on his own, you would’ve had to put off visiting the hot springs until the others camp back, drastically lowering your chances of being able to sneak away for some alone time. 

“I’m the one messed with the soup,” All eyes are suddenly on you, not a single one looking convinced, but you continue anyways, “You said that you thought it needed ‘a little something more’, so I figured I’d try to help with that. I didn’t expect my additions to cause such -...mildly repulsive results…I’m sorry, Wild. I’ll remake dinner tonight if you want.”

Wild narrows his eyes, humming in thought for a good few seconds before announcing, “I don’t believe you! But…”

He then turns on his heel, dramatically dipping his ladle into the soup. The quote-on-quote ‘liquid’ doesn’t drip back into the pot once he brings up a ladle-full, instead sticking to the utensil before flopping into the soup with a heavy ‘splash’, “...I might be able to fix it if I add more broth - but this is the last warning I’m going to give: the next time anyone tampers with my cooking, I’ll only be making food with a jar of goron spice added in from then on, you hear?!”

Everyone is quick to agree, although Hyrule shows some brief hesitation until you elbow him roughly in the side. At that point, he eagerly nods, giving Wild a little piece of mind as he tries to figure out how to fix this dinner ‘you’ve’ so cruelly ruined.

“...Thank you for that,” Hyrule whispers to you, bashfully joining you beside fire as you lean back and shrug casually, “I really owe you this time.”

“Eh, don’t mention it. I already owed you for allowing me a nice break,” You nod your head towards the path that leads to the hot springs before peeking open an eye and glaring at him, your voice suddenly stern which sends shivers down his spine, “But seriously, dude, do. not. touch. Wild’s cooking again. Forced to eat meals laced with goron spice is where I draw the line in my love towards you.”

“N-Noted.”

No matter how tightly he squeezes his eyes shut, all Warrior can see among the darkness is stars that seem to glow brighter whenever another wave of pain shoots through his nervous system. He'd like to say he's had worse, although this is truly in his top five - maybe even top three. He can't adjust his body without grinding his teeth, yet he tries anyways, digging the end of his sword into the ground and using it as support to get himself up, but each inch he moves is agony to his battered body.

The moblin - if he remembers correctly, it's from Sky's universe - follows the bloody trail that had been left behind after it had previously tossed Warrior, stalking closer to the downed hero who can only curse his luck. Of course something like this happens on his turn to patrol. He shouted for help not long ago, although given the distance he's gone from camp, it's fairly possible no one heard. Even with the moblin raising its spear, he finds himself more concerned with the others than himself, praying to Hylia they don't get ambushed like he had -

"- HEY! OVER HERE YOU OVERGROWN PIG!" The moblin pauses, forced to turn its entire body to see where the voice had come from. This allows Warrior to see around it, spotting you running towards them with your sword drawn. He might've been relieved at this point if not for quickly noticing the fact that you're completely alone.

"N-NO! Don -...DON'T!" Warrior tries his best to stand up and reach for his sword, however he immediately crumbles onto his knees, hissing in pain as his free hand hurries to cover his wounded side. 

You don't listen, although you most likely didn't even hear him, too busy going face-to-face with the moblin. It reacts to your charge by holding its shield out in front of itself, yet you take no issue in running right up it, stepping onto the top edge which you use to kick yourself into the air over the moblin's head. You successfully catch yourself on your feet behind and, before it can recover from this surprise, you attack, hitting the monster as many times as you can manage. 

It cries out and angrily swipes its spear towards you (while Warrior holds his breath in worry), but even then you're faster, swiftly leaping out of harm's way and slicing its side in return. The moblin huffs, raising its spear to throw, however it stalls, eyes rolling back into its head before blood loss finally overcomes it, causing it to crash into the ground with a loud 'THUD'.

"Warrior!" You take no time celebrating your victory, hurrying to your friend where you fall to your knees and immediately begin looking over his injuries. His tunic is soaked in crimson at this point particularly around his side, making it difficult to pinpoint the exact damage. You curse yourself for not having gotten here sooner even though you truly did run as quickly as your feet could carry you after hearing his distressed shouts for aid. Thank Hylia you happened to have been foraging not too far away. If you had stayed in camp with the others, you would've surely lost a beloved member of your group.

"Here. Stay still," You order, reaching into your pocket and uncorking a bottle you kept there. A pink glow is free to flutter out and to your friend, practically dancing over his wounds in careful work that brings instant comfort shown through his sigh.

"...Why'd you do that?" Warrior wonders aloud, earning a confused look from you.

"Would you rather me have dragged you back to camp for Hyrule -?"

"- I mean why did you take on that moblin like that? Alone no less."

You huff, taking offense despite knowing full well that he isn't insulting your skill. He’s just terrible at wording stuff (all Links are), "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to steal your thunder there. I was only thinking it would be better to save your dumb butt than to take my time personally gathering an army to collect your corpse afterwards.”

Warrior clicks his tongue, forcing his eyes away from you, "...I'm thankful, don't get me wrong, but it was still incredibly stupid...You could've gotten just as hurt as me..."

"Hypocrite," You huff under your breath, although he still hears and pouts as a result. Gently, you take his chin, directing him to face you again, "I get that you're a captain and all, thus you feel responsible for protecting others, but there's nothing wrong with admitting defeat and trusting someone else to take charge if necessary. Your ego isn't worth your life, after all, I’ll only mourn one of the two.”

Warrior blushes, trying to look anywhere except your eyes, yet you refuse to let him do so, too amused by his adorable embarrassment to let go of his chin right away.

"I...I suppose you're right."

"I always am."

"...I'll be sure to remember that from here on out."

[imsparky2002]

Coward and Proud of It

(Nathaniel is drawing in his sketchbook after another akuma attack, and notices his classmates looking embarassed, their faces riddled with guilt.)

Nathaniel: Why do you guys look like that?

Alix: Dude, we’re such horrible friends! We forgot about you again!

(He looked confused. She sounded sincere, but why?)

Rose: I can’t believe we left you behind! We’re supposed to look out for each other!

Nathaniel: Uh, what are you talking about?

Nino: We didn’t go back to look for you dude! We were too busy saving our own skins. (He looks ashamed. Nathaniel realizes what’s going on.)

Nathaniel: Are you talking about the last akuma attack? You think you abandoned me?

Kim: Yeah! You were nowhere to be found. Weren’t you looking for us?

Nathaniel: Uh... no? Guys, you didn’t leave me behind. I left you.

(The entire class gasps in shock.)

Chloe: What are you on about, Kurtzberg?!

(He just rolls his eyes at the girl.)

Nathaniel: Whenever I am able to do so, I slip away from you guys. Afterall, Akumas seem to have a magnet for our group. And the best way to avoid getting killed is to lay low, away from the source.

Adrien: You make it sound like we’re a liability to you!

Nathaniel: *Bluntly* You are. You all run around like headless chickens, instead of ducking for cover and keeping your heads down. If this were a zombie apocalypse, you’d fail horribly. Well, except for Adrien and Marinette. Somehow you two always manage to avoid the brunt of the attacks. Not to mention you’ve never been akumatized yourselves. Main character energy if I’ve ever seen it.

Marinette: Yeah... that’s the reason. *Internally sweating*

Max: Nathaniel, you make up one fourteenth of a group. I am pretty sure we’d realize if you had abandoned us.

Nathaniel: Well, Max, for a guy with such a high iq, you clearly weren’t smart enough the other four times I did it.

Alya: Hold on a second, you’ve left us FIVE TIMES?!

(Nathaniel nods. He doesn’t understand why everyone seems so surprised.)

Nathaniel: You make it sound like it’s such a hard thing to do. When you’re all freaking out like that, it’s easy for a quiet guy like me to slip away.

Alix: (Talking about the Art Club Squad) But every time we texted you in the group chat, you acted like you were trying to find us. You even said you understood how panicked we got.

Nathaniel: Yeah, I was lying. You think I’m gonna reveal my escape plans? Then you’ll wanna join me, and I can’t have anyone from this class, even my friends, putting a target on my back via association.

Juleka: *Mumbling* Ouch, dude.

Chloe: Hmph! Well if you’re so elusive, tell us how on earth a nobody like you managed to survive all these attacks.

Nathaniel: Why should I tell you? You’d just try to join me next time.

(Rose uses her puppy dog eyes, and he caves.)

Nathaniel: Alright, fine. But I’m not taking any of you next time, you hear me?

(They grumble and nod.)

Nathaniel: Ok, Stormy Weather was pretty easy. All I had to do was avoid Alec, head home to my house, shut all the windows, lock the doors, hide under the bed, and done. For some reason, Akumas usually attack anyone unlucky enough to be outside. If they don’t have a specific victim in mind that is.

(The classmates all mutter in agreement. He had a point.)

Nathaniel: Next up was Guitar Villain, and once again you all ran off together, not even thinking of splitting up. And it seems none of you got the idea of just pretending to like the music. That’s what I did, just copied what I saw Ivan doing in class the day before, and headbanged like there was no tomorrow. I find the music to be cringe as all hell, not to mention the singer’s a deadbeat dad with an obviously fake English accent, but I had to fake it to make it.

Juleka: *Muttering* He really is a scumbag.

Nathaniel: Then there was Frightingale. I didn’t escape by myself, since I got a helping hand from a certain cute writer who I had been in the music video with. Turns out we had both been crushing on the other for awhile, and finally had the courage to ask eachother out. He took me to a safespot with the other kids in Mendeliev’s class, they took a liking to me, since I actually bothered to ask about their lives. You do realize that the kids besides Marc, Mireille, Jean and Aurore have names right?

Marinette: Of course we did!

Nathaniel: Really, what are they?

(The class is unable to even come up with a guess.)

Sabrina: Uh...

Nathaniel: That’s what I thought. Anyway, Zombizou was my favorite. Me and the Science kids got to kick love-zombie ass, and in order to avoid suspicion, Marc and I kept making out whenever they were near. It was so awesome! (He blushes before getting back on topic.) So yeah. You guys never abandoned me, I abandoned you. And before you say anything, no, I’m not sorry.

Alix: *Looking forlorn* But dude... we’re your friends!

Nathaniel: Well, you are. Most of the Art Squad is, but the rest of you only interact with me if you need something for your ships. You realize I’m an accomplished cartoonist, right? The Ladybug comic I work on with Marc is a huge success. I’m just as important as the rest of you!

Kim: Dude, we aren’t saying you’re not.

Nathaniel: Well I wasn’t important enough for any of you to notice I was being bullied by Chloe?

Chloe: Oh please, Kurtzberg. You got off easy.

Marinette: She made everyone’s life bad, Nathaniel. Not just yours!

Nathaniel: When you get bullied, everyone coddles you. When I get humiliated in front of the class, nobody besides my art friends came to comfort me, to explain to me why I got akumatized, why I was right to feel angry about what happened. Marc’s class also took the time to explain to me how it was creepy to write my self-insert being in love with a real classmate. They’re the reason I apologized to you, Marinette.

Chloe: Well if they’re so cool, then why don’t you join them!

Mylene: Chloe! We wouldn’t want that! Nathaniel’s our friend!

Nathaniel: Actually, that’s what I plan on doing next year. No offense, but I can only tolerate like half of you. I’d rather be with a class that actually recognizes my value, that takes the time to ask how I’m doing. If that makes me a background character in your world, so be it.

(He gets up and sees Marc waiting for him.)

Nathaniel: I’m not some helpless little lamb that gets lost whenever there’s an akuma. I’m a survivor, a coward, and I’m proud of it. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m gonna make out with my boyfriend.

(He smirks as he sees each classmate with their jaw on the floor.)

Turns out our Nath wasn’t abandoned after all. He’s just an escape artist. This felt so cathartic to write, and I hope you enjoyed it. As usual, let me know your thoughts in reblogs, replies, posts, and asks. @artzychic27 @msweebyness 

[tocomplainfriend]

Responding to your post about fiction affecting reality: very well-written post and that’s something I agree with wholeheartedly!

Full disclosure: I am a Vivz supporter and don’t really interact with the critique community because of negative past experience (hence the anon), but I really liked your post as it was well-researched and brought up a lot of points that I did agree on. Mostly that, as you evidenced, “it’s just fiction” isn’t a great argument for poorly portraying a serious concept when there can be tangible consequences for that portrayal. And you gave some really striking examples.

In terms of Hazbin, it is not that I believe that Val’s portrayal as an abuser (and consequently Angel’s as a victim) lacks any impact, but instead that it adds a positive one. This isn’t something I’ve researched so the evidence I have of this is personal experience, but as you said in your post that media can affect real life I felt inspired to add to that conversation with how it personally affected me.

So I was aware rationally that a common result of abuse/SA is hypersexuality, like I’d seen that on psychology blogs and such but never really understood it. I’m ashamed to say I thought it was a little weird and very rare. Hazbin was what finally challenged that notion with me. Being able to see how abuse looks and attribute those events to Angel’s actions step-by-step made something click in my head. I even remember that shortly after seeing that episode, I apologized to one of my friends (a survivor themselves) over some judgmental comments I’d recently made over hypersexuality. Said friend also watched Hazbin with me and it’s the reason they talk more openly to me now and we’re a lot closer. Val’s “stupid” behavior in the show and mentioned in Vivz’s comments did not lessen the impact that episode had on me, or make it unbelievable to me that Val could be manipulative. If anything I understand more now that abusers don’t always appear as psychopathic masterminds. And I know my friend finds comments like the Mean Girls one funny and they tell me it’s empowering to make fun of Val’s incompetence.

That’s not the only positive influence Hazbin’s had on me, but the most relevant to your post, I believe. It’s the reason I’m often a skeptic on most criticisms, because my lived experience tends to go against them. You said the negative impact of Val was that people are drawing fetish art of him, but the only time I ever see that art is within critic’s posts. It never shows up in my regular feed, so it looks to me like he’s equally as fetishized as every other character; the unfortunate inevitability of the internet. I can’t say I’ve seen anyone post about stories like mine about learning to understand survivors, but I have heard positive stories from survivors themselves in person and online which lead me to believe that the positive impact outweighs the negative.

Fiction has real impact, very true. But consider that might be a good thing in this case.

Thanks for being respectful!

TW: Rape, SA

I'm a victim of SA myself and that's why I wrote all of this post. If you got something positive out of this piece of media, that's great. Same with victims that saw potion and were okay with it- that valid as much as the people that didn't like it at all. I recommend watching many others shows yourself (or movies, books, whatever) will help you out with sorts of topics in bigger ways. I understand you feel like you got something good out if (and I'm glad) but I do need to say, this is minimal in comparison to other media you could consume regarding the topic!

I personally suffer with Hypersexuality, and the treatment in the show (and merch and otherwise) I found completely wrong. Even if you got to a good understatement of the topic, please put research into it (also outside Tumblr for that matter! There are better places to find stuff about!). Thank you also for admitting your faults over your treatment of hypersexuality and apologizing for it. Many people will never let themselves grasp this concept, so thank you.

If you took Valentino's comparison to Mean Girls or Powerpuff Girl as a way of making fun of him, that's you. I found it, personally, terrible. Specially cause many comments regarding that (that I put on the post) were people actively disregarding the topic at hand. Saying that Valentino is just a karen, or He is Bubbles coded, feels so out of the realm of everything (the last one didn't feel like making fun of him). I don't like the comparison of an active sexual predator to a mean high school girl or a kinder garden girl that's regarded as bubblely or dumb. Feel like you should reach into his actions over It feels diminishing to me and other people (who also complained about this themselves).

People should be extremely careful of what they portray about this topic in media. Other stuff written in Hazbin or Helluva Boss regarding R-pe jokes also is extremely disgusting to me. Never forget that if you think this portrayal is ok, one episode apart it's a gang r-pe jokes towards Sir Pen... and an r-pe joke towards Moxxie in Spring Brakers. Which I find extremely disrespectful to do and adds to r-pe culture as much as any other r-pe jokes (general or towards men) in media. Especially when they want to portray it in a serious way with Angel, where was that energy then? (Don't say Viv didn't write that, she liked a tweet about the Sir pen joke, and the spring braker is written by Viv and Brandon.)

Also, about manipulation:

The tweet right below says that "He isn't manipulating them" because he is too stupid to do so. Responding "The Vees are just meangirls" it's crazy to me.

About "You said the negative impact of Val was that people are drawing fetish art of him, but the only time I ever see that art is within critic’s posts. It never shows up in my regular feed"

Val has being fetishized by the crew itself! The person (who is not an SA/r-pe victim said by themselves, who has being open of shipping ValxAngel and being into r-pe porn) is the one that produce the whole poison part of the episode (also based on his previously non canon ValxAngel comic). You could also go throught the people Viv's responds and likes and it's mutuals with, and they also do the same thing as this crew-member (Raph). Congrats that it doesn't appear in your timeline, tho. If this art appears in a critic post, it is because it's being criticized or brought up to make a point.

[It's not on my blog yet, but I don't like receiving double ask in the inbox, specially of anons! Sorry. I don't know if it's the same person or not, and I don't want to end up receiving 5 asks in my inbox again.]

[writersminagerie]

Never to be seen again

Fandom: Baldur's gate 3

Characters: Orin the red, Enver Gortash, Ketheric Thorm, Vesper (Durge)

Ships: Durgetash

Warnings: Mentions of murder, mentions of blood, mentions of violence, suicidal thoughts

Synopsis: The dead threes chosen were meant to have a meeting to discuss their plan and move forward into a new phase. However, when Orin shows up without her sibling things get messy.

__

It was an important day, and Vesper, of all people, was late.

And honestly even if it hadn't been a pivotal moment in the plan, their tardiness was cause for concern. The Bhaalspawn was always so punctual, annoyingly so. Gortash drums his fingers on the table, avoiding Thorm's annoyed gaze, and stares intently at the meeting room's door. As the time ticks by the Lord lets his mind wander to the possibilities. Vesper losing themselves in their work, delving into the blood and viscera of their victims with a frenzied excitement of a starving Gnoll. Bhaal coaxing them to be more brutal, more violent. Them Gloating to their sister about how they had caused a more haunting scene than she could. The weapon of the God of Murder.

How bloody would vesper be when they finally showed up? Gortash would undoubtedly have to push them to take a bath before bringing them to bed. If he could convince them that is, otherwise his silks would be ruined.. again. Damn assassin was lucky Gortash was so smitten.

Finally the door opens, and in walks Orin. Her grin was particularly disturbing this evening, the glint of happiness in her eyes was beyond anything mere killing brought her. Gortash suddenly got a cold sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He keeps looking at the door, waiting for Vesper to follow their sister. Begging silently that the fear taking hold was just an over reaction. The changeling began to laugh at him as she sits herself down in Vesper's chair.

"What is so funny?" He snaps finally turning his attention towards the pale woman, "get out of your siblings chair Orin. You stand."

"You look like such a helpless pup," Orin's smile grows wider ignoring the order to get up, "waiting for its master to come home to share scraps from a hunt. Ah.. but they're not coming." The feeling of cold numbness spread through Gortash's body, he manages to remain stony faced.

"What do you mean they're not coming?"

"Just that, lordling. They're not coming. They're dead and gone. Flesh cut to ribbons, their blood watering fields and feeding rivers. Their corpse left for the flies."

Gortash shoots up so fast his chair nearly topples over. Orin is watching him, daring him to try something, begging him to give her a reason to skin him. Ketheric was quiet, but Gortash swore he saw a little tinge of empathy in the elf's gaze. Loss was something they were all familiar with. No. This was a lie. It has to be a lie.

"You're lying."

"I'd thought you'd say that," Orin coos and draws a dagger. She plunges it into the table and leaves it for Gortash to examine.

A slightly curved steel blade, guard inlaid with blue stones, a worn handle wrapped in black leather, and a silver pommel shaped like a dragons head. It was Vesper's. Gortash had it made for the Bhaalspawn, a gift, and a promise they'd rule Faerûn together. The man reaches out and pulls the blade from the table. He refuses to fall apart in front of the other. Refuses to give Orin that satisfaction.

"How?" he asked.

"They'd gotten sloppy, they lost our fathers favor, and I'm taking over now," Orin sounded far too delighted. It took every ounce of self control to not take Vespers blade and plunge it into the Changling's throat. She had done it. There was no doubt in Gortash's mind. As much as he wanted to kill her for taking away his love, he couldn't. the brain needed the three stones working together to remain under their command. They wouldn't be able to find another suitable wielder on such short notice.

Orin was necessary. At least For now.

"Seems we have a set back and won't be able to advance just yet," Gortash said, "Ketheric you will keep massing your armies.. and Orin.. seems you'll be the new representative of your father. Duke Ravenguard will be arriving at Waukeen's rest tomorrow. we'll have him on a leash shortly."

"Just a setback?" Orin sounds amused her brow quirked. "I'm impressed at your callousness, I thought you'd be more... broken. Crying over your lost plaything. But perhaps you'll just get a new one."

"We have work to do Orin," Gortash growls, gripping the dagger tight. "Return to your duties the both of you. I will figure out a way to keep things running smoothly." The man turns on his heel and storms out of the meeting room without letting either of them speak further. He manages to keep his cool up until he enters his study. as soon as the door locks the rage and sorrow hit him like a tidal wave.

Gortash lets out guttural screams, cursing Orin for killing the only person who showed him anything other than brutality. Cursing Vesper for leaving him, for destroying what little happiness he had. How dare they make him care only to disappear! Without a word without letting him say goodbye! He goes on a rampage through the room, tearing up projects, smashing chairs to splinters, flipping his desk, scattering papers and ink pots. All he could see was red, the emotions consuming every fiber of his being.

He had no idea how long his rage lasted. Only that when it was over he was completely exhausted and every inch of the study was completely destroyed. The man sinks to the floor, he was still holding Vesper's dagger. He regards the weapon a moment, testing the edge against his thumb. The Bhaalspawn kept the edge razor sharp, it didn't even hurt as the blade drew blood from Gortash's finger.

It would be so easy to join them. Just draw their sharpened blade across his throat and let darkness take him. This whole plan had been both of their ideas, they had wanted to rule together. They spent countless hours bent over books drawing up their plans and spent countless nights tangled up together figuring out how to get the stone and the crown.

What was the point of building an empire if you lose the one you wanted to build it with?

A shudder ran through him, he could sense Bane's presence in the back of his mind. The god was quiet, but his presence alone was enough to make Gortash hesitate. There was an air of anticipation, daring the man to go through with his foolish little plan. To die and face the consequences. Bane would consider his death a failure on the man's part, and Gortash's soul would burn for all eternity in Bane's fires. And that realization brought on a new one that nearly made him sick.

His soul belonged to Bane and Vesper's belonged to Bhaal. Gortash would never see them again.

Not in this plane or the next.

[antianakin]

I watched that scene in V for Vendetta when V kills Delia, and it occurred to me that there isn't quite the same scene throughout TBB S3. Despite the heavy redemption themes for Crosshair and Emerie, I don't think I heard either of them directly acknowledge their wrongs and apologise to their (live) victims. I didn't hear Crosshair admit fault for shooting Wrecker on Kamino, trying to incinerate the squad on Bracca, or kidnapping Hunter and using him as bait. Never mind to Howzer for his squad's arrest and death in captivity, or the people of Ryloth for his assassination of Orn Free Taa. Or to the next of kin of at least two women I remembered he killed during his Imperial service.

I never heard Emerie apologise for using the kids and clones as pincushions to draw blood, abducting and imprisoning them. Has everyone forgotten that she was there regularly while Crosshair was strapped to the bed and being experimented on?

The point is that while both characters did heel-face turns and performed deeds to atone for their pasts, the lack of apology is deafening. Howzer was portrayed as the asshole for not seeing Crosshair's heel-face turn because it should have been ''obvious'' how Crosshair treats Omega. I see it as the characters who should have broken the fourth wall and read the script to bypass the drama that would have occurred if an apology had been forthcoming. The "hard" part was done; Crosshair lost his hand; what more do you idiots want? I would have chalked it to the cancellation had I not seen something similar running around Season 1...

It's one of those aspects that gnaws at me with Disney Star Wars. What I call the externalisation of evil, paired with the lack of accountability. Evil happens because people were forced or duped to act on its behalf, but because these people are not "true" believers (as seen by their redemption), they need not be held accountable for their actions while serving evil. Their acts in service of the "superior good" balance the scales and bypass the need for accountability.

And for a "kids" show lauded as the most "adult" of the TCW-era animation, I have to ask, is this really the lesson to teach kids? Because in real life, no one can read your mind and hear your apology mentally. And some can fake it and be unrepentant in the end. The victims of your wrongdoing have the right to confront you, hear your apology, and decide to absolve or condemn you. "I am not here for what you hoped to do. I am here for what you did"- V

"Is it meaningless to apologise? Never I'm so sorry" - Delia's last words to V

I find myself less upset about Emerie because Emerie was introduced so late that not only do we not see her doing anything THAT horrific, but there wouldn't have been a lot of time to really work through any kind of redemption arc for her. Within her first few episodes, we do see her soften towards Omega a bit, so they DO set up that Emerie isn't all she appears to be which allows for her to have stronger reactions to things like the Force sensitive children in the vault later.

My issue with Emerie, which is likely partially due to the cancellation cutting off some of what they might have planned to do with her, is that we have ZERO EXPLANATION for her. Why does she exist, was she just a defective clone who came out female and so the Kaminoans sent her away or did one of them intentionally try to create a female clone for some reason? Why did they send her to Hemlock, how was Hemlock connected with the Kaminoans to begin with and connected SO early that he was able to acquire a clone before the Jedi and the Republic even knew they existed? Why did Hemlock accept her and what has he been doing TO her this whole time? What is her relationship with being a clone if she was presumably separated from the rest of them for her entire life and not necessarily raised as a clone the same way as even TBB would've been? How does this impact her relationship with the clone prisoners on Tantiss as well as Hemlock?

Her redemption arc feels both half-assed and like... just half-assed enough because Emerie is basically a blank slate the whole time. We don't know anything about her or her motivations for anything and so there's nothing to really make me feel like her quicker change of heart goes against anything we know about her. She's never shown to be particularly unkind or malicious, just... somewhat disconnected from the clone prisoners and inclined to just accept that Hemlock's work is necessary. Because we know so little about her aside from that she's been with Hemlock since she was extremely young, it works for me that she's mostly just kind-of disconnected about the things he's doing to the other clones until she manages to make a personal connection that sort-of changes her perspective. She does not personally capture or hurt anyone to my memory, she never seems to be intentionally trying to cause pain to anybody, there's no malicious intent behind her actions that she has to work around and make up for. There's not even any real prejudice and anger towards the clones themselves that is causing her to be okay with what Hemlock is doing to them. So just her recognizing that a change NEEDS to be made is enough for me with Emerie, I don't feel like I needed more of an apology in order for her "redemption arc" to make sense because she's barely a fleshed out character as it is.

Crosshair on the other hand, DID owe an apology to a lot of people. I HATE the way they handled his interactions with the rest of the squad and with Howzer in particular. I HATE the way HOWZER has to apologize and Crosshair never does. It's fucked up and wrong and such a badly done redemption arc and I honestly can't even blame that on the cancellation because it's early enough in the season that they likely already had that built in before they had to make any changes. There's also already been TWO SEASONS before this to build up to Crosshair's change of heart that I think got mishandled as well. He got so little screen time in season two that his change of heart that turns him against the Empire doesn't feel believable to me at all.

My biggest issue with BOTH of these characters and the way their stories were handled was the distance from the ACTUAL CLONES.

This is an issue I've had with the show from the beginning. It's billed as a show about clones, but the main characters are SO separated and distant from the real clones that none of their development really has anything to do with the clones and it makes it feel like it never really WAS a clone story at all. Crosshair's story would've been more compelling if it had been about his bigotry towards the clones and his development had come specifically from learning they were good people and he was wrong about them. Emerie and Omega's stories should've been about them finally being able to connect to the other clones that they'd been forced away from their whole lives and figuring out what it truly means to BE a clone. The Bad Batch's story would've been more compelling if it had had more focus on what was actually happening to the clones immediately after Order 66 and the desperation and tragedy of trying to save them in a world that cares about them even less than it used to.

Instead, Crosshair's story seems to be about realizing the Empire sees him, PERSONALLY, as expendable and THAT'S what makes him realize it's bad. The fact that the Empire sees him as no different than the other clones doesn't really allow him to see the CLONES in a different light or connect to them better, it just destroys his loyalty to the Empire because he's not considered special anymore. Emerie only turns against the Empire after she sees what's happening with the Force sensitive children, the torture and captivity of the clones doesn't seem to bother her at all. Omega's development for the last two seasons has had nothing to do with her identity as a clone and a lot more with her identity as a "soldier". Echo is the only character with any real connection to the other clones and the moment he starts to voice that, he gets written off and becomes a recurring cameo character instead of a regular main ensemble member. The moment he decides to more fully be a part of a clone-centric storyline, he can't be a part of the Bad Batch's story because the Bad Batch is inherently NOT A CLONE STORY.

And this is the biggest problem with this show. It's selling itself as a clone story and not actually following through on it and it causes this weird dissonance within the narrative because I don't think this show ever truly knew what story it was telling. It hurts every single one of the characters.

This show would've been a LOT better if they had just let it be a story about, say, four random bounty hunters who worked as a team. Or even, god help me, four Mandalorians from different clans or houses or whatever who are BARELY managing to stay civil with each other. It would've made the stories with Crosshair and Emerie feel a LOT easier to stomach because we aren't sitting there wondering why they aren't reacting to what's happening to the other clones around them. It might've made the stories easier to WRITE, too, because they wouldn't have had to keep trying to force a connection between these characters and the clones that so clearly just isn't there.

Maybe these "redemption arcs" would've been better done and made more sense if these characters weren't clones.

But then again I remember how well done Ventress and Kallus's "redemption arcs" were and I think that maybe it wouldn't have mattered at all.

[monty-glasses-roxy]

Hold on something's just hit me.

If everyone in the Plex were to believe that Gregory dropped Cassie at the end of Ruin to keep himself from being found, whether he did it or not, wouldn't that make Roxy to one most able to understand him?

As Mimic's guard dog, surely she would know the lengths you have to go through to keep that fucker trapped. A whole team of Raceway construction workers went straight to their deaths down there. Roxy won't let the Raceway be repaired and re-opened in order to keep people safe. She's probably been able to see Mimic and its victims through the floor this entire time, she knows what it can do and what it's done, even if she doesn't know the full extent of it.

She's willing to sacrifice her Raceway and Salon to keep people from finding Mimic. Her pride and joys, basically her whole reason for being built in the first place. They're not worth the risk to her.

Whether Gregory sacrificed Cassie to keep Mimic trapped or not, surely Roxy would realise some sort of similarity. She may think doing that to Cassie was too far, she may think he's a monster for even considering it and she may feel as though nothing could justify what he did... But there's a part of her that gets it. The absolute terror that comes at the slightest possibility that Mimic could escape. She gets that sacrifices have to made, fuck she's made those sacrifices herself. She would never have sacrificed someone for this, that's why she ran headfirst at Mimic instead of just sealing the exits again, but there could be that tiny little part of her that feels the need to constantly to remind her that Gregory was trying to do the same thing she was.

The key difference here, is that if Gregory had done it, it would fall in line with almost everything else we've seen him do. The sacrifices he makes, are of other people, and not himself. He sacrificed Roxy, Chica and Monty to upgrade Freddy for his safety and possibly the safety of Vanessa. If he also dropped Cassie, then he's once again sacrificing someone else for the sake of his own safety. Not like he has that much else to lose, but I'm drawing comparisons here.

Roxy on the other hand, sacrifices herself. She sacrificed her Raceway and her Salon for the benefit of both herself and others. Unlike Gregory finding himself in a hopeless situation and hurting others to get out of it, Roxy was given this job (probably) and chose to give up what little she has in the world to keep the situation from happening. Even when Cassie deactivates her and ends up face to face with Mimic, Roxy jumps straight at it to buy her time to escape which could have easily killed her.

So now you have Roxy, who unfortunately does understand Gregory's choice to drop Cassie (if she believes he did it which yeah she probably does) but has absolutely no sympathy for him. She couldn't care less about him. There's potentially a fearful little voice in her head that she's the same as Gregory that fuels her anger towards him even more. She hasn't ever sacrificed someone else to keep the Mimic at bay and she's been doing it for fuck knows how long, what gives Gregory a free pass? Maybe if he hadn't stolen her fucking eyes she would have been able to stop the whole thing from getting that far anyway!

I'm not saying this to frame Gregory as a villain or anything. I don't think he dropped Cassie and I still think it was entirely Freddy's fault for what happened to the others in SB. I just think this is interesting from a character stand point. The one person that could understand the choices they've made to keep Mimic from escaping is each other, but they're both too hateful of each other for it to affect anything... If they were ever to settle their differences, I think it would have to start here. The only common ground they share, is the one thing no one else does.

But Gregory didn't even fucking do it so I bet that goes well lmao

[avvail-whumps]

‘guns for hire’ — forty-eight hours #37

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content warnings: whumpee referred to as “kid” but they’re an adult, conditioned whumpee, interrogations, stockholm syndrome, mentioned past character death

Sharpe was expecting Summers to lay into him the moment the door was closed, and he was already preparing a cigerette for him to drag between her harsh words.

He hadn’t been expecting her hand to slap them from his fingers harshly, causing them to clatter to the ground. His brows furrowed instantly, arms coming up in mock surrender.

“Jesus, Summers,” he grunted, but the woman’s fiery eyes were burning too brightly for her to even care about his visible discontent.

“This whole thing is a fucking mess,” she snarled, face twisted in anger. “He should be in a hospital. He shouldn’t be locked in some interogation room while you grill the poor kid until he’s in tears.”

“I’m not grilling him,” Sharpe argued, but he was promptly cut off.

“No, Steven,” she snapped. “Be quiet for two seconds. You arrested Roy under ridiculous assumptions and for what? Because you think it was his uncle that killed Mikhail Wilson?”

“I know it was his uncle that killed Mikhail Wilson,” the detective corrected with a scoff, his brows furrowing in discontent. “Kidnapping Leo was sloppy. So naturally his uncle is going to be the one to clean up loose ends.”

“On what grounds, Steven?” Summers snapped, throwing her arms up in disbelief. There was a fiery, but exasperated tone to her sharp voice. “On what grounds would any of this hold up as viable evidence? It doesn’t. It’s all speculation, and speculation isn’t going to get Roy convicted.”

“You really believe the bullshit about stumbling onto his house is true? That there happened to conveniently be someplace else that kidnapping victims are kept?”

“Those forests are fucking huge,” Summers frowned, shaking her head. The anger was slowly leaving her voice, finding it was useless to argue against Sharpe. “People go missing in them and never found all the time, and you know this. If his kidnappers wanted to keep him someplace concealed, we might never find it, even if we had hundreds of officers searching every square acre.”

Sharpe shook his head, running a desperate hand through his hair. His eyes snapped towards the door where Leo was, and all it took was the reminder of him in the car to get him fired up once again. There were too many little discrepancies popping up that couldn’t be sheerly down to coincidence.

“The kid is confused,” Summers spoke once more, drawing him out of his boiling rage. “He’s scared. He’s likely traumatised, and you think he’d be able to retell some fake, elaborate story in the state he’s in right now?”

“Summers—”

“Forensics are doing a sweep of Roy’s house,” she interrupted coldly. “If anything detrimental comes up, we’ll know. They’ll have Roy’s trip to Morocco checked, as well as his phone and laptop.”

The detective decided to keep mouth shut for now. There was no use arguing against her when the evidence was stacked up against him so highly, which he saw and understood completely. Although his words were being seen as sheer speculation, which in reality, it was, it was speculation that Sharpe believed to be the truth, and he was going to fight tooth and nail to save Leo from the man’s clutches. 

“Summers, you know I’m a good detective,” he started, and the woman turned away from him with a sharp groan. 

“Don’t start this, Steven,” she snapped. “I know you’re a good detective. But this is a mess and you know it, even if you are right.” 

“We’d hit a dead end. His case had been closed. The captain was even willing to bet his career on this case, and look what happened. We found him.” 

“And haven’t they given a valid enough reason to explain that?” 

Sharpe grit his teeth, a sharp scoff rising in his throat. He almost couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “What, so you believe Roy’s bullshit about not wanting to call the police?” 

“You saw the kid in there,” she fired back swiftly, without missing a beat. “He genuinely believes that he was responsible for Michael’s death. You’re a detective, Steven. Like you said, a good one. Can’t you tell that he’s scared out of his mind?” 

“He’s scared enough to do what he’s told,” he grumbled dryly under his breath, stifling a grunt when Summers elbowed him a little too hard in the rib. He could tell she was angry and frustrated, and so was he. They’d found the kid safe and sound, but they both knew that he wouldn’t ever be the same. Just looking at all of the horrible scars on his body from the photos, and the sickening guilt in their stomachs for not saving him quicker. It was enough to shake the both of them, including Sharpe, despite his tough exterior. 

“What kind of twenty-four year old lives in the middle of nowhere anyway?” Sharpe grumbled under his breath, ignoring Summers’ eyes when she turned to glance at him. She leaned against the wall, running a hand through her hair and gathering it up into a ponytail. She pressed the bobble between her teeth as she did, before scraping it all back successfully. 

“I had a word with him while you were talking with Leo,” she sighed, folding her arms over her chest. “I already asked him. His explanation was reasonable enough.” 

The detective scoffed. “And what was that?” 

“His uncle,” she shrugged wearily. “It’s safer for him than if he was in the city. Wouldn’t be hard for that man to find him if he decided he didn’t want his dear old nephew running around by himself anymore.” 

Sharpe had a lot to say about that, but for the sake of not having his cigerate and lighter slapped out of his hands for a second time, he decided to keep it to himself. He bent down and scooped the two objects up, tossing the cigerette in the bin, and pulling out another from the depths of his trouser pockets. He leaned against the opposite side of the wall, beside the water dispenser. He wasn’t allowed to smoke at the station, but he didn’t care. 

“How is the Commissioner taking this?” 

His words lingered in the foul air for a while, tainting it even further. Summers’ eyes remained glued to part of the ground, her eyebrows raising with a deep sigh. 

“As you can imagine, not very well,” she muttered. “He’s absolutely livid. You’ve probably cost the Captain his badge.” 

Sharpe sucked in a breath, tasting the familiar tobacco on his tongue. “Yeah, well, we’ve still got over twenty-four hours for Leo to tell us the truth.” 

Summers gave another pathetic shrug. The detective didn’t want to believe that she’d given up just yet, but it was becoming increasingly more difficult as the time whirled on by. They’d have to move Roy into a cell for the night, as well as find someplace for the kid to recuperate. By then, their time would be rapidly diminishing. 

“And what if Roy walks free, huh, Steven?” She asked softly. “There’ll probably be hefty compensation for the Commissoner to deal with once this is all over. And, Jesus, if his uncle is willing to tie up loose ends for his nephew like you said, what’s the chance he won’t do the same here?” 

Something icey made its way into Sharpes chest. His eyes narrowed as he glanced at her from above his cigarette. 

“What exactly are you implying?” 

Summers tapped a finger on her forearm. “The Commissioner isn’t going to let this slide.”

“Doesn’t this just prove my claim if he does?” He grumbled. “That he currently has connections with his uncle?” 

“He’s his legal guardian,” Summers reminded him gently. “So, no. Not really.” 

“Fuck,” Sharpe sighed, rubbing the aching crease in his forehead. He took another deep drag, letting the sting fill up his lungs. All he could hope for was that once the house was sweeped and searched, something of value would come up. Something incriminating, while they thoroughly did a search on Bran, Sean and Rafi in the meantime. Sharpe didn’t feel as though Leo would take well to his encouragement to tell him it was Roy, so he found his gaze settling on Summers’ remorseful face again. 

“Can you talk to the kid again?” He asked softly. “He might open up to you. Much prettier than me, after all.” 

That brought a small smirk to her lips. “Was that a compliment, Steven?” 

He tapped the end of the cigerette with a chuckle, watching the dark ash flutter to the ground. 

“Never.” 

She shook her head, pushing off the wall. “I’ll do my best. They should transfer Roy into a cell for the night.” 

“Already on it,” Sharpe called out as his feet carried him swiftly through the corridors of the station, his smile fading as soon as her back was turned. 

. . . 

Leo must have drifted off for a while, because when he blinked his eyes open, they were crusted and sore against the dry air. His stuffy nose struggled to take a deep breath in, uncurling his head from his arms. His neck felt horribly stiff as he shifted back into the chair, weary hands rubbing at it gently. 

He was still in the same, boring room as before, alone as ever. 

He wondered where Roy was. 

God, he would do anything to see him right now. Was he somewhere in the building? Were they treating him badly? Was he doing a good job? Without Roy here to tell him if he was doing okay with the story, he could feel himself becoming agitated and nervous. If he was here, he would probably be holding him gently, whispering sweet nothings into his ear, and Leo would lap it up like it was the last time he’d ever hear anything nice. It might have been now. What if he got into trouble for killing Michael? What if he slipped up and disappointed Roy? 

Even when the door popped open again, Leo didn’t look over. He was chewing on his finger again, staring intently at the surface of the table. 

“Leo?” 

He jerkily nodded his head, letting the woman know that he was listening. It passed over him in a blur, however. He briefly listened to her soft words, much kinder than the bearded detective from before. He learned that her name was Summers. Heard her repeat the same mantra’s of “you’re safe now” and “no one can hurt you anymore”. He had to endure the difficult, probing questions that Roy had told him about, words flying from her mouth like “do you understand the concept of Stockholm Syndrome?” or “did he coerce you into sexual intercourse?”, and Leo forced himself to keep his head on straight through it all. 

Still, like Roy wanted, he didn’t crumble. 

He felt like he would. Each question was chipping away at his exhausted resolve, the sinking darkness under his eyes an indication enough about what the stress was doing to him. He was guided carefully to an unlocked cell, where they encouraged him to get some rest. A bunch of pillows, blankets, water, pills, and even a bar of chocolate was handed to him by uniformed police officers.

Their kindness was almost strange.

Respectfully keeping their distance, making sure he was comfortable and ensuring him they would do their best to stay quiet for him. Even when he’d become anxious over the cell door being locked and caging him in like some criminal, a pudgy officer had placed a chair against the door to keep it propped open for him. 

Leo barely slept a wink. 

He pulled the blankets right up to his nose, but none of them reminded him of home. His stomach ached as sickening thoughts plagued his mind. I need to tell them. I need to tell them the truth. Then another side of them, cruel and hissing in his ear. What about Roy? He’ll be so disappointed in you. 

By the time he’d been retrieved by those two detectives again and placed in the same little room, he was more of a coward than he had always been. He sobbed as he told them the same story, over and over again. Even as the timer ticked down, closing in on the forty-eight hours with only minutes left, he gave Sharpe and Summers the same answer to their demands. 

“We can only do this with your help,” the man pressed, a slight edge of desperation in his tone. “Tell us it was Roy.” 

He didn’t. 

And by then, it was too late anyway.

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[proud-mama-joyce]

some predictions for the final Vecna showdown

Major spoilers for Vol. 1 below!

First I want to line up several things we know:

Will has an important relationship with the UD: it’s frozen in time on the day he disappeared, and he has more ability to communicate from the UD than other characters. (Joyce had a LOT of string lights that were lit up at once that he couldn’t have been touching simultaneously, and Will shouldn’t have been able to see the alphabet she wrote on the wall if it were frozen in time. Also, Joyce didn’t plug in the string lights when Will was communicating with her. There’s more I could say here, but I’ll leave it at that for now.)

Vecna appears to have been born with his powers—or at the very least, they predated his lab experimentation. This means that it’s possible for other people in the ST universe to also be born with similar abilities.

We have hints that Will’s memories will be explored in Vol. 2 (e.g., Lonnie’s actor appearing at the table read; Noah posting a video of roller skating in his finale outfit)

Noah was wearing a harness at one point while filming S4

When asked about the saddest scene in ST, Noah said he thought of one in S4 (which likely relates to Will)

There’s a mixtape labeled “For Will” in promo material that we haven’t seen in the show yet

Will’s birthday was forgotten in Vol. 1 (and I do not believe this was an accident)

According to Netflix, an out-of-context spoiler word to describe S4 is “yes” (which has only ever been important in the past on the show during Mike’s memory of meeting Will on the swings)

In E7, El overpowers 001 following a memory of her mother’s “I love you,” suggesting again that love provides the key to Vecna’s defeat

In a recent interview, the Duffer brothers said that “Running Up That Hill” was chosen in part because of how well it connected thematically to how Vecna’s curse is defeated. (Does it have something to do with “swapping places,” then?)

From the episode titles that were released, we have several translations of last episode: “The Piggyback," "The Stowaway," "The Infiltration," "Eleven's Plan," "The Stealth Plan," "The Guest," and "The Hunt for Vecna"

That “infiltration” translation is interesting—Dustin asked Max if she thought she had infiltrated Vecna’s mind. He described her location as “Freddy Krueger’s boiler room,” which is notable since El is seen in the HNL boiler room with 001 before their faceoff

The D&D game and basketball game appear to foreshadow someone unexpected coming in at the last minute to provide a victory. Dustin’s roll is too low initially, and then Erica (the guest player) rolls a 20. Lucas is on the bench all game, but provides the winning shot.

More subjectively, there appear to be many Tom Riddle parallels with Vecna. If Will had more abilities than meets the eye, I think Vecna would be *very* interested in him, and possibly become preoccupied with understanding his abilities and the potential threats they may pose to him (in the way that Tom Riddle was obsessed with tracking down Harry). We already know that Will’s disappearance is tied to freezing the UD in time, but we don’t know how that may have affected Vecna—but if it did, it would provide him with a powerful motive for seeking out Will specifically (on top of other reasons).

Now let’s have some fun…here's one way I could imagine this coming together:

Paralleling the D&D and basketball games, the Hawkins gang make a plan to defeat Vecna that initially fails. The California gang + El arrive in Hawkins, El has her powers back, and they think they have everything set up for a victory, albeit a risky one. Since Max is still cursed, they attempt to make use of the fact that she’s familiar with Vecna’s location and tactics and that he’s still after her. Max chooses to stop listening to her mixtape in order to draw Vecna back. In the meantime, Eddie tries to disrupt the demobats’ echolocation abilities by shredding on his guitar, to keep Vecna from scouting for a new victim rather than keeping his attention on Max. Then, El attempts to make a psychic connection with Max during her trance in order to defeat Vecna, while Max tries to hold him off as long as possible. (In this way, they would “piggyback” onto Vecna’s connection with Max.)

However, this plan fails because the moment the California gang arrived, Vecna became obsessed with getting to Will—not only because of his trauma, but because of their similarities (if Will was born with abilities like he was) and/or the past connections he sees with the UD in Will’s memories. If Vecna is like Tom Riddle, he sees Will as a threat he needs to better understand. So Vecna doesn’t want to focus on Max, and he spotted Will before the demobats got diverted. However, he can’t resist the fact that Max is offering herself up to his clutches, so he keeps her in a limbo rather than the full trance that El needs in order for her to enact her part of the plan. El can’t make the connection she needs, and everyone panics.

Then: an unexpected person—Will—provides the key to victory, but it doesn’t look good at first. Vecna curses him while the other planning is being carried out. Maybe Will initially hides it, but eventually Mike sees a nosebleed (like he saw Max’s) and puts two and two together. Mike “kicks into gear” and alerts the others because he realizes Will is in danger—but it’s almost too late. Will is put into a trance with Vecna, and El’s newly regained powers are temporarily too crippled to connect with Will after her attempt with Max. Vecna relentlessly torments Will about feeling forgotten (especially on his birthday), about hiding his love for Mike, about his sexuality, and about his past traumas.

Maybe Vecna brings Will back to his memory of meeting Mike at the swings. If, like Voldemort, Vecna is an antagonist who doesn’t fully understand love, he might think Will wishes he could erase Mike from his life and all the suffering that came along with him. So maybe he asks Will, after all of his tormenting visions, if Will would choose to take back his “yes” to Mike. Even knowing the heartbreak, would he still choose to be his friend? Why return to that, when he could join him instead and make full use of his abilities?

But he underestimates Will—and Mike, who’s losing his mind trying to reach him. (Maybe he’s put on the “For Will” mixtape that he was too scared to give to Will on his birthday, but it’s not enough this time because Vecna learned from his encounter with Max.) Will’s trance goes on, and he levitates. His imminent danger prompts important realizations for Mike and ultimately leads to a love confession. Will more clearly sees what’s happening outside of his trance due to his “true sight” and stronger ability to communicate to/from the UD. He hears Mike’s love confession, which suddenly empowers him against Vecna in the way that El’s mother’s love did.

Will breaks free of Vecna by making a psychic connection with him and reversing who’s in control, overpowering him. “Yes,” he still chooses Mike, even with the pain that has accompanied everything. (Will the Wise rolls a 20. The lights everywhere shine intensely. Mike and the others think all might have been lost.) The psychic connection he creates opens a new rift, allowing him to get back through. He collapses into Mike’s arms, as Mike sobs in relief.

In a quieter moment, Will finally gives Mike his painting. It’s the two of them at the swings when they met. Before, “it was you guys who saved me.” This time, it was Mike.

[ilovescarletwitch]

Oblivious Yoda is canon!Yoda

This is a huge pet peeve of mine. Pro Jedi I have a bone to pick, be warned.

Recently I have seen so many Oblivious Anakin is Canon Anakin fics and I really want to know what movies they watched. Anakin was an incredibly perceptive 9 year old who saw Qui-gon's lightsaber and immediately realised he was a Jedi and also knew that Watto wouldn't be able to resist a bet and thus they could trick him. During the First Geonosis Battle he tells a pilot where to aim to cause more damage. When they were escorting Satine he catches on pretty quickly that she has history with his master. During the episode with the Talc he is the first to notice the Talc use picture to communicate and draws a picture to show them they wish to be friends. At the end of the Rako Hardeen arc everyone is congratulating themselves on a job well done and Anakin is the first to realise something is wrong and run to stop Dooku. At the Wrong Jedi he is the one who figures out who the bomber is.

What is he oblivious to? Fandom calls Anakin oblivious in a disgusting display of victim blaming because he didn't realise when he was ten that his new friend was trying to groom him.

Yoda has been the Grandmaster of the Order for centuries. And yet he is oblivious to the survival of the Sith, even when Qui-gon reports it he refuses to believe it and sends Qui-gon to his death. He is oblivious to the Sith master serving in the Senate and then being elected Chancellor. Seriously he is in the same room so many times and fails to sense anything.Chancellor Sith grooms one of their most powerful students right under his nose and he never catches on.He is oblivious to someone, maybe Sifo Dyas maybe not, using the Order's names and funds to order an army of clones that are essentially slaves. According to the new Disney Canon, Dooku has already fallen and in cahoots with the Sith before he left the Order but Yoda is oblivious to what his former apprentice is doing and remains oblivious until Dooku chooses to show his hand. He is oblivious to someone tampering with the Jedi Archives. He is the one to first bring the clones into the battlefield and essentially make them the army of the Republic and yet he remains oblivious to the fact they are a Trojan Horse meant to destroy the Jedi Order. Why is Anakin the oblivious one and not Yoda who is a lot older than Anakin, has a lot more experience and is the one leading the Jedi Order?

Same goes for the rest of the Jedi council, Master Ti in particular. She is stationed on Kamino and her job isn't just to train troopers but also to keep an eye on the Kaminoans. Yet she remains oblivious to so many clones being fitted with chips that would make them turn on the Jedi. During the Fives arc she is completely oblivious to Nala Se dragging Fives before his meeting with the Chancellor. But she has already heard Fives words and yet never investigates after he turns up dead immediately after. People love to crucify Anakin for not listening to Fives but at the time Fives had lured them in a warehouse, stolen Rex's weapon, trapped them behind a ray shield and proceeded to accuse the Chancellor of treason. Anakin had every reason to believe Fives was mad, it's Shaak Ti that was there the entire time and whose job it was to keep an eye on Kamino. Yet nobody says oblivious Ti is canon Ti.

Luminara Unduli's padawan is so traumatized by the war that she not only grows disillusioned in the Jedi Order but carries out a whole terrorist attack on the Temple and frames another Padawan for it. And Luminara remains oblivious to her padawan's actions until Anakin exposes her. Yet there is no tag calling oblivious Luminara canon Luminara.

Obi-Wan Kenobi remains oblivious to Chancellor Sith grooming his student for ten years. He is the adult charged with a small child's care and he never notices that he is under someone else's dark influence. He remains completely oblivious to any personality and behaviour changes that should be huge red flags. Yet, nobody calls Obi-Wan oblivious for not realising that the politician who arranged to meet his underage student alone is hurting his student.

Nobody calls Bail and Mothma oblivious for not realising that their head of state is colluding with the enemy and orchestrating a crisis after another so he can gather more powers and thus name himself emperor.

It's only Anakin who is either a literal child or the age of your average college student during the entire prequels that is called oblivious because he didn't realise that his mentor was manipulating and using him.

@tragicfantasy-girl @riana-one you have some of the best takes regarding hypocrisy in fandom. Do you have any instances where Anakin is actually oblivious?

[look-how-they-massacred-them]

Preliminary Poll

Marinette Dupain-Cheng

Submission reason:

Reduced to only having her motivation be her crush on a boy repeatedly. Disallowed from being able to make mistakes or have faults. Made to take on responsibility for the mistakes of other characters to learn the ‘lesson’ of the episode.

They make her loose all logic when thinking about pretty much at this point nonsensical crush and make everyone against her when faced against the worst lies. They also make her know less about her own heritage than a white boy. Overall just the writer's only caring about making their white boy look good and limited her character growth and potential

victim of both the crew's misogyny n racism she cannot have something genuinely good happen to her a rule of the show's bible is that marinette must always be the one to learn a lesson pretty much every character in this show could be submitted including the writers' favorite boy adrien but im submitting marinette specifically as shes literally the protagonist of the show n they cannot be fucking normal towards a 14 year old asian teenage girl theres a lot of shots that show off her ass for ~totally~ no reason (there was even like a screenshot where it compared her normal ladybug model to one of her kwami fusion models n the kwami model dont remember which one literally had a bigger ass like what the fuck) surely theres nothing weird about how she has the most obvious body paint suit among the girls had a comic where she was depicted as not having any clothes after she changes back from being ladybug (something invented entirely for that comic alone n has never been a problem otherwise) leaving her to having to wear a fucking cardboard box n one of the crew literally drawing her naked n the show's creator defending them (ive never seen the actual art but the creator defending them does imply that someone on the crew did do that) n thats not even getting into the writing im not gonna touch on the racism myself cause i dont fully remember all the moments n might get some details wrong but from my experience it was relatively easy to find fans of color talking about it anyway the writers on this show seem to have a personal fucking vendetta against teenage girls n especially teenage girls in love i know chloe's been submitted a lot n shes is only one of many victims of it if girls like the same guy they will get into cat fights n be mean as hell to eachother (marinette chloe n lila) while if guys like the same girl theyre allowed to be friends n it not really factor into their relationship (luka n adrien) they write marinette as being weird obsessive n stalkery towards adrien simply because shes a teenage girl with a crush n lack awareness that some of the stuff would be entirely reasonable for her to know cause yknow adrien is literally a celebrity just cause they think peak comedy is bad stuff happening to marinette when she tries to move on from her crush on adrien (something they literally wrote her to do) cause its only ever resulted in her getting humiliated they yanked her back after giving her an actually good love interest who respects her boundaries just god theres a fucking lot going on here n i dont think i even covered the worst of it

her parents are literally based off of the creator n an ex girlfriend of his (his tweet stating that is still up btw) so to me that adds like a whole nother layer to the way shes treated in the show cause he called marinette his virtual daughter

Propaganda:

this is a show specifically designed to be as unpleasant as possible for anyone who isnt interested in watching a dumpster fire n there are aspects of it that make it legitimately concerning that its target audience is children especially young girls i wouldnt have as much of a grip with it if it was just trashy adult show but no this is for kids n its just gotten worse as time goes on it had a decent first season i watched most of it in one night when i was like 12 but godddd kids deserve media that actually respects their intelligence time n doesnt seem to viscerally hate them n this aint it

[cup1dxzs]

Darling Little Puppet

Wally Darling X Reader

Chapter 5- Curiosity Killed The Cat

Momentarily enjoying the soft feathery feeling of the poor victim you’d slam yourself into, but to your surprise you were met with nothing but red colored feathers, you prayed to god maybe it was just a costume, but alas he was not on your side today as the mysterious ball of feathers turned to face you with a annoying look on her equally feathery face.

She squawked at the sight of you, pulling her arm- wing? Whatever it was up to her beak as if she was staring at a zoo animal that had just escaped it’s enclosure, it made you feel self conscious, did you look that bad? But you barely had space to think about that as you stared up at the bird that practically towered over you, she could practically squish you if she pleased. Doing the only reasonable thing you screamed bloody murder as you stared at what the fuck this abomination was and promptly bolted away from the terrifying colorful creature, having an alarmed face the entire time as you turned to run away like a feral cat, hearing her call after you in attempt to get you to stay and probably question who you were.

Making a quick turn around the building you two were previously in front of, you’d assume it was a post office as it had a mailbox on the side of the building you’d glanced at while running. Now located in the center of the small town? Neighborhood was also another guess that ran through your head, turning your head to look at one of the houses it was a cute little red house with some bushes and freshly planted flowers on either side of the entryway, walking closer to try and see if you could figure anything else out about this place and where the hell you were, also to catch your breath, unfortunately to no avail for both actions, you’d find yourself questioning the windows that were decorated as eyes, watching them move and stare-

“Did it just fucking look at me? Hundred percent sure by now I’m not anywhere close to my home…” You looked disgusted by this point, the living? House seemed to not be able to do anything other then just look at you and make lot’s of ruckus that involved creaking and thumping. It honestly freaked you out but it seemed that the house couldn’t harm you physically, you didn’t need another injury as the lingering pain in your head and the soreness of your whole body snapped you back to reality, if this could even be considered real.

“Oh Wally you’re just the best artist! This is the best drawing of an apple I’ve ever seen! It’s way better than the one you showed me yesterday!” A voice of a very joyful girl could be heard as she practically shouted at the person near her, you’d look around for a hiding spot and the one close enough was unfortunately the bush near the white flowers, quickly diving into it’s unnecessarily sharp sticks and twigs you’d quietly cursed as a twig had poked your eye. Making yourself as hidden as possible you’d try your best to peep out the bush and see who the new voices were, how populated was this place and why were the majority of them strange looking animals?

Peering from inside the shrubbery you’d spot very blonde hair, and what seemed to be green leggings..? It was almost humorous how similar she looked to that cartoon Julie….almost humorous.

‘You’ve gotta be kidding me.'

Inhaling sharply through your nose you’d push yourself a little bit more farther but not too much so you’d be seen by the girl that looked to be a puppet you’d watch play around on your Tv just the night before. The more you analyzed her the more you couldn’t deny that she was probably some girl dressed up as her, they acted the same, dressed the same, hell even talked the same and by that she literally kept talking without missing a beat for what seemed forever.

As you droned out her rambling you began to analyze your situation, so did this mean that you were somehow teleported, maybe even trapped, inside a children’s Tv show? But everything here seemed far too real to be a little show kids watched on their stupid Tv, did that mean they could see you? Were you trapped in an episode? Were you dead? You’d already checked the back of your head that one time and there wasn’t any blood or even a gaping head wound so that crossed out that possibility, it relieved you to know that you weren’t dead but it unsettled you to know that your were in a kids Tv show. Although it made you wonder, were you robbed by a person who wasn’t actually human because as far as you knew humans weren’t able to teleport each other into television shows at will. Even then you had to show an ounce of gratitude that you weren’t inside a slasher movie, You’d probably be the first person to die if that was the case.

Hearing Julie’s voice falter as she spoke was the only thing that stopped you from going into a downward spiral of pure confusion on how and why you’d end up in this very strange situation.

“Uhhh- Wally what’re you doing?” She’d ask, tilting her head in confusion as she’d stop her temporary rolling on her heels just to emphasize how confused she really was at her neighbors antics.

‘Wait where is Wally-‘ You’d think mentally slapping yourself for not keeping a better eye out, suddenly the sensation of being picked up by your underarms became very apparent as you were lifted from out of the bushes you took refuge in, as if you were some random outdoor animal being abducted from their environment, yelping in surprise as it had all happened too sudden not even having enough time to think of making an escape route, the most you could do was squirm in defeat.

“Well what do we have here?” A voice of the not so darling puppet spoke as he held you up with surprising strength.

Welp, Cat’s out the bag now.

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GUYS I MADE THE AO3 ACCOUNT, it’s under the same user i use for tumblr, and all thanks to that beautiful person for encouraging me, I’m so happy for all of the support and love I’ve received so far for this story, lmk if there’s any little bits I messed up on or if there’s an idea you simply came up with! I love talking with you guys!

-ChillyKitty